There is still the problem of the over-reach that has slowly stretched the form beyond the original mandate as specified in the constitution. You can tell that they are sensitive to these concerns by the little historical blurb they have after each question. Nevermind the fact that their present “reasons” have little or nothing to do with the original reasons some questions were asked long ago. IE: property ownership, and such. (If you recall, only property owners could vote back then.)

I will give kudo’s for them keeping the form to only 10 questions. (I don’t know about the “long form” some are getting, and from the sound of it, it seems onerous.) I will damn them to hell for spending 14 billion dollars doing it, including the sponsorship of a stock-car, and super-bowl ads.

There is however still some items they have no business asking, and I didn’t answer questions like them 10, 20, or 30 years ago either, so my reasons have nothing to do with Obama. They have NEVER prosecuted anyone for failing to fill it out, or for leaving parts blank. Do fill it out and send it in…it is important.

I have put the 10 questions here, along with my answers.

The Questions on the Form:

How many people were living or staying in this house, apartment, or mobile home on April 1, 2010?

We ask this question to help get an accurate count of the number of people in the household on Census Day, April 1, 2010. The answer should be based on the guidelines in the ‘Start here’ section. We use the information to ensure response accuracy and completeness and to contact respondents whose forms have incomplete or missing information.

Answer: 5

Were there any additional people staying here April 1, 2010 that you did not include in Question 1?

Asked since 1880. We ask this question to help identify people who may have been excluded in the count provided in Question 1. We use the information to ensure response accuracy and completeness and to contact respondents whose forms have incomplete or missing information.

Answer: No

Is this house, apartment, or mobile home: owned with mortgage, owned without mortgage, rented, occupied without rent?

Asked since 1890. Homeownership rates serve as an indicator of the nation’s economy. The data are also used to administer housing programs and to inform planning decisions.

Answer: Left blank

What is your telephone number?

We ask for a phone number in case we need to contact a respondent when a form is returned with incomplete or missing information.

Answer: Left blank

Please provide information for each person living here. Start with a person here who owns or rents this house, apartment, or mobile home. If the owner or renter lives somewhere else, start with any adult living here. This will be Person 1. What is Person 1’s name?

Listing the name of each person in the household helps the respondent to include all members, particularly in large households where a respondent may forget who was counted and who was not. Also, names are needed if additional information about an individual must be obtained to complete the census form. Federal law protects the confidentiality of personal information, including names.

Answer: Person 1 (2,3,4,5)

What is Person 1’s sex?

Asked since 1790. Census data about sex are important because many federal programs must differentiate between males and females for funding, implementing and evaluating their programs. For instance, laws promoting equal employment opportunity for women require census data on sex. Also, sociologists, economists, and other researchers who analyze social and economic trends use the data.

Answer for persons 1 thru 5: Male, female, female, female, male.

What is Person 1’s age and Date of Birth?

Asked since 1800. Federal, state, and local governments need data about age to interpret most social and economic characteristics, such as forecasting the number of people eligible for Social Security or Medicare benefits. The data are widely used in planning and evaluating government programs and policies that provide funds or services for children, working-age adults, women of childbearing age, or the older population.

Answer for persons 1 thru 5: 49, 47, 17, 16, 15. (No dates given)

Is Person 1 of Hispanic, Latino or Spanish origin?

Asked since 1970. The data collected in this question are needed by federal agencies to monitor compliance with anti-discrimination provisions, such as under the Voting Rights Act and the Civil Rights Act. State and local governments may use the data to help plan and administer bilingual programs for people of Hispanic origin.

Answer: Left blank

What is Person 1’s race?

Asked since 1790. Race is key to implementing many federal laws and is needed to monitor compliance with the Voting Rights Act and the Civil Rights Act. State governments use the data to determine congressional, state and local voting districts. Race data are also used to assess fairness of employment practices, to monitor racial disparities in characteristics such as health and education and to plan and obtain funds for public services.

Answer: Other/Human

Does Person 1 sometimes live or stay somewhere else?

This is another question we ask in order to ensure response accuracy and completeness and to contact respondents whose forms have incomplete or missing information.
Answer: No

“Exactly how Americans define “socialism” or what exactly they think of when they hear the word is not known”

It occurs to me, that this statement encapsulates much of what I believe to be a the failings and ills of society today.

Gone are the days, if they once existed, of opinions rooted in fact and study. Regardless of your thought of socialism, should not an individual have, at the very least, a general understanding of an issue prior to lending their thoughts a voice? I cannot help but feel, that this seemingly minor issue, lies curled at the base of the majority of the problems we face as Americans today. The consistent failure, day in and out, to truly define that which you stand for and against has become an anchor on this great nation.

Daily, people expound upon that which they half-understand, vote without research or fact, blindly trust that all will be “okay”, and, in the end, assign blame where they see fit. The responsibility for the mess we currently enjoy lies within us all. Whether because we have failed to properly educate ourselves in each decision, to prepare our children, or merely to speak out when the time is ripe, the fault is surely ours. With every silenced tongue and lazy opinion, democracy dies.

“Socialism refers to the various theories of economic organization advocating public or direct worker ownership and administration of the means of production and allocation of resources, and a society characterized by equal access to resources for all individuals with a method of compensation based on the amount of labor expended.”

The democrats are continuing to quietly attach another nationalization program to the corpulent national healthcare scheme. This silent scheme would replace private student loan lending institutions in favor of  direct government financed (read taxpayer financed) student loans. The Hill reports thousands of jobs would be lost in this pursuit:

But the student loan industry estimates that nearly 35,000 jobs would be lost if the federal government lent directly to students and only let private companies service the loans.

Just what we need are more college graduates unable to find work and saddled with crushing student loan debt. If you believe the cost of higher education is exorbitant, imagine what it will be like when all price controls are removed with government subsidizing student loans. Colleges and Universities will no longer have any incentive to price their product competitively if the government is there to approve student loans that cover whatever tuition they demand.

Dana Perino writing for Fox News makes a salient point regarding government takeover of student loans:

One thing is certain, consumers see the best results when they are empowered to choose which options best suit their needs. Maintaining a diverse array of private student lenders — for-profits and non-profits, local and national — would ensure that a retail market is preserved as a means to promote innovation and customer service excellence. Just as none of us want to be forced into a health insurance policy that pays for things we don’t want or need, it’s also a mistake when a high school senior only has one government-mandated option to finance their college education.

If Congress wants Americans to have health care and student loans that work for them, they should support reforms that *drive down* costs and let families shop around for the products best suit their needs. The principles of “choice and competition” cannot just be meaningless, throw-away lines that the Democrats use when they want to get their way. Republicans and like-minded Democrats should ensure that these principles are maintained in the student loan market in order to preserve jobs in a tough economy and prevent the country from spiraling further into debt.

