The opportunity for them to embrace a teachable moment so as to explain, in layman’s terms, why the country has suffered under the current administration’s policies, and why their proposed platforms bring relief to individuals and business owners across the political ideological divide, is slowly fading into the history books as “what could have been.” It doesn’t have to be this way, but, then, the proprietary minions of the inside-the-beltway GOP establishment don’t much care for the notions of we “fly-over” types. They know all about campaign strategy. Just ask them.

If avoiding the alienation of the electorate’s goodwill wasn’t enough of a reason not to go so personally and caustically negative, there is the notion that in doing so a great amount of damage would be done to each of the candidates, so much so – and for no other reason than to win the nomination at all cost – that the Obama campaign would be handed a full arsenal of negative talking-point ammunition for the General Election campaign. Armed with this free opposition research, already tested for its maximum destructive potency, and close to a $1 billion campaign war chest, David Axelrod, Valerie Jarrett, David Plouffe and Roberts Gibbs could get a mentally challenged three-toed tree sloth elected over the Republican challenger.

And while there is merit to the argument that the negative attack campaigning is “honing” the eventual candidate’s ability to confront the Obama campaign’s inevitable onslaught of attack ads and smear tactics, the fact of the matter is this: Axelrod, Jarrett, Plouffe, Gibbs and President Obama himself are infinitely more acclimated and proficient in the ways of Saul Alinsky than anyone on the Right side of the aisle, short of David Horowitz. The idea that any Republican candidate can compete in the arena of Alinsky negative political campaigning is a reality only in the realm of the absurd. Only a megalomaniac of a Republican campaign strategist would even entertain such a ridiculous notion.

Proof positive that the attack and smear campaign strategy currently being employed by the GOP primary candidates is doing more harm than good comes in the poll numbers. Yes, Mitt Romney’s attack ads aided his campaign in Iowa against Newt Gingrich. And yes, Newt Gingrich’s attack ads helped him in South Carolina. And again, attack ads helped Mr. Romney beat Mr. Gingrich in Florida – even though it cost him close to $17 million to achieve that victory. But, in the end, it was Rick Santorum who – without spending millions of dollars – swept the caucuses in Minnesota, Colorado and Missouri. Out of all of the Republican candidates, Santorum has waged the least negative campaign where attacking his fellow Republicans is concerned. I suppose one could go as far as to say that not only does Mr. Santorum believe and adhere to the Ten Commandments, he holds faithful to the “Eleventh Commandment” as well, or, at least better than the others.

But aside from the GOP primary candidates’ poll numbers and approval ratings – and perhaps more importantly, we need to look at what happened to President Obama’s poll numbers while the mainstream media was fixated on the negative campaigning of the GOP primary candidates.

In December of 2011, at the quasi-official onset on the GOP Primary cycle, President Obama’s poll numbers were something that the “axis political powers” of Axelrod, Jarrett, Plouffe and Gibbs were starting to become concerned about. His disapproval rating stood at 51.4 percent while his approval rating was an alarming 43.2 percent. Yet today, in just two and a half short months, Mr. Obama has reversed those numbers. Today, Mr. Obama’s disapproval rating is 47.0 percent and his approvals are at 49.0, according to the RealClearPolitics.com average of the major polls as of February 9, 2012.

Traditionally, negatives, or disapproval ratings – the percentage of people sampled who voice a disapproval of the elected official’s performance – are much harder to turn around than approval ratings. When someone disapproves of the performance of an elected official it takes an incredible amount of “good behavior” on the elected official’s part or an extraordinary event to change that perception. This is also the case with voter turnout. It is always easier to motivate people to turn out at the polls to vote against someone or something. To wit, in 2008 Mr. Obama’s supporters were more motivated to vote against President George W. Bush than they were convinced by the obtuse and undefined notion of “hope and change,” a recycled campaign slogan from the Clinton campaigns.

It can be easily established that Mr. Obama didn’t execute a change of agenda to affect “good behavior”:

▪ His performance in Middle East diplomacy has been dismal; his alienation of the Israelis has resulted in a movement to the Right among the American Jewish voters.

