In today’s Halli & Friends radio program, Halli outlines the upcoming tax increases resulting from the expiration of the Bush tax cuts, and Obamacare. Are you ready for this?

Plus, the numbers are in and Governor Butch Otter and the Idaho Legislature were right when they cut spending in both the 2010 and 2011 budgets. Halli discusses the details.

And finally, the Idaho Republican party has come under fire for a new plank in their platform calling for candidates in the Republican Primary to reveal whether or not they agree with the platform. The mainstream media call this a “loyalty oath”. Learn the truth in today’s program.

Listen on this website, or at BlogTalkRadio.com/IdahoTalk.

By Richard Larsen

“Bureaucracy is the epoxy that greases the wheels of progress.” Dr. James Boren, Former professor of Political Science and founder of International Association of Professional Bureaucrats.

Nowhere in recent memory has this been more self-evident than in dealing with the oil spill disaster in the Gulf of Mexico. Time and time again the government has proven Dr. Boren’s aphorism by getting in the way of any progress to clean up the mess down there.

For example, early on, the state of Alabama conceived a plan to erect huge booms offshore to protect their coastline, which is about 200 miles long, from the drifting blobs of oil. They searched the world, scouring sources for the massive booms, some weighing tons and as high as twenty feet, to help protect their coastline.

No sooner had Alabama gotten the booms into place then the Coast Guard, who had helped them locate the equipment, mandated that they be moved to protect the Louisiana coast instead.

This led Alabama to devise a backup plan, where they would procure snare booms to catch the oil as soon as it began to wash up on their beaches. Low and behold, another federal bureaucracy snatched that solution away from them. The Fish and Wildlife Administration nixed that plan because they said it would endanger sea turtles that nest on the beaches. Never mind that the entire ecosystem of the turtles is endangered by the encroaching mass of oil blobs invading the Alabama beaches!

So, Alabama state officials, not to be outdone by bureaucratic obstacles, resolved they would try another, less high tech effort to prevent the oil from caking their beaches. They decided to hire 400 workers to patrol the beaches and, by hand, scoop up the oil residue that washed ashore.

So how did that plan turn out, you ask? Well, you probably guessed it: another federal bureaucracy hampered that backup plan to the previous backup plan, which was the backup plan to the original plan aborted by federal bureaucracy. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA) wouldn’t allow those workers to work more than 20 minutes per hour. They further demanded that the state allow said workers an hour-long break after every 40 minutes of work. OSHA’s requirements had the affect of reducing manual cleanup effort efficiency by more than 60%, with just 40 minutes of work for every three hours on the clock.

As Richard Morris, former Clinton administration advisor has said, “Every agency — each with its own particular bureaucratic agenda — was able to veto each aspect of any plan to fight the spill, with the unintended consequence that nothing stopped the oil…” Rather than facilitating the cleanup, federal bureaucracies have thwarted state and corporate cleanup efforts, as they engage in an apparently uncoordinated tug-of-war jockeying for control and exercising their bureaucratic “epoxy” power. Consequently, the ineptitude hampers cleanup efforts as the assault on our southern shoreline advances.

Alabama Gov. Bob Riley characterized the situation by stating that the administration’s “lack of ability has become transparent” in its handling of the oil spill.

Even more disconcerting is the fact that we’ve been enlarging federal bureaucracy at an unprecedented pace over the past two years. The new health care mandate creates over 100 new government agencies and bureaucracies to implement the dictates of that onerous legislation.

The new financial reform package passed by congress creates another 20 new government agencies to beat financial institutions into submission because of the way they implemented the last set of federal regulations congress foisted upon them. Most of the costs of this additional bureaucratic morass will be borne by us. Not just in the form of taxes to cover government cost of implementation and enforcement, but through additional banking fees and charges to cover the anticipated 20% increase in costs to affected financial institutions, which will be passed on to the consumers. That’s us.

Ronald Reagan recognized intuitively as well as empirically how destructive to freedom and liberty bureaucracies can be. He said, “Man is not free unless government is limited…. As government expands, liberty contracts.” And that’s not just for individuals. Just ask the state of Alabama. All of this gives added significance to another of Ronald Reagan’s statements, when he referred to the phrase, “I’m from the government and I’m here to help,” as “the nine most terrifying words in the English language.”

