Fear This

I'm going to run the risk this morning of being the cranky old guy that everyone avoids. It's my right as a cranky old guy. Anyway, my blog, my rules. I'll write what I want, and you can avoid it if you want.

I'm sick of the fearmongering in this world. I shouldn't be; it's nothing new under the sun. It's always been here and likely always will. Still, there are times it really grates on a guy.

When I was 14 and a freshman in high school (to save you the time figuring out when, it was 1974) I remember our science teacher giving us a handout which said we would be out of oil by 1985. Period, end of report, no doubt about it. Yet here we are today with a couple hundred years of known reserves. Right about the same time we were pummeled with tales of a nuclear winter which would freeze us all out before 1990. Now we're apparently growing too hot. I think I'm within my rights to ask, what the hell? Why do you want to scare kids like that? And why are you still doing it today?

Ronald Reagan was supposedly leading us into nuclear holocaust. When AIDS was first discovered I read an article which claimed that the United States Army alone would have a million cases by 1995 or so. Neither concern hit anywhere near the heights which were predicted. And need I even mention COVID as an example of what government inspired hysteria causes?

Just to show that this rant isn't driven only by my personal philosophy, the right does it too. Barack Obama was not a particularly good President so far as I'm concerned, but he wasn't His Satanic Majesty either. Trying to remove President Clinton during the Lewinsky scandal merely created a sideshow that wasted our time and energy. Few people out to gut the Second Amendment are fire breathing commies. Many of them are otherwise good people who simply disagree with you. We don't need to insult anyone, we should strive not to insult anyone, especially those we may actually convert to our line of reasoning if we're patient and civil.

It all becomes one big game of the boy who cried wolf. One of these days a true crisis may arise which actually threatens life, the universe, and everything. Yet a lot of folks (like me) are going to say humbug simply because we've heard it all before. We need to be better about seeing things as they are and acting from that rather than trying to play people, especially the young, like puppets. We need to begin speaking to others, or at least not merely speaking at them as though they're great stupid fools too ignorant to believe the 'obvious'. It's beneath our dignity as human beings, and I'm sick of the whole thing.

Go now. What are you waiting for?

I am not a fan of Donald Trump. I do not want him to be the standard bearer for the GOP in November 2016. But I do have two words for those who say they will move to Canada if he is elected. Two very simple words.

Go now.

I am not a fan of Barack Obama. I suspect I feel about him the way many anti-Trump supporters feel about The Donald. In truth, I likely feel more powerfully anti-Obama than they feel anti-Trump. But never once during the 2008 or 2012 Presidential campaigns did I ever think that I would leave my country if that man were elected. This is my country. I will not abandon her merely because I do not like her choice for President. But if you would, if you would leave simply because you do not like the occupant of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, then I have two words for you.

Go now.

I'm aware of the spike in google searches for immigration to Canada in recent days. I love Canada myself; if forced to leave the United States, I would go there, if you'd excuse the irony, in a New York minute. But as it is, my country is the USA. And I will not leave her merely because the political tides are against my beliefs. But to those of you who would, I have two words.

Go now.

What are you waiting for? Clearly your patriotism is shallow and parochial. Go now. The door is open.

Dictating from the White House

President Barack Obama has leapt into action. He has issued executive orders and executive actions requiring tougher fuel efficiency standards for trucks. strengthening the U.S. patent system, and signed an executive order intended to speed up the process for approving import or export cargo. He will do other things, he promises, to bypass an uncooperative Congress. Mr Obama has also dallied with the minimum wage.

Shades of Obamacare. When the President doesn't get what he wants, he pulls whatever lever he can to get it, democracy be damned.

Defenders of the Chief Executive say that it's simply to get some movement on key issues, and that they're small measures anyway. They won't effect many. We will even add to his defense ourselves by allowing that other Presidents have issued executive orders when they felt a need, and that Mr. Obama was freely elected. He's doing nothing save serving the folks who put him in office.

Well, and we probably shouldn't go for the easy pitch here, Hitler was democratically elected. Did he have the best interests of the German people in mind? Beyond that admittedly (hopefully) extreme hyperbole, when a President seems to be getting nothing done because of Congress, and that Congress (elected more directly by the people than he was and representing a broader electorate) then it strikes us that the people don't want what he's offering. Seeing as Obamacare is decidedly unpopular, we are left to wonder whether a president who really had the will of the people in mind would have magnanimously went along with its repeal. Yet he forced that through with parliamentary gamesmanship, and now threatens extensive use of the executive order.