▪ The American voter has finally come to the realization that the Obama Administration’s Labor Department has been “cooking the books” where the unemployment numbers are concerned; true unemployment, when those who have given up looking for work out of exasperation are calculated in, stands at 22.5 percent.

▪ And Mr. Obama has gone out of his way to offend not only Catholics with an incredible transgression against religious liberties in his contraception mandate, a mandate aimed at Catholic universities, hospitals and philanthropic organizations, he has motivated the whole of the religious community in the United States to rally against this element of Obamacare.

So, with the idea that Mr. Obama has turned his disapprovals around because he executed “good behavior” disproved, we can only surmise that something else affected this dramatic turn-around; something extraordinary. Now, what took place between last December and today? Could it have been Republican primary votes and caucuses in Iowa, New Hampshire, South Carolina, Florida, Minnesota, Missouri and Colorado? Could it have been millions of dollars spent on ads ripping our Republican candidates apart; ads that smeared the records and characters of those who would run against Mr. Obama in November?

As I stated in an earlier article on this very subject:

“Mr. Gingrich, you’re a professor (and not a fake activist professor, like the one currently inhabiting the Oval Office)…seize the teachable moment to explain to the American people why Capitalism works, why limited government works, why American entrepreneurship is the best in the world when allowed to be free…

“Mr. Romney, seize the teachable moment. Abandon the negative campaigning and explain to the American people why Capitalism is good; why venture Capitalism serves a great purpose; and why redistribution of wealth only creates a non-motivated society that eventually devolves into the Atlas Shrugged storyline.”

I meant it then and, with the reality that this ridiculous and self-serving negative campaigning is literally aiding Mr. Obama’s approval ratings, I mean it even more now. Our candidates – Mitt Romney, Newt Gingrich, Rick Santorum and Ron Paul – have a golden opportunity to inform and educate the American citizenry on some of the most basic and critical elements of Americanism; elements blurred by the bribery entitlement mentality of the Progressive Movement and, especially, the Obama Administration. Pray tell, what do you really think this underwater mortgage homeowner bailout is all about? Why now? Think about it!!

There comes a time when even politicians have to come to the realization that they have an obligation to do what is right for the country before they do what is advantageous for themselves. That time, for the Republican Primary participants, is now. It is one thing to debate differences where issues and ideology are concerned. We the People expect and deserve that from those vying for public office. It is quite another to employ, narcissistically, the tactics of slash-and-burn politics for the sole reason of “winning.” We the People, the nation, in the memories of the Framers and the blood of true Revolutionaries – our children’s’ futures – do not deserve that.

The 2013 budget being released Monday will propose public works spending while seeking tax increases on the wealthy and corporations to claim progress on the federal deficit in his upcoming budget. The spending plan projects a deficit for this year of $1.3 trillion, the fourth straight year of $1 trillion-plus deficits, and $901 billion next year.

Jacob Lew, the president’s chief of staff, said the new budget would put the country on track to achieve $4 trillion in deficit reductions over the next 10 years, achieved by raising taxes on the wealthy and trimming government spending. Lew said the president’s budget would cut spending by $2.50 for every $1 it raises in new taxes.

“In the long run, we need to get the deficit under control in a way that builds the economy,” Lew said during appearances on the Sunday talk shows. “We do it in a way that’s consistent with American values so that everyone pays a fair share.”

The release of Obama’s spending plan for the budget year that begins Oct. 1 marks the official start to an election-year budget battle over taxes and spending as the nation’s debt tops $15 trillion.

Read more at the Associated Press

CROWLEY: “I want to read for our viewers something that Sen. Harry Reid, the Democrat Majority Leader in the U.S. Senate, who said, ‘We do not need to bring a budget to the floor this year. It’s done, we don’t need to do it.’”

LEW: “He’s not saying that they shouldn’t pass a budget. But we also need to be honest. You can’t pass a budget in the Senate of the United States without 60 votes and you can’t get 60 votes without bipartisan support. So unless… unless Republicans are willing to work with Democrats in the Senate, Harry Reid is not going to be able to get a budget passed.”

