Portland, 21 November 2009

           Apparently not.
           What is amazing is just how disliked both Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi are among the other members of Congress. Fully a third of both caucuses would toss Reid and Pelosi out on their ears if allowed a secret vote with which to carry it out. (See what I mean about manhood?) I'm speaking about a first ballot, no debate dislike.  So, why are they bewing drug along on a bill most of them don't like, and could gut both Pelosi and Reid like a fish simply by voting no.
           We believe, with an initial showing like that, a clear majority would quickly follow suite.
           Again, it's a question of manhood....and dirty laundry.

            The way the Democrat leadership runs the congressional membership now is a reflection of how they would rule the whole country...and in sort order is their plan...with a bullwhip and extortion. No carrot and stick. No sweet talk, no gentle cajolery. The whip!
            You can search history for the way certain dictatorial types have looked down upon their lackeys factotums and gopheres even as they depend on them for everything. If Mary Landrieu of Louisiana thinks that Harry Reid thinks better of her because he had to bribe her in order to get her vote, she's better think again. His disdain is now doubled. (Mine never was that high either.)
            In these times I always think of what the old revival preachers used to urge on their congregations...that first step, that first step. The road to the alter always begins with that first step out of the pew. Then there is no turning back. "I know you want to do it, brothers and sisters.  I know it." And when just one does it, many always follow.
            But alas, there are no men among the Democrats.
            
           Bernard Chumm

Portland, 21 November 2009

         In September my esteemed colleague, Mr Bushmills posted a piece about the French saving civilization, on the theory that the Russians, who could also do this terrible thing, don't really know all that much about civilization.
         From time to time we simply need to repeat the call:
       
         If total war is to be avoided in the Middle East, it must be a third party who blows Iran's nuclear capabilities to smithereens. Only the French and Sarkozy have 1) the military capability, 2) the cultural insight, and 3) the manhood to do this.
         We repeat out call: Set loose the Frogs of war!

Bernard Chumm

Richmond, November 20, 2009

           One year out to the mid-terms, three years out to the general, any wannabe who wants to lead the GOP into an electoral victory in 2012 needs to be turning the dirt over in his garden now.
           Our opinion, consistently, has been that members of Congress need not apply. We believed that in 2008 as well. There are dozens of reasons why this is so.
           But that does not mean that there does not have to begin very soon a movement in both houses that will coincide with the general themes of the would-be president. Ploughing the row, so to speak.
           Now in truth George W Bush did an effective job of this in 2000, only his themes fell flat very quickly. I even liked the sound of "compassionate conservatism" except my definition and GW's barely touch. But for reasons I can only call self-deluding, Bush persisted in his themes of getting along, even as the Democrat Party in Washington, by March 2001 had already revealed themselves as different beings altogether than the democrats Bush had known in Austin. These Democrats' real purposes, for reasons that were obvious to Christ as soon as he met Satan eye to eye in the Wilderness, George W Bush could not allow himself to recognize.
           But on the ashes of Bush's failure, the GOP's next candidate has to be able to 1) recognize the full dimensions of this opponent and the struggle, which is both cultural and constitutional, and 2) convey to the general public that he understands these dimensions in the same way we already do.
           In other words, seeing Evil personified, he must show us that he (or she) is ready, willing and able to spit in its eye. To hell with this turn the other cheek crap....especially since it's our cheeks, not his, being slapped around.
           All this will be altogether more easy to accomplish if this undeclared "leader" begins seeking out fellow visionaries very quietly (but strongly) among members of Congress, media and other cultural and institutional leaders. It will require some discretion, and a special touch, hence some time, to be able to effectively vet his best allies among congressional members without being ratted out to a media who will not have his best interests at heart.

