What is the most important issue facing the American people today? Until late last Fall, Al Gore, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, Henry Waxman, the presidents of our major universities, and the editors and reporters at The New York Times, The Washington Post, The Los Angeles Times, Newsweek, Time, The New Yorker, CBS, ABC, NBC, CNN, WNBC, and the like –  not to mention the scientific establishment in the United States – were as one in telling us that global warming was a profound threat to our well-being and that of the rest of mankind. And John McCain, Lindsey Graham, and sadly, in the end, a hapless George W. Bush were willing to lend the hysterics a measure of aid and comfort.

In the United States Senate, the indomitable James M. Inhofe of Oklahoma was very nearly alone in standing up to denounce the whole enterprise as a hoax, and in turn he was himself denounced by all right-thinking people as a scoundrel and a fool. There were, of course, scientists proficient in meteorology who entertained grave doubts, and some of them made a great fuss, but they were soon denied federal funding for further research, and young entrants into the profession quickly learned that if they wished to have successful careers it was incumbent on them to join the chorus who denounced global-warming skeptics as lackeys of the fossil fuels industry. The global-warming cabal was to the liberal democracies of our time what  Trofim Denisovich Lysenko and his disciples were to biology in the Soviet Union of Josef Stalin.

When he became President, Barack Obama pledged to “roll back the specter of a warming planet” and “restore science to its rightful place,” implying – graceless as always – that the administration of George W. Bush had suppressed inconvenient scientific truths in the interests of ideology. In fact, Obama seems not to have understood what he was saying, for a specter is “an apparition inspiring dread,” and it is one of the principal functions of science to dispel illusions of this very sort; and, instead of debunking “the specter of a warming planet” and restoring “science to its rightful place” thereby, he embraced that specter and sought by way of inspiring dread in the American people to railroad his compatriots into subjecting the entire economy to the supervision of the administrative state.

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The Nevada desert can be cold and windy, as it was in Searchlight, but the message was one of warmth and optimism. It was one of disgust with government, but a belief that we can turn this around and begin our sprint back towards Constitutional values.

As a candidate running for US Senate against Harry Reid I know what this battle is like first hand. As a 4-term Nevada Assemblyman I have felt the pressures by those on the left to grow government to the point that it will strangle the people and I have fought it at every turn.

I found a large group of Americans in Searchlight who wanted change and were willing to fight the dirty, cold wind on that marvelous Saturday because they believe with all their hearts that the values set forth in our Founding documents are those that lead to Liberty and Freedom unsurpassed by any nation on earth. That is the message of the Tea Party movement, a return to Constitutional values that we seem to have forgotten. This movement that began with government intrusion into our lives through “healthcare reform” has shown to me that the health of our nation is fine in many respects. There is nothing healthier than respectful, dignified and direct distrust in government. It is the message of our Founding.

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Many a partisan and pundit-provocateur has spent the last year trying to convince us that the tea parties consist of violent extremists.  The multi-front attack has come from the media, Hollywood, and the current White House.

At the genesis of the movement, David Axelrod couched criticism of the Obama agenda as “unhealthy” on national television.  Last April, the infamous “right-wing extremism” report released the week before the tax day tea parties by the Department of Homeland Security.  The report referenced “disgruntled veterans” and lumped those that believed in states’ rights in with white supremacists and militia members.  It was an embarrassment to the Department of Homeland Security and the administration.  Public apologies to veterans and regrets regarding the extremely broad language were issued.

A while back, “Law and Order” ran a ridiculous episode where a lawyer declared that Rush, Beck, and O’Reilly drive people to commit violent hate crimes.  Before that, there was an episode referencing a tea party in the context of discussing extremists. In February of this year, Marvel Comics issued an apology after a comic implicitly painted tea parties in a racist, violent light.

Countless guests have appeared on Keith Olbermann’s show to dissect the tea party movement psyche.  Most notable was budding amateur psychologist Janeane Garofalo who erroneously dismissed tea partiers as intellectually deficient violent racists.  More recently a guest on The Rachel Maddow Show, talking about the recent Midwest militia arrests, conflated the tea party movement and right-wing militant extremists and implied that the nation is somehow in danger of the tea party splintering into militia terror cells.

