Comparing the numbers from 2007, the last fundraising cycle before a Presidential election, the RGA is very happy, “more than doubling” that total. They carried over $26.6 million into 2012 giving them “more cash on hand than any other political party committee.”

The DGA, on the other hand, raised just over $20 million in 2011. That’s an improvement over their 2007 total of $12.7 million, but significantly less than the RGA’s total.

The RGA’s more than doubling of the DGA’s fundraising is an important as we head into the 2012 cycle. Democrats are hoping for significant coattails from the billion-plus dollars expected to be spent by the Obama 2012 machine and their surrogate groups.

Governor Bob McDonnell, Chairman of the RGA, said, “This year, the RGA will be on offense in eight of eleven states scheduled to hold governors’ races, and is in position to make game-changing investments in our races, including those in critical presidential and Senate battleground states.”

As the states push back against Washington’s usurping of the 10^th Amendment, grabbing more power for itself, having governors in those statehouses who will engage in a fight against it is important in the battle for liberty. The RGA appears well-positioned to be a significant player in that fight.

It led to a popular song by Crosby, Stills, Nash & Young and all manner of public outrage.

These “Occupy” mutants would like nothing more than to repeat that, especially now that the liberal Public Policy Polling firm found their movement to be less popular than the body lice with which they are infested.

But in the age of the Internet and camera phones, that’s just not possible.

In 1970 there were just 3 television networks, filming events was rare, grainy and encumbered by bulky, expensive equipment. A photograph, like one iconic one from Kent State, had no context beyond what a writer gave it. That’s no longer the case.

Everyone has a camera, video is not in short supply, context can no longer be given extemporaneously. If and when violence breaks out from the “Occupiers,” who’ve pledged to shut down parts of major cities around the country tomorrow, they won’t be able to spin the context of their actions beyond what is already on the public record.

When a protester says “You’re going to see what a Molotov Cocktail can do to Macy’s” on camera, their intentions are clear. The continual flow of threats of violence, and acts of violence, from these mutants is well documented online. They’re proud of it. That wasn’t the case in 1970.

While the threats and actions were there, President Obama’s good friend Bill Ayers and his Weather Underground terrorists were just one of many groups engaging in terrorists attacks against the United States, the all important look inside the mind of those people wasn’t.

Radicals back then were paranoid, refusing to speak their intentions freely in front of anyone but their most trusted inner circle. Their public pronouncements were more measured and filled with what they determined to be digestible, acceptable statements. They were crazy, but they weren’t stupid. They knew the American people would never support their radical agenda, so they hid it. That is not the case today.

The narcissism of today’s radicals doesn’t afford them the consciousness of the unpopularity of their agenda. This comes from the radicals in academia who present only one side of issues and pop culture that relentlessly reinforces the lies they’ve been told. For those who’ve never questioned what they were told, accepted it whole-cloth, never stepping outside the liberal bubble, seeing what they were told reinforced everywhere they looked gave them an arrogance of false righteousness their forefathers didn’t have.

That’s why they live stream their meetings nightly. That’s why the gleefully embrace the “human microphone,” not thinking the stripping of individuality would be disconcerting to a nation founded on rugged individualism.

Yes, their fellow travelers in the mainstream media have done their best to conceal their violence, their threats and their general creepiness, but they’ve bypassed the traditional media because they arrogantly assumed “We the People” were on their side. But the more we saw, the more disgusted we became.

The Internet and the camera phone, the very devices they thought would be their most valuable tool in spreading their message to the masses, is their ultimate downfall.

No one will have sympathy for anyone killed or injured by police in a riot if there is video of people calling for violence and riots against police beforehand. If there is video of people making threats, engaging in violence, calling the police “pigs!” That doesn’t fly in the modern age.

So by the time the “National Day of Action” starts tomorrow, this minority of mutants has already damaged their “brand” beyond repair. The iconic image of the “Occupy” movement will never be a screaming woman over a dead body, it will forever be a man defecating on a police car, windows of businesses being broken or any number of other offensive things willingly and deliberately done and said on camera for the world to see.

In the end, the worst enemy of the “Occupy” mutants was not the establishment, it wasn’t Wall Street, it wasn’t Fox News, it wasn’t Republicans, it was they, themselves.