           Now this is not an endorsement for "Anyone but Sarah Palin". Quite the contrary. She is the one immovable object in our desire to see a rejuvenated, and "re-masculated" GOP. We are encouraged in our belief that Sara will accept whatever role and platform from which she can best help "America". If the GOP can't find this person, she will act accordingly. We like her, and would vote for her in a heartbeat, but unless she has a "guns-a'blazin'" strategy that will quieten much of the anti-American (not to mention anti-Sarah) mood in America...you know, putting 8-10 members of Congress in jail, ditto the administration, and generally re-acquaint the people with the legal limits of "treason"...we can expect only 4-8 more years similar to Bush's slide into irrelevancy. The new President will have to represent a new start, a start from ground zero. A new dawning of American civilization.
           Personally, I like David Petraeus, so the sooner he retires and begins surveying his options, the better. I also like Judge Napolitano...articulate, rigid in his beliefs, and a Libertarian to boot. Good combo there. We still like Mitt Romney, Huckaby not so much, and Newt, don't even bother to get up off the couch. But Romney's biggest strength in 2008 will be his biggest drawback in 2012. The new reality of a socialist today takeover doesn't call for a leader who can smile the chrome off a trailer hitch. We need a spitter, with just a glimmer of cold-blooded meanness in his eye...and an acetylene torch.
          I may have missed someone let me know, and if anyone steps forward meeting that description, I'll keep you posted.
          Finally, the would-be president needs to be considering a kitchen cabinet of specialists who will move with some stealth to disembowel the bureaucracy, among other things. We have a good bureaucracy-buster as part of our own team right here in Richmond. We think that is key.
          If we are going to have czars, this is the business they should be going about.
VB
          
    

Portland

        ....Bill the Baptist.
        After all, Obama's administration is made up mostly of old Clinton operatives, including Eric Holder.

        So, when does Salome dance, Bill? And who is she?

        Watch your top knot Bill Clinton. You are still a great mind, and with a little humility, (and a few moments at the foot of the Cross) can still serve your Nation and your God.
        Just watch your top knot.
    Bernie

Richmond, November 18, 2009
 
           Taking over the GOP consists of only one thing. It does not require a change in personnel, although that will undoubtedly happen as many of those centrists who don't get it or don't want to get it (virtually all of them) will head to high cotton...until they realize there is no place else to go. As Democrats they will be garden gnomes.
           For at least a decade rank and file conservatives have watched the process of diminishing the Constitution continue apace. This is not new. It is not an Obama phenomenon. This goes back to Clinton, even LBJ. The Obama-Pelosi-Reid axis is a natural extension of a power process that has been going, unabated and un-challenged, for forty years.
          It is and always has been about the Constitution of the United States, for that document, in its spirit as well as its language, expresses the deepest desire of the little men and women to be free all over the world...and from the beginning of time. It is their blueprint for every hope and dream.
          So, let's be logical. It only follows that the "men who would be kings", or aristocrats, or merely hereditary elites, not to mention a few tyrants, would hate that document...for precisely the same reasons. In theory, this sentiment has also existed from the beginning of time, long before It was ever written.
          For over forty years, excepting eight special years with Ronald Reagan, the Republican Party in Washington has treated the Constitution much as a Christian might the name of Jesus at a swell in-group New York City cocktail mixer...wrong atmosphere, wrong crowd...so best to keep Its name silent...just to avoid any embarrassing pregnant silent air.
          Besides, the Constitution comes with its own built-in protections, the Invisible Hand.
          Funny, but mentioning both God and the Constitution in worshipful tones, in public places, went out of stylish vogue at about the same time, around 1900. Since then, they have belonged to the silly little Hyman Kaplans just getting off the boat, or lately, that femme fatale from Alaska about to lead the GOP off a cliff...only how can you fall off a cliff while dwelling in deep in hole?

         No matter, everything, everything, revolves around the Constitution. For you one-issue conservatives, whether your cause is school prayer, abortion, immigration, low taxes, without the Constitution you're skating on thin ice. You only have a political issue. You have no universal high ground. You have no territory.
         Split hairs later. Make the Constitution your universal watchword. Your ralling cry. Your standard. Your battle cry.
         Do that one thing, and you will regain the Republican Party.
Vassar Bushmills

Richmond, November 18, 2009

             Time stopped for about four hours on Sunday, December, 1941. When it started up again virtually everyone...everyone...knew that the life they had known on December 6th would be no more...forever. Still, they did a complete three-sixty (as Maxine Waters is prone to say) and moved forward. They still went to work and school, and window shopping. The movies were almost the same as they were before, except for the Movietone reel. The magazines looked almost the same as they had before. It was just that everything...everything...was dipped in that large vat of boiling oil called "the war". For 150 million people, life was turned up on its end. For a million, it ended altogether.
             This didn't happen after 9/11. The "event" lasted about a week, maybe two, and then we all went back to work once we'd seen that the terrorists didn't have another immediate plan up their sleeve. The rest, the war in Afghanistan, then Iraq, well, the government seemed to have that in control. We followed it in the newspapers, on television, but except for the million or so with loved ones in harm's way, the other 249 million didn't really pay much attention. We worried about our weight, our new cell plan and dithered with our iPods, "texted" then tweeted, and moved on toward our personal 12/7.

