I'm sorry, but...

I'm sorry, but...
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I'm sorry, but...
09/18/2007 | Philistone

Posted on 09/18/2007 9:39:52 AM PDT by Philistone

I'm sorry that your child was killed by a drunk driver, but that doesn't give you the right to pull my car over at random and search me or it.

I'm sorry that your father died of lung cancer at the age of 60, but that doesn't give you the right to tell me I can't smoke in my own house or car.

I'm sorry that your best friend died of a heart-attack after eating nothing but Big Macs all his life, but that doesn't give you the right to tell me that I can't eat fats if I want to.

I'm sorry that you were raised to be squeamish at the sight of blood, but that does not give you the right to force me to eat only vegetables or wear only plant fibers.

I'm sorry that you can't afford health insurance, but that does not give you the right to force me to provide it for you.

I'm sorry that over 150 years ago people with the same color skin as me enslaved people with the same color skin as you, but that doesn't give you the right take the hard-earned efforts of my labor for yourself.

I'm sorry that your homeland is corrupt and your culture has no work ethic, but that doesn't give you the right to come here illegally and burden our schools and emergency rooms with your presence.

I'm sorry that your parents chose to come here illegally, but that doesn't give you the right to force me to fund your college education.

I'm sorry that you find it fashionable to ride your bike to work, but that doesn't give you the right to take away my car.

I'm sorry that your lack of intelligence and attention through high school and college left you fit only for a job as a public school teacher, but that doesn't give you the right to inflict your anger and ideology on my child.

I'm sorry that you are mentally and physically unfit to serve in our nation's Armed Forces, but that does not give you the right to disparage those who are fit and do serve.

I'm sorry that your parents and teachers continually told you that you are unique and special, but you are not.

I'm sorry that the jocks stuffed you in your locker in high school, but that doesn't give you the right to equate my President with Hitler.

I'm sorry that you failed Trigonometry, but that doesn't give you the right to equate Sociology with Engineering

I'm sorry that you are not as attractive as other women, but that does not give you the right to impose your feminist idiocracy on me, my company or my family.

I'm sorry that your nervous system is so exquisitely sensitive that you can be hurt by minute variations in air pressure caused by sound waves, but that doesn't give you the right to determine what I can and can not say.

I'm sorry that your enormous ego coupled with a complete lack of self-esteem, lack of any sense of self-worth and ignorance about how the real world works has led you to becoming a Liberal, but... Well, no buts. I'm not really sorry.

Remember: Anyone who tells you "it's for the children" believes that YOU are a child.
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1 posted on 09/18/2007 9:39:53 AM PDT by Philistone
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To: Philistone

‘I’m sorry that your child was killed by a drunk driver, but that doesn’t give you the right to pull my car over at random and search me or it. ‘

You don’t have a ‘right’ to drive. Sorry, your just wrong about this one. The others I tend to agree with. But driving is not a ‘right’ under any interpretation of the Constitution.

2 posted on 09/18/2007 9:41:39 AM PDT by Badeye (You know its a kook site when they ban the word 'kook')
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To: Philistone

In sort you’re just plain sorry.

3 posted on 09/18/2007 9:41:58 AM PDT by usmcobra (I sing Karaoke the way it was meant to be sung, drunk, badly and in Japanese)
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To: traviskicks

ping!!

4 posted on 09/18/2007 9:42:07 AM PDT by bamahead (Few men desire liberty; The majority are satisfied with a just master. -- Sallust)
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To: Philistone

Perfect

5 posted on 09/18/2007 9:42:52 AM PDT by wastedyears (George Orwell was a clairvoyant.)
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To: Philistone
You have named your post “Hillary's World”.
6 posted on 09/18/2007 9:43:21 AM PDT by OKIEDOC (Kalifornia, a red state wannabe. I don't take Ex Lax I just read the New York Times.)
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To: Philistone

This is a sorry thread.....

7 posted on 09/18/2007 9:44:08 AM PDT by caver (Yes, I did crawl out of a hole in the ground.)
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To: usmcobra
In sort you’re just plain sorry.

Or more properly, "In Collate, You're just plain sorry."
8 posted on 09/18/2007 9:44:12 AM PDT by w1andsodidwe (Jimmy Carter allowed radical Islam to get a foothold in Iran.)
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To: Philistone

I’m sorry that life has left you so bitter and angry. That doesn’t mean you I have to wallow around in the anger with you. I choose to make my life the best I can, while ignoring those that disagree with me. Mostly, I choose to not be bitter.

9 posted on 09/18/2007 9:44:18 AM PDT by SoftballMominVA (Never argue with an idiot. He will bring you down to his level and beat you with experience)
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To: Badeye
You don’t have a ‘right’ to drive. Sorry, your just wrong about this one.

But he does have a right of protection against unreasonable search and/or seizure...
10 posted on 09/18/2007 9:44:42 AM PDT by Snardius
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To: Philistone
I'm sorry that your homeland is corrupt and your culture has no work ethic, but that doesn't give you the right to come here illegally and burden our schools and emergency rooms with your presence.

Amen, FRiend!
11 posted on 09/18/2007 9:44:47 AM PDT by Millee (Tagline free since 10/20/06)
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To: Philistone

Can I print this on another website?

12 posted on 09/18/2007 9:45:04 AM PDT by OCCASparky (Steely-Eyed Killer of the Deep)
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To: Philistone

Well put - too bad it won’t fit on a bumper sticker. Then again, most folks who need to read it don’t have the attention span anyway.

13 posted on 09/18/2007 9:45:35 AM PDT by ProfoundMan (Money is the mother's milk of politics but righteous indignation is the drug of choice.)
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To: Philistone
Nice little synopsis.

Too bad the intended recipients will hear everything before the word "but" and nothing after.
14 posted on 09/18/2007 9:46:07 AM PDT by Madame Dufarge
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To: Philistone

Well-done!!

15 posted on 09/18/2007 9:46:25 AM PDT by Former Dodger ( "Insanity: Doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results." --Einstein)
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To: Philistone

“I’m sorry that the jocks stuffed you in your locker in high school, but that doesn’t give you the right to equate my President with Hitler.”

I laughed a the locker part, but it’s the 1A that gives them that right to run their mouths.

16 posted on 09/18/2007 9:46:35 AM PDT by Rb ver. 2.0 (Reunite Gondwanaland!)
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To: Badeye
But driving is not a ‘right’ under any interpretation of the Constitution.

Neither is walking down the street.
17 posted on 09/18/2007 9:47:34 AM PDT by ElkGroveDan (Take the wheel, Fred.)
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To: Badeye

“You don’t have a ‘right’ to drive. Sorry, your just wrong about this one. The others I tend to agree with. But driving is not a ‘right’ under any interpretation of the Constitution.”

I think he was talking about unreasonable searches, you know amendment four, not the ‘right’ to drive.

18 posted on 09/18/2007 9:48:12 AM PDT by CJ Wolf (Tagline space for rent. FRmail me for prices and terms and conditions. willing to barter...)
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To: Snardius; Badeye
Kinda’ like that Breathalyzer hidden in the HP’s flashlight?

Sticks it in the window as he says “Good evening folks” followed by “OK, who’s been drinking?”
19 posted on 09/18/2007 9:48:20 AM PDT by PeteB570 (Guns, what real men want for Christmas)
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To: Badeye

Has nothing to do with safety; it’s about the cops “showing” that they’re “doing something”, and about money — getting people on anything they can to generate revenue for the city or town. They could care less about you or your children.

20 posted on 09/18/2007 9:48:22 AM PDT by Clock King (Bring the noise!)
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To: Badeye
‘I’m sorry that your child was killed by a drunk driver, but that doesn’t give you the right to pull my car over at random and search me or it. ‘

You don’t have a ‘right’ to drive. Sorry, your just wrong about this one. The others I tend to agree with. But driving is not a ‘right’ under any interpretation of the Constitution.

Under common law you have a right to use your own property. We weakened that right by telling people that driving is a privilege. That still does not give you the right to use that property in an unsafe manner, as in being drunk. Just as the right to bear arms does not give you the right to shoot people.

Using your own car is a common law right we have given up.
21 posted on 09/18/2007 9:48:28 AM PDT by Dominick ("Freedom consists not in doing what we like, but in having the right to do what we ought." - JP II)
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To: Badeye

“You don’t have a ‘right’ to drive.”

When you are in possession of a valid license, you damn well DO have the right to drive. Nobody claimed that right was Constitutionally protected one. The Constitution does not grant rights, bud. It protects them.

22 posted on 09/18/2007 9:48:40 AM PDT by L98Fiero (A fool who'll waste his life, God rest his guts.)
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To: Badeye
You don’t have a ‘right’ to drive. Sorry, your just wrong about this one. The others I tend to agree with. But driving is not a ‘right’ under any interpretation of the Constitution.

Regardless, we still have a Constitutional protection from illegal search and seizure. . .
23 posted on 09/18/2007 9:48:55 AM PDT by Filo (Darwin was right!)
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To: Snardius

You don’t have a ‘right’ to drive. Sorry, your just wrong about this one.
But he does have a right of protection against unreasonable search and/or seizure...

Its not unreasonable, given when it occurs, and the number of dead each year as a direct result of drunk drivers, and the fact that driving is not a right.

24 posted on 09/18/2007 9:49:01 AM PDT by Badeye (You know its a kook site when they ban the word 'kook')
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To: ElkGroveDan

But driving is not a ‘right’ under any interpretation of the Constitution.
Neither is walking down the street.

Hmmmm.

How many people die from drunk walkers?

25 posted on 09/18/2007 9:50:08 AM PDT by Badeye (You know its a kook site when they ban the word 'kook')
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To: Badeye

Your right. Driving is not referred to in the Constitution; neither is abortion.