In 1971, John Kerry famously asked “How do you ask a man to be the last man to die for a mistake?” Similarly, how can these “occupiers” ask, no hope, someone is the first to die for their’s?

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Among the literature I picked up off of their table was one titled “Security Statement.” What it said, and what it implied, was rather disturbing:

As the Security Committee of Occupy Baltimore, we release this statement to ensure the safety of our newly forming, delicate yet strong community.

Sexual abuse and assault are dehumanizing acts for the survivor as well as the abuser. It strips people of their right to safety, dignity, and respect, basic values which embody many of the intentions behind Occupy Baltimore. As a vibrant community, we recognize and give power to these values and the rights of survivors.

OK, saying you’re against “sexual abuse and assault” isn’t controversial, but do you really have to say it? Why isn’t it understood? As it turns out, that’s just the beginning of the weird. The entire “Security Statement” is about sexual assault and abuse.

Sexual abuse or assault at Occupy Baltimore is in violation of our values, and will not be tolerated. It is an explicit policy of Occupy Baltimore to prohibit abuse by any members of the community upon another person. Violation of this policy will result in the abuser no longer being welcome at the occupation.

So sexual abuse or assault are against “explicit policy” and will get you shunned? What about arrested? Those things are crimes, after all. Shouldn’t Occupy Baltimore, like every other group or individual, encourage people to contact the police to get these predators off the street? You’d think so, but you’d think wrong:

Though we do not encourage the involvement of the police in our community, the survivor has every right, and the support of Occupy Baltimore, to report the abuse to the appropriate law enforcement.

So if someone were sexually assaulted, a horrible experience, they wouldn’t be discouraged to contact the police, the “occupy community” would rather handle it internally. That’s just perverse.

The “Reporting Procedure”:

Any member of the Occupy Baltimore community who believes he/she/they have been a victim of, are aware of, or suspect a commission of sexual abuse, are encouraged to immediately report the incident to the Security Committee. T (sic)

The point person for dealing with these situations will be Koala! (sic) Largess, (443) 642-XXXX.

Survivors of Sexual Abuse will be given the support, resources, and assistance needed for their emotional and physical health.

So if you’ve been raped or sexually assaulted, don’t call the police; call someone named “Koala.” You can’t make this up, mostly because women’s groups would be protesting you if you did.

And that’s just side one:

The Occupy Baltimore prohibits retaliation against any member, survivor, or outside person who reports in good faith a complaint of an abuser or who participates in any related inquiries. False accusations of sexual abuse in bad faith can have serious consequences for those who are wrongly accused. Occupy Baltimore prohibits making false and/or malicious sexual abuse allegations, as well as providing false information during an inquiry. Anyone who violates any part of this policy will not be welcome at Occupy Baltimore.

They’re setting up their own court system here, where the ultimate punishment, no matter the severity of the offense, is banishment from a tent city. This is sexual assault we’re talking about here, not taking someone’s cupcake out of their lunch in the fridge.

The last part is “Investigation and Follow-Up”:

Occupy Baltimore’s Security Committee will make every reasonable effort to keep the matters involved in the allegation as confidential as possible while still allowing for a prompt and thorough inquiry.  All allegations of abuse will be treated seriously and thoroughly investigated.

If the survivor wishes to involve law enforcement, in order to obtain physical evidence of the assault, you must report the incident within 72 hours or the assault as collection and preservation of evidence is critical. Occupy Baltimore will also work to supply the abuser with counseling resources to deal with their issues.

The Occupy Baltimore Community has a Zero-Tolerance policy for any sexual, physical, or mental abuse of or by a community member.

So allegations of sexual assault will be kept from authorities. They “do not encourage the involvement of the police,” but if you’re gonna do it, do it within 3 days. I don’t know about you, but I’ve seen enough episodes of “Dateline” to know you report these things immediately, not after seeking guidance from the Hippie Council. And, in typical liberal fashion, they offer counseling not only to the victim but the perp as well.

Maybe everyone can join together for a nice drum circle at the end of the day and let bygones be bygones.

It’s rather disturbing that this group of semi-organized (at best) amateurs would set up a parallel, internal system of justice that discourages involving law enforcement like they were their own country. What’s more disturbing is that assault victims might abide by these suggestions, and perpetrators of such a crime could get away with only a shunning by this small group and some counseling.