The Cato Institute takes a closer look at “Inventing a Student Loan Crisis“.  A must read for those interested in what is really going on with student loans.

In the end all will be well…Harry Reid believes it is a big day in America..only 36,000 Americans have lost their job today.

A suburban Pennsylvania woman known by the alias “Jihad Jane” has been arrested and charged with trying to recruit Islamic fighters and for plotting to assassinate a Swedish cartoonist who made fun of the Prophet Mohammed, according to a federal indictment unsealed today.

Colleen R. LaRose, 46, of Montgomery, Pa., described by neighbors as an average “housewife,” is better known to federal authorities as “Fatima Rose” or “Jihad Jane.”

The indictment, obtained by ABC News, charges LaRose with conspiracy to provide material support to terrorists and conspiracy to kill in a foreign country.

She is also accused of making false statements to a government official and of attempted identity theft, a passport she allegedly stole with the intention of giving to an Islamic fighter. The court papers claim that LaRose reached out through the Internet to jihadist groups saying she was “desperate to do something to help” suffering Muslim people, and that she desired to become a martyr.

Check out the indictment below:

Indictment 1

Yahoo has it up highlighted: (click to enlarge)

Kos, Think Progress, TPM, Alan Colmes…..all went off the deep end.

HuffPo:

Former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin — who has gone to great lengths to hype the supposed dangers of a big government takeover of American health care — admitted over the weekend that she used to get her treatment in Canada’s single-payer system.

“We used to hustle over the border for health care we received in Canada,” Palin said in her first Canadian appearance since stepping down as governor of Alaska. “And I think now, isn’t that ironic?”

The irony, one guesses, is that Palin now views Canada’s health care system as revolting: with its government-run administration and ‘death-panel’-like rationing. Clearly, however, she and her family once found it more alluring than, at the very least, the coverage available in rural Alaska. Up to the age of six, Palin lived in a remote town near the closest Canadian city, Whitehorse.

Of course they all look foolish thanks to some honest reporting from Politico:

CORRECTION: Whitehorse is in Yukon, not Saskatchewan, and Palin, as a young child, lived closer to it than earlier reported.

UPDATE: Here’s some more context: “My first five years of life we spent in Skagway, Alaska, right there by Whitehorse. Believe it or not – this was in the ’60s – we used to hustle on over the border for health care that we would receive in Whitehorse. I remember my brother, he burned his ankle in some little kid accident thing and my parents had to put him on a train and rush him over to Whitehorse and I think, isn’t that kind of ironic now. Zooming over the border, getting health care from Canada.”

ALSO: Socialized medicine apparently only kicked in in Yukon in 1972, post-Palin.

The irony here is that they PAID for their health care.

Wow….go figure.

And all the other moonbats have ignored this info choosing to keep their PDS on display without correction.

Dan Riehl brings brings up the double standard here:

A sentence in an Associated Press item I blogged last night really brought home to me the double standard the AP and others have employed in covering Sarah Palin, versus their long running coverage of Obama going back to even before he was elected.

Palin’s health care history, even when she was a child, is of interest because of her criticism of Obama and other Democrats working on U.S. health care.

Palin is a former governor, now a private citizen with, admittedly, significant political cache. But Obama ran for and now occupies the office of the so-called leader of the Free World. Shouldn’t his college thesis that, for all we know, doesn’t even exist, have been of at least some interest before November 2008? What about the Law Review articles it seems he’s never written, unlike most every review editor in the past?

That and basically all of his college history remains locked away, evidently of no concern at all to the AP. And I have seen a recent item suggesting his record as a lawyer back in Chicago is far from complete in official records these days, though I can’t find a current link.

As I recall, Obama traveled to Pakistan as a young man in 1981. Back during the campaign, there never was any serious interest in why, or what he did during the trip. But that Sarah Palin! My God, she crossed the border for a check up a time, or two – we’d better dig into her child health care records, it’s now fair game, after all, because, well, who knows what we might turn up??

And Dan has more on the particulars of Sarah’s Canadian health care experience….stuff you just won’t read at Kos and friends.

They embarrassed themselves time and again with their BDS….now, they just look even more foolish.

UPDATE

From The Jawa Report:

Update: Jawa reader and Canadian citizen Garduneh Mehr points out..

Healthcare is not free in Canada; we pay for it with our taxes. And Sarah Palin’s family, not being citizens, would have had to pay full fee.

Of course this whole issue stems from Newfoundland premier opting for his heart surgery in the US.

Updated for clarity:

1972

Yukon creates medical insurance plans with federal cost sharing, April 1.

My father agreed to the trip, reluctantly: he maintained I should take a pickup and drive straight there without the possibility of disappearing forever in a thousand miles of bush and mountains, never to be seen or heard of again. I assured him I felt way more comfortable on a horse than in a vehicle and persuaded him that a horse was more my style and it might be the last chance I would ever have to really see the wild country. I promised to start home in the second week of July and to keep a journal, so not to lose my famous sense of time.

That spring we had heavy rains with heavy snow melt, the rivers and creeks were raging between the high water marks of their banks, and I was lunging in the traces while waiting to leave. Crossing rivers and creeks while they are in flood stage is suicide, so I waited in the agony of expectation of an exciting pack trip. I loaded up 40 hot rounds for my 8mm Mauser; they were hot, because I wouldn’t fire my weapon except to kill the odd animal for meat or to bail myself out of a Grizzly encounter. I’d pack a 22 rifle for shooting ptarmigan and grouse, sport wing shooting was out of the question, head shots from 30 feet was the order of the day, my apologies sportsmen, but this was a question of survival and eating well on the trail.

There would be five us on this trip, me, Dallas my saddle horse, two pack horses Florence and Bertha , and Tiger my beloved and battle scarred Catahoula. You may have noticed all my horses were mares. After a lifetime as a horseman, I have come to several conclusions; first off, is that in certain human blood lines, a horseman will appear once in so many generations. There might be many family members who ride, but there will be one who has an uncanny gift for horses and among those will be the occasional mare man: he will have an unexplainable way with horses, especially mares. For mares are the real animal, the animal that migrated four to five thousand miles a year, the animal that will fight to the death while defending her foal, the animal that is considered difficult by most horsemen, who prefer geldings; by definition, the ‘Mare Man’ doesn’t have these problems, he goes about his work with ease using horses that others avoid. A true ‘Mare Man’ can be observed with a mare hugging him lightly, as if he were her foal: not in the rubbing method you so often see, that has people thinking their horse is showing affection, but is really using the human as a scratching post and displaying disrespect towards his rider.