This is not leadership. It is however dictatorial. Small issues can become large rather quickly, and a power once used is easy to expand. If the President gets comfortable with this plan of action, it is not difficult to imagine him becoming emboldened and expanding his orders into other areas. Yes, we're arguing the slippery slope. Yes, we know that Barack Obama has issued fewer executive orders than many other Presidents, including his predecessor. But seeing as our current Chief has demonstrated a willingness to do whatever he wishes for whatever he wants, his actions are disconcerting.

This is not a President. This is a community organizer bossing everyone around. How do you like them apples, comrade?

The Truth Will Rise

Representative Paul Ryan of Wisconsin, the candidate for Vice President on Mitt Romney's ticket during the 2012 Presidential election in the United States, gave a speech yesterday in which he encouraged the GOP to pick its battles in the coming four years against President Barack Obama. Basically, he said that the Republicans need to oppose the President outright at times, compromise at times, and make the President's proposals (alliteration can be cool) more conservative when they can be so made. It is good advice.

What else can be done save to work with what we've got? And what we've got is four more years of President Barack Obama. He can, if he has the spine, and evidence shows he has more than that, veto what he does not like. And his vetoes will hold. Despite the control the Republican Party has on the House of Representatives, the Democrats hold the Senate. No veto will be, can be, overridden until at least 2015.

What does this say of the obvious majority? The majority which exists, obviously, in the fact that Republicans control most state houses and governorships. The United States is a conservative nation; it was founded on what today would be called conservative principles. We are a conservative nation. What do we do?

We wait. In the meantime, we do what we can, and we wait. We delay what seems inevitable (only seems, remember) and do what we can with what we've got to hold at bay the true evils which infect our country.

Such is not surrender; such is not an admission of defeat. Reality imposes certain restrictions; yet they are nothing more than restrictions of the moment. A 'tactical readjustment of the lines' may be necessary from time to time, from point to point. We are still winning the battle of the spirit.

It is a battle we will win. We will win it because human beings in their hearts see and understand it. It is a battle we will win because everyone, every man, woman, and child, sees it and fights towards it.

We will win it because it is in our nature. We will win it because it is what we believe. We will win it because it is right, and we know it.

We know it. That is our strength and our comfort. We know it.

Obama's Hypocrisy on Abortion

Well. When living children who reach the age of six or so are shot to death, they are mourned. As well they should be, of course. As well they should be. Yet should their mothers had elected to terminate their young lives in the womb, or, perhaps, a scant few seconds after they had left the womb, well, that is Momma's choice. Or Barack Obama's, as the case may be, given the legislation he and they supported.

How many children died during the massacre at Sandy Hook Elementary School last month? How many would have died before their births six years or thereabouts prior should their mothers or Barack Obama had chosen their deaths?

Pretty much about the same numbers.

Yet Adam Lanza is a cad, and Barack Obama a hero as he pronounces new gun control legislation. The pot calling the kettle, dare we ask?

Dare we ask. Dare we ask.

The Audacity of the President

“Implicit . . . in the very idea of ordered liberty... is a rejection of absolute truth, the infallibility of any idea or ideology or theology or ‘ism,’ any tyrannical consistency that might lock future generations into a single unalterable course . . ."

-The Audacity of Hope, by President Barack Obama

Well, there you have it, and about as concisely as can be had. Barack Obama doesn't believe in anything. It's no wonder that he believes that he can do as he pleases without regard to that pesky Constitution. All that document did was to lock future generations into a certain course. Never mind that the ride, on the whole, has been rather fruitful. The Constitution represents an 'ism'.

Guess what, Mr. President? You have an ism yourself. Everyone has an ism. Yours is relativism, and it is by far the worst ism out there.

How can you, Mr. Obama, assert the truth of the need for national health care if you don't see at least a bit of an absolute there? Doesn't everyone, of all times, at some point or another, need health care? Surely you would not have pushed for it if you did not see the benefit for all times and all places? Conservatives don't agree with you, of course. But we would have a greater respect for you if you were to argue that national health care, done well, will be a benefit for this and all following generations. As it is, all we can conclude is that you forced it through for selfish and self serving purposes: to win elections and create a legacy.