26 posted on 09/18/2007 9:50:11 AM PDT by mosaicwolf
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To: Badeye
You don’t have a ‘right’ to drive. Sorry, your just wrong about this one. The others I tend to agree with. But driving is not a ‘right’ under any interpretation of the Constitution.

No, but being secured in one's person, possessions, and papers against unreasonable search and seizure is a right. I don't give a damn if the car is on a public road. You don't forfeit your Constitutional rights when you start your car.
27 posted on 09/18/2007 9:50:11 AM PDT by JamesP81
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To: Badeye

He never claimed driving was a right.

28 posted on 09/18/2007 9:50:57 AM PDT by packrat35 (PIMP my Senate. They're all a bunch of whores anyway!)
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To: Philistone
I am sorry that Bush is bringing in so many Muslims to this Christian country. He is Balkanizing the United States. The future does not look bright. The man destroyed the USA.
29 posted on 09/18/2007 9:52:19 AM PDT by GinaLolaB
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To: Philistone
I'm sorry that your lack of intelligence and attention through high school and college left you fit only for a job as a public school teacher

Come on that's overstating things a bit no? There are more than a few public school teachers here.
30 posted on 09/18/2007 9:52:22 AM PDT by Borges
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To: Badeye
How many people die from drunk walkers? You are changing the subject. The question was regarding forms of travel that are specifically mentioned in the Constitution.
31 posted on 09/18/2007 9:52:56 AM PDT by ElkGroveDan (Take the wheel, Fred.)
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To: Badeye
Its not unreasonable, given when it occurs,

If he doesn't have a warrant, or really strong probable cause, it's unreasonable. Random stops and searches are illegal. Period.
32 posted on 09/18/2007 9:53:00 AM PDT by JamesP81
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To: Badeye

“Its not unreasonable, given when it occurs, and the number of dead each year as a direct result of drunk drivers, and the fact that driving is not a right.”

Sorry but you are wrong, when it’s a random stop with no probable cause it’s wrong.

33 posted on 09/18/2007 9:53:16 AM PDT by CJ Wolf (Tagline space for rent. FRmail me for prices and terms and conditions. willing to barter...)
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To: CJ Wolf

“You don’t have a ‘right’ to drive. Sorry, your just wrong about this one. The others I tend to agree with. But driving is not a ‘right’ under any interpretation of the Constitution.”

I think he was talking about unreasonable searches, you know amendment four, not the ‘right’ to drive.

Given the stats related to the percentage of drivers drunk at very specific times (after 11PM any day of the week) its not ‘unreasonable’.

And I think the courts have ruled along this line repeatedly when its been challenged.

Disclaimer; One of my childhood friends, who was to be in my wedding party as an usher was killed by a drunk driver.

While sitting on his COUCH in his LIVING ROOM.

Hence, I’m a bit hardcore about drunk driving. Its my personal belief the third time your caught driving drunk, the state should surgically remove your eyesight to protect the rest of us.

Yes, I know its Draconian. Then again, I held my friends six month old daughter while we buried him...

34 posted on 09/18/2007 9:53:26 AM PDT by Badeye (You know its a kook site when they ban the word 'kook')
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To: Froufrou

Ping

35 posted on 09/18/2007 9:54:09 AM PDT by JamesP81
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To: Badeye

Any search without reasonable suspicion that the individual targeted is guilty IS UNREASONABLE. WAYR?

36 posted on 09/18/2007 9:54:12 AM PDT by American_Centurion (No, I don't trust the government to automatically do the right thing.)
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To: Philistone

I have grown sick of the “ its for the children “ crap

because that is all it is, crap

37 posted on 09/18/2007 9:54:20 AM PDT by sure_fine ( • not one to over kill the thought process)
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To: Philistone

For most of a lot of those things, I’m glad.

38 posted on 09/18/2007 9:54:51 AM PDT by Lonesome in Massachussets (NYT Headline: Protocols of the Learned Elders of CBS: Fake but Accurate, Experts Say)
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To: Philistone

Excellent points, all of them. I didn’t care for the tone though. Saying, “I’m sorry that, but” 30 times in a row leaves me with the impression that you’re not really sorry, you’re just being sarcastic. I’m not saying that to flame you, it’s just my gut reaction.

39 posted on 09/18/2007 9:55:42 AM PDT by highimpact (Abortion - [n]: human sacrifice at the altar of convenience.)
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To: Philistone

I’m sorry that your husband was killed on the Long Island Railroad by an insane Colin Ferguson, but that doesn’t give you the right to take away my guns and therefore make me as vunerable as your husband was on the train.

40 posted on 09/18/2007 9:56:59 AM PDT by Alas Babylon!
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To: JamesP81

Its not unreasonable, given when it occurs,

If he doesn’t have a warrant, or really strong probable cause, it’s unreasonable. Random stops and searches are illegal. Period.

No problem you holding a personal opinion like that. The courts have said otherwise, repeatedly.

I’m happy with those rulings. We kill more in a single year due to idiots driving drunk than we’ve lost since 9/11 in the war...by quite a bit actually.

41 posted on 09/18/2007 9:57:37 AM PDT by Badeye (You know its a kook site when they ban the word 'kook')
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To: Philistone
Bush’s father instituted the “war on drugs” therefore suspending all of our rights not to be searched and set up for that matter. The best bet is to get off the streets by 9 pm and stay inside and lap up CNN and eat Chinese wheat glutton and get fat.
42 posted on 09/18/2007 9:58:25 AM PDT by GinaLolaB
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To: Badeye

The number of people who are actually killed by drunk drivers each year is very small. And I am not talking about “alcohol related fatalities.” All this Government hysteria is not justified.

43 posted on 09/18/2007 9:58:31 AM PDT by Enterprise (Those who "betray us" also "Betray U.S." They're called DEMOCRATS!)
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To: CJ Wolf

‘Sorry but you are wrong, when it’s a random stop with no probable cause it’s wrong.’

In your opinion. In the real world, its law thats been affirmed repeatedly.

44 posted on 09/18/2007 9:58:38 AM PDT by Badeye (You know its a kook site when they ban the word 'kook')
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To: Badeye

Random searches cannot be reasonable, as there is no probable cause.

And I would argue that driving IS a right, by the way.

45 posted on 09/18/2007 9:58:52 AM PDT by Sloth (You being wrong & me being closed-minded are not mutually exclusive.)
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To: Philistone

I like turtles.

46 posted on 09/18/2007 9:59:45 AM PDT by isom35
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To: Enterprise

‘The number of people who are actually killed by drunk drivers each year is very small.’

Really? Whats the total?

Second question. How many is ‘enough’ for you?

47 posted on 09/18/2007 10:01:00 AM PDT by Badeye (You know its a kook site when they ban the word 'kook')
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To: Badeye

One can drink. One can drive. But it’s incredibly stupid to do them at the same time.

48 posted on 09/18/2007 10:01:25 AM PDT by auboy
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To: Sloth

‘Random searches cannot be reasonable, as there is no probable cause.’

I think the statistics available undermine this claim. Just my opinion.

‘And I would argue that driving IS a right, by the way.’

Sorry, thats established fact that it is not a ‘right’ by court precedent.

49 posted on 09/18/2007 10:02:21 AM PDT by Badeye (You know its a kook site when they ban the word 'kook')
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To: highimpact
Excellent points, all of them. I didn’t care for the tone though. Saying, “I’m sorry that, but” 30 times in a row leaves me with the impression that you’re not really sorry, you’re just being sarcastic. I’m not saying that to flame you, it’s just my gut reaction.

Well there may have been just the slightest tad bit of sarcasm in there... ;-)
50 posted on 09/18/2007 10:02:33 AM PDT by Philistone (Your existence as a non-believer offends the Prophet(MPBUH).)
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September 13, 2007, 5:00 a.m.

Keep ’Em Out
Higher education has been oversold.

By George Leef

In one of his New York Times columns earlier this year, David Brooks lamented that “Despite all the incentives, 30 percent of kids drop out of high school and the college graduation rate has been flat for a generation.” Brooks, like many spokesmen for the higher-education establishment, worries that the United States is falling behind in the international race for brainpower.

That is why we keep hearing politicians talk about the need to stimulate a higher rate of college attendance and completion. We’re in a global “knowledge economy,” and whereas America used to be tops in the percentage of workers with college degrees, we have now fallen behind a number of other nations. At a big education conference I attended back in February, former North Carolina governor Jim Hunt called this situation “scary.”

Sorry, scaremongers, but there is nothing to worry about. If anything, America now puts too many students into college, and we certainly don’t need any new subsidies to get more there.

Here are my reasons for holding that contrarian view.

First, it isn’t true that the economy is undergoing some dramatic shift to “knowledge work” that can only be performed by people who have college educations. When we hear that more and more jobs “require” a college degree, that isn’t because most of them are so technically demanding that an intelligent high school graduate couldn’t learn to do the work. Rather, what it means is that more employers are using educational credentials as a screening mechanism. As James Engell and Anthony Dangerfield write in their book Saving Higher Education in the Age of Money, “the United States has become the most rigidly credentialized society in the world. A B.A. is required for jobs that by no stretch of imagination need two years of full-time training, let alone four.”

Second, the needless pressure to get educational credentials draws a large number of academically weak and intellectually disengaged students into college. All they want is the piece of paper that gets them past the screening. Most schools have quietly lowered their academic standards so that such students will stay happy and remain enrolled. Consequently, they seldom learn much — many employers complain that college graduates they hire can’t even write a coherent sentence — but most eventually get their degrees.

Third, due to the overselling of higher education, we find substantial numbers of college graduates taking “high school” jobs like retail sales. It’s not that there is anything wrong with well-educated clerks or truck drivers, but to a great extent college is no longer about providing a solid, rounded education. The courses that once were the pillars of the curriculum, such as history, literature, philosophy, and fine arts, have been watered down and are usually optional. Sadly, college education is now generally sold as a stepping stone to good employment rather than as an intellectually broadening experience. Sometimes it manages to do both, but often it does neither.

