Health Care Reform All About HIM!

Despite what B. Hussein Obama says, he owns the health care reform issue lock, stock and barrel and it is all about him! With his job approval ratings now below 50% (Welcome back Carter), the Snake-Oil Salesman-in-Chief has become a regular sit-com on broadcast TV to air his infomercials for ObamaCare -- the cure for all ailments! With a practiced straight face he looked right in the camera and lied to America -- "This is not about me!"

Nonsense! It is all about him. Health care is his signature effort -- his line in the sand. And he knows if he produces nothing, the mystique of The One is forfeit. This is why Obama keeps moving the goal posts of deadlines and details. Universal coverage? Well maybe, maybe not. No middle-class tax increase? Well, maybe just a little, as long as they don't "primarily" bear the burden. It is all about him and he will put his signature on anything as long as the title says "health-care reform." So he just keeps putting lipstick on this pig and trots it out on stage almost daily.

If this is not about politics (and politics is all about him), then why is it that his grand-scheme for health care does not address in any shape, form or fashion one of the worst sources of waste in American medicine - - the outrageously insane cost and arbitray rewards of medical malpractice?

When a doctor, a neurosurgeon for example, pays $200,000 a year for malpractice insurance before he even turns on the lights in his office, hires his first employee or sees his first patient -- who do you think pays for this overhead? Patients, in higher doctor fees and insurance premiums. Why? One word answer -- Lawyers!

With lotto-like awards in which one claimant collects giga-bucks and 1/3 of everything goes to lawyers -- where do you think the money comes from? The insurance companies, which then pass it on to you in higher premiums. Unlike the Fed, insurance companies just can't print money to pay claims.

But the greatest waste is the hidden cost of defensive medicine. These are all the tests and procedures that doctors order for no good reason other than to protect themselves from the bottom-crawling, scum-sucking scavengers, and I am not talking about catfish! Every doctor's worst nightmare is a malpractice suit and the increased cost of unnecessary medical procedures is incurred with an eye not on medicine but on the law.

Tort reform, not ObamaCare, would yield tens of billions in savings alone. Yet it is nowhere in the Democratic bills. And Obama breathed not a word about it in his recent hour long infomercial. Why? Simple -- Democrats are parasitically dependent on the huge donations from trial lawyers.

I seem to remember The O promising a new politics that puts people ahead of special interests. What am I to believe? The reality of his actions-- or my lying ears?

Green Shoots of Hope

There may be some ‘green shoots’ of hope for Conservatives just six months into the nightmare called “The Era (Error) of Obama.” While his poll numbers remain fairly strong at 56%, they do not represent the kind of strength with which one can ‘walk on water’!

There are a couple of trends that should provide some encouragement to Conservatives and irritate the Obamaites. First of all, a recent Gallup poll found 40% of Americans described their political views as conservative. Compare this to only 21% who say they are liberal. That would indicate that 39% of Americans are independent. Guess who is becoming disenchanted with Obamaism? What’s more, Gallup also found that Americans, by a two-to-one margin, say their political views have become more conservative in recent years than liberal. And a Pew survey in May shows that there has been “no consistent movement away from conservatism, nor a shift toward liberalism” since the last election.

What does that mean for the good guys? (That would be we Conservatives, in case there is some Liberal interloper reading my blog). It means that the ‘American Idol’ election of Obama in 2008 did not represent an ideological shift toward Liberalism, as fantasized by the Cerberus of Obama, Pelosi and Reid. The “mandate” claimed by Liberals is simply not there!

Secondly, Republicans, while still working through an identity crisis, are gaining ground with the American voter on issues. Even the Obama mouthpiece, the New York Times, in a poll earlier this month, shows almost 70% expressed a “great deal” or “quite a bit” of concern about the expanding role of the federal government under Obama.

When it comes to party affiliation, Democrats have lost more support this year than Republicans. In addition, Republicans are closing the gap and, in some areas, pulling slightly ahead of Dummycrates in generic Congressional polls.

