Why the Left Hates the Laffer Curve...

By Andrew A. Morgan

 

For those who are familiar with the "Laffer Curve," the name generally brings on an immediate and politically charged opinion related to the inherent implications the curve has historically had on the topic of the government's tax rate policies.  However, the underlying points illustrated by the curve deserve serious and independent consideration.  In fact, to evaluate the Laffer Curve without bias will undoubtedly yield a better understanding of one of the key political issues facing America today.

The name "Laffer Curve" originated in 1974 and was given by a writer for the Wall Street Journal in honor of Arthur Laffer, an economist who later served on President Ronald Reagan's Economic Policy Advisory Board.  It was originally used as part of the argument against the tax increases Gerald Ford was contemplating with an aim to reduce the federal deficit.  But the concept was not at all new.  The nonlinear relationship between tax rates and government revenues depicted in the curve is something that has been discussed and written about for at least several centuries.  In fact, Laffer explains that he himself learned of the concept from reading works by other economists, including Keynes.
Simply stated, the "Laffer Curve" is a theoretical curve showing the relationship between an applied income tax rate and the resulting government revenue.  Generally, the tax revenue is indicated on the vertical "y" axis and the tax rate on the horizontal "x" axis.  The fundamental concepts are as follows:
1) A tax rate of zero results in zero government revenue.
2) A tax rate of 100% will also result in zero government revenue.
3) As the tax rate increases above zero, there is a resultant increase in government revenue.
4) As the tax rate continues to increase, the resultant increase in government revenue begins to slow.
5) There is a point at which the curve peaks and turns back toward the horizontal "x" axis.
With this basic outline understood, the critical matters of the slope (or shape) of the curve and the questions of the rate at which it peaks and at which it declines naturally come next.  This is where the disputes come into play.

A purely conceptual symmetrical Laffer Curve depicting the described relationship

The disagreements are obviously in the details.  Conservatives arguing for reduced or limited tax rates point to the Laffer Curve to support their arguments.  Because of this, liberals have gone to considerable lengths to discredit the concept of the curve.  Many liberal politicians have also sought to discredit the concept because when it comes to determining appropriate tax rates, their ideology elevates the consideration of "economic fairness" above that of an objective cost-benefit analysis.  In their view, the concept of achieving what they see as fairness through progressive or redistributive tax policy trumps the risks to the overall economy indicated by the shape of the curve.  Conversely, many conservative politicians have sought to exploit the curve without much concern for the accuracy involved because when it comes to determining appropriate tax rates, their ideology elevates the principle of limited government above that of a concern for maximizing government revenue.  In their view, maximizing government revenue is not the goal.  So in most cases, those who have made use of the concept of the Laffer Curve have either omitted or distorted the details to suit their own arguments.
If you try to look up the Laffer Curve, you'll see various things.  A quick web search will bring you visuals showing curves of varying slopes, shapes, peak tax rates, etc.  Some economists have concluded that the peak occurs at an effective tax rate as low as 15%, some at 70%.  But these numbers and curves almost never specify a representation of a particular tax or tax bracket.  They are generated primarily by people with a personal political interest in the impression created and without a primary concern for accuracy and validity.
Once the political rhetoric is peeled away, some basic facts remain.  There is a relationship between rates of taxation and government returns.  Earnings and profits which are taken from the people, investors, and the private business sector do represent a reduction in both financial fuel and worker incentive.  These are truths.  The difficulty is in determining which part of the curve you are on at any given time.
The more money taken from a company, the less it has to invest or to pay its employees, and the more likely it becomes that the company will seek to protect its capital from taxation or consider outsourcing costly parts of its operation or relocating part or all of its operations to a country with lower tax rates.  In the case of capital gains, the more profit is taken from an investor who risked his (or her) own capital, the less inclined he will be to risk further capital.  The more money taken from a worker's paycheck, the less money there is for his personal budget and savings.  As the amount of money withheld from the worker's paycheck increases, the benefit this worker gains from his efforts proportionally diminishes -- and with it his incentive to work.  At certain tax rates, these reductions are not effectively problematic.  But for each tax, there is a threshold rate above which these reductions become problematic for both the private economy and for the government's bottom line.
The factors that go into determining where you are on the curve are many.  And this is where politicians and pundits generally rely on the fact that the overwhelming majority of the citizenry do not have the knowledge, understanding, patience, or inclination to dig into the details.  In truth, most of them don't.
First, the curve is different for different types of taxation and is not the same for each income bracket.  For example, the curve is not the same for the Personal Income Tax as it is for the Corporate Income Tax or for the Capital Gains Tax.  The curve is not the same for the personal income tax applied to a person making $40,000 per year as it is for someone making $1,000,000 per year.
The curves for these different taxes and tax rates will begin and end at the same place.  But the area between the slope and point of diminishing return is certainly not the same.  Secondly, the economic climate at any given point in time introduces countless variables such as the general economic growth rate, banking practices, loan interest rates, employment rates, consumer confidence, inflation rates and many others, all of which contribute to the shape of the curve.  The curve is not the same for the same tax at different points in time because economic conditions are constantly shifting.  Thirdly, it is impossible to quantitatively "measure" the relationship with any exactness because of the inherent time lag involved between changes to the tax rate and the resulting impact on government revenue.  Other factors always come into play during this lag period and to some degree contribute to the resulting government revenue.
There is no single "Laffer Curve"; there is no set-in-stone point at which increased tax rates cease to generate government returns.  But we can be reasonably certain that during the last century we in America have at different times found ourselves on both sides of the curve.  There have been occasions where increased tax rates clearly resulted in increased government revenue. There have been occasions where decreased tax rates clearly resulted in increased government revenue.  When it comes to the argument of whether tax rates should be raised or lowered, at different points in time and in different economic circumstances, each side of the political aisle has been correct.  At different points in time and in different economic circumstances, each side has been wrong.
A fair examination of the current income and corporate and capital gains tax rates require a detailed examination of the current tax rates along with the historical record related to changes in rates and government revenues.  Examining our current data or past data also requires that economic context be considered.  This is where it becomes very complicated.  And because it involves so many interrelated variables, politicians and pundits are always able to find select data to support their argument.
But under all of the political banter, finger-pointing, and hyperbole, the curve does exist.  At any given point in time (including right now), changes to a given tax rate in either direction will produce a result.  Government revenue may increase.  If it happens near the crest of the curve, it may produce little or no change in revenue.  Government revenue may decline.
Assuming that the goal is to achieve maximum government revenue without reaching experiencing significant economic harm caused by excessive taxation, it might seem at first that the ideal scenario would be for tax rates to be at the maximum on the curve.  However, a more careful examination indicates otherwise.  One critical consideration is that the potential for negative consequences to both the private sector and the government's revenue is not equal on each side of the curve.  On the curve's ascent, where tax rates are lower than the point at which revenues peak, the downside risk is for inadequate revenue to the government, which will deprive it of spending money on potentially anything upon which the government spends money.  However, on the curve's descent, where tax rates are higher than the point at which revenues peak, the downside risk is not only for inadequate government revenue, but also for diminished private investment, decreased entrepreneurial and corporate investment, decreased workforce motivation, and increased corporate outsourcing.
Bearing this in mind, common sense would seem to dictate that our goal should always be to have tax rates which keep us on the ascent, or left side of the peak. Once over that crest, the dangers become much more numerous.  Furthermore, because ever-changing exterior economic circumstances cause the curve to change over time and might result in an unchanging ascent-side tax rate becoming a descent-side tax rate, we can conclude that the ideal tax rate is one which generates government revenue relatively high up on the ascent side of the curve, without ever quite reaching the peak where government revenues flatten or begin to diminish.

Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/09/why_the_left_hates_the_laffer_curve.html#ixzz27ryRc9gY

'If I Were the Devil' (Warning for a Nation) - Paul Harvey

CLASSIC REWIND - 1965: 'If I Were the Devil' (Warning for a Nation) - Paul Harvey

This speech was broadcast by legendary ABC Radio commentator Paul Harvey on  April 3, 1965:
If I were the Devil . . . I mean, if I were the Prince of Darkness, I would of course, want to engulf the whole earth in darkness. I would have a third of its real estate and four-fifths of its population, but I would not be happy until I had seized the ripest apple on the tree, so I should set about however necessary to take over the United States. I would begin with a campaign of whispers. With the wisdom of a serpent, I would whisper to you as I whispered to Eve: “Do as you please.” “Do as you please.”   To the young, I would whisper, “The Bible is a myth.” I would convince them that man created God instead of the other way around. I would confide that what is bad is good, and what is good is “square”.  In the ears of the young marrieds, I would whisper that work is debasing, that cocktail parties are good for you. I would caution them not to be extreme in religion, in patriotism, in moral conduct. And the old, I would teach to pray. I would teach them to say after me: “Our Father, which art in Washington” . . .
If I were the devil, I’d educate authors in how to make lurid literature exciting so that anything else would appear dull an uninteresting. I’d threaten T.V. with dirtier movies and vice versa. And then, if I were the devil, I’d get organized. I’d infiltrate unions and urge more loafing and less work, because idle hands usually work for me. I’d peddle narcotics to whom I could. I’d sell alcohol to ladies and gentlemen of distinction. And I’d tranquilize the rest with pills. If I were the devil, I would encourage schools to refine yound intellects but neglect to discipline emotions . . . let those run wild. I would designate an athiest to front for me before the highest courts in the land and I would get preachers to say “she’s right.” With flattery and promises of power, I could get the courts to rule what I construe as against God and in favor of pornography, and  thus, I would evict God from the courthouse, and then from the school house, and then from the houses of Congress and then, in His own churches I would substitute psychology for religion, and I would deify science because that way men would become smart enough to create super weapons but not wise enough to control them.
If I were Satan, I’d make the symbol of Easter an egg, and the symbol of Christmas, a bottle. If  I were the devil, I would take from those who have and I would give to those who wanted, until I had killed the incentive of the ambitious. And then, my police state would force everybody back to work. Then, I could separate families, putting children in uniform, women in coal mines, and objectors in slave camps. In other words, if I were Satan, I’d just keep on doing what he’s doing.
Paul Harvey, Good Day.

End America's Middle East Engagement

By Michael Djordjevich

The Roman philosopher Seneca observed, "It is human to err, but stupid to persist."  It has been a serious mistake to get involved in the Middle East the way America did after the activation of NATO and its make-believe "success" in the Balkans in the decade of the 1990s.  The war in Afghanistan is lost; Iraq is rapidly leaving our sphere of influence; Pakistan, in fact, has been out of reach all along.  Iran is nearing possession of the atomic bomb.  Most of all, the majority of people of the Islamic faith there do not want us in their houses and, as a consequence, many fall for the siren songs of jihadists.
Why do we persist?
The "Arab Spring" has been an unquestionable mirage.  At best, it may take a couple of generations of persevering emancipation and sincere strivings by Arabic secular and religious elites for the current dark winter of cultural, social, and religious conditions to give in to the sunshine of real democracy, human dignity, pervasive tolerance, and the rule of law.  Enhanced and fortified by common sense, history irrefutably attests to this imperative.
So what do we do now?
Based on cost vs. benefits, we do not need Arab oil.  We also do not need boots on the ground in the region, and we do not need false and costly friendships.  There are other ways to project our geopolitical presence there.
First, let's pull out our brave military, which is suffering increasing casualties and has been once again forced by politicians to be in a no-win position.  Secondly, stop immediately throwing good money after bad -- stop any and all aid to fraudulent friends in the region.  Just with these two decisions, we will save trillions of dollars in a short time and use them for the urgent and greatly needed rebuilding of America.  Thirdly, determinedly announce and clearly commit to mercilessly defend the survival of a few remaining true friends in the region, such as Israel.  This can be achieved by our Navy and Air Force, which are more than sufficient for this task if given a free hand.
Among the first acts of the president next year should be to order a full and comprehensive withdrawal from the Middle East along the aforementioned lines.  Moreover, he would declare that the USA will leave the region to its own people and will let them sort out and resolve their historical differences, such as the divide between Sunnis and Shiites, geopolitical problems of borders, and the future of entrenched dictators and current autocratic regimes.  America will focus its energies and depleting resources on rebuilding our country, which is in a dire need of major overhaul.
Since we are sincerely cutting ties with the Arab world and would leave it to them to run it, we expect and will enforce with all our might corresponding reciprocity.  Thus, any violent jihad and terrorism carried out against us will be most severely and promptly punished, with dire consequences for any country, political government, or religious or other organization or individual involved with these hostile and unprovoked activities.  Incidentally, for this we have resources and ability, but we need the will.
The benefits of our withdrawal from the Middle East in tangible terms -- human and other resources -- are enormous but still quantifiable.  The other benefits are intangible but in the long run more significant.  It is indisputable that our deep involvement in the Arab quagmire has had mostly unexpected but extremely serious consequences to our way of life.  Salman Rushdie simply condensed one key problem: "The Satanic Verses could not be published today" (Financial Times, September 22, 2012).  Our fundamental individual and, hence, collective liberties have been radically and dangerously diminished and debased.  This insidious process that started accelerating after the 9/11 tragedy must be arrested and reversed, or in not too distant future, we and our children will live in a world of ever-expanding authoritarian/totalitarian rules with our liberties and rights severely limited and eventually curtailed.
There is yet another rather critical issue inseparably related to our current posture toward the Middle East and Islam.  It is the first time in history that Muslims are massively emigrating and peacefully populating lands of Europe and America.  In the context of the above stated recommendations, this matter must be rationally and openly faced and resolutely resolved also.  Common sense demands that if someone is accepted to move into our house to live with us, that party must live by the existing house rules.  Followers of Islam and others who settle in the West must not expect and be led to believe that they may diminish or alter or do away with Western political, social, cultural, and economic mores to suit their faith.  For this unique and noble heritage our ancestors paid an incalculable and heavy historical price over the past millennium.  Should we forfeit it or water it down, we will no longer be we.
The American president who would rally America and Europe and bring along the rest of the world to accept this epochal course of actions along the above recommended lines would be a true visionary and an authentic statesman, not a politician.  He would be caring for future generations and not for future elections.  His place in world history would be comparable to none.

Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/09/end_americas_middle_east_engagement.html#ixzz27nthU7C3

Boycott cafeteria lunch to protest Obama guidelines

NJ high school students to boycott cafeteria lunch to protest Obama guidelines

Rick Moran

Serving "healthy" food to kids doesn't do any good unless they eat it.
CBS New York:

Students at Parsippany Hills High School held a strategy session on Thursday to discuss a potential lunch strike, on Friday, over what they have called inadequately sized meals.
"This year you're eating lunch and you're like 'Did I even eat?' You're not even full," senior Brandon Faris told CBS 2′s Derricke Dennis.
New federal guidelines stemming from first lady Michelle Obama's "Let's Move" campaign have resulted in limits on protein and bread, and an increase in vegetables and fruits. The changes have also come at an increased cost.
ll of it has also sparked a student campaign that has included online parody videos of students falling sleep in class and performing sluggishly in sports.
They hope to further their efforts with a cafeteria boycott that will cost the school money, and students like Faris said they want to know why they are paying the price for other people's problems.
"If somebody's obese why should someone like me who's not obese have to suffer, and eat a small meal when I'd rather have a bigger meal?" he said.
Members of the food service industry told CBS 2 that new federal guidelines have caused a significant shift in portion size.
"There's a lot less turkey on the sandwich, there's 33 percent less turkey and the size of the bread has been reduced by a third," explained Mark Vidovich, who runs Pomptonian Food Service.
The changes have caused some parents to step in and subsidize the small school lunches with brown bag meals from home.
"I certainly don't want him to feel hungry," said Kelly Cacca.

