The amendment reads as follows:

Amendment IX - Construction of Constitution. Ratified 12/15/1791.

"The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people."

Levin (The Great One, as dubbed by his WABC pal, Sean Hannity) essentially agrees with my previously stated opinion that the Ninth Amendment is a rule of construction to interpret the first Eight Amendments in context, and which essentially codifies the Declaration's reference to inalienable rights, rather than being a source of amorphous and innumerable additional FEDERAL constitutional rights.

As Levin puts it:

"By its express text, the Ninth Amendment merely sets forth a rule of construction governing the first eight amendments. Its text cannot plausibly be read as a font of any rights. True, the Ninth Amendment presupposes the existence of “other [] [rights] retained by the people,” but the source of those rights must lie elsewhere...

And they include as well the broad array of non-constitutional rights that state law is free to protect, including (to the extent not covered by the Constitution’s guarantee of a “Republican Form of Government”) the basic right of the people to engage in self-governance. Indeed, those who seem to think that any right that is really, really important must be constitutional engage in the very disparagement of non-constitutional rights that the Ninth Amendment is designed to guard against."

I have generally agreed with Levin, but the two pending cases, as well as Barnett below make the best arguments I have ever heard on the other side of the substantive debate.

Read the whole Levin post and follow the links for two excellent posts at Benchmemos (also on NRO) by Ed Whelan and Matthew Franck respecting the Ninth Amendment.

http://levin.nationalreview.com/post/?q=ZjIwNjE4YjNlMTRlNWU5ODc3MzkzN2I4...

Below are the main portions of Randy Barnett's WSJ column and Matthew Franck's rebuttal on Bench Memos on the two potentially landmark cases that rely upon the Ninth Amendment to degree unprecedented in constitutional jurisprudence. The link to the whole Barnett article (subscription required) follows the following excerpt, which is followed by portions and link to Francks:

RULE OF LAW

In Re: Life or Death
By RANDY E. BARNETT
December 9, 2006; Page A9

In Abigail Alliance v. von Eschenbach, a three judge panel of the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals ruled that, when a drug passed Phase I trials establishing its safety, a terminally ill patient has a right to try the drug before its efficacy is established, provided the patient has no other FDA-approved drug available for treatment. However, two weeks ago the circuit granted the government's motion for an en banc rehearing before all the members of the court.

At stake is the right to life. Although the parties are pleading the Due Process Clause of the Fifth Amendment, their claim also finds textual support in the original meaning of the judicially neglected Ninth Amendment, which reads: "The enumeration in the Constitution of certain rights shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people."

The Ninth Amendment's author, James Madison, explained to the first Congress that it was added to guard against the implication "that those rights which were not singled out, were intended to be assigned into the hands of the general government, and were consequently insecure." If the right to preserve one's life is not among the natural liberty rights retained by the people when they established government, then none are: The Declaration of Independence not only affirmed the natural right to life, it also affirmed that "to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men."

Of course, under our Constitution, state governments have the power to protect the health and safety of their citizens, and the federal government has been accorded the power to regulate the interstate marketing of drugs. But the question is whether terminally ill patients with no alternative have the right to take a chance on a drug of unproven effectiveness after Phase I trials establish its safety to the satisfaction of the FDA. If the retained right to life is truly fundamental, as the Declaration attests, and is not to be denied or disparaged, as the Ninth Amendment attests, then this decision is the patient's to make unless very good reasons exist to the contrary.

This is not a situation where "quack" doctors peddle false hope to dying patients, inducing them to avoid alternative effective treatments or simply to waste their assets. A physician's recommendation of a post-Phase I drug is backed up by the FDA's conclusion that it is safe, as well as a pharmaceutical company's willingness to wager millions of dollars on the approval process to show it is also effective. Does it make any sense to respect the liberty of citizens to strap waxed boards to their feet and slide down snowy slopes with trees whizzing by for the thrill of it (I am not making this up), yet deny the dying access to potentially life saving drugs that have been proven safe?

The natural rights to life and health are also at stake in the "partial birth abortion" cases that were argued to the Supreme Court in October. The Eighth and Ninth Circuit Courts of Appeals both held the federal ban on partial birth abortion was unconstitutional because it lacked an exception for the health of the mother. While this procedure is highly controversial when performed late term, the ban applied throughout the entire pregnancy. Moreover, the statute allows even late term use of the procedure to protect the woman's life (the very same right to life at issue in Abigail Alliance).

It is not as if Congress denies the existence of a constitutionally protected right to preserve one's health. Instead, Congress claimed that the procedure could be banned because it is never necessary to protect the health of the mother. However, both the Eighth and Ninth circuits found substantial medical authority that the banned procedures are necessary at times to preserve a woman's health.

In the face of this medical disagreement, the government argues that the congressional decision to ban the procedure should be upheld because it supported by some medical authority and therefore is "rational." Under the government's theory, however, when there is substantial disagreement among medical authorities, any decision by the government would be "rational" because supported by one side or the other.

Standing in the government's way is the 2000 case of Stenberg v. Carhart, in which the Supreme Court struck down a Nebraska ban on partial birth abortion because it too lacked an exception for the health of the mother. The court ruled that "where substantial medical authority supports the proposition that banning a particular abortion procedure could endanger women's health" a woman and her physician have a right to opt for that procedure. In other words, in the face of disagreement among reputable medical authorities, we should defer to the choice of the individual and her doctor, rather than to politicians.

Stenberg was decided 5-4 with Justice O'Connor providing the fifth vote to strike down the statute and Justice Kennedy in dissent. With Justice Alito replacing Justice O'Connor, observers are guessing that Stenberg is "in play."

But these cases are not really about the contentious liberty to choose abortion. Rather, they concern the fundamental right to preserve one's health. Is it so hard to imagine a conservative justice siding with a patient, her doctor and a substantial body of medical authority, over the highly politicized opinion of Congress?

Which brings us back to the issue of deference. Is Congress entitled to blind deference when a person's life and health is at stake? Or do the people themselves deserve deference when their choices are supported by state-licensed and regulated physicians and either substantial medical authority or Phase I trials? The Ninth Amendment was added to the Constitution precisely to affirm, in Madison's words, "the just importance of other rights retained by the people." We will soon learn whether the courts agree.

http://online.wsj.com/article_email/SB116562303655545069-lMyQjAxMDE2NjE1...

Mr. Barnett is the Carmack Waterhouse Professor of Legal Theory at the Georgetown Law Center and the author of "Restoring the Lost Constitution: The Presumption of Liberty" (Princeton, 2003).

Also see:

Matthew Franck's "Deny or Disparage" response:

In the Saturday edition of the Wall Street Journal (sub. req’d), Randy Barnett of Georgetown’s law school urges the federal courts to take up the Ninth Amendment in defense of the “natural liberty rights retained by the people when they established government.” In Barnett’s view, such rights would include the “right to preserve one’s life” by the use of experimental drugs that have been deemed “safe” in Phase I trials by the FDA but not finally approved for general prescription use after complete testing for their efficacy. And they would include the “right to preserve one’s health” by means of a partial-birth abortion as long as there is some “disagreement among reputable medical authorities” as to whether such an abortion was “necessary” to a pregnant woman’s health.

In one of his more trenchant opinions on our rights-manufacturing jurisprudence (a dissent, more’s the pity), Justice Scalia had this to say, in Troxel v. Granville (2000): “The Declaration of Independence . . . is not a legal prescription conferring powers upon the courts; and the Constitution’s refusal [in the Ninth Amendment] to ‘deny or disparage’ other rights is far removed from affirming any one of them, and even further removed from authorizing judges to identify what they might be, and to enforce the judges’ list against laws duly enacted by the people.”

http://bench.nationalreview.com/post/?q=MmQ1NTI3OTI5NDFkMjk2ODNmMWRlMDEz...

Levin:

"Just so. And anyway, “not . . . deny or disparage” is strange language to use in a provision calling for the judicial vindication of rights. How does one disparage a right, after all? Point and giggle?"

UPDATE

NEIL STEVENS' PRIOR DIARY EXCERPTS AND LINK

Denying and Disparaging the 9th

One amendment has been shoved under the bus by all though. That one is the 9th, and I wish it weren't so, but it doesn't get enough respect.

I understand why the left denies and disparages the 9th amendment. That's easy: they see 'rights' as alternately tools to be used by judges to achieve policy goals that cannot be won with elections, or as responsibilities of the government as a representative of classes of people collectively. That is about the only meaning the word can have with them, after all. Alien to them is the concept of an absolute natural order or, Sagan forbid, a deity-given order of how things are and should be.

So for them, such a broad amendment stating facts about the world, steeped in a concept of humanity that is contraindicated by their worldview, is nothing more than an "inkblot." It's easy for them to declare that, too. When you have a "living Constitution," some parts grow beyond their text (1st, 14th) while others shrink (2nd, 9th, 10th, Article 1,...).