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Today, in 1792, President George Washington exercised the first Presidential veto. We’re not sure what the bill was, but we trust that Washington made the right choice. (In fact, we think a veto is the proper default position for the executive branch.)

Spring means for millions of Americans renewed hope.  This is not Barack Obama’s sullied ‘hope’, but hope in the sense of untempered optimism, a youthful belief that miracles are possible and the fanciful notion that finally the stars will align and this will be our year.  Spring means that our lives will be diverted for three hours each day, mesmerized by new epics, comedies and tragedies with valiant heroes, vile villains, twists, turns, unbridled joy, tortuous heartbreak and through it all a devotion to something greater than ourselves which we have no control over yet irrationally believe that we do.  Spring means baseball.

Baseball is the quintessential American game.  As with our system of government, baseball took something British and made it better.  It started out as an agrarian game played across America’s heartland, and over time evolved like our nation with an influx of immigrants, the addition of the DH (call it welfare) and the institution of the luxury tax (a progressive means of redistribution of course), and though like America it has been blighted with corruption and scandal (Teapot Dome:Black Sox Scandal as Impeachment:Steroids), baseball has retained its fundamental character and charm.

Most importantly, no matter what has happened in our lives, baseball for better or worse has remained a companion during our springs, summers and when we have been lucky, our falls.  James Earl Jones beautifully characterized baseball and the hope it brings in Field of Dreams, when he reassured Ray Kinsella (Kevin Costner) that he would not lose his farm:

Ray, people will come Ray. They’ll come to Iowa for reasons they can’t even fathom. They’ll turn up your driveway not knowing for sure why they’re doing it. They’ll arrive at your door as innocent as children, longing for the past. Of course, we won’t mind if you look around, you’ll say. It’s only $20 per person. They’ll pass over the money without even thinking about it: for it is money they have and peace they lack. And they’ll walk out to the bleachers; sit in shirtsleeves on a perfect afternoon. They’ll find they have reserved seats somewhere along one of the baselines, where they sat when they were children and cheered their heroes. And they’ll watch the game and it’ll be as if they dipped themselves in magic waters. The memories will be so thick they’ll have to brush them away from their faces. People will come Ray. The one constant through all the years, Ray, has been baseball. America has rolled by like an army of steamrollers. It has been erased like a blackboard, rebuilt and erased again. But baseball has marked the time. This field, this game: it’s a part of our past, Ray. It reminds of us of all that once was good and it could be again. Oh… people will come Ray. People will most definitely come.

The nostalgia we feel for baseball is akin to the nostalgia we feel for this country.

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Beware of Greeks bearing gifts, Homer teaches us, something every school child used to know. Beware of politicians and expert educators bearing standards, the last seventy years or more of Progressive education should have taught us. But we are slow to learn.

We have been given almost a month to digest the hundreds of pages of the new National Governors Association’s Common Core State Standards that could well become national standards pressed in some way upon every child who attends a public school in America. So we had better read, write, and think fast. Pundits and educationists, even some stalwarts of education reform, are beginning to praise these new standards as being more comprehensive than any before, far better than what the diverse and unreliable states are providing. Schools will now be held accountable to “higher standards”; teachers will know what they are responsible for teaching; students will be swept up in “the vision of what it means to be a literate person in the twenty-first century,” which, we must surmise, is very different from what it meant to be literate in, say, the eighteenth century, when the likes of Thomas Jefferson read Latin and Greek for fun. It all sounds wonderful. At least it does until sensible people realize that these standards, which are only the best of the worst of the existing state standards, have absolutely nothing to do with sound education. It will be a mistake to get bogged down in a discussion of whether these standards are better than the various state standards since the whole enterprise is just a diversion hiding what truly ails public schools. The reason is obvious to anyone who has ever listened to some of these so-called experts drone on about standards without ever making a literary reference or drawing a lesson from history or even talking about a book.

