Vocal Minority

Quotes of Note

… When Democrats and liberals making sweeping electoral gains, it’s based on “hope” and “change,” on “civic engagement” and reversing a “culture of corruption.” It’s all very positive, upbeat, and high-minded. They want to build up the village. But when Republicans and conservatives make sweeping gains, or appear to be on the cusp of them, it’s based on negative, downbeat, and low-minded sentiments. They want to burn down the village.

Conservative ascendancy is rooted in things like “rage” and “anger” and is driven by “angry white men,” as if the elections are the outworking of some kind of troubling psychological condition. The late Peter Jennings embodied this view perfectly when he described the 1994 elections as a “temper tantrum” and compared what voters did that year to what you’d see from “an angry two-year-old.” We’re seeing the same thing now, on the eve of tomorrow’s elections in Virginia, New Jersey, and New York’s 23rd District. …

—Peter Wehner at Commentary’s “Contentions” blog, November 2, 2009

Quotes of Note

When I see those in government, both locally and in Washington, spend and tax and come up each day with new ways to spend and tax—health care, cap and trade, etc.—I think: Why aren’t they worried about the impact of what they’re doing? Why do they think America is so strong it can take endless abuse?

I think I know part of the answer. It is that they’ve never seen things go dark. They came of age during the great abundance, circa 1980-2008 (or 1950-2008, take your pick), and they don’t have the habit of worry. They talk about their “concerns”—they’re big on that word. But they’re not really concerned. They think America is the goose that lays the golden egg. Why not? She laid it in their laps. She laid it in grandpa’s lap.

They don’t feel anxious, because they never had anything to be anxious about. They grew up in an America surrounded by phrases—”strongest nation in the world,” “indispensable nation,” “unipolar power,” “highest standard of living”—and are not bright enough, or serious enough, to imagine that they can damage that, hurt it, even fatally.

We are governed at all levels by America’s luckiest children, sons and daughters of the abundance, and they call themselves optimists but they’re not optimists—they’re unimaginative. They don’t have faith, they’ve just never been foreclosed on. They are stupid and they are callous, and they don’t mind it when people become disheartened. They don’t even notice.

— Peggy Noonan from her opinion piece “We’re Governed by Callous Children” in yesterday’s WSJ.

I love being a conservative. We conservatives are proud of our philosophy. Unlike our liberal friends, who are constantly looking for new words to conceal their true beliefs and are in a perpetual state of reinvention, we conservatives are unapologetic about our ideals. We are confident in our principles and energetic about openly advancing them. We believe in individual liberty, limited government, capitalism, the rule of law, faith, a color-blind society and national security. We support school choice, enterprise zones, tax cuts, welfare reform, faith-based initiatives, political speech, homeowner rights and the war on terrorism. And at our core we embrace and celebrate the most magnificent governing document ever ratified by any nation--the U.S. Constitution. Along with the Declaration of Independence, which recognizes our God-given natural right to be free, it is the foundation on which our government is built and has enabled us to flourish as a people.

This one also originates from the WSJ. It’s from an editorial El Rushbo wrote in October, 2005. Over the weekend, while stumping for Democrat Bill Owens in NY-23, Veep Biden declared, “I know what all these folks [= Republicans] are against. … But I don't know what they’re for.” In response, Rush pulled his piece out of the archives and read the above paragraph, which he assures is all Biden needs to know:

What makes this paragraph so brilliant is that it aptly defines not only what conservatives/Republicans are for, but also what liberals/Democrats are against.

Rite Quotes: Liberty and Tyranny, Chapter 2, Mark R. Levin

About this Rite Quotes series here.

From Chapter 2 of Liberty and Tyranny by Mark R. Levin, 2009

Chapter 2 of Levin’s book, “On Prudence and Progress,” covers the issue of how a society evolves within the confines of the Constitution and rule of law. Three themes are prevalent: (1) First, he illustrates the contrast between change (the politically-expedient tactic of the Statist) and prudent reform (the Constitution-preserving method of the Conservative). Here he debunks the oft-used smear that Conservatives fear change and cling to the status quo. (2) Second, Levin discusses equality and the Statist’s misuse of this concept as a means to tyrannical ends. He writes about how the Statist is so obsessed with fixing every perceived inequality that the Constitution, the rule of law, and preserving the dignity of the individual are no barriers to achieving that goal. (3) Finally, Levin explains how the compliant media, academia, and entertainment industry play an essential role in softening up the American citizenry to accept the intentions of the Statist.