Fourth, it’s a mistake to assume that the traditional college setting is the best or only way for people to learn the things they need to know in order to become successful workers. On-the-job training, self-directed studies, and courses taken with a particular end in mind (such as those offered in fields like accounting or finance at proprietary schools) usually lead to much more educational gain than do courses taken just because they fill degree requirements.

“But wait,” I hear readers saying, “isn’t it true that people with college degrees earn far more than people with only high-school diplomas?”

That is true on average — an average composed to a large degree of very bright and ambitious people who would be successful with or without a college degree, and also of people who earned their degrees decades ago when the curriculum and academic standards were more rigorous. It simply doesn’t follow that every person we might lure into college today is going to enjoy a great boost in lifetime earnings just because he manages to stick it out through enough courses to graduate. The sad reality is that we now find many young people who have spent years in college and have piled up sizeable debts serving up Starbucks coffee or delivering pizza for Papa John’s.

A perennial trope among politicians is that more education will make everyone better off. Having a more efficient educational system — one that taught the three Rs well in eight years rather than poorly in 16 — would indeed be a benefit. Simply putting a higher percentage of our young people into college, however, makes just as much sense as spreading more fertilizer on a field that’s already been over-fertilized.

— George Leef is the director of the John William Pope Center for Higher Education Policy and a blogger at NRO’s “Phi Beta Cons.”
National Review Online - http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=NGY0NmY3MzMzOWU1NDZmYmE0MTE0NGJkZGVmYzNiZWU=

Lest we forget that freedom is not free and that you CAN'T get something for nothing:


No 'Health Care'?
By Thomas Sowell
September 4, 2007

During the first 30 years of my life, I had no health insurance. Neither did a lot of other people, back in those days.

During those 30 years, I had a broken arm, a broken jaw, a badly injured shoulder, and miscellaneous other medical problems. To say that my income was below average during those years would be a euphemism.

How did I manage? The same way everybody else managed: I went to doctors and I paid them directly, instead of paying indirectly through taxes.

This was all before politicians gave us the idea that the things we could not afford individually we could somehow afford collectively through the magic of government.

When my jaw was broken, I was treated in an emergency room and was given a bill for $50 -- which was like a king's ransom to me at the time, 1949. But I paid it off in installments over a period of months.

Like most young people, I was lucky enough not to have any heavy-duty medical expenses that would have required major operations or a long hospital stay.

That is still true for most young people today, which is why many people in their twenties do not choose to pay for medical insurance, even when they can afford it.

They know that, in an emergency, they can always go to an emergency room. And today the idea that you ought to pay for that out of your own pocket is considered almost quaint in some quarters.

It is not uncommon -- especially in California, with its large illegal immigrant population -- for hospitals to have to shut down because so few people pay for the emergency room care they receive.

There are, of course, people with huge medical bills that they cannot possibly pay. Believe it or not, that also happened back before the modern welfare state.

Some hospitals -- whether public or private -- could absorb such costs, with the help of donors. There were people with polio living in iron lungs, which is why rich and poor alike gave money to the March of Dimes.

But that is very different from hospitals being stiffed every day by emergency room users whose only emergency is that they want to keep their money to spend on fun, instead of on doctors.

The biggest of the big lies in the "health care" hype is that a lack of insurance means a lack of medical care. The second biggest lie is that health care and medical care are the same thing.

Doctors cannot stop you from ruining your health in a hundred different ways, so statistics on everything from infant mortality to AIDS are not proof of a need for government to take over medical treatment.

Few people show the slightest interest in what has actually happened in countries with government-controlled medical care.

We are apparently supposed to follow those countries' example without asking about the months that people in those countries spend on waiting lists for medical treatments that Americans get just by picking up a phone and making an appointment.

It is amazing how many people seem uninterested in such things as why so many doctors in Britain are from Third World countries with lower medical standards -- or why people from Canada come to the United States for medical treatment that they could get cheaper at home.

Government price controls on pharmaceutical drugs are more of the same illusion of something for nothing.

People who are urging us to follow other countries that control the prices of medications seem uninterested in the fact that those countries depend on the United States to create new drugs, after they destroyed incentives to do so in their own countries.

Since it takes more than a decade to create a new drug, a politician can be elected president by hyping price controls on drugs, spend eight years in the White House, and be living in retirement before people start to notice that we no longer get the kinds of new medications that successively conquered deadly diseases in the past.

---------

Thomas Sowell is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305. His Web site is www.tsowell.com.

COPYRIGHT 2007 CREATORS SYNDICATE, INC.

--------------------

Note -- The opinions expressed in this column are those of the author and do not necessarily reflect the opinions, views, and/or philosophy of GOPUSA.

For those of you Bush haters let me refresh your memory about the real criminal and liar in the White House; X42:


The Progressive Review

This list was compiled at the end of the Clinton administration. It was last partially updated in 2000

Our Clinton Scandal Index

The Clintons, to adapt a line from Dr. Johnson, were not only corrupt, they were the cause of corruption in others. Yet seldom in America have so many come to excuse so much mendacity and malfeasance as during the Clinton years. Here are some of the facts that have been buried.

RECORDS SET

- The only president ever impeached on grounds of personal malfeasance
- Most number of convictions and guilty pleas by friends and associates*
- Most number of cabinet officials to come under criminal investigation
- Most number of witnesses to flee country or refuse to testify
- Most number of witnesses to die suddenly
- First president sued for sexual harassment.
- First president accused of rape.
- First first lady to come under criminal investigation
- Largest criminal plea agreement in an illegal campaign contribution case
- First president to establish a legal defense fund.
- First president to be held in contempt of court
- Greatest amount of illegal campaign contributions
- Greatest amount of illegal campaign contributions from abroad
- First president disbarred from the US Supreme Court and a state court

* According to our best information, 40 government officials were indicted or convicted in the wake of Watergate. A reader computes that there was a total of 31 Reagan era convictions, including 14 because of Iran-Contra and 16 in the Department of Housing & Urban Development scandal. 47 individuals and businesses associated with the Clinton machine were convicted of or pleaded guilty to crimes with 33 of these occurring during the Clinton administration itself. There were in addition 61 indictments or misdemeanor charges. 14 persons were imprisoned. A key difference between the Clinton story and earlier ones was the number of criminals with whom he was associated before entering the White House.

Using a far looser standard that included resignations, David R. Simon and D. Stanley Eitzen in Elite Deviance, say that 138 appointees of the Reagan administration either resigned under an ethical cloud or were criminally indicted. Curiously Haynes Johnson uses the same figure but with a different standard in “Sleep-Walking Through History: America in the Reagan Years: “By the end of his term, 138 administration officials had been convicted, had been indicted, or had been the subject of official investigations for official misconduct and/or criminal violations. In terms of number of officials involved, the record of his administration was the worst ever.”

STARR-RAY INVESTIGATION

- Number of Starr-Ray investigation convictions or guilty pleas (including one governor, one associate attorney general and two Clinton business partners): 14
- Number of Clinton Cabinet members who came under criminal investigation: 5
- Number of Reagan cabinet members who came under criminal investigation: 4
- Number of top officials jailed in the Teapot Dome Scandal: 3

CRIME STATS

- Number of individuals and businesses associated with the Clinton machine who have been convicted of or pleaded guilty to crimes: 47
- Number of these convictions during Clinton’s presidency: 33
- Number of indictments/misdemeanor charges: 61
- Number of congressional witnesses who have pleaded the Fifth Amendment, fled the country to avoid testifying, or (in the case of foreign witnesses) refused to be interviewed: 122

SMALTZ INVESTIGATION

- Guilty pleas and convictions obtained by Donald Smaltz in cases involving charges of bribery and fraud against former Agriculture Secretary Mike Espy and associated individuals and businesses: 15
- Acquitted or overturned cases (including Espy): 6
- Fines and penalties assessed: $11.5 million
- Amount Tyson Food paid in fines and court costs: $6 million

CAMPAIGN FINANCE INVESTIGATION

- As of June 2000, the Justice Department listed 25 people indicted and 19 convicted because of the 1996 Clinton-Gore fundraising scandals.
- According to the House Committee on Government Reform in September 2000, 79 House and Senate witnesses asserted the Fifth Amendment in the course of investigations into Gore’s last fundraising campaign.
-James Riady entered a plea agreement to pay an $8.5 million fine for campaign finance crimes. This was a record under campaign finance laws.

CLINTON MACHINE CRIMES FOR WHICH CONVICTIONS WERE OBTAINED

Drug trafficking (3), racketeering, extortion, bribery (4), tax evasion, kickbacks, embezzlement (2), fraud (12), conspiracy (5), fraudulent loans, illegal gifts (1), illegal campaign contributions (5), money laundering (6), perjury, obstruction of justice.

HISTORICAL CONTEXT

- Number of independent counsel inquiries since the 1978 law was passed: 19
- Number that have produced indictments: 7
- Number that produced more convictions than the Starr investigation: 1
- Median length of investigations that led to convictions: 44 months
- Length of Starr-Ray investigation: 69 months.
- Total cost of the Starr investigation (3/00) $52 million
- Total cost of the Iran-Contra investigation: $48.5 million
- Total cost to taxpayers of the Madison Guarantee failure: $73 million

OTHER MATTERS INVESTIGATED BY SPECIAL PROSECUTORS AND CONGRESS, OR REPORTED IN THE MEDIA

Bank and mail fraud, violations of campaign finance laws, illegal foreign campaign funding, improper exports of sensitive technology, physical violence and threats of violence, solicitation of perjury, intimidation of witnesses, bribery of witnesses, attempted intimidation of prosecutors, perjury before congressional committees, lying in statements to federal investigators and regulatory officials, flight of witnesses, obstruction of justice, bribery of cabinet members, real estate fraud, tax fraud, drug trafficking, failure to investigate drug trafficking, bribery of state officials, use of state police for personal purposes, exchange of promotions or benefits for sexual favors, using state police to provide false court testimony, laundering of drug money through a state agency, false reports by medical examiners and others investigating suspicious deaths, the firing of the RTC and FBI director when these agencies were investigating Clinton and his associates, failure to conduct autopsies in suspicious deaths, providing jobs in return for silence by witnesses, drug abuse, improper acquisition and use of 900 FBI files, improper futures trading, murder, sexual abuse of employees, false testimony before a federal judge, shredding of documents, withholding and concealment of subpoenaed documents, fabricated charges against (and improper firing of) White House employees, inviting drug traffickers, foreign agents and participants in organized crime to the White House.