The right's opposition to the amendment is harder to understand logically, though. We're the steady opponents of judicial activism, determined champions of an enduring Constitution, and last supporters of textualism in Constitutional interpretation. Why, then, do some of us hop onto the bandwagon and declare the 9th to be "meaningless?"

Unfortunately I think the reason is emotional. We've been hit over the head so many times by an activist Judiciary finding excuses to use their self-proclaimed supremacy over the Legislature and the Executive, that we've forgotten that our view of rights is not the same as theirs. We see "rights" in a Constitutional law context and cringe just on reflex.

What we should be doing instead is upholding the 9th along with the rest, but with the constantly-needed reminder that rights and the role of the Judiciary do not change with the makeup of the Supreme Court. We ought not shy away from our otherwise-principled respect for the document as it is written, just because we fear runaway judges perverting it into a blank check for activism.

READ THE WHOLE THING AND COMMENTS (MY COMMENTS ARE RE-PRINTED IN THE COMMENTS TO THIS DIARY AS WELL.)

http://www.redstate.com/blogs/neil_stevens/2006/sep/22/denying_and_dispa...

Gamecock, a civil and criminal trial and appellate lawyer for two decades in federal and state courts throughout the South, is presently vice-president of a multi-state real estate investment firm headquartered in Charlotte, N.C. For more Bio info see his personal "Gamecock" Townhall website. Gamecock is also an original contributing writer for www.race42008.com and recently joined The Minority Report as well.

http://theminorityreportblog.blogspot.com/index.html

"One man with courage makes a majority." - Andrew Jackson

No word if the Study Group Program for the Sanity on War-Challenged will continue beyond this fiscal year.

Given the unique nature of MSM coverage actually reporting the facts and what they mean in the real world and not just in the All-Events-Only-Matter-Only-In-How-They-Confirm-Bush-Is-The-World's-Menace World, I will let them report the verbal shots heard round the world today:

Asia Times

Bush holds his course
By Jim Lobe

WASHINGTON - Despite a growing and virtually universal consensus both in the US and abroad that the United States must engage Syria and Iran if it hopes to stabilize Iraq, US President George W Bush appears determined to ignore Baghdad's two key neighbors as long as possible.

That is increasingly the assessment of analysts who had been hopeful that the Democratic sweep of the mid-term congressional elections in November, as well as Bush's decision to replace Pentagon chief Donald Rumsfeld with former Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) director Robert Gates, would incline the president toward a more accommodating stance.

In particular, it had been thought that those two developments would make the anticipated recommendation by the congressionally mandated, bipartisan Iraq Study Group (ISG) co-chaired by former secretary of state James Baker - that Washington actively promote and participate in regional negotiations on Iraq that would include Iran and Syria - politically irresistible. Its long-awaited report will be released next week.

But recent statements by Bush and other senior administration officials, as well as the departure of a key "realist" adviser to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, have fueled growing speculation that Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney hope they can still prevail in Iraq without having to sit down with the two "evil-doers".

Indeed, that appeared to be the message Bush wished to convey on Tuesday at a North Atlantic Treaty Organization summit in Riga where he recommitted the US to support for Iraq's "young democracy" and vowed not to withdraw US troops "until the mission is complete".

"He has no intention to change his policy in Iraq," Pat Lang, a former top Middle East analyst at the Pentagon's Defense Intelligence Agency, concluded after reviewing Bush's remarks.

In the same appearance, Bush also seemed to rule out talks with Tehran and Damascus under present circumstances. "Iran knows how to get to the table with us. That is to verifiably suspend their [uranium] enrichment programs," he said, stressing, however, that he had no objection to direct talks between the Iraqi leaders, such as those carried out over the weekend in Tehran by President Jalal Talabani, and their counterparts in Iran and Syria.

The New York Times described Bush's comments as "laying the foundation to push back against" the ISG's anticipated recommendations, an assessment that echoes recent suggestions by senior officials, including Bush, that the ISG is just one of a number of ongoing reviews of the situation in Iraq that the administration will consider in the coming weeks.

read it all

http://www.atimes.com/atimes/Middle_East/HL01Ak01.html

Wall Street Journal-Transcript of News Conference

Bush:

Our objective is to help the Maliki government succeed. And today we discussed how to further the success of this government. This is a government that is dedicated to pluralism and rule of law. It's a government elected by the Iraqi people under a constitution approved by the Iraqi people, which, in itself, is an unusual event in the Middle East, by the way.

We talked today about accelerating authority to the Prime Minister so he can do what the Iraqi people expect him to do, and that is bring security to parts of his country that require firm action. It's going to -- the presence of the United States will be in Iraq so long as the government asks us to be in Iraq. This is a sovereign government. I believe that there is more training to be done. I think the Prime Minister agrees with me. I know that we're providing a useful addition to Iraq by chasing down al Qaeda and by securing -- by helping this country protect itself from al Qaeda.

Al Qaeda wants a safe haven in Iraq. Al Qaeda made it clear earlier that suicide bombers would increase sectarian violence. That was part of their strategy. One of our goals is to deny safe haven for al Qaeda in Iraq, and the Maliki government expects us and wants us to provide that vital part of security.

So we'll be in Iraq until the job is complete, at the request of a sovereign government elected by the people. I know there's a lot of speculation that these reports in Washington mean there's going to be some kind of graceful exit out of Iraq. We're going to stay in Iraq to get the job done, so long as the government wants us there.

We want the people of Iraq to live in a free society. It's in our interests. In my judgment, if we were to leave before the job is done, it would only embolden terrorists, it would only embolden the extremists. It would dash the hopes of millions of people who want to live in a free society, just like the 12 million people who voted in the Iraqi election. They want to live in a free society. And we support this government, because the government understands it was elected by the people. And Prime Minister Maliki is working hard to overcome the many obstacles in the way to a peaceful Iraq, and we want to help him.

Read it all (subscription required)

al reuters

He said that while the Iraqi government was free to talk to Iran about helping end the violence, U.S. conditions for direct talks with Tehran remained unchanged.

"As far as the United States goes, Iran knows how to get to the table with us, which is to do that which they said they would do, which is verifiably suspend their enrichment program," he told a joint news conference after talks with Estonian President Toomas Ilves on his way to a NATO summit.

read it all

spine still intact

Bush remains:

"One man with courage makes a majority." - Andrew Jackson

www.race42008.com

But just as armed American Dons could also exude pious charm in unarmed business deals, so Russia's Don famously fashioned a counterfeit soul to disarm the main obstacle to its devious designs. Bush is better at spotting evil from afar.

The premature death toll of vocal opponents of Russian President Vladimir Putin is mounting. The apparent poisoning death of ex-Russian spy Alexander Litvinenko is only the latest.

Sky News reports:

"A large quantity of radiation, probably from a substance called Polonium 210, has been found in the body of dead ex-Russian spy Alexander Litvinenko.

The "major dose" of alpha radiation was detected in his urine, said Government experts, who added that Polonium 210 is only dangerous if ingested.

They also revealed that police have found radiation at three locations: his Muswell Hill home, a central London sushi bar where he ate shortly before falling ill, and a hotel where he had met two Russians that morning.

Before he died in a London hospital on Thursday night, Mr Litvinenko wrote a statement on Tuesday blaming Russian President Vladimir Putin for ordering his murder.

The distraught father He accused the leader of having "no respect for life, liberty or any civilised value".

He told Mr Putin: "You have shown yourself to be unworthy of your office, to be unworthy of the trust of civilised men and women."

The Russian President said the death was a tragedy, but he had not seen any definitive proof that it was a "violent death". He also brushed off suggestions linking him to the case.

Mr Litvinenko's tearful father Walter said: "This regime is a mortal danger to the world", adding: "It was an excruciating death."

Mr Litvinenko's supporters said he was killed because he was investigating the murder last month of journalist and fellow Putin critic Anna Politkovskaya.

see link to full text of statement:

http://edition.cnn.com/2006/WORLD/europe/11/24/uk.spy.statement/

The murdered journalist and activist noted by Litvinenko are not the only suspicious deaths of Putin's internal critics in recent years, not to mention the attempted murder of Ukraine opposition leader Viktor Yushchenko's who recovered from his mystery illness which was also caused by poisoning.

Meanwhile The Don's partners in Crime, Presidents Assad of Syria and Ahmadenijad of Iran, continue to live as Lebanon’s industry minister, Pierre Gemayel, a fierce opponent of Syria and Iran was murdered in broad daylight and Iran's Bearded would be destroyer of Israel is promised nuclear defense assistance and delivered missiles from his Godfather.

http://www.breitbart.com/news/2006/11/24/061124134543.qth288nm.html

Reckon James Realist Baker, the kook leftists on his commission and the Kook DEM Party still favor dialogue with the Axis of Evil Leader, its Basher flunky and the unextinguished ember from the ash heap the Evil Empire was buried under?

