2012 Candidate Profiles: David Gerson of Minnesota Congressional District Two

Professor Wall interviews congressional candidate David Gerson (R-MN)

Incumbent Republican U.S. representative John Kline (R-MN) has been looked upon as a hero in the Minnesota GOP for his stunning upset of popular Democratic congressman Bill Luther (DFL-MN) in 2002, but times have dramatically changed since then. Ten years after his historic victory, Kline has a number of constituents unhappy with him and as a result he is now facing his first severe election test since 2002. This time, however, the challenge is within his own party; coming from engineer and economic author David Gerson (R-MN) of Eagan, Minnesota.

“I was asked to come down to CD2 and run in the primary against John Kline and the issue is that his constituents felt that he was not representing their interests and that his voting over the last ten years has not equaled or been in line with the Republican platform” said Gerson in an interview with New Agora. He also added: “The reason why I am taking on the incumbent Republican versus running against a Democrat is because I believe that both parties’ leaders have failed us, including the Republican Party. We are looking to reform the Republican Party to ensure that when we send people to Washington D.C. that they uphold our values and our ideals and we feel there is a need to hold our current leadership responsible for their transgressions in not doing so.”

Gerson, born in Boston and raised in both Boston and North Carolina, received bachelors and masters degrees in the engineering field from North Carolina State University and is currently an executive at a global engineering company where he is responsible for executive engineering transformation.

He also has begun dabbling in writing books on economics and recently just published his first book on economics labeled ‘How Crony Capitalism Crushed the Middle Class and Killed the Economy: Revealing the Economics of Legal Plunder’. When asked how he was inspired to write the book, Gerson said:

“I’ve been always a little bit interested in Macroeconomics and since the financial crisis I have had a much deeper concern like most Americans and I’m a pretty analytical guy so I dive into things pretty deeply.” Gerson then related how, having never taken a college-level economics course, he was forced to do much of his own research, but looked upon that as an advantage as he entered his study of economics with an open mind. He then directed his studies to every part that he did not know so that he would have more fully rounded knowledge. As he studied, he began to have some ideas that were different from what was being presented and started to put those ideas into a book which forced him to do a lot of research to validate his points. It helped to shape some of the thoughts that he had and to confirm a lot of the thoughts that he had and he attempted to bring across the economic message in a way which would be digestible in the book, though he admitted that the book is ‘slightly wonkish’. He also stated that he hoped more people would build on his work and that the ideas he had put forward in it would influence him in his congressional votes on economic policy if he were to be elected to Congress.

Gerson, who references and criticizes the Federal Reserve in his book, states that he supports Ron Paul’s Audit the Fed bill and the drive to end the Federal Reserve, while also emphasizing that it will not be a simple task and there will have to be a long transition period and transition plan put in place where the setting of interest rates and other such things are systematically removed from bureaucratic control and given back to the free market before the end of the Federal Reserve can finally come about.

“The number one thing is transparency. People need to see transparency and that will obviously affect the behaviors of the people that operate inside the Fed” Gerson added, referring to the Audit the Fed bill.

In reference to Ron and Rand Paul’s new crusade for internet freedom, Gerson emphasized that he supports the crusade as a fight for freedom of speech.

“I don’t want to see government controls over the internet. We have a right to free speech and I don’t want to give control to some bureaucrat that is going to determine what is proper and what isn’t” said Gerson.

When asked about the ‘indefinite detention of Americans’ clause in the NDAA law, Gerson stated that he was surprised more Americans were not outraged at the loss of their right to due process of the law. He then reiterated a pledge to work with congressmen such as Justin Amash and Rand Paul to repeal laws such as the NDAA indefinite detention clause, H.R. 347 (which limits the rights to free speech in and around federal buildings and grounds) and the PATRIOT Act (which allows government to access individuals’ private records along with other invasive capabilities). He also stated that he supported efforts to eliminate the use of drones on American soil.

“I hate to oversimplify it, but we cannot sacrifice our rights in the name of safety period” stressed Gerson.

With regards to issues such as abortion and marriage, Gerson stated that he is pro-life and supports pro-life causes but that he would rather see the pro-life issue resolved at the state level first. He added that he would support pro-life legislation such as Ron Paul’s Sanctity of Life Act which would overturn the Roe v. Wade Supreme Court decision by removing the issue from federal jurisdiction and returning it to the states where most criminal law is already handled. He also supports efforts to defund Planned Parenthood. Concerning marriage, Gerson stated that he believes marriage is not a federal issue.

Gerson also pledged that he would work to repeal the Affordable Care Act, also known as Obamacare.

“I would work to repeal (Obamacare). It is that simple. I don’t think it’s the right thing for America. It makes bigger government, bigger government controls; with bigger government comes inefficiencies and market distortions which is unhealthy for America.”

With his positions on the issues laid out, Gerson was asked about his campaign to unseat John Kline as the Republican nominee for Congress in Minnesota’s Second Congressional District, with the first reference being to what he feels needs to happen in order for him to successfully defeat Kline in the primary.

“I think it is this simple. People need to know John Kline’s voting record” said Gerson “John Kline does a great job messaging against the Democrats, but he has been part of the Republican leadership and part of leadership period on both sides of the (aisle) that has failed us over the last ten years. He has voted in line with (Speaker of the House) John Boehner on every major issue. No one votes with John Boehner more than John Kline. If you are happy with the leadership in Congress, and we know that nobody is, they have the lowest approval rating in history, you will love John Kline. We need to expose his record, which is un-defendable.”

Put simply, Gerson believes that if people are awakened to who Kline really is, then that will be all he needs to win the primary.

“(Kline) has not been representing his constituents” continued Gerson “He has been representing special interests in Washington D.C. He says he is for lower taxes, but he continues to vote for big government programs, bigger government, bigger budgets, bigger federal deficits that increase our taxes. He has voted to take away our civil rights; he has voted for the NDAA; he voted for the PATRIOT Act and its extensions every time; he voted for H.R. 347. So he has taken away our civil rights and he has voted for bigger government; he has voted for a 2.4. trillion dollar increase in the debt ceiling; he provided the deciding vote on Medicare Part D, the largest social welfare initiative since (President Lyndon) Johnson’s Great Society programs. He overrode President (George W.) Bush’s veto which effectively repealed the Freedom to Farm Act which even President Bush labeled as lacking fiscal discipline and he liked Cash for Clunkers so much that he voted for it twice.”

When asked, in contrast to Kline’s record, why voters should pick him over Kline, Gerson issued a straight forward answer.

“Well I’m not a career politician. I’m successful in the private sector so if I get voted out of Congress I can go back to the private sector and maintain my standard of living, actually I would increase it by going back to the private sector. So I will not be swayed by the Establishment from my own agenda (into) supporting the special interest groups and playing the Washington games; so I am a private sector guy, I am not a career politician. I will represent my constituents. I am a true conservative and I will uphold the Republican platform. The problem has been that we have been electing people that have come to campaign and say that they believe in the Republican platform but then go to Washington D.C. and transgress completely away from what our ideals and our true conservative values are.”

In a follow-up question, Gerson was asked to comment on Kline’s statement in an email to potential supporters in the 2nd Congressional District where he appeared to label Gerson as an outsider from Minneapolis and the Fifth Congressional District and why he felt Kline was resorting to this tactic to disqualify Gerson in the minds of voters instead of debating the issues.

“I would love for him to meet up and debate me on the issues” said Gerson with a touch of enthusiasm, “because I would love to call him on his voting record which is just un-defendable. I have no idea why he made that statement, your characterization might be as right as any.” Gerson then explained that, while it was true that he had originally been living in Minneapolis, he was moving to the 2nd Congressional District and has been active in the Minnesota Republican Party. He also re-emphasized that he was recruited through certain networks to come down and challenge Kline.