The ultimate control government can have over anyone is to control not only what they eat, but portion size as well. If I were in high school and forced to eat the measely portions they dole out, I would hope my mother would pack an extra something so I would be sated. As an athlete (swimmer), I was burning 3000 calories a day and didn't have an ounce of fat on my body.
I have no doubt Michelle Obama would recoil in horror if she saw what I ate for lunch every day I was in training. Let's hope this boycott becomes a nationwide phenomena and will force government to get their noses out of our kids' food.

End of Article  
------------------  
*****  
If you found this article useful and enlightening, please consider my published book which contains other insight and understanding on problems and solutions facing our country.

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*****

It's Over

By William L. Gensert

 

Give up -- Barack Obama has won.  With the election only weeks away, it is clear from recent swing state polling that Mitt Romney has lost this election.  According to the Quinnipiac numbers, in the battleground states of Ohio, Florida, and Pennsylvania, the president is ahead by 10%, 9% and 12%, respectively.

Romney can't win.  Just ask any journalist or newscaster.  He is toast -- stick a fork in him.
Bull...
If anything, the closer we get to Election Day, the more apparent it is that Obama is not only losing, but losing big.  The Obama campaign, and by "campaign" I mean members of the media and polling organizations, is trying to convince prospective Romney voters to believe that all is lost -- in which case, they hope, we will stay home.
But just because they say so, that doesn't make it true.
Everyone knew from the outset that Obama, with his sad record of continuous failure on almost every front, was going to air out his inner bitterness and envy, and campaign negatively.  But did anyone suspect that his sole hope for victory would rest on trying to suppress the vote of his opponent with naked media bias and polling -- most of which assumes a higher Democrat turnout than in 2008, when the electorate, many Republicans included, swallowed whole Obama's vision of "hope and change"?
Well, three and a half years later, the digestion of that particular meal has given America and Americans an ulcer -- a bleeding ulcer.  I can attest to that -- every time I see the man or hear him speak, it makes me sick to my stomach.
It is ludicrous to maintain that Obama, a curiously small giant of humanity, is ahead anywhere in this nation by 10%.  The recent meme of the inevitability of Barack Obama is merely the delusional desperation of sycophantic minions.  What else do they have?  What else can they say?  
The polls allege Obama is ahead by 10% in Ohio (or should I use the Hawaiian spelling, "Oiho") -- a mining state -- where part of the economy depends on King Coal and the money it brings in.  This is the man who, through his agents at the EPA, has singlehandedly destroyed the coal industry in America.
He is said to be ahead by 12% in Pennsylvania -- also a mining state, and home of the Marcellus Shale natural gas field.  Yet even the uninformed know that under Barack Obama there will be no drilling for oil, mining coal, or building nuclear power plants.  And probably in a second term, the EPA will shut down fracking, which means no natural gas either. 
Yeah...he's way ahead.
In Florida, he is leading by 9%.  It is beyond belief that the state, with its large population of seniors and Jews, is going to vote overwhelmingly for the man whose signature legislation, ObamaCare, decimates Medicare and who has marginalized and insulted Israel repeatedly during his entire term.  Remember, he had time for Whoopi, but not for Netanyahu.   
And let's not forget that Florida is a state with no state income tax.  In fact, many people move there for that reason -- how do you think they got Lebron?  Yet we are supposed to believe they will vote for the man who gave us 20 new taxes through Obamacare and plans to raise taxes all around?  And if you don't think his proposed one-year extension for most of the Bush tax cuts, set to expire January 1, 2013, is not a plan to let all tax rates rise a year later, you haven't been paying attention.
Yeah...he's going to win big there.
The truth is plain to see.  Obama is not going to pick up any new voters with his record of economic destruction and the misery he has foisted upon the electorate.  He will bleed support as his base withers away in the harsh glare of the Obama reality.
Take his vote total from 2008 and subtract out some portion of the voters who bought the dream but lived the nightmare. 
Then, subtract out some portion of the youth vote, who have discovered that hope means no jobs and student loans they can't pay, while change means whatever coins they can find underneath the cushions of their mother's sofa -- in whose house they are relegated to live because of poor prospects and lack of opportunity.
Remove the women who don't agree with abortion on demand and contraceptives for all -- free and clear.
Remove the Catholics and other religious "folks" (a favorite Obama term) for the same reason, in addition to his assault on religious freedom, support of same-sex marriage, and antipathy for insulting the prophet of Islam, while accepting any slight on the Judeo-Christian American tradition.
...Oh my goodness, did I just hurt the feelings of Muslims by not capitalizing "prophet"?  I anxiously await the knock on the door from the Obama secret police.
Remove the Jews who are appalled at his treatment of Israel and his obvious sympathy for Islamists.
Remove the sensible, who recognize Obama's impotence in the face of Iran's steady march toward acquiring a nuclear weapon.  After all, we have nothing to fear from Iran, a nation whose leaders continuously call for the destruction of Israel and America.
Take out all those people who can no longer afford the drive to work, now that Obama has allowed the price of gasoline to double during his tenure.
In addition, many blacks, who have suffered most under this man's policies, will not be there for him this time around.  They may not vote against him -- racial solidarity, and all that -- but many will certainly stay home. 
Remove the voters who do not like the fact that for Barack, the buck always stops at Bush.
Simply put, people will not go out of their way to support someone who has tortured them into submission for three and a half years.  Even though they may not tell pollsters that. 
With that in mind, can anyone say there is the same level of electoral enthusiasm for the president as there was in 2008? 
For many supporters, who still believe in the myth of Obama but are not so far gone they cannot see what he hath wrought lo these last few years, a second term for the president is like a colonoscopy -- they have to say yes.  But really, who looks forward to it?
The once unstoppable Obama movement has constipated to a halt.  He was once a god, and now he is man -- a nasty, unsuccessful man, who blames everyone and everything for his serial failures. 
After all is said and done, what is he left with?  The same hardcore group of delusional ideologues who would vote for him even if they came home from work and caught him beating their grandmothers to death with his Nobel Prize -- but these voters were never in play anyway. 
Obama is going to lose in a landslide.  And Barack Obama, the media, and the polling organizations will be appropriately shocked.
Shocked, I say! 
Round up the usual suspects.

Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/09/its_over.html#ixzz27nprH38X

Barack Obama: Confidence Man By Thomas Sowell

By Thomas Sowell

.

Much puzzling behavior by Barack Obama falls into place when we go behind the image that he projects (““Obama 1”“) to the factual reality of the man’s whole life and thrust (“Obama 2”).