This is patently false.

You can’t filibuster the budget. The Congressional Budget Act of 1974 stipulates that debate is automatically cut off after 50 hours of debate. At that point, a budget can be passed by a simple majority, 51 votes. Democrats currently hold 53 seats in the Senate. They can pass a budget on a simple party-line vote.

Lew, a former director of the Office of Management and Budget, surely knows this. While the Obama Administration has regularly plumbed the depths of managerial incompetence, even they can’t be this incompetent.

That Lew prefaced this whopper with the tell-tale “let’s be honest” canard only highlights the cynical political maneuvering that is at the heart of the Administration.

So, let’s really be honest here. The latest Obama budget contains what virtually every proposed Democrat budget has for the past few decades; tax hikes, increased spending now and illusory budget “savings” some time in the ill-defined future. The Senate could pass Obama’s proposed budget within a couple weeks. The White House’s real problem is that Democrats don’t want to vote on his proposed budget.

Washington (CNN) – Sarah Palin issued a warning to Mitt Romney Saturday, calling on the former Massachusetts governor to do a better job explaining his record to conservatives or risk dampening voter turnout in November if he wins the Republican presidential nomination.

In an interview with CNN and The New York Times before her speech to the Conservative Political Action Conference in Washington, Palin said she was confused by Romney’s declaration here on Friday that he was a “severely conservative Republican.”

“I wasn’t quite sure what the word ’severely’ meant,” Palin said.

She said Romney and his two main rivals – Rick Santorum and Newt Gingrich – should be given time to explain the flaws in their record until the Republican National Convention in August, when she said the nomination fight could ultimately be decided.

But Romney may have the hardest sale to make, she said, asking him to explain his “shifts in ideology” since he left the Massachusetts governorship.

“You have to have the tea party patriots enthused and energized in order to win this nomination, and more importantly in order to defeat Barack Obama,” Palin argued.

If conservatives are “dismissed and they are marginalized” by the Republican establishment, “they are going to be much less enthused and much less willing to put it all on the line for the GOP candidate in the general election.”

The Obama administration recently ruled that all insurance policies must offer contraceptive services with no co-payments required. In and of itself, that decision is neither positive nor negative. Forty-three percent of voters favor it, while 46 percent are opposed. Among Catholics, though, according to Scott Rasmussen, only 28% believe religious organizations should be required to implement rules that violate church teachings. Sixty-five percent are opposed, which is true even though many Catholics disagree with the Pope on this matter. The only Catholics that agree with Obama are those that already voted for him. Only 39% of Catholic voters approve of Obama’s job performance today, compared to 54% in November 2008.

The person most helped by all of this is Rick Santorum, who now trails the president nationwide by only four points, 46% to 42%. In Ohio, Santorum is even with Obama, while Romney trails by four points.

Interestingly, Mitt Romney’s argument about electability is also called into question by recent polling. According to Rasmussen’s tracking history, Obama attracts some 50% of the vote against Romney’s 40%, opening up the largest lead Obama has yet enjoyed against Romney in regular polling going back more than a year. It’s also the first time that the president has reached the 50% level of support against Romney.

So what to make of it all? Romney’s down against Obama and Santorum’s up.

Ah, but will he swing and miss in November?

“It’s a coalition of different organizations including Occupy DC,” said James, an occupy protestor who joined the movement in late September from Orlando, Florida and emigrated to Occupy DC. “I think lots of organizations will be there too.”

James said the following of the Occupy CPAC plan:

The plan is for non-violent civil disobedience. We want to disrupt the conference and have our voices heard, have our message of the 99% against the 1% and have that voice take precedence. Things like CPAC have dog and pony shows, media circuses and it’s embarrassing. We’re supposed to be the most advanced democracy in the world and it’s embarrassing to have our political process look like a reality TV show.

It’s hard to say how many people will show up, but I think there will be a couple of hundred occupiers at least, and I heard at least three hundred people representing some unions, so my guess will be three to five hundred people. I hope it happens.