Even the Libs in the UK suggest not. see link

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,6-2466572,00.html

But what inspired this blog entry was hearing Fred Barnes on Brit Hume's show discussing the speculation that the Baker Group was considering proposing talks between the US, Iran and Syria over ways to stabilize Iraq last night, agree with the rest of the panel that "given the assassination in Lebanon", surely their could be no talks between the US and Iran/Syria now.

Ok, let me get this straight. Iran has been the world's number one sponsor of terror since 1979 and was singled out by President Bush, along with Iraq and North Korea, as part of the Axis of Evil that threatens America after 911. Iran's forward infantry army, The Hezbos, are stationed in Lebanon where they regularly, and as recently as THIS PAST SUMMER, wage war on Israel. Administration officials have frequently commented on Iran and Syria as aiding and arming our enemies in Iraq. The Members Only donned Bearded One regularly declares that he intends to wipe Israel off the map as he defies the UN over his oil-rich nation's ongoing nuclear program for "peaceful" purposes.

But IF ONLY Lebanon's Gemayel continued to breathe the air in Earth's atmosphere, Syria and Iran would be acceptable partners to discuss bringing stability to Iraq?

Has Putin poisoned the entire Beltway? What else can explain the Alice in Wonderland conventional "wisdom" spewing forth from there.

I suspect this whole notion was a trial balloon put out by Baker. And, I suspect we will talk to them, as in, "you have 72 hours to give up the nuke program, disarm the Hezbos and cease and desist arming our enemies in Iraq or your tenure as heads of state will end."

Christopher Hitchens puts Baker in perspective in his latest:

James Baker is the last guy we should listen to about Iraq

.....The summa of wisdom in these circles is the need for consultation with Iraq's immediate neighbors in Syria and Iran. Given that these two regimes have recently succeeded in destroying the other most hopeful democratic experiment in the region—the brief emergence of a self-determined Lebanon that was free of foreign occupation—and are busily engaged in promoting their own version of sectarian mayhem there, through the trusty medium of Hezbollah, it looks as if a distinctly unsentimental process is under way.

This will present few difficulties to Baker, who supported the Syrian near-annexation of Lebanon. In order to recruit the Baathist regime of Hafez Assad to his coalition of the cynical against Saddam in the Kuwait war, Baker and Bush senior both acquiesced in the obliteration of Lebanese sovereignty. "I believe in talking to your enemies," said Baker last month—invoking what is certainly a principle of diplomacy. In this instance, however, it will surely seem to him to be more like talking to old friends—who just happen to be supplying the sinews of war to those who kill American soldiers and Iraqi civilians. Is it likely that they will stop doing this once they become convinced that an American withdrawal is only a matter of time?

At around the same time he made this statement, Baker was quoted as saying, with great self-satisfaction, that nobody ever asks him any more about the decision to leave Saddam Hussein in power in 1991. It's interesting to know that he still feels himself invested in that grand bargain of realpolitik, which, contrary to what he may think, has not by any means been forgotten. It's also interesting in shedding light on the sort of conversations he has been having in Baghdad. For millions of Iraqis, the betrayal of their uprising against Saddam in 1991 is something that they can never forget. They tend to bring it up, too, and to fear a repetition of it. This apprehension about another sellout is especially strong among the Shiite and Kurdish elements who together make up a majority of the population, but it seems from its public reports so far that the ISG has not visited the Kurdish north of the country. If Baker thinks that the episode is a closed subject, it shows us something of what the quality of his "listening" must be like.

In 1991, for those who keep insisting on the importance of sending enough troops, there were half a million already-triumphant Allied soldiers on the scene. Iraq was stuffed with weapons of mass destruction, just waiting to be discovered by the inspectors of UNSCOM. The mass graves were fresh. The strength of sectarian militias was slight. The influence of Iran, still recovering from the devastating aggression of Saddam Hussein, was limited. Syria was—let's give Baker his due—"on side." The Iraqi Baathists were demoralized by the sheer speed and ignominy of their eviction from Kuwait and completely isolated even from their usual protectors in Moscow, Paris, and Beijing. There would never have been a better opportunity to "address the root cause" and to remove a dictator who was a permanent menace to his subjects, his neighbors, and the world beyond. Instead, he was shamefully confirmed in power and a miserable 12-year period of sanctions helped him to enrich himself and to create the immiserated, uneducated, unemployed underclass that is now one of the "root causes" of a new social breakdown in Iraq. It seems a bit much that the man principally responsible for all this should be so pleased with himself and that he should be hailed on all sides as the very model of the statesmanship we now need.

Read the whole thing

http://www.slate.com/id/2154164/

We do need to talk to Iran and Syria. For Baker and his ilk, so long as 72 hours have passed between Iran/Syria sponsored killings of our Allies and/or Troops, Basher and Beard can visit him in Baltimore over Blue Crab. But for Bush, I suspect his end of the dialogue will be from the Oval office, hopefully after bombing has commenced.

The wild card in this is The Godfather of Mother Russia and the continuing revelations of his misread soul.

www.race42008.com

"One man with courage makes a majority." - Andrew Jackson

Because I am sure when I hear unpatriotic speech and that most others do as well, I am convinced that if the GOP members of Congress would dare to publicly denounce unpatriotic speech every time they hear it, that it would resonate with Americans and transform the country. It would send the message that the PC speech code is no longer operative. that we are free to openly love this country and shame those that would embolden enemies to fight on and kill more of our troops.

I would compare the ease with which unpatriotic speech can be discerned with being able to distinguish mothers and non-mothers with children. Its a love thing, and

(begin inside Redstate inside communication) 

Yes, TS, Cella, Johne, and others, it is first an emotion. It is THE emotion. The emotion that animates a man to want to live.

I am writing this beacuse I am just too lazy to engage in the high level of discourse over on Paul's diary, ie Redstate's MENSA Mount Olympus!! My printer is down, and to intelligently engage I would need to copy off the comments and study more comprehensively so as not to embarrass myself amongst the Gods! This is a compliment to you guys. And don't worry, I'm secure. But I was inspired by reading snippets of yours over at

http://www.redstate.com/blogs/paul_j_cella/2006/nov/17/neighbors_and_pat...,

and so, I wanted to try and personalize part (not the TS imperialist designs on liberating Shanghai just yet, but) of what you guys have so eloquently dissected....

(end RS)

Yes, Paul, at its base, patriotism is the manifestation of many kinds of love; a desperation born of mortality to be reconciled with God; and the desire that one's mortal life have an immortal importance by being a part of something that he was part of and that others will be part of in a similar way.

Only people that love their life will fight others to save their life. And by life, I don't just refer to a man's physical well being. No, a man's life includes the other people that he participates in life with, that he influences and that influence him. People that think in the same general way. people that he is bonded with in a style of living in which they revere the same things.

I have always been an American exceptionalist that loved America from the First Grade till today. I have always been patriotic. I shed tears upon hearing the National Anthem, speeches quoting the Founders, Lincoln, FDR, etc.

But the patriotism I had before 911 doesn't compare to the patriotism I feel to my bones everyday post 911. The patriotism I feel now, is akin to the way one's feelings about one's parents changes over time after when they die. At some point you are shocked and stunned in a very desperate way with the fact of who they were, how so very precious and important they were, and how much they loved you, and you can hardly bear the fact that you can't repay it more now that you realize just how important they were.

My parents were both passed away before 911. Mother when I was 17, but Dad, just a few years earlier. To not be able to talk to Dad and watch ballgames was already a source of great pain, but then to not be able to see him now.

And then it struck me. I looked around at America in a whole new way, especially those in my communities and State, but also the whole country. I saw the country that my Mom and Dad lived and died in and left their mark upon. I was one of their marks, and this was my country. And Others wanted to destroy my country. To cause my Dad to die all over again. To cause all of us and all we have been, are and will be, to die, utterly, and forever.

The Cold War was never real to me. Probably because I was in a Carter-like liberal denial. After my conservative epiphany, though, when I read many books about Reagan and what he faced, I now realize how dangerous was the world I sleepwalked thru while Reagan won the war.

But on 911 and after, it really hit me just how much I loved this country and would do anything to preserve it for posterity. I thought back to a College Professor that I didn't understand at the time. He would tear up talking about sitting on the banks of the Panama Canal watching our Boys go to fight Japan after Pearl Harbor. I didn't understand then. I was a young spoiled American that just took all this for granted. WWII was history and it had to be that way....

Well, when the WTC towers fell, I knew that things would be like they would be only if we fought and won. And what was to happen post-911 wasn't in a history book.

