Shortly after Obama became your uber-liberal Congress-enabled two-year/two-bit dictator, the term "Tea Party " was beginning to take hold.

When I first realized there were millions of others, like me, who were willing to protest the wasteful deficit spending and borrowing and socialistic legislation that the Obama-Reid-Pelosi troika had begun putting forth and ramming through, I doctored up a recent photo, had it cartoonized and made it my official mug shot as a show of solidarity with folks who had been filled with the Tea Party spirit.

Soon the Tea Party movement evolved from small regional grassroots organizations confronting Congressional incumbents (legislators still assumed, at that point, that their appearances at town hall meetings would be little more than friendly flesh-pressing campaign ops) into a force that would introduce and support fiscally responsible, Constitution-grounded candidates while continuing to demand real answers and sane actions from the establishment hacks.

Prior to the 2010 elections' better-than-expected outcome I retired the star-spangled bandana and tea bag earring. In case you're wondering, in real life I have no pierceings and have never worn a do-rag (although I did eat copious amounts of calamari fra diavolo once with Lou Albano at least a decade before his inspiration made hanging things from facial punctures the hip thing to do.)

But with loony lefties now blaming every Democrat ineptitude on the Tea Party (whose first officeholder has been on the job for eight whole months) it's time, once again, to show my solidarity.

	Do you believe the OPF propaganda that Barack Obama and his formerly bullet-proof Democrat House/Senate majority are not to blame for the lack of economic recovery? In the nearly three years since the over-promised $700 billion "stimulus" was launched unemployment rose from under 8% to over 9%. Under-employment and foreclosures have been off the charts and the home
OPF: Don't ever question his competence and motives!

values are in the tank. The federal government's size and spending has increased while the private sector flounders.  The US Dollar and "full faith and credit" (a term the president loves to throw around while seeking non-traditional loopholes at every turn) of our government has come under scrutiny. The national debt is out of control and now the issue of raising the debt ceiling is, once again, on the table.

Given the opposition's marginalized powerlessness during the entire first half of his term, how could anyone but Obama and his supporters be responsible for all the mis-spending, the ramming-through of job-killing ObamaCare and other big government legislation that only deepens the problems of our beleaguered economy?  Their ineptitude has led to the exacerbation of every problem the blame-throwers ever claimed to be "inherited".  Certainly, promised repairs and subsequent recovery have been non-existent.

In light of the dismal record of failure to create jobs while simultaneously growing government and constraining the private sector's power precisely where it is needed most, it might not surprise you that Obama’s proposed future spending includes $3.73 trillion on infrastructure, high speed rail projects and other shovel-ready-like programs.

Given the complete waste of all previous stimulus funds, what are the odds that New Deal projects will quickly put millions of American’s back to work?  It took US involvement in World War II to bail FDR out of the Great Depression.

Covering their ineptitude and refusal to deal with reality and the facts, the ongoing criticism counter-attack strategy is to continue using the same blame cards that have been played all along to obfuscate the reasons for the failure of Obama's agenda and leadership, as well as their own.

This week Texas Democrat Rep. Sheila Jackson Lee of the Congressional Black Caucus turned over yet another race card from the House floor:

"I do not understand what I think is the maligning and maliciousness [toward] this president.  Why is he different? ...Why is this president being treated so disrespectfully?...Why did the leader of the Senate continually talk about his job is to bring the president down to make sure he is unelected?  I am particularly sensitive to the fact that only this president -- only this one, only this one -- has received the kind of attacks and disagreement and inability to work -- only this one.  Read between the lines.  What is different about this president that should put him in a position that he should not receive the same kind of respectful treatment?"

The questions that reality-based Americans ask, Ms. Jackson Lee...

Which president has ever been given the free media ride that Obama has received?  What failed presidency has ever been treated more kindly and respectfully (to the point of being shamelessly defended by major outlets) by the media than this one?  Who devotes more partisan OPF time than MSNBC, for example? 

How convenient for Ms. Jackson Lee to forget her own disrespect for the presidency when she was a frequent solo singers in the Diss Bush Choir not so long ago. Then there's Maryland's governor Martin O'Malley, head of the Democrat Governors group, who goes ballistic partisan to avoid the truth:  

"Republicans seem to be led by uncompromising hard-liners," he said, singling out House Majority Leader Eric Cantor for criticism. "I think that there is an extreme wing within their party who have as their primary goal not the jobs recovery, but the defeat of President Obama in 2012...So their only way of evening the playing field is to keep the president from being successful in the jobs recovery...I think that they are disgracefully cynical."

Again, it's OPF for the nearly five years of the Democrats' congressional majority -- the last two years spent ignoring anything the opposition has said while demonizing marginalized Republicans as "The Party of No".  This amounts to a gross, willful denial of truth and facts.

