Tea Party and related matters

[Crafty_Dog]

 

[Crafty_Dog]

http://www.glennbeck.com/2012/11/07/glenn-we-are-going-to-double-down/?utm_source=Daily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=2012-11-07_177246&utm_content=5054942&utm_term=_177246_177253

[DougMacG]

Another point within the fiscal cliff options that the Republican House faces I will stick here.  To the extent that elected Republicans vote for Obama Democrat policies in order to be more liked in Washington and in media, we will see more and more bitter challenges come within the Republican party.   From that we will see more not-ready-for-prime-time candidates winning endorsement (Todd Aiken etc) screwing up their own race and others with it.

To the extent that elected Republicans merge their proven skills of getting elected with all that is good about tea party principles, from my point of view we have a strong chance to win the next off-year election in the House and perhaps many, many more.

[Crafty_Dog]

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323401904578159292998710054.html?mod=us_news_newsreel

[Crafty_Dog]

http://www.glennbeck.com/2012/12/06/where-does-glenn-stand-on-gay-marriage-he-sat-down-with-penn-jillette-to-discuss-the-role-of-libertarianism-in-the-future-of-the-country/?utm_source=Daily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=2012-12-07_183908&utm_content=5054942&utm_term=_183908_183916

[Crafty_Dog]

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/calif-student-sues-school-after-allegedly-being-suspended-for-his-politics-and-he-has-some-noteworthy-video-evidence/

[Crafty_Dog]

South Carolina's Scott to Succeed DeMint .
 
By VALERIE BAUERLEIN
Tim Scott, a South Carolina Republican who is a favorite of the Tea Party, was named Monday to fill a U.S. Senate seat to be vacated by Sen. Jim DeMint.


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South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley said in a noon news conference that her choice was simple. Mr. Scott, a conservative stalwart who was a successful small businessman and most recently a representative from South Carolina in the U.S. House, shares the same philosophy as the man he will succeed, she said.

"I am strongly convinced that this is the right U.S. Senator for our state and our country," she said.

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Rep. Tim Scott
.Washington Wire
Meet Tim Scott, South Carolina's Newest Senator
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Mr. Scott's appointment is historic. He will become the first African-American senator from South Carolina since Reconstruction, and the only black in the Senate.

Mr. Scott said he was honored to succeed Mr. DeMint and will try to uphold his record of fiscal conservatism, especially in confronting the federal government's spending problem. "Our nation finds itself in a situation where we need some backbone," he said.

Mr. DeMint said Mr. Scott, who was raised by a single mother, has a story and record that are inspiring. "Our country needs those positive, optimistic voices to encourage people that there is a way out of this quagmire we're in in Washington," he said.

Ms. Haley made an oblique reference to the historic nature of the appointment, but said it was important to her as an Indian-American to say that she chose Mr. Scott, an African-American, for his merits. "Congressman Scott earned this seat for the person that he is," she said.

Sen. Lindsey Graham also praised Rep. Scott, but acknowledged the state's troubled racial history. "Yes, you did earn everything that comes your way, Tim, but this is a day that's been long in the making in South Carolina," Mr. Graham said. "I'm very proud to see it come."
==================

By JASON L. RILEY (who happens to be black BTW- Marc)

South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley named Charleston Rep. Tim Scott to replace Sen. Jim DeMint, who announced this month that he is retiring in January to head the Heritage Foundation, a think tank.

Mr. Scott, a Republican first elected to Congress in 2010, was the front-runner for the post, though the GOP governor reportedly also considered appointing herself or Jenny Sanford, the state's former first lady. "Scott will serve until a special election is held in 2014 for the final two years of DeMint's term," according to the State newspaper. "He is expected to run in that election. Haley said last week she planned to appoint a successor she believed could retain the seat."

Scott will become the Senate's lone black member and the first black senator from the South since Reconstruction. The GOP will no doubt enjoy having a high-profile black politician to assist in minority outreach. But it's also worth noting that Mr. Scott is a favorite of the tea party activists whom Democrats and liberals have tried to dismiss as bigots. Two years ago, the NAACP passed a resolution condemning "racist elements and activities" in the tea party. The civil rights group also issued a report that accused the movement of giving a "platform to anti-Semites, racists and bigots."

The popularity of other black tea party heroes like Herman Cain and Florida Congressman Allen West should have been enough to put this nonsense to rest. But now that this supposedly "racist" grass-roots movement is partly responsible for the Senate's only black member come January, be assured that the media will set about refuting these baseless accusations.

That was a joke.

[Crafty_Dog]

Tim Scott: Meet the New Senator From South Carolina Tim Scott, the newly appointed Republican, will give liberals fits. His first priority is working for tax reform
By STEPHEN MOORE
Washington

Republicans in need of encouraging signs for the new year need look no further than Tim Scott. He was appointed by Gov. Nikki Haley on Monday to succeed Jim DeMint as U.S. senator from South Carolina. Mr. Scott is a charismatic and principled economic and social conservative from the Deep South. He owes his rapid political rise in part to the tea party movement. Oh, and he is black.

In a few weeks, when the new Congress convenes, Mr. Scott, 47, will take his place as the first black senator from a former Confederate state since Reconstruction. This will make it exceedingly difficult for liberals to maintain their stereotype of the South as a land teeming with white racists. "If that were true," he says, "how could I have been elected to Congress in a district that is 70% white?" He adds: "I have campaigned all over the state of South Carolina. It is the friendliest state in the country. And truly here people judge you by the content of your character not the color of your skin."

Though he would clearly prefer to discuss substantive matters other than race—"I try to steer away from these issues," Mr. Scott says—he recognizes that he has been thrust into the spotlight as a groundbreaking black politician. With some prodding, he reluctantly addresses the subject.

He says that he is fully aware of the challenge that he presents to the GOP's traditional liberal critics. "I think one of the most threatening places to be in politics is a black conservative," Mr. Scott says, "because there are so many liberals who want to continue to reinforce a stereotype that doesn't exist about America." What stereotype is that? "That somehow, some way, if you're a Republican you're a racist and if you're black, there's no chance for you in society.

"We have serious challenges in this nation. Some are racial. But in my life, the vast majority of people that have really afforded me the opportunity to succeed were white folks. Is there a better way to say that?"

Mr. Scott's own story exemplifies the change in attitudes taking hold in the New South. When he first ran for office 18 years ago, for county council, even his friends were shocked. "People said, 'Son, you're running in the wrong party.' They had never even heard of a black Republican. I ran against a white guy, who was a very popular Democrat at the time. I won, not because I was black and a Republican. I won because they liked my values."

Mr. Scott is sitting down with me in the Cannon House Office Building a few days after his appointment. Chairs and desks are stacked in the halls, ready to be moved to the Senate.

Most conservatives and Republicans in South Carolina and around the country were delighted by Ms. Haley's choice. But the left wasted no time pouncing on the appointee. Adolph Reed, a professor at the University of Pennsylvania, took to the op-ed page of the New York Times with an indignant piece entitled "The Puzzle of Black Republicans." Mr. Reed sneered that Mr. Scott holds positions "utterly at odds with the preferences of most black Americans" and that his rise fits "a morality play that dramatizes how far [blacks] have come. It obscures the fact that modern black Republicans have been more tokens than signs of progress."

To the left, Mr. Scott is dangerous because he has challenged liberal orthodoxy his whole career.

When he was Charleston County Council chairman in 1997, he decided to post the Ten Commandments outside the building—a move ruled unconstitutional in a lawsuit brought by the ACLU. Mr. Scott believes the free-enterprise system holds the most promise for allowing the poor to escape poverty. He blames liberals for an attitude instilled in minorities that they can't succeed in America because of racial barriers, "which becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy."

He thinks racial-preference programs and racial quotas are "mostly unnecessary," because while he supports goals to promote minority hiring, "you can't force people into relationships." He adds: "It's the same as when I asked the same girl out 10 times, and she just didn't want to go."


Growing up in North Charleston, he attended a mostly white but desegregated high school and was elected president of the senior class. After graduating from Charleston Southern University in 1988, he went into the insurance business and shortly thereafter hung out his own shingle as Tim Scott Allstate, which grew to 3,000 customers. He was elected to state offices beginning in 1995, then in 2010—the year of the tea party—he ran for Congress and defeated Strom Thurmond's son. In the House, his first act was to sponsor a bill to overturn ObamaCare.

Despite his storybook rise—"I never even imagined being in the United States Senate, it was never part of the plan"—Mr. Scott has felt the personal sting of racism and has had doors shut on him. In high school and college he was bullied and "sometimes I got hate-filled notes with racial slurs attached to my locker."

It was made worse, he recalls, because "I was a kind of an oddball. Had three pair of pants and two pair of shoes. And you know, you rotate them and you got made fun of. I had buck teeth, they were going in two different directions. It was a challenging time." The barriers, he is convinced, "only made my will to succeed even stronger."

The two guiding influences of his life have been his mother, who always worked two jobs ("I'm living her American dream," he says proudly) and the man he calls "my mentor," John Moniz, a white Christian and one of the first franchise owners of Chick-fil-A restaurants. "He took me under his wing and for three or four years he was telling me that as a poor kid in North Charleston, that I could think my way out of poverty. I didn't have to play football. I didn't have to become an entertainer."

One of the people who got him interested in politics, surprisingly enough, was Jesse Jackson. Mr. Scott didn't necessarily agree with Rev. Jackson's politics but was struck that a black man could run for president—which back in the 1980s seemed a revolutionary concept.

Another influence was the late, legendary Sen. Strom Thurmond. "In 1992, I was the vice chairman of his last re-election," Mr. Scott says. Really? He worked for the formerly staunch segregationist? "He was a complicated man," Mr. Scott says, "but people change their minds. They embrace truth. In the end he received around 30% of the black vote. I'd like to get there. If Strom Thurmond could get 30% of the black vote, any Republican can."

Mr. Scott has also been active in the tea party, and he bristles at the suggestion that its influence is waning. "No. I think almost every American is a part philosophically with the tea party." How so? Because of what the tea party stands for, he says: "Limited government, free markets, entrepreneurship, capitalism, and making the government smaller, less intrusive and keeping it out of your pockets." Those are enduring American principles, he says. As for charges that the tea party is racist, he laughs. "I was warmly embraced by the tea party. They openly seek more minorities."

If conservative ideas work better, how does he explain the re-election of Barack Obama, the most liberal president in a century? "People like Barack Obama. He's a warm person." By contrast, Republicans have failed miserably to get their message across. "Most of our problems this year," Mr. Scott says, come down to violating his first rule of politics: "People don't care how much you know until they know how much you care," reciting an old line from the late Jack Kemp, another Republican he admired.

