How Did America Come To This? ... J. D. Longstreet

How Did America Come To This?

A Commentary by J. D. Longstreet

Americans of my generation are not as surprised, as a lot of Americans these days, at the state of our nation.  We saw this coming as far back as fifty years ago.  Look about you today.  THIS is what the glorious “sixties” has wrought.

The Hippies, the Flower Children, the Pot Heads, the whole scraggly, long haired, dope smoking lot of them – now run every consarned thing!

We are just now beginning to pry them out of our government, but the damage they have done to America will take generations to repair.

Remember their communes, and collectives?  They took those socialist ideas right into our state and national legislatures.  Now we are paying the price.

But when they took their socialist ideas into the halls of education they fundamentally changed the nation by indoctrinating at least a generation of America’s children in the socialist ideals.  They downplayed the importance of American history, of America’s democratic constitutional republican form of government. They declared the Constitution is not set in stone.  It is a “living, breathing document” subject to change at the whim of every new generation.

Then they went on to teach our children how great government is as a provider and protector -- sort of a “Big Brother, ya know?”   They hammered home the idea that government should control everything.  See, with the government in control, we’d never have to worry, because the government would provide for our every need.

My generation recognizes that for what it was and is:  Socialism leading to communism. 

They did, and continue to do, a heck of a lot of damage to America.  One of their gifts just keeps on giving:  Ignorance:   

In 2010 I wrote an article titled:  “America’s Golden Age of Ignorance.”  (You may read the entire article HERE.)  In that article I said:  “One can only conclude that America finds herself in the current mess as a direct result of ignorance. “Ignorance of what,” you ask?  I must answer, “Ignorance of practically everything.

Ignorance of America’s colorful political history, and that of the world, is much to blame for the Obama Regime’s continued acceptance by vast numbers of Americans.  But, I am happy to report that number is growing ever smaller as each day passes.

Ignorance of history, as well as of current events, among the populace of any country, can lead to consequences that are truly awful.  Take the election of America’s first socialist government, for instance.  The election of 2006 turned our national legislature into a socialist machine bent on creating an even stronger central government with all the power it could grasp.  Then, in 2008, the capstone of socialist victory in American politics was the election of Barack Hussein Obama.  He promised fundamental change in America.  The politically savvy in America understood he meant to lead America into out and out socialism.  And he did.

Even today, the average democrat voter will deny the existence of a socialist government in America today.  They simply do not recognize it.  I am convinced that ignorance stems from the fact that they were not taught the US Constitution, the Bill of Rights, the genius of America’s founders, and the love of a free constitutional republic that led their ancestors to lay down their lives to protect and preserve the freedom granted by that constitution. That is ignorance.

Back in the day, before teacher’s unions, American students were taught the fundamental concepts of American democracy and the rights and responsibilities of citizenship. We learned, as students, that life in America is a privilege. We learned that freedom is not free, it is preserved by Americans who know its value, even if it means laying down their lives in its defense..

Students also leaned the immeasurable value of The Founding  Documents, the Declaration of Independence, the US Constitution,  and the all important Bill of Rights.  They learned that The Founders said what they meant and meant what they said when writing the constitution.  Students also learned that the US Constitution is a document for the ages.  It is not a living breathing document subject to change at the whim of those citizens who live under its protection.

No longer.  Today we graduate students who cannot read their diplomas, who cannot find Canada and Mexico on a map, and have no idea what the Constitution or the Bill of Rights are!  They have no clue that the  Bill of Rights limits the role of government in the daily lives of Americans.

These are the Americans who placed the so-called democrats in charge of America’s government.  I say “so-called” because those of us who have dabbled in politics, all our adult lives, understand that those in charge of the US government today are not democrats as they would have you believe. They are socialists, Marxists, communists, and progressives. 

So – how WERE they elected? They were elected by people who genuinely thought they were voting for democrats, and by people who don’t care what kind of government we have so long as their place on the government dole is protected and their “hand outs” continue to arrive every month, and by those who were interested only in the power that would accrue to them if socialists controlled the US government.   The latter could not have accomplished this feat without the ignorance of the former, whose votes they knew they could count on.