“(I) was recruited to come down here and try to send this message, not just to John Kline, but to all incumbents and to the Republican Party that we need some catharsis, we need to be honest with who we are and we need to deal with the last elephant in the room that our leadership has been failing us and we cannot blindly vote for people because they are incumbents” said Gerson.

Gerson was also asked, if he were to become the nominee, if he would be able to change his strategy from contrasting records to educating the populace about why his stances are more correct then what Democratic nominee Mike Obermueller will be standing for.

“It is a two-fold thing, not only do they have to understand who John Kline is and what he has really voted for and the fact that he is not representing who he is and his voting record is one of the worst in Washington D.C. and we have to start holding our incumbent leaders responsible for their transgressions. They also have to know who I am and my background.” Gerson then stressed that people could learn a lot about his views through his book and through his website where he lays forth overviews to why he is running, what his beliefs are and what he is doing to get people to believe again in the system so that they can take back their government and so help re-energize the Republican Party base with candidates who are private sector-oriented and not career politicians.

When asked about his political future and whether he would consider running for either a state office or for the Republican nomination to challenge Senator Al Franken or Governor Mark Dayton in 2014, Gerson emphasized that he currently was completely focused on the task at hand, namely defeating John Kline in the Minnesota GOP primary.

“I currently have no aspirations to do anything except win on August 14th” said Gerson, then adding: “I fully expect that we will actually be in a race for the general election, come August 15th. I am not thinking beyond August 14th today, we are a machine, we are focused on winning on August 14th in this primary.”

Finally, Gerson was asked if his campaign had a campaign song to which Gerson replied that they did not but that they would love suggestions and he encouraged constituents to call in with recommendations.

Congressman Kline should be worried about this challenge. Considering Minnesota gave its nod for the Republican presidential nomination to Congressman Ron Paul and the Republican U.S. Senate endorsement to state representative Kurt Bills and that David Gerson is clearly in the same mold as those gentlemen, it is obvious that this is a serious challenge. If the trend which has been taking place in the Minnesota GOP continues, then Kline could very well find himself watching Gerson and Obermueller battle for his seat in the general election while he prepares for retirement as another victim of the Tea Party and Liberty Movement’s takeover of American and Minnesota politics.

© 2012 New Agora and The Subsidiarity Times. All rights reserved. This material may not be re-published, re-broadcast, re-written, re-transcribed or re-distributed without written permission from blog author.

2012 Candidate Profiles: Chris Fields of Minnesota Congressional District Five

Chris Fields gives a campaign speech at a picnic in Hopkins, Minnesota

He is running in a district where Republicans have not won since 1960, but that does not deter former Marine Chris Fields (R-MN) from believing he can replace incumbent Congressman Keith Ellison (D-MN) in Minnesota’s Fifth Congressional District and so join the other 434 U.S. representatives on Capitol Hill in January 2013.

“(The) campaign is going good, we have a lot of support” said Fields in an interview with New Agora journalist Professor Wall, “the interesting part of the people that support Chris Fields is this: they’ve ranged from all spectrums of the political world. We have Democrats, hardened Democrats, because frankly they are not very satisfied with Keith Ellison and the things that he has been doing, the grandstanding in Congress, his lack of legislative achievements and so they are in our camp; and then we have social conservatives that are in our camp because I am a strong pro-life candidate and we also have Ron Paul supporters and I’m a liberty loving guy like all of those guys and so our support is very deep and very wide. In fact, last month alone we raised thirty thousand dollars which is a big deal for a congressional campaign of this size in the toughest district for Republicans to win in.”

Fields said his motivation to run was twofold. Part of his motivation came from his experience growing up as the impoverished child of a very young mother (she had three children before she was twenty) which left an imprint on him and has helped him understand the struggles of so many of today’s Americans. The other part came from his twenty-one years of service in government as a United States Marine. Those experiences, said Fields, evoked a very strong sense in him of what he could do to turn things around.

In current events, when asked for his opinion on Ron Paul’s “Audit the Fed” bill currently going through Congress, Fields emphasized that it would not be a quick process to bring the end of the Federal Reserve about, but that he supports ‘the thrust of (Ron Paul’s) argument which is: “we need accountability.”’

“I think that’s where his bill is aimed: at getting more accountability with our economic policy and I would be a huge supporter of that alone” said Fields.

Concerning Ron and Rand Paul’s new crusade for internet freedom, Fields supports efforts to keep the internet open and free.

“We would have to take a look at the legislation (in favor of internet freedom), but I did not support SOPA” said Fields

“What I am concerned about with internet freedom” he continued, “is that it has to remain open, it has to remain accessible to everyone, to bloggers and to the wide range of Americans who want to be able to express themselves. What is truly concerning to me is when you have, whether it is the recording industry or some of the other industries that are lined up against (internet freedom) and they want to control the voice, they want to own the internet so to speak. That really doesn’t sit well with me and it shouldn’t sit well with a lot of Americans.”

Chris Fields converses with potential supporters as part of his bid to win the congressional seat in Minnesota's 5th House District

In regards to the prospective indefinite detention of Americans thanks to certain clauses in the NDAA law, Fields stated that, while the clause was, in a sense, ambiguous and many had tried to reassure Americans that the law would not be used or construed that way, he still could not have supported it.

“With the NDAA, no I could not have voted for that, with that statement in there. There was one statement that could be construed as ‘Americans could be held, detained’; President Obama had a signing statement saying ‘Hey, this in fact not what we are going to do’, this is not a road his administration was going to go down, but the fact that its in there just leads me to believe that some clever lawyer somewhere could potentially use that and that is enough for me not to support that bill. I don’t want to give those folks the ammunition to restrict American liberties and our due process because that is what this goes to: our due process.”

Fields expressed even stronger concerns about the use of drones on American soil. “I’m particularly concerned about drones and here is why:” said Fields “A couple of weeks ago a drone just crashed in Maryland and Maryland is a pretty big state, but my experience in the military is that we usually test out equipment out there on the West Coast in Nevada in the big desert, so that wouldn’t have raised my eyebrow; but the fact that it crashed in Maryland, like what sort of testing were they doing out there? What was this drone’s mission in particular? Was he going around picking up signals from everyday Americans? We need to know more about that and the fact that this administration has used drones so extensively in the War on Terror, it is a system that can be ripe for abuse.”

Following up his opinions on these issues, Fields emphasized that, unlike Ellison who seems to choose his battles based on the administration in power, he would rather vote for what was right than follow the party line.

“I’m not interested in the Left or the Right so to speak, its about what is right for me and what I see (as the difference between) myself and Keith (Ellison) is ‘Hey, I want to be someone that focuses on what is right and I don’t care who the administration is’; if its President Romney, no, I get to oppose his use or abuse of drones; or you know, this NDAA, I don’t care who put that bill forward, you know, you have to have some sort of integrity and that’s what our political system is missing right now.”

Upon being asked for his stances on some of the main social conservative issues as well as Obamacare, Fields re-emphasized his pro-life roots, especially being born to a fifteen year old mother, and added “I am Pro-Life from cradle to grave with no exceptions and you know what, I am pretty unapologetic about that.” He did go on to add however that he was not a single-issue candidate and that he felt that the country has more pressing concerns which must be solved before a constitutional amendment banning abortion could be constructively addressed and have any hope of becoming law. Speaking on Obamacare, Fields expressed grave concerns about the Federal Government intervening in healthcare and said he would prefer state and local authorities taking control of their own situation in regards to addressing any healthcare problems. Fields also added that he felt the marriage issue would be best settled by the people at the state level in the referendums currently being voted on rather then judges.

With two candidates vying for the Democratic congressional nomination in Congressman Ellison and activist Gary Bosiclair, (an ally of Democratic presidential candidate Randall Terry), Fields is ready to lay out why voters should pick him over either of those candidates in November.

