GIVE ME VIRTUE

Statesmen ... may plan and speculate for Liberty, but it is Religion and Morality alone, which can establish the Principles upon which Freedom can securely stand....The only foundation of a free Constitution, is pure Virtue,and if this cannot be inspired into our People, in a great Measure, than they have it now, They may change their Rulers, and the forms of Government, but they will not obtain a lasting Liberty." -- John Adams (letter to Zabdiel Adams, 21 June 1776)

WHO NEEDS NUKES? The problem with nuclear weapons today can be summed up as follows: They are going out of fashion where they are needed most and coming into fashion where they are needed least. -- Bret Stephens, opinionjournal.com, 3/20/07

KYOTO IS ONLY A DEMO!

Columnist Steven Milloy recalls talking with Mr. Gore in 2006 about the 1997 Kyoto Protocol he helped negotiate as vice president. "Did we think Kyoto would [reduce global warming] when we signed it? . . . Hell no!" said Mr. Gore, according to Mr. Milloy. The former vice president then explained that the real purpose of Kyoto was to demonstrate that international support could be mustered for action on environmental issues. -- John Fund, opinionjournal.com, 3/19/07

GUNS FOR DC

In a major triumph for the Constitution, the Circuit Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia ruled last Friday that the Second Amendment means exactly what it says

...."To summarize, we conclude that the Second Amendment protects an individual right to keep and bear arms. That right existed prior to the formation of the new government under the Constitution and was premised on the private use of arms for activities such as hunting and self-defense, the latter being understood as resistance to either private lawlessness or the depredations of a tyrannical government (or a threat from abroad)." (Circuit Court of Appeals for
the District of Columbia, 3/09/07)

-- PatriotPost.us, 3/16/0

THE NEW FASCISM

Fascism idolizes the state, socialists idolize "society" and communists idolize"humanity" as a whole.

What holds these ideologies together is much stronger than what divides them: they are all dedicated to the proposition that the rights and desires of individuals are properly subsumed by the needs of the whole. Individualism is selfishness, rights are collective, and the "good" of the whole is the true measure of society....

So today we are witnessing the rise of a new version of the same old collectivist ideal; instead of the State or Humanity being elevated above individualism, it's an idealized version of the environment or the "Earth." Call it Nature, call it Gaia, or even call it Climate, the ideologists of collectivism are just trying to sell us a new reason to subsume our individual liberty to a collectivist whole....

The "solution" to the climate change "crisis" is exactly the same "solution"that was proposed to solve the "population bomb" crisis in the 70's. It's the same solution that was proposed to solve the "crisis" of capitalist"exploitation." It's always the same collectivist solution, whatever the"crisis:" the relinquishing of individual rights in order to promote the greater good....

The people who warned you about the crisis are the very people who you need to follow in order to solve it.

In today's rebirth of fascism the leaders of tomorrow are the academic-media-political elite who run the major Universities, the government bureaucracies, and of course the all important media.

The elite is those who know better than you what is good for you.

-- David Strom, townhall.com, 3/1/07

YOU NEED COURAGE It is dangerous to be right when the government is wrong. -- Voltaire

YOU NEED GOD You leave out God, and you substitute the devil. -- Winston Churchill

YOU NEED LIBERTY AND LAW Without liberty, law loses its nature and its name, and becomes oppression. Without law, liberty also loses its nature and its name, and becomes licentiousness. -- James Wilson

YOU NEED PUBLIC VIRTUE America needs a people who do not merely talk about public virtues, but embrace them with passion and humility. -- Brent Bozell

YOU DON'T NEED MORE GOVERNMENT Even in the best of times, government is mightily incompetent -- and the bigger government gets, the more incompetent it becomes. -- Michael Novak, OpinionJournal.com, 3/14/07

WHAT HAS TO HAPPEN:

1. The creation of an Iraqi government that is dominated by Shia, neutral to Iran, hostile to jihadists but accommodating to some Sunni groups.
2. Guarantees for Iran's commercial interests in southern Iraqi oil fields, with some transfers to the Sunnis (who have no oil in their own territory) from fields in both the northern (Kurdish) and southern (Shiite) regions.
3. Guarantees for U.S. commercial interests in the Kurdish regions.
4. An Iraqi military without offensive capabilities, but substantial domestic power. This means limited armor and air power, but substantial light infantry.
5. An Iraqi army operated on a "confessional" basis -- each militia and insurgent group retained as units and controlling its own regions.
6. Guarantee of a multiyear U.S. presence, without security responsibility for Iraq, at about 40,000troops.
7. A U.S.-Iranian "commission" to manage political conflict in Iraq.
8. U.S. commercial relations with Iran.
9. The definition of the Russian role,without its exclusion.
10. A meaningless but symbolic commitment to a new Israeli-Palestinian peace process.

-- George Friedman, Stratfor Geopolitical Intelligence Report, 3/13/07

DEMORALIZING COWARDICE: [In a letter from Army Sgt. Daniel Dobson, he] says he was in the chow hall in Mosul, watching CNN on the day of the House vote [decrying the sending of more troops to Iraq]. He writes ... "it made me furious to see congressmen unashamedly proclaim their cowardice, but the reaction of the soldiers tore my heart in two. The faces were that of men that looked as if they were just told there is no United States to go home to. The fury gives way to depression: the thought alone that our elected representatives do not represent us anymore is more than depressing. We see cowardice, sickening spineless cowardice and it makes soldiers sick." -- Cal Thomas, townhall.com, 2/20/07

A GLOBAL ANCHOR: There can be no security anywhere in the free world if there is no fiscal and economic stability within the United States. -- Ronald Reagan, reagan2020.us/speeches/A_Time_for_Choosing.asp, 1964