[All bolds are mine]

[T]he Conservative doesn’t reject change. For [Edmund] Burke, change as reform was intended to preserve and improve the basic institutions of the state. Change as innovation was destructive as a radical departure from the past and the substitution of existing institutions of the state with potentially dangerous experiments. (p.13–14)

*     *     *     *     *

The Conservative believes, as [Edmund] Burke and the Founders did, that prudence must be exercised in assessing change. Prudence is the highest virtue for it is judgment drawn on wisdom. The proposed change should be informed by the experience, knowledge, and traditions of a society, tailored for a specific purpose, and accomplished through a constitutional construct that ensures thoughful deliberation by the community. (p.14)

*     *     *     *     *

The Conservative must accept that the Statist does not share his passion for liberty and all the good that flows from it. … The Statist rejects the Founders’ idea of the dignity of the individual, who can flourish through ordered liberty, for one rooted in unpredictibility, irrationality, and, ultimately, tyranny. (p.15)

*     *     *     *     *

For the Statist, liberty is not a blessing but the enemy. It is not possible to achieve Utopia if individuals are free to go their own way. The individual must be dehumanized and his nature delegitimized Through persuasion, deception, and coercion, the individual must be subordinated to the state. … His first duty must be to the state—not family, community, and faith, all of which have the potential of threatening the state. (p.16)

*     *     *     *     *

The primary principle around which the Statist organizes can be summed up in a single word—equality. … The Statist, however, misuses equality to pursue uniform economic and social outcomes. He must continuously enhance his power at the expense of self-government and violate the individual’s property rights at the expense of individual liberty … 
    President Barack Obama made this point when lecturing the Wesleyan University graduating class of 2008 during his campaign: “[O]ur individual salvation depends on collective salvation.” But salvation is not the government’s to give. Indeed, it is not a grant to mankind from mankind. Under the wrong conditions and in the wrong hands, this deviant view is a powerful tool against humanity. (p.16–17)

*     *     *     *     *

Academics claim to challenge authority but, in truth, preach authoritarianism through various justifications for and approaches to deconstructing the civil society. They talk of individual rights but promote collectivism. They talk of enfranchisement and suffrage but promote judicial and administrative usurpation of republicanism. They talk of workers’ rights but promote the heavy taxation and regulation of labor. Indeed, academics portray Utopia as a kind of heaven on earth but have a high tolerance for the hell of widespread misery. (p.19)

Levin concludes the chapter with this memorable quotation from C.S. Lewis:

Of all tyrannies, a tyranny sincerely exercised for the good of its victims may be the most oppressive. It would be better to live under robber barons than under omnipotent moral busybodies. The robber baron’s cruelty may sometimes sleep, his cupidity may at some point be satiated; but those who torment us for our own good will torment us without end for they do so with the approval of their own conscience. (p.22–23)

A brilliant ending to a brilliant chapter.

Chapter 1 post here.

Quote of the Day (7/10/09) [UPDATED]

"The United States has sometimes fallen short of meeting our responsibilities. Let me be clear, those days are over."

- President Barack Hussein Obama

Aren't you proud we have a president who loves and cherishes his country so much? 

Worst. President. Ever.

UPDATE:

Quote of Note: Two Kinds of People in the Electorate

On Monday "Gregory of Yardale," who blogs at Teh [sic] Resistance, posted this absolute gem at Gateway Pundit:

There are two kinds of people in the electorate:
1. People who remember how horrible the Jimmy Carter years were.
2. People who are about to find out.

I was still in my single digits when Carter was president, but I do know my history.

I also am pretty sure that if anyone can make Jimmy Carter actually look good, it's President Golden Calf.

[H/T Brutally Honest via Power Line]

Quotes of Note (1/27/09): El Rushbo and the Great One

If any two people can rescue this country from the socialist sewer into which we are slowly sinking, it’s El Rushbo and “The Great One” Mark Levin.

Here is a quote from each of their shows yesterday which really made me laugh, because they are so right!

From Rush, on Nancy Pelosi’s bone-chilling argument that we need to encourage birth control because lower birth rates mean less strain on the economy:

If Nancy Pelosi wants fewer births, I have the way to do this, and it won't require any contraception: You simply put pictures of Nancy Pelosi in every cheap motel room in America today. Well, that will keep birth rates down because that picture will keep a lot of things down — if you get my drift …

From Mark, some free legal advice to embattled Illinois Governor Blagojevich:

Governor Blagojevich, I could have given you the best legal advice possible for defending yourself. What you should have done was said that you are an Al Qaeda terrorist and invoke the Geneva Conventions [and] the Bill of Rights. You’d have every left-wing ACLU-type lawyer defending you and you’d actually have the sympathy of the media and the Obama administration.