I am one of those ‘Mare Men’: from my father’s side, descended from those ancient Celts that rode across Europe two thousand years ago, from where no one knows, fought Caesar in a series of desperate wars that nearly destroyed Caesar and his legions. Only those that sailed to England and Ireland escaped the Gladiatorial arenas and slavery. At least that is what I have been told by old Irish horsemen who have watched me work and have stared into my green eyes while taking note of the auburn hair.

I didn’t really need two pack horses, but if one of them became lame, I wouldn’t need to leave most of my gear. Each horse would have four sets of pre-fitted shoes with nails. A stall jack and fitting hammer along with a leather apron and basic shoeing tools would take care of the hooves for a two thousand mile trip. If they had to make the last two hundred miles barefoot, they could do it, being a little tender would make them anxious to get shoes on in the future. Cooking utensils, a couple of tarps, (One for a wicki-up and one for a ground cloth) an ax, small shovel, Melville’s ‘Moby Dick’; Hemingway’s ‘For Whom The Bell Tolls’; and a so called Complete Works of Shakespeare made up my reading list. I had a coal oil lantern with enough fuel for a few minutes worth of light each night: although in June there was 22 hours of daylight and at night there was usually enough light to see, almost enough to read.

I packed a lot of food, some vegetables, dried rice and dried beans there is less and less edible green food the farther North you travel, I’d be sure to make spruce tea and rose hip tea to maintain an adequate intake of Vitamin C. Scurvy was a serious problem in the early days, it affected Jack London and probably shortened his life, and he was only in the North for one winter. The Northern natives roast the stomachs of Caribou with the grass and lichens inside along with huckleberries or blueberries until they (the caribou stomachs) are ready to explode and then have a feast similar to our turkey dinners. I haven’t tried it, but I would eat it rather than starve.

Eventually the creeks and rivers began to ease up on their rampage and it became safe to travel. I said my goodbyes and headed out on what could have been my last adventure in the mountains, in more than one way.

I used my compass and the government maps that were notoriously inaccurate at the time and headed North. I ate my heaviest foods first, thus I would lighten the load on my pack horses: eventually, I would be eating dried beans, rice and oats; the mainstay of the horse packer, delivering the most nutrition for the weight carried.

The trip was a reaction to the thoughts of desperation caused by leaving my home and my life. When I returned from college in four years, my personal dogs and horses might be gone forever. I might change and never be the same after going to school, I was full of doubt, I enjoyed my life on the ranch and in the wilderness and now it was coming to an end; so that I could be with people who had no concept of life in the wilderness, to me it felt like a prison sentence rather than an education.

In the mean time, I crossed several rivers and came upon an alpine valley with a huge stand of mountain balsam. For some reason I was hesitant to cross this foreboding stand of deformed trees. They were six to twelve feet high with aged thick trunks, probably two hundred years old, dwarfed because of the extreme alpine conditions; their bodies twisted from perpetual winds into patterns that reminded me of flames in a campfire, perpetual bizarre green flames. On the other side of the valley was a barren mountain top like the one I was on, except there was a grizzly digging after ground squirrels or some other little rodent. He was digging very quickly like a dog digging in soft earth, except the ground he was digging in was rock hard and every once in a while a boulder the size of a man’s head would fly up between his hind legs. He was a rare beauty, black (a rare color for Grizzly, although they can vary a great deal) and large with his new fur glistening in the sun and rolling with deposits of fat from the spring grass. It would make a great hide for my room at college and the rendered lard makes the best pie crusts; but I wasn’t hunting Grizzly and the temperatures were so warm the hair might slip and I didn’t have enough salt for the raw hide. Lucky for him.

Horses can smell a Grizzly from several miles away if the wind is right, their nose is good enough to determine which way a Grizzly is headed when they cross his trail, but at this distance their eyes can’t see a Grizzly and the wind was at our backs so they couldn’t scent the bear.

Tiger was keying off my caution, he was sitting to my right and studying the strange stunted forest ahead of us. He was a veteran bear fighter, carried the scars and understood the inherent dangers. Besides the company, he provided protection at night in case a bear walked into camp while I was sleeping and decided to pull me out of my blanket roll for a quick snack. I tie each of my horses to a tree for the night in a perimeter around my sleeping area. A horse wont make a noise if they aren’t threatened, if the bear comes close to them they will scream like a woman, a terrible noise: Tiger would and has fought to the death to give me time to wake up and grab my rifle. I love horses and appreciate their nature and culture, but that is the main difference between a dog and a horse as a friend.

I had about a mile of this green forest of Perdition ahead of me and I wanted to get on the other side with enough daylight to find a good camp with feed and water for the horses; I was counting on the Grizzly deciding I was a dangerous character with three horses and a dog and heading off to tall timber once he stopped digging long enough to catch our scent.

We were half way through when I noticed the hair along Tiger’s back standing straight up and his lip curled in a silent growl. We had company and it might be that Grizzly I saw on the opposite hill.

I heard a low growl coming from Tiger and I put the lead pack horse’s halter rope in my left hand and drew my rifle out of its scabbard with my right hand. Tiger turned just as the horses bolted, I pulled up my saddle horse and the pack horses ran by me on the right, the left pannier or pack box on Florence hit Dallas, my saddle horse hard in the right flank and then the ax laced to the box caught my right leg and pulled me out of the saddle and onto my horse’s neck, in less than the blink of an eye, before they pulled up and circled, they were directly in front of my horse, a movement that released my leg or I would have been hung up on a runaway pack horse or on the ground on my back. Thankfully, I had my rifle out of the scabbard or the stock would have been broken. I kept the horses under wraps while they were lunging and jumping in several different directions. I pushed myself back into the saddle and turned around to see what the Hell was gong on behind me. My future family and leg were obviously bruised from the near disaster, but I didn’t have time to acknowledge the pain or take inventory. The bear had circled behind me and was making runs at us and snapping his jaws with that loud clamping sound like a small bore rifle or a 30-30 firing. He was trying to stampede my horses and doing a pretty fair job of it: Tiger kept the bear from running in and grabbing one of us and all I could do was hold onto my rifle, taking an accurate shot in this wild melee was a forlorn hope. Although Tiger was so mad he was foaming at the mouth, he was in control enough not to run in and fight the bear alone or we would have had the biscuit (as in last supper).

Suddenly, the noise all stopped except for Tiger circling us growling and barking, the pack horses were crowding us and making a nuisance of themselves. I could feel a hitch in the stride of my saddle horse, she was bruised and lame at the very least, I could feel the blood running down my leg into my right lace-up over the ankle moose hide moccasin; the blood was flowing freely, judging by the squishy feeling in that moccasin, the blood scent would excite the bear’s blood lust even more, but we seemed to be alright for the time being.