ARKANSAS ALTZHEIMER’S

Number of times that Clinton figures who testified in court or before Congress said that they didn’t remember, didn’t know, or something similar.

Bill Kennedy 116
Harold Ickes 148
Ricki Seidman 160
Bruce Lindsey 161
Bill Burton 191
Mark Gearan 221
Mack McLarty 233
Neil Egglseston 250
Hillary Clinton 250
John Podesta 264
Jennifer O’Connor 343
Dwight Holton 348
Patsy Thomasson 420
Jeff Eller 697

FROM THE WASHINGTON TIMES: In the portions of President Clinton’s Jan. 17 deposition that have been made public in the Paula Jones case, his memory failed him 267 times. This is a list of his answers and how many times he gave each one.

I don’t remember - 71
I don’t know - 62
I’m not sure - 17
I have no idea - 10
I don’t believe so - 9
I don’t recall - 8
I don’t think so - 8
I don’t have any specific recollection - 6
I have no recollection - 4
Not to my knowledge - 4
I just don’t remember - 4
I don’t believe - 4
I have no specific recollection - 3
I might have - 3
I don’t have any recollection of that - 2 I don’t have a specific memory - 2
I don’t have any memory of that - 2
I just can’t say - 2
I have no direct knowledge of that - 2
I don’t have any idea - 2
Not that I recall - 2
I don’t believe I did - 2
I can’t remember - 2
I can’t say - 2
I do not remember doing so - 2
Not that I remember - 2
I’m not aware - 1
I honestly don’t know - 1
I don’t believe that I did - 1
I’m fairly sure - 1
I have no other recollection - 1
I’m not positive - 1
I certainly don’t think so - 1
I don’t really remember - 1
I would have no way of remembering that - 1
That’s what I believe happened - 1
To my knowledge, no - 1
To the best of my knowledge - 1
To the best of my memory - 1
I honestly don’t recall - 1
I honestly don’t remember - 1
That’s all I know - 1
I don’t have an independent recollection of that - 1
I don’t actually have an independent memory of that - 1
As far as I know - 1
I don’t believe I ever did that - 1
That’s all I know about that - 1
I’m just not sure - 1
Nothing that I remember - 1
I simply don’t know - 1
I would have no idea - 1
I don’t know anything about that - 1
I don’t have any direct knowledge of that - 1
I just don’t know - 1
I really don’t know - 1
I can’t deny that, I just — I have no memory of that at all - 1

ARKANSAS SUDDEN DEATH SYNDROME

- Number of persons in the Clinton machine orbit who are alleged to have committed suicide: 9
- Number known to have been murdered: 12
- Number who died in plane crashes: 6
- Number who died in single car automobile accidents: 3
- Number of one-person sking fatalities: 1
- Number of key witnesses who have died of heart attacks while in federal custody under questionable circumstances: 1
- Number of unexplained deaths: 4
- Total suspicious deaths: 46
- Number of northern Mafia killings during peak years of 1968-78: 30
- Number of Dixie Mafia killings during same period: 156

It is important in considering these fatal incidents to bear in mind the following:

The fact that anomalies need to be investigated further carries no presumption of how a death actually occurred, only that there remain serious questions that require answers.

The possibility of foul play must be taken seriously in a major criminal conspiracy in which over two score individuals and firms have been convicted and over 100 witnesses have pled the Fifth Amendment or fled the country.

If foul play did occur in any of these cases, that fact by itself does not carry the presumption that the the Clinton machine was involved. Given the footprints of organized crime, drug trade, foreign espionage, and intelligence agencies on the trail of the Clinton story, such a assumption would not be warranted. It is also well to keep in mind the classic prohibition era movie in which the corrupt poitician’s job was not to engage in illegal acts but to avoid noticing them.
ARKANSAS MONEY MANAGEMENT

- Amount of an alleged electronic transfer from the Arkansas Development Financial Authority to a bank in the Cayman Islands during 1980s: $50 million
- Grand Cayman’s population: 18,000
- Number of commercial banks: 570
- Number of bank regulators: 1
- Amount Arkansas state pension fund invested in high-risk repos in the mid-80s in one purchase in April 1985: $52 million through the Worthen Bank.
- Number of days thereafter that the state’s brokerage firm went belly up: 3
- Amount Arkansas pension fund dropped overnight as a result: 15%
- Percent of Worthen bank that Mochtar Riady bought over the next four months to bail out the bank and the then governor, Bill Clinton: 40%.
- Percent of purchasers from the Clintons and McDougals of resort lots who lost the land because of the sleazy financing provisions: over 50%

THE MEDIA

- Number of journalists covering Whitewater who have been fired, transferred off the beat, resigned or otherwise gotten into trouble because of their work on the scandals (Doug Frantz, Jim Wooten, Richard Behar, Christopher Ruddy, Michael Isikoff, David Eisenstadt, Yinh Chan, Jonathan Broder, James R. Norman, Zoh Hieronimus): 10

FRIENDS OF BILL

- Number of times John Huang took the 5th Amendment in answer to questions during a Judicial Watch deposition: 1,000
- Visits made to the White House by investigation subjects Johnny Chung, James Riady, John Huang, and Charlie Trie. 160
- Number of campaign contributors who got overnights at the White House in the two years before the 1996 election: 577
- Number of members of Thomas Boggs’s law firm who have held top positions in the Clinton administration. 18
- Number of times John Huang was briefed by CIA: 37
- Number of calls Huang made from Commerce Department to Lippo banks: 261
- Number of intelligence reports Huang read while at Commerce Department: 500

UNEXPLAINED PHENOMENA

- FBI files misappropriated by the White House: c. 900
- Estimated number of witnesses quoted in FBI files misappropriated by the White House: 18,000
- Number of witnesses who developed medical problems at critical points in Clinton scandals investigation (Tucker, Hale, both McDougals, Lindsey): 5
- Problem areas listed in a memo by Clinton’s own lawyer in preparation for the president’s defense: 40
- Number of witnesses and critics of Clinton subjected to IRS audit: 45
- Number of names placed in a White House secret database without the knowledge of those named: c. 200,000
- Number of women involved with Clinton who claim to have been physically threatened (Sally Perdue, Gennifer Flowers, Kathleen Willey, Linda Tripp, Elizabeth Ward Gracen, Juantia Broaddrick): 6
- Number of men involved in the Clinton scandals who have been beaten up or claimed to have been intimidated: 10

THE HIDDEN ELECTION

USA Today calls it “the hidden election,” in which nearly 7,000 state legislative seats are decided with only minimal media and public attention. But there was an important national story here: evidence of the disaster that Bill Clinton was for the Democratic Party. According to the National Conference of State Legislatures, Democrats held a 1,542 seat lead in the state bodies in 1990. As of 1998 that lead had shrunk to 288. That’s a loss of over 1,200 state legislative seats, nearly all of them under Clinton. Across the US, the Democrats controled only 65 more state senate seats than the Republicans.

Further, in 1992, the Democrats controlled 17 more state legislatures than the Republicans. After 1998, the Republicans controlled one more than the Democrats. Not only was this a loss of 9 legislatures under Clinton, but it was the first time since 1954 that the GOP had controlled more state legislatures than the Democrats (they tied in 1968).

Here’s what happened to the Democrats under Clinton, based on our latest figures:

- GOP seats gained in House since Clinton became president: 48
- GOP seats gained in Senate since Clinton became president: 8
- GOP governorships gained since Clinton became president: 11
- GOP state legislative seats gained since Clinton became president: 1,254
as of 1998
- State legislatures taken over by GOP since Clinton became president: 9
- Democrat officeholders who have become Republicans since Clinton became
president: 439 as of 1998
- Republican officeholders who have become Democrats since Clinton became president: 3

THE CLINTON LEGACY: LONELY VOICES

Here are some of the all too rare public officials, reporters, and others who spoke truth to the dismally corrupt power of Bill and Hill Clinton’s political machine — some at risk to their careers, others at risk to their lives. A few points to note:

- Those corporatist media reporters who attempted to report the story often found themselves muzzled; some even lost their jobs. The only major dailies that consistently handled the story well were the Wall Street Journal and the Washington Times.

- Nobody on this list has gotten rich and many you may not have even heard of. Taking on the Clintons typically has not been a happy or rewarding experience. At least ten reporters were fired, transferred off their beats, resigned, or otherwise got into trouble because of their work on the scandals.

- Contrary to the popular impression, the politics of those listed ranges from the left to the right, and from the ideological to the independent.

PUBLIC OFFICIALS

MIGUEL RODRIGUEZ was a prosecutor on the staff of Kenneth Starr. His attempts to uncover the truth in the Vincent Foster death case were repeatedly foiled and he was the subject of planted stories undermining his credibility and implying that he was unstable. Rodriguez eventually resigned.