“With Keith, you know what you’re going to get” Fields said of Ellison, “Keith has been in office since 2006 and not much has gotten better in the lives of many of the people in the district. Minneapolis is home to the largest achievement gap in education between black and white students and with regard to unemployment we still have the largest unemployment gap between blacks and whites in the entire country. That is an embarrassment and I would say this: In the age of Obama and with a representative like Ellison, that should not be the case. Minneapolis and the fifth congressional district have not gotten the focused attention they need. Keith is out talking about a lot of national issues, you name it, everything from Syria to Palestine to Citizens United, this guy is all over the map and what we don’t have here is focused attention; and what we aim to do is provide focused attention, not focusing on the issues that are friendly to Left or issues that are friendly to the Right, but focusing on what is right and what is right for the fifth congressional district. We need to get private enterprise in here and we need to start making investments, not just government investments, which is exclusively what Keith talks about almost, but we need to get private dollars, we need to make ourselves more attractive economically so that we can get new Fortune 500 (companies) to grow. We have a lot of Fortune 500 companies, but we don’t have a lot moving here and that’s what we need to begin to do.”

With Boisclair, Fields commented that: “(I) read some of his stuff, I understand he is pretty strong on the (Pro-)Life issue and I applaud him for that but beyond that we have not seen a whole lot of information with regard to where he stands. If you are going to be strong on the (Pro-)Life issue but then continue to support some of the other drastic environmental pieces of legislation that the Democratic Party has put out, like being opposed to the Keystone Pipeline and things of that nature, well then you have the difference there. So you have to backup what you’re talking about with a strong agenda that gets people back to work and in particular addresses the achievement gap in education as well as the unemployment gap.”

Concerning his political future, Fields was asked if he would consider running for the Republican nomination to challenge Senator Al Franken or Governor Mark Dayton in 2014.

“Well right now we have to focus on what is on our plate and so me pontificating on what I am going to do the day after the election is probably not where my focus needs to be. And one of the things that voters are going to understand about me is that I am incredibly focused and incredibly disciplined. And that is probably a product from me being in the Marines but probably not insofar as, coming from the South Bronx in New York City, there is a whole lot of ways to get yourself distracted and turned around and so that you go all off of course in terms of making yourself successful in life. (I) been able to avoid those distractions and so I think in the political sense here I can avoid the distraction of thinking about tomorrow and focus in on what is important for today.”

© 2012 New Agora and The Subsidiarity Times. All rights reserved. This material may not be re-published, re-broadcast, re-written, re-transcribed or re-distributed without written permission from blog author.

The Stamp and Declaratory Acts of our Era: Obamacare and the Supreme Court Decision

The Supreme Court’s appalling 5-4 ruling upholding the poorly named Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) has thrown down the challenge to the American people. The people of America proclaimed the motto of the Gadsden Flag “Don’t Tread on Me” through the Tea Party for the last five years and the Federal Government, speaking through the majority opinion in the Supreme Court’s decision, has responded accordingly: “Oh yeah? Stop us then.” With that answer from the Federal Government, the second coming of the American Revolution has come closer to reality.

If one thinks back to the original American Revolution, that movement also started over two vastly unpopular laws. First, there was the Stamp Act of 1765. That law required every individual to pay for a government stamp on almost everything, from legal documents put together by lawyers to playing cards and dice used by sailors. It would be followed in 1766 by the Declaratory Act which decreed that Parliament had the “full power and authority to make laws and statutes of sufficient force and validity to bind the colonies and people of America in all cases whatsoever.” These acts were the closest thing to taxing and regulating behavior the modern world would see from a government until the twentieth and twenty-first centuries. The acts ignited a firestorm of protests from the colonists. They were outraged at the prospect of being taxed and over-regulated by a government a long way away which knew very little about the colonies and refused to see the misery that their taxes and regulations would inflict upon them.

Today in America we are seeing a similar wave of anger against the act which has come to be known as Obamacare. In this act, which became law on March 23, 2010, all American citizens are required to either purchase health insurance or be taxed. To uphold the law under the Constitution in the June 28, 2012 Supreme Court decision on the law, Chief Justice John Roberts argued that the federal government has the right to tax American citizens for any reason whatsoever. In making this decision, Roberts and the liberal justices on the Supreme Court have opened a Pandora’s Box. This law is going to hit every citizen of America and everyone is either going to have to pay more money for a limited-choice, government-sanctioned healthcare plan or see their taxes skyrocket higher every April. The Supreme Court Decision, by decreeing that the federal government can tax Americans for anything at all, has, like the Declaratory Act, given the federal government the power to regulate human behavior at any level and they do it by taxing you, just like the Stamp Act.

The gauntlet has been laid down ladies and gentlemen. Furthermore, the states are responding. Since the indefinite detention of American citizens without trial was made legal in the 2012 National Defense Authorization Act, several states have responded by introducing bills to nullify the NDAA, which means that that federal law will not be effective inside that state’s borders. Now, it has been proposed to nullify Obamacare at the state level and already several states have introduced legislation to do just that. This action is very similar to how the colonies responded to the Stamp and Declaratory Acts. They refused to pay the taxes and to effectively implement this refusal, they enacted a nation-wide boycott of British goods in order to avoid paying the taxes. It was, effectively, nullification of British laws by the American colonies.

So how is this leading to a second American Revolution? Just watch and wait. Once the states’ nullification measures begin to take effect and Obamacare and any other laws which are nullified prove to be unenforceable, the federal government will be forced to either let the states get away with those measures or they will have to move troops in to force the state governments to obey federal laws. If they choose the latter option (which seems likely), then expect the situation to really get out of control. The federal government already seems to be preparing for this in having the military drill inside American cities. If they implement military takeovers of the states and their local governments, one might expect history to repeat itself and events which took place in a British-occupied Boston and in the small towns of Lexington and Concord in 1775 will repeat themselves in one or more of America’s fifty states which will lead to the states rising against the federal government in a Second American Revolution to re-enforce the principles of the Founding Fathers. Only this time, the cry of warning from those seeking freedom will not be “The British are Coming!” but: “The Feds are Coming!”

© 2012 The Subsidiarity Times. All rights reserved. This material may not be re-published, re-broadcast, re-written or re-distributed without written permission from blog author.

Dan Liljenquist’s Senate run in Utah exposes the neo-conservative infiltration of the Tea Party

June 26th, 2012, the voters of Utah will vote for candidates to be the standard-bearers for their respective parties in the run for many federal and state offices which will take place this November. The most contested of all of these primary races will apparently be the primary race for the Republican nomination for United States Senate in which Senator Orrin G. Hatch, who has held the seat since 1977, is being challenged by Tea Party-backed state legislator Dan Liljenquist. While certain polls predict that Hatch might succeed in holding off Liljenquist and so avoid the fate which befell his former (or soon-to-be former) Senate companions Bob Bennett and Richard Lugar, Liljenquist will still be able to claim a moral victory in the primary, even if it does not include winning the Utah GOP’s nomination for United States Senate.

Liljenquist will win a moral victory in his challenge against Hatch by the fact that his candidacy has exposed the extent to which big-government neo-conservatives have sought, and in many cases succeeded, to infiltrate and claim leadership positions in the small-government-demanding Tea Party movement. Hatch has backed many laws unpopular with the Tea Party movement during his time in the Senate, among them the TARP bailout, the State Children’s Health Insurance Program (which he co-sponsored with the late Senator Edward Kennedy), the No Child Left Behind Act, the Bridge to Nowhere, the Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac bailouts, Medicare expansion, raising the debt limit and many other laws of that nature. Yet, despite all of Hatch’s support in favor of these things which the Tea Party despises, there is a very large lineup of so-called “Tea Party leaders” who have backed Hatch’s re-election bid and that should be disturbing to the grassroots Tea Party organizers. The list of these supposed “Tea Party leaders” includes names such as Tea Party Express co-leader Sal Russo, two members of the neo-conservative “talk radio mafia”: Mark Levin and Sean Hannity, and, most disturbingly of all, former Alaska Governor and 2008 GOP Vice-Presidential candidate Sarah Palin. With such Tea Party-oriented names as these lining up against Liljenquist, is it any wonder he is trailing in the polls to Hatch?