Perfect!

Quotes of Note: El Rushbo on Responsibility

This morning update, which played yesterday morning before the coronation of the Golden Calf, is pure truth and pure genius. [Highlights mine]:

Today, my friends, the 44th President of the United States of America will preside over the most expensive, most opulent, star-studded Inauguration ceremony since the Great Depression. And we, the people of the greatest nation on earth, have new marching orders from on high. It is the will of the Messiah, Lord Barack Obama the Most Merciful, that we citizens usher in a “new era of responsibility.”

Now, these orders might come as a surprise to the tens of millions of you who actually live responsibility every day instead of talking about it

Those of you who pay your mortgages on time and are now being asked to bail out those who should never have gotten loans they couldn’t afford in the first place.

Those who take parenting seriously, who are asked to pay for the health care, breakfasts, lunches, and general welfare of those who don’t.

And those of you who serve your country in uniform in the face of the ingratitude of your fellow citizens on the left, who never seem to support the missions you sacrifice so much for.

And, while it’s true that the fruits of your hard work are often squandered by irresponsible politicians in Washington, intent on placing even more obstacles in your way -- you are being called to a higher purpose: Work harder, and give more, so that our Messiah can bequeath even more benefits of your bounty on the irresponsible masses who elected him.

So go forth from this immaculation and be responsible. For once. Try it!

This is why I love Rush Limbaugh. This is 1000% right on the money. This country is still as divided as it was during the Bush years. The people who didn’t voted for Obama are generally those who don’t take responsibility, and elected a president who, through taxation, regulation and useless programs, would punish those are are already responsible and suck them even more. As Mac Johnson wrote in an article a couple weeks ago:

[T]he Democrat Party is essentially a coalition of the paternalistic and the infantile: a union of an elite that believes you must be taken care of like children with a voting block that wants to be taken care of like children.

This is who Obama’s followers are: Children who need him like a father to take care of them—standing on the back of your hard work and playing by the rules—and Barack Obama is more than happy to assume that role.

Strip away the empty “hope and change” rhetoric; it’s the age-old game of buying people’s votes. And that’s what Barack Obama has done: Bought the votes of his supporters using the money of those who didn’t support him.

So, who’s yo daddy, America? Papa Obama is, that’s who!

Bottom line: Many Americans are already responsible. But we aren’t the ones who voted for Barack Obama.

Quote of Note: El Rushbo

A little background first:

Thursday’s (Northern Ohio) News-Herald reported:

A history teacher at North High School in Eastlake remains on paid leave after a tape aired 3 seconds of pornography in his classroom Wednesday.

Dean Morrison had been fast-forwarding between two History Channel segments when his class of about 20 upperclassmen got a glimpse of a woman performing a sex act on a man, officials report.

Immediately after class, Morrison reported the blip to the principal and parents were notified.

Eastlake police have already closed their investigation and will not press charges.

With his trademark wit, El Rushbo made the following comment:

All he had to do was say he was teaching the history of the Clinton years and he would have gotten away with it! … In fact he’d be a hero today!

Quotes of Note: Dems LOVE This Economic Collapse (El Rushbo)

The following monologue by Maha-Rush-i was so awesome that I was surprised it was not one of the segments transcribed on his website. So, I transcribed it myself:

You believe me when I tell you: There are people on the Democrat side of the aisle who are celebrating and happy about this [economic collapse] for three reasons:

A. They want people suffering and hurting before an election. They want people who have a little bit more than somebody else to be suffering and hurting a little bit more. It’s about time those people were gotten even with, the “winners of life’s lottery”!

They also are happy because the more pain and suffering you have, the greater the likelihood that you will fall for the notion that Democrats need to be elected to fix this.

And the third reason they like it is because it’s destroying the capitalist system. All the solutions being proposed to fix this are socialist: Government taking over this, government taking over that. Government gonna buy some banks, government gonna take over the mortgage business. Government gonna take over Wall Street, government gonna regulate this, government gonna do that.

They love it. They love this collapse.

He is 1000% right. And right now the candidate who is currently ahead in the polls is one of the Democrats who caused it, while at the same time purporting to have the tools to fix it. That’s like the fox claiming to have the tools to fix the lock on the door to the henhouse.

Talk about frightening!