An efficient and effective bureaucracy is critical to the proper function of government in serving citizens. We have obviously far exceeded that. For those who love government and bureaucratic micromanagement of our lives, this is your heyday. For those of us who love freedom and actual solutions, we’re living a nightmare.

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9th July 9, 2010

To: Senators Risch and Crapo

Representatives Simpson and Minnick

Governor Jan Brewer

Re: Three items

Dear Sirs/Ma’am:

First, I would like to invite you to our Idaho Falls Tea Party event on 29 July at 6pm at the Broadway Bridge. We’ll be holding a SUPPORT ARIZONA RALLY as this is the day that their new illegal immigration law takes affect. It is their response to the failure of the federal government to protect our country. Governor Jan Brewer will also be issued an invitation. Her willingness to stand against a government is to be commended.

Please let me know whether you will be able to attend. It should only be an hour at most and we’d certainly appreciate your show of support.

Idaho is considering similar legislation and we MUST show a united front.

Secondly, congratulations to Senator Risch for his reversal of support in regards to Idaho land. Though I consider myself an environmentalist, I am also a Constitutionalist. First I wonder where in the Constitution do you find Constitutional support for your proposal? I am looking forward to your response on this matter.

Lastly, within the last two weeks, as the Tea Party Patriots Idaho State Coordinator, I contacted your offices (with the exception of Rep Minnick) and asked for some information about a vote that was soon to come up. Telling your staff that I needed it for dissemination around the Idaho Tea Party groups, they requested my email address for a speedy reply. To this date, I have not heard one word from any of your offices. How disappointing. Americans are weary of having our representatives ignore us.

Thank you for your time,

Andi Elliott

2498E 2100

Hamer, ID 83425

straighttalkidaho@yahoo.com

Andi Elliott
Patriotic Resistance Idaho State Coordinator
Tea Party Patriots Idaho State Coordinator
Idaho District 2 Coordinator Anystreet.Org
Member of the American Grand Jury

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By Robert L. Webster

When in the course of human events, it becomes necessary for the people of a nation to demand a return to the fundamental principles of liberty which were established by their founding fathers, and to eliminate the changes which have weakened and deformed it from the intent of the original charter, a decent respect to the opinions of its citizens, civilized nations and of all mankind, requires that they should declare the causes which compel them to this action.

We, the people of the United States of America, hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are born free, in that they are endowed at birth by their Creator with certain inalienable rights, among which are the right to life, liberty, property and the freedom of choice – that to secure these rights, men may institute a government, delegating to it those specifically enumerated and limited powers necessary to the security and felicity of the governed, and that whenever any form of government becomes destructive to these ends, it is the right and duty of the people to alter or abolish it, and in its place to either restore the original, or institute a new government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form as shall seem to them most likely to secure their national safety and happiness.

Prudence dictates that governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes, and history has shown that men are naturally inclined to suffer abuses of government, while abuses are tolerable, than to correct them by abolishing the traditional form of government to which they are accustomed. But when a long and significant string of abuses has been experienced, and appears to be designed to destroy the Constitutional form and revert back to the despotic forms of history, this people reasserts its God-given right and duty to throw off such abuses, and to restore again the principles and safeguards provided by the Founders in the inspired original system, the Constitution of the United States of America.

The citizens of this Democratic Republic have suffered enough abuses of government power over its brief bi-centennial existence. The history of the second century in particular is replete with injuries and usurpations, in an apparent design to convert and subjugate this land of abundant resources, industrious people and “common-law” liberty back under the control of the ancient systems of “rulers law.” As testimony, let the sobering facts be submitted openly before God, and to a candid world of witnesses:

Religious persecution has been allowed to persist without just redress or protection by the national or State governments, at times occurring even under government orders.

The issue of “separation of church and state” has been grossly distorted to the point of separation of religion from government and from everyday life. This is a national disgrace, and a reversal of the wholesome relationship intended by the Founders as essential to national well being.

The sixteenth amendment of 1913 has violated the Founder’s principles by authorizing the federal government to collect direct income taxes from the people. It has been a primary cause of centralization of power to the central government, and must be repealed.

The seventeenth amendment of 1913 has helped to destroy States’ rights and the delicate checks and balances system by making the election of US Senators by popular vote, instead of by the State Legislatures, thus increasing the influence of

The twenty third amendment attempts to create a State out of a city – Washinton DC – in violation of the Founders wisdom. It must be repealed, allowing the residents to vote as citizens of the State of Maryland.

