Sure We Can (Well Maybe)
I find if I can write things down they stop rattling around in my mind. Here are my TWO TOP rattlers of the morning.

ONE: At a time of record deficits, cutting back on military spending has caused a lot of worry and debate. Our military defends our country and protects from the ’bad’ guys. Our military has built a new soccer field for detainees at Camp 6 in Guantanamo Bay — at a cost of $750,000 to taxpayers. They say it’sbecause the detainees (militants) like soccer. Now since the detention camps opened in 2002, some half dozen cases have been prosecuted — four ended in plea agreements with minimal jail time.

Two: (Closer to home….) New Albany, Mississippi somehow got 9.6 million dollars to tear up forty miles of railroad track and paved it so it will be a walking trail and a bike path…. They say this project will create jobs and help businesses. Who got them the money and from where? Clearly taxpayers’ dollars but who got them the money? Where did such an idea come from? I know that New Albany needs help but a forty mile walking path. (?)

After reading this one-two punch over coffee this morning I had to wonder how this country runs at any level?

President Obama Job Approval
RCP Average
Approve
48.1
Disapprove
48.1

Direction of Country
RCP Average
Right Direction
34.8
Wrong Track
59.0

Generic Congressional Vote
RCP Average
Republicans
43.4
Democrats
43.2

Here are Real Clear Politics average polls….. Notice congress generic polls are now tied…. So half the folks see Dems and GOP in the same light. Also, and I think very importantly, notice the tie with Obama on approve versus disapprove. What becomes, once again, critical is the independent voter. It seems that group has a history for voting for whom they perceive to be a strong leader. Like the rest of us, they are staring at Mitt and Rick with a big question mark popping up in their minds.

This missive may be the ten thousandth time I have suggested that everyone needs to take a look at Newt Gingrich in some other way than what has been the past measuring stick…. I think this because 1) Our two leading candidates clearly support some form of national health plan. I can rationalize how Rick could be off base BUT Mitt has a history with this kind of dangerous legislation. 2) Neither of these two candidates will speak directly to the issue of how they would cut government growth or spending other that vague generalities . 3) Already the polls are raising the question of each of their abilities to beat Obama in the general election……

The November vote will be for or against a President who in his first term in office has kept every promise he made… He has worked tirelessly to expand government, expand social programs, raise taxes, created a national health plan, and is in the process of spreading the wealth around…..

Many of us discount what Obama has accomplished because we don’t believe in what he is doing…. And in doing so we assume the majority of the voters feel the way we do… Big mistake…because trust in a politician keeping his word is paramount for most voters. On our side we only have one candidate, Newt Gingrich, who has a track record of making campaign promises and keeping them… Rick was voted out of the senate by voters of his state. Do you know how seldom this happens? (They saw something in him they didn’t like….and they know something about him most of us don’t know.) Poor Mitt…. He just wants to be president really bad… If the nation’s life wasn’t on the line I don’t know how much I would care….. Donations are slowing down for him so he may have to drop another 50M into this campaign just like the last one.

Not long ago I ran an article written by one of Newt’s daughters concerning rumors about her mother’s and father’s relationship. Silly me…thinking that because of what she was saying was different than what the liberal press was reporting would make some difference in how Newt is being judged.

Being a slow learner, I want to try again and this time address the ethic charges against Gingrich. This article is once again from one of my favorite web sites, TownHall, and the writer is Byron York:

The Romney campaign has been hitting Newt Gingrich hard over the 1990s ethics case that resulted in the former speaker being reprimanded and paying a $300,000 penalty. Romney mentions it often, and his campaign made the ethics case the focus of the most widely viewed attack ad of the Florida primary.
Given all that attention, it’s worth asking what actually happened back in 1995, 1996 and 1997.

The Gingrich case was extraordinarily complex, intensely partisan, and driven in no small way by a personal vendetta on the part of one of Gingrich’s former political opponents. It received saturation coverage in the press; a database search of major media outlets revealed more than 10,000 references to Gingrich’s ethics problems during the six months leading to his reprimand. It ended with a special counsel hired by the House Ethics Committee holding Gingrich to an astonishingly strict standard of behavior, after which Gingrich in essence pled guilty to two minor offenses. Afterward, the case was referred to the Internal Revenue Service, which conducted an exhaustive investigation into the matter — and then, three years later, completely exonerated Gingrich.