It was and is in us. George W Bush is one of us, and he has in him what many of us have in us. Hopefully a majority. I am confident it is a strong majority. But there is a string minority that does not have in themselves what Bush and I and Millions have that will not let us ever stop fighting to save this country, and that is a love so deep that to live is to love this country.

Yes, TS, Cella, Johne, and others, it is first an emotion. It is THE emotion. The emotion that animates a man to want to live. That cares about his fellow man. After the fall, and more specifically, after man united under one government totally alienated from God living in pure evil, God separated man into nations so that evil would not compound exponentially. So that nations could check each other and not be as likely to think himself God.

So it is God's plan that men look after themselves in groups that take care of themselves first and protect themselves from others. For when man is not so separated, he is less able to see God.

Patriotism is really a barometer to determine if a man is truly alive in God's world. Is a man's life connected with others or is he an Island to self?

This patriotism I have post-911 is different in kind from what it was pre-911. I think about this love everyday. And I guess it explains my complete and total contempt for people that show that they do not love this country by what they say and do. They say they love this country, but what they really love is themselves and an imaginary country that never was and never will be. They are not connected to our people by love. No. They are connected to us and this land, more like a Scientist is to guinea pigs, or doctors to patients, or a hotel patron to the Hotel staff, or curious ex-patriots from Utopia nation. We just don't measure up to them. they just can't accept that this is as good as it gets. They hate life because they are surrounded by Neanderthals compared to them. they hate their parents for not fixing the world before they were born into it. They reject the notion that man cannot perfect himself thru social structure. They reject the notion that war is ever necessary. Send a few detectives to Tora Bora.

It is people like theses that look at 5000 years of history in which there has always been war and in which civilizations like them fell to barbarians, and yet come away clueless and in denial. If only people would just do right, then I might could love them...

Well, they wait to love and so are not prepared to fight.

And if we are to preserve this nation we love, we will have to defeat the Left just as surely as we have to defeat the Jihadists.

God Bless America

(Still thinking TS about whether I'm in for liberating China! smile - But I am a neo-con, and cannot imagine that after liberating oppressed peoples from tyrannical regimes posing a threat to us, that I wouldn't share America The Book with the liberated and help them be Connecticut!)

GC also writes for www.race42008.com
"One man with courage makes a majority." - Andrew Jackson

OK, I made the last part up.

But, I haven't been able to find ONE elected Republican who thinks that it is inappropriate for Steny Hoyer to serve as a House leader despite his not one, but two racist comments denigrating Maryland Lt. Gov. Michael Steele, who is Black.

The Caucasian Hoyer, who called Steele a "token" in 2002, described him as "slavishly supporting the GOP" when campaigning for his White opponent during October.

http://www.newsmax.com/archives/ic/2006/10/18/132551.shtml?s=ic

But its worse than "just that."

See Malkin excerpt from before the Election:

Hoyer didn't just innocently use the word in ordinary conversation. He employed it during a comedy routine in front of a crowd of mostly black business owners:

[Democrat Senate candidate Ben] Cardin, a dry and detailed-oriented career legislator, was upstaged at his Upper Marlboro event Sunday by the irrepressible Rep. Steny Hoyer, who did a comedy routine about the event’s host, Cool Wave Water, and told the audience that Steele had had “a career of slavishly supporting the Republican Party.”

Why would it be funny if not for the sneering, racist implications? Hoyer is the number two Democrat in Congress. He knew what he was doing: pandering. Hoyer now claims disingenuously that no insult was intended. Bull. In the past, Hoyer has derided Steele as a "token." Black Democrats in Maryland have no problem with smearing Steele as an "Uncle Tom."

http://michellemalkin.com/archives/006141.htm

Why doesn't the GOP, a party founded for the purpose of abolishing slavery, denounce Hoyer and demand he step down like they did Lott, if for no other reason than to to defend their own candidate? A white Democrat directs racial slurs at a Black Republican and the GOP is silent.

The GOP is usually silent when a spine is required. Silence. the sound of a content minority.

What must a white democrat do or say to Blacks before the GOP would take notice? Use the "N" word in public? Throw an Oreo cookie at them?

I doubt even that would move them. After all, Steny is their honorable friend. And he's a "reasonable" man. A guy they can deal with. Not like that Murtha character.

I have found no evidence that Murtha has ever denigrated black people. I guess Steny will tell better jokes in conference committees.

Does the GOP have ONE man with courage? Because if we do, you know...

"One man with courage makes a majority." - Andrew Jackson

To read the very interesting full debate on this racial issue at Redstate, where this blog was originally posted, click here.

A civil/criminal trial lawyer for two decades in federal and state courts throughout the South and presently Vice-President of a multi-state real estate investment firm headquartered in Charlotte, N.C., Mike DeVine a/k/a Gamecock was a SC Democrat party activist, official and delegate for 20 years, until his June 2001 conservative epiphany that led him to leave the Jack Asses of the World's Oldest political party to embrace the Elephants' never forget Party of Lincoln and Ronaldus Magnus.

GC also blogs for www.race42008.com.

This blog entry originally posted on Redstate and was inspired by pagar's endorsement  just after a chickenhead explosion and just before this rooster concluded it was owed to the RS and TH public. It is submitted as a possible alternative explanation, not as a refutation of the other thoughtful surmises on Redstate or Townhall such as Dan McLaughlin's.

FTR, I am a great admirer of Rumsfeld and think that thanks to his strategies and leadership, never have our enemies been so decimated, our security so enhanced, so many living in tyranny been liberated in so short a time and at so low a cost by any military in history. Rumsfeld and Bush are known in liberated Afghanistan and Iraq by the vast majority of the gratefully liberated (most of whom have been blackballed from MSM appearances) as "The Liberators," as the history of the Muslim and Arab worlds will also remember them long after Pinch is pinched with death taxes.

I am wholly unconvinced that Rumsfeld's resignation on any particular date in the past would have helped the GOP keep their majorities or that the media spin on why his resignation occurred when it occurred has any basis in reality.

I suspect that Rummy, soon to be the longest serving DOD in history, has wanted to leave the post for the normal reasons his predecessors did for quite sometime, but that he has stayed in order to make sure that our enemies not be emboldened that his resignation is a sign the President is losing the will to fight and that the Dems would gain power. Once the Dems gained power, the goal of thwarting the Dems alliance with America's enemies was unachievable. Resigning right away limits the negative press by being in the same cycle as the Dem wins.

I am confident that had Rummy resigned during the campaign that it would have hurt the GOP more. Bush and the GOP have failed utterly in selling a most sell able war. That is the major reason they lost power. Well, not really. The main reason is the YEAR SIX phenomenon of built up grievances. The problem is that the conservative movement is still relatively young, and so we don't have the built up large majorities like the Dems had over their 40years. The GOP will re-gain the majority. The Dem party will make sure of that.

I also suspect that most of the work in Iraq requiring over 100,000 troops is largely done but that Bush's main goal is to make sure that when they begin with withdrawal it not be seen as a defeat like the Dems have tried to ensure. I think the Baker Commission will be the cover. It will cite the sterling achievements. The Dems cynical timetable ala Murtha actually coincided with the Bush's plans all along. But the Dems goal is that America be humiliated in the world.

See also Fred Barnes' "There's Still Life in that Lame Duck":

excerpt:

"With Rumsfeld's resignation, Bush demonstrated his willingness to make major concessions. Rather than change the strategy in Iraq, he changed the strategist. This is not the first step in a disguised retreat from Iraq, Bush aides insist, nor does it represent a turnover of national security policy to the "realists," as opposed to an idealist like Bush, who ran foreign affairs under Bush's father. The president told Rumsfeld's successor, Bob Gates, the goal is still to create a stable democratic Iraq that can defend itself--in other words, victory."

read the whole thing

And read Bush's comments on the war in his pre-election interview with conservatives in the Oval Office and I think we should conclude that Bush will never stop defending us and will not betray our purple-fingered allies in Iraq nor our troops.

How many times have we worried that Bush would waver and weaken on the war due to his silence or media spin and speculation? Yet he has never wavered. Never.

And The Decider won't ever quit before Inauguration Day, 2009.

www.race42008.com

"The trouble with our liberal friends is not that they're ignorant; it's just that they know so much that isn't so." - Ronald Reagan

cross-posted at http://www.redstate.com/blogs/gamecock

FNC was a breath of fresh air for conservatives when it was founded a little over 10 years ago, and remains more breathable than any other MSM news network on cable or broadcast. The contrast between the way it covered the news and the rest of the MSM was stark in its respect for conservative ideas and its scrutiny of liberal conventional wisdom.