James also said that he hopes that Republicans will join their cause and said that during his time in Occupy Orlando there were “a couple” of Tea Party members and Republicans who occupied with them in Florida.

He added of the CPAC attendees:

I hope they realize we don’t take them seriously. They’re time is up–they just don’t know it yet. They are paper tigers and we are a scorching world fires, and by saying we, I mean the American people.

I would love it if people from CPAC came out and spoke to us as long as they were prepared to talk about the things we agree on and not the things we disagree on. We can agree to disagree on a lot of common issues, but when it comes to simple, common issues such as six banks running the country. I think we can find a whole lot of things to agree on with Republicans and libertarians. I’d like to see a non-violent, incremental revolution happen in this country. Something well thought out and move slowly.

Whether you’re on the right or the left, there’s so much posturing now. The Republicans know they’re not going to overturn Roe v. Wade in my lifetime so let’s get together and talk about reducing unwanted and teen pregnancies.

People ask what are you going to for the occupation? So, I ask well what are YOU going to do to change things because sitting at home and watching Dancing at the Stars and buying things online from IKEA? That’s not going to lead to a better future for your children.

Occupy DC protestors invited Big Government into their library at McPherson Square which includes a collection of historical and political biographies and texts. Under the American flag a piece of Occupy artwork hangs with Lady Justice's scales of justice - a dollar sign outweighs an infinity sign suggesting in America money outweighs everything else.

In it’s exclusive interview with James, Big Government tried to get a sense of what some of the general feelings were about the various CPAC speakers as well as President Obama. James said that he can only speak for himself on these issues, but explained he “could almost stomach” former Massachusetts Governor Mitt Romney when he was in office, but was now disappointed, and felt even greater disappointment with the other candidates:

ON RICK SANTORUM: “That’s just an embarrassment to our country that this guy is leading the Republican primary. He’s an intellectual lightweight. I’m not an elitist but even if you aspire to public service you should have a level of service and passion and be deeply informed on the issues.”

ON MITT ROMNEY: “On Mitt, it’s hard to say. I spent some time in Boston when he was governor there and that Mitt Romney I could almost stomach him. He was more of a centrist, he was balanced and reasonable, and now… why do we believe these things that politicians say? He was once reasonably pro-choice and believed in at least in some compromise on universal health care and led of the most liberal state in the country and now he’s indistinguishable from Sarah Palin or Rick Santorum.

WHY THE REPUBLICAN PARTY IS NOT COMMITTING TO ROMNEY: “The right-wing Christian base is looking for a reason, any reason to demonize him because he’s a Mormon. They’re showing their true colors, they’re wholly owned by radical, fundamentalist Christians and that cannot be good for the United States of America.”

ON NEWT GINGRICH: “Gingrich. Smart guy, really, really smart guy but I don’t agree with almost any of his political positions, and there was a time when he showed intellectual prowess, but his personal foibles are such that he shows he’s not suited for political office. Three wives? Come on. I’m the most open minded person in the world when it comes to social issues, but you want someone with strength and convictions, and he doesn’t. He’s lived his life like a drunken frat-boy.”

ON RON PAUL: “Ron Paul is the crazy uncle at both CPAC and Occupy DC. He has supporters on all sides of the spectrum. He’s personally good for the process because he does have very few common sense ideas but when you look at his intellectual underpinnings, he’s a little crazy. He’s unforgiving on certain social issues and it’s amazing how many people support him. You can’t be an Objectivist and a Christian at the same time.”

ON PRESIDENT OBAMA: “Obama sickens me, he’s the biggest disappointment of my life. I’m an anarchist but I vote because I still have to live in this system. On election-day, I felt sick, but I voted for him because he did seem like a different kind of politician. He gained his Senate seat just as a launching pad, but I believed him. I believed he was going to be a new politician, a new type of president, but he’s now just a big war criminal as George W. Bush as far as I’m concerned. When he appointed Geithner I was like, really? You’re going to get former Goldman Saks people? Obama had the opportunity with his force and personality as the first black president and really riding into office on a wave of hope and goodwill, there were a lot of slightly left Republicans even, but he’s never taken advantage of the bully pulpit he was given.”