It’s that last part of the story you don’t hear about much.

At the center of the controversy was a course Gingrich taught from 1993 to 1995 at two small Georgia colleges. The class, called ”Renewing American Civilization,” was conceived by Gingrich and financed by a tax-exempt organization called the Progress and Freedom Foundation. Gingrich maintained that the course was a legitimate educational enterprise; his critics said it had little to do with learning and was, in fact, a political exercise in which Gingrich abused a tax-exempt foundation to spread his own partisan message.

The Gingrich case was driven in significant part by a man named Ben Jones. An actor and recovered alcoholic who became famous for playing the dim-witted Cooter in the popular 1980s TV show ”The Dukes of Hazzard,” Jones ran for Congress as a Democrat from Georgia in 1988. He served two terms, but lost his seat due to redistricting. Attempting a comeback, he ran against Gingrich in 1994 and lost decisively. After that, it’s fair to say Jones became obsessed with bringing Gingrich down.

Two days before Election Day 1994, with defeat in sight, Jones hand-delivered a complaint to the House Ethics Committee. (The complaint was printed on ”Ben Jones for Congress” stationery. ) Jones charged that Gingrich ”fabricated a ’college course’ intended, in fact, to meet certain political, not educational, objectives.”
Jones teamed up with his friend, Democratic Rep. David Bonior, to push the case relentlessly. Under public pressure, the Ethics Committee — made up of equal numbers of Republicans and Democrats — took up the case and hired an outside counsel, Washington lawyer James Cole, to conduct the investigation.
Cole developed a theory in which Gingrich, looking for a way to spread his political views, came up with the idea of creating a college course and then devised a way to use a tax-exempt foundation to pay the bills. Cole didn’t argue that the course was not educational; it plainly was. But Cole suggested that the standard for determining wrongdoing was whether any ill intent lurked in Gingrich’s heart, even if the course was unquestionably educational.

It is hard to con vey today how much the media became preoccupied with the case, and how much pressure fell on Gingrich and Republicans to end the ordeal. In January 1997, Gingrich agreed to plead guilty to the previously unknown offense of failing to seek sufficiently detailed advice from a tax lawyer before proceeding with the course. (Gingrich had, in fact, sought advice from two such lawyers in relation to the course.) Gingrich also admitted that he had provided ”inaccurate, incomplete and unreliable” information to Ethics Committee investigators. That ”inaccurate” information was largely Gingrich’s contention that the course was not political — a claim the IRS later would support.

Why did Gingrich admit wrongdoing? ”The atmosphere at the time was so rancorous, partisan, and personal that everyone, including Newt, was desperately seeking a way to end the whole thing,” Gingrich attorney Jan Baran said in 1999. ”He was admitting to whatever he could to get the case over with.”

It was a huge victory for Democrats. They had deeply wounded the speaker. But they wanted more, and they pressed the IRS to investigate.

Experts examined every word Gingrich spoke in every class; they examined the financing and administration of the course; and they examined how the course might have fit into Gingrich’s political network.

In the end, in 1999, the IRS released a highly detailed 74-page report that concluded the course was, in fact, a legitimate educational exercise. ”The ’Renewing American Civilization’ course was educational … and not biased toward any of those who were supposed to be benefited,” the IRS concluded.

Bottom line: Gingrich acted properly and violated no laws. Of course, by that time, Gingrich was out of office, widely presumed to be guilty of something, and his career in politics was (seemingly) over. Now he’s having to fight the fight all over again.