Let us imagine an author at his craft, say, Herman Melville while writing Moby Dick, or Jane Austen working on Pride and Prejudice. Now assuredly what these literary artists hoped above all else was that a century or two from their own time students in high schools would be using their great works not better to understand love or honor or revenge or nobility or happiness, but to “analyze how multiple themes or central ideas in a text interact, build on, and, in some cases, conflict with one another”; as well as to “analyze the impact of the author’s choices regarding how to develop and relate elements of a story or drama (e.g., where a story is set, how the action is ordered, how the characters are introduced and developed).” We know that this sort of innocuous thing is what the authors had in mind because that is what our teachers told us in school. We remember the drill: the plot graphs—rising action, climax, falling action (or denouement)—the cast lists of main characters and outlines of “main ideas,” the possible literary techniques—foreshadowing, alliteration, onomatopoeia. What we do not remember is one dad-gum thing about these stories: what insight they gave us into the human condition, what they portray as heroism, villainy, love, or self-deception. We do not remember any of these life-ennobling themes because those matters never came up in our English (what are now called our “Language Arts”) classes.

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Of course there were no news accounts of this, so we missed it. On March 31st, Rep. Paul Ryan delivered a keynote address to the Oklahoma Council of Public Affairs, one of the better state-based free market think tanks. It is a magisterial distillation of where we are…and where we need to go. Full text of the address below:

Last week, on March 21st, Congress enacted a new Intolerable Act. Congress passed the Health Care bill – or I should say, one political party passed it – over a swelling revolt by the American people. The reform is an atrocity. It mandates that every American must buy health insurance, under IRS scrutiny. It sets up an army of federal bureaucrats who ultimately decide for you how you should receive Health Care, what kind, and how much…or whether you don’t qualify at all. Never has our government claimed the power to decide when each of us has lived well enough or long enough to be refused life-saving medical assistance.

This presumptuous reform has put this nation … once dedicated to the life and freedom of every person … on a long decline toward the same mediocrity that the social welfare states of Europe have become.

Americans are preparing to fight another American Revolution, this time, a peaceful one with election ballots…but the “causes” of both are the same:

• Should unchecked centralized government be allowed to grow and grow in power … or should its powers be limited and returned to the people?
• Should irresponsible leaders in a distant capital be encouraged to run up scandalous debts without limit that crush jobs and stall prosperity … or should the reckless be turned out of office and a new government elected to live within its means?
• Should America bid farewell to exceptional freedom and follow the retreat to European social welfare paternalism … or should we make a new start, in the faith that boundless opportunities belong to the workers, the builders, the industrious, and the free?

We are at the beginning of an election campaign like you’ve never seen before!

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The left has been at war with traditional American values for decades: the Founding Fathers, the Constitution, free enterprise, Christianity. All are objects of scorn and ridicule by those who hope to “remake America” – to use President Obama’s phrase – into some sort of leftist utopia on the model of those that have already failed all around the world.

The war on Christianity is a particularly disturbing fight. The battle has been lowlighted over the years by leftists who twist themselves into intellectual knots in an effort to remove Christ from Christmas – which is like trying to remove the wet from water.

But the fact that they’re trying to defy the laws of physics doesn’t stop leftists.

Their war on American culture took a new turn this week, when the city of Davenport, Iowa, at the urging of its civil rights commission, decided to rebrand Good Friday as the “spring holiday.” A certain Baptist minister from Montgomery, Alabama might be shocked to find that civil rights activists these days are devoted to striking Christ from the public lexicon.

The decision sparked a national firestorm – Good Friday, after all, is merely the day that Christians around the nation and the world mark the crucifixion of Jesus Christ. The city finally had to reverse its decision.

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I would like to extend an invite to fellow freedom lovers and hope you are able to join me on April 10th at the annual Defenders of Freedom Dinner, featuring my good friend Congresswoman Michele Bachmann! Together we will continue to fight and restore America!

As the Central Illinois 912 Project has addressed previously on BigGovernment.com, Shorebank is a community bank based out of Chicago that is engaged in microfinancing – a hybrid of capitalism and social justice.  They have been supported and promoted by individuals like Van Jones, President Obama, President Clinton, and Secretary Clinton. They have also become heavily involved in the financing of green projects (see here and here).