Then he tells a story: "I put together a group of mostly black pastors and thinkers in the new part of my district, near Hilton Head. I told them, 'I don't expect you to vote for me in November. I don't know that you will vote for me ever. But we're going to start a relationship today. And it's not about the election. It's about life. It's about changing the course of history for kids who are coming behind us.' " He notes that one of the pastors in the meeting called him after his appointment to the Senate to celebrate the news.

Mr. Scott seems to have a talent for reaching out to voters who might be expected to be skeptical of a Republican. The first step, he says, is simply to convey your interest. When he recently addressed a gathering of Mexican residents of Charleston, he did his best to read his speech in Spanish. "Think about the fact that I flunked Spanish in high school. I am not bilingual, I'm bi-ignorant. But they were chuckling. It broke the ice."

He says he is frustrated that Republicans seem to be no better at communicating during the fiscal-cliff negotiations than they were during the campaign season. Somehow, the GOP has allowed the focus of the talks to center on taxes for the rich: "We need a spending conversation, but you cannot have that in the middle of a revenue argument, so we can't win. The American people want less spending and less debt, but we aren't talking about that."

Once he has taken up his place in the Senate, he says, he will try to spur more conversation about spending, but he will also address tax reform. He will introduce the "Rising Tide Tax Reform Act," which would lower corporate taxes to 23% and allow for permanent repatriation of foreign earnings back into the U.S. "On the personal tax code," he says, "I like the plan of lowering the tax rate so that we can increase the revenue."

A major influence on his thinking about tax matters is economist Arthur Laffer—"one of my closest advisers." Raising tax rates, especially on capital gains, Mr. Scott says, will result in less revenue.


If he succeeds in his mission on tax reform, he predicts: "Once we get to lower tax rates, and we execute more revenue coming in, our economy will start growing at a faster pace, and we're going to like the results."

In the Senate the man he most wants to emulate is Marco Rubio of Florida because "he has the warmth and communication skills that I like." Can he fill the shoes of Jim DeMint, who is leaving to become the president of the Heritage Foundation? "I doubt it because there is only one Jim DeMint, not two. But I have a desire to make sure that his consistent conservatism continues."

Mr. Moore is a member of the Journal's editorial board.

[Crafty_Dog]

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/12/26/us/politics/tea-party-its-clout-diminished-turns-to-fringe-issues.html?nl=todaysheadlines&emc=edit_th_20121226

[Crafty_Dog]

http://www.glennbeck.com/2012/11/07/glenn-we-are-going-to-double-down/?utm_source=Daily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=2012-12-26_188428&utm_content=5054942&utm_term=_188428_188441

[Crafty_Dog]

http://www.daybydaycartoon.com/2013/01/07/

[Crafty_Dog]

http://www.glennbeck.com/2013/03/20/cnn%E2%80%99s-erin-burnett-destroys-her-last-shred-of-credibility-with-blatant-smear-of-glenn-beck/

[Crafty_Dog]

It’s a well known fact around the Mercury offices that Glenn has pretty intense ADD. “Let’s do a fiction book!”"Let’s do an outdoor stage show with fireworks and special effects!”"Time to start a network!”"Green energy!”"Let’s cancel that fiction book and do a book on gun control”"3D Printers!”"Bigger 3D Printers!”. Seriously, it’s a problem. So when Glenn, who notoriously has trouble focusing on anything for more than five minutes, says there are stories and issues that he needs to stop and focus on, it’s time to listen up. After all, he often sees the big picture better than anyone in the mainstream media will admit. So what are the stories that Glenn thinks are going to be very important in the months ahead?
 
“We have been covering an awful lot of things and if you have been listening since I got into talk radio you have probably seen a change in me,” Glenn said.

“A lot of the people get into the talk radio because they want to be like Rush Limbaugh. I don’t. And I never really wanted to talk about the things that we talk about I’m much more of a creative guy, entertainment guy. I’m just different. And but I always wanted to be true to myself. Because I spent most of my career lying to myself.”
 
“I didn’t know what I believed. When I got a phone call from a listener on September 12th, it wasn’t the 11th. Somebody called and said what’s happening. And I said ‘I don’t know but I promise you I will find out.’ That was a life changing phone call.”
 
“This audience has changed me many, many times.”

“I don’t know anybody else on the radio that will admit to being wrong and being shaped by the audience, they’ve called me and said things that stuck with me.”

“We have a relationship that goes back for a long time and I told you two years ago that I sensed a change coming and I needed to be down here in Texas. Wasn’t really sure why, still not really sure why. We’re building a network. I’m not really sure why. I honestly — everything in me we have less time than it will take to build this network. So why am I wasting my time and my money on doing that?”


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“And then at the same time I’m compelled to do things like the ‘Man in the Moon’. Are you kidding me. Why is that? But believe it or not That Independence Week and the thing that we do like that, to me, make more sense than even building this network. Because we have to capture the hearts and minds of people. And nobody on our side is doing that.”
 
“But I have sensed since the election, and it is growing stronger, and I said to the boys this morning I don’t know how to verbalize it yet. I don’t know exactly what it is. But I think we have to focus, really focus, something that doesn’t usually happen with me, really focus on a few things. Because the time is coming to where you can’t be spread out so thin. We can’t hit all of these things. And I don’t mean this as a company. I mean this as a country.”
 
“And I wrote down the things that I think are going to be really important. That are going to be the stories of tomorrow. One is religious persecution. Most people are not covering this. We are working on some pretty shocking things that have not been covered on religious persecution. There’s a story up on TheBlaze about Egyptians torturing in mosques, torturing Coptic Christians. Horrible, horrible stuff is happening under the Muslim Brotherhood.”
 
“We’ve told you before the rise of the anti-semitism is rising at record levels not seen since the 1930s. But also religious persecution in some areas it will come where some people will persecute Muslims because they will deem them the enemy. And we have to stand up for people and their right to worship God as they choose and act on those beliefs, as long as it is not ‘submit or I kill you’. That’s not a belief that you can act on. And that’s not a belief that we should be standing up to protect. But, I believe these things will make us stronger,” Glenn said.
 
“Religious persecution is a big story we must follow.”
 
“Second one, and they’re in no particular order: education.The right and the necessity to preserve history. Your textbooks are a thing of the past. They are all going digital. They can be changed at a moment’s notice. The right and the responsibility to preserve true history. The right to teach our own children the way we choose to teach our own children. The right to protect, defend and not distort religion in our educational system.”
 
“And under education state sovereignty, local sovereignty and paramount parental sovereignty,” Glenn said.
 
“The next one is defense. You have a right to defend yourself. You have a right to have and carry arms. You have that right, and it shall not be infringed. Meaning it shall not be undermined and it shall not be altered in any way.

“We have a right to not only defend ourselves but we have a right to gather in groups, and gather and speak. Gather to tell the truth as we understand it. That means gathering in groups and speaking doesn’t mean anymore just getting together on the street corner. It means you have a right to gather in groups without government harassment on the Internet.”
 
“And while we’re at the Internet. We have a right to privacy. They cannot monitor you, track you, classify you without a warrant and a trial by a jury.”
 
“And last one is money and property. It’s more than money. It’s property. I have a right to do on my land what I choose to do on my land. I have a right to do with my money what I choose to do with my money. If I decide to hoard it all, and put it in mattresses I have a right to do that. If I choose to give it all away to charity I have a right to do that.”
 
“It is my money. It is the sweat of my brow. What is in my bank is mine. Not yours, not the state’s. If I’ve made an agreement, and I’m putting that in safekeeping you are to protect from the bank itself and from the government. What I have, what I have earned, my talent, my time – it’s mine.”
 
“It’s time that we really focus. It’s time that we really pick something that is near and dear to your heart. And I believe the line in the sand – as I was putting this list together here and I’m trying to figure out things, and I realize it comes down to 1791. It all comes down to the Constitution with the Bill of Rights, not just the Constitution. Remember, they wouldn’t sign it with just the Constitution. They demanded a Bill of Rights. The things that the government promises they will never ever violate. Ever. And they put them there for a reason, and we are now seeing the equal and opposite reaction to the violation of those rights. And the line in the sand is the Bill of Rights and we need to stand together and link arms.”
 
“Liberals and conservatives. People who worship God deeply profoundly and atheists. People who believe that the earth is all going to be incinerated because of my SUV and people who think that’s hogwash. And we fight it out on the battlefield of ideas.”
 
“But that ring, that battlefield, the rules are set up by the Constitution and the Bill of Rights.”
 
“Where we cannot mix is big government progressives – and they will have you believe in the G.O.P. thatthat problem is a liberal problem. No, it’s a progressive problem. And the person who started the progressive party is Theodore Roosevelt and he was a Republican.”

“Progressivism is what needs to be rooted out because progressivism was designed to thwart and dismantle piece by piece the Constitution of the United States of America. It really comes down to the Bill of Rights. And those things that are in it.”
 
“Why are drones wrong? Bill of Rights. Why is bailing out the banks wrong? The Bill of Rights. Why is what’s happening in the Cyprus, and it will come here? The Bill of Rights. Why is it I can’t put a tracking device on your car? Bill of Rights. Why can’t I tell your church to marry gays Bill of Rights. Why can’t I tell your church you can’t marry gays? Bill of Rights. All of it, Bill of Rights. Bill of Rights. Bill of Rights.”
 
“The line is being drawn in the sand. Don’t cross it. See where it is. Protect and defend it. This is the Alamo.”

[Crafty_Dog]

http://www.glennbeck.com/2013/03/28/sos-stand-against-%E2%80%98most-important%E2%80%99-piece-of-fundamental-transformation/

[Crafty_Dog]

http://live.wsj.com/video/wsj-live-presents-sen-ted-cruz-interviewed/F6CEFCDC-B21F-4A0B-83A0-C4B86888E64E.html#!F6CEFCDC-B21F-4A0B-83A0-C4B86888E64E

[Crafty_Dog]

 
DC, You Have a Problem
#DCintervention
 
WHAT: Go to your Senator’s office with a sign or a flag (or both) and hold a sign waving protest outside the office, then deliver a letter inside.
WHEN: Tuesday, April 16, 2013.
TIME: Noon, local time.
 
WHY? Because they’re drunk on power.
News Item #1: Speaker of the House John Boehner – leader of the Republican Party – said that the House will definitely act in some way on gun control legislation, and that he doesn’t need a GOP majority – his own party – to pass legislation.
 
News Item #2: The Senate voted to move forward on a gun-control bill before the bill had been released! Senator Pat Toomey, elected in the tea party wave of 2010 with grassroots tea party support, co-sponsored this direct attack on our 2nd Amendment rights. In doing so, he has given momentum to the forces that promise to “come back the very next day” to push for more control. There is a much higher chance now that the bill will pass. Read more from Gun Owners of America. Oh, and the reason for the “bipartisanship” on this bill? Boozin’ it up on Senator Manchin’s yacht.
 