A major shaper of Obama administration OPF propaganda strategy is former Obama advisor Rahm Emanuel, recently elected mayor of Chicago. Emanuel lamented, during a recent WLS radio press conference, the possibility of having to lay off over 600 city workers to make budget ends meet:

“I did not create this problem...[The former administration] can be my partner in doing things smarter, better and more efficient and cost-effective to the tax payers. The people that struggle everyday in this city, get up, raise their kids, go to work and pay the bills. I will be their voice. They deserve one in City Hall.”

Sounds a lot like his Dear Leader's pre-shellacking campaign statement last year: "We don't mind the Republicans joining us. They can come for the ride, but they gotta sit in back."  Further proof that left-wing politicians are so entrenched in making every problem OPF that they even blame their predecessors in one-party towns like Chicago.

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Not famous for paying dues, left-wingers continue to harp on their socialistic anti-meritocracy argument that so-called corporatists (apparently that's anyone who works for a for-profit private sector company, especially an executive or CEO) have no right to be paid differently than rank and file workers whose brow sweat lubricates the private-sector's revenue machine for stockholders and profit sharers.

Those same anti-corporatists never criticize the overpayment, over-endowment and system-milking of civil servants and their bureaucrats; the worst offenders being federal and state administration appointees, public sector union officials and so-called "green company" executives and CEO's.  Of course, the words "greedy" and "selfish" are always part of liberals' anti-business diatribes but they are never attributed to anyone whose primary benefactor is the taxpayers.

Since unions ostensibly represent public sector employees — including all of those ungrateful civil servants who have recently been asked to make reasonable concessions in their wage/benefits packages to enable cash-strapped states to continue employing them — general anti-union sentiment has resulted.

Private sector unions have irked many of us for years by contributing to the uncompetitive-ness of such US-based entities as the domestic auto manufacturing industry as compared to their thriving non-union import brand counterparts.  Likewise, union corruption and the organized crime connections of many labor unions have turned people sour on those organizations.

In any case, the spectacle of union-led public service employees demanding continuation of cushy contracts while state governments (like their citizens) struggle to make ends meet was the straw that broke the camel's back for many formerly union-tolerant Americans.

The unions' unswerving financial support of this totally failed administration and the free-spending Obama-Pelosi-Reid agenda are certainly factors that have contributed to union backlash.  Furthermore, it has amounted to funding the continued loss of jobs — including union jobs.

Fox News reports:

Federal records show labor unions spent close to $100 million in the 2010 midterm cycle — over $20 million more than what they spent in 2008 — but nonetheless saw their share of the electorate drop from one cycle to the next, from 21 percent to 17 percent.

That the unions may be spending more money to achieve diminished results would reflect their shrinking percentage of the population as a whole. In 1950, an estimated 38 percent of the American labor force belonged to a union; today, that figure stands at around 12 percent, and even lower — 7%— for the private sector. This diminution in labor’s ranks is all the more significant when juxtaposed with the tripling of the American labor force over the same time period.

Putting distance between themselves and Obama while threatening to de-fund his re-election campaign may be the only way for unions to regain credibility and membership.  It would also be wise for unions to begin cultivating better relations with the House majority, Republican senators and the next president.

Raven Clabough of NewAmerican writes about one major union leader who is flipping the script:

On May 20, AFL-CIO president Richard Trumka told the National Press Club, “You can be a friend and make a mistake once in awhile. And we forgive you for that mistake. The different is this: that we’re not going to spend precious resources helping candidates that don’t stand up and help us.”

Last month, Trumka made similar assertions while addressing a Beltway audience.

“I have a message for some of our ‘friends.’ For too long, we have been left after Election Day holding a canceled check, waving it about [and saying] ‘Remember us? Remember us? -- Asking someone to pay a little attention to us. Well, I don’t know about you, but I’ve had a snootful of that BLEEP.”

My last rant mentioned Joe Biden's "official" acknowledgment (at the annual Brotherhood of Teamsters convention in Las Vegas last week) that non-support of Obama's re-election would mean the end of favored-nation status for the Teamsters. Biden admonished them: "And don't any of you, by the way -- any of you guys -- vote Republican.  I'm not supposed to say this [but] don't come to me if you do! You're on your own, Jack!"

Was Biden issuing an ordered preemptive threat in case James Hoffa was prepared to make similar comments to those of Richard Trumka's or was the loose-lipped #2 merely gaffing it up, as usual?

It's bad enough that Obama has lied to and ignored people he considers "the enemy".  But by biting the hand that feeds him, your Dear Leader shouldn't be surprised if his union card is revoked for non-payment of dues.