Then we have the obvious retort to your written philosophy: how can you be sure that your ideology, and it must be stressed that it is an ideology, be true if nothing is true for all times and all ages? Do you, can you, can any rational and intelligent being, really believe that? It seems that if they did, they would be little more than narcissists, or worse. Why bother about other people if nothing is true for all times and all ages?

Are we to presume, Mr. President, that, as nothing is true for all times and places, that there are, will be, or have been, periods where rape and child molestation are or were moral? Yes, we are quite sure you would say no to that. Yet as soon as you do, you have violated your own creed. By what legal or philosophical justification must rape and child molestation be wrong, anywhere and everywhere, unless we want to to bind the hands of future generations on the grounds that these things are and always will be wrong?

Ye speaketh with forked tongue, Mr. President. If nothing is right or wrong for all ages, then nothing is right or wrong today. But that suits your purposes just fine, doesn't it? You like the tyrannical consistency of relativism. That's how you can support abortion but cry for the children of Newtown, Connecticut. It's all relative.

Buying Elections

Mitt Romney has garnered more money out of Michigan than President Barack Obama. The Michigan native and son of former Governor George Romney has raised around $2 million, whereas the President has picked up $1.6 million himself. Nationally, however, it is a different story. The President has raised in the area of a whopping $157 million dollars. It makes Romney's total of $74 million appear almost meager. And it leaves a fascinating question.

Where are all the liberals who want presidential campaigns, indeed most any campaign for any political office, publicly funded?

They are strangely silent over an issue which so often in the past drawn their ire. We don't want anybody to buy an election, do we?

But as we have so often said here, liberals want what they want because it suits them. We cannot have evil rich Republican corporate types buying an election. But Hollywood hot shots and limousine liberals can buy whatever office they want.

That's pretty much what happened in 2008. Republican John McCain, who accepted federal election money, was outspent 4 to 1 by Barack Obama between September and November 2008. Still, he only won the popular vote by 53 to 47 percent in a year of rout by other Democratic candidates. If that doesn't qualify as a bought election, it certainly creases the envelope. And the President is trying to do the same thing in 2012.

We can demographics, if you like, and point out than Romney's contributors in Michigan tend to be wealthier while Obama has more total donors. Or even than contributions from Ann Arbor, the President's biggest local supporting city, came from an awful lot of University of Michigan employees. Academics tend to be among the richer liberals. But the demographics don't matter, if buying and selling elections is the moral evil the left until recently wanted us to believe.

It's simply more liberal hypocrisy. Keep that in mind when you consider your vote this November.

The President and Birth Control

The Obama Administration may have scored the political hit of the year with the birth control issue. In an era where religious liberty doesn't mean as much as it should, the President has mapped out a plan to make religion look bad while also making conservatives in general seem out of touch with the nation they love. By insisting that somehow, some way the seriously religious support something they morally cannot, Barack Obama may have found a way to ensure his reelection this fall.

He knows what he's doing. He's taken an issue which hasn't meant much for decades now and made it a front and center bone of contention. He's placed supposed women's rights against freedom of religion and is sitting back letting the spectacle play itself out. And who wins? He does.

The compromise he's offered is no compromise at all; indeed, one wonders whether compromise is possible on such questions. To say that Catholic institutions don't have to pay for birth control services yet insurers do misses the point: where does it leave insurers who may have the moral convictions of the Catholic Church? And it still, even if arguably only indirectly, forces Catholic institutions to pay for it.

It would be easy to say that we have a President who doesn't understand the Constitution. But that's not the case: we have a President who doesn't care about it. He's called it 'deeply flawed'. With that attitude, it's no wonder that such a historically important right as freedom of religion (and conscience) mean little to him. Our basic freedoms are little but political footballs to any community organizer.

Hopefully, Americans will see through this, remember their Constitution, and vote accordingly. But for now, the President has released his bull upon the china shop. And he doesn't care who has to pick up the pieces if it gets him a second term.

Obama's Disregard for Canada and Ourselves

President Barack Obama has rejected the Keystone Pipeline project, despite the fact that it would create 20,000 direct jobs. Who would those jobs go to, you might ask? Mostly union members, the exact people who seem to have wed themselves to the Democrats without any real real concern for what Democratic policies must actually mean for the working stiff. Is there a lesson in all this? One would think so; yet they'll still vote for him in November.

The President had three and a half years to make up his mind about the Pipeline, then had the audacity to blame the GOP for his dismissal of it. What more needed to be done? This is little more than an elections year ploy towards the environmental left, a group for which many if not most union members have little regard. But will they ask whether the President is selling them out because of this? It's highly doubtful; they may even bend over backwards to find reason to support him anyway. Has Big Labor ever stopped and asked if maybe they're being played?