Quote of Note: Democrats Never Take Blame, Only Shift It (D. Prager)

One of Sarah Palin’s best lines from the VP debate last Thursday:

One thing that Americans do at this time … is let’s commit ourselves just every day American people, Joe Six Pack, hockey moms across the nation, I think we need to band together and say never again. Never will we be exploited and taken advantage of again by those who are managing our money and loaning us these dollars. We need to make sure that we demand from the federal government strict oversight of those entities in charge of our investments and our savings and we need also to not get ourselves in debt. Let’s do what our parents told us before we probably even got that first credit card. Don’t live outside of our means. We need to make sure that as individuals we’re taking personal responsibility through all of this. It’s not the American peoples fault that the economy is hurting like it is, but we have an opportunity to learn a heck of a lot of good lessons through this and say never again will we be taken advantage of.

Radio host Dennis Prager, on his show the following day, was shocked and pleased by these words, and argued that phrases related to taking personal responsibility, not living outside one’s means, and taking opportunities to learn lessons would never be uttered by a Democrat. After that statement, Prager came out with the following brilliant revelation:

The Democratic motto is, essentially: Ask not how you can blame yourself. Ask how you can blame others … The more left you go, that becomes the motto of one’s life and of one’s politics.

Nuff said.

Quote of Note: El Rushbo on Yay Palin and Poor Hillary

Naturally the media and blogosphere are abuzz because of John McCain's VP pick, female Alaska governor Sarah Palin.

Anyway, just minutes after Mrs. Palin finished her acceptance speech in Dayton, the second hour of Rush's show started. I almost swerved off the road in laughter when Rush opened by saying:

Hillary Clinton -- her place has been taken by the other woman ... again.

Ouch! That was awesome!

I can't wait for the left to do what they do best: trash the living daylights out of her because she's a woman who doesn't toe the left-wing party line. Just like they trashed black Republicans like Clarence Thomas, Michael Steele, Ken Blackwell, etc. for being blacks who didn't swallow liberal crap like good little, um, slaves. Right, Dems?And watch them go after her age too. After all, Obama, who seems to have spent more time on the presidential campaign trail then in the Senate, wasn't too young to be president. Mrs. Palin has the executive experience that Obama sorely lacks. To quote Anthony Michael Hall in "Sixteen Candles": This is getting good.

Governor Palin, you go, girl!

Quote of Note: Prager on the Saddleback Civil Forum

This is why I love radio host and author Dennis Prager. On yesterday's show, Prager was discussing this past weekend's presidential forum at Saddleback, and especially the media's reaction to the fact that McCain clearly shined over Obama. While discussing a Washington Post opinion piece by Michael Gerson, Prager said this:

(Reading from Gerson's article) [Obama's] whole manner smacks of chalkboards and campus ivy. Issues from stem cell research to the nature of evil are weighed, analyzed and explained instead of confronted ... This approach has a genuine appeal to some voters, especially of a more liberal bent, who believe there is a nuance shortage in American life.

To which Prager responds:

Which drives me nuts! Because if there's any side that lacks nuance, it's the left. "Tax the rich!" is not nuance. "Bush lied, people died!" is not nuance. The black and white side is the left.

Oh yeah. It's so true.

Incidentally, I share Prager's hat tip to the WaPo for publishing this article, which actually made McCain look good and Obama not so good. Sometimes the truth just can't be sugar-coated.

Quotes of the Week

The following quotes were cited in a recent American Thinker article called Why Do We Call Them ‘Democrats’? by Lance Fairchok. The article makes the argument that socialists never stop trying impose their ideology on their country. They just need to dress it up in other ways like “Democrat,” “progressive,” etc., so that they don’t realized that they are ever so slowly slipping into an inescapable government-controlled life.

Don’t believe it? Read it and weep:

The American people will never knowingly adopt socialism. But, under the name of “liberalism,” they will adopt every fragment of the socialist program, until one day America will be a socialist nation, without knowing how it happened.

— Norman Thomas, U.S. Socialist Party presidential candidate 1940, 1944 and 1948 [and grandfather of current Newsweek editor-at-large Evan Thomas]

Should the people of the United States own refineries? Maybe so. Frankly, I think that’s a good idea. Then we could control the amount of refined product much more capably that gets out on the market...