As the historian Gertrude Himmelfarb observed more than a decade ago, “What was once stigmatized as deviant behavior is now tolerated and even sanctioned; what was once regarded as abnormal has been normalized.” But even more importantly, she added, “As deviancy is normalized, so what was once normal becomes deviant. The kind of family that has been regarded for centuries as natural and moral – the ‘bourgeois’ family as it is invidiously called – is now seen as pathological” and exclusionary, concealing the worst forms of psychic and physical oppression.
My point is this: Evil talks about tolerance only when it’s weak. When it gains the upper hand, its vanity always requires the destruction of the good and the innocent, because the example of good and innocent lives is an ongoing witness against it. So it always has been. So it always will be. And America has no special immunity to becoming an enemy of its own founding beliefs about human freedom, human dignity, the limited power of the state, and the sovereignty of God.

Thanks, Byron

Well, the big day is coming with SUPER TUESDAY…. It would be nice IF next Tuesday offered us some closure. I fear not…. Iran has its equivalent of super Tuesday today…. I don’t expect much of a change there either. Inflation in Iran is running 20% plus there… If we had 20% inflation here I predict, with confidence, what American’s voters would do……

Just a few of numbers to mull over:

November elections will take place in 249 days, 9 hours, and 55 minutes
Actual Unemployment 23,044,093
US Retirees and SSI 66,797,723
Food stamps 46,784,780
Liability Per Tax payer 1,041,436
Unfunded liabilities 117,834,017,737,930

Does anyone have any ideas as to how we are going to pay these bills?

Click on the link below and hear/see Senator’s Reid’s stand on the current conflict between religion and government.

Have a great day…

Ron

Docnick37@gmail,com

Http://theoxfordteaparty.blogspot.com

http://dailycaller.com/2012/02/07/harry-reid-%E2%80%98totally-supports%E2%80%99-obama-going-against-catholic-church-over-mandatory-contraception-coverage-video/

Since Yahoo is my home page, I was so alarmed to see this yesterday, I had to go home early!

Knowing these demonic liberals, all I can say is — Hope springs eternal.

Not Just Any War:

The attacks come fast and furious. It feels as if all governmental institutions are finding ways to strip away our fundamental rights.

It has been some time since I forwarded an article from the College Conservative web site. I don’t know how many of you have logged on. If not , please do. I am so impressed by these students writing and thinking.

These students are the ones along with our grandchildren who will be left with the expanding national debt that is being created as I click away on this keyboard. They are the ones who will continue the small out cry against big government while trying to keep the torch lit for liberty and freedom.

Atarah Golden: politicaljunkie09

Parental rights are slipping away from parents at an imperceptible rate and now falling into the hands of the government.  The government is using the rights of the parent to empower children to make decisions for themselves.  You heard me correctly – the government is stripping away your rights as parents and handing your rights over to your children.  Children are encouraged to withhold vital information from their parents, and they have the law to back them up.   Parents of Minnesota, did you know that a doctor can perform any medical procedure on you child without your authorization, in a non-life threatening situation?
“Any minor may give effective consent for medical, mental and other health services to determine the presence of or treat pregnancy and conditions associated therewith, venereal disease, alcohol and other drug abuse, and the consent of no other person is required.”

Unfortunately, this law is not exclusive to the state of Minnesota.  In the state of Arizona, minors have the ability to explicitly consent to contraceptive services and STD/HIV screening services.  With regards to alcohol and/or drug abuse treatment, the minor must only be 12 years of age to explicitly consent.  Again, this is not exclusive to the state of Arizona, this is nationwide. According to the Guttmacher Institute, an organization working to advance sexual and reproductive health throughout the world, many states have implemented similar laws:

26 states and the District of Columbia allow all minors (12 and older) to consent to contraceptive services.  20 states allow only certain categories of minors to consent to contraceptive services . . . All states and the District of Columbia allow all minors to consent to STI (sexually transmitted infection) services.  18 of these states allow, but do not require, a physician to inform a minor’s parents that he or she is seeking or receiving STI services when the doctor deems it in the minor’s best interests . . . 2 states and the District of Columbia explicitly allow all minors to consent to abortion services.  36 states that require parental involvement have an alternative process for minors seeking an abortion.  36 states include a judicial bypass procedure, which allows a minor to obtain approval from a court.  4 states require judges to use specific criteria, such as a minor’s intelligence or emotional stability, when deciding whether to waive a parental involvement requirement.  12 states require judges to use the ”clear and convincing evidence” standard that the minor is mature and the abortion is in her best interest when deciding whether to waive parental involvement requirement.