The twenty fifth amendment violates the Founders’ principles by allowing a President to appoint a Vice President, which, under manipulated conditions of sedition and murder could result in a president never elected to office; it must be repealed.

The twenty sixth amendment dangerously advanced “democracy” beyond a healthy balance by allowing eighteen-year-olds to vote. They lack maturity; it should be repealed.

MONEY IS POWER, and the enemies of America have taken control of America’s wealth. The Federal Reserve System of 1913 is unconstitutional and must be replaced immediately by the Constitutional Monetary System as prescribed by the Founders – the economic system of prosperity which has never yet been instituted!

America’s Constitutionally prescribed gold and silver money standard has been unconstitutionally removed, and must be restored, under Congressional control. With the value of the dollar and the money supply tied to within 5% of the measured Gross National Product, and limiting all interest rates to a maximum of 10%, for no longer than ten years credit; prosperity would be unprecedented and secured.

The Congress has consistently spent beyond its budget; a balanced biennial budget must be required, under penalty of automatic dismissal from office for all who vote to cause budget excesses.

The Congress has voted to increase its pay while still in its current term of office; these current increases must be repealed and all future increases outlawed; each one voting for it should be recalled by their respective States. The States alone must decide Congressional salaries.

The Congressional seniority system has stagnated progress and corrupted the legislature. Amend the constitution to limit all federal elected legislative, executive and judicial terms to a lifetime total of twelve years in any one office or position.

The total tax burden of the people, including federal, State, local, sales and hidden taxes, is now 50% or more of the average individual wage earner’s income, a level so oppressive that it approaches complete subjugation. It is destroying the lives of America’s people! Not even Almighty God taxes beyond 10%! Amend the Constitution to limit the TOTAL maximum individual taxable burden to 10%, with the States to collect it and apportion revenues to various levels of government – State, Local, and Federal – for only constitutionally authorized activities. Exclude all churches, inheritances and all people under age 21 from any form of taxation. The people must be free to profit and prosper from their own enterprise and initiative, and free to keep and use their earnings as they choose. The result will be a more prosperous nation and government.

Property ownership has been eliminated unconstitutionally by property taxation. Reestablish property ownership to include all surface and subsurface rights, and never may be forfeited or lost due to failure to pay taxes of any kind, and that property may be inherited or granted free from any inheritance tax.

The Congress has violated the individual freedom and income of the people with the oppressive and ineffective Social Security System. Phase it out in ten years and replace it with voluntary, private, annuity-type savings and investment programs for retirement. Leave welfare to the generosity of the local people, who (when not over-taxed by government) will provide for the needy directly.

There is no Constitutional authority for federal involvement to be in business enterprises of any kind. Liquidate all federal businesses and properties into private enterprise hands in ten years.

There is no Constitutional authority for federal ownership or management of lands and resources beyond the constitutional prescription, viz. Washington DC, ports and arsenals, needful government buildings and legitimate US territories; yet the federal has withheld lands and resources within state boundaries, rightfully belonging to those States created out of public domain. Restore all lands and resources immediately to the respective States.

There is no Constitutional authority for federal involvement in education, except to encourage it within the States, as explained in the Northwest Ordinance of 1897, viz. the teaching of religion, morality and knowledge. Promote education of the Constitution in the tradition of the Founders, but cease all direct involvement in education. It is exclusively a State issue.

There is no Constitutional authority for any level of government to give away (grant) any of the people’s property (money) as AID to anyone for any purpose; this includes aid to education, welfare and foreign banks or interests. Cease all grants. Leave the solution of all such matters to the States and the people. Experience has clearly demonstrated that such aid does not buy friends, but is counterproductive. Export American constitutional freedom and prosperity by example, not by financial grants.

The Supreme Court has usurped legislative power: Congress must strike out all decisions which conflict with the Founders’ intent. Limit federal court jurisdiction to matters of life, liberty and national citizenship. No person born in the USA of non-citizen parents has a right to US citizenship. No foreigner or criminal has US citizen rights beyond liberty and life, while staying here.

The court system has obstructed justice and has not provided the right to a speedy and just trial. Eliminate plea bargaining. Require capital punishment within six months for capital crimes.