We had at least a half mile to go, we were moving at a fast walk, if we broke into a trot it would be hard to keep the horses under control if the bear tried to separate us again. If it was just me on a saddle horse, I could make a dash for the open country and dismount to hopefully kill the bear that was making my life so miserable. With two pack horses tied with the second one’s halter rope to the first one’s tail, they would be dead meat if I lost control of them or I could fall and end up as dead meat on the ground in this Mountain Balsam Hell.

My situation was becoming desperate, I had to get out of this Balsam and away from this aggressive bear, the horses were all in a lather from their fear and exertions, and Tiger would eventually make a mistake in judgment, he was continually circling to protect us and had to be getting tired. I was used to having the lead rope for the pack horses in my right hand and the bridle reins in my left hand: my rifle was in my right hand, although I couldn’t get a shot off, the bear had respect for that rifle, he had probably been shot at before, my left arm was exhausted from hanging onto the lead rope of the spooked pack horses; suddenly from the right, the bear charged and started snapping his jaws in between growls or roars. This time the horses broke and I was along for the ride, I watched the trees and tried to pick the best trail with enough room for all three horses. I couldn’t see Tiger, but there wasn’t anything I could do to help him: hopefully, he was tight behind us. If a pack slipped or if a rope came undone, the pack horses would fend for themselves. The horses were running out of control and were no longer responding to me. Normally, pack horses couldn’t keep up with a saddle horse, but Dallas was bruised and the pack horses were scared witless.

We broke cover and stopped fifty yards later. I jumped off and waited for the bear to come out. No bear, oh well, it could have been worse. Tiger’s pads were torn and bleeding from running over the sharp flinty rocks, but the wounds were superficial, he was just footsore. Dallas was bruised and sore, but not bleeding. My calf had obviously been hung up on one of the panniers and either the ax or shovel had cut me.

The realization of how close we had been to a disaster settled when I saw a tall Indian walking towards me with a smooth easy stride and a rifle held in his right hand. His face was a deep brown like a twice baked biscuit, he half grinned said some words that I didn’t understand except for the odd English or French word. Pointing to his chest he said a word that sounded like biscuit, from that time on he was known as Biscuit, he spoke directly in your face and used a series of clucks when he talked, he sprayed saliva without being aware of it and to keep from insulting him, I ignored the desire to wipe my face. With a diplomatic flair using three languages, he said the Black Grizzly was a bad bear that liked to eat horses and the occasional human. He motioned for me to follow him, I had not learned the city custom of not trusting strangers, I followed him into the past, a world in flux.

We walked for a mile or so and came upon a pony with a thick mane and tail full of burrs. He seemed proud of this animal and mounted it with pride. I climbed on Dallas and we rode into his village at about ten pm, there was still a couple of hours of daylight left. He showed me a corral to put my horses with fairly decent feed, so I un-tacked the horses and left them to recuperate.

He walked me over to a portable building, inside there was a White Man with an English accent. It was a medical office, the guy had a nice smile and introduced himself as Gregory. He asked what happened, I wasn’t too proud of my adventure so I told him my leg was bleeding.

He looked at the back of the calf and said it was a long wound, but only needed a few stitches at one end and a good cleaning. I asked him if he had anything for a dog’s paws and he gave me some stuff for sled dogs on the ice. He fixed us a pot of tea and we talked.

He was an immigrant from England who was hoping to earn a stake in life and move on. He was an RN and came out to the wilderness to deliver babies and try to keep these “Northern Niggers” healthy while bringing them into the twentieth century. I felt as if I had a brick had dropped into my belly and felt so sad for Biscuit who was waiting patiently for my treatment.

I was shocked to hear that expression. I thought he would come here because he liked helping these people, but apparently he was only here to make the most money and pay off his college loans the fastest way possible. Although my mother was a native woman that men went out of their way to help and open doors for, Like she was the Queen of England, I was born with green eyes, fair skin, and an auburn color to my hair. Except for a few personality traits and high cheekbones, no one would guess that I had native blood in my veins.

I took an immediate dislike for this man who was in his mid twenties and refused payment for my treatment. I walked outside his office after thanking him and shaking his hand. Biscuit and I walked to his house and sat down to a plate piled high with boiled moose and greasy fry bread. I love the Native people, but their dietary habits and culinary skills are often found lacking. I was hungry, so I ate some of the grey looking and unappealing meat and fought to keep it on my stomach.

I was given a bedroom that was just that, a room a little larger than the bed. I laid there wondering what I was doing with these people and drifted off into a deep sleep. The next morning I wandered into the kitchen and scouted out the food available, if I could start a decent meal before they woke up, they wouldn’t stop me from cooking.

I found enough flour, eggs, butter, blueberries, and bacon to start a decent meal: I didn’t know how many people I was cooking for, so I just started cooking. People of all ages came down when they smelled the aromas coming from the wood cook stove. They began to eat and eat and eat, I made coffee and they drank like they had never had a drink in their life. I was having a good time and the women enjoyed watching my cooking skills, for a teenager, I was feeling pretty good.

After everyone had eaten their fill, Biscuit introduced me to everyone, I called him Biscuit and everyone thought I was hilarious. I was especially interested in meeting his three daughters: they were the real Indian Princess Types, the oldest was about fifteen and beautiful, the others were about 12 or 13 and cute as buttons. I tried to say the oldest girl’s name and came out with Vase, again I was considered a true comedienne, the twins seemed to be named Teal and Seal, this brought more laughter; but the names stuck, because everyone was using my new names for themselves, sometimes without laughing.

Gregory said he was going to town and asked if I had suggestions for their food and cooking requirements. I asked how much they had to spend and he shrugged his shoulders and said whatever. I thought this was a strange answer, but I was bound and determined not to eat boiled moose again, if I could avoid it. I ordered spices, flour, olive oil, vegetables, a large soup pot, a dutch oven, a large skillet with a glass lid, a roasting oven and various ingredients for breads and pies. He said he would be back in two days.

I was shocked, two days, I had hoped to be healed up and back on the trail in two days. Oh well, they liked me and I ordered all the stuff, I better teach them how to cook and use the equipment.

Gregory told me that Biscuit had ordered a pre-made log house and it was waiting for someone to take the initiative and start the construction. I told him to tell Biscuit that I wanted to see the house.

Biscuit walked me behind his house and there were the materials to build a beautiful log house. He showed me the plans, it was obvious that Gregory wasn’t about to assist, so I studied the plans and told Gregory to bring back rudimentary carpenter tools, sacks of ready mix concrete, along with nails and screws and plywood for a foundation.