Ignorance is a dangerous, dangerous, thing.  WE here in America, are only just re-learning this lesson.” (Read the entire article HERE. )

That was my opinion then and it remains my opinion today.

This is a desperate time for America.  We are suffering from self-inflicted wounds.  We will be a long time healing. And there will be scars. There are always scars when the soul of a nation is attacked.

Altho the sun is going down on America, it has not set yet. To insure that it will rise and shine brightly on America again, we must reclaim our government, reclaim the dream that is America, and reclaim America’s status as the greatest nation in the world and the global leader of freedom loving peoples everywhere.

J. D. Longstreet

The More Obama Speaks... ... Alan Caruba

The More Obama Speaks...

By Alan Caruba

The most interesting thing happening in the world of politics and finance today is the way Barack Hussein Obama continues to lose traction every time he gives a speech.

After the “jobs” speech, Wall Street dropped three hundred points when the market opened the following morning.

When longtime, staunch supporters of Obama such as MSNBC’s Chris Matthews look and sound betrayed, it is clear that even Obama’s liberal base is in disarray. Matthews, presumably a seasoned political observer, had poured all his faith into Obama, believed in hope and change, and Obama only delivered a huge national debt, the first downgrade of the nation’s triple-A credit rating, massive unemployment, and the sad repetition of failed solutions.

Conservative commentators were openly disdainful of Obama’s use of a joint session of Congress as a stage for a purely political speech, but it was the public as always that had the last word.

Obama’s first speech to a joint session of Congress in February 2009 garnered 52.4 million viewers. By January 2010, the State of the Union speech drew 48 million and the 2011 SOTU attracted only 42.8 million.

His “jobs” speech was watched by 31.5 million. On the East Coast it was 7 PM, but in California it was 4 PM. Maybe it was just the time difference? Or maybe people have decided that listening to Barack Hussein Obama is just a great waste of time, no matter what the hour may be.

I know that the conventional political wisdom is that Obama has 14 months to go and that he’s a great campaigner, but to my eye his audiences following the “jobs” speech were composed mostly of union members or the very young.

Among the military, whenever he addresses them, the silence is palpable. Recall the sullen response he got at West Point when he announced his Afghanistan strategy, if one can even call it that.

There is a hard core of perhaps 20% who love Obama to the exclusion of his record of failure to focus on the economy. Others, though, from the black and Hispanic base are beginning to look for the exit. The Black Caucus is unhappy. Hispanics are unimpressed.

The race card is being played. Class warfare is being encouraged. These are the tools of a demagogue.

Obama, though, is convinced that if he just talks enough he can change opinion; thinks he is the master salesman, the ultimate campaigner. What he does not see, nor sense, is the derision with which his message is being received.

The public has had two and a half years to take his measure and while he cannot be fired until November 2012 and will not leave until January 2013, he is pure poison to any hope of economic recovery. He has the reverse Midis touch; whatever he touches turns to poop.

It was almost comical that the solar panel company he touted as the green jobs wave the future, Solyndra, received millions from the government, filed bankruptcy, and got a visit from the FBI that seized its records and computers. When it comes to picking winners and losers, Obama always manages pick a loser and stick the public with the bill.

Meanwhile his administration seeks to block Boeing from creating new jobs and raids Gibson guitars for using the same wood as every other guitar-maker in the nation. His administration shipped guns to the drug cartels in Mexico for reasons beyond comprehension. His Attorney General pleads ignorance.

His rhythmic phrase, “Pass this bill”, repeated seventeen times in the course of his speech to Congress ignored the fact that there literally is no bill. Out on the campaign trail a day or so later he was still saying it.

Obama is intoxicated with the sound of his voice, his staccato delivery, his hand gestures, and all the other elements of oratory upon which he has depended for his rise to the top. He just hasn’t figured out that it is not what you say, nor how you say it, that matters. What matters is the result of his policies. They don’t work.

Obama matters less and less in national affairs except for the destruction he and his minions continue to wreak upon a nation struggling to come back from a major financial crisis, fearful of his flawed judgment, not hiring, not spending, and waiting impatiently for November 2012 to arrive.