            Individually, life rarely flips as it did after 12/7. A car crash, a sudden catastrophic illness in the family, a new born with special needs, all these occur daily, still they never invade the people as a whole. Mass unemployment comes closer, as we've seen in the past year, rising from 4% to nearly seventeen. Still, the vast majority walk around as if it still is, and always will be, December 6th.
            It's a good thing we don't have targets on our backs, as the Jews did in the 1930s.
            Or do we?
            As many Christians, for one reason, conservatives for another, and still others for other reason, all saw in the language of Barack Obama and the company he kept, and now keeps, there is ample reason to pick up one's belongings and move to a safer haven. In 1933 many Jews begin doing just that, as Hitler finally took power and began moving toward dong what he'd said all along he was going to do.
But the majority of Jews didn't. They just couldn't believe that Hitler could or would turn their lives upside down...and in this belief they were sheltered by the comfort and protection of their own habits....nice house, employment, a post at the university, the hospital. Those nightmare scenarios don't happen to civilized people...at the hands of "civilized" people.
           Well, we all know the rest of that story.
           We also know that of those who can tally their odds and have the money, many do move. Even Rush Limbaugh has threatened to go to New Zealand.
           But most of us couldn't move if we wanted to. Where? Mexico? Canada? No, we either hunker down or we fight, and if history is any indicator, most of us hunker down....especially if we are guaranteed the basic elements of life...work (of sorts), food (of sorts) and a place to live (of sorts). It's a basic law of life that, when faced with losing those three things, Liberty comes in a far distant fourth.
          You can then see why it was such a big deal, a meaningful deal, the real deal, when the signers of the Declaration of Independence pledged their "lives, fortunes and sacred honor", for they all did just that. Most lost their fortunes, their homes, many of their children, had bounties placed on their heads, and fought a war, in one way or another for six long years.
          It's almost time we have to start choosin' up sides....Hunker down, or fight. These are things you need to start thinking about now, not the day after Election Day, 2010.
Vassar Bushmills

Portland, 17 Nov 2009
               
              Item:  The Associated Press dispatched eleven journalists to Fact-check Sara Palin's new book to uncover factual discrepancies.
They found six or seven, minor, almost typo-level errors.
              Yes, I know, to date no news agency has done anything like that with Al Gore's book(s), or films, but at least we know now the AP, and in all likelihood CNN, NBC, ABC, CBS, and maybe even MSNBC are back in the truth business.
 
              So, here's what you do, FoxNews.
              I see you've been having a lot of fun with the "discrepancies" between Administration announcements of jobs created or saved by the stimulus package and the truth, as the facts continue to trickle in about mistake after mistake and out and out fraud.

              We think it's time for you (FoxNews) to connect the dots. This latest spate of non-facts coming out of the Administration only accents a bevy of untruths that actually began early in the 2008 campaign, when Obama stated he barely knew Bill Ayers, who, it turns out ghost-authored one of his books.
              Those weren't broken campaign promises. They were out and out lies. And like Glenn Beck, Shep can pull out a big chalkboard, list them, then connect the dots. (We urge this be done by the news side of Fox, though.)
              With those facts established as a baseline. it is appropriate that as the Administration and Congress continue to publicly state that this or that is not intended in health care rationing, stimulus success, etc, that each comment be preceded by a beep-beep-beep-warning: "The Administration (or Congress) had been known to lie in the past."...then issue their comment.

               In fact, I believe this is a journalistic responsibility. The Constitution inferred it as part of the press's quality control function.
BC
             

Portland, 11 Nov, 2009

         Everyone is saying it. Obama's cool exterior and schtick is wearing thin. Iceman. Mr Cool. Mr Dispassion, none of these things seem to work as much, or as well anymore. Even the leftish press is bored.
         The question always has been: Is this a genuine demeanor, or a facade?
         We think it is real, only it is not due to a cool, calm, collected spirit , but rather, when measured against his actual actions about the things he seems especially cool about...the war in Afghanistan, the murders at Ft Hood, terrorism, death panels, ...
         Indifference.
BC

Veteran's Day
 
             Veterans, I salute you.