Inadequate checks exist to prevent or correct constitutional abuses of power by the Supreme Court. Authorize by amendment an elected Regional Court of Constitutional Appeal, which can judge and overturn or reverse any decisions of the Supreme Court which may be judged by the elected Regional Court of Constitutional Appeal to be unconstitutional.

The federal government has entangled America in foreign alliances contrary to the Founders’ intent. Through NATO, the UN, Nafta, Gatt and other “alliances,” the federal has combined with other unelected entities to subject America to jurisdictions foreign to our Constitution and not acknowledged by our laws, giving unauthorized consent to their acts of pretended legislation and concepts of so-called “international law.” No unelected body has power to make any law binding on any people! Cancel US involvement in the United Nations Charter; we are not bound by it. Cancel US funding of the UN, and restrict UN activity to a discussion forum of only those nations operating as constitutional republics.

There is no constitutional authority for the Executive branch to create law, yet the President issues Executive Orders having the effect and force of law, and the executive branches issue regulations which have the force of law but not passed by the legislature. Repeal all such, and establish a paid ten-member Federal/ State/ Citizen Checks and Balances Committee to watchdog all Federal and State branches for usurpations of power.

The federal has involved the nation in undeclared “no win” wars in violation of the constitution, transporting large armies to many foreign places in defense of international power schemes aimed at one-world government dominion. Amend the constitution to provide that 2/3 of the States legislatures may override any Congressional declaration of war. No so-called “police action” or international “peacekeeping” military force will be permitted. Any deployment of US military forces must be committed to protect America’s constitutional values, and to WIN – to end the conflict and restore peace as quickly as possible.

National leaders often have had no constitutional training prior to office; require all elected and appointed officials to pass a national constitutional examination in the intent of the Founders, based on the Constitution itself and the Federalist Papers, as a pre-requisite for federal elective offices and judgeships. Publish a semi-annual constitutional voting and decisionmaking index for all such federal officers.

The executive branch has created a multitude of new offices, and has sent forth a swarm of agents who harass the people. Not the least of these is the IRS, which has been unconstitutionally empowered to function as all three branches of government combined – creating laws, administering them, judging their compliance, prescribing the penalties and enforcing them, often unjustly. This is tyranny!

Repeated petitions for redress of grievances have been ignored or become cause for REPEATED INJURIES TO THE PEACE AND CONFIDENCE OF THE PEOPLE. The federal seems deaf to the voice of constitutional principles, continually seeking to expand its jurisdiction and power, increasing it’s inequitable system of taxes, increasing its spending without prudent budget limitations, seeking primarily for re-election and party status, while subjugating the States, local governments and the people.

The Founders’ worst fears of concentration of power into political parties (Faction) have become realized. The system of political parties has entrenched itself by gradual tradition into the very fabric of all levels of government to control legislation, positions of power, and even provide government-financed primary elections of private political parties, which exclude independents and new parties. Require that no person may be a candidate for or hold any public office, federal or state, who is sponsored by any political party, and that no position in any level of government may be held by anyone who is a member of a political party.

Therefore, WE THE PEOPLE have determined that we as citizens, deprived of our liberties under our current government, much as were our Founders under the hands of an oppressive king, unitedly denounce the above-noted offending actions of our government as being UNCONSTITUTIONAL, employing first those constitutional means at our disposal to remove the offenders and the offences, restoring the Constitution to the original intent of the Framers. In those cases when peaceful means have proven inadequate, we reserve the right of liberty under God, as stated in the original Declaration of Independence, to effect the necessary restorations by force – political, economic or military.

It is left to us of this generation of Americans to preserve, defend and restore the greatest charter of human liberty in history, for ourselves and for all mankind, the original Constitution of the United States of America.

With a firm reliance on the guidance and protection of the Almighty, who inspired our Founders to create the establishment of the original Constitution, we the undersigned herein do mutually pledge to God, to each other and to our posterity, our fortunes, our sacred honor and even our very lives if necessary, to the restoration of the Constitution of The United States of America.

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I’m flummoxed when people tell me that when voting for Obama, they wanted change but not this kind of change. My response is, “Why didn’t you know how he planned to change America? He told us exactly what he was going to do. Even the most cursory glance at his speeches or books would have made that apparent…but you didn’t want to hear the truth. To Obama, you were/are a “useful idiot”.