But unlike its critics claim, FNC has never come anywhere close to the advocacy journalism engaged in by the rest of the MSM, unless one considers being patriotically for One's own country as it wages war against Islamo-Facist terrorists and Baathist-Fascist mass murdering terror-sponsoring regimes to be improper "advocacy"?

Fox prides itself on being "fair and balanced," and compared to the MSM, it is, whatever "fair and balanced" means beyond having Combs eat up Hannity's valuable time.

However, given the recent spectacle of the MSM's grossly biased behavior as a 527 adjunct of the Democrat party during the recent campaign and their historical bias for the Democrats in varying degrees since the 1960's, America needs FNC to be the "balance" against the MSM for the sake of Jefferson's imperative that democracy cannot succeed absent an informed electorate.

How could Fox perform a balancing role and maintain their fairness and integrity?

Why not have a program fashioned after Brent Bozell's MRC, Newsbusters and Hot Air, and display the lunacy of the MSM as well as their factual inaccuracies and lack of similar treatment of democrats and republicans in similar situations?

Why not have a program that explores what patriotism meant to our founders and to Americans during previous wars?

Why not have a program that dissects liberal myths such as the Wall of Separation, McCarthyism, the unheroic 60s hippies, the noble cause in Vietnam and the carnage the Dems wrought with their activism, etc.

Why not cover Congress like a campaign commercial with a truth detector review?

Why not provide a regular forum for conservatives to advance their cause without being constantly interrupted by an emotional substanceless Democrat?

Why not occasionally deciding for themselves what is news instead of letting the NYT decide for them?

If this country is going to have a chance to staunch the Slouching Towards Gomorrah, modern day Liberalism, of the kind that Europe is dying from, the Democrat Party is sick with and which has given the GOP a rash, must be fought and weakened if not defeated outright.

We must have a public that hears the truth told in English and not the Orwellian 1984 PC speak of the MSM.

The MSM planned October surprises to divert the attention of the American people from the issues and Fox followed along with its nose up the MSM-Foley butt.

It has got to be tough on conservatives in the beltway. They are surrounded by stupid liberals that they want to be friends with, which makes it harder to call them stupid. But the MSM libs have no problem calling us racists, starvers of the old, the poor and the children, warmongers and religious kooks. And too many conservatives just smile and grit their teeth. This kind of go along get along crap will lead either to the fall of America or a bloody Civil War.

Can anyone doubt after the spectacle on the MSM in campaign 2006 and the behavior of the Dems and the MSM since soon after the invasion of Iraq, that the liberals are a clear and present danger to defeating our enemies abroad and maintaining the values necessary to our domestic strength?

Orwell feared an all powerful State. He had it half right. The Media is imposing 1984 on the State. We must have an ally in the milieu from whence the threat is borne.

Conservatives must own and use television media to combat the MSM political party, so dubbed by Howard Fineman and other honest liberal MSM reporters.

originally posted at www.race42008.com

"The trouble with our liberal friends is not that they're ignorant; it's just that they know so much that isn't so." - Ronald Reagan

I was reminded of Spratt's and the Democrat Party's nearly three quarter century old playbook when I heard SC-5's Congressman's 2006 radio ad version of the elect me or those evil republicans will "take your check" lie as I was riding through the District that remains relatively as poor as it was 24 years ago. What progress has been made in the District since Reconstruction is due to the growth of the Charlotte, NC Metro area and Republican economic policies and not anything Spratt has done. But they still have Shaw AFB (as if without Spratt the US would not have to have an Air Force) and the checks still come in the mail (But hasn't it been the GOP that's been voting to fund the checks since 1994?)

But don't bother a Democrat with facts when he's drumming up fear and hate to motivate the permanent dependency victim class he and his party helped to create. A class they feed a steady diet of class envy, victimology, and demonization of republicans as heartless, racist bigots as a substitute for self reliance and responsibility. In order to get votes from those that are poor, one must make sure their are always a good supply of the poor.

And so, Spratt lies. He lies when he says that Republicans want to privatize Social security. He lies when he implies that doing nothing will not lead to a bankrupt system. He hardly ever not lies when he opens his mouth about anything. He's an elected Democrat.

A major reason I had to leave the party if I wished to be able to look myself in the mirror, was due to their lies that the GOP would take social security away from the old and disabled, starve children , or make the burning of Black churches a spectator sport.

The GOP had targeted this seat by heavily promoting a serious SC State Legislator challenger, Ralph Norman, who is well known and well respected in District 5. I have not seen evidence of an aggressive television campaign however.

Norman has fared well in the debates, and in the process has helped to debunk the Myth of the Moderate Democrat, or at least the myth that democrats elected to serve in Washington are distinguishable in any significant way from the Pelosis, Kerrys and Kennedys.

In one of their eight debates (yes, 8) one of the Democrats that the MSM never misses an opportunity to call "moderate", Norman effectively forced Spratt to admit he:

1 - favors federal funding of embryonic stem cell research when Spratt had tried to obfuscate the issue by only referring to the generic "stem cell" research (which includes adult and cord blood in addition to embryonic);

2 - favors abortion on demand under Roe, when Spratt had tried to pass himself off as a pro lifer due to his support for "regulation" of abortions; and

3 - believes man is responsible for global warming and favors taxing citizens and businesses to stop us from usurping the power of the Sun.

http://www.wsoctv.com/news/10208437/detail.html

Norman also showed that except for a few high profile late in election year votes, Spratt's (and most all Democrats in Congress, as rated by the ACU - see link below) voting record is hardly distinguishable from the Lib Dems and certainly far closer to them than to conservative Republicans from the South and West or even liberal and moderate Republicans from the Northeast. In fact, all the DC dems have liberal voting records, bar none. Look at the link below. You will search in vain for even ONE democrat that has a more conservative record than ANY Republican. Bar None!

http://www.acuratings.org/

Sample ratings from 2005 and 2004

Spratt-D-SC 12 20
Pelosi-D-CA 0 8
Harold Ford-D-TN 21 21
Tom DeLay-R-TX 88 100
Cynthia McKinney-D-GA 4 n/a
Peter King-R-NY 83 71
Mel Watt-D-NC 0 0

So, the Moderate SC, TN and NC reps vote conservative from 0-79% of the time, while San Francisco Lib and Marxist McKinney vote conservative 0-92% of the time. Whereas, Northeastern King votes conservative 71-83% and DeLay 88-100.

The Myth of the Moderate elected Democrat in DC. The only thing moderate about them is the speed and tone of their voices as they lie about their records and their intentions.

Moderate and conservative Democrats desperately need to cease being impressed with rhetoric from a hired employee whose job is not to please one's ear, but to vote in accordance with their values on laws passed in D.C. Their job is to represent them, not please them with TV performances. For that, one should seek out true professional oratory entertainers on Turner Classic Movies and the Baptist Church!

Amen!

See also my recent essays related to this subject:

Democrats Would Let Foley Take Minors to Georgia for Abortions
http://gamecock.townhall.com/g/8d0e3c24-19e0-4c98-8234-6cf28053b94b

Hate-Driven Dems Never Win: Mature GOP Voters vs. Hate-Motivated Dem Voters 2006
http://gamecock.townhall.com/g/531f46e9-c032-446e-9dd9-53acb1bbb669

I Proudly Registered to Vote as a Republican Today
http://gamecock.townhall.com/g/8b3b9321-f84d-4ab4-84e6-4e9716f50543

A civil/criminal trial lawyer for two decades in federal and state courts throughout the South and presently Vice-President of a multi-state real estate investment firm headquartered in Charlotte, N.C., Mike DeVine a/k/a Gamecock was a SC Democrat party activist, official and delegate for 20 years, until his June 2001 conservative epiphany that led him to leave the Jack Asses of the World's Oldest political party to embrace the Elephants' never forget Party of Lincoln and Ronaldus Magnus.

Originally posted at Redstate.

Gamecock also writes at  www.race42008.com

"The trouble with our liberal friends is not that they're ignorant; it's just that they know so much that isn't so." - Ronald Reagan

What made the interview so revealing was the historically informed interviewer, Ralph Bristol, host of the radio talk show that bears his name on Greenville/Spartanburg's AM1330/950 WORD in Sen. Graham's home state of SC. See links:

http://www.newsradioword.com/
http://www.ralphbristol.com/

As I have argued for the past three years, the Iraq War is one of America's finest hours with respect to our accomplishments and even more so with respect to costs incurred when compared to past US wars and with congruent wars in world history.

Yet, Sen. Graham, like most elected officials, and even most unwavering war supporters, has bought into the Drive-by Media-driven conventional wisdom meme that the war has been "mishandled" and that because of same, Iraq is a "mess" requiring a new "plan" or "strategy." Of course, if one wishes not to face the raised eyebrows of Tim Russert and more importantly, to be re-invited as co-stars on Sunday TV shows, one must accept the meme and only then argue for victory.