Meanwhile, what does this say about our regard for Canada? This is costing them time, effort, and jobs as well. They're trying to be good neighbours by selling to us first, and we spit at it. What kind of message does that send? Isn't it better to get oil more locally rather than from halfway around the world and stay involved in the Middle East? Call it dirty oil if you will, but we'll never have a war for oil with Canada, you know. Now they'll simply sell it elsewhere.

We have a President who hurts America and her greatest ally and friend. He hurts the very people who are supposed to be among his core supporters. Yet it will all mean nothing to his apologists.

But it does mean something to the rest of us. November 2012 cannot come quickly enough.

Obama the Coward?

President Barack Obama certainly is a politician. Either that, or he's afraid of his own policies and/or core constituency. The latest example of this is the delaying of a decision on a proposed US/Canadian oil pipeline until after the 2012 elections. It is clearly a move designed to appeal to the environmentalists, who hailed the decision as one which will lessen the production of greenhouse gases.

Maybe so, maybe no. Either way, we all know that liberal environmentalists are against anything which actually helps human beings go about earning the daily bread, and that they are fanatical supporters of the President. By refusing to make a decision before the next major electoral cycle plays out, he's simply playing to them to ensure their vote. Should he be re-elected, it would not be a surprise if he quickly approved some sort of pipeline then, when he doesn't have to worry about pandering to his supporters.

Never mind that we could desperately use the jobs now, or that Canada might just sell the oil to Asia. It's all about putting off the tough decisions until after a referendum on his power. He did the same thing with Obamacare, making it so that the major provisions of the health care overhaul don't take effect until after November 2012 as well. By that point, he will either be given another term or have been tossed out. He would then be in the position of not having to worry about 2016 while reaping the praises of his primary Presidential act, or be able to catcall as his masterpiece is altered or abandoned.

The bottom line is that what we see in President Obama is someone who paints himself a true believer while putting off the actual effects of his creed until they can't hurt him, or, at least, not hurt him too bad. If you think that's chicken of him, you may just be on to something.

Polls: Still Meaningless

Just a few days ago, we argued in this column that pools mean little, especially so early in an election cycle (as we are well ahead of the 2012 Presidential election). With two recently released polls, one showing that President Barack Obama would lose to the kind of favorite son (he was born and raised here in Michigan) Mitt Romney while another right on its heels said the President would win, it seems appropriate to examine them in a bit greater detail.

The first poll had Romney winning 46 to 41 percent, with a margin of error of 4%. What this translates into is that he could win bigger, say, 50 to 37 percent, if the whole margin for error goes his way, or lose 45 to 42 percent if the error factor goes towards the President.

The second poll, which plays into Mr. Obama's favor, had him winning 47% of the vote to Governor Romney's 42. Yet the with the same 4% margin of error, that could mean a win of 51-38 for the President, or a win of 46-43 for Romney. Of course, neither projection really factors in how the remaining percentages would go. Yet that only exacerbates the problem. Winning margins could go wildly off course either way depending on how the rest of the voters, those not committing to either projected candidate in the polls in question, cast a ballot.

An interesting aside is that the polls agree that marginal candidates, such as Thaddeus McCotter and Herman Cain, are unknown by around 48% of the voting public.

So what have we here? Two polls which effectively tell us nothing about who would actually win the Presidency (if left up to Michigan) in 2012, with the caveat of something which common sense would have told us immediately if we would take a second to listen: nobody knows Livonia Congressman McCotter or businessman Cain.

Yet both poll results were big news locally. It had to be a slow day.

GOP in Michigan

Michigan will be one of thirteen states which will have, in the coming months, ads attacking President Barack Obama's handling of the economy. The plan has set off the expected saber rattling, as Republicans look to hurt Mr. Obama where he did well in 2008 while Democrats seek to argue that the Republicans aren't playing fair on the issue.

That being said, it is important that the Republican National Committee has selected Michigan as one of the battleground states. The President won handily three years ago, but the state has experienced a Republican resurgence since, taking the entire legislative branch as well as the governorship. Neither the White House nor the Democratic leadership should expect a particularly easy time here in 2012.