So, we have a president who has demonstrated time and again his racism, his dislike for America, his contempt for our Constitution, his disdain for our staunch allies, and his subservience to our sworn enemies. We have a president who has removed hundreds of pictures of our Founders and previous presidents from the White House and replaced them with over 300 pictures of himself; a president who has spent nearly 2 million dollars (according to the DNC) hiding his personal records from his employer…We The People!

This past Christmas, Obama celebrated Ramadan in the White House. Are there still those of you who don’t know that America is the next target of the radical Muslims?

Face it, 30% of the US population (the undereducated, ultra liberals who can afford to isolate themselves from the masses, those in the middle class who want something for nothing, the miseducated, and Communists/Socialists among us) support the Obama agenda and are controlling 70% of Americans. This president is intent on bringing America to her knees. Are YOU going to stand up for her?

Andi Elliott
Idaho State Coordinator
Tea Party Patriots

By Richard Larsen

A few weeks ago when speaking to the cadets at West Point, President Obama quipped that, “In some areas my power is absolute.” He then absolved all cadets of infractions and granted pardons to them.

While that was a humorous exchange, it may have revealed a sentiment that has already proven very troublesome to any of us who claim fealty to the United States of America. He obviously feels that he has absolute authority over whatever he chooses.

Our country is a constitutional republic established by a literal document, the Constitution, which specifically itemizes the limits of governmental authority, and delineates that power across the three branches of government. The executive branch, of which Obama is the head, executes the laws which are codified by congressional legislation, which laws are also ascertained by our judiciary to be either constitutional or illegal based on interpretation of our founding documents and judicial precedent.

As such, the president cannot make laws by fiat, or declaration. He executes or enforces the laws established by Congress. For example, it would have been entirely proper for Congress to pass legislation either encouraging or demanding that British Petroleum set aside $20 billion for legitimate claims related to the gulf oil spill. But when the White House conducted their “shakedown” of British Petroleum and demanded it, where was the legal foundation for him to do that? Irrespective of the logic of BP stepping up to the plate to handle such claims, the president had no legal authority to make such demands. He also has no legal authority to pressure BP into not paying dividends to shareholders. This certainly resembles a Chicago-style “offer you can’t refuse” more than it resembles the rule of law in a constitutional republic.

Speaking of the oil spill, last week the president told Matt Lauer that he was wanting to know “whose tail to kick” for the gulf oil spill. He may not have to look very far, if we consider what led up to the catastrophe. He and his comrades in the Congress have coddled and embraced the radical environmental movement for years, and it was due to pressure from those groups that Gulf oil exploration has been pushed into ever deeper waters, as far away from coastlines as possible.

Considering Obama received massive political donations from BP, and how lax federal inspectors were with their operations in the Gulf, a logical person might wonder if the donations bought that laxity by inspectors, which placed the Gulf in jeopardy with precisely the kind of disaster we’re facing there now. You combine those two factors alone, and the president may only have to go as far as his bathroom mirror to see whose “tail to kick.”

The shakedown of BP closely resembles the shakedown of the auto industry after we, with our tax-dollars, and without our approval, bailed out Chrysler and GM. With a phone call, the president essentially fired the chairman of General Motors, wiped out all the equity of the owners of the company (the shareholders), and wiped out the principle that bondholders held in company bonds. Where was the legal authority to do that? There was no statute, no congressional action granting him that authority. Do we have a president to execute the laws of the land, or do we have a dictator in a totalitarian regime who does whatever he wants, regardless of legality?

Even Senator Robert Byrd recognizes the Chicago-style power grab occurring from the Oval Office. In a letter to the president last year, Byrd denounced the 36 “czars” appointed by the president over nearly every aspect of our lives. Byrd said such positions “can threaten the Constitutional system of checks and balances. At the worst, White House staff have taken direction and control of programmatic areas that are the statutory responsibility of Senate-confirmed officials.” But in spite of the recognition of this Chicago-style executive branch power grab, Congress does little to curtail presidential totalitarian actions, and serves as little more than a rubber stamp for anything he bothers to seek authorization on, like the takeover of our health care system.