Most conversations about the war between elected officials and the media are juvenile arguments over meaningless semantic phrases like whether we are "winning" (we won't know we were winning until we have won) and should "stay the course," but even that conversation may be had only after the obligatory re-hash of the WMD intell failures and star chamber-like inquisitions as to whether the poor soul would still vote for the war knowing what we know now. And of course, one must accept that we really know what we know now, ie that since we didn't find the volume of WMD that we expected, that surely they never were there. That we know. Uh huh...

See Amir Taheri on why if we saw the war through the enemy's eyes, public support would be high. There is no excuse for the GOP and their alternative media outlets not to communicate the truth about the war that deserves to be told to honor the troops and to respect the American people.

http://www.benadorassociates.com/article/20213

But Graham didn't get the luxury of an un-challenging canned cliche interview with Bristol. No sir. Bristol challenged Graham on his certainty that more troops at the outset and now would solve all Iraq's problems. Bristol refused to accept the CW that the war has gone badly and is going badly or that the US and not Iraq is responsible for security.

I was happy that Graham got to hear that view, because while I am all for the democratization project as a long-term draining of the swamp that produces terrorists, the main reason we are there is to prevent future 911s by eliminating a terror sponsor state (done) and preventing the establishment of a replacement for same.

The Iraq battle is part of a long war that we can't make shorter by making getting out of Iraq the main goal. If Iraqis need to have a Civil War to put down the Baathist deadenders and their al Qaida allies, then let them have at it. We are there to kill terrorists that are only too happy to come there for their 72 virgin-bound ticket/Big Sleep/Dirt Nap and to prevent the re-establishment of a terror sponsor safe haven state, with oil money for WMD fueled 911s.

As Bristol deconstructed all the beltway assumptions, Graham sounded like his eyes were in a deer meets headlights mode. He came away exhibiting America's post-WWII war ignorance and ignorance of what history teaches is necessary to stay free.

It also glaringly revealed Graham and his GOP colleagues' failures to properly inform the public about the war in historical context rather than the Media bushlied 20/20 hindsight context, and their culpability in producing the very sceptical American public they fear could succumb to cut and run Democrats' desire for another glorious Vietnam-like retreat (But please don't show us the millions killed by the falling dominoes. If its not on film it doesn't happen in Greenwich Village.).

But war ignorance is not the only problem. The other problem is that Graham and too many others see themselves as armchair Commanders-in-Chief whose duty is to never fail to let the President and the Public know their every thought about how the war should be fought. After all they, not the generals, have the greatest quality to direct war strategy: ie a majority of votes from their respective states for a cushy 6 year job saying my honorable friend to some of the sorriest people on Earth with co-starring roles on TV if they will only please, please criticize the man elected by a majority of all the states so the Libs can enjoy the fantasy that Bush is stupid and they are smart.

Graham and his colleagues voted for the war. When they did so, then as now, the Constitution vested the plenary power to WAGE war in one man, not 100 or 535, and for good reasons. He displays all the reasons why every time he opens his mouth to express support and a desire to win (and for that he is to be admired as are Lieberman and the GOP) but then can't resist reciting the litany of defeatism, lest anyone in Georgetown think him unenlightened. Having put troops in the field, they owe the troops all they can do and say to help them and tearing down their CINC 24/7 doesn't cut it.

Notice that I have not mentioned my usual complaints about the Democratic party's bushlied, defeatist contributions to weak public support for the war? And all redstaters know my utter contempt for my former party.

The reason I haven't is because the GOP could cure that problem if they had the spines to not care what the media thinks and call their Dem colleagues on the carpet for speech that emboldens the enemy and costing American lives. The GOP senators could shame the Dems into silence if only they could give up being CINC's in waiting themselves and the fawning faux admiration of the media.

They could start by censuring Senators Lurch and Thing from Massachusetts and famed Nazi Hunter Turban from Illinois.

But let's not get fixated on the freaks. Its not them that are the danger. Its the so-called moderates that can't think, much less say, the word victory and with whom that the enemy in Iraq, Saddam's lawyers and Kim Jung Il regularly shares talking points with.

Lindsey Graham was the first republican I voted to send to Washington, DC after my 20 years in the democrat party before my 6/2001 epiphany (see I loved tax cuts before the war) and when this talented lawyer is in your corner, he is the best advocate you can find. And he also states a great case for the war as well, in between preening negativism. But Lindsey is, like most Americans, weakened by affluence and the vacation from history we have had since Korea and WWII.

Thankfully George W. Bush gets it.

Ralph Bristol gets it too, and we can only hope that Graham's exposure to Bristol's wisdom helps him to grow and do his duty to present a united front to the enemy and stop calling dishonorable democrat senators his honorable friends.

Originally posted at Redstate.com

Gamecock also writes for www.race42008.com.

"The trouble with our liberal friends is not that they're ignorant; it's just that they know so much that isn't so." - Ronald Reagan

Given the Washington Post's front page Sunday wake-up poll showing Democrat Ben Cardin surging to a double digit lead in the Maryland U.S. Senate race against Republican nominee Michael Steele, despite Cardin's cancellation of a debate following on the heels of a shellacking at Steele's hands in a debate the night before, one can only conclude that all Cardin needs do to bury Steele would be for Cardin to run naked at Annapolis shouting anti-Naval epithets.

The MSM mass insult to the intelligence continues. A host of Red State all stars, citing poll internals skewed to Democrats and away from Independents, have deconstructed the poll's credibility quite nicely in comments to the below blog entry last night:

New Wash Post poll has Cardin beating Steele 54-43%

This morning, Hugh Hewitt rips the poll to shreds with some interesting additional evidence that the poll is little more than a desperate October surprise ad for Cardin, with the Post acting like what The American Spectator's Jed Babbin calls, the 527-Media.

Link to Babbin's August 2006 column when he first coined the "527 Media" phrase and suggested that the RNC treat the MSM as such in ads.

Hewitt, in his Town hall blog, cites pollster Charlie Cook as declaring the race a toss-up as late as Friday. WaPo didn't deem Cook's move "fit to print". Hugh suggests the Post may have crossed a line with Maryland's Black voters with this bending over backwards grotesque advocacy for Cardin who beat former NAACP hear Kweisi Mfume in a bitter Democrat Party primary for the right to face Steele, also Black, in the general election.

Read the whole Hugh Hewitt piece.

Thus continues the print MSM Prevaricating March to the Sea (read Chesapeake Bay) of eventual weekly legal organ status. Let's let the Doctor of Democracy review recent history as we close:

The media in this country lied about hurricane Katrina and the aftermath -- and they gave themselves Pulitzer Prizes for doing so. They lie constantly about the status of the Iraq war. They lied about Karl Rove in the Valerie Plame matter. They not only lied about Bush's National Guard records, they engaged in a conspiracy to create forged documents to further what they knew was a lie.

The Drive-By Media lies constantly about the economy. They lie about our judicial nominees. They lie about John Bolton. They lie about Donald Rumsfeld. They lie about Condoleezza Rice. They lie about Dick Cheney. They will lie about anybody who gets in their way. They lie about Halliburton. They lie about oil profits. They lie about tax cuts and how they are effective. They lie about practically everything. They carry the water for the Democrat Party. They carry the water for liberal elites, for anti-capitalists in the environmentalist movement and elsewhere. They carry the water for the appeasement crowd, the socialist elites in Western Europe. When someone stands up to them and questions them in their tactics, they try to intimidate and destroy.

Just think. Think about the last three days. There are literally hundreds of stories over the last three days about me. They're not focused on the phony science involving embryos. They're not focused on any aspect of the issue that the ad that Michael J. Fox produced attempts to persuade people about. They're not focusing on it. I wonder why? Because they know it's not a winning issue. The only way it's a winning issue is if nobody stands up to the ad. The only way it's a winning issue if nobody challenges the lie and the misrepresentation that they put forth in the ad. For three days, we've had news stories about me. No focus on the phony science involving the embryos." - Rush Limbaugh

This column was originally posted at Red State.

DeVine-Gamecock  is also a contributing writer for www.race42008.com.

"The trouble with our liberal friends is not that they're ignorant; it's just that they know so much that isn't so." - Ronald Reagan

As revealed by the below scholarly scientific piece, the reason the MSM can't defend the substance of Fox's claims is because his claims, as pointed out by Rush Limbaugh, are not true and the real agenda issue in this imbroglio is abortion, not stem cell research per se, or the bogus lie that the Hearing-Challenged Limbaugh "made fun" of Fox's particular disability.

See more DeVine Gamecock commentary as well as expert witness supporting excerpts and link to full article below...

Dr. Mary L. Davenport in the American Thinker says:

"Mr. Fox and his ads’ sponsors are guilty of conflating embryonic stem cell research, which the GOP candidates and many Americans oppose for destroying a human life in the name of curing other people’s diseases, with stem cell research in general, which includes adult stem cell research and umbilical cord blood stem cell research."