             People sometimes forget that "the news", like most other things, comes in twos. There's news you can file away, and maybe write a book about someday, or win a trivia game. And then there's news you can use right away.
             All the news the members of the US Army want to know is whether their head generals have their back. They didn't under Clinton, and it has been loudly shouted now that they don't, and won't with Casey, under Obama. All that is left to know is just how far this absence of loyalty will filter down.
             As I just said, this is not uncommon. With Afghanistan slowly being tabled (we called this the day after the election) the soldiers' generals are likely to start resigning/retiring pretty quickly. I expect to see both Petraeus and McChrystal in civvies by this time next year. Hopefully, Petraeus will be shooting higher.

             The investigation of the Ft Hood murders by a uniformed American-born jihadist will continue to move apace until exactly one day after it has passed from memory from all except the families of the victims. It won't matter what those findings will be, or how they will be couched (spun) or how much evidence will have been officially suppressed (uncorroborated, insufficent) to protect various agencies and their ranking bureaucrats for having neglected to do this or failing to do that. The first utterance from the FBI (read Justice Department) told us where this investigation would officially go before the last victim had been bagged and tagged and moved to the hospital. Remember, the FBI still stands by its refusal to issue a search warrant against the 20th hi-jacker in Minneapolis. Same mantra, same rationale. Protect the decision-makers.
             But the old days are gone when you could just put a lid on these things. Thank the internet and alternative media. One of the ultimate failings of the type of government Obama and the Left wish to impose on us is the knee-jerk protection of bureaucratic screw-ups by trying to re-define what is fact and what is not. After Waco, Janet Reno blamed "process", which she promised to fix. Not one single head rolled. The live bodies who brought about that murderous debacle walked away scot free. The job of management is to control bureaucracy, not protect it.
             This we know: by re-defining "fact" as only that which a commission declares to be a "fact" as it brings down the gavel, simply isolates the bureaucracy even more, bringing about its ultimate demise. Just ask the Soviets, East German, Romanians, Bulgarians, et al. Just ask our soldiers, who already know they had been the victim of a jihadist, a terror-attack.
             In the meantime we all try to soldier on with the knowledge we all know to be true. Nidal Malik Hasan was an anti-American, pro-jihad officer in the US Army and the Army and other agencies knew it. In all likelihood, the final report will gloss over this fact, and will spend most of its time absolving the actors who allowed him to move to his final scene unimpeded, and the atmosphere of fear from repercussion (Political correctness), instead focusing on the process.
             In this I will offer a qualified defense of the Army, in that ithe Army also comes in two's. There is the uniformed side, including the medical wing, I am sure there has been much banging of heads and gnashing of teeth by officers and enlisted for some time about this Maj Hasan, only to be blocked or intimidated by the "other" Army, made up mostly of civilian bureaucrats from the Dept of Army (DA) and Dept of Defense (DoD), and their arsenal of regulations saying that observations and complaints about "people like" (infer what you want with this) Hasan can only be handled in a certain way.
             In short, real soldiers in the Army were hamstrung by the syatem about "people like" Hasan from the git-go.
             So, in the end, Obama sends out his general (Casey) to protect his bureaucrats, this general in effect telling his troops, even during a war, that CYA politics comes first. It takes no time at all for this message to trickle down. In fact, it already has. It has also trickled sideways, for the same message has been read loud and clear with the Marines, the Air Force and Navy. If there were a morale-ometer in the military, it would have dropped by half when Casey made his first statement.

             What to watch for, of course, is how the investigation and trial will (and probably already is) being gerrymandered. This was a crime committed by a uniformed soldier against soldiers on a US military base. The lead investigation, in fact, arguably, the exclusive investigation, should be with Army CID. Yet I have not heard CID mentioned. The charges and trial should all be according to the UCMJ, the prosecutor an Army JAG, not a DOJ lawyer. Watch to see how that turns out, and whether TJAG, the Pentagon and Ft Hood command tries to influence how the case is put together and tried. The convening authority is the commander at Ft Hood, not Casey, not TJAG. Also, watch to see if the the Army brings in special trial judges (they can do this) rather than the regular judge rotation at Ft. Hood. This will mean they have been shopping for judicial rulings that will favor suppressing certain information that might embarrass DA, DoD or the medical command. I'm sure TJAG in Washington is hard on this search now.
            Sine Waco, I no longer trust TJAG.
VB

Richmond, November 10th, 2009

           As you know, John Mohammed, the so-called "D.C. Sniper", is scheduled to be executed this evening at 9 PM. The US Supreme Court has already refused to intervene. As expected, various groups have appealed to Virginia governor Tim Kaine, himself in his last days in quite a different context, to commute the execution.