Executive branch power has been increasingly steadily over the past century, but the acceleration and extent of it over the past two years is alarming. We are rapidly losing our republic, as governmental actions nearly daily expand the scope and breadth of government intrusion into our lives, limit our liberty and ability to choose, and commit multi-generational larceny against our posterity to pay for the largesse of government. We apparently are no longer a land ruled by law based on constitutional principles, when the president without legislative or constitutional authority, but by diktat can destroy equity ownership, shakedown companies for political purposes, and reshape national policy with his cadre of czars in the White House.

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Idaho Chooses Life

The London Times reports on a new medical study finding that babies as young as 6 months old demonstrate moral discernment. The research comes out of Yale University’s Infant Cognition Center.

One of the tests used involved an animated film, in which different colored geometric objects were depicted as trying to get up a hill. Other objects were shown pushing the yellow square back down, while others were pictured as helping push the yellow object toward its objective. 6 month old babies were then asked to pick out the “good” objects and “bad” objects. In 80% of the cases, babies chose the objects shown as helping the other up the hill.

Professor Paul Bloom said his research contradicted the assumptions of leading psychologists like Freud and William James who believed moral impulses were social contraptions imposed late in life.

“There is growing evidence that supports the idea that perhaps some sense of good and evil is bred in the bone,” Bloom is quoted as saying.

Indeed. What does the Bible say?

“I will put my law in their minds and write it on their hearts….” (Jeremiah 31:33)

But will such scientific research, suggesting that we are sentient, moral beings from the moment of our conception, make any difference to ideologues like Elena Kagan?

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By Richard Larsen

The alacrity for government spending illustrated by the self-purportedly educated elite in this country displays alarming naiveté and ignorance on fiscal matters. A recent column in the Journal provided a superb example.

While walking around his neighborhood almost impishly marveling at the public parks, the roads, and his ability to dial 911 for assistance, a Journal columnist rhetorically questioned, “I am lost! I love what the government does for me. Would someone please tell me where to seriously reduce government spending?”

As my adorable 3-year-old granddaughter Addisyn would say, “Are you kidding me?” Let’s start by turning off the spigot! If your basement is being flooded due to a broken pipe, you don’t start bailing out the water, you first turn off the source and then turn your attention to reducing the water level.

Since this administration took power less than 1½ years ago, the Federal Budget has ballooned by over 60%. The yearly deficit has more than quadrupled to $1.2 trillion. The federal debt has grown from $11 trillion to over $13 trillion, and with all the Obama spending promises, that debt will burgeon to $23 trillion in the next ten years, according to the Government Accountability Office. Current debt amounts to $42,000 per American, and over $118,000 per taxpayer.

And what do we have to show for all that “wonderful” government spending? A jobless rate hovering around 10%, which Obama promised us wouldn’t go over 8% if the “stimulus” was passed, and a horrible job outlook for the foreseeable future. We have an economy that is statistically out of recession, but the recession mentality is alive and well.

The private sector, meantime, refuses to hire new workers not only because of the moribund economy, but because Obama and his facilitators in the Congress have essentially declared an all-out war on the private sector and the regulatory environment is at enmity with economic growth. Obamacare has led to the write-down of billions of dollars by American companies, including $1 billion by AT&T alone. Congress’ penchant for regulation increases the costs of operation for small businesses and large businesses alike, further hampering economic recovery and shooting job creation prospects in the foot.

The heralded financial reform recently passed by congress amounts to little more than government control of the financial sector, which banks have already said will impact their bottom line by another 20%. And you thought your bank fees were high before? Where do you think they make up that lost revenue? You pay it!

Gratefully the Idaho Constitution prohibits deficit spending, otherwise, judging from the clamor in the public sector, our lawmakers would have been pressured into doing what California, New York, and other states have been doing: maxing out the state credit cards pushing them to the brink of financial ruin.

That’s precisely what Obama and his congressional minions are doing. But the laws of fiscal restraint that apply to the rest of us don’t seem to apply to them. If we max out a credit card, not only are we unable to charge any more on it, but we eventually have to pay off the debt accrued by our imprudent and insatiable appetite for spending. Congress, however, can just increase their own spending limits, and continue to charge away.

If we as individuals do the same thing as Washington is doing these days, we’re irresponsible. Yet to the statists in our midst, our politicians are to be praised for all that wonderful government spending they do. Which begs the question: why are we held to a higher standard of fiscal responsibility and accountability with our own money than they are with someone else’s?