As we have seen, the MSM, with few exceptions, has avoided any talk of the substance of the claims, choosing instead to demonize Rush Limbaugh for daring to question claims by a disabled person and question whether the disabled person is acting in accordance with his prior admitted conduct when in a persuasive role, i.e. to go off his medications, given that Fox does not usually show such severe effects of Parkinson's in his frequent public appearances and in his role on "Boston Legal".

But the other reason their is no MSM defense of the claims is that the real reason that the Left has made embryonic stem cells their cause celeb is because embryos are made available by abortions, and abortion is the issue that defines the Left.

Dr. Davenport continues

"The only limits in question are on federal funding of new embryonic stem cell lines, requiring the sacrifice of new embryos. Private and state-funded research (California voters are spending six billion dollars borrowing money to fund this) is ongoing. The implicit claim that research based on new embryos is “the most promising” is absurd, completely unsupported by the scientific literature, and an insult to voters, based as it is on the assumption that they are incapable of understanding the issue. Too stupid to tell the difference, is the elitist assumption underlying this campaign.

Flim-flam is a charitable description. Why would federally-funded research be more promising than state- and privately-funded research? And on what possible basis can the claim be made that embryonic stem cell research is more promising than adult stem cell research?

The plain fact is that embryonic stem cell research is proving to be a bust. There are currently 72 therapies showing human benefits using adult stem cells and zero using embryonic stem cells. Scientifically-minded readers can review this medical journal article on the status of adult stem cell research. Adult stem cell therapies are already being advertised and promoted while no such treatments are even remotely in prospect for embryonic stem cell research.

The fact is that adult stem cells have already produced remarkable cures, whereas embryonic stem cells have failed. This should come as no great surprise to anyone with a background in high school biology..."

Read the whole American Thinker piece.

The fact is that the Left is desperate to find a way to combat moral objections to abortion and they think that if they can make embryonic stem cells a political issue in the curing of diseases, they can defend abortion as producing life saving "products"!

These people have no shame. They will lie to sufferers of diseases and exploit them with false hope. They will lie about anyone that dares to contest the content of claims made by their carefully chosen victims supposedly immune from criticism. They will lie about the substance of issues. basically the Left Lies. That's what they do. And they expect that they will not be challenged given the many decades of media monopoly they enjoyed. The key word being "enjoyed" with the "ed".

They no longer enjoy that monopoly and with courageous conservatives like Rush Limbaugh and his 20 million dittohead army, they cannot count on not having their lies challenged even when they exploit the disabled to spout the lies.

We won't be holding our breath for the MSM to come to the rescue of Limbaugh even though he is deaf. You see Limbaugh opposes abortion, i.e. the sacrament of the Left's secular religion.

Over at Redstate a poster asked why their isn't more emphasis on Cord Blood research. I advised that  Cord Blood Stem cell research requires birth not abortion. The politicization of embryonic stem cell research is a cover for the advancement of the abortion agenda. The Left desperately wants to legitimize abortion as life saving rather than life taking. Abortions provide the "work product" for embryonic research. Birth's provide umbilical cords which are to the abortion lobby what a cross is to Dracula.

Rush commented on recent MSM history to put the MJ Fox incident in context:

"Let's review some obvious recent history. The media in this country lied about hurricane Katrina and the aftermath -- and they gave themselves Pulitzer Prizes for doing so. They lie constantly about the status of the Iraq war. They lied about Karl Rove in the Valerie Plame matter. They not only lied about Bush's National Guard records, they engaged in a conspiracy to create forged documents to further what they knew was a lie.

The Drive-By Media lies constantly about the economy. They lie about our judicial nominees. They lie about John Bolton. They lie about Donald Rumsfeld. They lie about Condoleezza Rice. They lie about Dick Cheney. They will lie about anybody who gets in their way. They lie about Halliburton. They lie about oil profits. They lie about tax cuts and how they are effective. They lie about practically everything. They carry the water for the Democrat Party. They carry the water for liberal elites, for anti-capitalists in the environmentalist movement and elsewhere. They carry the water for the appeasement crowd, the socialist elites in Western Europe. When someone stands up to them and questions them in their tactics, they try to intimidate and destroy.

Just think. Think about the last three days. There are literally hundreds of stories over the last three days about me. They're not focused on the phony science involving embryos. They're not focused on any aspect of the issue that the ad that Michael J. Fox produced attempts to persuade people about. They're not focusing on it. I wonder why? Because they know it's not a winning issue. The only way it's a winning issue is if nobody stands up to the ad. The only way it's a winning issue if nobody challenges the lie and the misrepresentation that they put forth in the ad. For three days, we've had news stories about me. No focus on the phony science involving the embryos." - Rush Limbaugh

Originally posted at Red State.

Read DeVine-Gamecock at www.race42008.com as well.

"The trouble with our liberal friends is not that they're ignorant; it's just that they know so much that isn't so." - Ronald Reagan

Now lets make Hay in waging this war, which is really a battle in the larger Civil War the left has been waging against America for decades that has reached new lows since the invasion of Iraq. Many have commented on this war. For an example see Prager.

One of the major points that Prager makes is citing the alienation of the left in the MSM, academia and the Dem party that is behind much of the blame America first world view that serves as the "moral" justification for the Left's actions that many Americans consider unpatriotic, if not rising to the legal definition treason.

But I want to explore this issue a little deeper and focus not so much on CNN, but rather on the general population and look not only at the results of the Left's 40 year indoctrination on a large percentage of the American people in varying degrees, but also other influences that define the divide on the war that includes people that would not be considered part of the larger civil war in the culture..

And then I want to look at how we can wage and win this civil war at least as regards unity against foreign enemies.

Let me say this at the outset. I believe that we will unite to win the war against Islamo-Facism. The only question is if we will do so based on logical persuasion based on a historical perspective or based on massive casualties on American soil as a result of future 911's.

A second preliminary remark concerns the warning of a future civil war in America between Muslim-America citizens and the sharia-hating rest of us. I think it is essential that we unite on the present foreign struggle, if not the culture, before that occurs.

Now to the matter at hand raised by haystack.

Gamecock and most Americans alive on September 10, 2001 were gratefully ignorant of all things war, especially, the place war holds in the history of mankind and the brief history of of western civilization especially since 1776.

This ignorance born of long periods of prosperity is not a new phenomenon. Many if not most great civilizations fall due to internal rot from within that aggressive enemies exploit to bring them down.

In many ways this war ignorance is a major reason that the Left was able to increase in power in the 60s and thru today. Security, or assumed security from foreign invasion or attack is a prerequisite for leftist, secularists to grow.

The conflicts we have engaged in since 1960 have added to the ignorance and made it worse, because the added elements are what I think helps produce a lot of otherwise conservative citizens, not part of the left in any major way, but which are passive as regards what patriotism means, ignorant of the crucial need to win wars to total victory and tolerant, if not outright supportive, of media behavior like that of CNN.

I speak now of the effect of such phrases as "limited war", and "proportional escalation", but even more so the "exit strategy" mantra and the insidious self limiting "Powell Doctrine."

The First America Civil War and WWII were great victories precisely because they were total victories for the victors and total defeats for the vanquished. Less than two generations after Appomattox, Southerners enlisted in greater numbers than any other region in the "Union" army to defend the United States that had utterly devastated their CSA gone with the wind.

Japan loves baseball and Germany is pacifist.

Limited war in Vietnam prolonged the Cold War and resulted in mass slaughter that the Left still refuses to apologize for. It also signalled to would be future enemies of the United States that we could be defeated by enlisting the American Left's media in their cause.

The Powell Doctrine's insistence that war only be fought if it could be won quickly with massive force, little loss of life and have a clear "exit strategy" signalled to the world that would be enemies could defeat us even more easily than in Vietnam and that we wouldn't even fight unless Syria agreed to come along as the lowest common denominator. And even then the "victory" would leave the aggressor in power.

I think the psychological effect of the above continues even after 911 among too many citizens that never speak of victory in Iraq, but only "how to get out," as if we didn't go there for a purpose that was important enough to "get in" in the first place.

Now to my prescription for how to wage a non-violent civil war against the Left, their MSM and their useful idiots even among conservatives.

These thoughts are triggered not only by Haystack's Declaration but also by some comments made to me about the CNN video being the "truth" and Bush's so-called "propaganda".

I think the key to unity is educating the near left on war and patriotism. But it will be hard. Why? Well, prior to now,

I have suggested that the only way to turn the tide on the media and the left is for elected GOP members (but not the president) to call out their Democrat colleagues on live TV for statements and actions that embolden the enemy. To be blunt in their face. This would signal to the public that its OK to call out unpatriotic behavior and give it a definition. I am pleased to note that Duncan Hunter (R-CA) has moved to take action against CNN and that for the first time since WWII the US government has changed an American with treason.