You see, parents are becoming irrelevant when it comes to important decisions involving their children.  As stated above, some states require a judge to render a decision which should be explicitly made by the child’s parent.  So where does it end?  Why are children being encouraged by our government officials to make decisions for themselves?  It is not just legislators; doctors have overstepped their bounds, as well.

There have been several cases in which health care providers have taken it upon themselves to disregard parents’ wishes and encroach on their decision-making rights.  Parents Erin and Ken Stieler have firsthand experience in this area.  The Stielers’ 10-year-old son Jacob was diagnosed with Ewing Sarcoma, a rare bone cancer.  Jacob was taken to Helen DeVos Children’s Hospital in Great Rapids, Michigan to undergo chemotherapy.  The treatment was very difficult for Jacob and it took a huge toll on him, both physically and mentally; at one point, he told his parents he wanted to die.  Fortunately, after three months of treatment, the PET scans confirmed the cancer was completely gone.  Still, the doctors advised Jacob to undergo more chemotherapy.  After researching the side effects of the chemotherapy Jacob’s doctors wanted him to continue, Jacob’s parents concluded that “the risk of the drugs was far greater than the risk of recurrent cancer, since Jacob had a clean PET scan.

Dissatisfied with the Stieler’s decision, the hospital contacted Child Protective Services and accused Jacob’s parents of medical neglect.  The Stielers hired a lawyer to fight the charges brought upon by the State of Michigan.  This case began to catch the attention of individuals who supported the Stieler’s decision and a legal team presented the judge with a petition to dismiss the case.  After reviewing the petition, the judge did just that.

Although this case had a happy ending, this goes to show that states are trampling on parental rights.  In this case, the state had the audacity to invalidate the Stieler’s decision concerning their son’s unnecessary chemotherapy treatment.  Parental rights within the United States are already hanging by a thread.  I wish I could tell you the madness ends there, but it does not.  There is more.

The UNCRC is an international treaty, short for United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child.  The United States has not yet adopted this treaty; Somalia is the only other country who has not done so.  Even left-wing MSNBC recognizes this treaty has a better chance of passing under the Obama administration “than at any point in the past.”  The treaty sounds completely harmless, but this is not the case at all; quite the contrary, actually.  This international law contains 54 articles.  I will address a few (the 54 articles can be read in its entirety here).
Article 4 of the UNCRC states: “You have the right to life.  Governments should ensure that children survive and develop healthy.”

According to the Supreme Law of the Land, the Constitution, we have a right to privacy.  Does this mean a government bureaucrat will treat each parent as an abuser and enter our homes once a year, once a month, or even once a week to “ensure that children survive and develop healthy?”  Well, don’t rule it out; Article 6 of the Constitution states, “This Constitution, and the Laws of the United States which shall be made in Pursuance thereof; and all Treaties made, or which shall be made, under the Authority of the United States, shall be the supreme Law of the Land; and the Judges in every State shall be bound thereby, any Thing in the Constitution or Laws of any State to the Contrary notwithstanding.”

This international treaty would be an adjunct to the Constitution.  In other words, this treaty will also be the supreme law of the land.  Let us take a look a look at another article in this treaty;  Article 9 of the UNCRC states:

“You should not be separated from your parents unless it is for your own good . . .”

This statement is quite vague.  One thing is for certain, though; a government bureaucrat will be responsible for telling you what they think is best for your child, and you will forced to comply.  If not, your child will be removed from your custody.

Article 12 of the UNCRC states:

“You have the right to say what you think should happen when adults are making decisions that affect you, and to have your opinions taken into account.”
As an Elementary Education major with years of experience working with young children, I can personally say that children have no problem telling adults how they feel.  Many parents do take their children’s feelings into account and genuinely hear them out, but regardless of what the child thinks or feels, it is the parent’s responsibility to make the final decision.  That is why children are considered minors until the age of 18, and in some cases, 21.  If a child is not satisfied with the parent’s decision (which is pretty common among children and teenagers), if would not be too far-fetched to assume that the child can contact a government bureaucrat and say something like, “my mommy and daddy won’t let me to spend the night at Johnny’s house this weekend.”  A government bureaucrat will then enter the home and determine if staying at Johnny’s house is in the child’s best interest.  The bureaucrat will most likely side with the child and give the parents one of two options: let the child spend the night at Johnny’s house or have the child removed from the parent’s custody.  Is that scenario so hard to believe?  I think not.