Margaret Thatcher, former British Prime Minister once said, “The problem with socialism is that you eventually run out of other people’s money.” While arguments abound as to whether government takeover of the auto industry, the student loan industry, the health care industry, and the financial services sector constitute socialism, the mentality is more than evident. And who can argue that the politicians in Washington are spending other people’s money? Ours, our children’s, and our grandchildren’s!

The president said a few months ago, “It would be a terrible mistake to borrow against our children’s future to pay our way today….” Yet that’s exactly what he’s doing! Didn’t Bernie Madoff just go to prison for doing the same thing? The president is committing multigenerational larceny and funding a federal government Ponzi scheme.

Congress has to be recomposed with members who aren’t so cavalier about spending without regard to the ultimate multigenerational cost. Somehow they need their limitless credit cards taken away to prevent them from bankrupting the country. Let’s turn off the spigot, and then we can talk about reducing the $45 trillion in unfunded entitlements, and odious debt they’ve run up.

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By Richard Larsen

It is nothing short of astounding that Federal government officials including the president and the Speaker of the House would call Arizona’s efforts at border control “misguided” and “irresponsible.” After all, Arizona’s new law, which allows state and local law enforcement to request documentation of possible illegal aliens, is very similar to federal law already on the books. Control of a nation’s borders is an essential attribute of national sovereignty.

It’s clear that Border States have to do something since much of the expense burden in health-care and education is borne by the states. The federal government is AWOL on border security, and has been for years, which has facilitated illegal breaching of our border. The feds have acted with willful indifference in regard to border security, but now they’ve gone further. For them to now object to Arizona’s attempt to curtail the problem amounts to obstruction of justice (since Federal law also declares being in the country illegally is a crime) and outright aiding and abetting since the nation’s top law enforcement officer, Attorney General Eric Holder, has said they may sue Arizona for attempting to do what they themselves refuse to do.

I’m constantly amazed at those who side with law-breakers, whether it’s being in the country illegally or any other crime. “They’re just trying to improve their lives,” they might argue in defense of illegal aliens. Well, so are burglars, drug dealers, and most other criminals. Should burglars not be prevented from entering your home illegally since they’re trying to improve their station in life? To all such, the same counsel could be proffered, “Do it legally!”

Since we are a nation comprised of immigrants, we can hardly be accused of being “anti-immigrant.” What we are, however, is “anti-illegal-immigrant.” After all, we are a nation at least ostensibly based on the rule of law and we’re all engaged in our own pursuit of happiness. That’s not in exclusion to the laws that may stand in our way, but rather it’s based on those legalities.

The mainstream media takes great pleasure in isolating and commentating on some of the signs wielded at the Tea Party rallies. For some reason, they don’t seem to take note of those wielded at pro-illegal immigration rallies, such as the one held in Phoenix a couple weeks ago. One protestor’s sign read, “Give us free health care, jobs, no taxes, house, food. YOU OWE US AMERICA! We will shoot more Arizona police until we get free!” Since when do we “owe” it to the world to become a free-lunch provider?

Arizona State Senator Sylvia Allen explained the need for Arizona to take matters into their own hands. “The border patrol is not on the border. They have set up 60 miles away with checkpoints that do nothing to stop the invasion. They are not allowed to use force in stopping anyone who is entering. They run around chasing them, if they get their hands on them then they can take them back across the border. Federal prisons have over 35% illegal’s and 20% of Arizona prisons are filled with illegal’s. In the last few years 80% of our law enforcement that have been killed or wounded have been by an illegal. The majority of people coming now are people we need to be worried about. The ranchers told us that they have seen a change in the people coming they are not just those who are looking for work and a better life.

“The Federal Government has refused for years to do anything to help the border states. We have been over run and once they are here we have the burden of funding state services that they use. Education cost have been over a billion dollars. The healthcare cost billions of dollars. Our State is broke, $3.5 billion deficit and we have many serious decisions to make. One is that we do not have the money to care for any who are not here legally. It has to stop.”

She also refuted those who claim Arizona’s new law is “Nazi-like.” She explained, “Federal law is very clear if you are here on a visa you must have your papers on you at all times. That is the law. In Arizona all you need to show you are a legal citizen is a driver license, MVD identification card, Native American Card, or a Military ID. This is what you need to vote, get a hunting license, etc. So nothing new has been added to this law. No one is going to be stopped walking down the street.”