           For as long as I can remember, executions have been carried out in a rather predictable and ordinary fashion.
           Around the place of execution people gather, some with placards, others simply to pray, depending on whether their bias against the death penalty is political or religious in nature.
          But also, depending on the kind of killer being executed, there is also a counter demonstration, sometimes, in part by aggrieved family and friends, still others with their own political ax to grind, such as making executions public. And then there are those little groups of creeps who truly want to celebrate a good hanging.
          Nowhere to be seen, ever, is the one man or woman who have the actual power to not kill this man. The power to commute also carries with it the power to kill be refusing to commute.
          This isn't distended logic. It simply reflects a solemnity about the taking of lief that people in positions of majesty seem to overlook. Of all the dark duties the state must carry out, (at least until they discovered enslaving the people and taking all their money can be made legal), putting a man or woman to death has to be at the top.
          It would seem to me that the place of execution is the only place for that one person to be...and that his/her demeanor and dress should reflect not just the sobriety of the occasion, but the great weight that an executive carries by not stopping this horrible killing of another human being.
          Carrying an open Bible would be nice. Me, I'd be with the Catholics, joining them in prayer for the soul of the soon-to-be-departed, as well as my own. Maybe someone would think to prayer for the governor's strength.
          Just a thought.
VB

Richmond, November 6, 2009

             For amusement, sometimes, or a kind of vacation away from the weightier aspects of this wahr, I sit and muse about the very basic elements of political and human discourse.
             Many years ago, around Carter's time, I read a column in the Arizona Republic by Mary McGrory in which she stated that "liberalism" stood for the proposition that all human activity should be subject to the political process. Since that idea was anathema to the Constitution, as a professing liberal I had a choice to make. So it was the day I quit being even a liberal in name only.
             Some years later, after a long stay in Russia, the first full winter after Clinton was inaugurated, I was walking in downtown Cincinnati, on my way to a meeting with some 5th Street lawyers. A tall young man, in black dress overcoat, grey scarf, and a clipboard stopped to ask me some questions. He explained he was conducting a poll, and seeing he was dressed better than I, I didn't bother to ask "for whom?".
             His first questions was simple: "What do you consider to be the most important political issue before the American people today?"
             Easy, as Clinton had already been there almost a year. So my answer was one word "Honesty."
             In dead seriousness, without looking up from the clipboard, he said, "I guess I can put you down as a Republican, then." It was not a question, but a statement of fact....so in quick understanding, I turned and walked the other way.

             I think about that episode a lot. I've told it a hundred times, and shushed more Democrats than you can imagine. But I was always unsettled about what that young fellow was telling me, for what that fellow was telling me was that honesty, simple honesty, telling the truth versus telling a lie had been reduced to a political calculation. One of the most important "survival-enhancing" attributes for civilization had been put into a box along with campaign slogans, songs, and parade banners. A mere "party" favor, really.
             Instead of politics being played on a field designed by a sense of truth, (among other cultural norms), in this fellow's eyes, truth was being played out on a field designed by politics. It really was an alternative universe one of us lived in.
            And there's the rub. Who's on the outside looking in, and who's on the inside looking out? And which, in anthropology-speak, represents survival for the civilization?
            My God! Mary McGrory had won...and civilization lost.

            I always knew there was something profound in these encounters, but since I had no drunk Russians at my side to quickly walk up and point it out, as they had with the operative (Homer Simpson) clause of the Declaration of Independence, it took years for the answer to be revealed to me.
           The Constitution of the United States, in it essence, is not a political document, and conservatism, therefore, in its essence, is not a political dogma.
           We are, to the core, anti-political, for the Constitution provides a system whereby people can go about their lives without politics, pushing what we traditionally refer to as politics to the margins of their lives, where they can attend to it as often as sitting down to make the house and car payment at the beginning of each month.
           Seriously, how can we debate politically Jefferson's famous Homer Simpson clause of the Declaration, "we hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal" when we hold that as an essence of human existence? Only the Left, the Marxists, the "Fascialists", believe human equality to be a political issue, and By God, it seems they now control the turf.
           You can't watch a news show, even on Fox, in which some fundamental understanding of human liberty isn't matter-of-factly relegated to the subordinate position of an idea(l) whose political fate has yet to be decided, or considered to be subject to the political caprice or power. Think about it. Watch for it. It is pervasive. Every time the word "partisan" is used, look for an underlying relegation of a universal truth into a political niche.
         