Article 13 of the UNCRC states,

“You have the right to get, and to share, information as long as the information is not damaging to yourself or others.”

The first question to ask is, what does our government consider damaging and inappropriate?  Well, we have a government that encourages young children to engage in sexual activity and withhold information from parents; information that prevents parents from protecting their children from decision that can and will affect them for the rest of their lives.  There are also scholars working hard to normalize and redefine pedophilia as “intergenerational sexual intimacy?”  Judith Levine, an academic and author of the book Harmful to Minors: The Perils of Protecting Children from Sex stated this:

“. . .there are people pushing a conservative religious agenda that would deny minors access to sexual expression,” and “we do have to protect children from real dangers . . . but that doesn’t mean protecting some fantasy of their sexual innocence.”

These are prime examples of why you cannot trust others to tell you what is best for your child.

As of 2008,  193 countries have ratified UNCRC, composed by 18 ”international experts.”  If the UNCRC is so grand, then why is homeschooling illegal in several European countries?   If the UNCRC really cares about the rights of the child, then why are Sweden and Switzerland teaching children as young as 4, sex education?  One of the 18 UNCRC composers is from Uganda, where honor killings have not been made illegal.  As a result, young women are killed frequently.

Parental rights within this country are already dwindling, and the UNCRC will, without a doubt, prevent parents from having much say in their child’s upbringing.  Each parent has a different method of child-rearing. Some parents circumcise their sons and some do not agree with this; some parents home-school their children, while some prefer to put their children in the public school system; some parents give their children chores, and some do not; some parents spank their children, while some do not agree with this method of discipline.  You may not agree with the Stieler’s decision to discontinue the treatment for their son, but regardless with how you feel about some of the issues I have listed, parents make decisions for their children because they know what is best for them.  Not every parent’s decision will be the right one, but that is all part of being a parent.  Parents who have their child’s best interest at heart should not be treated as abusers, as this treaty suggests.

There is a way to fight this treaty, and I encourage each and every parent to take action immediately!   Sign the petition that will protect parental rights by embedding them into the Constitution.  This is known as the Parental Rights Amendment, a proposed modification to the Constitution.

SECTION 1: The liberty of parents to direct the upbringing and education of their children is a fundamental right.

SECTION 2: Neither the United States nor any state shall infringe upon this right without demonstrating that its governmental interest as applied to the person is of the highest order and not otherwise served.

SECTION 3: No treaty may be adopted nor shall any source of international law be employed to supersede, modify, interpret, or apply to the rights guaranteed by this article.

Parents nationwide are being punished for doing what they think is in the best interest of their child, and you could be next.  Fight for your right as a parent.  Children are in danger, and it is up to parents to ensure their child’s safety.  Contact your senator and representative today. Tell our government officials that we mean business.

Atarah Golden :: Cecil College :: North East, Maryland :: @ LastCivilRight

(Thanks Atarah. Good article….Write more…. We need to know what you young conservatives are thinking and how you are thinking about our problems I because you are our future.)

ALSO, there is a international treaty at the United Nations that Obama and Hillary Clinton seem to want to sign onto that has to do with private gun ownership. If agreed to this would be a way to justify Government not allowing Americans to own guns. What comes next?

Most countries are having a hard time governing themselves. We are finding ourselves along with American businesses being governed indirectly through international treaties. The UN is made up of many countries who hate America and what it represents. Many of these nations have been thought of, by us over time, as allies.

Given the article above which Republican candidate do you imagine would be most likely to address these government V.S. parents problems?

…. 276 days, 6 hours, and 31 minutes till the polls open.

And the presidential campaign marches on while the voters are still vetting their candidates…

Ron

Docnick37@gmail,com

Http://theoxfordteaparty.blogspot.com