One Day we'll learn, but I'm not sure quite when ...

Well it happened again. A co-founder of Hamas and Obama are singing from the same prayer book or whatever Muslims use for their devotions.

At the White House “Iftar, a few days ago, Obama declared his support for the mosque at Ground Zero and then, on one of the talk shows yesterday, the killer from Hamas concurred.

Something on my liberal-sensing radar tells me that some bleeding heart somewhere wants to praise Obama for hosting an “Iftar”. What’s an “Iftar” you may well ask?

Well it’s a celebratory meal to mark the breaking of the fast of a day of Ramadan.

“Good”, says my imagined but very real liberal, “But we’re at least reaching out and Obama is doing the reaching”.

Not so fast there. The first president to host an Iftar was not Obama but the Nemesis, the Darth Vader, the Death Star. No, no, cries my real but imaginary liberal .

Sorry but "Yes", it was George W. Bush.

And guess when?

2001 is when.

And what good did it do us then or since or now?

The Imam who wants to build his new mosque near to Ground Zero already has another outlet of his very own franchise of the “Religion of Peace” within 12 city blocks. And there are more than 20 mosques within the city of New York already.

And, Oh by the way; the Houston Chronicle reported that debris from the Twin Towers did fall on the building and the site of this insult. And so did parts of the landing gear and fuselage of American Airlines Flight 175. And who knows what body parts as well of men and women and babies and babies yet unborn.

I spent the weekend with an ex New Yorker and an Obama voter who is appalled by the whole thing. I tried to explain my personal dichotomy namely my head and my heart.

My head says that, provided zoning laws are not compromised the proposal should have been approved as it was,

But my heart is with the survivors of 911. This was not an attack on the World Trade Center alone. Let’s not forget the Pentagon nor wherever United 93 was headed.

It was an attack on all of us. Christian, Jew, Hindu and yes Muslim as well.

What can be gained by building a lightning rod so close to a center of huge emotion? Both love and hatred. For surely, hatred it was that drove those airplanes to the destruction of so many. And equally surely, it is love now that drives the living to remember their dead.

The one certain way to transform that love into a new paroxysm of new hate is to shove a $1 Billion memorial into the minds of those who visit sacred ground.

Then, Obama came out yesterday and today with an attempt to backtrack.

Yesterday, Obama took a swim. Not quite in the Gulf but close enough for liberal media fawning. There on the beach was the “TOTUS”, the Teleprompter of the United States who tried and failed to tell us that he didn’t say what he’d clearly said just a few hours before.

What made the difference? The Polls. What Else?

Mostly, I start out these posts with a cartoon but not today.

G-d Bless America.

Call my plastic surgeon, I need a top-up soon. Make that Now !!

In the greatest party-affiliation cover-up since the media tried to portray Gary Condit as a Republican, the media are refusing to mention the party affiliation of the thieving government officials in Bell, California.

There have been hundreds of news stories about Bell city officials' jaw-dropping salaries. In this poor city on the outskirts of Los Angeles, where the per capita annual income is $24,800 a year, the city manager, Robert Rizzo, had a salary of $787,637.

That's about twice what the president of the United States makes. (To be fair though, Rizzo was doing a better job.)

Rizzo was the highest-paid government employee in the entire country, not counting Maxine Waters' husband -- pending further revelations. With benefits, his total annual compensation, according to the Los Angeles Times, came to $1.5 million a year.

Alerted to the Bell situation, the White House quickly added the Bell city manager to the list of jobs saved by its stimulus plan.

Not only that, but Rizzo was entitled to 28 weeks off a year for vacation and sick leave. To put that in perspective, that's almost as much vacation time as public school teachers get!

Reached in Spain eventually, when her aides could find out which of the 30-odd suites she was in, even Michelle was outraged.

Rizzo responded to the anger over his preposterous salary by saying: "If that's a number people choke on, maybe I'm in the wrong business. I could go into private business and make that money."

(If he wants to grab one of those private-sector jobs that pays $1.5 million for 24 weeks of work, may I suggest the entertainment industry?)