           You can see why we're losing then. It's their ball field, their game rules, even their ball. By us (conservatives and GOP alike) dropping the ball by not making the constitutionality of the health care plan our first line of attack (or is it defense?), we have inadvertently cast the Constitution into that same old box of political tools, which, like truth, can be pulled out, or hidden away, at the choice of the game-players.
           We need to refuse to concede this field, or we can't win.
           Bernie Chumm has been working on a piece criticizing Glenn Beck's book, Arguing With Idiots (sort of), in which he says we must stop conceding premises to the Left that we know to be false. He believes, and I agree, that every time a newsman, interviewer or member of the opposition Left drops one of those "as everyone knows" little lies, prefaced often with "partisan", the conversation has to stop at that very moment, and the subject turned toward the lie, and not to whether the jobs saved by the stimulus package is factual or not.
          Rule: Refuse to play on a field designed by, and rules defined by, lies.
          Conservatism isn't about politics, it is about territory; cultural territory the Constitution (and God) says every free man and women are entitled to stake out, and even anthropologists will admit, are necessary for a culture to more forward, grow, and prosper, propagate and survive.
          This is why we fight.
          Now, we just have to start fighting smarter.
Vassar Bushmills

Portland, 4 November, 2009

       "On the fiftieth day of Christmas, my true love gave to me....
        ...Fifty new knees a'quaking..."

      Fifty new sets of knees, that is.
      With a House health care bill to be voted on over the weekend, there may not be time for the vote yesterday to be analyzed, but as we see it, on Tuesday morning, there were forty knees quaking in the Democrat Party already. This morning there were an additional thirty Dem's ...and twenty more Republican's knees.
       Never underestimate the power of NY-23 and Doug Hoffman. Our belief here is that the Scozzafava babe was the one sure "Aye" vote to health care reform and that was why the Dem's prevailed upon the media to prevail upon the GOP...etc. A plant, all directed toward that one vote.
       The Democrat-winner (our opinion) will want to stay on and get re-elected in twelve months, so my guess he already possess one of these sets of quaking knees. He's 50-50 at best on health care since he knows he will in all likelihood meet Hoffman again a year from now, and then, the Ft Drum absentee votes will be his rather than the Whatzername with an (R) next to her name.
        The times, they are a'changin'....
BC

Richmond

      In general, we don't like blogs, and we don't like blogging activity. We use this blog site at TownHall to post very un-bloglike think pieces, analysis and the occasional (disguised) action plan. You know our view; the real battleground will be "after the politics", and the politics will only decide who is on which side of the glass window, looking in or out; who will be dressed in the uniform of officialdom, and who will be in the camo's of guerrillas. Right now we're on the inside, in the full dress regalia of constitutional liberty. That can soon change, as the window has already been broken by a rock, and the door kicked in.
      As we've also commented before, to most people of the Right, especially the younger set, blogs are vanity sites, part preening, part catharsis, where a person can vent, collect a variety of links then pass them around to his/her collection of friends, and generally go to bed each night deluding himself that he/she is actually a "sojur" against the enemies of Liberty. Indeed, sometimes, that is all we can do.
      In the end blogs are what we called in the military G-2 sites, a place where raw intel (factual news stories) is gathered, analyzed and disseminated. At the upper end of that spectrum you'll find Matt Drudge, who is a daily library of factual information, as useful a clearinghouse as you'll ever want to find. Drudge also comes up with some of his own news breaks as well. So does Michelle Malkin, who does analysis as well, and, when she can, makes public appearances, cheering the troops on. But she doesn't really lead them. She's more Stage Door Canteen, leading war bond drives, than a field commander. Lesson: There's only so much writers and well-known personalities can do.
      And blogs are not as adept as talk radio as the analysis side of G-2 intelligence, for there is the master of that art, Rush Limbaugh who must do 15 hours a week, on the wing, which few revival preachers can do for even one week, let along 51, or is 50? Along with Glenn Beck and Sean Hannity, talk radio "G-2 analysis" reaches an army of listeners even the best blog can't begin to dream of reaching.
      But there is that one single limitation to talk radio. It is all talk, which for years has allowed millions of concerned American's go to bed each night also thinking they had done something for the Cause just by listening.
      Recently, Glenn Beck has moved over to the Plans and Ops (G-3) side of this little war, which we believe to be a major development against this "fascialistic" takeover of the American republic. It's major because Beck has stepped outside the box the Left had planned on him staying inside, which buys a lot of time for our side in that, if G W Bush is any kind of example, it takes at least a year for the Left to come up with a counter-strategy. (They live by their "book" and things outside the book discombobulate them...at least for awhile. We like anyone, or any tactic that gets out in front of the Left.) Still, in the end, Beck is locked in a box of his own making, which means that his long term value to the Cause will remain as a G-2 analyst...at least as long at the government allows those platforms (talk radio and the internet) to continue.