ON THE OCCUPY MOVEMENT: “I think the most important thing about the occupation is that we are horizontal. We truly don’t have leadership. We represent such a broad sect of society we only agree on a few things and those things will come up to our general assembly process and sometimes they become part of the official position of Occupy. If you’re an occupier you’re not just encouraged but required to do the best thing for the occupation. As long as you’re not talking about violently hurting another human being, I may not join you, but I’ll stand in solidarity with what you do. I think what the occupation will achieve is not change but rather space for a chance. By hitting the 1 percent from every angle we are going to disrupt it and create that space for chance.”

James concluded the one hour interview by saying that he actually “pine(s) for the days of William F. Buckley, when there were intelligent people who would debate the issues with convictions.” He concluded, “There was a generation of conservatives. Many of them were well spoken, their arguments were well reasoned and they came from personal conviction and by and large you could, the American public could carry on a conversation that mattered without it devolving Jersey Shore.”

If one hops into the Way-Back Machine and plops down in late 18^th century France, one is apt to re-discover that fixture of high school European history known as The French Revolution.  Few would argue that French monarchy was a system worth endorsing.  But how quickly we forget what replaced it – a radical left-wing action that resulted in a secular Democratic republic that was a wee bit authoritarian.  Actually, if memory serves, there was this thing called The Committee of Public Safety – a virtual dictatorship run by crazy Robespierre that resulted in the Reign of Terror.

There’s a great quote from Robespierre to justify the use of violent repression, “Terror is nothing else than justice, prompt, severe, inflexible”.   Hmmmm.  Terror = Justice.  Now just slip the word “Social” in there before “Justice” and you can see where I’m headed.  But just so I can complete this parallel, Robespierre arranged to have even his allies executed so he could run the show himself, with his power assisted throughout the countryside by the Jacobin Club aka Popular Societies aka ACORN.

While the MSM spins about the “non-violent, non-Anti-Semitic non-racist #Occupy Movement”, your intrepid journalists here at The Bigs have uncovered tons of evidence that demonstrate just the opposite. Indeed, plans are in the works to….what’s the word?….terrorize the opponents of the People’s Revolution aka Obama’s #Occupy Movement. The result of all this violence was The Thermidorian Reaction – a swing back to the Right following the revolution.   I repeat, to the Right.

Let’s jump forward into modern day: 1968.  The country was being torn apart by protests.  Lyndon Johnson decided not to seek another term.  A power vacuum was created in the Democratic Party, and once again the Left ate its own at the Democratic National Convention.  Richard Nixon ran on a platform of restoring order.  He won.  Thermidorian Reaction.

The Reign of Terror, it is noted, actually executed far more workers and peasants – about 70% of those murdered by most accounts.  As we’ve seen, the Leftist-driven revolutions often go down in self-consuming flames, and are even being egged-on to their doom by their organizers.

Flashforward to present day.  Here’s the thing about Americans: most of us just want to be left alone to pursue life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness.  We want a job, a family, friends, neighbors, entertainment, a vacation if we can afford it, to save a little for retirement, and to enjoy ourselves.  Most Americans reject extremism on either side of the political spectrum.  Most Americans are much, much smarter than they are ever given credit for, have a very strong sense of right and wrong, know when the country truly is headed in the right direction or the wrong direction, know excess when they see it, and are fair-minded.

In other words, Americans get it.

And one thing they cannot, and will not, abide – the thing that trumps all else — is social unrest.  But rather than blame it on the intended target, they will look at the protestors and they will know that they are of the same ideology and party as the one in the White House.

They will shake their heads.  “You idiots.  You guys are the ones in power and you’re complaining?”

And they will blame it on the guy in charge – Barack Obama.

Whomever the GOP candidate will be just needs to point this out, and the 21^st Century Thermidorian Reaction will sweep him into power, probably by a larger margin than anyone currently expects.