News Item #3: Another Senator supported by the tea party and elected in 2010, Marco Rubio, is also breaking his promises and his oath. Rubio is the star spokesman of the Senate group working on an illegal immigration bill – completely behind closed doors, refusing to let the American people see the language. They won’t even let their colleagues in the Senate see the bill! The bill already comes to around 1500 pages and they are planning on holding only ONE hearing, and will allow zero amendments! They are altering the entire immigration system, something that will have far reaching consequences on everything – security, education, taxes, spending, welfare, culture, jobs, crime, etc., and they’re only allowing one hearing on it. Oh, and they are already admitting it won’t be “budget neutral,” meaning they plan on increasing spending to get this done.
 
THEY HAVE A PROBLEM AND THEIR ADDICTION IS FAILING US ALL.
 
•         They break their promises and betray their oaths of office.
•         They write thousand-page bills behind closed doors.
•         They won’t hold public hearings or meetings about bills.
•         They vote for bills before they’ve been released; before they’ve read them.
•         They behave like rulers instead of public servants.
•         They put politics over principle.
 
Please make every effort you can to come out on Tuesday the 16th to your Senator’s office at noon, local time, and tell everyone you know! Bring as many people as you can!
 
Check our website, www.teapartypatriots.org for updates and a tool kit that includes a letter to deliver to your Senator and sign ideas, a place to RSVP and locations you can go.
 
It’s time for an intervention. Will you join us?
 
Share this on Facebook and Twitter and GET THE WORD OUT.
 
WHAT: Go to your Senator’s office with a sign or a flag (or both) and hold a sign waving protest outside the office, then deliver a letter inside.
WHEN: Tuesday, April 16, 2013.
TIME: Noon, local time.

[Crafty_Dog]

Tuesday’s Protests – DC, You Have a Problem
Late last week we announced our #DCIntervention protests at Senators’ local offices across the country that will take place at noon local time tomorrow, April 16, 2013. We are still moving forward with these protests. While we understand that there are many who have loved ones who were impacted by the horrific events in Boston today, we encourage them to take care of their friends and family first. However, there are many other patriots who can continue to carry the torch to protect our constitution and the rule of law.
 
The message tomorrow is simple, follow the Constitutional process. We must move ahead with that message so that it does not get lost in the media storm that is sure to follow today’s events in Boston. While the authorities address the explosions, we the people must address the problems that will not go away just because the media’s attention is elsewhere.
 
However, it is more important than ever that our messaging be focused and united around our major points as we outlined yesterday:
•   Stop writing legislation behind closed doors with a small group of people.
•   Stop voting yes on bills that haven’t been read or haven’t even been released.
•   Stop rushing through massive pieces of legislation before Congress and the American people understand the consequences and how we will all be affected.
•   Let the sunshine in! We aren’t asking for a lot – just to be represented rather than ruled over.
 
Congress railroaded the American people with Obamacare, they did it with the Continuing Resolutions (i.e. spending bills), and they’re doing it right now. If we don’t call attention to it and tell them it’s unacceptable, they will continue to do it until we have no rights left.
 
AGAIN – please stay on message while at the protests. The media may be looking to stick a microphone in your face and get you on tape saying something about the bombings in Boston that they can twist. Our thoughts and prayers are with the people of Boston, and our beef with our Senators is about the lack of transparency and their disregard for the Constitution. They are completely separate issues; don’t let a reporter make you tie them together. And remember, you can always walk away from a reporter. You don’t have to answer their questions.
 
Don’t forget to access our Toolkit that has:
•   A checklist so that you don’t forget anything!
•   Petitions that we will deliver to the Senators in DC if you fax them back to us.
•   Printable posters and suggested sign slogans.
•   Letters to deliver to your Senators while you are there.
•   Sample letters to the editor for your local newspapers.
•   Talking points and resources with links to more information.
•   Sample Facebook posts and Tweets for social media.
•   A list of which Senators voted correctly last week.
Our hashtag on Twitter for tomorrow’s protests is #DCintervention. Please use it when you tweet!

[Crafty_Dog]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PODZaaMTwfg

[Crafty_Dog]

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/04/22/beck-breaks-exclusive-information-on-saudi-national-allegedly-connected-to-boston-bombings/

[Crafty_Dog]

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/04/22/dhs-official-provides-new-details-maintains-innocence-of-saudi-national-once-considered-a-person-of-interest-in-boston-bombings/

[Crafty_Dog]

http://www.glennbeck.com/2013/04/23/napolitano-admits-saudi-was-put-on-watch-list/?utm_source=Daily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=2013-04-23_215217&utm_content=5054942&utm_term=_215217_215224

[Smiling Dog]

My fluckin head is spinning right now!!!!

[Crafty_Dog]

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/04/24/armed-and-dangerous-becks-latest-revelations-on-saudi-national-once-considered-person-of-interest-in-boston-bombings/

[G M]

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/04/24/armed-and-dangerous-becks-latest-revelations-on-saudi-national-once-considered-person-of-interest-in-boston-bombings/

Where is professional journalist Martha Radditz on this?

[Crafty_Dog]

http://www.glennbeck.com/2013/04/26/watch-oreilly-reacts-to-story-on-saudi-national/?utm_source=Daily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=2013-04-26_216349&utm_content=5054942&utm_term=_216349_216357

[Crafty_Dog]

http://townhall.com/columnists/douggiles/2013/05/05/achtung-baby-are-people-being-encouraged-to-rat-on-antigovernment-neighbors-n1587321/page/full

[DougMacG]

http://townhall.com/columnists/douggiles/2013/05/05/achtung-baby-are-people-being-encouraged-to-rat-on-antigovernment-neighbors-n1587321/page/full

“We want people to call us if the guy down the street says he hates the government, hates the mayor and he’s gonna shoot him,” Bradshaw said. “What does it hurt to have somebody knock on a door and ask, ‘Hey, is everything OK?’ ”


Palm Beach County was home for Mohamed Atta and other 911 hijackers briefly, but the example they give to watch for is the right wing kook.

http://www.palmbeachpost.com/news/news/encounters-with-911-hijackers-still-haunt-palm-bea/nLxgP/

[Crafty_Dog]

http://www.daybydaycartoon.com/2013/05/04/

http://www.daybydaycartoon.com/2013/05/05/

[Crafty_Dog]

Glenn Beck Keynote (NRA Convention, Houston 2013)

Monday, May 6, 2013 at 7:32 AM PDT

Hello Texas! Thank you. It is a real honor to be here tonight.

We’re living in interesting times. I want to start with something I don’t think anybody else at the NRA has ever started with before: a picture of a naked hippie.

That’s actually going to play a role in the talk tonight, but I’ll come back to it in a minute.

The first time I spoke at the NRA, it was in Louisville, Kentucky. They gave me this gun. It was such an amazing honor for me, but it was also one of the most terrifying times in my life.

They were doing a retrospective of Charlton Heston because he had just died. And so this is the Charlton Heston gun. They had a gigantic 25 foot image of him behind me with him holding the gun just like this: “Out of my cold dead hands!”

Then they froze the image behind me and said: “This year we would like to award this rifle to Glenn Beck.”

Wayne leaned in and said: “Glenn, say something!”

So as I walked to the podium, I just thought “Don’t say ‘I hope you didn’t take it out of his cold dead hands, did you?’ Just don’t say that!”
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I have no idea what I said, but I know I didn’t say that!

Charlton Heston’s words were meant to wake people up.
He needed to shock us into realizing who our opponent really was: an out of control growing government under Jimmy Carter.

Today we are in a different place than we were in 1976.
The problem is worse today. It wasn’t just Jimmy Carter, just as it isn’t just this president. It’s not just the Democrats either—it’s the republicans too.

The problem is everywhere.

It’s in our media, churches, educational systems, in our own homes. It is the Progressive ideology, which is antithetical to our Constitutional Republic. They want to fundamentally transform the country.

We used to ask how did this happen? If we’re here to tell the truth then we must accept much of the blame as well, since even our families are imploding.

Our Constitution, our rights, our way of life is at stake.
The Freedom of all mankind is at stake. And because of that, so are our souls.

As I have prepared my remarks over the past few weeks, I wondered what your reaction would be tonight as well as the reaction of the rest of the country.

I am going to take a different approach from what many might expect. Parts of it will be a bit tough, but they have to be said.

I grew up in the small farming town of Mt. Vernon Washington. I have also lived in midtown Manhattan. I have picked raspberries and hunted pheasants on my grandfather’s farm. I have been in the boardrooms of the powerful on Wall Street.

In the end here is what I know: I am blessed to have grown up in America.

I cherish my country and the way I was raised, but I also know we are all unique, and I respect the way you grew up as well.

I understand that many can’t understand me or the what I believe, and I’m okay with that. I don’t understand many in New York, but I appreciate the difference. Until recently, it seemed, we were all okay with our differences and we tended to get along.

We have a tough journey ahead.

This weekend, I believe, is one of the most important moments in history for America and certainly the NRA

It is right for this convention to happen in TX. Because this is where the Alamo happened. It’s where “Draw a line in the sand” came from.

General William Travis knew he had to stand on one side of the line, because it was right for him. He did not hold contempt for others who chose differently. He just said: “Best be goin’…”

If we are going to stand and fight we must love those who choose a different path.

We must also know 4 things:

-What we fight
-Who we fight
-Why we fight and most importantly,
-How we fight.

The media would have you believe that we’re silly, selfish, and think our gun rights and our guns are more important than our own children.

But we believe they are important because of our children.

Where the real rub begins is that the progressive elite believes it can make choices better than we can.

Choices on what we eat, what we drive, what we believe is moral and immoral, how to raise our children, and even if— and how— we can worship our God.

They think we’re wrong so they must regulate us until we comply.
I will not comply.

We, on the other hand, believe that it is they who are in error.

And we are once again ready to live as Americans always have: we agree to disagree. We appreciate our freedoms—or as they would say ‘celebrate the diversity!’—and return to focus on those things that unite us rather than divide us.

There are those who believe in the philosophies of man, whether it’s Marx and Engle or Saul Alinsky’s rules of divide and conquer.
We not only believe those ideas are wrong, we also believe them to be dangerous and evil.

We stand against those who want to close our hearts by absolving us of our own personal responsibilities and duties to each other. Who want to force us to accept a faceless bureaucracy and call it charity. Charity is not something a government forces you to do; charity is something that our belief in God compels us to do.

There are Americans who really think they know better than everyone else. They truly believe they should be put in charge of making choices because their choice will be better than ours.

We think they are arrogant and wrong. America has been calling out for someone to take responsibility. The culture of ‘pass the buck’ is so prevalent that our ‘bucks’ no longer have any value.

Tonight, that era of shame ends now.