Obama himself is well aware of the nature and importance of his image. In his own words, “I serve as a blank screen on which people of vastly different political stripes project their own views.” An 18th-century philosopher put the matter bluntly: “When I speak, I put on a mask. When I act, I am forced to take it off.”
Many of Barack Obama’s actions as president of the United States reflect neither political expediency nor an attempt to promote the best interests of the American people. Take, for example, his bowing low from the waist to foreign leaders.
No president of the United States had ever done that before. It gained Obama nothing with the voters, nor was there any reason to think that he expected it to. Why then did he do it?
What did it accomplish? It brought the United States down a peg, in the eyes of the world, something that he has sought to do in many other ways.
These bows were perfectly consistent with his view of a maldistribution of power and prestige internationally, just as his domestic agenda reflects a felt need for a redistribution of wealth and power within American society.
It is not just the United States, but the Western world in general, including Israel, that needs to be brought down a peg, from the standpoint of the ideology prevalent among the people with whom Barack Obama has allied himself consistently for decades.
Against that background, it is not at all puzzling that President Obama has clamped down on offshore oil drilling by Americans in the Gulf of Mexico, while actually encouraging and subsidizing with our tax dollars Brazil’s offshore oil drilling.
Nor is it surprising that he imposes draconian restrictions on industrial activities in the United States in the name of fighting “global warming,” while accepting the fact that Third World nations that are beginning to industrialize will generate far more pollution than any restrictions in America can possibly offset.
That is another example of international redistribution — and payback for perceived past oppressions or exploitation of the West against the non-West. So is replacing pro-Western governments in the Middle East with Islamic extremist governments.
Some people may have gotten focused on the issue of Barack Obama’s birth certificate because so much of what he has done seems foreign to American ideals, traditions, and interests. But birth tells us nothing about loyalty. One-time American Communist leader Earl Browder was descended from the Pilgrims.
Those who have questioned whether Barack Obama is really a citizen of the United States have missed the larger question: whether he considers himself a citizen of the world. Think about this remarkable statement by Obama during the 2008 campaign: “We can’t drive our SUVs and eat as much as we want and keep our homes on 72 degrees at all times . . . and then just expect that every other country is going to say, ‘Okay.’”
Are Americans supposed to let foreigners tell them how to live their lives? The implied answer is clearly “Yes!” When President Obama went to the United Nations for authority to take military action and ignored the Congress of the United States, that was all consistent with his vision of the way the world should be.
How has Obama gotten away with so many things that are foreign to American beliefs and traditions? It is partly because of a quiescent media, which shares many of his ideological views and is focused on the symbolism of his being “the first black President.” But part of his success must be credited — if that is the word — to his own rhetorical talents and his ability to project an image that many people accept and welcome.
The role of a confidence man is not to convince skeptics, but to help the gullible believe what they want to believe. Most of what Barack Obama says sounds very persuasive if you don’t know the facts — and often sounds like sheer nonsense if you do. But he is not trying to convince skeptics, nor is he worried about looking ridiculous to informed people who won’t vote for him anyway.
This is a source of much polarization between those who see and accept Obama 1 and those who see through that facade to Obama 2.
— Thomas Sowell is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution. © 2012 Creators Syndicate, Inc.

Do Americans truly understand 'redistribution of wealth'?

By Virginia Prodan

The recently uncovered tape of Obama addressing students at Loyola University in 1998 has produced an uproar.  In the tape, Obama expressed his admiration for redistributive government programs:

I think the trick is figuring out how do we structure government systems that pool resources and hence facilitate some redistribution, because I actually believe in redistribution, at least at a certain level to make sure that everybody's got a shot.  How do we pool resources at the same time as we decentralize delivery systems in ways that foster competition, can work in the marketplace, and can foster innovation at the local level and can be tailored to particular communities?

If he is elected, Obama's 1998 proposition will be reality in the next four years.
When he proposed to redistribute wealth, Ibama meant that the system has to find a "trick" way to transform your wealth into government's hands.  Government will then distribute that wealth to others of its choosing.
Your work and your wealth will belong to the government "in the name of society"; in other words, it will belong to the collective.  Actually, though, your work and your wealth will belong to the elite of the government, who will decide who and what is given your money.  This is what "redistribution of wealth" means in Obama's philosophy; it is also the basic principle of communism.
The meaning of the "redistribution" of wealth is official government stealing and the end of your freedom.  It is the beginning of your forced sacrifices for your leader, your government, and your society.  This leads to a permanent realignment of power in society, as has been seen in Europe, or the rise of a dictator, as has been seen frequently in communist society.
For almost half of my life, I lived in communist Romania.  I lived the other half in the free land, America.  Believe me -- I know what Obama is talking about and advocating for America.
Obama's America is a communist society.  As history shows, he will bring about this way of life by the following means:
1. Transforming private property into collective property. 
The right to individual private ownership of property is sacred in America.  American society is based on a person's right to the fruit of his labors, not to mention his ancestors' labors.  The government has no right to take these away. 
Under redistribution of wealth philosophy imposed by government -- and of the communist system - you have no personal right to your work, property, or inheritance.
2. Destroying the initiative and creativity of people.
America's wealth and prosperity were created by individuals with the great desire and creativity encouraged by a free society.  Many Americans started at a lower income and with no prior wealth.  Andrew Carnegie, Henry Ford, Bill Gates, and Steve Jobs, among others, started with essentially nothing and built huge enterprises.
Creativity and working hard were emphasized by many successful Americans during their lives and after their deaths.  Andrew Carnegie, for example, felt so strongly that each generation should make its own way that he left the bulk of his estate to charity.
The successes and consequent contributions of these "wealthy" people create growth and opportunities for other Americans, resulting in more success and wealth for America as a whole.  But eliminating from society individual power and desire curtails and squashes the drive for success.
A government does not create wealth.  It is the private sector, where new businesses are started and flourish, that allows opportunity and wealth to expand.  The private sector is responsible for economic growth.
As America's successful become wealthy, they are able to give more and support others, be it through research projects, schools, or the arts.  Throughout history, it has been the wealthy who have commissioned fine art, musical compositions, museums, and other monuments of civilization.
3. Increasing the poverty of all who depend on government for basic needs.
Government redistribution will not help the poor.  History has shown that redistribution of wealth makes all poor. 
In communist societies like China, Russia, Romania, etc., there was and there is no equality of classes.  Rather, there exist millions of poor people under a small, elite group of communist rich who never care about helping poor people.
History shows example after example of communist systems that have collapsed, each of which made promises like equality and justice and failed to deliver.  But each of these collapses took millions of lives and many generations, as people discovered the lies and finally fought the system only at length.
American society is well-known for its compassion for and charity to the poor.  Many programs, both private and public, are in place to help those seeking to overcome poverty.  Yes, many in society believe we should be doing even more.  But one must remember that poor people are part of our society who need to be helped, but not enabled. 
We must not be stopped by the pressure of political correctness to acknowledge that many people have greater abilities than others -- artistic or musical skills, abilities in mathematics or science, in leadership, in business, and so forth.  Therefore, as people are different in abilities and effort, fairness of reward requires such differences.  This is in fact the true "fair shake" we hear so much about today in politics.
Make no mistake: this November election starkly concerns what we want our future as a country to be.  We have to decide if we want to elect a president who will bring us back to the American values of free market and free opportunities to pursue the American dream, or if we want to elect a president who will take us into socialism and communism -- in other words, the end of our freedom, where government controls, dictates to, and owns us.
Redistribution of wealth means not equality, fairness, or justice, but rather poverty, slavery, and a complete lack of freedom.
Freedom is precious to those who don't have it.  Will free American people choose to be enslaved?  I hope not.  Do those Americans who think "redistribution of wealth" is wonderful and will make their lives easier really understand its world history and true consequences?  That remains to be seen.

Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/09/do_americans_truly_understand_redistribution_of_wealth.html#ixzz27dF3dlcR

'Unskewed' Polls Show Nearly 8-point Romney Lead...

by Jerome R. Corsi

NEW YORK – Arguing that most of the major polls reported by establishment media are “skewed” in favor of the Democratic Party and incumbent Barack Obama, a website contends that a true gauge of the presidential race, based on more realistic models, shows Republican challenger Mitt Romney leading by an average of nearly eight points.
In its daily readjustment of the polling data, UnskewedPoll.com also produces a table showing the spread in President Obama’s approval/disapproval ratio is an average of 8.8 percent more disapproval, as of Monday.
Not a single major poll or approval/disapproval index favors Obama when Unskewed.com’s analysis is applied.
The website says there is Democratic bias in polling because of over-sampling Democrats based on voter exit polls in the 2008 presidential election, when enthusiasm for a then relatively unknown but charismatic presidential candidate boosted Democratic Party voter registration and turnout to historic levels.
Race beginning to look a lot like 1980? What might Ronald Reagan’s victory path mean?