B. Husseins’ 56% approval rating, as noted earlier, is down from 65% in the last month. The decrease in his job-approval ratings is driven in part by a 15 point drop in support among independent voters. This must really have caused a ‘loose bowel moment’ in the White House!

These trends are now manifesting themselves in the views of lawmakers. For example, Blue Dog Democrats are growing a pair and bucking the Obama reckless spending agenda.

Now it would be wishful thinking on the part of Conservatives and Republicans (for the two are not necessarily the same) to pretend that Obama is in a free-fall. However, he is no longer skating on smooth ice. A public who bought into the ‘snake oil cure-all’ sales pitch are now having the first twinges of buyer’s remorse. He is much more liberal than advertised and his ‘jus words…jus speeches’ are beginning to fall a bit flat. Obama is sounding like politics as usual.

We Conservatives should take Obama’s advice to Congressional Democrats: it is time to “buck it up” and “not slow up or lose heart” in our fight to restore America to the country it should and can be. We are at a rare nexus in history when what we do now, really does have long lasting, even existential, consequences for “life liberty and the pursuit of happiness.”

Fight the good fight and let it be known, “We Will Remember In November!”

Put Me on the Health Care Waiting List Now Please: An Open Letter to My Congressman

The following is a great spoof about the 'waiting lists' under ObamaCare. It was written by fellow blogger, Annette Bybee. You can read more of her material at: http://pitchforkandtorch.blogspot.com/

Re-printed with permission:
________________________________________________________________
Dear Congressman,

I need to ask you a favor. I hate to bug you, because boy, are you guys busy back there in Washington! I mean, wow! You don't even have time to read your bills. Not even the ones you wrote yourselves. First there were all those bailouts, then there was stimulus, then that whopper of a cap and trade bill, and now you're getting ready to hit us with socialized medicine. I know, I know, you don't like to call it that. It's 'health care reform' or a 'single payer option' or a 'public plan'. Yada, yada, yada. It's socialized medicine. And you want me to have it, even if I actually like the health care plan I already have, like 70% of the population does. But never mind what we want. Just go ahead and push your agenda on us, under the whip cracking of Pelosi. Have you ever noticed how she has that self-satisfied smirk when she's in front of the cameras? And what's with those kindergarten wooden bead necklaces?

But I digress. I really need your help. You see, I like to plan for the future. And the future means possible unemployment because of all the stimulating you folks are doing to the economy, or if not unemployment, at least high taxes to pay for all that stimulating and all that 'free' health care. And because my electric bill will "necessarily skyrocket" I won't be able to afford heat or air conditioning, or TV, or lights. I'll be sitting around in the dark shivering or sweating, not listening to Rush because I'm sure you'll pass the fairness doctrine at some point.

There I go again, digressing. Okay, so I've heard that in countries with socialized medicine there are waiting lists for some minor frivolous health care procedures, like cancer treatments or necessary surgeries. And I'm kind of worried about it. So could you be a pal and ask that future Health Care Rationing Czar to put me on the waiting list to get on the waiting list? Just in case I actually get sick in the future. I like to plan ahead. And while you're at it, can you please put me on the waiting list for psychiatric treatment as well? I feel a nervous breakdown coming on, what with watching you destroy my country and all.

Sincerely,

Your Humble Constituent

P.S. You might want to put yourself on that list as well, because of course you'll be under the same health care plan as us peons, right?

When All Else Fails...Rewrite History!

Promises, promises! How does The One Who Can Do No Wrong handle the corner all his ‘jus words…jus speeches’ has painted him into? Easy! Just redefine your original goals and act as if America won’t remember what you said the first time. Neat trick, if we let him get away with it….but we will not!