And it begins with us. Here we are, millions of Americans and NRA members. And millions more who are home who aren’t NRA members, who aren’t Democrats or Republicans but are willing to stand and declare the ‘buck stops here’

I not only will take responsibility but will cry out for my God given right to own, not only my choices, but my consequences. This is our biggest difference. Not rights, but responsibilities.

A righteous cause must be cemented in the truths of the past, but because the world is dynamic we must build on those truths. Patrick Henry once said, “give me liberty or give me death!” But may I clarify and deepen its meaning?

It is time to say, “Give me responsibility or give me death” for there is no real liberty, no real freedom if one is not allowed to make his/her own choices and then fully accept the responsibility of those choices.

We fight against those who stand against what our founders called nature’s laws. They believe they are qualified to make decisions for the collective.

May I humbly remind them that God himself does not make decisions for the collective? God himself sent His son to help individuals. God himself saves the individual, thus saving the collective.

While we have a responsibility to love, help, and care for one another, in the end, it is each of us taking responsibility as it is the only way to progress as individuals and as a people.

We fight against those who deny the Creator, His power and then have the audacity to grant to themselves the collective power which even God denies himself.

Please hear me clearly: this is not presidents or parties. We wrestle against those powers and principalities, against the rulers of the darkness of this world. We stand against spiritual wickedness in high places. And we fight them with the eternal truths that man once felt were so obvious that they were declared self-evident.

I believe we were all born at this time for a reason. We were born here at this time with a profound responsibility to ensure that the flame of liberty is not snuffed out.

It will be up to the people in this room, and anywhere upon the face of the earth, who carry the understanding and can verbally defend nature’s God and nature’s law.

It is in the hands of those in this room and all with eyes and ears to protect man’s liberties and set this ship right to once again begin the long march toward true freedom.

I find myself in a strange position; I’m the owner of a growing media company. I’m not beholden to any special interest groups or parties. I can’t tell you that I’m afraid to speak the truth, and I will speak the truth.

A couple months ago, I instructed my editors at The Blaze to report on stories where people who used a gun saved the day. We hear all the other stories. About three months ago, right after the Sandy Hook shootings I wanted to find the stories of everyday people who had saved lives with guns. And with very rare exceptions, we’ve had a new story on the front page every day for the last 100 days.

My partner on the radio Pat said to me: “Glenn, have you been looking at The Blaze? Every day there’s a new story about someone who’s stopped a rape or a robbery with a gun! It’s like a new epidemic of good with guns!”

I said, “Pat, there’s no epidemic. I’ve just made a policy that we do actual honest journalism.”

Let me give you a couple of the stories:
On April 4, just one month ago, in Portland Oregon, a woman was attacked around 10pm after she had gotten out of her car.
A man approached her from behind and dragged her backwards by her ponytail.

We know what would have happened next. But this woman had a gun. She pointed it at the man. He fled.

A week earlier, in Youngstown, Ohio, an elderly woman strapped to an oxygen tank was at home, and she saw the shadow of a man lurking outside her window. Then her front door rattled. Then glass broke.

The man was inside her home.

She retrieved her revolver and she called out: “Leave me alone!” “Get out of here!”

But the guy kept coming at her. So she shot him and held him at gun point in her kitchen until police arrived.

Then a few weeks before that, in Dickinson, Texas, there’s a home invasion, and the attackers were sexually assaulting a woman and her daughter. An unspeakable horror.

The woman’s young son was tied up, but broke from his restraints and grabbed the family handgun. Upon seeing the gun, the two men fled from the home.

It happens every day. And the Blaze is the only major media outlet in the country with the guts to report it.

Guns save lives. Guns protect homes and businesses. Guns protect our children.
And only in very rare occasions are they used by madmen to kill our children.

The truth is that guns on so many occasions are the only difference between your mom or sister getting raped and them walking home unmolested. It happens all the time. And it can happen to anyone.

The other side knows this and have counted on a compliant and willing partner in the mainstream media to overlook these stories. They are counting on you not to be able to find these stories.

But what they haven’t counted on are broadcast entities like mine and bloggers like Michelle Malkin, Dana Loesch, Ben Shapiro, and others.

What they didn’t count on or see coming……is you. Your willingness to share these stories To Tweet, Facebook, or even email them to friends.

They are counting on organizations like the NRA and people who have committed to stand to fold out of fear. They’re counting on us to be quiet. They’re counting on our soldiers to come home, sit down and be quiet, to not to have the courage like so many soldiers who come home and tell the truth like Marcus Luttrell and Chris Kyle—nor his sweet wife who will now power-on and pick up the torch.

You see, they don’t know us.

They didn’t foresee the Colorado sheriffs who stood up to Obama’s gun-grabbing measures or the officers who were told “it was in their best interest” to be at the Denver police academy to stand behind the president’s anti-gun measures. Because they answer to a higher power and because they know the truth, they refused to betray the idea of freedom of conscience and the Bill of Rights.

Let me tell you something that the sheriffs knew: it’s never in our “best interests”… to sit down, shut up, and be quiet.
It is always right to stand, always right to speak, and always right to defend the truth.

No matter how high the price, we know that there is a difference between right and wrong, and it is far past time for us to begin declaring it. Never give up. Never give in.

Since when in America is standing up against your own beliefs “your best interests?”

Some of our friends who don’t understand why we make such a big deal out of what is happening don’t understand. They think it’s not about guns. It’s not.

It’s about the right of conscience and the responsibility to keep them secure for future generations.

Progressives want the Second Amendment to be overlooked… but we’re making it clearer: “The right of the people to keep and bear Arms, shall not be infringed!”

A man goes out and commits an unspeakable act of horror with a gun. Don’t blame the gun. Don’t blame my gun or your gun or the NRA.

It is not the gun that commits unspeakable acts, it’s the individual.

A gun’s power— for good or for evil— is merely a reflection of the hands that holds it.

I have been looking for gunst hat tell the story and teach the story of the 2nd Amendment.

I want to start with this:

Barbary Powers Rifle

This is a gun that was used the first time we fought Islamic Extremists. Most people don’t even realize that’s what the Barbary Pirates were. It was on the shores of Tripoli.

Why were our marines called leather necks? ‘Leather’ implied you couldn’t be beheaded by the Muslim extremists.

Most people don’t even realize. Thomas Jefferson wrote in his version of the Koran printed by the U.S. government—the Koran in which he warned us about Islam—he didn’t want to have a foreign war, but we were paying 75% of everything that we had over in bribes to the Barbary pirates, so he sent the marines over. This gun was used against the marines.

But this is not a Barbary pirate gun, although it is decorated as one. This was first used in the American Revolution by a British soldier against us. That soldier was killed. The gun was then picked up and used by an American soldier against the British. Then that American died fighting on the shores of Tripoli and was picked up by the Muslim extremists.

So which is this gun? Is it good or is it evil. It is nothing but a gun. A gun is only a reflection of the people that use it.

It is the man, not the gun. People are different but the gun remains the same. When you get past the politics, when you get past the media, and you get to have a conversation with people of any party, any class or when you get to have an honest conversation, people will agree: this is crazy what’s going on…

How do we even protect our kids? Our families? I’m worried that our children aren’t going to have the opportunities that I had.
I’m worried about the kind of country that they are growing up in, which brings us to why we fight.

We have to have that conversation tonight: ‘how do I protect myself and my children and my loved ones? How do they protect themselves?’

We fight because we actually want to fix things.
Our families and our society are sick.

We have become a nation that is numb to the horrors of death unless it serves a political purpose.

Our ambassador is butchered in Benghazi, our military is told to look the other way and leave men to die on the battlefield, and the media fails to report it.

Our media does not report that it is too often safer to walk down the streets of Baghdad than Chicago, and yet the elites call the NRA and its members killers.

We would never discuss the fact that an abortion doctor in Philadelphia literally had jars of baby feet on his desk.
As we look away from the slaughter house and the fact that 41% of all pregnancies in NY end in abortion, our president becomes a champion for the over the counter abortion pill for 15 year olds.

Our society is sick. But while we are struggling on how to fix these things, we also have to beat back the power grabbers and their lies.

We know that the only thing that can stop someone from committing murder or from threatening our life is a law-abiding citizen who has a gun and knows how to use it.

If we’re really interested in solutions. That’s one. Because gun-free zones will do nothing but prevent the good guys from bringing a gun to school.

In the People’s Republic of Cambridge, they actually have a nuclear-free zone. I love that. No nuclear weapons in Cambridge! I feel so much better.

It’s a hate-free zone, too. No HATE!

What could possibly happen? Besides the fact that two of their own citizens plotted mass murder right there in nuclear-free, Kumbaya Cambridge. And you know what, they did it with a weapon of mass destruction.

Yes, believe it or not, that’s what they’ve labeled my grandmother’s summer pastime. This pressure cooker is a weapon of mass destruction.

Have we gone insane? Have we gone insane!

Yes we have.

After the Sandy Hook massacre, the government went in, seized the opportunity, exploited these families, and pushed for more control over our lives. It’s immoral.

Meanwhile they left our communities with “gun-free zones”
And for criminals, all that means is: “zero-opposition zone.”

The American People have the facts on their side. But the American people don’t know the facts.

We have the Constitution on our side. But we don’t know the Constitution anymore.

We have the truth on our side. But how many people can even recognize the truth?

The only way you can control a free people is to lie. The bigger the lie, and the longer you deny reality, the more apt people are to believe it.

Yet, someone will always stand up, and those who seek to control must make an example of them—smear them, isolate them, mock them, destroy them so the truth is no longer relevant. And nobody wants to talk about it any more.
“OK, 2+2 = 5!”

They call us rednecks, right-wing, anti-government and Christians. And people believe them, especially those who never grew up around guns, who are legitimately confused about the NRA and the right to bear arms. These are the people we need to reach out to because they really think the gun is evil. They really believe that we are the ones responsible for killing all those children at Sandy Hook, Aurora, Columbine, and the rest. They have accepted the media lie that the NRA is malicious.

And I don’t blame them. When your kids are being carted out of a classroom with a paper gun, with enough indoctrination, you would too.

It takes a lot of work to get around all of the lies of an out of control government and a media in collusion. And there’s another reason why people believe it. When a society is this sick and you are on overload as a parent, if someone gives you an easy answer, you snap at it because it’s convenient.

It’s easy, and it doesn’t require us to examine our lives or our role as a citizen or parent. Now, only 35% own a gun and that number is decreasing.

So let’s be clear:
Let’s talk about facts. Let’s talk about history. I don’t want you to take my word for any of this—look it up yourself. Do your own homework.

Let’s start by making something abundantly clear, over and over again.

Guns have lifted people out of poverty and over ands over have allowed the oppressed to rise up against tyranny.