JEAN DUFFEY: Head of a joint federal-county drug task force in Arkansas. Her first instructions from her boss: “Jean, you are not to use the drug task force to investigate any public official.” Duffey’s work, however, led deep into the heart of the Dixie Mafia, including members of the Clinton machine and the investigation of the so-called “train deaths.” Ambrose Evans-Pritchard reports that when she produced a star witness who could testify to Clinton’s involvement with cocaine, the local prosecuting attorney, Dan Harmon issued a subpoena for all the task force records, including “the incriminating files on his own activities. If Duffey had complied it would have exposed 30 witnesses and her confidential informants to violent retributions. She refused.” Harmon issued a warrant for her arrest and friendly cops told her that there was a $50,000 price on her head. She eventually fled to Texas. The once-untouchable Harmon was later convicted of racketeering, extortion and drug dealing.

BILL DUNCAN: An IRS investigator in Arkansas who drafted some 30 federal indictments of Arkansas figures on money laundering and other charges. Clinton biographer Roger Morris quotes a source who reviewed the evidence: “Those indictments were a real slam dunk if there ever was one.” The cases were suppressed, many in the name of “national security.” Duncan was never called to testify. Other IRS agents and state police disavowed Duncan and turned on him. Said one source, “Somebody outside ordered it shut down and the walls went up.”

RUSSELL WELCH: An Arkansas state police detective working with Duncan. Welch developed a 35-volume, 3,000 page archive on drug and money laundering operations at Mena. His investigation was so compromised that a high state police official even let one of the targets of the probe look through the file. At one point, Welch was sprayed in the face with poison, later identified by the Center for Disease Control as anthrax. He would write in his diary, “I feel like I live in Russia, waiting for the secret police to pounce down. A government has gotten out of control. Men find themselves in positions of power and suddenly crimes become legal.” Welch is no longer with the state police.

DAN SMALTZ: Smaltz did an outstanding job investigating and prosecuting charges involving illegal payoffs to Agriculture Secretary Mike Espy, yet was treated with disparaging and highly inaccurate reporting by the likes of the David Broder and the NY Times. Espy was acquitted under a law that made it necessary to not only prove that he accepted gratuities but that he did something specific in return. On the other hand, Tyson Foods copped a plea in the same case, paying $6 million in fines and serving four years’ probation. The charge: that Tyson had illegally offered Espy $12,000 in airplane rides, football tickets and other payoffs. In the Espy investigation, Smaltz obtained 15 convictions and collected over $11 million in fines and civil penalties. Offenses for which convictions were obtained included false statements, concealing money from prohibited sources, illegal gratuities, illegal contributions, falsifying records, interstate transportation of stolen property, money laundering, and illegal receipt of USDA subsidies. In addition, Janet Reno blocked Smaltz from pursuing leads aimed at allegations of major drug trafficking in Arkansas and payoffs to the then governor of the state, WJ Clinton. Espy had become Ag secretary only after being flown to Arkansas to get the approval of chicken king Don Tyson.

DAVID SCHIPPERS was House impeachment counsel and a Chicago Democrat. He did a highly creditable job but since he didn’t fit the right-wing conspiracy theory, the Clintonista media downplayed his work. Thus most Americans don’t know that he told Newsmax, “Let me tell you, if we had a chance to put on a case, I would have put live witnesses before the committee. But the House leadership, and I’m not talking about Henry Hyde, they just killed us as far as time was concerned. I begged them to let me take it into this year. Then I screamed for witnesses before the Senate. But there was nothing anybody could do to get those Senators to show any courage. They told us essentially, you’re not going to get 67 votes so why are you wasting our time.” Schippers also said that while a number of representatives had looked at additional evidence kept under seal in a nearby House building, not a single senator did.

JOHN CLARKE: When Patrick Knowlton stopped to relieve himself in Ft. Marcy Park 70 minutes before the discovery of Vince Foster’s body, he saw things that got him into deep trouble. His interview statements were falsified and prior to testifying he claims he was overtly harassed by more than a score of men in a classic witness intimidation technique. In some cases there were witnesses. John Clarke was his dogged lawyer in the witness intimidation case that was largely ignored by the media, even when the three-judge panel overseeing the Starr investigation permitted Knowlton to append a 20 page addendum to the Starr Report.

OTHER

THE ARKANSAS COMMITTEE: What would later be known as the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy actually began on the left - as a group of progressive students at the University of Arkansas had formed the Arkansas Committee to look into Mena, drugs, money laundering, and Arkansas politics. This committee was the source of some of the important early Clinton stories including those published in the Progressive Review.

CLINTON ADMINISTRATION SCANDALS E-LIST: Moderated by Ray Heizer, this list was subject to all the idiosyncrasies of Internet bulletin boards, but nonetheless proved invaluable to researchers and journalists.

JOURNALISTS

JERRY SEPER of the Washington Times was far and away the best beat reporter of the story, handling it week after week in the best tradition of investigative journalism. If other reporters had followed Seper’s lead, the history of the Clintons’ machine might have been quite different.

AMBROSE EVANS-PRITCHARD of the London Telegraph did a remarkable job of digging into some of the seamiest tales from Arkansas and the Clinton past. Other early arrivals on the scene were Alexander Cockburn and Jeff Gerth.

CHRISTOPHER RUDDY, among other fine reports on the Clinton scandals, did the best job laying out the facts in the Vince Foster death case.

ROGER MORRIS AND SALLY DENTON wrote a major expose of events at Mena, but at the last moment the Washington Post’s brass ordered the story killed. It was published by Penthouse and later included in Morris’ “Partners in Power,” the best biography of the Clintons.

OTHERS who helped get parts of the story out included reporters Philip Weiss, Carl Limbacher, Wes Phelan, David Bresnahan, William Sammon, Liza Myers, Mara Leveritt, Matt Drudge, Jim Ridgeway, Nat Hentoff, Michael Isikoff, Christopher Hitchens and Michael Kelly. Also independent investigator Hugh Sprunt and former White House FBI agent Gary Aldrich.

SAM SMITH of the Progressive Review wrote the first book (Shadows of Hope, University of Indiana Press, 1994) deconstructing the Clinton myth. The Review provided extensive coverage of the topic.

THREAT MONITOR
Finding malware on your Windows box (using the command line)

Ed Skoudis
08.16.2007
Rating: -4.62- (out of 5)


RSS FEEDS: Threat Monitor
Add to Google

I hope that headline doesn't scare you. A lot of people shun the Windows command line in favor of more complicated graphical user interfaces. But when it comes to investigating malware infections, various command-line tools can be incredibly helpful, since GUI-based tools can't always do the job.

Listen to Ed Skoudis's tip
Download Ed's command line tricks to your PC or favorite MP3 player.

First off, invoke a command prompt. Go to Start --> Run and type in 'cmd.exe.' Putting '.exe' at the end of the entry is important; it is a far safer way of bringing up a command prompt. To trick users, a malicious program might purposely be called 'cmd.com,' and in such a case, the malware would run if just 'cmd' were typed. Thus, go ahead and type 'cmd.exe' instead.

'netstat'
Next, with a command prompt going, run the netstat command and take a gander at the listening ports on your systems. A lot of people know that 'netstat –na' can provide a list of TCP and UDP ports on the machine. Adding an 'o' to the command arguments can reveal the process ID of each process using a port. And, starting with XP SP2, an added 'b' flag will show the EXE name using each port, along with the dynamic link libraries (DLLs) that it has loaded to communicate with the network. Beware of the 'b,' however. The function can chew up some serious CPU time, tying up between 60% and 100% of your processor for up to a minute.

But, wait, there is more. Suppose you want to look at port usage and see how it changes over time. Adding a space and then an integer to that netstat command, as in "netstat –nao 1", will run the command with a frequency equivalent to the integer, in this case, for every one second. The display will be dumped on the screen continuously, as shown below.

[NAO]

For more information
In our Intrusion Defense School, learn other ways to catch Windows malware.

How good is Windows Vista virus protection? Peter H. Gregory explains.

Learn how certain antimalware tools use the command line to update on demand.

Of course, to sift for malware that uses TCP and UDP ports, you need an idea of what a system's normal port usage should be. To research the ports that are in use on a box, try searching for specific ports in Google. Also, Microsoft has a list of common ports that are used by both Windows clients and servers . You can also research ports associated with both Microsoft and third-party applications, as well as official port assignment lists.

If an unusual TCP or UDP port is found to be in use, you might want to do a Google search. Use a "site:" directive that is associated with an antivirus company like Symantec, Sophos, or McAfee. The sites may have a write-up about malware that uses the given port. Here's an example of a helpful search query:

site:symantec.com tcp port 4444.

'reg'
A write-up from the antivirus vendor may give further insight into any registry keys that the malware may have altered. To query these registry keys at the command line, use the reg command. Even if the antivirus Web site doesn't provide any registry keys to look for, you may want to research the most common registry keys altered by malware: keys associated with system startup and user logon. Commonly known as the "run" registry keys, the reg command can help display their values at the command line. Please note that a lot of legitimate software activates itself using these keys. After running the command, you will discover items under these registry keys. Again, a few Google searches for what is displayed will help separate legitimate settings from malware.

C:\> reg query HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Run
C:\> reg query HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Runonce
C:\> reg query HKLM\Software\Microsoft\Windows\CurrentVersion\Runonce

I'd recommend running the commands an additional time, replacing HKLM with HKCU. The substitution will find user-centric auto-start registry keys, instead of just the system-wide settings under HKLM.

'dir'
It's also smart to check out the autostart folder for any unexpected programs starting from there. Run the familiar old dir command, using /A to display files with or without any attributes set, as well as hidden and unhidden files.

C:\> dir /A "C:\Documents and Settings\All Users\Start Menu\Programs\Startup"

'net users' and 'localgroup administrators'
Some malware adds an account to the local machine. Therefore, it's important to run the command 'net users,' which checks for accounts defined on the system. Also, because some bots add an account to the local administrators group, make sure to run "localgroup administrators," which should check out this particular group's membership. Do you know all of the people in your administrators group? The figure below shows some sample output.