© Alan Caruba, 2011

Israel On The Brink

Israel On The Brink

A Commentary by J. D. Longstreet

Israel is preparing to lose its friend to the south, Egypt.  Well, the fact is that Egypt was never a friend of Israel.  See, Egypt found that after at their much-vaunted military was defeated several times by Israel’s military, even when Egypt was allied with several other Islamic countries, maybe they had better seek someway to save face.  They did that with a peace treaty in 1979, which has held until the recent over throw of the Mubarak regime.  Now all bets are off. 

With the attack on Israel’s embassy in Cairo recently, Israel has no choice but to prepare for another attempt to wipe them out by their ancient foe from the south.

Just days ago, their former friend, Turkey, to the north, has decided they are no loner Israel’s friend. 

Now add to the mix the fact that the Palestinians are going to make a move (later this month) in the UN for Statehood, which they will not get, and Iran working around the clock to develop a nuclear bomb to strap to the nose cone of a missile aimed at Israel, and one can mentally see the mercury rising in a giant thermometer over the Middle East.

War is coming.  Anyone who doubts that is not dealing with the reality of the situation on the ground in that powder keg region.

It is unsettling to realize that the US government’s current administration will be partly to blame when the shooting starts.  What must be even more troubling for Israel, and for many Americans, is the fact that Obama might be President when Israel goes to war, again, just to defend its right to exist.

The Obama Administration has made no secret of its distaste for the state of Israel. US President, Obama, has made no secret of his favor toward the Islamic nations which have sworn to wipe Israel from the map.

As the war clouds gather, again, over the Holy Land, Americans must realize that there is no way for the United States to be uninvolved.  Even if Obama wishes to throw Israel to the Islamic wolves, he must protect the sea-lanes in the Middle East for the safe transport of oil for the US and so many other nations of the world. The US military WILL find itself in another shooting war in the Middle East, as if the three current wars were not enough.

Over the past weekend, Israel’s Prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu said the Middle East was currently “undergoing a political earthquake of historic proportions.”  He called on Israelis to “act coolly and with responsibility.”  However, history has taught us that no matter how responsibly Israel acts; it will not lessen the bloodlust of the surrounding Islamic states and would-be states to destroy the single democratic state in the region, which happens to be a Jewish state.

Earlier this year, during the so-called “Arab Spring” uprising, we warned that soon all that Arab/Islamic anger would be directed toward Israel. It took no crystal ball, or any prophetic skills, at all, to make that prediction. Any student of history could have drawn the same conclusion simply by studying the history of the region. 

In my opinion, the so-called Arab Street doesn’t have a clue whom they will be going up against when they attack Israel… again.  Yes, the average Arab is better educated today, and with the Internet, a goodly portion of them is fairly well up on current events. But how many of those, who will be cannon fodder for their Islamic leaders, have any idea that Israel is one of the leading military powers on earth? 

Israel not only has a nuclear arsenal, they have a second strike capability.  That means, it would behoove any nation seeking a nuclear first strike on Israel to know and understand that the second they press the nuclear button, they are doomed.  Their fate is sealed.

Egypt will soon be completely lost to Islamic extremists.  Once the dust settles in Libya, it, too, will be locked into the Islamofacist’s camp … AGAIN … as will Iraq and Afghanistan as soon as US troops depart those countries.

The world must realize it is facing a nuclear war in the Middle East.  Israel will not simply allow themselves to be overrun and wiped out.  Either Israel wins or the world faces the nuclear destruction of a huge portion of the Middle East.  Its called the “Samson Option” and it is ready and waiting.

Look.  This is a war that has been brewing for decades.  It will be horrible.  Should it go nuclear it will cause the slaughter of thousands upon thousands of Israel’s antagonists.  And, sadly, the decisive defeat of Israel’s enemies will only buy peace for Israel for a couple of decades … maybe.

J. D. Longstreet

“Evil IS Real.”

“Evil IS Real.”

A Commentary by J. D. Longstreet

President George W. Bush, in his 9-11 tenth anniversary speech at Shanksville, Pennsylvania, reminded all Americans that “evil IS real.” 