Those who seek control ask: “How could you defend the use of guns…how irresponsible…”

“The gun is the most dangerous thing on the planet.”
They say no other country in the world has the problem America has with gun massacres.
“We need to be more like England where the police use batons. The only way to save the lives of our children is to ban assault-weapons and control the people’s right to own a gun.”

Our president said: “If there’s even one thing we can do, one life we can save—don’t we have an obligation to try?”

Let’s start here, Mr. President. I’m gonna explain why that’s wrong. using your logic: Mr. President, you authorized the killings of more than 176 innocent children in Pakistan. These children didn’t do anything. I have to say, these children were just as innocent as the ones who died at Sandy Hook.

Adam Lanza killed 20 children. Your use of drones killed 176 children. I’d say you’re the priority if we use your logic.

Mr. President, “if we want to save innocent children” we need to start by taking that button out of your hand.

It’s not about the drones. It is not about the war. It is not about the guns.

Let me clarify for those in the media: I am not acusing the president of killing children even though the President has accused Wayne La Pierre and the NRA of killing children.

We will not use the tools of Saul Alinsky.
We have read the Rules for Radicals, which starts with “a tip of the hat—to the first radical Lucifer.”

We will not tip our hat to Satan. We will bend our knee to God and let us honestly seek the truth.

We must remain calm and rational. We must hold on to logic.
Because in the heat of battle, people make mistakes out of fear. In the moment of battle, you make irrational decisions b/c you just want it to stop.

If you look at the countries that have banned guns, it’s always because of an emergency.

So let’s fix reason and logic firmly in her seat, question with boldness, and accept the answers that science and facts give us whether they hurt us or help us.

Let’s look at the countries that have rapidly undergone efforts to ban guns:

In every single place that all guns or handguns are banned,
the murder rates go up.

Compared to all other developed nations, the highest murder rates are not in America but in those countries which have the strictest gun control laws.

Should we ban guns and be more like England? Gun-related crimes doubled in England within a decade of guns being banned.
And 4 years after guns are banned, the English Bobby began to carry guns for the first time.

Ban guns, gun deaths double.

Mass killings are becoming an epidemic? No they’re extraordinarily rare.
513 people have been killed in mass killings since 1983.
That’s far too many. But 3,696 people have been killed by lightning in the same 30 years.

There are 30,000 firearms related deaths per year they say.
But what they won’t tell you is that 65% of those, including the one 2 days ago, are suicides.

Most of the remaining 35 % are for self-protection.
Or they are cops in the line of duty.
Once you factor suicide, cops, and protection that murder rate gets cut by over half.

The murder rates are less than half of what they were during the Great Depression. That seems to imply that the more people out of work, the more murders occur. I would bet that the same would be true for suicides—The Blaze verified that the man who shot himself at the Airport Thursday had just been fired.

So maybe you don’t need to ban guns.
If you want to save lives, Mr. President, fix the economy. Create jobs. If you want to reduce violence don’t close gun stores, or increase regulation or buy up all the bullets, remove the tax burden and clear the path for small businesses so that they can create jobs.

Facts matter. They say we have one of the highest murder rates in the world. But if you take out the gun-related deaths in cities like Chicago, Detroit, D.C., or New Orleans—where gun laws are the strictest—America would have one of the lowest murder rates in the world.

When you take out these progressive cities, America goes from the country with the third highest rate to one of the bottom ten.

When someone argues for gun-control, they are either living in self-imposed ignorance or they’re not arguing about guns. Simply control.

For us, tonight and every day forward, we must be about educating ourselves and our families and dedicating our lives to man’s liberty. It must become about the responsibility we keep for ourselves as citizens. And to make sure we give no more of our power to those in government at any level.

But we also understand many of our fellow citizens don’t want to accept more responsibility. That is why New York City has Mayor Bloomberg.

In fact, I’ve come up with a slogan…and this one, New York and Mayor Bloomberg, you will love!

You WILL LOVE NY!

Progressives like Mike Bloomberg know better than you but he also claims he doesn’t have to live under those rules. For instance, he said because of global warming, New York needed a law so you couldn’t leave your car idling—but of course he doesn’t like to get into a hot car so he lets his car idle.
When he got caught he said: “OK what’s fair is fair,” and he instead got an air conditioner that most of use in their apartment in NY, built a special contraption, and put it in his car.

He wants to control every aspect of your life, he wants to control what you drink, what you eat, how you eat, how much you eat.

He even talked recently he doesn’t think he could force everyone in NYC to exercise. Excuse me? You don’t think?

Progressives think they’re different They’re special.
They are the ranchers and we are the cattle.

There are members in congress who are absolutely pro-gun control but think it’s an outrage that YOU should have a gun.
But they carry a gun because they’re different.

Michael Moore is as anti-gun as it gets. His security guards have been arrested twice at an airport for carrying an illegal weapon in New Jersey. You shouldn’t have a gun—but Michael Moore needs one.

Even the first Progressive president, Theodore Roosevelt, had a gun. So don’t tell me the disease of Progressivism doesn’t affect both sides, because the man who started the Progressive movement was a Republican.

Teddy Roosevelt had the ultimate security system.
He had the secret service. He had them at his door, his entry way, all the way to his bedroom, but God forbid someone get past them, he wanted the chance to shoot the attacker before they shot him.

Theodore Roosevelt’s Nightstand Pistol

He had his own gun in the nightstand. Why would this president need a gun?
He’s different, “Because he has people who want to hurt him!” He doesn’t need a wallet, a driver’s license, he doesn’t need to drive because secret service does it. So why would he need to keep a gun?

Hollywood stars have Protective details. Not everyone can afford armed security, Jim Carrey, but everyone should be afforded a chance to survive.

I am sorry to say I don’t trust someone else with my family’s safety. How could anyone believe that the government is best at protecting us when they failed to notice three out of the four Boston bombing suspects overstayed their visas and one of them was deported on national security grounds by one arm of DHS only to be granted reentry by another three weeks later.

But it is more than incompetence. The Second Amendment was written because of our natural rights. And we have the responsibility to throw off the chains of tyranny.

But that sounds old fashioned, doesn’t it? That’s what progressives will tell you, they’ll use that old fashioned thing. They will always tell you: “You know, the founders only had flintlocks and couldn’t see the AR- 15.”

Maybe they couldn’t see the AR-15.
But whether or not they could isn’t what’s important. Why they wrote the words they did is what matters.

And if you don’t like the Constitution, use the constitutional process to change it. The Founders made that possible.
But there is only one way to do it. It’s simple, but not easy. It’s called an Amendment.

The founders were not anti-progress, they were anti-control. They not only expected change, they embraced it but change through the rule of law and the constitution, not around it with an executive order.

The founders, they may not have seen the AR-15.
However, President Obama, Mr. Bloomberg, and Joe Manchin –and Pat Toomey…they were sure the hell smart enough to see you coming.

The founders warned of the “monopoly of violence.”
Because they knew that governments could turn against their people.

And if the government had a monopoly of violence, tyranny would go undefeated. If you don’t believe me… ask the Japanese-Americans who spent the war in internment camps.
If you don’t think our government can do terrible things to its citizens? Explain this:

The Lakota Indians were asleep by the river when the US troops arrived on a freezing December morning. For everyone’s protection, the troops began to enter the tents of the sleeping Indians and confiscate their guns.

One boy, a deaf boy, tried to hold onto his gun. Trying to explain that he had paid a lot for it. In the struggle to hang onto it, the gun discharged.

The US Soldiers stepped back and unloaded on the group of around 300 men, women, and children. 150 were killed, another 51 wounded. Others tried to run to the creek, only to be caught and killed by the soldiers. Without any defense.

The Creek was called “Wounded Knee.” The year was 1890. To emphasize to the press the urgency and necessity of disarming those savage Indians, twenty medals of honor were awarded to the American Soldiers. That’s more than awarded for
D-Day…only four.
Battle of the Bulge…seventeen.
Pearl Harbor…fifteen.

Rifle from Massacre at Wounded Knee

This gun belonged to a member of that tribe.

If you wish to excuse the internment camps or Wounded Knee, ask what gun control meant to the Average African-American of the South in 1850. Or even after they were freed in 1880s.

After the emancipation proclamation, slavery was over, but not really, as we all know it. It’s why Martin Luther King marched. It didn’t end. Why?

The proslavery Democrats in the South tried disarming blacks because it was the last thing that they could do to prevent them truly witnessing freedom. Even after they were declared free and were reading, educating themselves, trying to lift themselves up out of poverty, up from slavery, as Booker T. Washington would say.

The very last attempt to keep them in check was gun control.
If they weren’t allowed to protect themselves, it wouldn’t matter how much knowledge they had. It would all be meaningless in the face of a gun or a midnight raid or a torch or a sword.

You have a right to life. The Democrats were not happy about this at all, and they had the power in the South and they weren’t going to change—war or no war.

The Democrats had the terrorist organization called the “Ku Klux Klan,” which was killing blacks, but not only blacks, any white who supported the integration into the Union as full citizens of any black man or woman. So, the Klan would kill anybody, but they loved to kill blacks, and they really loved to kill who they called “RADICAL REPUBLICANS.” Those were the Republicans who supported racial integration and equality for all.

Our history is so screwed up that they try to make all white people racists.

Both Republicans and blacks ended up on the KKK kill list, and so the Klan went around burning and lynching families, killing them, whites, blacks, just out of sheer hatred. 25% of all the lynchings in America were of white people who had committed to stand and fight for the liberties of all men.

A lot of times, people couldn’t do anything about it because they didn’t have a gun, because their gun was taken away.

Now, if you don’t have a gun, and the Klan comes knocking at your door, how is that freedom, exactly?

You could protect yourself if you have a right to use a gun, have a gun, keep it on you. The left will ask “why do you need more than a couple of bullets or what are you going to hunt with more than 6 rounds?”
If the Klan or the Crips or any of the gangs coming across the border unimpeded come to my neighborhood, I may require more than 6 bullets.

Unfortunately the people who need this more than anything is Americans will not see or hear it. They are those Americans who are trapped in the violence, death, and despair of our inner cities; It’s the death and despair by progressive governments and a collective whose failing schools were designed not to teach about personal responsibility and freedoms.

Teach them their own history so they may join us in the understanding that universal access to firearms is indistinguishable from emancipation.

I ask you: please, do not to take my word for it. Do your own homework.

It’s not about safety, it is about control. At a time in our country’s history when the average twelve year old could go out and buy a gun.
At a time in the 1950s where over 60% of Americans had a gun in their home, some Americans still struggled to feel the true impact of God given rights.

In Alabama in 1956 you needed a permit to carry a gun.
A black preacher who knew his rights and, more importantly, knew history, took his job as a father and his duty to protect his family seriously, and as things heated up he did the right thing—as a law abiding citizen he went to his police station and applied for a permit to carry a gun.
Unfortunately, because he was considered a challenge to the people who were in control of the system the Alabama police told Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King:

We’d like to have someone like you have a gun, but for your own safety, Sir, we just don’t think you should have one.