[localadministrators]

'tasklist /svc'
There is one more vital area to analyze: running processes. On Windows XP Professional, the tasklist command can provide a wealth of information. By itself, it shows running processes, their process ID numbers and memory usage. But running 'tasklist /svc' reveals all of the services running out of each process, as shown below. This provides more to search for when researching whether the investigated system may be infected with evil programs. In particular, the svchost.exe processes are usually quite busy, running many services. Spyware sometimes inserts additional services into these processes or others to monitor or control a machine surreptitiously.

[tasklist]

In the end, this handful of commands can provide deeper insight into the configuration of a Windows machine. But practice makes perfect. Spend time analyzing clean systems, so that you grow familiar with what is on a "normal" Windows machine. Then, you can become more sensitive to the weird stuff that malware may inject. With some preparation and practice, command-line skills will significantly improve your understanding of Windows machines and prepare you to battle boldly in the fight against malware.

About the author:
Ed Skoudis is a SANS instructor and a founder and senior security consultant with Intelguardians, a Washington, DC-based information security consulting firm. His expertise includes hacker attacks and defenses, the information security industry and computer privacy issues. In addition to Counter Hack Reloaded, Ed is also the author of Malware: Fighting Malicious Code. He was also awarded 2004, 2005 and 2006 Microsoft MVP awards for Windows Server Security, and is an alumnus of the Honeynet Project. As an expert on SearchSecurity.com, Ed answers your questions related to information security threats.

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After Iraq
By Thomas Sowell
Tuesday, July 17, 2007
Send an email to Thomas Sowell
"And then what?" That is the question which should be asked of those who are demanding that we pull out of Iraq now.

No candid answer should be expected from cynical politicians like Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, who have their bets riding big time on an American defeat in Iraq, as their ticket to winning the 2008 elections.


People examine the wreckage of a vehicle damaged when a suicide bomber detonated a truck wired with explosives near a Kurdish political party's offices, followed by two other car bomb blasts, in the northern city of Kirkuk, 290 kilometers (180 miles) north of Baghdad, Iraq, Monday, July 16, 2007. The coordinated attack, believed to be the deadliest in Kirkuk since the four-year Iraq conflict began, killed more than 80 people and wounded more than 150, police said. (AP Photo/Yahya Ahmed)
Related Media:
VIDEO: Halting Progress in Iraq; House Pushes Pullout
VIDEO: Bush Briefed on 'Grass Roots' Effort in Iraq

But that question should be answered by those who honestly and sincerely think that a troop pullout is the answer to the Iraq problem. What do they think will happen if we do?

That question is studiously avoided by those in politics and the media who urge pulling out.

Those who deal in talking points may believe, or claim to believe, that there will be no further repercussions. But those who have to confront the real world know that pulling out now is a formula for a bigger disaster than anything that has already happened in Iraq.

Should American troops stay in Iraq indefinitely?

Nobody has ever wanted that. Our whole history shows that American troops have repeatedly pulled out of countries around the world when wars ended and enough order was restored to turn the country over to its own people.

The political conflict today is between people who think that pulling out should depend on conditions in Iraq, as those conditions unfold, rather than on arbitrary timetables created by politicians with no military experience, and with a time horizon that extends no further than the 2008 elections.

Those who say that the Iraq war has nothing to do with the war on terror seem not to notice that the terrorists themselves obviously think otherwise.

Terrorists are pouring men and military equipment into Iraq, with the help of Iran, and using suicide bombers there for some reason.

Terrorists recognize the high stakes in the outcome of this war, even if growing numbers of people over here refuse to.

To drive the United States out of Iraq would be a huge victory for the terrorists, attracting both recruits and support from around the world, and causing countries around the world to reconsider their ties to the United States.

International cooperation is essential to thwarting and disrupting terrorist activities, through such things as intelligence sharing among nations and clampdowns on the international money flows that finance terrorist activities. continued...
But how many countries will continue to cooperate with the United States when they know that the terrorists are in this for the long haul, while the U.S. can abandon them to their fate at any moment, whenever it becomes politically expedient at home?

Terrorist or Iranian control of Iraq would give them enormous leverage with other countries in the Middle East, putting control of the oil that is the lifeblood of Western economies in the hands of implacable and ruthless enemies.


People examine the wreckage of a vehicle damaged when a suicide bomber detonated a truck wired with explosives near a Kurdish political party's offices, followed by two other car bomb blasts, in the northern city of Kirkuk, 290 kilometers (180 miles) north of Baghdad, Iraq, Monday, July 16, 2007. The coordinated attack, believed to be the deadliest in Kirkuk since the four-year Iraq conflict began, killed more than 80 people and wounded more than 150, police said. (AP Photo/Yahya Ahmed)
Related Media:
VIDEO: Halting Progress in Iraq; House Pushes Pullout
VIDEO: Bush Briefed on 'Grass Roots' Effort in Iraq

With more resources to finance more international terrorism, does anyone think the terrorists will spare the United States?

Much has been made of how long we have already stayed in Iraq, the casualties, and the mistakes that have been made. But both deaths and mistakes have always been inseparable from war.

As for how long we have been in Iraq, the cost of a war is not measured in time. It is measured in lives lost.

While our media are impatiently waiting for the 4,000th American death in Iraq that they can trumpet, and rub our noses in -- in the name of "honoring the troops" -- we need to understand that casualty rates in Iraq are low, as wars go.

If and when that 4,000th American death in Iraq is reached, we need to recall that more Marines than that were lost taking one island in the Pacific during World War II.

During the Civil War, more than twice as many Union soldiers as that were killed -- in one day -- at the battle of Shiloh, and again at Gettysburg.

The "war on terror" is a misleading phrase. It is the terrorists' war against us -- and it is not something that we can unilaterally call off. Our only choice is where to fight it, over there or over here.

Thomas Sowell is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institute and author of Basic Economics: A Citizen's Guide to the Economy.

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Once were warriors:
Why Islam failed Muslims



By: Ohmyrus

I got the idea for the title of this article from a movie I watched – “Once were Warriors”. The movie highlights the social problems of the Maoris. Most of you probably have not seen the show because the movie was made in New Zealand.

Now lets turn our attention to something more serious. Islam was immensely successful in the first few centuries of its birth. It spread like wildfire from Spain to Pakistan. The success was due to the fact that Islam is a warrior religion - the last of its kind today. But the qualities and ethos that led to success are also some of the reasons for its current failure. Today Muslims are among the poorest and most backward people in the world.

Lets take a look at some Islamic beliefs that make no sense unless you realise that Islam was designed to support a war machine. Firstly there is the emphasis of heavenly rewards for its fallen warriors. Just as the ferocious Vikings believed that brave fallen warriors go to Valhalla, Muslims believe that those who are killed in a Holy War (Jihad) go to heaven where they will be rewarded with 72 virgins.

For the conquerors who survived the war, they will get booty and again girls. So either way they win. It is useful for a commander to have brave warriors who do not fear death. Besides this, Muslims are also discouraged from fraternizing with non-Muslims. The Koran tells Muslims not to take Christians and Jews as friends and also says that Idolaters are filthy. Contempt for non-Muslims lead to hate. Hate is a useful emotion to cultivate in your warriors. Compassion and empathy for the “other” do not make willing warriors.

Another martial value that Islam promotes is discipline. It does this in many ways. Firstly, authority is centralized in one person - Mohammed and later his successors. There is no separation of church and state - or should I say mosque and state. This makes sure that there is no opposition. The Roman emperors too made sure that they were unchallenged by appointing themselves Pontifex Maximus (Chief Priest). This is in sharp contrast to medieval European kings whose ambitions were often opposed by the church.

Next, Islam is highly ritualistic and many rituals and practices appear to a modern person to be pointless. For example, out of the five pillars of Islam, four of them are ritualistic and in themselves do not do any material good. Praying five times a day, declaring Mohammed to be a prophet, going to Mecca to walk round and round the Black Stone and fasting during Ramadan do not by themselves make this a happier, kinder and more prosperous world. The only one of the five pillars that does some good to mankind is the giving of the zakat - alms for the poor. However, this alms giving must be only for Muslims or it does not count. Therefore it benefits only a fifth of mankind.

Would it not be better for the Grand Designer of Islam (whoever that might be) to declare the five pillars to contain prohibitions against murder, theft, adultery and encouragements to perform kindness and assistance to the unfortunate people of the world? Besides these five pillars, Islam has countless other rituals and practices. These include the growing of beards, which hand to use to wash your private parts, which shoe to put on first, what types of body hair you are allowed to remove and so on. Some of these practices and rituals appear meaningless to me but on further examination there is a purpose to them.

The trick is to stop thinking that Islam, like other religions, was designed primarily to uplift humanity from barbarism by making us kinder, more forgiving and so on. It was designed instead to support a war machine. Islamic rituals and practices are designed at least partly to induce discipline and to unite Islam’s early followers who were drawn from many tribes. Lets take a look at the requirement to pray five times a day, facing Mecca.

By praying five times a day, Muslims are reminded to submit to God 5 times a day. By facing Mecca, they are reminded of Arabia and to subtly get Muslims to identify themselves with Arabia. That is also why they insist that you cannot understand the Koran fully unless you know Arabic. Prayers are to be made in Arabic. That is why there are so many Arab wannabes among non-Arab Muslims. This is also why to this day, Muslims are a potential fifth column in western countries. Their loyalty is often to their Ummah and not to the state they live in. Loyalty to their nation state is weak.

Rituals are important as brainwashing tools to instill discipline and loyalty.
Islam's focus on rituals remind me of the rituals in the military. Every morning you have a flag raising ceremony. You salute the officers. You must all be clean shaven and wear the same clothes. You sing patriotic songs. Soldiers perform all manner of rituals designed to promote loyalty, bravery and obedience.

Performing Islam's seemingly meaningless rituals is an affirmation that they do not question the will of God. In practice this meant that they do not question Mohammed and his successors. This is really good military discipline and is something all military leaders want.