Good luck to him. After leaving Bell, Rizzo will be lucky to land a job at Taco Bell. Before being anointed the King Tut of Bell, Rizzo was the city manager of Hesperia, Calif., where he was overpaid only to the tune of $78,000 a year.

The police chief, Randy Adams, was making $457,000 -- $770,046 including benefits. The assistant city manager, Angela Spaccia, had a $376,288 salary, with a total compensation package of $845,960. Being just an assistant city manager, Angela had to pay for her own yacht.

After the Los Angeles Times reported the stratospheric government salaries in little Bell, and the people of the town revolted, the millionaire government employees all resigned.

That'll show 'em! Oops, except upon their resignations, they qualified for lifetime pensions worth, by some estimates, more than $50 million.

These insane salary packages were granted by the mayor and four city council members -- who also set their own salaries. As a result, all but one was making $100,000 a year for these part-time jobs. After the council members' salaries came to light, the four looters cut their salaries by 90 percent.

According to Nexis, there have been more than 300 news stories reporting on the Bell scandal. Guess how many mentioned the party affiliation of the corrupt government bureaucrats?

One. Yes, just one. Now guess if the government officials were Democrats or Republicans? Yes, that is correct.

Congratulations -- you've qualified for our bonus round!

The one newspaper to cough up party affiliations, The Orange County Register, which I feel bound to boast is a paper that actually printed some of my deathless prose a few years ago, actually reported that these corrupt officials were all Democrats but only in response to reader complaints about the peculiar omission.

Lots of news stories on the scandal in Bell used the word "Democrat" or "Democratic." But that was only to say that the DEMOCRATIC attorney general of California, Jerry Brown, who is running on the DEMOCRATIC ticket for governor, is investigating the Bell officials' salaries.

So we know the media are aware of party affiliations. They just chose not to mention it when it would require them to identify shockingly corrupt government.

Unlike political corruption involving sex or bribery, the outrage in Bell isn't a scandal that hits both parties from time to time -- it's how the Democrats govern.

Elected Democratic officials bestow ludicrous salaries and benefits packages on government employees, and, in return, public employee unions make sure the Democrats keep getting re-elected.The scandal in Bell isn't a scandal at all for the Democrats. Au contraire! This is the governing strategy of the Democratic Party.

Ask Charlie Rangel or Maxine Waters or Rod Blagojevich.

A Touch of Whimsy

It shouldn't take too long for even a casual reader of this Blog to figure out that I'm a history "wonk". And I've been giving this subject on and off thought for a couple of months.

Liberal historians have been ranking Presidents for years and of course there's always a heavy leftward skew to their evaluations. Republicans are inevitably ranked lower than they deserve to be while Democrats are sure to be portrayed in the kindest historical light. Here's a different take on the issue: A look at the worst Presidents of the last hundred years from a conservative perspective.

7) Herbert Hoover (R): Hoover didn't make the list because the Depression started on his watch. After all, it's not as if he created that problem. But, his protectionist Smoot-Hawley Tariff Act created a trade war at the worst possible time and helped lock the Depression in place.

6) Warren Harding (R): Harding was only in office for a couple of years before he died of a heart attack. The bright side to that silver lining for Harding was that much of the incredible corruption that was going on during his presidency wasn't revealed until after his death. The worst of these ignominious adventures was the "Teapot Dome scandal," which involved bribery and a new first in American politics -- a cabinet member, Albert Fall, being sent to jail.

5) Richard Nixon (R): Not only was "Tricky Dick" Nixon almost impeached over Watergate, he shook the American people's faith in our government. Given the chronic overreach of the federal government, some might say that's a good thing. But, you generally get what you expect and if the American people don't expect competency, honesty, and decency from our government, we're not likely to get it.

Nixon did improve relations with China. He also put America in a position where we could have won in Vietnam had the Democrats in Congress not cut off supplies and air support to our former allies and left them to be slaughtered.

Still, Nixon did a lot of damage domestically. He created the out-of-control EPA and was primarily responsible for creating the federal government's Affirmative Action program, which codified discrimination against white Americans into the law. Additionally, he imposed wage and price controls that hurt the economy. That’s not much of a domestic legacy.