Learning that the “occupiers” and environmentalists have a mutual dislike of certain kinds of soap comes as no surprise to anyone who has ever sat next to them on a subway, but the why is different for each group. Where the protesters, presumably, haven’t used soap in a month out of the necessity of circumstance, the environmentalists shower but want to take your choice of soap away from you.

I’ve written about this before, twice in fact, and while it’s not the most exciting topic on the planet (that honor goes to a tie between the start of NHL season and release of the new iPhone), it’s every bit an affront to liberty as banning incandescent light bulb was. Only with soap, there’s still time to act to stop it.

The offending ingredient in soap is called Triclosan, it’s what makes anti-bacterial soap anti-bacterial and stops you from getting sick an untold number of times every year. But to environmentalists, benefits to humans is of little concern, nor are facts, it’s the agenda of control über alles.

Zealots like Congressman Ed Markey (D-MA) and Congresswoman Louise Slaughter (D-NY) are pushing Congress to ban antibacterial soap under the time-tested Washington favorite motivation “just in case.” Just in case it’s dangerous, just in case it causes problems, just in case…

Under the “just in case” model there is much that wouldn’t be banned, or never have come into being in the first place. That’s why we have science and why science studies things such as this. And science has weighed in.

A new study published in the peer-reviewed International Journal of Microbiology Research found no harm nor risk of creating “super bugs” in connection to the use of antibacterial soaps in the home. Have you heard about it? Of course not, it doesn’t fit the agenda of the media today.

As the Occupy Wall Street crowd continues their unbroken string of glowing media coverage, it has been uncovered that there is coordination between these anti-corporate radicals and so-called journalists. That there is a liberal bias in the media was always known, that there is actual coordination is new. But it doesn’t begin and end with extremists in the streets, it is total and complete and extends all the way down to soap.

Not surprisingly the New York Times has written extensively asking if antibacterial products are “safe” without proof, even as recently as this past August. Yet search for a story in the Times about the latest scientific study to the contrary of what they like to imply and you’ll come up empty. It doesn’t fit the narrative.

The reason most “newspapers” will give you for not running something like the latest study results is that it was funded by an interested parties – in this case the American Cleaning Institute and Personal Care Products Council. The media tend to only report on studies that are funded by environmental groups that draw nebulous conclusions and use qualifying terms like “might” and “could” while pretending they have no vested interest or agenda in their outcome. The same bias in on display in the global warming debate – studies funded by environmental groups with an admitted agenda are highlighted while studies conducted by any group that can be tied to an oil company, no matter how old of tenuous the tie, is run with qualifiers or ignored altogether.

It’s odd that an activist group with a financial interest tied to a political agenda would have their nebulous word taken as gospel while an industry that faces financial liabilities for their product has no say in the public square. Until you realize that the media has chosen sides, facts be damned.

These issues should be studies, regularly and the results monitored closely and publicly. Nothing is more important than public health. But public health and the public interest can not be served when it is forced into the backseat of an agenda driven media  working hand in hand with agenda driven activist groups. In the ongoing battle over soap, and on so many other issues, the media has some dirt on their hands.

Bisphenol-A (BPA) is a chemical used to harden plastic so it can be used in the countless ways it helps improve countless millions of lives. As it is a chemical, it was only a matter of time before the extremist environmentalists started talking of the “dangers” of it to human beings. Ironically, charges of this nature are always led by people who have no concern of human beings. They are the same type of people who effectively banned the mosquito killing agent DDT. That ban has led to millions of avoidable deaths around the world from malaria. While the banning of BPA wouldn’t lead to deaths, it’s banning wouldn’t save any lives either. But it would put a lot of people out of work.

But work, jobs, livelihoods of individuals has no place in the environmental extremist agenda. They’ve replaced what was known to kill malaria carrying mosquitos with nets to sleep under. So instead of eliminating the problem they’ve reduced the problem…during sleep hours. Malaria’s largest number of victims are infants and children who don’t have the wherewithal to swat mosquitos away when they land on them, and since no one can live their whole life in a net, their exposure risk is high.

The book from which the religion of modern environmentalism sprang is “Silent Spring” by Rachel Carson. In many ways it is the Bible of that movement. And even though it has been discredited, the “Silent Spring” model still serves as the modus operandi of the environmentalist cult. Ban first, ask questions later. That’s what they were trying to do with BPA.

