DebateGate

Archbishop of Canterbury Calls for Sharia in Britain

For once I have to agree with Rowan Williams, Archbishop of Canterbury, the moonbat who has been using his position as head of the Church of England to help dismantle the remnants of British civilization. He now proclaims that Muslim sharia law in the UK "seems unavoidable."

The key word is seems. Technically, Britain could still save itself, if it rose up against a liberal establishment run by quislings like Williams, who actually likes the idea of instituting Islamic law in what was until recently a Christian country.

He feels that Britain's Muslim conquerors should not have to choose between "the stark alternatives of cultural loyalty or state loyalty." Therefore the British government must become Islamicized.

Did I mention that this treasonous jackass is head of the Church of England?

At least not all Britons will have to live under sharia ? for the time being. Williams showcases his philosophical wisdom by proclaiming that the concept "there's one law for everybody" is "a bit of a danger."

Williams has sucked up to Muslims before. In stark contrast, Bishop of Rochester Michael Nazir-Ali has warned of the "no-go" areas Muslim colonists have been carving out in Britain. Unsurprisingly, Nazir-Ali has received death threats and has to live under police protection.

Maybe Williams thinks he will live a little longer by selling out his faith, his country and his culture. But who knows? When the Islamic conquest of Britain is complete, Williams might just lose his head anyway, despite his servile dhimmitude.


via Moonbattery

Smokin'!

http://youtube.com/watch?v=6lAFfLy05_Y

Conservatives Lose
by Donald Devine
Issue 99 - January 16, 2008

The radical leftist Alexander Cockburn said of the Iowa Republican victor: as ?demonstrated during his ten years as the governor of Arkansas, [Mike] Huckabee is a progressive, with enlightened views and a record of substantive action on immigration, public health, the regressive nature of sales taxes, education of poor kids and the possibility of redemption for convicted criminals.? As governor he was so ?enlightened? in following the state education association union agenda and with increasing spending generally, he received the endorsement of the New Hampshire NEA for president.

New Hampshire GOP winner John McCain voted against the George W. Bush tax cuts in 2001 and again in 2003. He supported the Administration?s amnesty immigration bill. He supported the No Child Left Behind educational centralization act. He was co-sponsor of the free-speech-limiting McCain-Feingold campaign finance bill. He is an enthusiastic supporter of more government market regulation in such fields as securities, automobiles and communications, among others.

Ronald Reagan would be appalled! Although a miracle is remotely possible, the likelihood is that Reagan conservatism is dead for this election.

Sure Gov. Huckabee is strong on conservative social issues and Sen. McCain is a war hero and often a leader against wasteful spending and earmarks. But Ronald Reagan insisted that conservatism was a triad of limited national government taxes, regulation and spending, a commitment to traditional social values, and a strong but pragmatic foreign policy. The closest to the Reagan tripartite formula is Fred Thompson but he came in a weak third in Iowa and had one percent in the Granite State. Ron Paul is strong on cutting spending and supporting traditional social issues but, although he recognizes proper limits on foreign entanglements, goes to the extreme of voting against almost all defense appropriations and sees little need for any foreign military presence at all.

While Mitt Romney mostly says things President Reagan would agree with, he has not been able to convince most people he is sincere and as a result received disappointing margins in the early states, including a narrow win in his home state Michigan, after large leads in early polls. The only other candidate registering in the nomination contests is Rudy Giuliani, who is questionable on all three of the Reagan criteria. So the chances a Reaganite can win are slim and none.

Even at its lowest ebb, conservatism had hope for the future. Barry Goldwater lost the 1964 election by a landslide. But conservatives considered him the winner because his ideals eventually triumphed under President Reagan. Although his opponent won overwhelmingly, by the end of Lyndon Johnson?s term he was so unpopular he could not even seek re-election. His Great Society ended in the 1970s with both colossal inflation and economic stagnation. In contrast, Sen. Goldwater?s idea of limited constitutional government became the Republican platform and rallied the imagination of the generation that nominated and elected Reagan, resulting in a 9.7 percent reduction in non-defense discretionary spending, with total domestic spending down from 17.9 to 16.4 percent of GDP during his tenure.

The only one with any claim to be a future Barry Goldwater is Rep. Paul; but he has some real problems and will certainly not follow his predecessor and win the GOP nomination. This is understandable because the limited government cause is now actually at an even lower ebb. Long gone are the days of President Reagan?s absolute reduction in discretionary spending over his eight years or even the limited Congressional reductions immediately following the 1994 election. The George W. Bush presidency has resulted in the largest percent increases in domestic national spending of any eight years since the early New Deal?and, of course, in inflation-adjusted dollars, absolute spending has increased many times more even than under Franklin Roosevelt with much greater market regulation and control over state and local governments.