But I now think this matter goes so deep that not even a much stepped-up calling out of the unpatriotic elected officials and media by patriotic elected officials will suffice, and that it may have to be fought at dinner tables family by family and person to person. It may well be necessary that we risk losing friends to win our Civil War, just as the First Civil War divided families and friends, so that we can win the war abroad and be strong to face the internal cultural divisions and a possible future Civil War against whatever enemies we may have developing within. We will have to be more blunt and stand our ground.

The CNN matter tells me that we must take off the gloves. Too many Americans are numb due to TV and the moral equivalence it sets up in its crossfire type shows, where everybody are pals and all views are taken equally seriously. Commercial break. See you tomorrow on Hannity & Colmes. Well, all views are not equal. Our enemies don't quote all views. They quote the views that fit with their goal, ie that we cut and run and give them the victory they have sought since they started streaming into Iraq after Saddam fell to join their Fedayeen Saddam fundamentalist religious brethren and Sunni Baathist brethren to re-establish a new safe haven and terror sponsoring state to replace the ones they lost under the Taliban and Saddam. Thanks to our military and increasingly the new unified free Iraqi security forces, the enemy's new "training ground" is neither "safe" nor a "haven." Cutting and running would make it both, with unfettered oil-rich nation-state funding to boot with access to the Persian Gulf shipping lanes.

Many Americans are totally blind to the line CNN crossed. People, we are surrounded by severely disabled citizens when it comes to war and patriotism. Major surgery is required to correct the disability. many on the left argue that we need to see such "snuff" videos so that understand what war is about, as if we don't know and that if we did we would see that war is never the answer. Yet those on the left don't want us to see the 911 videos that are the reason we went to war in the first place.

We have never allowed the showing of such close angle videos or pictures of killing by either side in war. And the showing of an enemy propaganda video would most certainly have gotten the broadcaster charged with treason and probably hanged under WWII or any other war rules prior to Vietnam. Even in Vietnam we censored enemy videos of the killing of Americans for several reasons, first of which is that it could cause sensitive civilians to lose morale at home and that it it is disrespectful to the dead and their families.

But as regards enemy provided propaganda films, the dangers are even greater that the video contains a message to their allies, provides a basis fore them to boost morale and instructs those they can't otherwise communicate with to keep up the fight.

Tony Snow also objected to the video partly because it depicts US soldiers as "sitting ducks."

Let's get the bottom of this quackery about sitting ducks.

First, I think Tony should not have dignified the sitting duck argument with a response. To do so implies that if one's soldiers are sitting ducks that the war should not be fought. If that were the rule, then we would still be a colony of the British. I really have a hard time even understanding the argument. Some falls back on the WWII example as if tank led armies on a plain is the only war our soldiers "deserve" to fight and as if no soldier was ever shot down by a sniper's rifle fire in 1776, 1917 or 1941. Its silly, nonsensical and unworthy of a response.

Secondly, lets look at why CNN shows an enemy propaganda video of an American soldier being targeted BUT NOT 911 videos of Americans burning to death, jumping from skyscrapers and hitting the pavement. If ever there were sitting ducks, it was the inhabitants of the WTC, the pentagon and the airplanes. The video of the deaths of civilians at he hands of the enemy can't be shown somehow.

But we can see the enemy aiming fire at our soldiers?

You see the connection? The soldiers are being fired at because of 911. the soldiers are in harms way voluntarily to prevent future 911s. But CNN can't let Americans see that connection. Oh no. They would rather us see the "insurgents", ie butchers that worked for Saddam or al qaeda as akin to our colonist founders, ie Minutemen, fighting for "their" country, all the time ignoring that 80%+ Iraqis are fighting with us against the insurgents for their country and to deny victory to those that would perpetrate more 911s. The enemy has diverted their most of their resources from attacking us on US soil to a desperate attempt to prevent the establishment of a stable free nation in the Middle East that is our ally against their Islamo-Facist vision and slavery.

So we cant see the deaths of America civilians but we must see our soldiers in sniper sites that the enemy hopes will cause us to cut and run, as does CNN.

The war against the MSM must be waged by not letting actions that aid and abet the enemy go undenounced in blunt terms to their faces with NO ambiguity that we respect them even if they disagree.

Those that embolden the enemy thru unpatriotic statements, actions, omissions and endorsements, explicit or tacit, are not honorable. Now, many don't realize they are acting unpatriotically. They are ignorant. They must be educated on the matter. A patriotic spanking appears in order to GC. We must become like that nation in 1777, 1917 and 1944 that were united on what patriotism is and what actions and statements are unpatriotic and on the absolute necessity to achieve total victory no matter the cost.

Give me Liberty or give me Death!

originally submitted to compliment my Red State brother, Haystack who properly and eloquently declared war on the MSM.

D-G also blogs at www.race42008.com.

"The trouble with our liberal friends is not that they're ignorant; it's just that they know so much that isn't so." - Ronald Reagan

They ALWAYS emphasized how the GOP could lose and the DEMS could win, just like the MSM does and has since the 80s and Reagan forward and increasingly so after the advent of the NEW MEDIA.

What is pathetic is to have our beltway conservatives fall for it, first in 1992 and now in 2006. For Fred Barnes and Cal Thomas to say that they are sure we will lose the House and/or that it could do some good? Boggles the mind. Who cares what they think will happen. The game will be played.

Most Americans in a recent poll that has not changed except in our direction for decades is that over 60% of Americans describe themselves as conservative or very conservative!!

These people are not going to vote for Democrats.

Get out the vote? Well duh. Yes, chatterers, the Election will be decided by ACTUAL VOTES ON ONE DAY, ie ELECTION DAY, November 7, 2006.

What is so funny, is that the whole "get out the vote" mantra was always mainly seen as a democrat mantra, because, at least since the 80s, as a Democrat Party official, I knew that GOP voters were self-motivated. It was my former party that had to harass and cajole and herd ginned up victim voters like cattle.

When people become republicans that is the evidence of their motivation. They GET OUT THE VOTE like breathing. They become republicans TO VOTE!

They understand that really ALL that matters is to vote. Congressmen are voting machines to exert our will. That's all they are. All that matters is if our side outnumbers their side so that our policy preferences can prevail. That's all that matters, and its bad liberal policies that causes people to BE republicans in the first place.

Yes, there are some that can be discourage from voting, and that can be a danger, which, again, makes the "smart" conservative beltway boys all the more wrong to join in a chorus of conventional wisdom that is but sound and fury signifying nothing. Nothing anyone says can prevent a voting machine from tallying a vote made by a GOP voter at their polling place on November 7th.

The fact is that NO MATTER WHAT THE MSM POLLS AND TALKING HEADS SAY, our people can freely go to the polls and vote our GOP reps into office in a landslide. The talk cannot effect that unless we let it, and the only way any significant number let it happen is if they take Barnes and Co to heart and give up.

The election has not begun. The Election begins at 12:01 AM on Election Day, November 7, 2006 at Dixville Notch, NH and ends at 8 PM in Hawaii.

The GOP doesn't have to "come back" from "being behind."

We are tied now and will be until the first chap at Dixville Notch comes out of the booth and outs us ahead by one vote.

Courage.

A civil/criminal trial lawyer for two decades in federal and state courts throughout the South and presently Vice-President of a multi-state real estate investment firm headquartered in Charlotte, N.C., Mike "Gamecock" DeVine was a long-time SC Democrat party official until his June 2001 conservative epiphany.

DeVine regularly writes about legal issues; economic issues given his phi beta kappa econ major education; political issues given his past experiences as an official in the South Carolina faction of the world's oldest political party; and about the virtues of conservative political thought, policies and values given his June 2001 epiphany that led him to leave the Jack Asses to advance a n elephantine we never forget, Reaganite, conservative agenda to save an anti-Borkian America "Slouching towards Gomorrah."

Moreover, as Legal Editor and conservative voice of The (Decatur, GA) Champion newspaper, (legal organ for DeKalb County in Metro-Atlanta Atlanta), he was the one of first columnists in the nation, soon after September 11, 2001, to comment on the likelihood that captured terrorists in Afghanistan would be deemed to be illegal enemy combatants not entitled to Prisoner of War status under the laws of war. He also wrote four dueling editorial debate columns against then Congresswoman Cynthia McKinney after her disgraceful statements after 911 and before her firs ever electoral defeat in 2002.

This Rooster knows from whereof he crows!!!

originally posted at RedState.com

Gamecock also blogs for www.race42008.com

"The trouble with our liberal friends is not that they're ignorant; it's just that they know so much that isn't so." - Ronald Reagan

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