Gregory then told me that Biscuit wanted me to teach his people to speak like me. I looked at him like he had been bucked off on his head, he said, “They like your voice because you are soft spoken,” he smiled, said good bye and left for town.

I selected a fairly decent location and began stepping off the measurements for the foundation. With the help of Pythagorous, and his 3, 4, and 5 triangle rule, I stuck sticks in the ground that defined a rectangle with right angles for corners, while 20 or so people watched in amazement. I worked until I couldn’t do anything else without equipment and noticed that the people were still watching me.

I held up my hand as if to say stay to a dog and pulled out Moby Dick from one of my pack boxes. I started to read about hunting and harpooning whales when one of the young twins came up with a piece of paper and a pencil. I wasn’t going to get away with anything with these people. I drew a whale and a man in a boat throwing a harpoon into the whale. As soon as I was done drawing the whole group converged on the drawing and began to speak in very excited and animated ways concerning my humble drawing. Eventually, they listened to the story again, but I had to point to certain features of the drawing like the whale and the harpoon while making dramatic gestures, the women would scream and put their hands over their mouths and everyone would break out in insane laughter. Everyone was having a party except me. After repeating the process with several more drawings, I was worn out while they were clamoring for more. For the life of me, I had read Moby Dick several times and could only think of three or four places that seemed even remotely funny, like when Quegqueg put his boots on under the bed, now that was funny to me, but my audience found little or no humor in that passage.

They especially enjoyed the passage about an English fisherman who put his wife in a small dory and deserted her on the ocean in a small dory: another sailor saw the distressed woman, rescued her, and took her home to become his common law wife. Apparently she prospered with the second man and her original man sued to get her back. The court ruled, in the same traditions of our courts, by citing the laws concerning harpooned whales; whales that escape the first whaler are considered free whales and once a whale is free upon the high seas it belongs to no one and since the second fisherman had already harpooned the wife and captured her, she now belonged to the second fisherman. Now this brought the house down, they were literally rolling in the aisles.

In Canada and the US, there are White people who attach themselves to minority groups and encourage them to be perpetual wards of the state. With an Elitist attitude that encourages them to be victims and forever under the protection of these self-serving whites who are actually parasites of other peoples misery.

Native people are as intelligent as any race that has walked the face of the earth; they readily adapt to modern life if given the tools and opportunity. Skookum Jim from the Yukon Gold fields is a perfect example: he was a stone age man who was thrust into a position of power and wealth from a purely accidental find of one of the richest gold mines in history. An unusual and extreme case, but it illustrates the ability of native people to adapt in an extreme and unusual situation.

Liberals with the perpetual ‘Nanny State’ mentality have debauched whole native cultures, their policy is not working! It doesn’t take long on the streets of Calgary, Vancouver, or Seattle; to see a drunk native doing the three steps forward two back shuffle. Yet this man’s grandparents were proud, strong people at least until the compassionate Liberals destroyed their pride with policies that made Liberals rich and debouched Native culture. Defining people who need to live under the blanket of Perpetual Nanny Statism that is characteristic of Liberal philosophy not only applies to Native people, but to the Hispanic and Black as well. Liberals cast these minorities as “Less Than” people who are unable to compete with the Liberal’s self serving vision of the ‘Omnipotent White’: thus in the Liberal perversion of freedom, the minority is forever given the unofficial categorization of the ‘White Man’s Burden’ for perpetuity, at least according to the world vision of the Progressive. Of course the Liberal benefits at the polls by making whole cultures wards of the state and by making whole disciplines in Universities dedicated to caring for people who, with a little organization, could have stopped the westward expansion of the United States and Canada; the concept is preposterous, yet it is happening continuously, the subjugation of whole races and cultures, to consolidate power and control for Progressive Socialism.

Can you imagine the howling if a Republican had said this?

RATHER: Obama “Couldn’t sell watermelons even if you gave him a State Trooper to flag down traffic!”

“Obama’s big problem,” a senior Democrat told me, “is that four times as many people watch Fox News as watch CNN.” The Fox network is a remarkable cultural phenomenon which almost shocks those of us from a country where a technical rule of impartiality is applied in the broadcast media. With little rest, it pours out rage 24 hours a day: its message is of the construction of the socialist state, the hijacking of America by “progressives” who now dominate institutions, the indoctrination of children, the undermining of religion and the expropriation of public money for these nefarious projects. The public loves it, and it is manifestly stirring up political activism against Mr Obama, and also against those in the Republican Party who are not deemed conservatives. However, it is arguable whether the now-reorganising Right is half as effective in its assault on the President as some of Mr Obama’s own party are.

So let me see. Deficit being raised to astronomical levels, unemployment high and getting higher, housing market down in the dumps, pushing a bill that nobody wants, reading terrorists Miranda rights, putting those same terrorists on trial in the United States, closing gitmo, and making government into some socialist state to control every aspect of a persons life.

That’s not his BIG PROBLEM.

No, it’s Fox News and it’s “24 hr rage”

Guess they missed MSNBC during the Bush years eh?

Idiots.

In full parade-fashion, last Thursday’s March 4th “Strike and Day of Action to Defend Education” saw liberal activists and students once again “fighting the good fight”, seeing oppression and racial discrimination in necessary budget cuts that affect education. Peter Robinson summing it all up:

We have here the vocabulary of the peace movement, of the struggle for decent conditions for migrants and other exploited workers, and of the civil-rights movement. Yet what did the protesters demand? Peace? Human rights? No. Money. And for whom? For the downtrodden and oppressed? No. For themselves. At a time when one American in 10 is unemployed and historic deficits burden both the federal government and many of the states, the protesters attempted to game the political system. They engaged in a resource grab.

The protests did offer students a certain kind of instruction. They taught them to replace the idealism of youth with the crassest self-pleading.

These students may like to believe that they are asking themselves, “What is good for society?” But really, they are asking, “What is good for myself?”

And yes, they can compare themselves to their brethren of 40 years ago:

The Vietnam anti-war/peace movement should be more properly and accurately scarlet-lettered an anti-draft movement. By the end of 1971, under Nixon, the draft ended. Major peace protests happened throughout 1968 through ‘71. The largest, most intense bombing of the war occurred in Christmas of ‘72 [Operation Linebacker II]. Any protests? Any peace movement marches? Not a peep. Because those protesting the war knew that they would no longer be called up to serve. Yet we’re to believe that the “peace” movement were anti-war out of altruistic good conscience on behalf of the Vietnam people. No: many were motivated by selfish interests. After the draft ended under Nixon, so too did the majority support for these idiotic marches, which only fueled more violence; not less.

h/t – iowntheworld.com/blog via AmericanDigest.com

Iraqis held a referendum on their future today with an election that was marred by violence but still saw the highest turnout yet which in itself speaks to the optimism of the Iraqi people. Two images from Sunday’s election illustrate Iraq’s past and future:

A young Iraqi girl, who accompanied her family to the polling station, asked for her finger to be inked, even though she was too young to vote, shows her inked finger as she leaves the polling station in Karbala, Iraq, Sunday, March 7, 2010. Iraqis voted Sunday in an election testing the mettle of the country’s still-fragile democracy as insurgents killed 25 people across the country, unleashing a barrage of mortars intent on disrupting the historic day.