Even worse, over these years most young Republicans now consider federal standards to control education, energy, commerce, agriculture, etc. as the proper positions of their party, rather than policy areas for state or local government or the private sector, as for Goldwater and Reagan. Many others think empire should be the foreign policy goal, while Reagan?s Weinberger Doctrine set narrow limits on the use of military force. In an era when a presumably conservative president says that ?when someone hurts, government has to move? no leader is speaking for a Reagan-like limited government and the young assume big government is the only solution.

The young people who provided the Goldwater movement with its energy and became the adult leadership for Reagan came predominately from an organization called Young Americans for Freedom. Its now aged alumni were asked their opinion of Rep. Paul and particularly what they would have thought of him if they were now as young as they were when they were first attracted to Goldwater. Twenty-seven percent were so opposed to his anti-war positions that they would not even consider him a conservative. Yet, while only 38 percent were actually supporting Paul for president, 72 percent thought they would have been attracted to and inspired by his limited constitutional government message when they were young.

Rep. Paul?s position that American forces should not be involved beyond its shores does go well beyond even traditional non-interventionism. YAF?s mission statement allowed foreign intervention based upon the ?just interests? of the U.S., not on abstract non-interventionism (nor upon abstract intervention, for that matter). From the earliest years of the new Constitution, the U.S. was in Morocco, Algiers, Tunis, Tripoli, the French high-seas, British Canada and Spanish Florida, to say nothing about against (foreign) Indian tribes. George Washington?s warning was against entangling, permanent alliances, not about rejecting foreign relationships per se. It is true, as Paul likes to quote, that John Quincy Adams spoke of America?s heart and how it should act in world affairs in the following terms.

    Wherever the standard of freedom and independence has been or shall be unfurled, there will her heart, her benedictions and her prayers be. But she goes not abroad, in search of monsters to destroy. She is the well-wisher to the freedom and independence of all. She is the champion and vindicator only of her own. She will commend the general cause by the countenance of her voice, and the benignant sympathy of her example. She well knows that by once enlisting under other banners than her own, were they even the banners of foreign independence, she would involve herself beyond the power of extrication, in all the wars of interest and intrigue, of individual avarice, envy, and ambition, which assume the colors and usurp the standard of freedom. The fundamental maxims of her policy would insensibly change from liberty to force. The frontlet on her brows would no longer beam with the ineffable splendor of freedom and independence; but in its stead would soon be substituted an imperial diadem, flashing in false and tarnished lustre the murky radiance of dominion and power. She might become the dictatress of the world; she would be no longer the ruler of her own spirit. . . . Her glory is not dominion, but liberty. Her march is the march of the mind.

Yet, Paul omits Adams? immediately following words.

    She has a spear and a shield: but the motto upon her shield is, Freedom, Independence, Peace. This has been her Declaration: this has been, as far as her necessary intercourse with the rest of mankind would permit, her practice.

Paul?s foreign policy views limit his future appeal. Even Adams held that America does have a spear as well as a shield and she can be aloof from foreign engagement only to the degree ?her necessary intercourse with the rest of mankind? allows. Adams, of course, himself was the author of the rather aggressive Monroe Doctrine setting terms for all of South America, as well as of the transcontinental treaty with Spain and new relationships with Denmark, Mexico, the Hanseatic League, the Scandinavian countries, Prussia and Austria. One can even agree with Paul that it was not in U.S. interests to invade Iraq but with Adams not to reject it on abstract principle but upon whether it was necessary or not, or whether it should not have degenerated into nation-building. It should be noted that even Rep. Paul voted for the initial engagement in Afghanistan.

On the other hand, there is no question that Paul has reached deep into popular passions at least among active citizens. His packed early rallies exploded with placards reading ?liberty, liberty.? John Derbyshire says they might be ?crazy, as some colleagues tell me? and ?perhaps they are, to be shouting for liberty in 2007, after decades of swelling federal power and arrogance, of proliferating taxes, rules, and interests, of gushing transfers of wealth to politically connected elites from working- and middle-class grunts, of the college and teacher-union scams, of the metastasizing tort-law rackets, of ever more numerous yet ever more clueless intelligence agencies, of open borders and visas for people who hate us, of widening cracks in our sense of nationhood (?Press one for English ??), of speech codes and race lobbies and judicial impositions.? One might even say it is as ?crazy? to be for limited constitutional government today as it was in 1964.

Political movements are built on enthusiasm and whatever the Paul supporters are, they are fervent. Talk is cheep but writing checks and activism show commitment. In fact, it was Barry Goldwater who was the first to support a presidential campaign predominantly on small contributions and this prefigured his influence. Paul?s fundraising is phenomenal. In November, Paul surpassed the all-time on-line record by raising over $3 million in a single day, from over 37,000 contributors, celebrating Guy Fawkes? rebellion against English oppression of all things, asking only $100 each. On Boston Tea Party Day he doubled that again with $6 million. Thousands contribute $25 per week. His fourth quarter 2007 fundraising of $18 million surpassed all other candidates and included many more individual contributors. While this does not represent a majority or even close to one, it does represent an army of activists?again following Goldwater.