Now, lets turn our attention to the issue of apostasy for this is an important way in which Islam imposes discipline. As we all know, Islam is the only religion that insists that apostates be put to death. Muslims equate apostasy as treachery. For others, you are a true Christian, Buddhist or Hindu, only if you truly believe. Threatening people with death does not change what they believe in their hearts and is thus pointless.

This Muslim punishment only makes sense if you imagine yourself as a military commander of an army drawn from many tribes and religions (before conversion). An apostate is seen as someone who wants to defect to the enemy. Thus once again, Islamic teaching only make sense if you view Islam not so much as a religion like others but as a tool for Arab imperialism.

There is another thing that I should mention. According to the Koran and Hadiths, Muslims are allowed to have up to four wives and an unlimited number of slave girls. Having multiple wives actually gave a society constantly warring with its neighbours a military advantage over those that practice monogamy.

War widows can find new husbands and thereby produce children. Women were valued chiefly for their procreation abilities to produce more warriors. Of course in all ancient societies, women were lowly valued but more so in a warlike one where the survival of the society depended on male warriors. This accounts for the extra low status Islam gave women.

But what worked well for a medieval war machine is disastrous for Muslims in the modern world. For the early Muslims, they quickly gained wealth and power after they burst out of their poverty stricken Arabian Peninsula. The Arab war machine was supported by the blind obedience, brotherhood, courage, hatred and high birth rates inspired by Islam. But these same qualities have locked modern Muslims into poverty and often violence.

Without separation of mosque and state, it is difficult to make reforms. Islam is described by its followers as a complete way of life. This means that the ancient detailed instructions have been written down for Muslims to follow in all aspects of life for all time. This reminds me of the specialists and generalists of nature.

Some species like the Koala bear are specialists. They have adapted very well to a certain type of environment – the eucalyptus forests of Australia. But they are vulnerable if there is a change in environment. Generalists on the other hand do not evolve special advantages to thrive in any one environment.

Man is a generalist and can be found living in deserts as well as the frozen ice of the tundra. Had we specialized by growing blubber like the whales, we might thrive very well in the tundra but we can never live in deserts.

Islam is like the specialists. It prospered because its ethos makes it very successful as a medieval war machine when men fought with swords, bows and spears. But these same values make Muslims ill-equipped in an industrial and now post industrial world.

The emphasis on jihad where stained soldiers of Allah are rewarded with virgins in heaven may make great warriors but contribute to suicide bombers and intractable wars against unbelievers.

Conflicts with Muslims seem so hard to resolve as there is a never-ending stream of volunteers to fight in hopes of attaining their places in heaven. There can be no moderates when it comes to going to heaven. Inciting hatred for non-believers does not help the resolution of conflicts. Such thinking is bound to get a reaction from the non-believers they come into contact with.

The desire for war cannot be conducive for economic growth. This is doubly disastrous for Muslims because as I shall later explain, their religion retards economic progress in many ways. War coupled with economic weakness spells disaster. One of the driving force for economic growth is technology. While Islam can create disciplined soldiers, it cannot create good scientists.

As explained earlier, Islam’s ritualistic practices inculcate blind obedience among its followers and not questioning inquisitive minds. The way the Koran is taught in traditional Madrassahs is by memorization. This leaves no room for asking questions. The student is not encouraged to ask questions but only receives wisdom and learning from the teacher. Asking questions risks the student of being accused of blasphemy or unbelief.

The learning process is receptive and not interactive. Great scientists and philosophers do not come from such a passive environment. Human society progresses only if you have people willing to challenge orthodoxy. It should be noted that some of the greatest thinkers, scientists, philosophers, physicians and poets in Islam’s golden age were accused of blasphemy or apostasy. Bashshar Ibn Burd, Avicenna, Averroes, Al-Razi and Al-Ma’arri were most likely apostates.

Next we take a look at Islam’s subordination of women. This keeps them at home. Muslim women are not encouraged to work. It is a fact that women who stay at home tend to produce more children than those who go out to work. A high fertility rate may be a military advantage in an era when men fought with primitive weapons, but this is a handicap in the era of the internet.

Firstly, if women are regarded as second class citizens, there is less incentive to educate them properly. Semi-educated or illiterate mothers will find difficulty in educating their own children. Half the population is women. Therefore half the potential labour force is also women. You are not making full use of your human resources. This is not a new problem.

By Averroes time (1126 – 1198), the problem had manifested itself. Five hundred years after Mohammed, Muslim society already needed reforms. The practices that turned warring Arab tribes into world conquerors were already becoming outdated. This is what he said:

“Women are kept like domestic animals or house plants for purposes of gratification, of a very questionable character besides, instead of being allowed to take part in the production of material and intellectual wealth, and in the preservation of the same.”

Furthermore, a high fertility rate means more mouths to feed. While population pressures could be motivation for impoverished tribes to participate in wars of conquest in the 7th century, this is not an option today. You need industrial might to support a war machine today where wars are complex and expensive.

Today, a high fertility rate leads to poverty in third world countries and poverty stricken countries are advised by development experts to curb their population growth. Related to this issue of high fertility is the early age of some Muslim marriages. All agricultural societies tend to have early marriages. But other societies can be more easily persuaded to change with the times.

Muslim society, on the other hand, is more resistance to change. Thus recently, an Indian Muslim group wants exemption from a law requiring marriage partners to be at least 18 years old. This well-meaning law is aimed at allowing time for people to get a proper education before marriage and child-care.

The problem arises for the Muslim community because of Mohammed’s marriage to 9 year old Aisha. To accept this law would in their eyes be an insult to their holy Prophet. How can a Muslim accept a law, which would have criminalized their Prophet? This case again highlights how Islam is stuck in the 7th century.

Islam is a warrior’s creed that served its early followers well. From impoverished desert tribes, they rose to forge an empire in a short time that stretched from Spain to India. The ethos it engendered – brotherhood for believers, contempt and hatred for non-believers, belief in heavenly rewards for fallen warriors, a high fertility rate (which requires the subordination of women), blind obedience – created formidable warriors.

But these same qualities are handicaps for Muslims in the age of the microchip. Today they lead to poverty, belligerency, war and defeat. Many Muslims look back with fondness to their days of glory and try to recover their former days by using the old methods. That is why there is today a rising tide of Islamic fundamentalism across the Muslim world. They are bewildered at their weakness and look for conspiracy theories. Muslims think their failure is due to some Jewish or American plot not realizing that failure comes from within themselves. They are out of touch with reality.

Once were warriors, Muslims are now like Don Quixote tilting at windmills in a world they no longer understand.



Comments on this article

This is some good stuff:
Liberals don't believe anything. To be able to believe in something you have to think. Liberals don't think they FEEL.

My theory of liberals is that a liberal is a person who lacks the gene required for humans to be able to mentally process reality.

The theory will remain a theory pending the identification of the gene. However, much evidence of the theory's premise exists by examining the conclusions reached by liberal logic.

Let me share some observations I’ve gathered from Free Republic post.

Is it the liberal or the conservative who believes you can bring about prosperity by discouraging thrift?
Is it the liberal or the conservative who believes you can help small men by tearing down big men?
Is it the liberal or the conservative who believes you can strengthen the weak by weakening the strong?
Is it the liberal or the conservative who believes you can lift the wage earner by pulling down the wage payer?
Is it the liberal or the conservative who believes you can help the poor man by destroying the rich?
Is it the liberal or the conservative who believes you can further the brotherhood of man by inciting class hatred?
Is it the liberal or the conservative who believes you can build character and courage by taking away men's initiative and independence?
Is it the liberal or the conservative who believes you can help men permanently by doing for them what they could and should do for themselves?

Today's liberals have so sullied the term that even they shy away from it, preferring euphemisms like "progressive." (By that, they mean "progress" on the road to socialism.) If this is too abstract, here are a few practical distinctions:

Conservatives believe in individual freedom and responsibility.
Liberals believe in sacrificing individual freedom for socially desirable outcomes.

Conservatives believe in limited government.
Liberals believe that one of government's primary roles is social engineering.

Conservatives believe in free markets.
Liberals believe in government controls and central planning.

Conservatives believe that some problems have no solution and can only be mitigated at best.
Liberals believe that most every problem has a government solution.

Conservatives are concerned about the production of wealth.
Liberals are concerned about the redistribution of wealth.

Conservatives believe in the equality of opportunities.
Liberals believe in the equality of outcomes.

Conservatives believe that human nature is what makes us imperfect.
Liberals believe that human nature can be changed and perfected.

Conservatives believe in peace through strength.
Liberals believe in peace through cooperation and good will.

There are many other examples. Some are listed below whose liberal solutions defy logic in light of reality.

Why does a liberal feel that other citizens are not paying “their fair share” of taxes when taxpayers with 17% of the income pays 30% of the taxes?

Why does a liberal believe that throwing yet more money at education will improve its quality but adding educational choice will not?

Why does a liberal agree with the government when it subsidizes, taxes, regulates, and then sues a product manufacturer?

Why does a liberal oppose capital punishment of the guilty after receiving due process in law while supporting the capital punishment of an innocent fetus?

Why does a liberal support using welfare money to sue gun manufacturers instead of using the money to arrest the offenders?

Why does a liberal agree with the conservative that black citizens are equal and then support affirmative action and quotas indicating the liberal believes that blacks are not equal?