An elderly man with an inked finger flashes a victory sign after he voted at a polling station in Sadr City, northeastern Baghdad, March 7, 2010. Explosions killed 24 people as Iraqis voted on Sunday in an election that Sunni Islamist militants have vowed to disrupt, in one of many challenges to efforts to stabilise Iraq before U.S. troops leave.

Who do Iraqis have to thank for their freedom? Here are two reminders from 2003:

There was always kindling, matches, flour, sugar, coffee, tea, beans and rice; most trap cabins had enough emergency rations to keep a man alive for at least a month. It was a code that worked well among men who knew no law except for the law of hospitality.

These were men with the bark on, they would be considered dangerous if you saw one in the city: if you were in trouble in the mountains, forget the tree hugger, you better hope a trapper finds you.

Most lived a solitary life without women, there were a few who had Native wives and a few Metis who had Metis wives, these were women who knew no other life. For there were seldom women who wanted to live the life of solitary exclusion that was the trapper lifestyle.

Frenchy was a trapper, of French heritage, his most notable characteristic was a luxurious head of black hair and a rugged cheerfulness. He could sleep outside, in the coldest temperatures (40 to 60 below), wrapped in just a tarp, he drank vodka and liked to rub some into his scalp every morning. He said it made the hair grow and looking at that full head of hair, it was hard to argue the point.

I had known him for years, like most of these intrepid Frenchmen who wander into the unknown, they are wild characters and are loyal friends. I would have trusted him with money or my sister, if I had one. We often met at either his cabin or mine, since a creek divided our individual trap lines and we each had a trap cabin along the creek. These were trap lines that covered tens of thousands of acres with five or six cabins on them, before snowmobiles became practical, the cabins would be 15 to 25 miles apart. We used snowshoes, horseflesh, cross country skis, or dog team- there was no easy way to work a trap line.

But trapping was a lucrative business, during the Depression, trappers kept the economy alive. For some reason, rich people were still buying fur.

I loved to listen to Frenchy’s accent, English was obviously his second language; although he, like me, had never been to school, he was an avid reader. Many trappers were well versed in the classics or poetry, their powers of memorization was frightening. I think it was partially from remembering the location of hundreds of traps and snares.

Frenchy asked me to help him with his classical education and give him guidance, so far he had read Gilgamesh, the Iliad, the Odyssey, Beowulf, Aeneid, Elder Edda, Pharsalia, Os Lusiadas, Gerusalemme, Liberata, Paradise Lost, and La Le’gendes siecles. I was supposed to offer intelligent discussion on these tomes: truthfully, I mainly listened to Frenchy, his ideas were thought inspiring. We might meet on the trapline for the evening and by a flickering and sputtering oil lantern, Frenchy would ask me to explain braggadocio, of course I would reply with the typical answer, “A theatrical or poetic term for a braggart”, I would then be figuratively beaten about the head and shoulders like a red haired step child.

“Not exactly,” Frenchy would begin in slow and deliberate evisceration of my vocabulary, “Late 16th century, from the English verb, ‘brag’ the Italian augmentation suffix was added, denoting an idle, swaggering man who is likely to be a coward. Spenser developed a character named Braggadocio in, The Faerie Queene, a typical braggart that is finally exposed as a lowly coward and braggart. Falstaff is a braggadocio type and probably the most famous in English Literature.”

I listened in amazement, now I realize he should have been lecturing in University. After six years of academia, I only had one professor who could have argued against this titan of knowledge.

Needless to say, Frenchy was overwhelming a 16 year old boy who had yet to sit in a formal classroom. Although Frenchy had never been to school, his mind was like finely machined tool steel. When I explained that the Odyssey, Illiad, and Beowulf were epics of the oral tradition, he decided that he had to memorize these epic poems. This represents thousands of pages, I was lucky to memorize twenty or thirty lines, Frenchy was memorizing two and three times that much on each page.

I honestly began to doubt his sanity at this point and wondered how safe I was sleeping in the same cabin. It turned out that Frenchy wasn’t really losing his sanity, he was just overwhelmed with a thirst for knowledge and perhaps there was a need to impress someone else.

At home, I saw a rider with three pack horses dismounting in the corral, this wasn’t unusual, men often stopped for dinner and a bed in the bunk house. The man had close cropped hair and was clean shaven, once he had unsaddled his four horses, he waved to me like I knew him; but I didn’t recognize him. He walked closer and said, “Skook, it’s me Frenchy”.

With a shave and a haircut, I didn’t recognize him. I invited him in and he said he needed to confide in me first. Now I was 16 and Frenchy was at least 30, so this was obviously going to be unusual.

Frenchy said he needed me to take him into town: I assured him that there was no problem that we could take my team. He put his hand on my shoulder and said in a conspiratorial tone, “I need a ride to town in one of your dad’s trucks”.

Well this was a little more of a deal than I could swing with my own authority. I asked, “What do you need a truck for, Frenchy?”

He looked around and then whispered, “I have a mail order bride coming from Japan”, he could have told me he wanted to rob a bank and I wouldn’t have been more surprised.

“We better talk to my dad”, I told him. We walked inside and waited at the kitchen table for my dad. My dad had served in the Pacific during the war and I didn’t know how this news was going to be received. I knew some Pacific Vets had serious problems with anything made in Japan.

My dad listened to Frenchy’s story and when it was all over he broke into a wide grin and poured French a carefully measured shot of Tennessee Whiskey.

“Well, do you plan to get married right away or live in sin for awhile?” My dad usually went straight for the jugular in fights and conversation.

“We want to get married right away”, Frenchy, replied meekly.

“Then you will tie the knot here tomorrow night, I’ll do the preachin and Knarley will do the cooking, we’ll have one of Skook’s hams some barbecue ribs and we’ll have a big do, to welcome your new wife. You two take the Blue Egg into town and pick her up, it’s not a limo: but it is the best we have.”

Frenchy thanked my dad over and over, and I breathed a sigh of relief, the blue egg was an old Chevy Suburban, it was a bare bones truck, without carpet and the fancy trimming; but there was a pretense of comfort and there was room for baggage that was out of the weather.