      The Left on the other hand, sees and has used the internet and blogs, as operational tools from the very beginning. Being in our 60's, we are limited in our internet skills, but are long on understanding the way the Left uses and disseminates information (and propaganda) as operational aspects of their war against the Constitution. That's because we see the "game" through their eyes...more specifically through the eyes of a KGB handler. They use codes and they use the din of chatter to disguise codes, messages and marching orders. Even Marxist dialectics is a code of sorts. Al Qaeda "chatters" in a similar fashion, as did the Algerian rebels long before internet. Samizdat was code. The Jews in Diaspora created a verbal code that lasted from the Middle Ages into the ghettos of Poland during the Holocaust.
     And they use feints, "trial runs". We wrote about this before, as I am sure last night a few precincts in Virginia or New Jersey, maybe even NY-23, had votes stolen, purposefully, but possibly in precincts where those stolen votes wouldn't matter a single whit...just to test the system, to probe, and try new tricks, with little risk.
     They're still way out in front of us on this, we feel.
      For the past year we have been trying to plant seeds among the few who read our posts, and who may even pass them along, that much of what the Left is doing (that is legal) needs to be replicated on the Right, both nationally and regionally/locally, with an operational view of, where possible, to engage them head-on...on campus, in town...by letting them know they've been "made", to generally annoy the p**s out of them, and more importantly, perhaps, letting the bureaucratic factotums who drive this Left wing revolt to know they also have been made, and are now also under our microscope...and the buses may be pulling up to their front yard any day now. We generally refer to this as "Agitprop" although it's implications run much broader and much more deep.
     If you want to create both a chilling effect and palliative effect with bureaucrats, at the same time, that is how you begin...by letting the paper-hangers know you are onto them. But operationally, these are all local ops, a thing no talk show host, no best seller by Ann Coulter can facilitate.
     Linking a national plan to local ops has always been where the right comes up short, and the Left has had a least 20 years to develop.
    
     We've been watching RedState.com for about a year, now, and hope to be able to convince them to broaden their base of operations, ...for operations is indeed what they seem to want to do. The NY-23 story is not yet finished, especially since it will likely be repeated next Fall, after a genuine primary. (We smell an ACORN in the woodpile, for the numbers to have flipped so widely, so suddenly...but we could be wrong, maybe polling was simply poorly done in the first place). Still, that NY-23 and Doug Hoffman was a event (and a national story) at all can be laid at the feet of Erick Erickson and his collaborators at RedState.com.
     At the top end of the national spectrum, like we wish Limbaugh would be and Glenn Beck is trying mightily to be, we believe RedState.com is the Revolution's national G-3. HQ-level. In Sam Adams' terms, they are capable of lighting thousands of little fires between now and next November.
     We wish them well, and hope he can help in any way.
Vassar Bushmills

Richmond, November 1, 2009

          (I changed the title on Nov 6)
          One year and one week, so the timing is right.
          Right now...for you see, I had a revelation about the Scozzafava retreat in New York.