The President needs the rust belt states if he is to earn a second term. Michigan and the rest of the old industrial states are where the core, old line Democrats have traditionally been strong. They can attempt to blame GOP policies from several years back if they insist, but the question becomes: will the voting public buy it?

In the light of 2010 bi-elections, the answer seems to be no. You simply cannot continue to blame people who have been gone for years for troubles of your own making. Mr. Obama has allowed spending to soar, and without helping the economy one whit. If the Democrats and the President refuse to lean a lesson, they shall soon realize that the voters do take their lessons well, and will cast their ballots accordingly.

We Need More Oil

President Barack Obama has order the release of 30 million barrels of oil from the United States Strategic Reserve in order to keep gas prices down and help the general economy, which is still in the doldrums more than two years into his administration.

Such actions are akin to taking aspirin for cancer. They are by their nature limited in scope and do not address energy programs in the long term. Neither will it really aid the economy except, perhaps, for the short term. And that's really the problem with the Democratic Party today, if not the trouble with politics and politicians in general. Shoring up an Administration which must be be seeing the 2012 elections as an extension of the rout the left suffered in 2010 means more right now than any long term help for the American economy or the American citizen.

How about more drilling, Mr. President? How about opening up the ANWAR? Why don't we try using something more than band aids on a gaping sore? If there's one area which the Republicans surely messed up over, it was in not extending oil drilling further when they had both Houses and the Presidency. We might actually be past Mr. Obama's strategy and have more oil of our own at our disposal.

Well, it's something, we suppose. But it isn't enough, and the economy will not fully rebound without a more comprehensive search for energy. Find it, drill it, burn it in our engines. Short of that, we shall have in our future only a double dip recession.

Cash for Clunkers hurt the Poor

When attempting to buy a good used car in or around Detroit, indeed perhaps anywhere in the nation, and one thing will surely jump out at you: the high prices of used cars. At Auto Round Up on Detroit's west side, a 12 year old vehicle with 225,000 miles was going for $2,400! At A and G Auto Sales on the east side, a 1997 Mercury with 150,000 miles and a badly damaged rear bumper was priced at $1,695. Similar tales abound, but the bottom line is this: in the Motor City, good used cars at good prices are tough to find.

We have our friend President Barack Obama to thank for that. You see, the Cash for Clunkers program decimated the used car market. Every car turned in for the program had to be destroyed; they could not be refurbished or resold. The reason given was to get older, gas guzzling vehicles off the road.

But were they all really gas hogs? One particular area heavily hit are the famed minivans, family cars not especially known to burn excessive petrol or horribly pollute the air. Trying to find a decently priced one less than even 15 years old is a challenge: a 1995 Caravan at a car lot on Van Dyke in Warren, Michigan was listed at $1600. This is a vehicle 16 model years old.

So who benefited from the program? Middle class Americans who could have afforded a new car had they wanted anyway, and unionized auto workers who vote for the Democratic Party and our President. The poorer classes, the ones the left tell us so often how much they care about, meanwhile, are struggling to get something within their budgets. Even the used car dealers are struggling because they can't get cars for inventory at prices their clientele can afford.

The federal government should have never been in the auto sales field anyway, and part of the reason is in the unintended consequences of such behavior as illustrated by the dry yet inflated used car market. Cash for Clunkers hurts the very segment of society which Democrats claim to love so much. Yet a moment's simple thought would have prevent the harm. A basic understanding of supply and demand would have shown the folly of the program as written.

But appealing to the people who vote them en masse and are also more likely give the Democratic Party cash and effort means more to the left than rational government policy. Yet the poor? The ones the Democrats so much for?

We suppose that they may eat cake.

Who Needs Whom?

New polling suggests pretty heavily that the Democrats and President Barack Obama need the so-called moderate vote in order to win elections, while the GOP can rely on the conservative vote quite readily. This can be interpreted in several ways, but perhaps the most insightful is this: moderates aren't really moderates, as a group, but, rather, lean towards more traditional and familiar thoughts whenever in doubt.

That makes sense, in the end. For when there is a crisis, don't most people act based on what they know? When President Reagan was elected back in 1980 to stem the tide of Democratic and hence more liberal leadership, what was his appeal? To make America great again, based on the traditional American values of individualism and hard work. When the GOP ran the tide last November, what was the big question: nothing less than obtrusive, interfering government trampling the rights of the people.

The moderates responded as they knew how, by throwing out those who did not support real American values. That's why conservatives don't have to appeal too overtly to the presumed middle: they aren't actually in the center after all. They are in fact more moderate to conservative rather than being between the left and the right as they are generally portrayed.