On the way to town we stopped to tell my best friend, Knarley Manners, about the big do and how he should go to the home ranch tomorrow morning and begin cooking. He laughed and said it sounded like a hoot. I told him if he was skinning coyotes tonight, to wash his knife and hands before starting to cook, he laughed and said, “You Betcha”. Knarley used rendered bear lard to make the best pies and biscuits in the Peace River Country; but you couldn’t count on him washing his knife or his hands after skinning coyotes.

Using the Moccasin telegraph, I judged there would be at least a hundred to two hundred people; hopefully, there would be a few women and with any luck, they wouldn’t be sitting around with disapproving scowls on their faces.

Frenchy and I stayed at the Mile Zero Hotel and had dinner. We took a six pack of beer to the room and after a couple of beers, Frenchy told me about his apprehensions. He asked me about making love to a woman, I asked him why he was asking me and he said that Knarley had told him about the horse women in Virginia and about riding horses naked with the red haired girl.

I was going to need to talk to Knarley.

I thought for a few minutes and told Frenchy, “With humans it is different than cattle or horses, women expect you to be gentle and romance them: mares and cows are not wrapped up in the act emotionally, women are invested with feelings of love, if you cater to those feelings and spend time to express your love, a woman will feel much more attached and fulfilled, it will also mean much more to you, men often are willing to be like a bull or a stallion with no emotion other than lust, women soon lose interest in this type of man. That’s about all I can tell you about love, Frenchy, the rest a man and a woman figure out between them. If you have desire, you have desire: that is one of the most important requirements, after that it boils down to how you treat a woman before the rodeo and after the rodeo.

Frenchy thanked me over and over, I wasn’t actually sure why, since it was all beginning to sound like nonsense to me. I said good night and fell asleep after two beers and left Frenchy to the extra beer and his anxieties.

We were at the airport at eight AM waiting for one of the puddle jumpers that shuffle oil field workers around. Her plane landed and Frenchy was pacing like a caged animal, these big hairy faces began to get off and then there she was, pretty as a picture and no bigger than a minute.

She would brighten up things in the Peace River Valley, that’s for sure. She was a beauty, she bowed in a formal manner to Frenchy and he bowed for the first time in his life; an act that I was sure to become a regular tradition in the Peace Country. Men were going to be coming from a long way just to bow to this pretty little thing.

Frenchy introduced me, her name was Maki, and all of a sudden I was bowing and loving it, me who had never been subservient to anyone besides my dad was bowing to a woman I met seconds ago, a woman I could put in my pocket and walk away like she wasn’t there.

The drive home was interesting, Frenchy couldn’t stop talking, but I just wanted to hear her exotic accent speaking perfect English.

When we arrived home Maki was given a room so that she could prepare for her big day. In the mean time, the moccasin telegraph had performed flawlessly: trappers, cowboys, natives, and farmers began arriving to see Frenchy’s mail order bride and take part in the wedding ceremony and celebration. My dad had fixed up the cabin that we used for hunters and the odd family members that came to visit: that way the newly weds would have quiet place for their nuptials, because the party was likely to go on for 24 hours or so. A fiddle player and several guitar pickers showed up and started playing and the party was about to begin.

Frenchy had new blue jeans, a white shirt with blue suspenders and a blue bow tie, he looked quite dapper. My dad was going to walk Maki from her room up to Frenchy and then do the marriage ceremony. In the rest of the world, it might seem awkward, here in the Peace Country, it was normal.

When the bride walked out of her room, you might have thought several people were having heart attacks at the same time, because of the gasping and women grabbing their throats in shock, and then came the low moans. Maki was beyond beautiful in a long white silk dress with gold threads woven through it depicting rural scenes of Japan, and her long black silky hair piled high on her head. These country people, including me, had never seen such a beautiful sight. The men all envied Frenchy and the women were all jealous.

During the ceremony, there was not a sound other than my dad speaking and preaching, the audience was in a state of awe. After the ceremony, the dinner party went well and Knarley’s huckleberry and blueberry pies disappeared as quick as they were set down. The furniture was pulled back, Frenchy and Maki started the first dance, no one could remember Frenchy ever dancing, it was probably his first dance; he did well, but all eyes were on Maki.

After the first dance, My dad gave Frenchy a flash light and told him to go start on his new life as a husband and to remember the word husband is from husbandry and that means to care far someone else. The crowd whooped and hollered as the couple went into the night.

In nine or ten months, there was a baby born. I don’t think I have ever seen a happier couple. Maki took to life in the bush as if she had been born to it, she could run a household like none I had ever seen. It was uplifting to visit them and see how happy they were.

There was one funny incident, John Belcourt dropped in for a visit one day while Frenchy was out on the trapline. Maki was boiling doughnuts when John knocked on the door. She opened the door to see one of the biggest most powerful men I have ever known. John just walked in and sat at the table without saying anything. Maki was scared, John weighed close to 400 hundred pounds and was six foot six and John didn’t talk to you unless he knew you real well. He was one of the Indian groups we called Chips and they are big people.

Maki knew about the law of hospitality, she put two warm doughnuts on a plate and offered them to John. He inhaled them. He grunted and patted his belly to show that he enjoyed them and she gave him two more. The sequence was repeated until John had eaten 48 doughnuts. Maki was out of flour and had no idea what was going to happen when Frenchy came home. The two men were glad to see each other and Frenchy laughed and laughed about John eating all the doughnuts. You see, John was the most intimidating bull in the woods; but he was also the most gentle man alive.

It was a cold morning in early November, The RCMP ( Royal Canadian Mounted Police) squad car pulled up to the ranch with Knarley in the back seat. They wanted Knarley and me to take them to Frenchy’s cabin on a tributary of the Peace. I asked why and was told that a light skinned baby with oriental features had been found adrift on the Peace in a riverboat.

My heart felt cold. I told them we could only get within twenty miles of the home cabin by boat; but we could take horses all the way. They decided that we should take horses; although, none of them had ever ridden, they weren’t keen on staying up with Knarley and me on foot. I told them that we should take a pack horse with grub and First Aid equipment. They didn’t have a clue, they just agreed to everything.

I put the horses in a trot, the pack horse was packed so light it didn’t matter to him, Knarley and I could do 50 miles on these rolling foothills, but the police officers were in trouble. They would need to hang on, I was worried sick about Maki and Frenchy.

We arrived at the home cabin and there was no smoke from the pipe chimney. I ran to the door and kicked it in while the RCMP were yelling at me to wait.

Inside was a terrible tragedy. In the North country, a man uses an ax and a knife with the same familiarity as other men use silverware or a razor; of course slipping with an ax and cutting a foot or leg is a risk we all assume, such an injury can and often means death in the bush.