But a funny thing happened on the way to Utopia…

While environmentalists have always used their favorite tactic to “discredit” contrary information, their “go-to” arrow has been stolen from their quiver in the BPA fight.

To an environmentalist, the ability to attack the motives of those questioning their statements is their best weapon. Just look at Al Gore and the global warming/climate change debate. People dependent upon government grants to continue their studies find results that A) find results that are in line with those who publicize their “studies,” and B) will justify those grants and ensure the continued “need” for more. It’s almost as though crackheads got grants to study crack smoking and they miraculously get results that require more study. But since the end result of these studies is always the government getting more power to regulate people’s lives, it’s like the government is also a crack dealer and people trying to stop the cycle are the unwanted interventionists.

This circular dynamic was blown out of the water when a new study by the crack dealer, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA), found that BPA is harmless. While other large studies found the same thing, those were quickly attacked as being funded by “Big BPA” or some such nonsense. They’ve even helped expose the media bias inherent in these sorts of matters. But now the government itself has completed a large study, and duplicated the results in two separate labs, you’d think the fight would be over. It’s not.

The hardest thing to fight is dogma.

The ban bandwagon still rolls on, without even so much as a passing mention in the “news” stories about the new government findings.

So it seems we do now know what the environmentalists will do when their orthodoxy is proven false…ignore it altogether. But don’t you.

A federal ban, once pushed by Senator Diane Feinstein (D-CA), is all but dead…for now anyway. But that hasn’t stopped states, counties and cities across the country from moving forward with them. Is your local government moving to ban it? What will be next? What will it cost us in jobs, more money for “approved” products and liberty?

The environmentalists have an insatiable desire to ban what they, despite the evidence, don’t like. It didn’t start with BPA, and it won’t end with BPA…unless we end it.

The normal way passing legislation works is the House passes a bill, the Senate passes a bill on the same subject, they come together in a conference committee to hammer out the differences to form one bill, then both chambers vote again on the finished product. The way this debt negotiations have been going is the House passes a bill, the Senate and the President say they don’t like it. The House passes another bill, the Senate and the President say they don’t like it. Lather, rinse, repeat.

While this kabuki dance goes on, Republicans keep offering more and more plans, fighting amongst themselves and the media reports it as if they are the ones being unreasonable. This needs to stop.

It’s too late to stop a vote on the latest plan introduced by Speaker Boehner, it’s out there and everyone is expecting a vote on it. But that should be the last vote the House takes on the issue until the Senate acts on something.

What good will that do?

It shifts the narrative from “The Tea Party extremists in the House are blocking progress” to “Republicans can’t do anything until the Senate acts.” It highlights how the Democrats have yet to put forward any sort of serious plan with any bipartisan support, unlike Cut, Cap and Balance, which passed with Democrat votes.

This strategy also forced Harry Reid’s hand. He needs 60 votes in the Senate, so he’ll have to work with Republicans. Moreover, he has a lot of vulnerable Democrats up in 2012 who won’t be in a hurry to vote in support of a bad deal. Reid will have to moderate his bill, which will give Republicans a much better starting point in any conference committee.

The last 2 years Democrats have run the whole show, they’ve shut Republicans out of conference committees. Liberals have had the run of the Hill, and they’ve clearly gotten used to it. And Republicans have gotten used to being the red-headed step child. It’s time for that to end.

Republicans won a landslide of historic proportions in 2010, and while they know that, it’s long past time they start acting like it. I’m not suggesting they act like Democrats do, they don’t have the Senate, but to remember voters overwhelmingly chose them and the vision of Constitutional government upon which they ran.

This is a time for leadership, and Lord knows we aren’t getting it from the White House or Harry Reid. But leadership is as much knowing when to stop as it is leading the charge. House Republicans have led the charge, they’ve taken their side of the Hill. Democrats have no reason to take their side if Republicans will do it for them.

Harry Reid and President Obama don’t get to sit back and give a thumbs up or down like they’re Caesar, they aren’t dictators, they are participants. They’re supposed to be equal participants, they just haven’t been acting like it. It’s time for them to take off their togas and laurel wreaths and join the party.

If the Republicans all get on the same page, have message discipline about how they can’t pass legislation on their own, that they need the Senate to act so they can have a conference committee, the media will have little choice but to report the facts. Sure, that won’t stop MSNBC from blaming them, but it will take the crosshairs of the more legitimate media will be off the House, off the Tea Party, and the pressure will be put where it belongs – on Harry Reid and Barack Obama.