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(NEWSER) – Rudy Giuliani is getting ready to enter the race for the Republican presidential nomination, according to Weekly Standard editor William Kristol, who cites "two reliable sources." The deep-pocketed former mayor of New York City has learned some lessons from his disastrous 2008 bid, when he withdrew to Florida after deciding he couldn't compete with both Mitt Romney and John McCain in New Hampshire, Kristol says.
	Regardless of two personally disappointing previous campaign starts, the possibility that Rudy Giuliani may join the ever-growing field of 2012 presidential hopefuls takes me right back to where I left off the day he dropped out of the 2008 presidential race — believing that America's Mayor is not only a well-rounded, name-recognized candidate but, as compared to the current Republican frontrunners, is an extremely electable one.
For voters seeking a proven leader and crisis manager...

originally published 2/11/08

The 2008 Presidential Race's best candidate was gunned down in Florida last night. Former New York City mayor Rudolph Giuliani was not a victim of a stray bullet fired by one of his many co-candidates or even by the so-called drive-by media. Rather, Hizzoner was the victim of his own gun.  In effect, as a result of a lazy, pick-and-choose primary state campaigning strategy, Rudy's own index finger pulled the trigger.

Giuliani's common sense stances on debating team topics that are un-referenced in our Constitution (abortion, alien rights, same-sex marriage, etc.) had not suffered anywhere near the predicted conservative backlash. Likewise, Rudy and his team were doing a remarkable job of minimizing personal and character attacks stemming from earlier marital issues.

Talk of the alleged corruption of a prominent mayoral appointee who later became a Giuliani business partner was also minimal. Even a vicious attack by the New York City firefighters union, insisting that the mayor's administration committed egregious errors in preparing FDNY for an unthinkable tragedy like September 11, 2001, were skillfully downplayed by Giuliani in debates and interviews.

That the New York Times renewed its long-standing vendetta against the mayor with a recent endorsement of John McCain was a wake-up call for pragmatic conservatives — a warning that our failure to stand behind the most overall conservative candidate in the field will surely result in a RINO or an avowed liberal being elected president. Such a left-handed "endorsement" from one of the world’s most respected left-wing newspapers would have made a great addition to the conservative talking points of Rudy’s campaign.

But as another New York icon, Yogi Berra, once said:

“It was like deja vu all over again.”

In September 1999, Mayor Giuliani had put together a campaign for New York’s open senate seat with a sizeable war chest — including a dig-deep contribution from this renegade scribe — and won the endorsement of both the state’s Republican and Conservative parties.

At the time 9/11 was no more than a cryptic Nostradamus quatrain.  However, even in the absence of the heroic record of his conduct on that sad day in September 2001, conservatives throughout the State of New York had no problem jumping on Rudy's bandwagon.

Giuliani was already admired for his fiscal conservatism and law-and-order track record.  As mayor he put the shine back on the the Big Apple and turned its books around in the process. Prior to serving as America’s Mayor it was Rudy, in his role as US Attorney, who prosecuted and imprisoned organized crime bigwigs like John Gotti.

Giuliani’s expected opponent in the upcoming senatorial race would undoubtedly be the former first lady with the Louis Vuitton carpetbag full of pants suits, a recent arrival to tony Chappaqua, NY from Arkansas via Washington, DC.  It would have been close but, if nothing else, it would have sucked most, if not all of the residual hot air from the Clinton family balloon. Mayor Giuliani, however, was suddenly forced to quit the race to pursue urgent treatment for prostate cancer.

Second-time supporters — we again dug deep to be among Rudy’s first presidential campaign contributors — reckoned that the healthy, feisty ex-mayor would fight tooth and nail this time around to make up for his short-lived run for the US Senate.

Not merely because of the importance of preventing future 9/11’s but because the aspiring interloper who used our Senate seat purely as a stepping stone was running again and she appeared destined to end up in the Oval Office in the absence of a compelling competitor from within her own party.

Sadly, today, even the mayor's not-so-conservative position on gun control has been proven correct:  You can't shoot yourself with your own gun if you're not allowed to have a gun.

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On May 25, 1961 in an address to a joint session of Congress President John F. Kennedy challenged the USA to "...land a man on the Moon by the end of the decade." Americans of all ages are familiar with both this famous JFK quote and the subsequent Neil Armstrong speechlet: "This is one small step for a man, one giant leap for mankind..." that was issued by the astronaut from the lunar surface with nearly six months remaining on JFK's End-of-Decade Shot Clock.

The part of Kennedy's moonwalk challenge that most Americans have forgotten (or, more likely, have never been taught) is that the essential reason for his asking us to undertake this monumental task was not for the technological advancements that would accrue from a ramped-up space exploration program nor from the increased national pride and morale but, in JFK's own words within the same address, to "...catch up to and overtake the Soviet Union in the space race."