4) Jimmy Carter (D): Not only did Carter stand by and watch our ally, the Shah of Iran, get overthrown by fundamentalist crazies, he botched the Iranian hostage crisis that sprang from the overthrow in almost every way possible.

It's also worth noting that the Soviets were inspired by Carter's naiveté to invade Afghanistan on his watch. In other words, both the war on terror and Iran's quest for nuclear weapons can be directly traced back to Jimmy Carter's presidency. To top off all of that incompetence, Carter gave away the Panama Canal.

Then there was the domestic front. Carter was famous for his notorious malaise speech, gas lines, boycotting the Olympics, and an economy that was so dismal it actually diminished people's faith in the American dream. Meanwhile, Carter spent his time on such vital chores as scheduling time slots on the White House tennis court.

3) Woodrow Wilson (D): Adding Wilson to this list was a tough call because he deserves a lot of credit for his leadership during WWI. Of course, the failure of the League of Nations and the Treaty of Versailles, both of which contributed significantly to WWII, also occurred on his watch. Additionally, speaking plainly, Wilson was also a fascist.

Here's Jonah Goldberg describing American life under Wilson during WWI,

"The first appearance of modern totalitarianism in the Western world wasn't in Italy or Germany but in the United States of America. How else would you describe a country where the world's first modern propaganda ministry was established; political prisoners by the thousands were harassed, beaten, spied upon, and thrown in jail simply for expressing private opinions; the national leader accused foreigners or immigrants of injecting treasonous "poison into the American bloodstream;" newspapers and magazines were shut down for criticizing the government; nearly a hundred thousand government propaganda agents were sent out among the people to whip up support for the regime and its war; college professors imposed loyalty oaths on their colleagues; nearly a quarter-million goons were given legal authority to intimidate and beat "slackers" and dissenters; and leading artists and writers dedicated their crafts to proselytizing for the government?"

Admirable though Woodrow Wilson's leadership may have been during WWI, it doesn't make up for all of that.

2) Lyndon Johnson (D): You can thank Lyndon Johnson for dramatically ramping up our forces in Vietnam while simultaneously putting rules of engagement in place that made it nearly impossible for our troops to win the war. Then there was the Immigration Act of 1965, the Gun Control Act of 1968, riots in American cities, and the roots of the modern welfare state in America.

While Lyndon Johnson deserves credit for the Civil Rights Act of 1964, which was signed on his watch

with lots of Republican help, Johnson can also fairly be blamed for instituting an extraordinary number of bad policies during his limited time in office.

1) Barack Obama (D): It's impossible to fully evaluate Barack Obama's presidency because it's not over, but he has already done a devastating amount of damage in a freakishly short period of time.

Happily, there's still some hope that the utter destruction of the American health care system that he's trying to implement can be reversed. The socialistic takeovers of whole segments of American industries that began in the final days of the Bush Administration and expanded under Obama can also still hopefully be reversed in the coming years.

Additionally, we can still hope against hope that Iran will be stopped from getting nukes, that Obama won't lose the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and that none of his other disastrous policies like Cap and Trade will be passed. (The word “hope” comes up with Obama as often today as it did during his campaign, just in a different context)

However, Obama's massive expansion of spending and government for domestic purposes is not only unique in American history; it came at the worst possible moment. At a time when there were genuine concerns in America and across the world that our country no longer has the intention or even the capability of paying off our debt, Barack Obama massively increased spending under the auspices of fighting a short term recession. In this case, the cure is almost certainly worse than the disease.

Could America default on her debts because of what Obama is doing? Absolutely.

Could this spending be the reason future generations of Americans aren't as prosperous as their parents? Certainly.

Is it possible that we're literally experiencing the turning point that will take America from super power to economic basket case? Yes.

This country is now facing its greatest moment of risk since World War II and it’s an entirely self-inflicted wound.

PS: Many conservatives will undoubtedly be asking why Franklin D. Roosevelt isn't on this list. Had the list merely dealt with domestic policy, he would have easily been a contender for the top spot. His awful management of the economy alone, which extended the Depression for years, would merit a top 3 spot.