He was denied his right to carry a gun for his own safety.

Is there anybody within the sound of my voice that believes he was denied a concealed carry because it was in his best interest?

If we’re really concerned and serious about getting guns out of the hands of people who have proven themselves irresponsible and dangerous with guns,
Then we need to tell the truth:

Racists like James Earl Ray killed one.
Disturbed kids like Adam Lanza kill 26,
but our own history shows that
governments kill millions.

Let me come back to the picture of a naked hippie. And just so members of the press don’t get confused….

Early morning in California when a resident called the police to say that he saw a ‘naked hippie’ shooting birds. The California authorities responded by taking his gun away.

Charles Manson Shotgun

It was this gun.
Why am I telling you this story? Because it’s not the gun because the naked hippie went away without his gun but returned as helter skelter, a man known as one of the most brutal mass murders on record: Charles Manson.

He didn’t use a gun, he and his followers used knives.

It’s the intent and the person. It is the individual, not the weapon.

We must admit two things; that weapons will always find their way into the hands of bad people, but guns remain in the hands of good people. This is the beginning of the path to our solution: good people who are willing to stand.

9/11- Walter Reaver’s Revolver

September 11th, 2001. A moment in history that will define this generation. While victims were running away, men, were running into those buildings. Amazing men like young Walter Weaver, a member of the NYPD and an NRA life member. He was last seen in the world trade center trying to rescue people. He was in the lobby trying to free people trapped in an elevator. A servant fighting for the individual’s freedom until the very end.

After the towers fell and the nation mourned, we sifted through the rubble, this is all that was left as a reminder of Walter Weaver. A silent token of liberty.

Walter Weaver, I’m sure wouldn’t want to be called a hero.
He was simply an American.
He was an example of what we all should be—men, who just do the right thing when time calls our name.
When there is an emergency or trouble we are the ones that should run to help. We must be the action on the other end of the 911 call.

I don’t know, but I believe Walter Weaver would tell you that he wasn’t trained to be hero by the police academy.
But he was raised in a culture that taught him about self-sacrifice and to always do the right thing, even when no one else is watching. He had those things long before he wore a uniform.
How many of us can say that.

Good cops, bad cop, it doesn’t mean you take all the badges. It’s the people, not the badge.

As good as the policemen in our country are. When you are in trouble the average Police response rate is 8 minutes; most crimes take less than one.

If a responsible citizen with a gun had been in that movie theater in Colorado, or if members in the audience in that theater were allowed to bring their gun into the theater and not leave them locked in their cars, how many lives would have been saved?

How many of the mourning, children would instead have been able to spend time over breakfast with their mom or dad this morning if someone good was allowed to have a gun?

While our politicians from the local to the federal level have spent us into oblivion, and our public services are being obliterated and our police force is being cut.

I will no longer accept the media falsehood nor reinforce it by calling our brave men and women in blue on our cities and streets first responders. It’s time for America to recognize WE are the first responders.

They are the 2nd responders, we are the first responders.

When there is trouble let us be the first on the scene to help.
Let us be the first responder when someone is sick or hungry or frightened.

Let us be the first to share our bread with the hungry; Let us be the first to open our hearts to the homeless poor; Let us be the first to remove the yoke of injustice.

I don’t know what America will choose. But for me and my family, I choose to stand with courage. I choose to stand with selflessness. I chose to stand with God with Malice toward none and charity to all.

That’s who we are.

Forget what the media says, I know that’s who we are.

Our freedom is under attack. Our liberty and way of life is being legislated out of existence. Our rights are being diminished by a ruling power…an elite class is growing out of control.

We are in a really a precarious position, America. We have a government that is run by radicals actively working against us.

And there are politicians in the Democratic and Republican Parties who don’t fully understand that you’re dealing with a different enemy who is playing for the entire world.

They aren’t just tinkering around the edges anymore.
They are going after America at her very core.

Because they know: if you lose the 2nd Amendment
You lose the 1st, the 4th , the 5th, the 10,th the 14th, the 19th, then all you’ll be left with is the 16th Amendment, the income tax one.

And maybe if you’re lucky…you might still have that one about quartering soldiers.

Charlton Heston already stood in 1976
He drew that line in the sand. I will not give up my weapon. I will not comply. I will stand and fight.

But we must now define what it means to fight and it must allow us to remain true to who we are. Tonight begins a new chapter in the fight for liberty.

One that is about more than just our cold dead hands…it’s about the hearts of good people and the active minds of a free people, the actions of a righteous people.
It’s about who we are. As Americans, proud Americans with a cause greater than ourselves.

I believe it is time not to run from labels – instead embrace those things that will be the only life preserver of any value. Let us declare without shame: Yes- I will cling to my God and my guns.

He is my rock, and they are central to our foundation.

In the coming days I will announce an effort with major partners who know the time of our day.
I hope the NRA will join me on this.

We must begin to teach the American people how to stand for civil rights, with the same vigor and discipline that was taught to Alveda King and those around her by her Uncle Martin. We must learn what it means to passively resist.

Let us resist in the Judeo-Christian tradition.
This is the underground railroad and the lunch counters, and Tiananmen Square. Most God-fearing Americans have always associated things like ‘peace’ activists, sit-ins and resistance with pot smoking, naked hippies. By doing so, we have dismissed their power and their roots.

Because the cultural icon of that decade was the naked hippie we missed the truth, which truly moved us forward.
That free love had nothing to do with freedom and worse, love love should not be confused with sex.

The true and powerful message of the 1960s was that God demands equal justice and equal rights for all of his children. That was the center of MLK movement. And so we must pick up that truth again.

We must not respond in kind by getting angry, by playing dirty,
by calling the Progressives names and striking out .
Because we know who they are, we chose not be like them. Let’s not give them that satisfaction nor the media the story they’ve already written. We are better than that. We are the law abiding, god fearing members of the NRA.
We are Americans. We will be clear, and we will stand, we will march if we have to, but we will not be moved.
Our right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed. We will follow in the footsteps of Jesus Christ, Frederick Douglass, Winston Churchill, Thomas Paine, Dietrich Bonheoffer, Ben-Gurion, Margaret Thatcher, Ronald Reagan, Gandhi, Thomas Jefferson, and MLK.

Hear me now: “We Shall Overcome!”

Let us not talk about cold dead hands, but rather the people who have a cause to use them. It is not the gun, the knife or, as Cain discovered with Able, a rock but the cold heart filled with error and darkness that must be corrected.

So we will use these hands and our warm hearts to lift up, learn, teach, help and heal. We will work together side by side, white, black, Hispanic or native-American. It doesn’t matter because we don’t see those divisions.

WE will work together as Americans not only to preserve our rights, but the rights of our children to be safe, our wives and daughters to not be held at knife or gunpoint by a rapist and our most precious and vulnerable little ones to have the right to survive a simple walk down a city street or, God forbid, survive a day of public education.

It is not our cold dead hands that will win this but as always when it comes to American victories, it is our strong backs, our strong will, and the ability to adapt and learn and our warm hearts filled with love for all mankind that will compel us to defend all men’s right to life liberty and the pursuit of happiness.

Churchill said, we shall not falter, we shall not fail. I will tell you if America falls, the entire world falls into darkness, so I will add: we cannot falter, we cannot fail.

We will not be the generations that historians look back to and question. We will not be the generation which loses mankind’s freedom

They will look back to us instead and with awe and inspiration that in our darkest times with the greatest reason for doubt or fear, we rose above it, pushed the darkness back, and held the torch of liberty high once again for all men of the world to see and aspire to.

I am not moving. Because I have the power of the ultimate truth:
Because I am on the side of nature’s law and nature’s god.

Jesus was a man of love, peace, and forgiveness. But make no mistake he was also immovable.

The right to keep and bear arms shall not be infringed. We will fight by strapping on the full armor of God. We will stand firm with the belt of truth, the breastplate of righteousness, the shield of faith, the helmet of salvation, the sword of the spirit.

We will fight your tactics of fear, we will fight your darkness.
We will fight your lies and we will counter them with love peace and equal justice for all mankind.

[Crafty_Dog]

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/05/10/shock-irs-formally-apologizes-for-inappropriately-flagging-conservative-group-in-the-2012-election/

[G M]

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/05/10/shock-irs-formally-apologizes-for-inappropriately-flagging-conservative-group-in-the-2012-election/

There should be criminal investigations regarding this conduct. Didn't Nixon do this?

[Crafty_Dog]

At the moment they are blaming it on low level flunkies , , ,

[G M]

At the moment they are blaming it on low level flunkies , , ,

Were they plumbers? 

Yeah, mega federal bureaucracies where you can't scratch your ass without filling a dozen forms and getting approval from Washington suddenly just happen to have a sudden rash of rogue low level employees who just happen to target Buraq's enemy list. Funny how that works.

[Crafty_Dog]

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/348013/irs-inquisition-update

[G M]

http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/348013/irs-inquisition-update

Enemies list.

[Crafty_Dog]

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/may/11/tea-party-targeted-senior-irs-bosses-knew-conserva/

[Crafty_Dog]

Posting this here for my future reference; have not watched it yet:

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/05/28/were-looking-at-it-wrong-bestselling-author-explains-how-culture-really-changes/

[Crafty_Dog]

http://www.mediaite.com/tv/beck-fires-back-at-maddow-questions-her-intellectual-integrity-ive-never-been-called-a-conspiracy-theorist/

[DougMacG]

The merits of these policies can be debated on privacy and security threads, but the political reality is a big split within the conservative movement.  It also divides the left as these are now Obama policies exposed by the NSA leak, opposed by the ACLU and civil libertarians.

What a fatal, terrorist empowering shame it is that with the IRS abuse and other scandals that we don't trust our national security apparatus to sniff out and hunt down terrorists.
------

The WSJ quite descriptively calls it "A Tea Party Blindspot"
http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323844804578527312872991902.html?mod=WSJ_Opinion_AboveLEFTTop

"... both the Constitution and laws of war make no distinction between an American and foreign terrorist. Anyone who takes up arms as a declared enemy of the United States, fails to wear a uniform and targets civilians is an illegal enemy combatant, regardless of passport. The Supreme Court affirmed this principle in 1942 in a case involving Nazi saboteurs, including a U.S. citizen, who were caught on the U.S. East Coast and tried and executed by a military court.

Where a terrorist is captured is also immaterial. By offering special protections to those already on U.S. soil, Mr. Goodlatte and his ACLU allies would provide al Qaeda and other terror networks with a perverse incentive to recruit in America. Contrary to Kentucky Senator Rand Paul's assertions, terrorists certainly consider the U.S. to be part of the global terror battlefield. Ask any New Yorker."
...
"In practice the President has detained an American on U.S. soil as an enemy combatant only twice in 12 years."
...
"when the U.S. treated al Qaeda as a law enforcement problem and made itself more vulnerable to attack. The tea party-ACLU condominium is threatening to blur the laws of war with the rules of civilian justice in a way that could jeopardize U.S. security. Let's hope they fail."