Source: http://unskewedpolls.com/ LV = Likely Voters, RV=Registered Voters, MoE=Margin of Error

Republicans have complained that the establishment media’s voter-turnout models can serve a partisan purpose by presenting margins that keep discouraged Republican voters at home thinking the election is already lost.
Signs Obama losing
Despite the establishment media narrative that the Romney campaign is behind and in disarray, there are abundant signs the Obama campaign is behind and scrambling not to lose further ground:

• On Saturday, Obama campaign manager Jim Messina insisted to reporters that despite national polls showing Romney and Obama locked in a tie, Obama is still winning.
• WND reported last week Obama’s chief financier, Penny Pritzker, has entered the Hawaii housing market to buy a retirement home for the president and his family that will be available not in 2016, but in January 2013.
• On the eve of the opening session of the General Assembly, the Obama administration’s Middle Eastern policy appears to be imploding in the wake of the murder of U.S. Ambassador Christopher Stevens in an attack that intelligence sources believe was coordinated by jihadists tied to al-Qaida. The administration, nevertheless, insisted the attack was a response to an anti-Muslim movie trailer produced in the U.S.
• Initial jobless claims for the week ending Sept. 15 were a seasonally adjusted 382,000, exceeding forecasts of 375,000, suggesting no improvement in the percentage of Americans unemployed could be anticipated before the November election, as reported by Wall Street Journal Market Watch.
• Politico has reported that in the latest Politico-George Washington University Battleground Poll with middle-class families, which constitute approximately 54 percent of the electorate and usually split their vote between Democratic and Republican candidates, Romney holds a 14-point advantage, 55 percent to 41 percent.

10 Reasons Mitt Will Win...

By David Limbaugh

 

Call me Pollyannaish, but I believe Mitt Romney will defeat Barack Obama in November. Let me give you some of my reasons:

1) Romney's campaign message is essentially positive; Obama's is overwhelmingly negative. People always prefer promises of something better, but Americans are especially hungry now because times are very tough. Romney is offering concrete and realistic plans to help America grow again and create millions of new jobs. Romney's message and agenda appeal to all Americans, not just certain groups, and tell them they are not imprisoned in their current economic "station" as Obama would have them believe. Though Obama's promises of "hope and change" in 2008 were vague, at least he presented them as something positive. Today he tells us we must accept an America in decline both internationally and domestically. He insists that 8 percent unemployment is the new normal and that we must adjust to the malaise because it is going to take a long time to make a dent in it.
2) Obama is appealing to people's baser instincts of envy, greed and fear and has deliberately fanned the flames of racial tension for political gain. This would have been bad enough if he'd not presented himself as a post-partisan, post-racial phenomenon.
3) Obama had the wind at his back in 2008 after happening on to a perfect financial storm he claimed he had nothing to do with creating. Today our financial outlook is actually much worse; we are much closer to a Greek-style collapse, and Obama has done nothing and proposed no ideas to avert it. It strains credulity to think Americans are gullible enough to swallow his shameless scapegoating of Republicans for problems he exacerbated and is unwilling or too incompetent to address.
4) Indeed, Obama's record has been horrendous in every category -- economic, debt, national security, military strength, energy dependence, social cohesiveness, religious liberty, race relations, health care and business. America is significantly worse off than it was when Obama took office. It will be extremely difficult for Obama to overcome the reality of his terrible record with his fictional whitewashing of that record.
5) Similarly, it is hard to believe that the liberal media's gross distortion of events will trump the events themselves. For example, Republicans did not have a terrible convention, and Democrats did not have a wonderful one. Republicans presented a positive message; both Paul Ryan's and Romney's messages were strong and inspiring, and Clint Eastwood's speech mostly resonated. Most Democratic speakers were angry and sniping, and Obama's speech was mostly flat, empty and uninspiring. Bill Clinton's wonkish fantasy speech was the best they could do, but Clinton is not the candidate. It's also unlikely the media succeeded in fooling people into believing that Obama's terrible jobs numbers and foreign policy week from hell were positive or that Romney's relatively innocuous 47 percent video and his proper criticism of Obama's Middle East apologies were terrible negatives.
6) The avalanche of negativity spewing from the liberal media can be discouraging to conservatives, but the liberal media have steadily lost clout over the past 20 years, and the alternative conservative media have never been more robust. Not only are the liberal media less powerful but also conservative talk show hosts, bloggers, tweeters, columnists and Fox News react with lightning speed to counter every single lie they promulgate.
7) The polls can be discouraging, too, but we've seen this in previous elections. Some pollsters showing Obama significantly ahead have a dubious history of distortion and have used their polls to manipulate instead of report public opinion. Most polls showing Obama ahead are either oversampling Democrats (using 2008 as a model instead of more recent elections) or understating Romney's lead among independents. The Weekly Standard reports that through 2004, every incumbent whose Gallup approval rating was less than 50 percent at this point -- as is Obama's -- lost. In Ohio, thousands more Republicans have ordered absentee ballots than Democrats. Also, I'm skeptical that all poll respondents are being completely candid in their positive responses about Obama for fear of being accused of racism or of being out of step with the manufactured media narrative that Obama is a likable person.
8) Obama is having some difficulty with his base, which is why his campaign is increasingly desperate and shrill. Some blacks are so angry over his liberal social views they may stay home. Some Jews are awakening to Obama's mistreatment of Israel. If Obama were so confident, he wouldn't be so flagrantly neglecting his official duties to feverishly campaign.
9) Conservatives have never been more motivated. Americans reject Obama's radical liberalism. Scott Brown won Ted Kennedy's Senate seat; Democrats took a "shellacking" in the 2010 congressional races; Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker won; a strong majority of Americans still hate Obama's proudest achievement, Obamacare; the tea party is more energized than ever; and grass-roots Americans voted with their bellies for Chick-fil-A.
10) Americans haven't given up on America yet. They recoil at Obama's socialist rantings, redistributionism, class warfare, race baiting, apologies for America, attacks on business and domestic energy producers, and bizarre and offensive statements that "the private sector is fine" and that the death of our ambassador was "a bump in the road."

David Limbaugh

David Limbaugh, brother of radio talk-show host Rush Limbaugh, is an expert in law and politics and author of new book Crimes Against Liberty, the definitive chronicle of Barack Obama's devastating term in office so far.

How Carter Beat Reagan...

By Jeffrey Lord

Washington Post admits polling was "in-kind contribution"; New York Times agenda polling.

Dick Morris is right.
Here's his column on "Why the Polls Understate the Romney Vote."
Here's something Dick Morris doesn't mention. And he's charitable.
Remember when Jimmy Carter beat Ronald Reagan in 1980?
That's right. Jimmy Carter beat Ronald Reagan in 1980.
In a series of nine stories in 1980 on "Crucial States" -- battleground states as they are known today -- the New York Times repeatedly told readers then-President Carter was in a close and decidedly winnable race with the former California governor. And used polling data from the New York Times/CBS polls to back up its stories.
Four years later, it was the Washington Post that played the polling game -- and when called out by Reagan campaign manager Ed Rollins a famous Post executive called his paper's polling an "in-kind contribution to the Mondale campaign." Mondale, of course, being then-President Reagan's 1984 opponent and Carter's vice president.
All of which will doubtless serve as a reminder of just how blatantly polling data is manipulated by liberal media -- used essentially as a political weapon to support the liberal of the moment, whether Jimmy Carter in 1980, Walter Mondale in 1984 -- or Barack Obama in 2012.
First the Times in 1980 and how it played the polling game.
The states involved, and the datelines for the stories:

• · California -- October 6, 1980
• · Texas -- October 8, 1980
• · Pennsylvania -- October 10, 1980
• · Illinois -- October 13, 1980
• · Ohio -- October 15, 1980
• · New Jersey -- October 16, 1980
• · Florida -- October 19, 1980
• · New York -- October 21, 1980
• · Michigan -- October 23, 1980

Of these nine only one was depicted as "likely" for Reagan: Reagan's own California. A second -- New Jersey -- was presented as a state that "appears to support" Reagan.
The Times led their readers to believe that each of the remaining seven states were "close" -- or the Times had Carter leading outright.
In every single case the Times was proven grossly wrong on election day. Reagan in fact carried every one of the nine states.
Here is how the Times played the game with the seven of the nine states in question.
• Texas: In a story datelined October 8 from Houston, the Times headlined:

Texas Looming as a Close Battle Between President and Reagan

The Reagan-Carter race in Texas, the paper claimed, had "suddenly tightened and now shapes up as a close, bruising battle to the finish." The paper said "a New York Times/CBS News Poll, the second of seven in crucial big states, showing the Reagan-Carter race now a virtual dead heat despite a string of earlier polls on both sides that had shown the state leaning toward Mr. Reagan."
The narrative? It was like the famous scene in the Wizard of Oz where Dorothy and her friends stare in astonishment as dog Toto pulls back the curtain in the wizard's lair to reveal merely a man bellowing through a microphone. Causing the startled "wizard" caught in the act to frantically start yelling, "Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain!" In the case of the Times in its look at Texas in October of 1980 the paper dismissed "a string of earlier polls on both sides" that repeatedly showed Texas going for Reagan. Instead, the Times presented this data:

A survey of 1,050 registered voters, weighted to form a probable electorate, gave Mr. Carter 40 percent support, Mr. Reagan 39 percent, John. B. Anderson, the independent candidate, 3 percent, and 18 percent were undecided. The survey, conducted by telephone from Oct. 1 to Oct. 6, has a margin of sampling error of plus or minus 4 percentage points.