In 2009, Shorebank received more than $35 million in federal funds for grants and new market tax credits. Despite this new flow of funds to extend to their customers and loan recipients, Shorebank reported a loss of $50 million in 2009 alone and was issued a “cease and desist” order by the FDIC and the Illinois Department of Financial and Professional Regulation.  In addition, ShoreBank was receiving strong warnings from the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago. Their dire financial state had lead them to initially seek a “bailout” from the State of Illinois, promoted by Chicago Congresswoman Jan Shakowsky and Senator Dick Durbin. However, they have since decided that they can find capital without seeking state help.

Interestingly, Shorebank is currently seeking support from a few large banks –all of which have received federal bailout money from the Toxic Asset Relief Program (TARP) and are Shorebank stockholders. These banks include Citigroup, Bank of America, and Chase. Citigroup initially received $25 billion in taxpayer money (plus another $20 billion soon after), and Bank of America initially received $15 billion (plus another $20 billion after that). Neither of these banks has completely paid back their TARP loan. Chase also received $25 billion in bailout funds, but repaid its loan in December of 2009. So rather than seeking a bailout from a state that has a $13 billion budget deficit, Shorebank is seeking to be bailed out by banks that have already been bailed out by federal taxpayers – which is, in essence, an indirect, federally-funded bailout.

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Today, in 1814, Napoleon abdicated this throne. (It would turn out to be the first of two abdications.)

Canadians hosted hundreds of American air passengers whose planes were grounded on 9/11. They opened their hearts and their homes to us. During the Iranian hostage crisis of 1979-81, fearless Canadian diplomats in Tehran helped smuggle out of that maddened country endangered Americans.

None of that seemed to matter this week. Not content with putting an end to America’s historic “special relationship” with Britain, nor with bullying the U.S.’ only reliable ally in the Mideast, Israel, the Obama administration has launched an attack on our Northern neighbor, Canada. Their unguided missile landed squarely on Parliament Hill in Ottawa. It was Hillary.

Oh, my! Even the very liberal Toronto Globe and Mail felt the sting of Madam Secretary’s tongue-lashing. “It was the third time in a two-day visit to Canada that…Clinton gave Canadian hosts a headache,” writes Campbell Clark. Short work. But then, she was always capable of giving us three headaches in one day.

Clinton publicly rebuked the Conservative government of Prime Minister Stephen Harper. Harper wants to make maternal health the centerpiece of Canada’s initiative at the next G8 summit.

What could be wrong with that?

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The LA Times has a piece out today that is entirely worth reading, about a brave and crazy Englishman who, contrary to all self preservation instincts, sneaked into Progressive Socialist death camps during WWII.

Bearing witness to Nazi horror

Reporting from Bradwell, England – The men in stripes came in looking like boxers and ended up like skeletons. Denis Avey could see them wasting away in a place so evil that even nature had abandoned it, without a bee or butterfly in sight.

They were the Jewish inmates housed in the ghastliest part of Auschwitz, subjected to brutalities and atrocities that Avey, an English prisoner of war confined to another section of the camp, could barely imagine.

But then, he thought, why only imagine them? What if, somehow, he could see those horrors for himself — see them, remember them, bear witness to the world about them?

So the then-25-year-old pondered and plotted, soon hatching a plan so audacious that, more than 65 years later, he shakes his head at its absurdity. While so many Jews and others held at the infamous extermination camp were desperate to get out, Avey was actually devising a way to sneak in.

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If I had a dollar for every time some tool during the health care debate brought up how “we’re the only industrialized” nation in the world without socialized health care I’d have a lot of money. Why, I could even retire from my current job of poisoning the environment and taking advantage of the working man. I could, you know, relax.

Even the U.K., the drones blather, has government run health care. I guess they think we can identify better with the U.K. because they’re mostly white and speak English. I don’t know. I won’t waste any time trying to figure out the left’s thought process. Doing so would be as dangerous and pointless as trying to decipher the Necronomicon.