Even if the mission had not been fully accomplished before the end of the Sixties, Project Apollo would still have been hailed as a huge and prideful success -- especially in light of the overcoming of tragic setbacks, not the least of which was the Kennedy assassination. By1969, as a result of the myriad scientific, medical and technological advancements it had already provided, the program could easily have been hailed as a huge success and as proof that we had, indeed, overtaken the Soviet Union in the space race.

Equally important, the booming aerospace industry, its countless jobs, the high quality of those employment opportunities and the national excitement that NASA and the aerospace companies had created were, perhaps, the only bridge across the infamous Viet Nam Era Generation Gap.

Furthermore, while the USSR continued to make advancements in rocket science and space station technology, the Kremlin, believing that American private sector investment and ingenuity would certainly fulfill Kennedy's prophesy, all but conceded the moon race to the USA and never posed a major threat to the Kennedy vision.  The Apollo Program's success was, in that sense, one of the many Cold War battle victories of capitalism over socialism. 

While NASA was and continues to be a sizeable bureaucracy, its issuing of contracts rather than entitlements makes it a good economic stimulator in spite of the government wastefulness that liberals are quick to criticize in NASA and military budgets but loath to discuss when similar over-spending and corruption are discovered in their beloved social programs.  Incidentally, many of those Great Society bureaucracies were championed by surviving members of the extended Kennedy Clan eager to capitalize on JFK's image while ignoring his fiscal conservatism, militarism and sharp-edged rhetorical style.

Other than our avowed enemy the Soviet Union no other entities (not corporations, nor individuals nor political groups) were ever demonized by the Kennedy/Johnson administrations. Republican politicians, including Richard M. Nixon who held office on the day "the Eagle has landed" was broadcast to the farthest corners of the earth by the American mainstream media, were content to be equal partners in JFK's adventure.

We are stagnant today because we are no longer in a race to out-produce, in any context, any of our rivals -- certainly not those hell-bent on stealing what is rightfully ours. 

While the list of our avowed enemies has grown exponentially, political correctness has elevated hostile governments to the level of "neighbor nations."

While our economy goes begging for a common cause to rally industry (and despite our possession of the same natural resources we had available to us in 1961 with technologies that were unimaginable to JFK's generation) our government discourages private sector growth with over-taxation and over-regulation.

While our nation's wealth, influence, prestige and power continues to shrink, our need for inspirational and unifying leadership is greater than ever.  Instead we have divisiveness from the top down and moonwalking is nothing more than a choreographed form of sliding backwards.

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Barack Hussein Obama II -- that's the name on the controversial document lefties accept as their Dear Leader's official birth certificate (a document that won't fly if BHO2 wants to be on the ballot in Arizona in 2012, whether or not Donald Trump ever drops the subject) was in Chicago last week kicking off his re-election campaign. 

Obama claimed, in an interview with The Associated Press, that he was able to "yank the economy out of its hole."  Additionally, he boasted about getting an "overhaul" version of his intended socialized medicine plan crammed down our throats and about all of those new financial regulations and bureaucracies that will insure our continued (wink) prosperity.

Hey, if that's what Obama wants to lean on as the main teleprompter talking points for his Why I Should Continue To Live In The White House And Be Allowed To Keep Using Air Force One For My Personal Vacations message then I say exactly what the would-be hip, glib tough-talker himself said about conservatives' movement to de-fund and ultimately repeal, ObamaCare: "Go at it!" 

While we're on the subject of much ado about absolutely nothing, the only guy that has been able to yank anything out of a hole since Obama's inauguration is the top-hatted official who reaches, annually, into the ground hog's den.

As soon as Punxsutawney Phil awakens from that winter snooze his name is promptly added to the hundreds of thousands of other fictional characters on the Obama administration's Saved/Created jobs list. Phil has already made the list twice. Rocky and Bullwinkle are added each time one of their ancient episodes gets a re-run. Like Phil, Joe Biden made the list when he abruptly came-to at the end of his boss' recent televised dronefest.

Actually, that Bill Murray Groundhog Day flick is a metaphor for the first 800-something days since the Emperor of Egotism assumed the throne. Unable to fathom (or worse yet...not caring) that he can't keep repeating the same socialistic mistakes and still expect to wake up tomorrow morning with every problem solved, he continues to argue that we have to "invest" more, tax more, borrow more and print more money.  Meanwhile, Punxsutawney Phil's shadow keeps predicting at least six more weeks of wintry economic weather.

Despite his poll numbers being at their all-time low and hard-lefties talking about running a candidate against him in the primaries, it is estimated that the sequel, Barack Hussein Obama II, will rake-in in excess of a billion dollars, excluding the taxpayers' money being "invested" in Air Force One junkets to campaign destinations.

Obviously, contributors to Obama's re-election campaign haven't just been caught taking a Biden-like catnap.  These people have been hibernating! When they get yanked out of their holes they still think that it's Groundhog Day, January 20, 2009.

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