When it came to the stimulus package, the president and his administration, in the words of National Economic Director Larry Summers, “You’ll see the effects begin almost immediately.” Huh? I guess that is why the unemployment rate ‘immediately’ went from 8% to 9.5% (unless that was the ‘effect’ Obama and Summers had in mind?). Those promised jobs and economic growth clearly has not materialized.

Earlier this year, Obama assured us that most of the stimulus money “will go out the door immediately.” But it hasn’t. Only about 7.7% of the stimulus has been spent in the SIX MONTHS since its passage, and more of it will be spent in the program’s LAST EIGHT YEARS than in its first year. No surprise, the current occupant of the Oval Office claims he said something different: “We also knew that it would take some time for the money to get out the door,” Obama said in his weekly radio address this past Sunday. So we are seeing Obama attempting to lower expectations retroactively, saying in an op-ed in Sunday’s Washington Post that his stimulus “was, from the start, a two-year program.”

It seems that the only money that Congress can get out the door immediately is the pay raises they vote for themselves!

As Obama is wont to do, he answers his critics by creating straw-men arguments. In his latest radio address, he attacked detractors as those who “felt that doing nothing was somehow an answer.” But many of Obama’s critics didn’t feel that way. They offered – and Obama rejected out of hand – many constructive ideas to jump-start the economy.

For example, House republicans offered an alternative recovery package of immediate tax cuts and safety-net measures that cost HALF as much as Obama’s failed stimulus plan. Furthermore, Republicans calculated that their plans would have created 50% MORE jobs than the failed plan of Obama’s.

Now, what are you to believe? His statements now or your lying ears when he first demanded the stimulus bill passed? Hmmmmm?

Beware the Siren Song of Change

As we all remember (I keep hoping it to be a horrible nightmare from which I shall awake) the last election was run, and won, on the theme of “Change.” But all “change” is neither good nor prudent. Even when declaring independence from England, the Founders recognized the dangers of imprudent change as it relates to governing. That is exactly what we got!

However, we Conservatives do not reject change. Edmund Burke, British statesman and thinker, wrote that “a state without the means of some change is without the means of its conservation.” What kind of change, then, do we Conservatives support?

Change for reform can be beneficial and is intended to preserve and improve the basic institutions of the state as the Founders intended. Change as innovation (which is what are being force fed now) is destructive and a radical departure from the past and the substitution of existing institutions of the state with potentially dangerous experiments, such as Cap & Trade and ObamaCare! Furthermore, the Liberal often justifies change as conferring new, abstract rights, which is nothing more than a Liberal deception intended to empower the state and deny man his real rights – those that are both unalienable and rooted in tradition and faith. Burke wrote, “By this unprincipled facility of changing the state as often, and as much, and in as many ways, as there are floating fancies or fashions, the whole chain and continuity of the commonwealth would be broken. No one generation could link with the other. Men would become little more than the flies of a summer.”

As Mark Levin in “Liberty and Tyranny” observes: The Conservative believes, as Burke and the Founders did, that prudence must be exercised in assessing change. Prudence is the highest virtue for it is judgment drawn on wisdom. The proposed change should be informed by the experience, knowledge, and traditions of society, tailored for a specific purpose, and accomplished through a constitutional construct that insures thoughtful deliberation by the community. Not the passing of Bills by a derelict Congress without even reading them! Change unconstrained by prudence produces unpredictable consequences, threatening ordered liberty with chaos and ultimately despotism, and placing at risk the very principles we Conservatives hold dear.

We Conservative must resist ‘Change’ for change sake. Any change in our governance must be necessary, prudent and designed to strengthen our liberty, freedom and safety. We must be active in the political arena and hold our elected representatives accountable to these ends. The elections of 2010 is THE chance to right this ship of state, even if it means throwing 535 politicians overboard! -- TO ARMS! TO ARMS!