Win or lose, however, what Liljenquist has done by challenging Hatch in the primary and so forcing these so-called “Tea Party leaders” to choose sides in the primary battle between himself and Hatch, is expose the neo-conservative infiltration of the so-called “Tea Party leadership positions” for all to see. This fact had originally begun to show during Congressman Ron Paul’s 2012 candidacy for President, but many tried to dismiss it as evidence of the Tea Party being infiltrated by the neo-conservatives by following Rush Limbaugh’s lead when he proclaimed “Ron Paul is NOT the Tea Party and he is not the founder of the Tea Party”. Limbaugh is wrong of course as evidenced by the fact that the Tea Party movement arose “from the ashes of Paul’s 2008 Presidential Campaign” to quote one political commentator and the evidence to support this lies in the fact that Ron Paul organized the fantastically successful “Tea Party Moneybomb” on the anniversary of the Boston Tea Party in 2007 which is the first recorded Tea Party protest. All that aside, however, no one can dispute Liljenquist’s Tea Party credentials as opposed to where Hatch has stood over the past several years and so in a primary such as this, the true Tea Party supporters would be and should be endorsing, supporting and voting for Liljenquist. As people such as Levin, Hannity, Russo and Palin have failed to support Liljenquist, this shows them for what they truly are: neo-conservative infiltrators of the Tea Party movement.

Liljenquist’s moral victory in exposing these infiltrators for the rest of the nation to see makes a victory by Hatch in the primary a pyrrhic victory for the neo-conservatives in their attempt to infiltrate the Tea Party. Their opposition to Liljenquist has shown them for who they truly are and the news should be shouted from the rooftops to the many Tea Parties across America that the Tea Party members must no longer look to these neo-conservative infiltrators for leadership, but to the people who actually stand for the true principles of the Tea Party and will back those candidates who are going to stand by those principles of limited government both at home and abroad.

© 2012 The Subsidiarity Times. All rights reserved. This material may not be re-published, re-broadcast, re-written or re-distributed without written permission from blog author.

Senator Ron Johnson: “Ron Paul has done a real service to this nation”

(The Subsidiarity Times) In an interview with talk show host Jason Lewis, United States Senator Ron Johnson of Wisconsin expressed high praise for Ron Paul and the work that Paul has carried out in his two presidential campaigns.

“Ron Paul, I think, has done a real service to this nation, the way he talks about liberty, the way he has energized our young people. You know, I kind of count on the youth’s natural propensity to rebel, to start rebelling about their university professors, you know, start reclaiming their freedom, it is their future that is being immorally mortgaged here” said Senator Johnson.

Jason Lewis followed the Senator’s comments with an observation about how the youth of the late 1960s and early 1970s were all about free speech and rebelling against authority in their youthful days and now that they are older and in positions of power, they are demanding total compliance of the youth of today’s world.

“The good news is,” replied Senator Johnson “and that is the example of Ron Paul, the youth is starting to get it. They will value their liberty when they are taught that it is their right, not government’s right, it is their right and they will defend it and I find that when I talk to people on the universities, Ron Paul certainly tapped into that, the Republican Party and Conservatives need to tap into the energy of the youth.”

Very telling observation from Senator Johnson, who, unlike the mainstream media, has actually noticed the thousands upon thousands of young people who greeted and cheered for Ron Paul at every speech he gave during his campaigns.

© 2012 The Subsidiarity Times. Audio courtesy of The Jason Lewis Show; re-published with permission. All rights reserved. This material may not be re-published, re-broadcast, re-written, re-transcribed or re-distributed without written permission from author.

Judge Napolitano: If drones had existed in 1776, Jefferson would have had any sent to spy on him by George III shot down.

(The Subsidiarity Times) In a radio interview with radio talk show host Brian Wilson of “Brian Wilson and the Afternoon Drive” on the afternoon of May 30, 2012, Judge Andrew Napolitano, speaking on the controversy surrounding the President’s assumed authority to use drones to spy on and kill people, made the comment that if drones had existed in 1776, he felt that Jefferson would have had any drones sent to spy on him shot down.

“Can you imagine if drones existed in 1776 and George III had sent one to hover around the bedroom of Monticello? Everybody that worked for Jefferson would have had muskets in their hands to shoot it down! And they would have been heroes for having done so!” said Napolitano

Wilson and Napolitano were discussing a recent New York Times article detailing some very disturbing aspects of Obama’s undeclared wars along with a piece recently written by Napolitano himself containing some very strong criticisms of Obama’s law-usurping actions in pursuing these undeclared wars. They also discussed Napolitano’s statement in his article that “Obama has a morbid fascination with his plastic killing machines” (a reference to the drones) and what the impact of drones employed domestically would have on the American populace.

“There are three hundred fifteen, three hundred sixteen local and state police departments that already have drones but they don’t have the permission from the Federal Government to fly them. So the question is, what will they do with them? I mean, will they have them hover outside people’s bedrooms? Will they hover over people’s backyards? Or will they use them to kill people?” asked Napolitano.

He then added that “I caused quite a stir when I said on Special Report with my colleague Bret Baier that, in my view, the government would have a difficult time finding a jury to convict someone who shot down a drone that hovered over his family and children in his backyard; in fact such a person might very well be viewed by the jury as a hero. I’m not suggesting this should be done and I’m certainly not advocating violence, but I am suggesting that this use of drones would really turn the Constitution on its head”.

© 2012 The Subsidiarity Times. Audio courtesy of Brian Wilson and the Afternoon Drive Show; re-published with permission. All rights reserved. This material may not be re-published, re-broadcast, re-written, re-transcribed or re-distributed without written permission from author.

Schiff: The real financial crash hasn’t happened yet and I think its coming soon

(New Agora & The Subsidiarity Times) In a radio interview promoting his new book The Real Crash: How to Save Yourself and Your Country, financial analyst and former candidate for the United States Senate, Peter Schiff, warned Americans that the real crash he has been warning about has not happened yet and will likely happen soon.

“I described what was going to happen to the U.S. economy when the housing bubble burst, but that was not the crash I was trying to get people to guard against; it was going to be the next wave that was going to come, that was going to follow the government’s response to the smaller crash that happened first. So I just reiterated that in this book that the actual crash, the one I have been forecasting all along, hasn’t happened yet and I think its coming soon” said Schiff to radio talk show host Brian Wilson in the May 30th, 2012 interview.

Following up Schiff’s point, Wilson then asked him “You point out in the book, you give the history of how we got here, you point out how if we continue doing what we’re doing: we’re broke, we’re in debt up to our kazonkas, we’re in hoc to China and all the rest of that, we’re printing fiat money, and all the rest of that, and we’ve talked about that a lot here on this station, including our conversation with you and if we continue doing this, we’re going to have this currency/sovereign debt crisis thats going to just blow up and rain all over the place, its going to be very bad. There is another road to take in this fork in the road and as you point out in the book, that one has got a much happier ending, its a little rocky at the beginning, but its a much happier ending, but, and here is the conundrum as I see it, the dichotomy, is that road, while it has a happier ending, has to go through hell involving politicians making decisions and doing things that they absolutely have never done in the past and, quite frankly I don’t think have any intention, of doing in the future as long as there is a can to kick down the road. So where does that leave us?”