And before someone wants to pretend that the New Deal was a "big deal" and tries to draw parallels between it and the stimulus programs of the Obama regime they should take note that, as late as 1939, the unemployment rate was 21%. No, it was WWII that ended the Depression and it was this same conflict that created the Roosevelt legacy we hear about today.

FDR's leadership during World War II was so meritorious that it simply could not be overlooked despite the taint that his handling of the Holocaust is questionable.

That being said, FDR is often ranked by historians as one of America's great Presidents. A man whose greatness on the foreign policy front is quite nearly matched by the titanic damage he did to America on the domestic side certainly doesn't deserve that sort of honor.

Politics makes Strange Bedfellows!

I’m really not much of a fan of TV and certainly not late-night television but every once in a while the arms of Morphius elude me and I turn on the insidious box.

Thus it was recently that happenstance took me to the CBS show hosted by one David Letterman who is a liberal kind of guy, and like many on the left, old Dave is kind of frustrated these days. A new Gallup poll has Obama's job approval rating at just 41 percent, with 53 percent disapproving. Those are the lowest numbers Gallup has posted since Obama was inaugurated more than a year and a half ago.

So Dave is seeking answers to the president's diminishing popularity, and that kind of conversation usually involves the Fox News Channel, which is considered by the left to be all anti-Obama, all the time. Now I and the outlet itself dispute that perception but there is no doubt that Fox News is the most skeptical TV news organization when it comes to analyzing the president.

And isn't it about time someone did?

Consider this: If Obama was being worked over the way President Bush was by the establishment media, his job approval rating would probably be in the 20 percent range. Remember the brutal media beating Bush took? Today, the mainstream press is largely neutral or positive on Obama, even as many Americans are having doubts about him.

But let's get back to Letterman. Speaking with far-left MSNBC News commentator Rachel Maddow on his program, Dave listened as she put forth the preposterous theory that Fox News wants to frighten white Americans by reporting negatively about black Americans. "Scaring white people is good politics on the conservative side of the spectrum, and it always has been. The idea is that you sort of rile up the white base to be afraid of an other, to be afraid of scary immigrants or scary black people..."

In the past, paranoid, dishonest rants like that would have been dismissed as fringe speak. But not anymore. Without a shred of evidence, a guest on Letterman's "Late Show" (which by the way gets trounced in the ratings by Fox every night according the people who check these things) defines an entire news organization as a racist enterprise. And Letterman goes along with the program, adding: "These people are continuing to fan this flame and ... that is cancer."

Please.

The only people Fox News is scaring are far-left loons who see their shining city on the hill on fire.

For 18 months, the United States has been governed from the left, and things are not going well. I'm sorry if this analysis frightens some folks, but when you spend a half-trillion dollars trying to stimulate the economy and you create just 600,000 jobs, well, people are going to notice.

When the war in Afghanistan turns chaotic, Americans are not going to be pleased. When the nation's debt is increased by more than a trillion dollars a year because of record spending, folks are going to get a bit nervous. So, in order to counter those realities, the far left must divert attention from them. Thus, the scary black people deal.

In reply, here's a Top 1 list for Letterman and his liberal cronies: The American people don't need to be "riled" up by phony race baiting.

They are already riled up by reality. And the polls prove it.

Who Speaks for Us?

Yesterday, I wrote about reasons why independents should consider deserting the Left when the first Tuesday in November comes around.

Previously I spelled out some talking points for conservative candidates and back about 3 weeks ago I wrote about an easy-to-understand agenda and policy.

Now it doesn’t matter too much for the mid-terms but when the national races loom after that it most certainly does. We need a spokesperson.

So, with that in mind, I cast my eyes across this land. Frankly, I do not see a spokesman inside the Beltway who can articulate a program that can energize the silent majority, in other words the Right and the Independents. And so, it seems, we must look elsewhere.

One contender may be New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie who is taking on the state's entrenched special interests, shrinking government and fixing the budget hole -- all without raising taxes. He's doing in his state what the tea party movement is demanding of the federal government.

In the August issue of Townhall Magazine contributing editor Meredith Jessup reports on the impact Chris Christie is having not only in New Jersey but also on American politics. Below is an excerpt from her feature, "Throwdown in Trenton."