In other words, the race in Texas is close, assures the Times, with Carter actually in the lead.
What happened? Reagan beat Carter by over 13 points. It wasn't even close to close.
• Pennsylvania: The next "Crucial States" story focused on Pennsylvania on October 10. Here the headline read:

Undecided Voters May Prove Key

Reagan, said the Times, "appears to have failed thus far to establish many positive reasons for voting for him."
Once again the paper played the polling data card, this time saying Reagan had a mere 2 point lead. But the Reagan lead was quickly disputed in series of clever ways. Fundraising for Reagan wasn't as good as expected, said the Times, and besides the budget for a Reagan telephone bank being shaved "from $700,000 to $400,000." The Times/CBS poll showed that Carter was ahead of Reagan 36-32 among union households in a heavily labor state. To make matters worse for Reagan the GOP Senate candidate Arlen Specter was being "swamped" in the polls by his Democratic rival, the former Pittsburgh Mayor Pete Flaherty -- with Specter losing to Flaherty 47-36. Not to mention Reagan was being trounced in Philadelphia 52-15 percent. Towards the very end of the story was this interesting line -- a line that should have some relevance to the Romney campaign as President Obama struggles with the consequences of the killing of the American Ambassador in Libya. Reads the sentence:

One negative reason [meaning an anti-Carter vote] that did not turn up in the telephone poll but came up repeatedly in door-to-door interviews was the hostage situation in Iran. 

What happened? The race wasn't close, with Reagan beating Carter in Pennsylvania not by barely 2 points but rather trouncing him by over 7 points. And Arlen Specter beat Pete Flaherty.
• Illinois: The Times headline here in a story October 13?

Poll Finds Illinois Too Close to Call: Both Camps Note Gains by Carter 

The narrative for Illinois? Carter is gaining, so much so that:

…uncertainty about Ronald Reagan's leadership, especially among suburban voters, [has] apparently set back Mr. Reagan's hope for a victory in Illinois and left his campaign scrambling to regain lost momentum, according to advisers in both camps. 

Then came the usual New York Times/CBS polling data that proclaimed a Reagan one-point lead of 34% to Carter's 33% as a sure sign that "Carter Gains and Reagan Slips in Close Illinois Race" -- as an inside page headline proclaimed.
What happened? Reagan beat Carter by almost 8 points, 49.65% to 41.72%. Again, there was no "close" race as the Times had claimed.
• Ohio: The headline in this "Crucial States" profile once again conforms to the Times pattern of declaring Reagan and Carter to be in a "close" race.

Ohio Race Expected to Be Close As Labor Mobilizes for President

The narrative for Ohio? Ohio, the paper explained, had been "long viewed by Ronald Reagan's campaign as its best opportunity to capture a major Northern state" but "such a victory …is not yet in hand." Then came the inevitable New York Times/CBS polling data. Reagan was ahead by a bare 2 points, 36% to 34%. Two-thirds of the undecided were women and Reagan was doing "much worse among women voters than men." Carter on the other hand had the great news that "35 percent of the undecided came from labor union households, a group that divides nearly 2-1 for Mr. Carter among those who have made up their minds."
What happened? Reagan beat Carter by over 10 points in Ohio. Yet another "crucial state" race wasn't even close to being close as the paper had insisted.
• Florida: For once, the problem was impossible to hide. The Times headline for its October 19 story headlined:

Carter Is in Trouble With Voters In Two Major Sections of Florida

There was no New York Times/CBS poll here. But what was published was "the most recent Florida Newspapers Poll" that showed Reagan with only a 2 point lead over Carter: 42 for Reagan, 40 for Carter, with 7 for Anderson. The election, said the Times confidently, "was widely expected to be close." Surprise!
What happened? Reagan beat Carter in Florida by over 17 points.
• New York: The Times headline for its home state in a story dated October 21?

President is in the Lead, Especially in the City -- Anderson Slide Noted

The Times waxed enthusiastic about New York. Reagan was "being hindered by doubts within his own party." And it trotted out its favorite New York Times/CBS Poll to show definitively that Reagan was getting clobbered in New York. The poll, said the Times, "showed Mr. Carter leading in the state with 38%, to 29% for Mr. Reagan…." Which is to say, Carter was running away with New York state, leading Reagan by 9 points. The headline on the inside of the paper:

Reagan Far from Goal in New York; Carter in Lead 

Why was this so? Why was Reagan doing so badly in New York? The paper turned to a Carter campaign aide in the state who explained that New Yorkers aren't "willing to vote for a Goldwater." Then they found one "frustrated Republican county chairman" who said the problem with Reagan was that New Yorkers "don't like what they think they know about him." Then there was the usual yada-yada: Reagan was failing miserably with women (losing 41-23 said the poll) and losing in New York City, not to mention that "labor is hard at work" for Carter.
What happened? Reagan beat Carter in New York by over 2 points.
• Michigan: The last of the profiles in the Times "Crucial States" series was Michigan, published on October 23. The ambiguous headline:

Party Defections May Tip Scales in Michigan Vote 

The Michigan story begins with the tale of Reagan being endorsed by Dr. Martin Luther King's famous aide the Reverend Ralph Abernathy. But the Times immediately saw a problem in this backing of Reagan from a prominent "black civil rights leader." The problem? Black backlash. Said the paper:

Mr. Reagan was barely out of town [Detroit] before the backlash set in.
"The Abernathy Betrayal," screamed the headline over the chief article in The Michigan Chronicle, a black newspaper. And yesterday the 400-member Council of Black Pastors, in the greater Detroit area, broke its precedent of refraining from Presidential endorsements and declared its support for President Carter a direct reaction to the Abernathy endorsement.

In other words, Reagan was damned because he didn't get black support -- and damned especially when he did. Grudgingly, the paper admitted that "although the race was close" in Michigan, "Mr. Reagan was ahead." But once again, the Times insisted that a key state race was close. Close, you see, close. Did they mention it was close?
What happened? Reagan carried Michigan by over 6 points, 48.999 to Carter's 42.50. Yet again -- it wasn't close.
That same day, October 23, the paper ran a second polling story on the general status of the presidential election, its theme self-evident:

Poll Shows President Has Pulled To Even Position With Reagan.

The story by Times reporter Hedrick Smith began this way:

In an election campaign reminiscent of the tight, seesaw contest of 1960, President Carter has pulled to an essentially even position with Ronald Reagan over the last month by attracting some wavering Democrats and gaining on his rival among independents, according to a new nationwide survey by The New York Times and CBS News.

The survey, readers were assured, was "weighted to project a probable electorate" and had Carter leading Reagan 39-38.
As if the point hadn't been driven home enough, seven days later on October 30^, the Times decided to sum up the entire race in the light of the just completed Reagan-Carter debate. Can you guess what they said? That's right:

Carter and Reagan Voicing Confidence on Debate Showing: Performances Rated Close

And inside the paper the continuation of the story proclaimed -- guess what?