Full coverage: https://subscribe.wsj.com/

[Crafty_Dog]

A few days ago I heard (on the Hannity show) an interview with a Tea Party activist.
 He explained that as soon as their problems with the IRS became known, their
membership numbers imploded.  Members and potential donors were scared off.

This may be the answer to the question as to what happened to the Tea Party before
last year's elections.  They were an important presence in 2010, but 2 years later
they were hardly heard from (answer - people, generally, do not like the IRS
climbing up their pants).

Actually, I find it curious that - with all those billions spent on super computers
and high tech spying - what may have had by far the greatest impact, possibly of
historic significance - was plain old lack of integrity -  and corruption - of
individuals working for the IRS.

[Crafty_Dog]

http://www.theblaze.com/contributions/we-will-no-longer-accept-the-lies-becks-prepared-remarks-for-washington-d-c-rally/

[Crafty_Dog]

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/08/03/politico-looks-at-becks-growing-empire/

[Crafty_Dog]

http://www.glennbeck.com/2013/08/12/glenn-better-days-are-right-around-the-corner/?utm_source=Daily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=2013-08-12_243594&utm_content=5054942&utm_term=_243594_243604

[Crafty_Dog]

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424127887323446404579009201942413702.html?mod=trending_now_1

With clipboard in hand and "don't tread on me" rattlesnake earrings dangling, Jenny Beth Martin, the woman sometimes described as the tea party's den mother, stood guard over the microphone at a Capitol Hill protest of the Internal Revenue Service's targeting of conservative groups.

Lawmakers sweltered in a long line waiting to take the stage earlier this summer before a crowd of roughly 10,000 and a live Web audience. It was up to Mrs. Martin to decide who would get a turn.


Sen. Rand Paul of Kentucky, a tea-party favorite, got two minutes. Louisiana Rep. John Fleming, after shedding his dark suit jacket and waiting half an hour, told Mrs. Martin he needed to vote on the House floor soon. "I'm doing the best I can," she replied. Rep. Steve Stockman of Texas showed up without an invitation—and didn't make the cut.

After a tough 2012 election season, the tea-party movement is on the rebound. Mrs. Martin, head of the Tea Party Patriots, is riding a revival of interest sparked by controversy over the IRS's much-publicized targeting of conservative groups. She says the Patriots, the tea party's largest umbrella group, suffered because of the IRS's refusal to grant it tax-exempt status but now is benefiting from the backlash. Her group's monthly donations, she says, have tripled recently, and its staff has doubled.

The uproar has revived media attention and renewed the intensity of many tea-party supporters. Just last week, Mrs. Martin says, the Patriots received a new letter from the IRS asking for additional information about the group's activities, including copies of all direct-mail solicitations and telemarketing scripts before the 2012 election and any advertising materials in 2013. "This is beyond anger and frustration," she says.

Public-opinion polls suggest the controversy has helped the movement's image. In a June 15 Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll, 51% of Republicans said they had a positive view of the tea party, up from 42% in January, but still below the 63% recorded in December 2010. Among all adults, 26% had a positive view, up from 23% in January.

Mrs. Martin is trying to harness that energy to make tea-party voices heard when lawmakers are back home during the congressional recess this month. At the Atlanta airport recently at the start of a nine-day swing through seven states, she reviewed a map on the Patriots website of the weekend's scheduled appearances by lawmakers in their home districts and typed a message to her legions of Facebook and Twitter followers. She urged them to show up at those events and "remember the heated town halls of 2009," a reference to confrontations four years ago between conservative voters and lawmakers that put the tea party on the map.

That summer was when the movement took shape amid protests over President Barack Obama's proposed health-care overhaul. Today, health care has returned to the forefront as activists urge lawmakers to strip funds needed to implement the new health law, while also protesting a proposed overhaul of the immigration system.


"Jenny Beth personifies the conservative movement, re-energized by the administration's scandals this summer," says Republican Sen. Mike Lee of Utah, who is pushing to defund the health overhaul, even if that risks prompting a government shutdown. "She plays a leading role with the grass roots getting our message out to the mainstream" during the August recess and beyond.

Political operatives on both sides of the aisle acknowledge that the IRS scandal has reinvigorated the tea party. What remains open to debate, however, is whether the movement can sustain the momentum, and what it will mean for the Republican Party heading in to the 2014 midterm elections.

The tea-party faction already is gearing up for primary challenges against at least two Republican heavyweights, South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham and Tennessee Sen. Lamar Alexander, conservative activists say.

"Many traditional conservatives want the tea-party label—again—to distance themselves from the establishment," notes John Feehery, who advised several Republicans when they held leadership positions in Congress. He predicts the movement "will impact some Republican primaries in the midterm elections."

Brad Woodhouse, president of the liberal Americans United for Change and former communications director at the Democratic National Committee, says the tea party's renewed fervor won't translate to broader gains for the Republican Party. "The Republicans are already losing August, because they are fighting with each other…whipsawed between establishment and extreme factions," he says.

The Patriots aim to do two things for the movement: advise and train local groups, and support lawmakers and legislation consistent with its goal of "constitutionally limited, fiscally responsible government where free markets thrive."

At the dawn of the movement, Mrs. Martin was a suburban mother of twins who blogged about clipping coupons and planning meals after giving up her technology job at a national retailer to stay home outside Atlanta. She and her husband, Lee, filed for bankruptcy and lost their home when his business failed. Mrs. Martin says she cleaned neighbors' houses, refusing to apply for government assistance.

Like many conservatives, Mrs. Martin was caught up in a wave of populist anger over federal spending and the health-care overhaul. She was one of about 20 people who took part in an early conference call, convened via Twitter, that launched grass-roots gatherings that blossomed into the tea-party movement.

She and two others launched Tea Party Patriots. Her blogging, technology and local-advocacy skills suited her well for the work. She began traveling the country providing hands-on training for activists on expanding their local groups, speaking to the media and pressuring elected officials.

Tea-party activists helped the GOP gain control of the House of Representatives and install more conservative senators in the 2010 election. Mrs. Martin was named one of Time magazine's "100 Most Influential People in the World" that year, joining such luminaries as Bill Clinton and Taylor Swift. In her first-ever trip to New York City for the gala, she recalls telling the Time advertisers seated at her table, "I'm sorry you got stuck with me."

Patriots board member Ernest Istook, a former Republican congressman from Oklahoma, says Mrs. Martin's national visibility and 400,000-person donor base impressed the board, which made her the group's sole leader. "Jenny Beth understood that even a grass-roots movement needed organizational structure," Mr. Istook says. She took control of a $24 million budget, and earns nearly $250,000 a year.

At the behest of a wealthy donor, Mrs. Martin undertook a personal makeover, losing 70 pounds, changing her hairstyle and overhauling her wardrobe. She began traveling with an assistant.

One problem dogged the group: The Patriots didn't have tax-exempt status, a disincentive to some potential donors. The group had applied for such status in late 2010 but says it had heard nothing from the IRS during all of 2011.

To qualify for tax-exempt status, organizations are supposed to conduct "social welfare" activities, and can't be primarily engaged in partisan politics or electioneering.

Other tea-party groups were experiencing similar problems. Their leaders have said that they received letters demanding additional information, including names of donors, books read, every contact ever made with any politician and all materials ever distributed. "It was harassment, pure and simple, to weaken us going into the 2012 election," Mrs. Martin says.

Mrs. Martin says many local groups couldn't afford legal fees, so her lawyers and accountants answered questions for them. She also urged members to complain to congressional representatives. Members of some small tea-party groups, including their leaders, simply dropped out, says Darcy Kahrhoff, former president of the Katy Tea Party, in Texas.

"I kept telling everyone—including the big donors who wouldn't give to us without our nonprofit status—that the IRS appeared to be targeting tea-party groups," Mrs. Martin says. "But no one believed us."

An IRS spokesman says federal law "prohibits the IRS from discussing specific taxpayers or situations." Documents released in June confirmed that the IRS flagged liberal as well as conservative groups, but left unclear whether left-leaning groups were subject to the same lengthy delays and intrusive questioning.

By the 2012 election, the tea-party movement was in decline. Its members failed to show up to the polls in sufficient numbers, and many Senate challengers with tea-party backing were defeated. Rep. Michele Bachmann, chairwoman of the House Tea Party Caucus, barely retained her seat.

When Mrs. Martin toured chapters in California earlier this year, they told her they wanted to drop "tea party" from their names because its brand was tarnished. Mrs. Martin was presiding over a national office full of empty desks and dwindling volunteers and donations—a period she refers to as "frightening" and "disheartening."

Everything changed in May, she says, when the IRS disclosed that it indeed had been giving extra scrutiny to conservative groups' requests for tax-exempt status, focusing in particular on those with such words as "tea party" and "patriots" in their names.

Mr. Obama denounced the practice, and the resulting controversy eventually led to the resignation of the acting head of the IRS. (In August, the agency said it had taken "decisive action to eliminate the use of inappropriate political labels" in screening.)

"From that moment, the tea party has roared back to life," says Mrs. Martin, who says she has been getting by on as little as three hours of sleep a night. "It's been nonstop interest from the media, politicians and our grass roots."

On the weekend after the news hit, Mrs. Martin appeared on four television networks and released an urgent email fundraising appeal titled: "Project Phoenix: It's time to rise again."

Mrs. Bachmann called Mrs. Martin at home to brainstorm about holding a news conference on Capitol Hill later that week. Mrs. Martin wound up speaking alongside Mrs. Bachmann and other lawmakers calling for an investigation.

When Republican representatives scheduled hearings, Mrs. Martin located what she said were a dozen tea-party victims, prepped them and delivered them within 48 hours to congressional investigators, paying their airfares and hotels, according to several people involved in the process.

It came in handy that Mrs. Martin is on a first-name and cellphone basis with nearly all lawmakers with tea-party credentials. Rep. Louie Gohmert (R., Texas) says he and Mrs. Martin "text, email and talk" regularly. One evening this summer, Mrs. Martin changed into jeans and went out for Mexican food with Rep. Steve King (R., Iowa), who showed up in shorts and flip-flops. After hearing her at a meeting of conservatives on Capitol Hill, Sen. Ron Johnson (R., Wis.) asked her to come by his office to discuss strategy.

Recently, she has organized protests at IRS offices around the country. The Patriots funded a $20,000 event in Cincinnati, featuring Sen. Rob Portman (R., Ohio) and fried chicken. She fired up the several hundred attendees by reciting the First Amendment and detailing what she said were IRS intimidation tactics. "Are you next?" she asked.