Conservatism Under Attack

Conservatism is under attack and must be defended. But what does it mean to be a Conservative. Mark Levin in his “Liberty and Tyranny” has some thoughts on this subject. I agree and include some of my own:

Conservatism is a way of understanding life, society, and governance. The Founders were heavily influenced by certain philosophers, among them Adam Smith who espoused ‘spontaneous order’; Charles Montesquieu, separation of powers; and notably John Locke, a proponent of ‘natural rights.’ The Founders were also influenced by their faiths, personal experiences, and knowledge of history (actual history – not the revisionist swill taught in public schools and universities today). Edmund Burke, who was both a British statesman and thinker, is often said to be the father of modern conservatism. He was an early defender of the American Revolution and advocate of representative government. He wrote of the interconnection of liberty, free markets, religion, tradition and authority (most of these are in very short supply today).

The Founders believed, and the Conservative agrees, in the dignity of the individual; that we, as human beings, have a right to live freely and pursue that which motivates us, not because man or some government says so, but because these are God-given natural rights.

Like the Founders, the Conservative also recognize the rules of co-operation that have developed through generations of human experience and collective reasoning that promote the betterment of the individual and society. This is characterized as the civil society.

In the civil society, the individual is recognized and accepted as more than an abstract statistic or faceless member of some group; rather he is a unique, spiritual being with a soul and conscience. He is free to discover his own potential and pursue, to the best of his ability, his own legitimate interests; always tempered by a moral order that serves as a rule and guide for his life and being. Freedom to pursue happiness, success and prosperity – not a guarantee of equal outcomes is what drives the Conservative. He rejects the relativism that blurs the lines between right and wrong, good and evil, just and unjust, and means and ends.

In the civil society, private property and liberty are inseparable. The individual’s right to live freely and safely and pursue happiness includes the right to acquire and possess property, which represents that fruits of his own intellectual and/or physical labor. The illegitimate denial or diminution of his private property enslaves him to another and denies him his liberty.

In the civil society, a rule of law, which is just, known and predictable, and applied equally provides the governing framework for and restraints on politicians, thereby serving as a check and balance against the arbitrary use and, more than likely, abuse of power.

For the Conservative, the civil society has as its highest purpose its preservation and improvement.

The Liberal believes in the supremacy of the state, thereby rejecting the principles of the Declaration of Independence and the order of the civil society, in whole or part. For the Liberal, the individual’s ambition and pursuits for him and his family impede the objective of a utopian state.

The Founders understood that the greatest threat to liberty is an all-powerful central government, where the few dictate to the many. For much of American history, the balance between governmental authority and individual liberty was understood and accepted. Federal power was confined to that which was specifically enumerated in the Constitution and no more! And that power was further limited, for it was dispersed among three federal branches – the legislative, executive and judicial. Beyond that, the power remained with the states and ultimately the people.

This system is now dangerously out of balance and must be restored. Championed by the Liberal, judicial activism (legislating from the bench) is rampant and is a clear and present danger to the precise balance of power established by the Founders. That is why scrutiny of Federal and Supreme Court nominees is so very, very important, for what the Liberal cannot legislate, he decrees by judicial fiat!

Now a warning and a call to action:

The nation that our fathers, grandfathers and great-grandfathers fought and died for; the nation we in which we were fortunate to grow up is in mortal danger! Not as much from a foreign enemy, although they are there, but from within. Never has there been a time when the individual voice has been more important; never a time when individual action has been more urgent than this moment in history. For far too long, the Conservative has allowed political activism to be dominated by the Liberal. This shall no longer stand. We can, and will, re-take our country and return it to the conservative ideals and principles upon which it was founded so long ago.

Stand up! Be heard! Be counted! It starts today. Constantly call, write/email your elected representatives and let them know enough is enough. Demand that your voice be heard and heeded! Insist upon a return to conservative ideals of smaller, more responsible limited government. Remind them just who they work for and let it be known -- the Boss is NOT happy!