BIGOTRY IS BACK: Anti-religious bigotry serves a lot of agendas. The war on faith in America -- the effort to drive faith-based people from the public square and faith-based arguments from polite conversation -- has been underway for three decades, and is picking up steam. A Mormon is just a convenient target, and one that provides media pundits with a convenient cover. They voice their concern with [Mitt] Romney's faith by putting that concern into the mouths of unnamed evangelicals. ... Most of the published attacks on Mormons for being Mormons come in the mainstream, secular press. The legitimizing of this bigotry is far advanced. Excuses are offered for it, but it remains bigotry. ... Will Romney's religious faith hurt his candidacy? That remains to be seen, but if it does, it will have hurt the country much more than him. The bigotry that was thought to have been buried in 1960 will have been exhumed. It will be difficult to kill a second time. -- Hugh Hewitt, townhall.com, 2/19/07

THIS WAR IS DIFFERENT

The enemy [ i.e. terrorists in Iraq] clearly has no conscience, and they possess no concept of losing this war, display total disregard for the Geneva Conventions, and use every effort to maim and kill as many people as possible. ...

During the initial phase, Operation Iraqi Freedom, there was total focus on destruction of the Regime of Saddam Hussein. ... We were determined to beat the enemy. ... We must return to this mindset. While discarding all rules of engagement would be harmful, it is time that the U.S. military focus on winning, place a hiatus on nation building. ... It is time for the U.S. to use deception and aggression to fight an enemy that has no regard for the sanctity of human life. ...

In the 21st century, we should be reminded that there will never be another war like the American Revolution. The enemy will not wear red and stand in straight lines. The enemy lurks in every building, in the marketplace, in the schools, and behind women and children. If we don't learn to fight this kind of war, our loss in Iraq will only be the first. The global War on Terror requires that we alter this equation and calculate a new solution to win.

-- Lt. Col. Scott Rutter, townhall.com, 2/19/2007

ACCEPT NO SUBSTITUTE: ...In war, there is no substitute for victory, in peace, there is no substitute for growth. ... The strength of our economy promotes freedom not just at home but in every distant corner of our planet. End growth in America and the lights start to go out all over the world. -- Phil Gramm quoting John McCain, opinionjournal.com, 2/20/07

DEFYING THE DEFICIT: Bills that perpetuate wasteful spending should be vetoed. Not some of them, all of them. The numbers should shock us; indifference to them should shame us. -- John McCain, quoted by Phil Gramm, opinionjournal.com, 2/20/07

PEACEFUL SITS THE POWDER KEG: [On March 4, China announced the] largest jump in its military spending in five years -- 17.8 percent -- to $45 billion. According to military experts, however, even that number is likely understated by as much as a factor of four. ... Fortunately for the PRC, America has a seemingly unlimited supply of gullible lemmings who believe China is conducting this massive buildup for peaceful, defensive purposes only. -- PatriotPost.us, 3/9/07

PREJUDICE D'JOUR: Political correctness is not really about sensitivity and courtesy, which require mutual respect. Rather, political correctness entails intolerance for some prejudices but impunity for others. -- James Taranto

MARTIAN KYOTO? Habibullo Abdussamatov, head of the St. Petersburg's Pulkovo Astronomical Observatory in Russia, says the Mars data is evidence that the current global warming on Earth is being caused by changes in the sun...."The long-term increase in solar irradiance is heating both Earth and Mars,"he said."Man-made greenhouse warming has made a small contribution to the warming seen on Earth in recent years, but it cannot compete with the increase in solar irradiance," Abdussamatov said....Abdussamatov's work, however, has not been well received by other climate scientists. -- Kate Ravilious, nationalgeographic.com, 02/28/07

LYING ABOUT HAPPINESS: Focus on [this] statement for a minute -- "the connections to happiness are assumptions and lies." Media lead us to the unexamined assumption that owning more and better things will make us happier, that controlling more of our lives and being more independent and less needful of others will give us more happiness. Deep down though, we know that the implied and assumed connections are false, and that the real connections to happiness lie more with things like commitment, relationships, interdependence, sharing, delayed gratification, appreciation, and faith. -- Richard Eyre, meridianmagazine.com, 3/2/07

EXPERTS disAGREE: In 1997, Dr. Frederick Seitz, past president of the National Academy of Sciences, invited colleagues to sign a petition based on Robinson's work, which received more than 20,000 signers, most of whom hold advanced degrees in relevant fields of study. That petition stated, in part:

"There is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of carbon dioxide, methane, or other greenhouse gasses is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth's atmosphere and disruption of the Earth's climate. Moreover, there is substantial scientific evidence that increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide produce many beneficial effects upon the natural plant and animal environments of the Earth."

-- PatriotPost.US, 2/23/07

FEARING WHAT IS NORMAL: A general characteristic of Mr. Gore's approach is to assiduously ignore the fact that the earth and its climate are dynamic; they are always changing even without any external forcing. To treat all change as something to fear is bad enough; to do so in order to exploit that fear is much worse. -- Richard S. Lindzen, Professor of Atmospheric Science at MIT, PatriotPost.US, 2/23/07

METEOROLOGICAL METRIC: The degree to which you believe global warming is causing major hurricanes, is inversely proportional to your knowledge about these storms. -- Dr. William Gray, meteorologist, PatriotPost.US, 2/23/07

THE IMPUGN-THE-DOUBTER DEFENSE: It is a classic notion on the left in general, and of environmentalist zealots in particular, that no one can disagree with them unless they are either uninformed or dishonest. -- Thomas Sowell

THE SCIENCE IS CONCLUSIVE: The political left's favorite argument is that there is no argument. -- Thomas Sowell