The focus now is on the town-hall meetings that lawmakers hold in their home districts. The Patriots distributed an "August Tool Kit" to members with instructions for attending, including suggested themes of "the IRS scandal, immigration reform, or Obamacare." At a recent news conference, Mrs. Martin said the group is "targeting both parties to hold them accountable."

Some lawmakers aren't scheduling town halls, or are announcing them at the last minute, to avoid large or unruly turnouts. Mrs. Martin has volunteers in the suburban Atlanta office monitoring social media and Google and using other tools to find lawmakers' events, which are then mapped on the Patriots' website.

Mrs. Martin says her group plans to spend $750,000 on the town-hall effort, and $1 million on TV and radio spots in districts where lawmakers haven't agreed to fight the health law. Together with several other conservative groups, it is planning a Sept. 10 rally on Capitol Hill to "welcome back" Congress and call for it to delay implementation of the new health-care law by refusing to spend money on it.

"We're not high-powered. We don't have bucket loads of money," she says. But the political establishment is "scared to death of us."

Write to Monica Langley at monica.langley@wsj.com

[Crafty_Dog]

http://www.glennbeck.com/2013/08/28/was-obama-able-to-draw-a-bigger-crowd-to-the-washington-mall-than-glenn-beck/?utm_source=Daily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=2013-08-29+NL_252129&utm_content=5054942&utm_term=_252129_252144

[Crafty_Dog]

Glenn Beck Wants to Know: Why Can’t We All Just Get Along?
By AMY CHOZICK
NYT
Published: September 6, 2013



You left Fox News and started The Blaze, a TV station, Web site and subscription service. How is that working out?
Check back with me in 10 years. I think we’re just now entering the fields that I was hoping we would enter.


You’ve said The Blaze could put traditional TV news out of business. That’s a bold prediction.
I learned that when Barbara Walters came and did an interview with me. They had about 50 people in our studio for two days — more people in my offices than we had employees. All for an eight-minute segment.

But do you really think that will happen?
The nightly news is doing a fine job of putting itself out of business. Who watches it? I mean really, besides my grandparents, who are both dead, who is watching the nightly news? I think we’ll be ready to put them out of business in the next three to five years.

Is it true that you expressed interest in buying Current TV?
Yes. I didn’t speak to him, but I was told that Al Gore didn’t want to sell to me.

When you heard Al Jazeera was buying it, what did you think?
I thought that Al Gore saw me more as an enemy of America than Al Jazeera, which I found fascinating coming from the former vice president. Or maybe he doesn’t believe a word he says. He sold for twice the amount of what it was worth.

How did your fans respond to your support of gay marriage?
I don’t care. The point is that government shouldn’t be involved in marriage.

Did you hear any reaction?
Can we stop dividing ourselves? Do racists exist? Yes. Do bigots exist? Yes. But most of us are not. Most Americans just want to get along. Why can’t we do that? What has happened to us?

I think there’s a misperception that your show is more political than it actually is.
Unfortunately, because of the news of the day, we have spent most of our time on politics. What people don’t ever understand is this: I’m the guy who lives in Dallas who did not get an invitation to the George Bush Presidential Library opening. He didn’t like me. I had called for his impeachment. I didn’t call for Obama’s impeachment. People think I just hate this president. No, I hate power and those who do everything they can to hold onto it.

But you said you were going to hunt down progressives like an Israeli Nazi hunter.
Oh, I will. I think these guys are the biggest danger in the world. It’s the people like Mao, people that believe that big government is the answer, it always leads to millions dead — always.

Sometimes when you give a speech, you hold up a napkin stained with Hitler’s blood. Why?
It could be Hitler’s, I don’t know. It was from somebody present during the July assassination attempt. The point of it is: pay attention when the trouble is small. If you don’t pay attention to people who want to regulate every aspect of your life, it spirals out of control.

What was it like for you to live in New York?
Sad, because I think New York is one of the greatest towns in the world. I love New York. I wanted to live in New York my whole life, and I find it so unbelievably closed-minded.

You must feel more comfortable living in Dallas.
Yeah, but there are people that hate me all over the world. I went to South Africa, and people hate me there.

Why did you start your jeans company, 1791 Denim?
I wore Levi’s my whole life. I think they’re great. They’re making them in China now. Fine, whatever. But when they branded themselves the uniform for the progressive movement, instead of complaining, I started my own company. I don’t care if you’re a liberal and you want to wear them. I hope they’re comfortable. If they’re not, return them to me.

Are you still in touch with Sarah Palin?
No. In fairness, I don’t really stay in touch with really anybody. I’m a little busy.

INTERVIEW HAS BEEN CONDENSED AND EDITED.

[Crafty_Dog]

Why the Health Care Law Scares the G.O.P.
By EDUARDO PORTER
Published: October 1, 2013


This spring, the Missouri Chamber of Commerce urged the state Legislature to accept the federal government’s plan to expand Medicaid for the poor and disabled.
The business lobbying group had not suddenly gone rogue. Here is how Daniel P. Mehan, its president, summarized his feelings about President Obama’s health care law: “We don’t like it.”

But the Chamber was cognizant of the plea of its members directly affected by the issue: dozens of Missouri hospitals stood to lose $4.2 billion over six years in federal support for uncompensated care if the state refused to increase the income ceiling for Medicaid eligibility.  Pragmatism suggested accepting the expansion. Washington would pay the extra cost entirely for three years and pick up 90 percent of the bill thereafter.  And it would expand health coverage in the state’s poor, predominantly white rural counties, which voted consistently to put Republican lawmakers into office.

Missouri’s Republican-controlled Legislature — heavy with Tea Party stalwarts — rejected Medicaid’s expansion in the state anyway.

After their vote, a frustrated editorial in the faithfully conservative Missourian asked of the state’s elected Republicans: “Who Do They Represent?”

Today, the same forces that blocked the expansion of Medicaid in Missouri are going all out in Washington in a bid to undo all of the Affordable Care Act. Bowing to the vehemence of its Tea Party faction, the House G.O.P. forced a government shutdown when Senate Democrats refused to delay or defund the president’s health overhaul.

House Republicans are threatening even further damage if they don’t get their way, possibly unleashing financial chaos if they manage to force the United States into its first default ever on the government’s debt.

Republicans’ efforts raise the same perplexing question posed by the Missourian: What drives Tea Party Republicans and their financial backers? What calculation persuades them that repealing the health care law is worth the risk? Indeed, whose interests do they represent?

Nearly 6 in 10 Americans disapprove of trying to stop the law by cutting its financing. Even among those who don’t like the law, less than half want their representatives in Congress to try to make it fail.

It is tempting to discard the Tea Party activists driving the Republican Party as crazy — as some commentators have — motivated by fear and willing to believe that default won’t cause much harm and might even act as a purgative to free the economy of a bloated government.

“They listen to nobody but themselves,” the Harvard political scientist Theda Skocpol told me. “They are convinced of their rectitude and convinced that they alone are qualified to save America from the dire threat of Obama and his polices. They have worked themselves into a dangerous place.”

Their relationship with reality can take peculiar turns. Reflexive opponents of “government,” they can exhibit little sense of what the government actually does.

And yet the argument that half the Republican Party has simply lost its mind has to be an unsatisfactory answer, especially considering the sophistication of some of the deep-pocketed backers of the Tea Party insurgency.

There is a plausible alternative to irrationality. Flawed though it may turn out to be, Obamacare, as the Affordable Care Act is popularly known, could fundamentally change the relationship between working Americans and their government. This could pose an existential threat to the small-government credo that has defined the G.O.P. for four decades.

The law is imperfect. It has dozens of complicated, interlocking parts. Half of Americans say they don’t understand how it will affect them and their family. Still, the law has many provisions that are likely to improve life for millions of Americans, including a big portion of what we know as the working middle class.

Almost two-thirds of uninsured Americans have a full-time job, according to the Kaiser Family Foundation. A further 16 percent are employed part time.

The Department of Health and Human Services recently estimated that nearly six in 10 uninsured Americans could qualify for health coverage in the insurance market for less than $100 per person per month.

According to an analysis by the Urban Institute, 28 million Americans would gain health insurance under Obamacare. Of these, eight million earn more than twice the poverty level of $47,100 for a family of four. A majority of those would get a subsidy to buy a plan.

As it turns out, the core Tea Party demographic — working white men between the ages of 45 and 64 — would do fairly well under the law.

Take Missouri. It has about 800,000 uninsured. Almost half of them would have been eligible for expanded Medicaid benefits, had the Legislature not rejected them. Many of the rest — including families of four making up to $94,000 — will be eligible to get subsidized health insurance.

In St. Louis, for instance, a family of four making $50,000 a year will be able to buy a middle-of-the-road “silver” health plan for $282 a month and a bottom-end “bronze” plan for $32. Even Medicare recipients will get a benefit worth a few hundred dollars a year.

This could justify conservative Republicans’ greatest fears.

In 1994, when President Bill Clinton took an earlier stab at a health care overhaul, the conservative thinker William Kristol published a manifesto about why Republicans had to stop it.

“Passage of the Clinton health plan in any form would be disastrous,” Mr. Kristol wrote, italicizing for emphasis. “It would guarantee an unprecedented federal intrusion into the American economy. Its success would signal the rebirth of centralized welfare-state policy at the moment that such policy is being perceived as a failure in other areas.”

Two decades after Mr. Clinton’s ultimately failed attempt, Obamacare poses the same sort of threat.

Even Americans who say they dislike the law actually like many of its components. Nearly three-quarters approve of giving financial help to poor and moderate-income Americans to buy health insurance. Two-thirds approve of barring insurance companies from denying coverage because of somebody’s medical history. Three-quarters favor letting children stay on their parents’ insurance until they are 26.

Until now, social welfare programs in the United States have exhibited a “big hole,” Professor Skocpol said, consisting of nonpoor working-age Americans and their children. Obamacare closes a big chunk of it.

“The main beneficiaries tend to have lower wages, employed in smaller businesses that are not providing health insurance,” she said. “They are not elderly. They are also not the poorest.”

And they might be grateful to Democrats for the benefit.

To conservative Republicans, losing a large slice of the middle class to the ranks of the Democratic Party could justify extreme measures.

[Crafty_Dog]

http://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2013/10/truckers-for-the-constitution-plans-to-shutdown-d-c-beltway-october-11th/

[Crafty_Dog]

http://www.theblaze.com/stories/2013/10/09/glenn-beck-reveals-a-story-he-hasnt-been-able-to-share-for-over-a-year/

[Crafty_Dog]

http://americanmilitarynews.com/2013/10/breaking-photos-vets-march-dc-memorials-white-house-met-riot-police/

Free the forest!

http://abclocal.go.com/wpvi/story?section=news/local&id=9285277