The 2010 congressional elections will be when the second ‘shot heard round the world’ will be sounded followed by the 2012 presidential election. But it starts here, now, today. Study the issues, arm yourself with facts. Liberals scurry from the sunlight of the truth and the truth is on our side. Be relentless, forthright and persevere for the future of the United States of America depends upon you!

They Risked Everything - Now It Is Our Time

Rush Limbaugh' father, Rush H. Limbaugh, Jr., delivered this oft-requested address locally a number of times, but it had never before appeared in print until it appeared in The Limbaugh Letter. His dad was renowned for his oratory skills and for his original mind; this speech is, I think, a superb demonstration of both.

"Our Lives, Our Fortunes, Our Sacred Honor"

It was a glorious morning. The sun was shining and the wind was from the southeast. Up especially early, a tall bony, redheaded young Virginian found time to buy a new thermometer, for which he paid three pounds, fifteen shillings. He also bought gloves for Martha, his wife, who was ill at home. Thomas Jefferson arrived early at the statehouse. The temperature was 72.5 degrees and the horseflies weren't nearly so bad at that hour. It was a lovely room, very large, with gleaming white walls. The chairs were comfortable. Facing the single door were two brass fireplaces, but they would not be used today. The moment the door was shut, and it was always kept locked, the room became an oven. The tall windows were shut, so that loud quarreling voices could not be heard by passersby. Small openings atop the windows allowed a slight stir of air, and also a large number of horseflies. Jefferson records that "the horseflies were dexterous in finding necks, and the silk of stockings was nothing to them." All discussing was punctuated by the slap of hands on necks. On the wall at the back, facing the president's desk, was a panoply -- consisting of a drum, swords, and banners seized from Fort Ticonderoga the previous year. Ethan Allen and Benedict Arnold had captured the place, shouting that they were taking it "in the name of the Great Jehovah and the Continental Congress!" Now Congress got to work, promptly taking up an emergency measure about which there was discussion but no dissension. "Resolved: That an application be made to the Committee of Safety of Pennsylvania for a supply of flints for the troops at New York." Then Congress transformed itself into a committee of the whole. The Declaration of Independence was read aloud once more, and debate resumed. Though Jefferson was the best writer of all of them, he had been somewhat verbose. Congress hacked the excess away. They did a good job, as a side-by-side comparison of the rough draft and the final text shows. They cut the phrase "by a self-assumed power." "Climb" was replaced by "must read," then "must" was eliminated, then the whole sentence, and soon the whole paragraph was cut. Jefferson groaned as they continued what he later called "their depredations." "Inherent and inalienable rights" came out "certain unalienable rights," and to this day no one knows who suggested the elegant change. A total of 86 alterations were made. Almost 500 words were eliminated, leaving 1,337. At last, after three days of wrangling, the document was put to a vote. Here in this hall Patrick Henry had once thundered: "I am no longer a Virginian, sir, but an American." But today the loud, sometimes bitter argument stilled, and without fanfare the vote was taken from north to south by colonies, as was the custom. On July 4, 1776, the Declaration of Independence was adopted. There were no trumpets blown. No one stood on his chair and cheered. The afternoon was waning and Congress had no thought of delaying the full calendar of routine business on its hands. For several hours they worked on many other problems before adjourning for the day.