— Rep. Maurice Hinchey (D-NY), Press Conference with Democratic leadership, June 18, 2008

Don’t get fooled by that socialist rhetoric. By “the people,” Hinchey means the government, which purports to represent the people taking over an industry that should rightfully and constitutionally by owned by citizens who created them, i.e., according to the capitalist system. Hinchey the socialist can’t have that. If Hinchey had his way, oil refineries would be no more owned by “the people,” than The People’s Republic of China is owned by “the people.”

Next abomination:

This liberal will be all about socializing, uh, uh ... would be about ... basically taking over and the government running all of your companies.

— Rep. Maxine Waters (D-CA), May 22, 2008

These statements of government control by power-hungery “we-know-better-than-you” socialists like Hinchey and Waters should make every American’s blood run cold. That we have such ideologues in high political positions is enough to make one lose hope for her country.

How about a bit of conservative wisdom to calm the nerves:

No greater challenge faces our society today than ensuring that each one of us can maintain his dignity and his identity in an increasingly complex, centralized society.

Extreme taxation, excessive controls, oppressive government competition with business, galloping inflation, frustrated minorities and forgotten Americans are not the products of free enterprise. They are the residue of centralized bureaucracy, of government by a self-anointed elite.

— Ronald Reagan, Conservative Political Action Conference, Feb. 6, 1977.

Blessed words. I only pray that one day we may see another Reagan conservative running for high office soon in our lifetime. For with Pelosi and Reid having made an utter circus out of Congress and the most left-wing Senator Barack Obama knocking on the door to the Oval Office, this could very well be the beginning of the end.

Quotes of the Week

"The largest threat to freedom, democracy, the market economy and prosperity at the beginning of the 21st century is no longer socialism. It is, instead, the ambitious, arrogant, unscrupulous ideology of environmentalism."

- Czech President Vaclav Klaus, in his new book Blue Planet in Green Shackles. [h/t Marc Sheppard at American Thinker.com]

"What they'll say is, 'Well it costs too much money,' but you know what? It would cost, about... It ... it ... it would cost about the same as what we would spend... It... Over the course of 10 years it would cost what it would costs us... (nervous laugh) All right. Okay. We're going to ... It ... It would cost us about the same as it would cost for about ... hold on one second. I can't hear myself. But I'm glad you're fired up, though. I'm glad."

George W. Bush? Nope.

Dan Quayle? Nope.

It's the "clean" and "articulate" messiah Barack Obama, addressing an audience in Bristol, VA, June 6, 2008

"Everybody knows that it makes no sense that you send a kid to the emergency room for a treatable illness like asthma, they end up taking up a hospital bed, it costs, when ... if you ... they just gave ... you gave them treatment early and they got some treatment, and a ... a breathalyzer ... or inhalator, not a breathalyzer."

George W. Bush? Nope.

Dan Quayle? Nope.

It's the "clean" and "articulate" messiah Barack Obama, addressing an audience in Bristol, VA, June 6, 2008

"I have a fast fix for energy prices: On every pump that distributes regular gas, we post a picture of Harry Reid with the price appearing in his mouth. And on every premium pump, we post a picture of Nancy Pelosi with the price in her wonderful smile."

- El Rushbo, June 13, 2008

"In case you're wondering what your Father's Day present is. That's it [pointing to my baby daughter]. That's present enough."

- my wife, five minutes ago

Quotes of the Week

Admittedly I've been lazy lately with posting these. But the reaction to the Bush speech in Jerusalem produced a few gems last week, including ...

Can Somebody Explain to Me how Obama sat in Wright’s church for 20 years and managed never to hear anything, but hears 20 seconds of a Bush speech that doesn’t mention him and perceives a shameful personal attack? - Andy McCarthy

That's lib logic. Get used to it. It's here to stay it seems. Next one:

[President Bush] hit the nail on the head yesterday in Jerusalem. And today, the nails started to complain. - Former U.N. Ambassador John Bolton

And here's a great monologue from El Rushbo during his Friday show:

Not only can we not mention [Barack Obama's] ears...

We can't talk about his mother. We can't talk about his father.

We can't talk about his grandmother unless he does, brings her up as a "typical white person."

We can't talk about his wife, can't talk about his preacher, ... can't talk about his voting record, can't talk about his religion.

We can't talk about appeasement.

We can't talk about color. We can't talk about lack of color. We can't talk about race.

We can't talk about bombers and mobsters who are his friends.

We can't talk about schooling.

We can't talk about his name, "Hussein."

We can't talk about his lack of experience.

Can't talk about his income.

Can't talk about his flag pin ...

Now we can't say anything about him!

And that's just the way the Democrats want it. Welcome to liberal speech suppression.