Schiff responded with a tough, but honest assessment of the situation: “(It leaves us) between a rock and a hard place. Its not going to be easy. I mean, doing the right thing never is easy, look if it was easy, Europe would have done it. But its not easy and we have to understand that. But the alternative is actually worse, I mean yes, if we opt for the easy road we postpone the pain, but we ultimately are going to feel it and its going to be worse. Now for the politicians, they would rather have the pain tomorrow then today because tomorrow is after the election and today is before it. But for Americans who care about their country and who care about their children and their grandchildren, you know, lets get it over with! Lets do the right thing now! Lets stop making these mistakes so we can start fixing the mistakes and preparing the country for a future prosperity instead of continuing to dig ourselves into a deeper hole that is so much more difficult to get out of!”

© 2012 New Agora and The Subsidiarity Times. Audio courtesy of Brian Wilson and the Afternoon Drive Show; re-published with permission. All rights reserved. This material may not be re-published, re-broadcast, re-written, re-transcribed or re-distributed without written permission from author.

Governor Gary Johnson: “I need to be in the national presidential debates in order to win the Presidency”

In an interview with New Agora journalists Professor Wall and Info Crusader, former New Mexico Governor and eventual Libertarian Party presidential nominee Gary Johnson was asked, in response to an article on Examiner.com which forecast his potential to win the presidency in November 2012, what it would take for him to become the 45th president of the United States.

“The pie in the sky scenario for me is, being the (Libertarian) nominee number one, I hope to be the nominee, but secondly would be polling at 15% and being in the national debates for President of the United States against Obama and Romney. Thats, in my opinion, how anything could happen if that happened. But thats really key to having anything potentially happen” said Johnson.

In response to inquiries for his opinion on executive orders 10995, 10999 and 11000, which were issued by President John F. Kennedy during the Cold War, and allowed the Federal Government to seize and control the communications media and food supplies and to mobilize civilians into work brigades under government supervision, Johnson responded with surprise and some dismay.

“I wasn’t even aware of those” he said, “It sounds terrible, sounds horrible” he continued, going on to explain that they had a negative impact on the American people because “We are going further and further down the path of less civil liberties and when you have a government capable of taking over food supplies, what does that mean? You are going to be restricted potentially from getting food or if you are not going to be restricted, what are you going to have to do in order to receive your food from the government? No, this is scary. This is really scary. People should be outraged!”

He also added that as President “I would probably issue my share of executive orders, but it would be executive orders restricting government from doing all of those things.”

In regards to his campaign's efforts to become the viable third party alternative to the Republicans and Democrats over former Congressman Virgil Goode of the Constitution Party and former Governor Buddy Roemer of the Reform Party, Johnson stated that he would run on his record rather then seek endorsements. Citing the experience he had gained while running for Governor of New Mexico, he pointed out that he had not sought any endorsements during his campaigns for governor and had instead run on his record and been elected both times. He did add however, that he would welcome endorsements if any were to be given to him.

When Johnson was asked about whether he would potentially be willing to step aside and help unite the Liberty movement behind Ron Paul if Paul were to become a candidate under any label, Republican or third party, in the general election, Johnson re-emphasized the point he had been making since leaving the Republican Party to run in the Libertarian Party.

“One of my credos when it comes to politics is being reality-based and I just don’t think any of the above is going to happen” said Johnson. When asked in a follow-up question if Ron Paul would be considered for a cabinet position in a potential Gary Johnson presidential administration, Johnson was skeptical about the possibility even arising, but remained open to it.

“I go back to my experience as Governor of New Mexico. There was not one single commitment that I made to anybody for a job. It was all, apply for the job and I’m going to conduct an interview process. I don’t see Ron Paul as playing second fiddle to anybody and so, just the reality of Ron Paul, what he’s done, I don’t think he’s going to have any interest in a cabinet position and if he does, you know, terrific, we’ll deal with that if that actually comes into play.”

© 2012 New Agora and The Subsidiarity Times. All rights reserved. This material may not be re-published, re-broadcast, re-written, re-transcribed or re-distributed without written permission from blog author.

The Importance of the Young

This piece is dedicated to the young people of three great American movements: The Ron Paul campaign, the Campaign for Liberty movement and the Young Americans for Liberty movement.

Many times over the course of my ongoing career as a high school teacher, I am confronted by fellow teachers and authority figures in the education movement who often take me to task for, as they put it, “asking too much of the children”. In other words, some feel my assignments are far too challenging; others believe the children are not smart enough to grasp what I am teaching and that I should dramatically reduce the intelligence level of what I am teaching and the assignment tasks which I am asking of the children; still others give the argument of “If I cannot see myself doing what you ask, then there is no way the children can do what you ask”. This mentality is what makes me the angriest as a teacher. It angers me even more then misbehavior on the part of the students. While prudence in submitting challenges to students is wise (and as a teacher I recognize that), the arguments given in favor of prudence make my blood boil. Why are children and the young not allowed to attempt to master challenges? Why is the intelligence level of children and the young constantly being made portrayed as small and insignificant? Why are the young so frequently dismissed like small pawns or servants who should only be doing their masters’ beck and call? Why are things not allowed to be logically explained to them like the rational human beings that they are? Why are they force-fed what the older generation defines as truth and told to accept it without discussion instead of either having it logically explained to them or being allowed to use their own logic to come to the same conclusion themselves? Why are the young being marginalized and shown so much flagrant disrespect in today’s world?

There is a movement going on to condition many of today’s young people to accept a mentality that once they earn their wages, pay their bills and do their chores then they can relax and do whatever they want around their own residences as long as they keep out of the sight of the public; they have no other responsibilities. The attempt to impose this mentality upon the young is assisted by the perception given by popular culture, such as television, advertisements and the news media, that the young have lax “whatever” attitudes in their minds and a disinclination in their nature to do anything with their lives. For these reasons, many factions in our current culture tend to look on children, teenagers and young adults as bothersome, troublemaking, pleasure-seeking brats who need to be “subjugated”, kept at a low intelligence level and made to work as common laborers barely making enough to survive and kept happy by being allowed to satisfy petty, un-intellectual and not-always-moral desires. This movement is being encouraged and pushed forward on both sides of the ideological spectrum, Left and Right. It is also why the young tend to be a rebellious lot no matter what side of the ideological spectrum on which they fall. They see themselves as being talked-down-to, marginalized, misrepresented and, to put it bluntly, abused. This offends the young because is it at odds with their natural belief in their own self-dignity. The young want to be challenged, they want to have hope, they want to help drives to do great things and they want to learn more about our world. They will not be boxed into a set of pre-conceived ideas about themselves by the older generations. They want to find out logical, rational truth for themselves.

The young need to be encouraged in this mentality to discover or confirm rational logical truth on their own. This desire needs to be encouraged and cultivated at a young age so that by the time they become active members of their communities they can be a force for good rather then ill. We can already see the effects of how the marginalization of the young has led to increased crime rates and violence among the young, and how that has unsettled communities and led to police-state type tactics on the part of law enforcement. If the young were actually challenged with the opportunity to discover truth on their own and so be a more active, working part of their communities, there is no doubt that crime rates among the young would drop as they would be engaging in more wholesome pursuits. They would help build better communities for their elders and would be more inclined to assist the elderly in their old age which would lead to a more respectful, kinder culture all around. They would give hope for the future to a world which does not know hope in this day and age.

The young are our nation and our world’s future. They need to be academically challenged to improve their knowledge and intelligence, encouraged to logically discover the truth, given the respect befitting human beings and not stereotyped as either dumb brats only interested in their own pleasures or as very unintelligent beings who need everything spoon-fed to them. There needs to be a re-direction of our education movement towards the mentality of actually encouraging the young to assert and build themselves at many levels, whether they are children, teenagers or young adults. Those who have lived through the terrible period of being marginalized while in their youth should take the mentality of assisting the current young people to challenge themselves, assert themselves and discover the truth themselves. This way they can help the young overcome this additional barrier and assure themselves that there will be a future of hope.