After years of aimless wandering through the post-Reagan desert, the search for a conservative political leader may finally be over.

A young Republican from New Jersey is spreading the gospel of small government, fiscal restraint and responsible governing. Many elder politicos of Washington may dismiss his preaching as heresy; but the young governor's words have enthralled many voters looking for real change and a restoration of common sense in government.

More than his words, Gov. Chris Christie's actions during his short tenure in office to date are making a real difference, both in lifting the state of New Jersey out from underneath it's overwhelming debt and in reigniting Ronald Reagan's brand of small-government conservatism.

It's fitting that at age 18 in 1980, Christie cast his first vote for Ronald Reagan. With his zeal for smaller government, Christie has prompted comparisons with Ronald Reagan. But in the end, Christie insists his personal character and governing style are his own: Reagan-esque, "with a Jersey edge."

The road to the New Jersey governorship was an uphill trek for Christie. Since Christie's historic victory, the glaring national media spotlight has largely faded. But a close look at the Republican's efforts since taking the oath of office in January reveals that this conservative’s star continues to burn brightly.

On Day 1 in office, Christie inherited the nation's worst state budget deficit—$10.9 billion on a budget of $29.3 billion. Over the last decade, New Jersey's municipal spending had increased 69 percent, while property taxes had spiked by 70 percent.In his first weeks in office, Gov. Christie put the brakes on New Jersey's runaway deficit spending. He announced spending freezes on hemorrhaging public programs and signed an executive order declaring a statewide "fiscal emergency."

Before a special joint session of the New Jersey legislature, Christie announced his planned fiscal solutions for closing the budget gap. Citing both his duties as governor and his "moral obligation" to future generations, he candidly told state lawmakers he would undertake "bold action" to balance the state's budget. He pledged to:

• "Cut government spending and end public union excesses we can no longer afford";

• "Reform government to cost less and operate better"; and

• "Restore some sense of balance to the obligations we take on—so that in the future they are both sensible and sustainable."

He promised to "forge a new course" to bring state spending in line with revenues, and like leaders before him, Christie promised to hammer out a fiscal plan that "lays the groundwork for a better tomorrow."

But unlike Democratic politicians of the state's past, Christie understood that securing tomorrow meant tightening the belt today.

And, so far at least, he’s doing it

The View from the Trenches .................

Anyone who knows me could tell you that I’m a list maker. I make lists for the grocery store. I make lists when I take a trip. My critics may claim that I make a list of the lists I need to list.

However this list is very, very serious because it is addressed to the ones who actually decide elections. In other words, the independents or the moderates.

Now, picking a politician to support is like trying to decide whether you want to rent your apartment to a crack addict or a raging alcoholic. No matter which one you choose, it's going to cost you money, it's going to leave a mess, and it's probably going to end in sorrow.

Granted, you do occasionally have a Ronald Reagan type who shocks you by paying his rent on time, keeping the place clean, and putting a fresh coat of paint on the walls before he leaves, but that's not typical for politicians. What is typical is choosing between the lesser of two evils in D.C.

So, if that's the situation you find yourself in, let's talk about why your evil of choice should be Republican instead of Democrat!

1) We Need Checks and Balances: Most Americans pay less attention to politics than what time their favorite TV show comes on. In a strange sort of way, that's good news: It means that Americans are normally confident enough that things aren't going to spiral out of control that they don't feel a need to watch the politicians in D.C. like hawks.

Unfortunately, the Democrats did so well in the last couple of elections that the GOP simply didn't have the power to keep them from engaging in cataclysmically stupid policies that never would have seen the light of day under normal circumstances.

America desperately needs more Republicans in D.C. to keep Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi, and Harry Reid from continuing to implement their extremist left-wing agenda.

2) Restraining Spending: The GOP wasn't fiscally responsible under Bush. You know it, I know it, we all know it. However, we also know the Democrats weren't fiscally responsible under Bush either and since Obama got into office, they've gone completely out of control.

We have whole nations defaulting on their bills in Europe, nobody has any sort of realistic plan for how this country is going to pay back what it has already spent, and yet we're spending more money at the highest clip since World War II.

Moreover, Obama freely admits that if he has his way, the country will be running deficits for as far as the eye can see.