Outcome of Debate Rated as Close.

On November 4 -- the day before the election -- the Times proclaimed… proclaimed…
Yup:

Race is Viewed as Very Close

The final results?
Ronald Reagan clobbered Jimmy Carter winning 51.7% to Carter's 41% -- a 10 point-plus victory in the popular vote. Third place Congressman John Anderson managed a mere 6.6%.
In the Electoral College? Reagan carried 44 states for a total of 489 votes. Carter won 6 states plus the District of Columbia for 49 electoral votes.
To say the least, the race wasn't "close." To compare it to 1960 as a "tight, seesaw contest" was in fact not simply ridiculously untrue but bizarre.
So what do we have here?
What we have is the liberal "paper of record" systematically presenting the 1980 Reagan-Carter election in 9 "Crucial States" as somehow "close" in five of the nine -- Texas, Illinois, Ohio, Florida and Michigan. New York was in the bag for Carter. Only in his own California and New Jersey was Reagan clearly leading.
The actual results had only New York "close" -- with Reagan winning by 2. Reagan carried every other "close" state by a minimum of 6 points and as much 17 -- Florida. Florida, in fact, went for Reagan by a point more than California and about 4 more than New Jersey.
How could the New York Times -- its much ballyhooed polling data and all of its resulting stories proclaiming everything to be "close" -- been so massively, continuously wrong? In the case of its "Crucial States" -- nine out of nine times?
The obvious answer is called to mind by a polling story from four years later involving Ronald Reagan and his next opponent, Jimmy Carter's vice president Walter Mondale.
By 1984, Reagan was an extremely popular incumbent president. He was running well everywhere against Mondale. But suddenly, up popped a curious Washington Post poll that indicated Reagan's 1980 margin of over 16% in California had dropped precipitously to single digits. Nancy Reagan was alarmed, calling campaign manager Ed Rollins (full disclosure, my former boss) and saying, "You have to do something."
Rollins disagreed, as he later wrote in his memoirs Bare Knuckles and Back Rooms: My Life in American Politics.
A Californian himself Rollins was certain Reagan was just fine in California. The Reagan campaign's own polls (run by Reagan's longtime pollster Dick Wirthlin) showed Reagan with a "rock-solid" lead. After all, said Rollins, "Californians knew Ronald Reagan, and either loved him or hated him. He'd been on the ballot there six times and never lost." The Post poll data made no sense. But Mrs. Reagan was insistent, so Rollins ordered up another (expensive) poll from Dick Wirthlin. Rollins also dispatched longtime Reagan aide and former White House political director Lyn Nofziger, a Californian as well, back to the Reagan home precincts. More phone banks were ordered up. In all, a million dollars of campaign money that could have been spent on Minnesota -- Mondale's home state where the ex-Minnesota Senator was, remarkably, struggling -- was spent on California because of the Washington Post poll.
A few weeks later, the Washington Post ran a story that confirmed Rollins' initial beliefs. The Post confessed that… well… oops… it had made a mistake with those California polling numbers. Shortly afterward came the November election, with California once again giving Reagan a more than 16 point victory. In fact, Reagan carried 49 states, winning the greatest landslide victory in presidential history while losing Minnesota in -- yes -- a close race. Mondale had 49.72% to Reagan's 49.54%, a difference of .18% that might have been changed by all that money that went into California. Making Reagan the first president in history to win all fifty states.
After the election, Ed Rollins ran into the Washington Post's blunt-speaking editor Ben Bradlee and "harassed" Bradlee "about his paper's lousy polling methodology."
Bradlee's "unrepentant" response?

"Tough sh…t, Rollins, I'm glad it cost you plenty. It's my in-kind contribution to the Mondale campaign." 

Got that?
So the questions for 2012.
How corrupt are all these polls showing Obama leading or in a "close race"?
Are they to Obama what that California poll of the Washington Post was for Walter Mondale -- an "in-kind contribution"?
Is that in fact what was going on with the New York Times in 1980? An "in-kind contribution" to the Carter campaign from the Times?
What can explain all these polls today -- like the ones discussed here at NBC where the Obama media cheerleaders make their TV home? Polls that the Obama media groupies insist show Obama 1 point up in Florida or 4 points in North Carolina or 5 points in Pennsylvania. And so on and so on.
How does one explain a president who, like Jimmy Carter in 1980, is increasingly seen as a disaster in both economic and foreign policy? How does a President Obama, with a Gallup job approval rating currently at 49% -- down a full 20% from 2009 -- mysteriously win the day in all these polls?
How does this happen?

Can you say "in-kind contribution"?

About the Author

Jeffrey Lord is a former Reagan White House political director and author. He writes from Pennsylvania at jlpa1@aol.com.

The Persuasive Force of an Avalanche

By Daren Jonescu

 