God Bless the Young!

© 2012 New Agora and The Subsidiarity Times. All rights reserved. This material may not be re-published, re-broadcast, re-written or re-distributed without written permission from blog author.

The Rick Santorum - DC Establishment Conspiracy

In his best-selling novel Tinker, Tailor, Soldier, Spy, the novelist John Le Carré lays forth one of the most classic of all misdirection ploys. In the story, a low level British agent stumbles upon information about a traitor amongst the leaders of British intelligence and seeks to inform someone of this find. The traitor finds out he has been partially discovered and informs his real masters in Moscow, who in turn give him fictitious information about the agent to spread amongst his companions in British intelligence. The information says that the agent has defected and is trying to sell false information to British intelligence about a traitor in their midst. The remainder of the story is then about the agent and his allies trying to overcome this false information and expose the truth about the traitor in British intelligence.

The powerful political establishment in the United States of America is attempting to pull off something very similar today. They see, with alarm, that the people are turning against them and becoming angry at the continually deteriorating state of life in the country. With the elections due to come up this November 6th of 2012, they are attempting to pass a number of laws through Congress which would bestow unheard-of powers upon the President. If these proposed laws (like NDAA) all pass, they could potentially nullify the effect of a populist-controlled Congress and state governments. The Establishment is truly desperate to retain power and see an imperial presidency as the only way of doing so.

Their plot does not end there however. The Establishment is clever enough to know that they cannot win a race where their candidate can be clearly shown as an Establishment candidate. For this reason, they have chosen to back two candidates. One is their “sacrificial lamb” who is clearly labeled as the Establishment candidate. The other is proclaimed to the nation as the true limited government candidate, but is, in reality, the true Establishment candidate; a classic use of the misdirection ploy.

The first candidate is easy. Mitt Romney is the sacrificial lamb candidate of the Establishment. He is being offered to the nation as the candidate who must be defeated along with President Barack Obama in order to save America. The Establishment then settled on who their true candidate would be as the Iowa primary approached. They had spent the past year evaluating all of the debate performances and statements made by the Republican presidential aspirants and eventually settled on one of them. That was likely one of the reasons for the rise and fall of so many of the Republican aspirants in the polls last year.

The man the Establishment chose to be their true candidate was a man who had shown himself competent enough to handle an imperial presidency through his past record and current statements. He had been prone to a lot of tough talk and bomb-dropping rhetoric in the realm of foreign policy, he had been one of the biggest supporters of the War on Terror during George W. Bush’s presidency and he had a personal crusade agenda which, in the eyes of many Americans, is inseparably linked to certain aspects of limited government philosophies, namely that of being pro-life. The Establishment had found their man, and he was Rick Santorum, the former Republican senator from Pennsylvania.

Where is the proof that Santorum is a member of the Establishment? Look at these facts and it should become obvious. Santorum’s record on limited government issues should speak for itself. He supported Federal Government measures such as No Child Left Behind and Medicare Part D and many other bills and laws of those types. A true limited government man would never have done that. Santorum also seems to get very confused when he tries to clarify what he believes the Constitution says about powers given to the Federal Government and the State Governments. A true limited government man would know exactly what the Constitution says about the separation of powers. Santorum is pro-life yes (though his record on the pro-life issues occasionally leaves something to be desired), but just because one is pro-life does not mean they are for limited government. Just look at who defeated Santorum in the United States Senate race in Pennsylvania in 2006: A self-identified pro-life Democrat, Bob Casey Jr. Casey is by no means a limited government man and yet he proudly announces his pro-life positions (though, like Santorum, his record on the pro-life issues leaves much to be desired in some cases). Just because one is pro-life does not mean he is for limited government. One may just as easily push for pro-life resolutions through big government solutions.

So Santorum’s record is clear. He is not a true limited government man, but how can one be sure he is the GOP Establishment’s true candidate? Santorum provided that answer for the world to see just the other day. When confronted by an independent journalist about his abysmal record on limited government issues, Santorum lost his temper (as he has been doing a lot of lately) and just snapped at the person to go vote for Ron Paul. That was a major mistake.

If Santorum had been truly repentant about his past actions as a big government man and was seeking to truly turn things around, he would not have spoken that way. He would have explained to the journalist that it was a mistake and then would have laid out how he had learned from that mistake and what he would do to correct it. The answer he gave showed that Santorum only has one thing on his mind now in his campaign: Defeat Ron Paul and continue the Establishment’s big government ideas. It is the same mindset of the members of the Establishment who are linked to the Republican Party. That means that Santorum too is part of the Establishment. He is not the limited government man he claims to be.

The rest is pretty self-explanatory. Santorum and Romney are both part of the Establishment (and let us not forget Newt Gingrich and his record) and the Establishment is attempting to portray in people’s minds the image of Romney as the candidate of the Establishment with Santorum as the true limited government candidate. Santorum’s angry answer to the independent journalist, however, has blown the Establishment’s conspiracy wide open. People can connect the dots and now it should be obvious. A fake fight between two Establishment candidates has been set up and a process of manipulation is taking place which is trying to trick the people of America in continuing the status-quo just long enough for an imperial presidency to take charge.

The American people need to wake up now. Santorum is being portrayed to the American people as the man to save limited government by the Establishment. However, all he will do if elected, is strive to save the Establishment and their status-quo policies. Continuation of the status-quo policies, as former presidential candidate and political commentator Pat Buchanan has warned in his recent book Suicide of a Superpower, can only lead to America’s destruction in the not-too-distant future.

© 2012 The Subsidiarity Times. All rights reserved. This material may not be re-published, re-broadcast, re-written or re-distributed without written permission from blog author.

Why Ron Paul's Undercurrent Rise may be a Blessing in Disguise

Recent reports have said that the Obama 2012 Campaign has recently changed their campaign strategy from making campaign attacks against Mitt Romney (and, in certain cases, Newt Gingrich) to making these attacks against former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum. Santorum's recent victories in three major straw polls have led the media to begin labeling Santorum as the frontrunner in the GOP Presidential nomination race and this sudden apparent surge has made the Obama Campaign refocus its attacks and prepare for a scenario where Obama is running for re-election against Santorum in the general election. With Obama pretty much assured his re-nomination, it would seem to be wise politically to begin focusing campaign efforts against the prospective opponent.

What this may be doing, however, is providing a perfect cover for the man whom many believe is the "unrecognized frontrunner" in the GOP race. Texas Congressman Ron Paul's strategy of focusing on the caucus states is going to lead to a substantial number of delegates for him (at the very least that is) at the GOP nominating convention in Tampa, and this fact has gone largely unreported by the major media. In addition, Ron Paul Republicans are slowly taking over the Republican Party. They have already done so in Iowa, they seemed poised to do so in Nevada and if this trend continues, then Ron Paul could very well head into Tampa in a position to come away with a victory for the nomination, especially if the Republican Convention becomes an actual brokered convention like many are speculating that it might.

If that is so, and Ron Paul is only announced as the nominee of the GOP in August at the convention, then President Obama's re-election campaign could be in serious trouble. Paul has very few flaws to his record, background and stances, and with government intervention becoming very unpopular in America, the Obama campaign's stressing of the ideological and policy differences between Obama and Paul would actually be more a help then a hindrance to the Congressman. In addition, with just three months to go until the election after the Republican Convention, the Obama campaign would have to scramble to come up with any kind of effective campaign rhetoric against Paul's past and with no preparation due to the unexpected nature of Paul's victory, the rush to come up with campaign attacks would certainly lead to some poorly made and clumsily pointed attack ads which could only serve to reinforce the negative image of President Obama and his policies to the nation.