Invoking the U.K. as a model should, naturally, have the opposite effect on the American psyche. I hate to bring it up, but we kinda fought a war a couple hundred years ago to insure that we were NOT just like England. We already had the English life. We were right there and we rejected it.

Think of all the things we missed out on, only to aspire to end up in the same place. Our fish and chips are inferior. Guinness served over here is never quite as fresh. We don’t have tea time. I really like tea. We also ditched the cool accents. I mean seriously, I could have sounded like Ian McKellan or Sean Connery if it wasn’t for those clowns Ben Franklin and Thomas Jefferson.

Thanks to the American Revolution we can’t claim Led Zepplin, The Beatles, The Rolling Stones, The Arctic Monkeys, The Smiths, Blur or the Spice Girls as our own. James Bond is not our brother. Neither is Dr. Who. On top of it, I would probably be a Lord or Earl or something. Damn it, Lord Leigh Scott of Wauwatosa sounds freaking awesome! Thanks a lot Thomas Paine.

Jerks.

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“For the past 22 years, I have dedicated my life to serving my community as a New York City pastor and spiritual leader. I have counseled the suffering, married couples, helped the grieving, fed the hungry and have acted as a liaison between my community and the government.” – Michel Faulkner, NY Post

In Feb., Rev. Michel Faulkner officially entered the ring to compete in a Congressional race that is sure to draw national attention.  This Nov., Faulkner is challenging Rep. Charles Rangel, a four-decade seat holder in the 15^th Congressional district.  Faulkner has a track record of success in truly uplifting the downtrodden.  Unlike Rangel, if elected, Faulkner won’t champion self-centered earmarks, they’ll be no ethics violations and most importantly – no pandering to the establishment.  Faulkner is the real deal and in a district with immense need.

What is perhaps most intriguing about Rev. Faulkner is his eclectic past.  While on his intriguing journey from NFL football player to college dean to pastor to his current role — Congressional candidate — Faulkner has consistently worked to improve the lives of those in need.  Unlike Rangel who is prone to ethics allegations, irrational earmarking and questionable conduct, Faulkner provides a fresh and untarnished aura.  As a representative, his background and passion would surely meld to formulate viable and effective leadership.  Unlike many politicians who enter the field for shear personal gain, Faulkner’s aspirations can be traced back to his intense faith and belief in the Almighty.  He wants to place power back into the hands of the people.

His past experience includes serving in a pastoral capacity in a number of churches, working to help the economically disadvantaged, assisting those with HIV/AIDS, serving on various NYC tasks forces, and forming his own not-for-profit that focuses on leadership development.  Faulkner’s resume shows him to be a genuine individual whose intense personal faith has bred a genuinely heartfelt duty to his fellow man.

Faulkner’s political platform is as robust and encouraging as his past works.  Aside from his unwavering belief that government should truly be driven by the American people (a virtue that Congress and the Obama administration have clearly forgotten), Faulkner champions ideals that have traditionally benefitted the most valuable areas of our society.

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The Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR), claims to be “America’s largest Islamic civil liberties group.”  But that’s a myth.  As we reported here on BigGovernment.com last fall, only 1% of CAIR’s latest reported revenues actually came from Muslim American members.

Meanwhile foreign donors have given CAIR over $6,000,000 in cash and loans, and over $50,000,000 in pledges.  That’s 1% from American members; tens of millions from Saudi Arabia, Iran, the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait.  Shouldn’t there be a law to let the American public know the truth about CAIR and their foreign donors? Of course, and there is one.  CAIR just doesn’t follow it.

The Foreign Agents Registration Act (FARA), enacted just before World War Two, still requires foreign agents spreading propaganda to register so Americans can know what they are up to.  Back then the problem was foreign agents working for the Nazis.  Today the problem is foreign agents like CAIR, defending Jihadists in the media and pushing Muslim Brotherhood values in America.

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In 1841, Charles MacKay first published Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds.  It’s a classic, and remains required reading (and fun, too) for anyone who wants to understand, well, Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds.