Given the fact that so few people, about 20 percent or one in five, call themselves liberal, and it seems that what we truly have in our nation today is an overall aversion to liberalism. Even the presumed center appears to harbor similar doubts about the left, seeing as the Democrats need to get about 60% of the middle of the road vote to win major elections. It is a telling statistic, and does not bode well for any long term success for the party of Jefferson and Jackson.

Of course, the Democratic Party left the beliefs of those American stalwarts behind eons ago. But that is a tale for another time.

The War in Libya and American Politics

The old saying goes, "The more things change, the more they stay the same". It certainly seems to apply to President Barack Obama and the art of war.

Ronald Reagan was routinely criticized for his use of the military in areas of the world where we presumably had no interest. In that light it is fascinating to see the current Chief Executive railing against Libya. As John McCain said, Obama's policy with regards to that north African nation is simply that Gadhafi must go.

On the surface, that appears to be a much stronger attack on a foreign nation which has offered no real threat to us since, well, since President Reagan laid the smackdown on it back in the 1980s. Yet the media doesn't seem to mind Obama's warmongering. Why?

In part because it's a liberal leader rather than a prototypical right wing reactionary (in their minds) leading the way. But surely part of it lies in the fact that the only real area of American politics where the President holds a tremendous amount of sway is in foreign policy. Combine this with the fact that Obama and the Democrats are in trouble at home with the 2012 elections looming, and we see what is truly their inspiration: they want and need a foreign policy victory, especially one which is easily painted as being in support of freedom for the Libyan people, in order to shore up the chances of a better result for the Democrats and their President two Novembers from now.

We are not saying this is all the reason for their support of the Libyan rebels, but it is surely a huge factor in their rationale. In short, don't give the President too much credit. He's really only using Libya to fight his own political war stateside.

The President and Adolf Hitler

A group of South Dakota legislators have proposed that every one in that fair state over the age of 21 own a gun. The most immediate response is to jeer, and dismiss the move as a typically conservative reaction in protection of the Second Amendment.

But that would be wrong. What they are doing is showing the downright stupidity of certain government mandates on a level which even the most stouthearted liberal could understand. South Dakota State Representative Hal Wicks explains it best: "Do I or the other co-sponsors believe that the state of South Dakota can require citizens to buy firearms? Of course not. But at the same time, we do not believe the federal government can order every citizen to buy health insurance."

The action illustrates the inanity, indeed the total threat to personal freedom, which is essentially behind the Affordable Care Act. If the government can order the individual to get health insurance, what else might the government order them to do? Eat right? Exercise? Because, of course, eating right and exercise would help curtail health care costs and would be good for you. And isn't it about what's good for you?

But therein lies the trouble: it quickly becomes not about what's right for you but what's right for the general society. Not that the individual should not have a proper general concern for society (for a stable society best makes it possible for him to enjoy proper freedoms) but that, ultimately, the person must, under reasonable circumstances, have the final say on his or her daily choices. Otherwise, we may as well become the Borg, and allow ourselves to simply be plugged in where everyone else thinks best. We may as well become the robots of the state.

That is what liberals, in the end, want. They want to tell us where to live and what type of transportation to use and what to eat and what to do with our lives. For to the left, it's all about the state. Your freedom ends where their desires begin. And they want it all.

That's why the Affordable Care Act is totalitarian, plain and simple. If the government can tell us to buy a certain something, a certain anything, it lays the groundwork for the government to control us all the way down. At the risk of feeding the vitriol which has so many folks distraught these days, that's why it's okay to portray President Obama as Hitler. The jewel of his Presidency is simply dictatorial.

The State of the Union in 2011

President Barack Obama offered his third State of the Union address to the nation last night. It was not particularly remarkable. Indeed, it was rather bland, as though it had no real direction.

He tried throughout the speech to sound positive and upbeat, yet it seemed forced. That the President is a man with a certain charisma is without doubt. But that does not seem to translate well into a man who can inspire, which is what he seemed to be attempting last night.

No doubt that many of his supporters will point out that his proposals received high marks immediately after the talk; A CBS News poll had what the President proposed at an astounding 92 percent approval while seeing support for his economics jump to 81 percent. But those numbers cannot be counted for much as they will surely wane as the Tucson shootings fall further back into our history. We need only remember George W. Bush high marks immediately after 9/11: the nation tends to rally behind whoever is the leader right after a sudden and inexplicable event.