Much To Lose What kind of men were the 56 signers who adopted the Declaration of Independence and who, by their signing, committed an act of treason against the crown? To each of you, the names Franklin, Adams, Hancock and Jefferson are almost as familiar as household words. Most of us, however, know nothing of the other signers. Who were they? What happened to them? I imagine that many of you are somewhat surprised at the names not there: George Washington, Alexander Hamilton, Patrick Henry. All were elsewhere. Ben Franklin was the only really old man. Eighteen were under 40; three were in their 20s. Of the 56 almost half - 24 - were judges and lawyers. Eleven were merchants, nine were landowners and farmers, and the remaining 12 were doctors, ministers, and politicians. With only a few exceptions, such as Samuel Adams of Massachusetts, these were men of substantial property. All but two had families. The vast majority were men of education and standing in their communities. They had economic security as few men had in the 18th Century. Each had more to lose from revolution than he had to gain by it. John Hancock, one of the richest men in America, already had a price of 500 pounds on his head. He signed in enormous letters so that his Majesty could now read his name without glasses and could now double the reward. Ben Franklin wryly noted: "Indeed we must all hang together, otherwise we shall most assuredly hang separately." Fat Benjamin Harrison of Virginia told tiny Elbridge Gerry of Massachusetts: "With me it will all be over in a minute, but you, you will be dancing on air an hour after I am gone." These men knew what they risked. The penalty for treason was death by hanging. And remember, a great British fleet was already at anchor in New York Harbor. They were sober men. There were no dreamy-eyed intellectuals or draft card burners here. They were far from hot-eyed fanatics yammering for an explosion. They simply asked for the status quo. It was change they resisted. It was equality with the mother country they desired. It was taxation with representation they sought. They were all conservatives, yet they rebelled. It was principle, not property, that had brought these men to Philadelphia. Two of them became presidents of the United States. Seven of them became state governors. One died in office as vice president of the United States. Several would go on to be U.S. Senators. One, the richest man in America, in 1828 founded the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad. One, a delegate from Philadelphia, was the only real poet, musician and philosopher of the signers. (It was he, Francis Hopkinson not Betsy Ross who designed the United States flag.) Richard Henry Lee, a delegate from Virginia, had introduced the resolution to adopt the Declaration of Independence in June of 1776. He was prophetic in his concluding remarks: "Why then sir, why do we longer delay? Why still deliberate? Let this happy day give birth to an American Republic. Let her arise not to devastate and to conquer but to reestablish the reign of peace and law. "The eyes of Europe are fixed upon us. She demands of us a living example of freedom that may exhibit a contrast in the felicity of the citizen to the ever-increasing tyranny which desolates her polluted shores. She invites us to prepare an asylum where the unhappy may find solace, and the persecuted repost. "If we are not this day wanting in our duty, the names of the American Legislatures of 1776 will be placed by posterity at the side of all of those whose memory has been and ever will be dear to virtuous men and good citizens." Though the resolution was formally adopted July 4, it was not until July 8 that two of the states authorized their delegates to sign, and it was not until August 2 that the signers met at Philadelphia to actually put their names to the Declaration. William Ellery, delegate from Rhode Island, was curious to see the signers' faces as they committed this supreme act of personal courage. He saw some men sign quickly, "but in no face was he able to discern real fear." Stephan Hopkins, Ellery's colleague from Rhode Island, was a man past 60. As he signed with a shaking pen, he declared: "My hand trembles, but my heart does not."