One look at the burning buildings at “Ground Zero,” and the Pentagon, and the deep crater made by the plunging airliner in Shanksville, Pennsylvania should serve to underline the fact that evil DOES exist.  There can be no doubt. 

With the warning by our federal protectors, over the past weekend, that those sons of evil who murdered some 3,000 Americans ten years ago are lurking in the shadows – prepared to do it all over again -- Americans need to understand that the threat is just as great -- maybe even greater -- than it was in 2001.

One may claim to be non-religious and, I suppose, that IS possible, though unlikely in my opinion.  It is a part of the human being, the way our creator wired us, to seek a higher power, a supreme being, a god to cling to even when our grasp is tenuous, at best.  We have a built-in yearning for a god.

From man’s earliest days on this planet there is evidence that we sought protection and even direction from a superior being. It seems we NEED, desperately, to know there is a power higher than ourselves, especially when we find ourselves in trouble. 

Even before man ventured down out of the trees and out of the holes in the ground and the caves in the mountainside, he intuitively knew that evil awaited him, just outside the mouth of the cave, just at the cusp of his hole in the earth, and directly beneath the tree he was perched in.

Almost instinctively, man knows what the scriptures tell us about evil is true.   They warn us that evil stalks the earth seeking those it can devour. 

We have personified evil by giving it a name.  We of the Christian faith call our evil one Satan.  I believe if you check you will find that Satan is a derivation of an ancient Hebrew word referencing the same being.

But there’s something we have chosen to forget. It is something extremely important. By personifying evil and giving it a name we have allowed ourselves to forget that each one of us carries within himself, or herself, the capacity to do great evil to all the creatures of this planet -- but especially against his fellow human beings.

Man has free will.  You may see free will as a blessing or a curse.  At times it has proven to be both.  But here’s the thing:  With free will comes man’s capacity to do good or evil.  Man has a choice.

Remember the story of man’s fall from grace?  If you recall -- man was instructed by his creator not to eat of a certain tree in the Garden of Eden. 

So many times I have heard the title of that tree rendered incorrectly in story after story and film after film.  Nearly every time it is referenced it is referred to as the Tree of Knowledge.  It is important to know the true name of the tree because once you do, it will make all the difference in the world to the way you view mankind.

The correct name of the forbidden tree in the Garden of Eden story is:  “The Tree of the KNOWLEDGE OF GOOD AND EVIL.” 

Once the forbidden fruit was consumed, man, at that precise moment, gained the knowledge to know what was good and what was evil.  Combine that with free will and man became, and remains, the most dangerous being on the planet.  Man forsook an existence in paradise and commenced to create a hell on earth through his ability to conceive evil acts he could commit against his fellow human beings.

We have murdered each other since Cain murdered his brother Abel. Only -- we have become much better at it – much, much better.

When a man or a group of men can connive to murder three thousand people in a single act of intense evil, it is so horrid that most humans find it nearly impossible to conceive that ANY of their fellow beings on earth could formulate such a heinously evil act.

With the immediacy of modern communications we then saw those same people congratulating themselves on committing mass murder.  We see them smiling and blessing their god’s name for assisting them in carrying out their evil scheme.  We see them dancing in ebullient joy in their streets as they watch thousands die, burned to death, suffocated to death, and leaping to their deaths from breathtaking heights hoping to throw themselves into eternity to escape the devouring flames.

Their joy at the mass murder of their fellow human beings is, itself, pure unadulterated evil.

President Bush was correct -- EVIL IS REAL.  And whether you wish to admit it or not, there is now another personification of evil stalking the earth right alongside Satan.  In their time, rest assured they will BOTH be consigned to the depths of Hell.  No paradise, no virgins, only eternal suffering of pain and agony with no hope, whatsoever, of a reprieve.

I learned over the weekend, that my pain is still just below the surface.  I also learned that my anger burns today just as hot as it did on that September morning in 2001.

They have already consigned their souls to hell.  Shouldn’t we be about the business of sending them to their final destination as quickly, efficiently, and in the greatest numbers possible today?

J. D. Longstreet

9-11 ... Never Forget!