The empirical evidence that liberals cannot process reality is virtually unlimited but I won’t include the two hundred or so additional observations I have collected from Free Republic. Feel free to add comments or additional observations.
15 posted on 05/14/2007 9:19:19 AM PDT by MosesKnows
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Blacks Deserve More Than Liberalism, National Review: More Blacks In Conservative Movement Would Benefit Entire Nation - CBS News
Blacks Deserve More Than Liberalism
National Review: More Blacks In Conservative Movement Would Benefit Entire Nation

Feb. 11, 2007
Former Lieutenant Governor of Maryland, Michael Steele, says that he won black votes by being unapologetic about his conservative views. (AP)
(National Review Online) This column was written by Peter Kirsanow.
Two simple and succinct comments made by Michael Steele and Newt Gingrich at the National Review Institute Conservative Summit last month provide guidance to the conservative movement and the Republican Party on how to sell their ideas and widen their base. Were the advice to be followed, the entire country would benefit.

Gingrich observed that conservatives have a tendency to take self-defeating pride in not paying attention to language. By this he wasn't saying that conservatives should employ politically-correct language, but rather that conservatives need to improve their ability to communicate their ideas and message to the broader public.

For his part, Steele stated that despite his opponent's furious efforts to dissuade black voters from supporting him, he received 30 percent of the black vote because he took his conservative message directly to such voters and declared, unapologetically, "This is who I am." (Yes, being black didn't hurt either.)

Support for the Republican Party among blacks remains abysmal. Yet Republicans may have recently begun to do a slightly better job of following the advice of Gingrich and the example of Steele. Despite averaging about 12 percent of the black vote over the last two decades, Republicans have shown faint signs of progress. For example, in 2004 President Bush nearly doubled the number of black votes he received in 2000. Republicans have suffered a setback due to the racially charged rhetoric surrounding Katrina, but there's no evidence that the effect will be long term.

On the other hand, the conservative movement's appeal to blacks has remained fairly stagnant over the last ten years. Thomas Sowell and Walter Williams joke that in the late Seventies, a national meeting of black conservatives occurred whenever the two got together for dinner. The number of conservatives grew in the Eighties and early Nineties, due in no small measure to the writings of Sowell and Williams. But the overall numbers were and remain tiny.

I’m pretty sure I was the only black guy in an audience of about 800 at the National Review Institute Conservative Summit in January 1993 (although Bob Woodson appeared briefly for Jack Kemp's speech). Fourteen years later, there were perhaps half a dozen black faces in this year's crowd of about eight hundred.

In making these observations, I don't mean to count by race, be hyper race-conscious, or contend that some form of proportionality is in order. Nor is it to suggest that these figures are somehow representative of the number of black movement-conservatives. Rather, it's to illustrate why the Gingrich/Steele formulation deserves close consideration. The formulation is important not just to the conservative movement or to Republicans in general, but to the entire country.

Liberalism, Aggressive Multiculturalism, And National Unity

The dearth of blacks in both the Republican party and the conservative movement necessarily cabins the conservative policy agenda. In the decades since enactment of the 1964 Civil Rights Act, the Democratic party and liberals in general have used blacks both as a reason to advance the liberal agenda and as a bulwark against proposed conservative reforms. Liberals’ totemic use of black victimhood has been just as instrumental as their use of class warfare rhetoric in passing and preserving all manner of liberal policies: public housing, welfare, racial preferences, government health care, government education without choice, minimum wage — each is defended to some degree by invoking the poor and underprivileged (read: blacks and a few whites and Hispanics; indeed, the inner-cities of America are the laboratories where all the consequences of the foregoing liberal policies have come to life). John Edwards' "two Americas" is merely a version of this model reduced to sound bite to more effectively convey the supposed need for ever more government.

The appeal of the model isn’t confined just to blacks. It appeals to the media in search of a narrative that validates their preconceptions, to baby boomers seeking to recapture the heady days of the civil rights movement, to egalitarians aspiring to a utopian society, and to soccer moms and the like who, in good faith, want to do the "right" thing. That's a lot of voters and a lot of political clout.

In addition, the model has the effect of causing Republican politicians to be in perpetual apology mode on any matter even remotely related to race. Not wanting to appear hard-hearted or racist, Republicans and even movement conservatives trim their policy positions to convey compassion and racial sensitivity. The results are an inability to articulate reasoned opposition to governmental encroachment and bad policies. This ultimately produces positions that are seldom anything more than "Democrat Lite" — bad for the country as a whole and bad for blacks in particular.

Even more important than contributing to bad domestic policies, the absence of blacks from the Republican Party and the conservative movement has adverse consequences for the nation’s culture and cohesion. Liberals, using a Saul Alinsky approach to cobbling together disparate ethnic and interest groups, have unleashed an aggressive multiculturalism — what Christopher Hitchens calls one-way multiculturalism — that erodes our national resolve and enervates our cultural confidence. This aggressive multiculturalism, applauded by academics and the media, elevates race and ethnicity over American citizenship. It promotes allegiance to the tribe rather than to the nation as a whole. The eventual consequence is the kind of post-nationalism endemic to Western Europe. Needless to say, atomization of national unity isn’t a good defense against a foreign enemy. And, per Mark Steyn, the more aggressive a society’s multiculturalism, the more readily that society retreats in the face of a culturally confident foe.


(Page 2 of 2)
Feb. 11, 2007
Former Lieutenant Governor of Maryland, Michael Steele, says that he won black votes by being unapologetic about his conservative views. (AP)

WHAT DO YOU THINK?

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(National Review Online) Aggressive multiculturalism wouldn’t have such a hospitable environment if more blacks were in the conservative movement. Liberals couldn’t as easily play on white guilt to pile on the multicultural slop that pervades the academy. Politicians would have a tougher time using racial appeals to divide and dispirit. Pernicious legislation passed ostensibly to help the poor and minorities, but that actually harms its intended beneficiaries, would have a harder time even getting out of committee.

Therefore, having more blacks in the conservative movement isn’t simply a matter of "diversity," "inclusiveness," or some other vapid concept. As a matter of political calculation it will give Republicans more backbone to resist liberal policies while promoting conservative ones. Accordingly, having more blacks in the conservative movement is good for blacks, the movement, and the nation as a whole.

Conveying The Conservative Message

Getting the conservative message to blacks is a form of affirmative action, i.e., affirmative action as originally conceived, before it metastasized into preferences, quotas, and set-asides. Of course, blacks shouldn’t be given preferential treatment or accorded privileged status within the party or the movement — and not just because racial discrimination is antithetical to conservatism; tokenism has its own toxicity. Conservatives would do well simply to make sure black audiences are as aware of the conservative message as anyone else. Just as conservative organizations make sure college students hear the other side of the arguments made by liberal professors, conservatives should make sure blacks hear the other side of the arguments made by the Democratic party, the NAACP, the Congressional Black Caucus, and the rest of the vast civil rights establishment.

Some conservatives contend that nothing more need be done to hone and spread the conservative message to discrete groups, particularly racial and ethnic groups. For some it seems this is almost a Luddite form of resistance; for others it’s an extension of a laissez faire mentality.

This is where the Gingrich/Steele formulation comes into play. Conservatives who think that the sheer gravitational pull of their superior message should be sufficient to bring open-minded blacks into the movement grossly miscalculate the Left’s utter monopoly on black attention. Again, as Steele says, conservatives must make sure to go to blacks, explain conservative positions without equivocation, and say, unapologetically, "This is who I am."

Sure, it's easier for a black guy to make that pitch. But let's face it: Conservatives don't have a lot of bench strength in that regard. So everyone’s got to play.

There's a receptive audience out there. But the messenger should keep in mind Gingrich's advice concerning message. For example, most black conservatives can relate an experience similar to the following.

In the early Nineties, I attended a dinner party populated by about a dozen black guests very loyal to the Democratic party — some of whom had even run for office as Democrats. They didn’t know that I was, and am, a conservative.

During the course of the evening the conversation swerved into politics. I spouted unadulterated "conservative" positions on subjects such as school choice, welfare reform, affirmative action, and the Clinton health care plan. Every single guest agreed, unreservedly and sometimes adamantly, with my arguments. That is, until I made the mistake of prefacing one of my points by stating (ironically), "As Newt Gingrich pointed out ..." The temperature in the room dropped forty degrees at the mention of the name (it could’ve been any other well-known conservative’s name just as well). Pure hostility.

I don’t recall the specific point I was making at the time, but it doesn’t matter. Not only was that particular point rejected, but so was every subsequent one I tried to make. Several guests even recanted their support for the arguments I’d made earlier in the evening. Such was the brand name of conservatism.

The point isn’t that Gingrich’s or any other conservative’s name shouldn’t be mentioned if you hope to convert black audiences. Rather, it’s that Gingrich’s advice at the NRI Conservative Summit was smart and forward-looking. The above anecdote illustrates that conservatives have a message that resonates with all audiences, provided we take both Steele’s and Gingrich’s advice: Serve up 100 proof conservatism, say forthrightly “This is who I am,” and be mindful throughout of communicating effectively. Had Goldwater the benefit of Gingrich’s advice, the GOP today might be averaging 25 percent of the black vote instead of 12 percent — and that 25 percent is all it would take to render the continued relevance of the Democratic Party questionable, unless it reforms dramatically.

Following the Gingrich/Steele formulation doesn’t mean that waves of black folks are going to join the conservative movement. That hope has foundered so often that even the prospect of a partial realignment seems like a cruel joke. But the good news is that, aside from the efforts of Ken Mehlman when he was at the RNC, conservatives/Republicans have never employed the Gingrich/Steele approach in a sustained fashion. So there’s plenty of room for success.

Black college students in particular are a promising market for the conservative message. This cohort is barraged by liberalism not just from academics, but from the black establishment as well. Almost without fail, the conservative message is received with enthusiastic applause when I speak to black students. After one presentation at a historically black college, a student summed up many of the students’ comments: “I’ve never heard that (conservative arguments) before. That really made sense. All we get from (here he mentioned the names of some well-known black leaders) is a bunch of the same old crap.”

That’s why the conservative message can sell. It’s sensible. And quite often the other side of the argument is just a bunch of crap.

But the conservative message won’t sell unless the prospective buyer hears it.