If the GOP simply held spending back to the levels it was at in the Bush days, it would be an improvement. But, like them or hate them, the Tea Party movement is putting a tremendous amount of pressure on the GOP to engage in fiscal restraint -- and it's working.

So, if you don't want to see your children buried under a mountain of debt bigger than the Himalayas, you need to get the Republican Party back in control of Congress so they can slow down the economic crazy train that's rolling out of control towards Bankruptcy Junction.

3) Ending the Uncertainty Created by Government is a Key to Economic Recovery: The Democrats have tried to create an economic recovery with massive amounts of spending mixed with more regulations, bigger government, higher taxes, and a wildly unpredictable government that's hostile to business. In the words of Dr. Phil, "How's that working out for you?" Not so well, right?

Republicans have a different vision of how to help the economy. They favor low taxes, fiscal responsibility from the government, free market principles, cutting regulations, and ending the uncertainty created by wildly fluctuating government policies. Given how poorly the economy has fared with the Democrats in charge, doesn't it make sense to give the Republicans a shot at it? It's tempting to say that it couldn't get much worse, but when you see what's happening in Greece you realize things could get a lot worse in a hurry. That means time is short, the situation is very serious, and people need to get serious about deciding which way this country is going to go economically -- towards the policies that have made America successful in the past or towards the policies that have created a disaster in Greece and potentially elsewhere.

4) Repealing Health Care Reform Before It's Too Late: Obamacare will destroy the quality of health care in America, eventually lead to a complete government takeover of the health care industry, cause the deficit to explode, lead to rationing, death panels, and government funded abortions. The good news is that it's still possible to stop health care reform or at least we can slow it down by strangling the funding. Look at Missouri yesterday where more than 71% of the ballot said "No" to imposing mandates on citizens with respect to their coverage.

Of course, if health care reform goes into effect in 2014, it'll start to destroy the private health care industry in the United States. Then, we'll be stuck with a health care system that will be inferior to the one we already have until death do us part.

5) Fighting Massive Corruption: Capitol Hill has become riddled with corruption and scandals since Obama got into office. Charles Rangel has tax issues. Maxine Waters is about to go in front of the ethics committee. Eric Massa has resigned from Congress in disgrace. The Justice Department turned a blind eye to voter intimidation charges against the New Black Panthers, there has been a sleazy politicization of the census, there are allegations that the White House tried to bribe Joe Sestak to drop out of the Pennsylvania race - it just goes on and on for so long that it could be a whole column unto itself.

Unfortunately, this is just a natural consequence of having one party that controls all the levers of power. After all, when the defendant, the prosecutor, and the judge are all on the same team, it shouldn't surprise anyone when justice isn't served.

So, whether the Republicans are Boy Scouts or not (Bet heavy on not until they definitively prove otherwise), balancing things out is the only way to start draining the swamp.

6) You've Got to Punish Bad Behavior or You Get More of It: Politicians are like children. They will get away with as much as they can, as often as they can. That's why the voters have to set rules, boundaries, and limitations for them. If your son punches his little sister in the mouth and you just shrug your shoulders, what's going to happen the next time he gets mad at her? He may very well do it again. And, believe me, I speak from up close and personal experience.

If you let the Democrats get away with cutting crooked deals to benefit their union pals in the auto industry, health care reform, a failed trillion dollar stimulus, ethics scandals, pushing amnesty, cap and trade, and bowing to foreign leaders, they're going to be encouraged to do even more of it.

Given how unpopular their agenda has been and how arrogant the Democrats have been as they've pushed it through over the concerns of the American people, if the Democrats aren't going to get a spanking this November, then the American people may as well give up on the idea of disciplining them.

The door to the woodshed is less than 100 days away.

When you wet the bed, did your mother scold you?

Only twice in my life have I sought sessions with a professional in order to better understand where my head was at.

In neither case did the person have a couch but that’s the stereotype so lets stick with it for now and let's fast forward to the present, somewhere, almost anywhere in America and the therapist’s monolog could go like this ...............