In closing, Ron Paul should continue doing what he is doing. His strategy is beginning to pay off and he will eventually win some state primaries (most likely in the Far West) which will reinforce his image as the underdog coming back from behind to win. America has always loved underdogs. The Founding Fathers and their fight against Great Britain was an underdog victory and Ron Paul's ultimate victory will inspire the nation in the same way. Like a shadow creeping up to surprise people, Paul and his movement are creeping up on the Establishment and the Obama Campaign and when he emerges, the advantage he will have gained by the surprise will give him the upper hand in his bid to win the White House on November 6, 2012.

© 2012 The Subsidiarity Times. All rights reserved. This material may not be re-published, re-broadcast, re-written or re-distributed without written permission from blog author.

A Third Party Manifesto

“A man who is made a prince by the favour of the people must work to retain their friendship;” – Niccolo Machiavelli

“Whatever your issue is, whether it’s racism or homophobia or policy issues or taxes or urban decay or health care, you’re not going to go anywhere with it if we don’t focus on the concentration of power.” – Ralph Nader

“If the people want to be free…there is no force that can stop them. If freedom is what we want, it is ours for the taking.” – Ron Paul

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Americans have come to take the current political system of two major parties vying for government power for granted nowadays. It has become accepted that if one wishes to participate in and make policy changes at any level of government, then it has to be done while serving as a member of one of the two major parties. It is a classic example of an insider-only political system which, history shows, always leads to tyranny in some form or fashion.

The complaint that most people hear when discussing politics today is that there seems to be no major difference between the two major political parties. This analysis is very true. Many officials in both parties are genuinely concerned with the people they are seeking to represent and have different ideas on how to best do so. However, as seen by myself and many others who have worked in our nation’s capital for a time, there are very many insiders who seem to be the true power controlling the political machinery of both parties. As is natural with human nature, those who hold power are always reluctant to give it up. This truth has not only been witnessed by the outsiders who have worked in our nation’s capital, but has also been recognized and, in many cases, witnessed by those participating in the Tea Party and Occupy Wall Street movements. They have voiced their displeasure at the fact that true government power is so interwoven between the two major political parties that favors and shifts at the top are simply traded between the two under the cover of the democratic process of elections. If this is so, then it means that a form of tyranny reigns in a country which was founded on the belief that all men are created equal and the premise of checked and restricted government.

So for the abolition of insider-control and the resulting government tyranny, the two party system needs to be dismantled and a truly free process needs to take its place. To bring about this free process, discrimination against the other political parties needs to stop at all levels: federal, state and local. The mark of a truly free society is where many different viewpoints are allowed to be heard on the public stage, especially amongst candidates running for positions to represent their communities.

To reach this desired free society where the viewpoints of all the political parties running for office are freely presented to the public, the following actions could be taken:

I. Presidential Elections

1. The Commission on Presidential Debates should be dissolved. Presidential debates should be put together and sponsored solely by private intellectual organizations such as colleges and institutes. Moderators should be put forward by the private organizations sponsoring the debates. News organizations should have no power over the debates except to broadcast them to the nation to watch.

2. The debate stage should not be restricted to just the candidates who are polling 15% or higher in the polls. That is an elitist system which has no place in a country where the First Amendment to the Constitution guarantees Freedom of Speech. Access to the debate stage should depend on ballot access. If a candidate is serious about their run for the presidency, then a modest plateau of ballot access in around ten states should not be difficult to reach and all parties should be held to this standard, including the Republicans and Democrats.

3. Ballot access should be charged for all candidates and political parties in every state and they should have to renew it before every election that the candidate or party is participating in. The access requirements should be set at a reasonable level of something like 2,000 valid signatures, which should not be difficult for a serious candidate to reach.

4. Government money given to political parties should be discontinued. Money for all political campaigns should be raised through fundraising by the political parties themselves.

II. State and Local Elections

1. Debates should be scheduled for all political races where political parties are involved and the public should be invited to come free of charge in order to hear the issues affecting their communities freely discussed. Debate moderators should be unaffiliated volunteers from amongst the voters or from private local organizations and not in the pay of any news organization or political party.

2. Ballot access should be made easily attainable for the serious candidate for office and should be required of all political parties seeking to run candidates for the office.

3. For local political races, the required number of valid signatures to obtain a place on the ballot should be set at a very small percentage of the population of the district the candidates are running to represent. Example: In a district consisting of 500 people, only 65 signatures should be required for a place on the local election ballot.

4. State law should mandate that positions in the hierarchy of any political party should be determined every year by a presidential caucus-type election-and-ascension process within the parties themselves, rather then by appointment or a once-every-four-years selection process. This will help prevent the solidifying of power by any faction within a political party and will ensure that the people’s wishes shall be better represented.

III. Constitutional Amendments: Federal & State – Checking the Power of Political Parties

1. The Constitution of the United States of America was founded on the idea of checks and balances limiting government power. Where the Founding Fathers did not prescribe checks and balances was in the realm of political parties’ power because they correctly foresaw that the formation of political parties would lead to a struggle for power rather then a true representation of the people. For this reason they sought to avoid political parties. However, political parties are an inevitable result of any democratic system due to the human tendency of like-minded people to congregate together for a common cause. With this in mind, Constitutional Amendments filled with the just-listed Sections I and II’s checks and balances for political parties need to be added to the Constitutions of the Federal and State Governments. These will help break down and prevent a massive concentration of power by any one or more political parties.
2. Federal Constitutional Amendment: Commissions regulating and dictating presidential debates and access to the debates should be banned and no private intellectual organization is allowed to host, control or set-up more than one debate every four presidential elections; News organizations are only allowed to broadcast the presidential debates, not influence, host or have power over them; Federal Government money will be banned from ever going to any political parties; Debate access by a presidential candidate will be determined by one low number of states, preferably ten, that all candidates must have obtained a place on the ballot in and it will be ANY ten states, not a specific ten or fewer states.
3. Constitutional Amendments in the States: State Government money shall not be given by any means to any political party. Ballot access for any political candidate should be set at a very low number of valid signatures required, thus making it easy for a serious candidate to obtain a place on the ballot: A. Presidential election candidate requirements – 2,000 valid signatures from current state residents; B. State and Local election candidate requirements – valid signatures from a very small percentage of the current population of the district the candidates are running to represent. All political parties and candidates are required to obtain ballot access every election. Debates are to be required to take place in every political race where political parties are involved and no candidate with ballot access is to be denied the right to participate. Debate moderators are to be volunteers unaffiliated with any candidate, news organization or political party. Political Party hierarchy is to be determined by a caucus-type election every year in every political party.

These changes would radically change the American political system as we know it today. However the Founding Fathers of America believed in the idea of allowing the people to speak their opinions and having a completely equal chance to serve their communities in a leadership position for a short period of time. The people should be free to choose the best from among their community to represent them, not the ones with the most money. By opening the door to a wider array of candidates, this original dream of the Founding Fathers can begin to be re-discovered and realized.

A society where positions are debated freely is a truly free society. America has drifted from this truth in the last one hundred forty seven years and it is time that she returns to it. If she does, then she shall be better-placed to once again become the true beacon the world looks up to as the example of freedom.

© 2012 New Agora and The Subsidiarity Times. All rights reserved. This material may not be re-published, re-broadcast, re-written or re-distributed without written permission from blog author.

Santorum is Finished as a 2012 Presidential Candidate

I watched the Republican presidential debate of January 26, 2012 (once it was posted on YouTube) last night and while I have seen the same things that many of my fellow political opinion commentators, both famous and unknown, have seen, one thing stood out to me, and it was a point I think many may have missed. Rick Santorum just lost himself the Republican presidential primary race. Hands down, he lost it. Albeit he lost it in less spectacular fashion then Rick Perry did in his 53 second gaffe in a debate back on November 9, 2011, but he still lost it.