Preaching to the choir, which has spiritual value as an expression of camaraderie, must temporarily take a back seat to the urgent task of persuading the hitherto disengaged.  For while there is a large portion of the American electorate that seems irremediably committed to Barack Obama's promise of a food stamp in every pot, there is also, one must hope, a smaller segment of the population that remains inattentive to, or ignorant of, what is happening to America.
These are people of good faith who simply do not see what you see.  They have refused to listen to the evidence thus far; they have been educated to believe in the kind of euphemisms the left uses to mask its true intentions; they cannot accept that real live men and women could possibly have aims so antithetical to the interests of humanity, civilization, and decency, let alone that such people could have risen to the highest positions of government, education, the press, and the arts. 
(Before you scoff at the possibility that there might be such "people of good faith," consider the Tea Party.  I have read the self-descriptions of many people who say they were politically disinterested all the way into their 50s, but have had a violent awakening within the past few years.  What happened to them can happen to others.)
Though it may be difficult to muster the patience to argue with those who have chosen to remain under the rock of everyday life during this time of tectonic shift, if ever there was a moment for forbearance in the name of a greater good, this is it.  The stakes could not be higher.  The time could not be later. 
The practical problem, however, is that merely being correct is not enough to win an argument.  You must also make your interlocutor see your case, and take it seriously.  But the world has reached such an extremity of degradation that for those who have not been paying attention, even calling the dangers by their right names seems "over the top."  And if someone dismisses your argument as ridiculous on its face, they will not finally be swayed by it. 
This problem cannot be ignored.  Those frustrating "undecideds" to whom the obvious appears far-fetched must be won over.  If they cannot finally be persuaded, then the only other way out of this crisis may simply be to watch civilization die, and hope that reason and humanity may be reborn in some distant future.
How to overcome this barrier?  Consider how you yourself arrived at your conclusions regarding modern leftism in general or Barack Obama in particular.  You got there through inference and synthesis after exhaustively examining the verifiable facts.  Without the facts, you would never have believed those inferences and syntheses either -- nor should you have.  The accumulated evidence comes first.  Inescapable conclusions follow.
This is the solution for dealing with the disengaged.  Wave your arms in front of their televisions and newspapers until you have swept away "Dancing with the Stars," Peggy Noonan, and the rest of the veil of life-as-usual that blinds them to the danger all around.  Then overwhelm them, forcefully but without exaggeration or hyperbole, with the documented facts.  Merely say what you know, and what can be proven incontrovertibly, without scaring them away with inferences they are not yet able to understand.  If they are reachable at all, they will draw their own inescapable conclusions, just as you did. 
This modern version of the Socratic Method might just avert catastrophe.  It is fitting that Western civilization's most time-honored model of education should be the most valuable tool in rescuing Western civilization.
Persuade them with an avalanche of undeniable facts. 
Barack Obama was raised by a committed leftist mother who clearly displayed a predilection for men of similar inclinations, fathering Obama with one, and later marrying another. 
Both his father and stepfather were Muslims.  Obama spent a significant portion of his early formative years being raised and educated among Indonesian Muslims.  His mother was, on his own account, opposed to organized religion on principle.  In short, he was not raised in a Christian household or atmosphere. 
The only church to which Obama is known to have belonged is Jeremiah Wright's.  Wright, a black liberation theologian, sermonizes about the fundamental evils of America, and is vehemently anti-Jew and pro-Palestinian.  Obama has claimed that he heard none of this over his twenty years in Wright's church, and has publicly disowned his pastor.  (Wright has since described himself as a close political and spiritual mentor of Obama's, and claimed that in 2008 an Obama surrogate offered him $150,000 for his silence.)
One of the most influential male role models in his youth was Frank Marshall Davis (see Paul Kengor's work on this), a radical activist, card-carrying member of the Communist Party USA, and pornographer.  Obama's first autobiography, Dreams from My Father, written before he ran for public office, discussed Davis in some detail.  The audio version of the book, which Obama recorded in 2005, excised all references to Davis.  
Obama's political career began with a "meet the candidate" coffee klatch in the Chicago home of Bill Ayers and Bernardine Dohrn.  Ayers and Dohrn are founding members of the Weather Underground terrorist group, dedicated to the communist overthrow of the American system of government.  They have remained openly devoted to undermining American "capitalism" and "imperialism" to this day, though they have traded in the ineffectual methods of their youth for more subtle and gradual forms of cultural re-education. 
They are not the sort of characters who would blindly support just any old Democratic candidate for the state senate, let alone host his campaign kick-off party.  That is, they would not have supported Obama without feeling very certain that they knew who and what he was, and that his views and agenda were consistent with their subversive aims.  Ayers has subsequently spoken with his unique brand of leftist lyricism about the excitement and promise of Obama's 2008 presidential victory.
When Obama was publicly questioned about his relationship with Ayers, he famously dismissed this associate, mentor, and probable ghost writer of Dreams (see here) as merely "a guy who lives in my neighborhood."
Throughout his presidency, Obama has been strongly supported by the Communist Party USA.  The language of the CPUSA's 2012 endorsement includes a simple litany of all the same policy achievements and principles that Obama himself touts in his own defense.  It is the official position of the CPUSA that Obama's policy agenda is consistent with and conducive to the Party's goal of establishing a communist state in America.  They ought to know.
As president, Obama has appointed to important posts avowed communists, people with Communist Party affiliations, and admirers of Mao Tse-tung.  (See here, here, and here.)
For several years (we do not know how many), beginning in high school, Obama was a heavy user of illegal drugs, ranging from marijuana -- in his high school yearbook, he thanked his dealer by name -- to cocaine.  During his 2008 presidential bid, he repeatedly exploited his drug use to attract young voters by appealing to their desire for the "cool" candidate.  (See here.)
Obama admits to having been a bad student, due to being frequently absent from classes as a "loafer" and dedicated partier; and yet he was somehow able to wend his way up the American education food chain, from Occidental to Columbia to Harvard.  His academic records have been withheld from the public to this day.  (A valuable clue to the mystery of Obama's academic upward mobility may have just been discovered.)
His first literary agent promoted him using a short bio which claims he was born in Kenya.  This bio was changed in other ways over the course of seventeen years, but continued to say he was born in Kenya until 2007.  The agent's official explanation for this is a whimpered "fact-checking error."  As many have pointed out, however, a publisher does not create an unknown author's bio for him.  (How could they?)  They print the information they are given by the author.  Does this prove that Obama was born in Kenya?  Only if we assume he was telling the truth when he provided or approved his biographical information.  Perhaps he was.  My assumption is that he was not.  So Obama is either constitutionally ineligible to be president or a dishonest careerist who is prepared to promote his career with convenient lies about the most basic facts of his personal history, à la Elizabeth Warren, his fellow Harvard leftist and presidential appointee.  Take your pick.
Obama was a featured speaker at a dinner in honor of Rashid Khalidi, a pro-Palestinian academic who has made a career of defending the PLO and the Muslim Brotherhood, while spewing venom at the "occupiers" of Jerusalem.  We know that in his speech, Obama spoke of Khalidi as an intimate friend and mentor.  We also know that anti-Israeli sentiments abounded at this event, and that attendees apparently included Ayers and Dohrn. 
That, however, is about all we know, because the Los Angeles Times possesses the only known video of the event, and has refused to release it on the grounds of respecting the wishes of their source.  In plain English, they refuse to release it because they respect their source's desire to protect Obama from the video's incriminating evidence, as is apparent from the damage control story the Times published about this event.
In 2008, asked about his relationship to Khalidi, which, according to the Times' own "nothing to see here" story, Obama himself described as deeply influential, Obama said, "To pluck out one person who [sic] I know and who [sic] I've had a conversation with who has very different views than 900 of my friends and then to suggest that somehow that shows that maybe I'm not sufficiently pro-Israel, I think, is a very problematic stand to take."
Obama has 900 "friends," all of them pro-Israel, but just one anti-Israeli vague acquaintance -- "one person who I've had a conversation with."  So there, Professor Khalidi.  Yet another long-time Obama mentor and confidante thrown under the campaign bus. 
On the other hand, there is his administration's renunciation of the Mubarak government in Egypt.  The pro-Muslim Brotherhood and pro-Palestinian forces (to which Khalidi prominently belongs) hated Mubarak, not as an authoritarian, but as an Arab who tried to work with, rather than annihilate, Israel.  Thus it is clear why those forces cheered Mubarak's ouster in favor of the Muslim Brotherhood's takeover of Egypt, personified by Mohamed Morsi. 
Now Morsi -- whose campaign for Egyptian president was introduced by a cleric promising that Morsi would lead a "march on Jerusalem" -- is boldly setting the terms of U.S.-Arab relations, while the Obama administration trips all over itself to certify that, Obama's shaky words notwithstanding, they really do regard Morsi's government, and by implication the "civilization jihad"-seeking Muslim Brotherhood, as an ally.  (When Michele Bachmann and others raised the issue of Muslim Brotherhood infiltration of the U.S. government, the Washington establishment convulsed in melodramatic outrage -- without refuting the claims.)
Furthermore, the Democratic Party tried to remove the recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital from its 2012 platform, along with language condemning the Brotherhood's offspring group, Hamas.  Facing public scrutiny, and against the will of their own convention delegates, the Jerusalem language was reinserted into the Democrats' platform.  The Hamas language, however, was not. 
Then there is Obama's private plea to Dmitri Medvedev, caught on tape, that Vladimir Putin needed to give him "space," i.e., stop making public demands of him before the election, after which time Obama promised he would have more "flexibility" to give Putin what he wants regarding missile defense.
This, of course, is merely a beginning of the avalanche of facts -- not speculative inferences, but facts -- that can and must be presented to those who have not yet come to terms with what is at stake. 
Supplement this bombardment as needed.  Your ammunition will last at least as long as the 1.4 billion rounds the Department of Homeland Security purchased this year.  Consider: adding 50% to an already irredeemable national debt; supporting infanticide; violating Catholics' freedom of religion in the name of a "student" who claims she needs enough birth control to supply the Mustang Ranch; declaring himself a proponent of single-payer (i.e., socialized) health care achieved incrementally (but then denying that the signature legislation of his first term is exactly that); giving the most perfunctory and unfeeling "sad day" speech in history in response to the barbaric assassination of a U.S. ambassador, before racing to Vegas for a fundraiser; mocking every human being's pride in his own achievement ("You didn't build that"), thereby completely inverting the actual relationship between private success and "public works"; EPA drones flying over your farm; and so on ad infinitum.
You could not invent someone less suited to being president of the United States.  Just lay it out for the undecided, verifiable step by step, and dare them not to draw the only conclusion reason permits.
And never forget that just as Obama is, for the radical left, merely the public symbol of their agenda, so he is, for your argument, merely the thin edge of a wedge.  Having set the disengaged to thinking on this one score, a whole world of corruption and impending catastrophe will open up for them.  Once one has begun to see reality, there is no turning back.

Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/09/the_persuasive_force_of_an_avalanche.html#ixzz27UJhe4QH