"Most Glorious Service" Even before the list was published, the British marked down every member of Congress suspected of having put his name to treason. All of them became the objects of vicious manhunts. Some were taken. Some, like Jefferson, had narrow escapes. All who had property or families near British strongholds suffered. · Francis Lewis, New York delegate saw his home plundered -- and his estates in what is now Harlem -- completely destroyed by British Soldiers. Mrs. Lewis was captured and treated with great brutality. Though she was later exchanged for two British prisoners through the efforts of Congress, she died from the effects of her abuse. · William Floyd, another New York delegate, was able to escape with his wife and children across Long Island Sound to Connecticut, where they lived as refugees without income for seven years. When they came home they found a devastated ruin. · Philips Livingstone had all his great holdings in New York confiscated and his family driven out of their home. Livingstone died in 1778 still working in Congress for the cause. · Louis Morris, the fourth New York delegate, saw all his timber, crops, and livestock taken. For seven years he was barred from his home and family. · John Hart of Trenton, New Jersey, risked his life to return home to see his dying wife. Hessian soldiers rode after him, and he escaped in the woods. While his wife lay on her deathbed, the soldiers ruined his farm and wrecked his homestead. Hart, 65, slept in caves and woods as he was hunted across the countryside. When at long last, emaciated by hardship, he was able to sneak home, he found his wife had already been buried, and his 13 children taken away. He never saw them again. He died a broken man in 1779, without ever finding his family. · Dr. John Witherspoon, signer, was president of the College of New Jersey, later called Princeton. The British occupied the town of Princeton, and billeted troops in the college. They trampled and burned the finest college library in the country. · Judge Richard Stockton, another New Jersey delegate signer, had rushed back to his estate in an effort to evacuate his wife and children. The family found refuge with friends, but a Tory sympathizer betrayed them. Judge Stockton was pulled from bed in the night and brutally beaten by the arresting soldiers. Thrown into a common jail, he was deliberately starved. Congress finally arranged for Stockton's parole, but his health was ruined. The judge was released as an invalid, when he could no longer harm the British cause. He returned home to find his estate looted and did not live to see the triumph of the Revolution. His family was forced to live off charity. · Robert Morris, merchant prince of Philadelphia, delegate and signer, met Washington's appeals and pleas for money year after year. He made and raised arms and provisions which made it possible for Washington to cross the Delaware at Trenton. In the process he lost 150 ships at sea, bleeding his own fortune and credit almost dry. · George Clymer, Pennsylvania signer, escaped with his family from their home, but their property was completely destroyed by the British in the Germantown and Brandywine campaigns. · Dr. Benjamin Rush, also from Pennsylvania, was forced to flee to Maryland. As a heroic surgeon with the army, Rush had several narrow escapes. · John Martin, a Tory in his views previous to the debate, lived in a strongly loyalist area of Pennsylvania. When he came out for independence, most of his neighbors and even some of his relatives ostracized him. He was a sensitive and troubled man, and many believed this action killed him. When he died in 1777, his last words to his tormentors were: "Tell them that they will live to see the hour when they shall acknowledge it [the signing] to have been the most glorious service that I have ever rendered to my country." · William Ellery, Rhode Island delegate, saw his property and home burned to the ground. · Thomas Lynch, Jr., South Carolina delegate, had his health broken from privation and exposures while serving as a company commander in the military. His doctors ordered him to seek a cure in the West Indies and on the voyage, he and his young bride were drowned at sea. · Edward Rutledge, Arthur Middleton, and Thomas Heyward, Jr., the other three South Carolina signers, were taken by the British in the siege of Charleston. They were carried as prisoners of war to St. Augustine, Florida, where they were singled out for indignities. They were exchanged at the end of the war, the British in the meantime having completely devastated their large landholdings and estates. · Thomas Nelson, signer of Virginia, was at the front in command of the Virginia military forces. With British General Charles Cornwallis in Yorktown, fire from 70 heavy American guns began to destroy Yorktown piece by piece. Lord Cornwallis and his staff moved their headquarters into Nelson's palatial home. While American cannonballs were making a shambles of the town, the house of Governor Nelson remained untouched. Nelson turned in rage to the American gunners and asked, "Why do you spare my home?" They replied, "Sir, out of respect to you." Nelson cried, "Give me the cannon!" and fired on his magnificent home himself, smashing it to bits. But Nelson's sacrifice was not quite over. He had raised $2 million for the Revolutionary cause by pledging his own estates. When the loans came due, a newer peacetime Congress refused to honor them, and Nelson's property was forfeited. He was never reimbursed. He died, impoverished, a few years later at the age of 50.