Frenchy had slipped with an ax and split his shin bone, unable to move he had Maki treating the wound. The wound infected and it looked like he developed a fever, Maki had run out of grub and was starving. Once her milk quit, she put the baby in the boat and went back home to die with her husband.

We packed the bodies out and the police took them to town. My dad asked to have them buried in our community graveyard and he said a nice service out of the Book. The baby was adopted by a young couple in Alberta.

I often wondered why Maki didn’t get in the boat with the baby. Eventually, I realized that she could not desert the man she loved, she was devoted to the last ounce that she could give, towards the end, she realized that the only hope the baby had was to drift down river. She didn’t know that the boat could have caught in a snag or log jam and never been seen. She acted on faith and every thing worked out for the baby. It was a hard choice, ride out with the baby and let your husband die alone or take a chance setting the baby adrift and going back to die with your husband.

If Obama has his way with altering the Constitution, we will have the choice of going along with the current and allowing this transgression against our Freedoms to transpire or staying with the concepts of Liberty and Freedom that were written by our Founding Fathers and risking everything for that which we love. The rapacious beast of International Socialism is at the cabin door, are we ready to stand by the founding fathers and the countless veterans who have sacrificed their lives and bodies to protect our Freedoms or do we say, “He won, he can now remake our country into any Socialistic Dystopia that he wants.”

Now is the time to take the measure of your commitment to Freedom; this assault on the Constitution and our way of life is about to come to a head. I personally swear to all who read this, I will never submit to the shackles of Socialism nor the Yoke of Communism. I have lived over six decades as a free man and I will die a free man in the country that I love, that is my commitment.

The New York Times today adds yet another installment in my series “what went wrong” with the Obama presidency by focusing the blame on chief strategist David Axelrod. Good old David, who just loves Obama a little too much is under fire for not doing a better job directing the President. Axelrod’s response was combative and so typical of the denial of reality which grips the Obama White House:

In an interview in his office, Mr. Axelrod was often defiant, saying he did not give a “flying” expletive “about what the peanut gallery thinks” and did not live for the approval “of the political community.”

That “peanut gallery” includes the many wise and experienced sages who have watched with horror as the promise of Obama’s campaign turned into the sour train wreck we see daily. One of those sages, who got caught up in Obama hype was former Reagan speechwriter and columnist Peggy Noonan.

Peggy went from praising Obama early on to this:

What a Disaster Looks Like
ObamaCare will have been a colossal waste of time—if we’re lucky.
The Wall Street Journal
March 4, 2010

It is now exactly a year since President Obama unveiled his health care push and his decision to devote his inaugural year to it—his branding year, his first, vivid year.

What a disaster it has been.

At best it was a waste of history’s time, a struggle that will not in the end yield something big and helpful but will in fact make future progress more difficult. At worst it may prove to have fatally undermined a new presidency at a time when America desperately needs a successful one.

In terms of policy, his essential mistake was to choose health-care expansion over health-care reform. This at the exact moment voters were growing more anxious about the cost and reach of government. The practical mistake was that he did not include or envelop congressional Republicans from the outset, but handed the bill’s creation over to a Democratic Congress that was becoming a runaway train. This at the exact moment Americans were coming to be concerned that Washington was broken, incapable of progress, frozen in partisanship.
…
Why, in 2009, create a new crisis over an important but secondary issue when we already have the Great Recession and two wars? Prudence and soundness of judgment are more greatly needed at the moment.
…
New presidents should never, ever, court any problem that isn’t already banging at the door. They should never summon trouble. Mr. Obama did, boldly, perhaps even madly. And this is perhaps the oddest thing about No Drama Obama: In his first year as president he created unneeded political drama, and wound up seen by many Americans not as the hero but the villain.

In Washington among sympathetic political hands (actually, most of them sound formerly sympathetic) you hear the word “intervention,” as in: “So-and-so tried an intervention with the president and it didn’t work.” So-and-so tried to tell him he’s in trouble with the public and must moderate, recalibrate, back off from health care. The end of the story is always that so-and-so got nowhere. David Gergen a few weeks ago told the Financial Times the administration puts him in mind of the old joke: “How many psychiatrists does it take to change a lightbulb? Only one. But the lightbulb must want to change. I don’t think President Obama wants to make any changes.”
…

What accounts for Mr. Obama’s confidence and certainty?

Well, if you were a young progressive who’d won the presidency by a comfortable margin in a center-right country, you just might think you were a genius. You might not be surprised to find yourself surrounded by a cultish admiration: “They see him as a fabled figure,” said a frequent White House visitor of some on the president’s staff.
…
The president can’t be a hope purveyor while he’s a doom merchant, and he appears to believe he has to be a doom merchant to justify ramming through his legislation. This particular legislation is not worth that particular price.

All this contributes to a second problem, which is a growing credibility gap. In his speech Wednesday, demanding an “up or down” vote, the president seemed convinced and committed—but nothing he said sounded true. His bill will “bring down the cost of health care for millions,” it is “fully paid for,” it will lower the long term deficit by a trillion dollars.

Does anyone believe this? Does anyone who knows the ways of government, the compulsions of Congress, and how history has played out in the past, believe this? Even a little?
…
The only thing that might make his assertions sound believable now is if a group of congressional Republicans were standing next to him on the podium and putting forward a bill right along with him. Which, obviously, won’t happen, for three reasons. First, they enjoy his discomfort. Second, they believe the bill is not worth saving, that at this point no matter what it contains—and at this point most people can no longer retain in their heads what it contains—it has been fatally tainted by the past year of mistakes and inadequacies.

And the third reason is that the past decade has taught them what a disaster looks like, and they’ve lost their taste for standing next to one.

Peggy, I’d say there was a fourth reason Republican won’t be standing next to Obama while he tries to ram this through. The past year he has spurned every appeal from GOP leaders for a fair process that would incorporate their ideas. Remember when he told one GOP congressman early in his Administration “I won?” All he offered in his latest proposal was a window dressing of compromise. Every large legislative change, such as Medicare and Social Security were accomplished with broad bipartisan support. But Obama has made it clear it’s largely his way or the highway.

And one last point: Peggy asks if anyone believes Obama Care will be the fiscally responsible program Obama claims it will. There were plenty of people who were willing to believe the promises Obama made during the campaign. They’ve now had over a year to see who and what Obama really is. Like Peggy, many of them have had their eyes opened. That’s why his approval rating continues to drop and why a majority in a recent CNN poll say they wouldn’t vote to re-elect him.

What a shame they didn’t see through the charade before they voted for this train wreck of a presidency!