From Amazon:

“Why do otherwise intelligent individuals form seething masses of idiocy when they engage in collective action?  Why do financially sensible people jump lemming-like into hare-brained speculative frenzies- only to jump broker-like out of windows when their fantasies dissolve?  We may think that the Great Crash of 1929, junk bonds of the ’80s, and over-valued high-tech stocks of the ’90s are peculiarly 20th century aberrations, but Mackay’s classic – first published in 1841 – shows that the madness and confusion of crowds knows no limits, and has no temporal bounds.  These are extraordinarily illuminating, and, unfortunately, entertaining tales of chicanery, greed and naivete.  Essential reading for any student of human nature or the transmission of ideas.”

As MacKay explained way back when, idiotic crazes such as global warming hysteria are nothing new.  Throughout history, societies have fallen prey to similarly idiotic – yes I’ll say it again – Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds.  The book covers witch-burning, dueling, alchemy, the tulip mania, and much more.  To these – one more time – Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds, a future edition is sure to add a chapter on global warming hysteria.

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Back in November, when Peter Robinson interviewed me for Uncommon Knowledge, he waited until the last segment to throw down the gauntlet, asking me bluntly why I was so much more sanguine regarding the future than was the estimable Mark Steyn. My reply, which caught him off guard, was what he jocularly called “a low blow.” For I said something like this: “Mark Steyn is a Canadian. What would you expect? I’d be a pessimist myself if I were a Canadian.”

I would not want to deny that my ad hominem argument struck a bit below the belt, but I nonetheless thought it apt, and I have not in any way changed my mind. Mark is a man of keen understanding and quick wit, and he bears comparison with George Will and Charles Krauthammer, the very best of our pundits. Moreover; as a Canadian who has lived in Great Britain, he has firsthand experience of the profound damage done by what I, echoing Alexis de Tocqueville, termed soft despotism in my recent book. When he writes, in a recent post, “ it’s hard to overestimate the magnitude of what the Democrats have accomplished,” he is surely right. Indeed, I agree with almost every word in the following:

Whatever is in the bill is an intermediate stage: . . . the governmentalization of health care will accelerate, private insurers will no longer be free to be “insurers”  in any meaningful sense of that term (i.e., evaluators of risk), and once that’s clear we’ll be on the fast track to Obama’s desired destination of single payer as a fait accomplis.

If Barack Obama does nothing else in his term in office, this will make him one of the most consequential presidents in history. It’s a huge transformative event in Americans’ view of themselves and of the role of government. You can say, oh, well, the polls show most people opposed to it, but, if that mattered, the Dems wouldn’t be doing what they’re doing. Their bet is that it can’t be undone, and that over time, as I’ve been saying for years now, governmentalized health care not only changes the relationship of the citizen to the state but the very character of the people. As I wrote in NR recently, there’s plenty of evidence to support that from Britain, Canada, and elsewhere.

More prosaically, it’s also unaffordable. That’s why one of the first things that middle-rank powers abandon once they go down this road is a global military capability. If you take the view that the U.S. is an imperialist aggressor, congratulations: You can cease worrying. But, if you think that America has been the ultimate guarantor of the post-war global order, it’s less cheery. Five years from now, just as in Canada and Europe two generations ago, we’ll be getting used to announcements of defense cuts to prop up the unsustainable costs of big government at home. And, as the superpower retrenches, America’s enemies will be quick to scent opportunity.

Longer wait times, fewer doctors, more bureaucracy, massive IRS expansion, explosive debt, the end of the Pax Americana, and global Armageddon.

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As Moe Lane at Redstate noted, Rep. Phil Hare has forgotten the first rule of holes. When you find yourself in one, stop digging. As Big Government readers know, Rep. Phil Hare (D-Labor) is the Congressman who said he “doesn’t worry about the Constitution” and then mixed up that document with the Declaration of Independence…then said neither of them mattered to him because, well, ObamaCare is important! Or, something like that. As expected, this sparked a firestorm, so Rep. Hare cut his own video. It is below for your viewing pleasure. Our main tip to Hare: Memorize your lines next time. It looks really bad if you have to look at your notes to remind yourself to say that you love the Constitution.

Oh yeah, you can find info on Hare’s opponent, Bobby Schilling, here.