Our Statue of Liberty proclaims to the world that we hold the doors open for those who seek liberty and freedom and wish to immigrate to America. “Give me your tired, your poor. Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,” states the inscription. But let them come legally!

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Richard Larsen

Tens of thousands of protestors looting, pillaging, wantonly destroying property, chanting anti-government slogans, and cursing the president. The images are not pretty, as even the mainstream media are finally covering the monumental story. With obvious regret that it isn’t the Tea Partiers being covered, international media are reporting the meltdown of a socialistic economic system.

The president of Greece has warned that his country stands on the “brink of the abyss” as anti-government mobs protest government efforts to reduce government spending, entitlements, and wealth redistribution. The mob is comprised of employees of the government they’re protesting. Civil servants and public employee unions have mobilized in opposition to governmental efforts at curtailing spending.

Even though Greece is relatively small on the global economic scale, it figures prominently as the portent of eventual European Union dissolution. The nation has only 11.3 million people, and its GDP is estimated at roughly $333 billion. Thanks to EU and U.S. taxpayers, Greece is in the process of being bailed out. First indicated at $60 billion, then $100 billion, then $120 billion, and finally $150 billion is now being promised by the U.S. funded International Monetary Fund and EU member nations to bail out the nation.

It’s impossible to know where this will all end. Portugal, Spain, and Italy are in nearly as bad of shape, as their appetite for spending has also far exceeded their ability to generate the revenue to finance it all.

Some states in the U.S. are in just about as serious of financial disorder. California, New Jersey, and New York are not in much better shape than Greece, and will undoubtedly be beating a path to Capital Hill to panhandle Congress on behalf of their debt-laden state coffers. Taxpayers will be hit up yet again to bail out those who have no logical grasp of reality or comprehension of simple laws of economics who have sought to create dependency on the government at the expense of those who really produce.

One of the most pathetic aspects of this mess is the fact that even the United State of America is rapidly approaching that same break-point. The Social Democrats in the European countries most in trouble have not only spent their nations to the brink of bankruptcy, but their promises for entitlements and continued wealth redistribution ensure financial instability and sovereign insolvency at some point in the future.

Our Social Democrats in Washington have proven as adept at illogical financial excess and fuzzy math as their European counterparts. Not surprisingly, since they took control of Congress in 2006, the nation has lurched into a left wing nose-dive. If not corrected by a more reasoned and logical congress in November, the U.S. will be facing the same prospects as Greece, yet with much more catastrophic consequences. A report issued in March by the Congressional Budget Office indicates that Obama’s 2011 budget will generate nearly $10 trillion in cumulative budget deficits over the next 10 years, $1.2 trillion more than the administration projected!

Over a third of Greeks work for their government, a figure not that far out of the realm of possibility for the U.S. The “stimulus” from last year has proven to be stimulative only to government growth. And like their Greek counterparts, American civil servants are the most represented segment of the workforce organized into unions. And as economic historian John Steele Gordon points out, “Federal workers now earn, in wages and benefits, about twice what their private-sector equivalents get paid. Government workers often have Cadillac health plans and retirement benefits far above the private sector average: 80 percent of public-sector workers have pension benefits, only 50 percent in the private sector. Many can retire at age 50.” While private employers were shedding jobs during the recession, state and local governments hired 110,000 new workers.

Mona Charen, in a Wall Street Journal column noted last week, “And in a corrupt feedback loop that may not be so very different after all from the Greek practice, public employee unions give generously to Democratic candidates, both in cash contributions and by manning phone banks, getting out the vote, and so on. It’s no coincidence that the states with the most powerful public sector unions — New Jersey, California, and New York — are facing the most severe budget crises.”

The nations’ politicians have got to get a grasp of reality, shake off the imprudent and fallacious Keynesian notion of a nation spending itself out of a recession. And unlike the anti-government demonstrators in Greece, who are employees of the state and are fighting for continued excess, American Tea Party demonstrators are speaking out in opposition to the kind of spending that is giving new meaning to “Greek ruins,” in hopes of staving off the same fate in our country. The Social Democrats in our Congress, of both parties, must be removed from office and replaced with people who know how to balance a checkbook.

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