What am I talking about? Just re-watch the debate. Did Santorum deliver some strong blows against Romney and Gingrich last night? Yes he did. Did he have some spectacular lines in the debate? Yes he did. So what I am talking about? Just re-watch the debate when it came to one of the first foreign policy questions, then follow my train of thought here.

In response to a question from the audience asking what the United States’ role in assisting Latin America should be, Texas Congressman Ron Paul, whose positions on foreign policy have been regarded as controversial since he first started campaigning for President in 2007, made the first response by defining his foreign policy. He defined it as one of diplomacy, free trade and encouragement to all nations and also setting an example of freedom for other nations to freely follow rather than using force to get them to adopt our standards. Fair enough. One does not have to agree with this foreign policy if they do not want to. That is not the point of this piece. The point is Santorum’s response following Paul’s answer.

Santorum, plain and simple, lost his temper on the stage. It was shocking, and the venom of his tone, with which he tainted his answer, should have been shocking for all observing the debate. While he may have had the right to be angry, it is ALWAYS a very bad idea to lose one’s temper on the stage and yet he did. In one minute and forty-four seconds Santorum completely unraveled and launched into a long tirade against the Obama administration which, even though all of his complaints and laments were valid objections and concerns, was not a constructive answer of what he would do instead. What few bits of the tirade which sounded even close to constructive suggestions were very vague and in the end all Santorum really promised to do was visit Central and South America. In short, Santorum’s answer was just an angry unconstructive tirade and, as a result, a huge mistake.

However, instead of stopping there, Santorum exacerbated his mistake just seconds later. The debate moderator, Mr. Wolf Blitzer, allowed Congressman Paul to respond to Santorum’s tirade. Paul attempted to clarify where he stood in contrast to Santorum based on previous statements from Santorum in the past several months. As Paul finished speaking, Santorum suddenly responded with an answer which made him look like a complete fool: “I don't know what answer Congressman Paul was listening to. He obviously wasn't listening to my answer." It was an answer so ridiculous that many in the audience laughed at Santorum's obvious blunder. Here Paul had just given an answer of constructive proposals in response to Santorum's tirade, which had contained no constructive proposals, and Santorum said Paul was not listening to him. It was a ridiculous and huge blunder and from the pained look on Santorum's face as he said it, it looked as if he knew he was committing a blunder but could not admit it.

Finally, to wrap it up, Santorum put the icing on his mistake when he did seek to clarify what his foreign policy was. The whole answer was again very poor (Three-fourths of it was another tirade against the current administration with no details of what he would have done and would do instead) and the part of the answer where he sought to define his foreign policy consisted of vague references to building economic and national security relationships with no specific explanations of what he meant by these statements, how they would work and why they would succeed. Then he tried to distance himself from the stance of using military force that he had taken at previous debates and campaign stops. He then fell back into it by talking about 'supporting' nations which had not fallen under the sway of the Marxist regimes in Cuba and Venezuela which, based on previous statements Santorum had made linking 'support' to 'military force', would seem to imply that he supported military force to get these nations to do what the United States ordered them to. It was a classic example of disconcerted flip-flopping on the part of Mr. Santorum and a tragic finale to a huge mistake for his campaign.

To clarify, I am fully aware of what Mr. Santorum endorses for his foreign policy, and while I do not agree with his stances, I appreciated it in the debates earlier in 2011 when he gave clearer answers and examples of what he would do in the White House in regards to foreign policy. With this in mind, Mr. Santorum’s answers on these foreign policy questions last night added up to a tremendous blunder for him which, in my opinion, has sunk his campaign and finished his run as a serious contender in the Republican primaries. By this action, the 2012 Republican Presidential Primaries have now officially turned into a three man race between Mitt Romney, Newt Gingrich and Ron Paul.

Below is the transcript of the question and the responses of Congressman Paul and former Senator Santorum:

(Begin Transcript)

RAQUEL RODRIGUEZ (Hispanic Republican attorney from Miami in the audience): The U.S. has been largely away in its foreign and trade policy with Latin America. In the meantime, Iran and China have been increasing their influence over an involvement in Latin America through the leftist and left-leaning governments.

What would each of you do as president to more deeply engage in Latin America and, importantly, to support the governments and the political parties that support democracy and free markets?

CNN MODERATOR WOLF BLITZER: Congressman Paul?

CONGRESSMAN RON PAUL: Well, I think free trade is the answer. Free trade is an answer to a lot of conflicts around the world, so I'm always promoting free trade. And you might add Cuba, too. I think we would be a lot better off with Cuba, trading with Cuba.

So, I think the more you can do to promote this free trade, the better off we'll be. But as far as us having an obligation, a military or a financial obligation to go down and dictate to them what government they should have, I don't like that idea.

I would work with the people and encourage free trade, and try to set a standard here where countries in Central America or South America or any place in the world would want to emulate us and set the standards that we have. Unfortunately, sometimes we slip up on our standards and we go around the world and we try to force ourselves on others.

I don't think the nations in South America and Central America necessarily want us to come down there and dictate which government they should have. And yet, I believe with friendship and trade, you can have a lot of influence, and I strongly believe that it's time we have friendship and trade with Cuba.

BLITZER: Senator Santorum, are you with Congressman Paul?

FORMER SENATOR RICK SANTORUM: No, I'm not with Congressman Paul and I'm not with Barack Obama on this issue.

Our policy in Central and South America under this administration has been abysmal. The way we have treated, in particular, countries like Honduras, Honduras, which stood up for the rule of law, which threw out a would-be dictator who was using the Chavez playbook from Venezuela in order to try to run for re-election in Honduras, and the United States government, instead of standing behind the -- the people in the parliament, the people in the Supreme Court, who tried to enforce the constitution of Honduras -- instead of siding with them, the Democrats, President Obama sided with two other people in South America -- excuse me -- Central America and South America. Chavez and Castro and Obama sided against the people of Honduras.

This is a consistent policy of siding with the leftists, siding with the Marxists, siding with those who don't support democracy, not standing up for our friends in Colombia, not standing up for our friends who want to engage and support America, who want to be great trading partners and great allies for our country, to be able to form that kind of bond that is so essential in our own hemisphere.

The European Union understood how important it was for diverse people to be able to come together in an economic unit. We only -- not only have to come together as an economic unit, but the threat of terrorism, the threat of Iran now in Venezuela and in other places, and Cuba and in Nicaragua, the threat of radical Islam growing in that region -- is it important for -- it's absolutely important for us to have a president who understands that threat and understands the solution is closer ties. I will visit that area of the world, repeatedly, to solidify those ties when I become president.

BLITZER: Let me let Congressman Paul quickly respond.

PAUL: The -- the senator mentioned standing up for some of these nations, but he doesn't define it, but standing up for nations like this usually means that we impose ourselves, go and pick the dictators, undermine certain governments, also sending them a lot of money.

It doesn't work. Most of the time, this backfires. They resent us. We can achieve what he wants in a much different way than us using the bully attitude that ‘you will do it our way’.

This is not a benefit to us. And besides, where do you get the troops and where are you going to get the money? Because you're talking about force. And I know of a much better way than using force to get along with people.

SANTORUM: I don't know what answer Congressman Paul was listening to. He obviously wasn't listening to my answer.

What I talked about is building strong economic relationships, strong national security relationships. No one's talking about force. Nobody's talking about going into Cuba or going into Venezuela. It's talking about the other countries in the region, which are being influenced greatly by those countries, that are tending and moving toward those militant socialists, instead of the United States.

Why? Because we've ignored them. You've got a president of the United States that held a Colombian free trade agreement -- Colombia, who's out there on the front lines, working with us against the narco-terrorists, standing up to Chavez in South America. And what did we do?

For political -- domestic political purposes, the president of the United States sided with organized labor and the environmental groups and held Colombia hanging out to dry for three years. We cannot do that to our friends in South America.

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