Lives, Fortunes, Honor Of those 56 who signed the Declaration of Independence, nine died of wounds or hardships during the war. Five were captured and imprisoned, in each case with brutal treatment. Several lost wives, sons or entire families. One lost his 13 children. Two wives were brutally treated. All were at one time or another the victims of manhunts and driven from their homes. Twelve signers had their homes completely burned. Seventeen lost everything they owned. Yet not one defected or went back on his pledged word. Their honor, and the nation they sacrificed so much to create is still intact. And, finally, there is the New Jersey signer, Abraham Clark. He gave two sons to the officer corps in the Revolutionary Army. They were captured and sent to that infamous British prison hulk afloat in New York Harbor known as the hell ship Jersey, where 11,000 American captives were to die. The younger Clarks were treated with a special brutality because of their father. One was put in solitary and given no food. With the end almost in sight, with the war almost won, no one could have blamed Abraham Clark for acceding to the British request when they offered him his sons' lives if he would recant and come out for the King and Parliament. The utter despair in this man's heart, the anguish in his very soul, must reach out to each one of us down through 200 years with his answer: "No." The 56 signers of the Declaration Of Independence proved by their every deed that they made no idle boast when they composed the most magnificent curtain line in history. "And for the support of this Declaration with a firm reliance on the protection of divine providence, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor." My friends, I know you have a copy of the Declaration of Independence somewhere around the house - in an old history book (newer ones may well omit it), an encyclopedia, or one of those artificially aged "parchments" we all got in school years ago. I suggest that each of you take the time this month to read through the text of the Declaration, one of the most noble and beautiful political documents in human history. There is no more profound sentence than this: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable rights, that among these are Life, Liberty, and the pursuit of Happiness..." These are far more than mere poetic words. The underlying ideas that infuse every sentence of this treatise have sustained this nation for more than two centuries. They were forged in the crucible of great sacrifice. They are living words that spring from and satisfy the deepest cries for liberty in the human spirit. "Sacred honor" isn't a phrase we use much these days, but every American life is touched by the bounty of this, the Founders' legacy. It is freedom, tested by blood, and watered with tears. - Rush Limbaugh III ____________________ Follow the Tennessee Conservative on Twitter: www.twitter.com/TennConserv

Al Franken – Wholly Owned Subsidiary of ACORN

Al Franken, the former Stuart Smalley, becomes the 60^th Democrat in the US Senate. That statement is even painful to type on a keyboard! This blithering idiot joins the likes of Harry Reid, Chuck Schumer, Dianne Feinstein, Barbara Boxer, Chris Dodd, Dick Durbin and Roland Burris as examples of just how far the United States has fallen from its pinnacle of greatness.

The Franken ‘victory’ is just the latest assault on the senses. This nightmare became a reality when the incumbent Minnesota Republican Senator Norm Coleman conceded defeat in the recount of all recounts after the state’s Supreme Court unanimously rejected his lawsuit.

But his loss was more than likely preordained in 2006 when Democrat Mark Ritchie defeated two-term Republican Mary Kiffmeyer to become Minnesota secretary of State.

Ritchie is the one who finagled the recount that gave Franken a lead some six weeks after Coleman appeared to win by 725 votes on election day. Now here is the dirty little secret: Ritchie has extensive ties to the ACORN organization, now under federal investigation for voter fraud in fourteen states, and was endorsed by the community activist group in 2006.

"Mark Ritchie as we all know is a hard-core liberal who was endorsed by Acorn and funded by Acorn," Matthew Vadum, senior editor of CapitolResearch.org, a nonprofit think tank, recently told NewsMax. "It is not surprising that he has a permissive attitude toward the recount process."

Ritchie gave credit for his 2006 election to the liberal ACORN organization, the stated goal of which is to replace conservative secretaries of state with liberal Democrats. Why? Simple: After the recounts in Florida in 2000 and Ohio in 2004, both of which were key to Bush victories, the Left realized that the secretary of state is as important, if not more so, as which candidate got the most votes. Control the election process and you control the future.

In 2008, the group helped fund Democratic victories in Montana, West Virginia, Oregon and Missouri, spending some $280,000, according to the watchdog group Center for Public Integrity.

If this trend continues, our elections may soon be no more honest than the one recently held in Iran. If the Secretary of State Project and Acorn are allowed to so manipulate the process, there will be more "victories" like Al Franken's to come.