Democrats have gotten a free pass, mostly because Republicans have been so desperate to cut a deal and so afraid of getting the blame for there not being one. Harry Reid and Barack Obama have little interest in an actual deal, they certainly don’t want to cut spending, the only way to get one is to force them. No matter how cozy their relationship is with the media, and it’s cozy, when it is made clear and unequivocal that the ball is in their court, Democrats will have no choice but to play…or pay at the polls next year.

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Senator McConnell announced last week a contingency plan. The plan basically would give the President $2.4 trillion in debt limit authority in three tranches (Washington word for stacks of your money) and the President would be empowered to marry cuts to these increases in debt limit authority. The Congress would be empowered by a 2/3rds vote to legislatively veto any proposed cuts by the Administration, as a package deal, with these three increases in debt limit authority.

For example, the first batch of $750 billion in new borrowing authority might be conditioned by the President on massively cutting defense spending. Then Congress would have to vote, in both chambers by a 2/3rds vote, to stop these cuts. This seems at first glace to be a ill conceived and desperate idea out of the Republican “Leadership” to save face. It also may be unconstitutional, in that the legislature can’t delegate this type of authority under the Constitution.

McConnell thinks punting, chickening out, will somehow put the pressure on Democrats to…yeah, I don’t know either. He seems to think Democrat voters give a damn about spending or deficits at all (they don’t) or independents will rush to the polls in a year to vote out liberals who forced him to cave on an issue they don’t understand or particularly care about while they’re busy looking for work. The only way McConnell’s reported idea could be worse is if he insisted on more tax increases than Obama wanted because, essentially, allowing a debt ceiling increase without any spending cuts, or even with, IS a tax hike, only on the future. And the future was already screwed…

So what could a Senate Republican leader with testicular fortitude do? Since there isn’t one, this is all hypothetical.

First – Nothing. Obama is threatening to cut off Social Security payments, much like he threatened not to pay the military in the budget debate earlier in the year. If the debt limit was hit with no deal, the President would be forced to choose priorities for the nation’s money until a deal was reached. If he were to cut off Social Security, the military or any other program that directly and deliberately hurt people, that would be on him. You can really tell the character of the man, and the party, by him even making such a threat. But Democrats are no strangers to scare tactics, it’s where they live. Why not expose them?

Second – Instead of wussing out, why not offer, and have the House pass, a deal along the following lines:

Large spending cuts up front. Since no Congress can bind future Congresses, immediate cuts are the only type that will have any impact whatsoever. Promises of future cuts are a joke and a lie. It’s a lie Republicans have fallen for before. Both President Reagan and George H.W. Bush fell for this lie in exchange for tax hikes. So why not flip it?

Massive cuts up front coupled with triggers for votes on tax increases in the future if certain deficit specific benchmarks aren’t met. The spending decreases with realistic targets for both deficit shrinking and economic growth, which would increase revenue to the government. If, and only IF, these benchmarks aren’t met, then Congress would be compelled to vote on various tax increases.

No one knows who will be in the White House in a few years, or which party will be controlling Congress, so the tax hikes are not guaranteed. But the spending cuts would be, at least at the start. Once you lower the baseline, which would be immediate, the debt curve would start to point down.

This is no long-term solution, but given who is in the White House and who controls both sides of the aisle in the Senate, it’s possibly the best deal we could hope for. Everyone gets what they want, at least on paper. If Democrats are able to retake all branches of government in the 5-8 years, whatever it ends up being, when the triggers kick in, then Republicans haven’t been able to explain the importance of that vote to the American people, or have failed so horribly that they deserve to lose and the American people will get what they deserve. No one would go into those elections blindly.

We aren’t going to get the needed entitlement reform, Democrats simply don’t care about the future when they can try to scare people into voting for them. So this type of deal is probably the best we could hope for. It’s at least something worth trying before laying down our arms and following Leader McConnell into worthlessville.

This will have to be proposed by Speaker Boehner since McConnell has turned to jelly, but everyone knew that was likely to happen anyway.

So far, Boehner has been solid. Let’s hope he continues to be, especially now that it looks like he’s got a two-front war on his hands

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