          I know what I am about to suggest here could only occur if Michael Steele were to be wakened tonight by a slight tugging at his toe, to look up and behold his eponym, St Michael, in full armor, standing at the end of his bed.
         Only that way would Steele fully understand just how close to the precipice this great republic is standing, teetering in fact, and that in all logic, as even Homer Simpson knows, being a galley scrub on a seaworthy garbage scow is preferable to being the highest paid executive on a ship listing heavily to the left, about to take on its first big gulp of sea water.
          St Michael's mere presence would also remind Mike of the Source of this wonderful gift called Liberty, that America is indeed a gift, and, after having tried to protect the gift with creations of our own making, it might be prudent to turn back to the Grantor for guidance and courage. After all, sometimes we are measured by how we choose to go out, and indeed, if we do finally go out, watching the flame flicker, then snuffed, it will be on the High Road, closer to the Grantor, and further away from all the naysayers who have brought us to this edge of the cliff.
          And St Michael, merely by his raiment, shield and breastplate and sword, will let Michael know not only what needs to be done, but how.

          Then, Michael Steele will arise, go down to the office and call a meeting of his council. He will poll them, one by one, on no more than four simple questions, none of which speaks to the future of the Republican Party or a big tent. The questions will be "American" and constitutional in nature. After they answer, he will close the meeting and tell them to ask those same questions of the staff, and come back to him by the end of the day with their written answers.
          He will then email or fax to each state party headquarters those four questions, asking them to do the same thing.
          After two days he will write back to the state organizations with new orders, and a list. Then he will call in his people, and speak with them, one by one...and dismiss most of them. (My guess most will give answers Michael was not looking for.)
          He will then sit at his desk and make out a list of replacements. This may require some calling around, as by now, he may no longer know that many Gideon's first hand.
          Michael will then draft by hand a new manifesto of the Republican Party based on those four questions, and upon completion will sit back in amazement as it will be less long than Mr Lincoln's address at Gettysburg.
          He will then call a press conference and announce it to the nation, and will walk away shaking his head in self-wonderment, that after all these years of instincts to the contrary, that so much could be said when said with so little verbage...the right way. He will simply say, this is our banner, and around it we will gather and from it we will not retreat. He will not give a single heads up...to McCain, Boehner, McConnell, so that by the time they can organize a counter-revolt at the RNC, the national results will already be in...and like Doug Hoffman, the people will have spoken louder than the Club.
          He will then tell state and district chairmen they are to come up with plans...a One Year Plan, a Three Year Plan, and a 20 year plan to begin taking back their district, one voter at a time, based on the four themes emblazoned on that banner. No matter that they are in a safe district in Oklahoma, or the sole black Republican in Clyburn's district in South Carolina. No matter how gerrymandered, no matter how corrupt, they will have a plan that fits their district...based on that banner.
         
          These things Michael Steele will do because he knew to do so, simply because he is the namesake for an Archangel who decided to visit him personally one night.
          Other things, and these are my suggestions, include the creation of an ad hoc "unnamed council" of real Americans and observers and analysts outside the Beltway who can offer perspectives, especially about that special "Americanism" he suddenty saw revealed that night. Thomas Sowell, Rush Limbaugh and Charles Krauthammer come to mind. And Sara Palin, Newt, but only so log as they will leave their national ambitions at the door, although I seriously believe Newt would be a security risk for this sort of stealth. If not, keep them like the rest of us, in the dark. Run this council at secret locations, or just by video-com, but make it the most secret meetings this side of the Bat Cave. That drives the Enemy crazy, and and makes us out here feel secure in knowing Michael finally understands the real stakes in this, and the real game afoot.
           Do these things, and the sound of people rushing to get their hat and coat, will drown out all the caterwauling by the chattering classes.
           Let the grand gesture be a spine as stiff as an oak, a hand as steady as a surgeon, and a heart as grateful as a new mother.
VB

Portland, 1 November, 2009

          OK, we won, but will the GOP now join us...or get even?
          There is still an election on Tuesday. I assume there were at least 50 people in NY-23 were hard core Scozzafava fans...maybe it was her pleasing personality, or her hair styling...and maybe they will stay home, or vote Contra. Who knows.
          I'm not wondering, and certainly not asking the GOP to step in and help Doug Hoffman these last 48 hours, but one cannot help but wonder what they (and by "they" it could only be a couple of teed-off GOP officer rats in Washington and New York) might do to hand the victory to ACORN's other favorite candidate.
          Watch and wait.
           Tuesday would be wonderful date, one year to go, for the scales to fall off the GOP leadership's eyes, and finally get that Freedom Train chugging out of the station. I do expect they'd leave a few back.
Bernie