Mr. Obama wasn't all that smooth in his delivery. He stumbled a few times late in the speech and truly offered few specifics. A time or two an attempt at humor to lighten things up fell flat, although to his credit the remark leading into comments on health care was properly snarky: "Now, I've heard rumors that a few of you have some concerns about the new health care law." The President deserves praise for his comments in accepting John Boehner as the new House Speaker, too. They were well said and well played. Much of the speech was a laundry list, but that was to be expected. There were few surprises there.

In the end, what the President asked for was bipartisanship. What else could he do, given the circumstances? He was trying to tell the country that he would work with whom we have sent him. How far that will play out remains to be seen, of course, and even on this night of coming together, newly elected Republicans need to stay emboldened and focused on what they were sent to Washington to do. This is a President willing to force his views on your constituents even when they clearly did not want them; don't be too quick to accept the olive branch merely for appearances. The glow will fade, and you have real work to do.

It wasn't a terrible speech, yet it was not a very good one either. The President played the right keys under the circumstances. But can he find the right ones as the shirt sleeves are rolled up and he's not the center of attention?

Fighting the Good Fight

The United States House of Representatives has voted to repeal the 2010 Health Care plan. The GOP promises to fight hard in the Senate to follow up in agreement with the House. This is despite the fact that Nevada's Harry Reid has vowed to not it come to a vote in that body. Even so, should it pass the upper chamber, there is the virtual certainty that President Obama will veto it.

Just the same, the Republicans are well advised to press the issue as far as they can. If the are truly intent on showing that the are the party which speaks for mainstream America, if they really want to show the general populace that they are different from the democrats in thought, word, and action, then then the GOP must fight this battle to the end. Anything less would have to be considered a failure.

With the high number of Democratic Senators up for reelection in 2012 compared to only few GOP seats, and especially with the recent announcement that North Dakota's Kent Conrad will retire after this term, the Republicans can set themselves up to be the major party for decades. If they show backbone and grit and make sure the voters know they are not the Democrats. That begins with fighting Reid and company all the way to the mat and making the Democrats the fall guys on this issue. If they can back up their words with action, they'll do well. If not, nothing particularly dramatic will happen in November 2012.

A Review of the Year, Sort Of.

The Democrats want to bust the filibuster because the Republicans have used it so much in blocking many of their plans. Yet they used it themselves quite often thwarting the goals former President George W. Bush. This tells us two things: the Democrats, once again, are hypocrites, and that those in power like to wield that power.

The filibuster is Constitutional, folks, under Article I. If we alter it at all,then we ought to go back to when the Senator speaking had to hold the floor and stay there while filibustering. Any way you slice it, let it stand as a defense against tyranny, even if it is too often used for simple political gain or advantage. There are times when we must take the bitter with the sweet.

The Detroit Symphony Orchestra has been on strike for what, now, 13 weeks? No one seems to miss it. No one really cares, outside of self serving classical music patrons, whether it is there or not. That is the final word on the subject. There is no need to support optional features or unimportant peripheral issues cannot support themselves, no matter how necessary you believe they are or what positive, ahem, note you think it may sound for the community. Having a local professional symphony is just not a big deal. The crisis, such as it is, isn't worth a quarter note.

Barack Obama and his minions forced through health care reform, and paid dearly in November. This demonstrates that the political process can work. When the people are riled enough to do something within it.

Tim Tebow's anti-abortion ad during the Super Bowl was one simple yet stunning bit of cinema, and the liberal outburst against it demonstrated their complete loathing of human life. How dare we suggest that human life is special? That's the trouble with us conservatives: we think life important.

Whatever happened to the Wikileaks, uh, scandal? Somehow it doesn't seem so awful as it was supposed to be, with what's his name behind it in legal trouble and no Third World War yet.

The Tea Party demonstrated real political clout in 2010. Are they merely an organized minority or do they represent a greater portion of American public than we are supposed to believe? Either way, as the New Year dawns, it would be a good idea for the liberals to sit back with a cup of Earl Grey and consider the risks involved in over-reaching your bounds. Perhaps a spot of cream to ease the bitterness would be in order, eh wot?

2011 approaches, and there's no reason that we shouldn't accept it with open arms. We may as well be positive, at least at the start of the new decade. Auld Lang Syne, friends. Auld Lang Syne.