“Come in. Make yourself comfortable. What's that? You are a congressional Democrat? You voted to triple the national debt, destroy a health care system that the overwhelming majority of Americans were happy with in a way that creates a massive and infinitely complex new entitlement, bailout the banks and car companies, and "stimulate" the economy with an $862 billion boondoggle that hasn't created a single private-sector job?

Your president is suing the state of Arizona for having the effrontery to enforce a law he wishes not to enforce (though he does have the constitutional responsibility to ‘take care that the laws be faithfully executed’)?

The war in Afghanistan is not going well? The president's approval ratings are under water? Congress' approval ratings are running even with Mel Gibson's? Naturally, you're upset.

Relax. Here, wipe your tears. The wizards at the Democratic National Committee have the answer. The strategy is one you may remember from past campaigns. They call it the Great Smoke Blower. Jimmy Carter used it against Reagan in 1980. When things are objectively bad and you can't run on your record, you accuse the Republicans of extremism. Remember? In 1980, inflation was running at 14 percent. Interest rates were about 15 percent. American hostages were paraded on Iranian television. The economy was febrile.

What did they do? They accused Reagan of being a warmonger. They said he would divide north from south, white from black, union from management, and Christian from Jew. They said he would plunge the world into nuclear Armageddon. It was a reprise of the anti-Goldwater effort of 1964.

The newest ad from the DNC seeks to link the Republican Party with the tea party. Flashing faces on the screen, now Rand Paul, now Paul Ryan, now Sharron Angle, now John Boehner, all distinctions are blurred. Then they present the ‘Republican Tea Party Contract on America’ with 10 items. These, they expect, will frighten the heck out of John Q. Public.

Item 1: "Repeal Health Insurance Reform."

Item 2: "Privatize Social Security or Get Rid of It."

Item 3: "End Medicare as it Presently Exists."

Item 4: "Extend the Bush Tax Breaks for the Wealthy and Big Oil."

Item 5: "Repeal Wall Street Reform."
Item 6: "Protect Those Responsible for the Oil Spill."

Item 7: "Abolish the Department of Education."

Item 8: "Abolish the Department of Energy."

Item 9: "Abolish the Environmental Protection Agency." I

Item 10: "Repeal the 17th Amendment (direct election of Senators)."

Clever, right? Hey, why are you still weeping? Oh, I see. Rasmussen found that as recently as July, more than 60 percent of voters favor repealing the health care behemoth? So it wouldn't be scary if Republicans actually ran on that item.

Oh, and your opponent doesn't favor privatizing Social Security? Not even a little? Hasn't she ever said something like "We may have to consider changes to the retirement age?" because that can be demagogued as wanting to privatize Social Security. Well, you make a good point. The Republicans (to the dismay of philosophical conservatives and libertarians) have been embracing Social Security as Linus did his blanket, for many an election cycle.

I guess, while we're at it, we might as well go ahead and concede that these same domesticated Republicans haven't exactly been carrying the banner for eliminating the Departments of Energy and Education (far less EPA!) for a really, really long time, though some wish they would.

There, there. Don't fret. What? Your opponent actually is in favor of repealing the "Wall Street Reform"? She says it will create 243 new regulations, just for starters, and that the federal government will now have the power to decide whether pretty much every business in America is taking too much risk. If a federal regulator decides you are making bad decisions, he can close down your shop. Besides, it completely sidestepped the biggest reason for the financial meltdown, Fannie and Freddie, because those were Democrats' sandboxes.

Hmmm.

The unemployment rate in your district is 17 percent? Twenty-five percent among the young? The expiration of the Bush tax cuts will raise taxes for small-business owners, and this will make hiring even less likely? According to the Small Business Administration (another agency principled conservatives would happily kiss goodbye), small businesses were responsible for between 60 and 80 percent of net new jobs in the past decade. But now they're worried. They don't know how the new Financial Reform bill will affect them, and they've seen what the Massachusetts health reform did to business there so they're extremely nervous about the effects of the national health reform. They're getting by, but they're in no mood to hire.

In fact, they're in a firing mood. And they're looking at you. Here, you're going to need these tissues after all.

And me as well so pass the box please.

Pay my nurse on the way out however, we don't take Medicare but Visa and American Express are both fine.