Except for foreign policy, Paul is very much in the Goldwater and Reagan conservative tradition. Even there, Reagan committed U.S. troops much less than his successors, Republican and Democratic, and Paul?s admonitions against empire could fit into a new comprehensive Reaganite limited government platform. On domestic policy, Paul?s nickname regarding government spending is ?Dr. No,? voting against most spending bills in Congress. He is for sound money, eliminating government bureaus, federalism and privatization. He is against abortion, a national ID card, and an environmentalism that does not respect property rights. All matters not given to the national government in the Constitution should be exercised by the states or the people, he insists, mimicking the much neglected 10th Amendment.

Even if the Republican nominee wins the 2008 election, which is unlikely, the idea of limited government would not be high on his agenda and even if it were would be frustrated by a Democratic Congress. Meanwhile, Paul?s more passionate supporters will mature. There are nuts in any political movement?and there surely were in the 1960s--but mostly only the sound personalities persevere. Youthful enthusiasm is the lifeblood of any political movement and the only place it now exists on the right is with Mr. Paul, whatever his limitations. If the idea of limited government is to survive, it can paradoxically only come from a new generation of leaders motivated at least partially by a seventy-two year old Congressman.

Donald Devine, the editor of Conservative Battleline Online, was the director of the U.S. Office of Personnel Management from 1981 to 1985 and is the director of the Federalist Leadership Center at Bellevue University.
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? 2008 American Conservative Union Foundation 1007 Cameron Street, Alexandria, VA 22314 Tel: 703.836.8602

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January 22, 2008, 8:00 a.m.

The Paulonomics Factor
Ron Paul can?t win, but he could make a real difference in the economics debate.

By Donald Luskin

Republican presidential hopeful Ron Paul sounds radical when he advocates the elimination of the individual income tax, a return to a gold standard, the wholesale downsizing of the federal government, and the abolition of the Internal Revenue Service and the Federal Reserve. The media and the other presidential candidates treat him as a nut. Indeed, Paul often enough opens himself up to that treatment in the flamboyant way he expresses himself. Sometimes he even seems to relish his image as a gadfly on the political fringe.

But it?s time to start taking the ten-term Texas congressman seriously. He tied for second-place (with John McCain) in Nevada on Saturday. He beat both Rudolph Giuliani and Fred Thompson in Michigan (he also beat Giuliani in Iowa and South Carolina and Thompson in New Hampshire). And Paul now holds the record for the most money raised ? $6 million ? on a single day in a primary season by any candidate in history. It would be a real mistake to think of Paul as the Dennis Kucinich of the right.

Nut or not, Paul isn?t going away. His message is combining intense opposition to the war in Iraq with a strong agenda for free-market capitalism. So it?s drawing grass-roots support from both parties. Even if it?s a bridge too far for him to capture the GOP nomination, he could mount an insurgent run for the presidency with cross-party appeal and fundraising power, probably as the nominee of the Libertarian party (on whose ticket he ran for president in 1988). He could end up shaping the coming election as H. Ross Perot did the 1992 race ? denying either major-party candidate the mandate of a majority of the popular vote, and shifting the center of gravity on important issues.

For many conservatives, what makes Paul seem like a nut is his absolute opposition to the war in Iraq and his insistence on immediate withdrawal of U.S. troops from the Middle East and most of the rest of the world. On the other hand, his views on abortion are perfectly in line with mainstream conservative values (although this side of Paul never seems to get any attention).

On the economics front, Paul is a delightful paradox. If you crack the nut shell and look objectively at what Paul is really advocating, conservatives will find that Paulonomics looks an awful lot like Reaganomics. Paulonomics emerges as a refreshing return to conservative roots: small government, low taxes, deregulation, and sound money. If Paulonomics seems nutty, that may say more about the sad state of events today, with ?big government conservatism? having become the new touchstone.

The core concept of Paulonomics is the reduction in the size and cost of the federal government. Irking many of today?s conservatives, Paul emphasizes how this should include scaling back what he calls American ?militarism,? beginning with a pullout of Iraq.

But embracing a more classic fiscal conservatism, Paul would outright eliminate what he believes are wasteful and counterproductive federal programs, such as the departments of Education and Energy. Nutty? Most Republicans wouldn?t dare talk about eliminating the Department of Education in the age of ?No Child Left Behind.? But Paul reminded me in a recent interview that it wasn?t so many election cycles ago that scrapping this department was an official plank of the GOP platform.

And if you mean it about cutting the cost of government, you?ve got to after the big-ticket items. As to the biggest-ticket items of all, Paul would decommission Social Security and Medicare by honoring obligations to those who are utterly dependent, but letting young people opt out of both systems entirely. Nutty? Let?s be honest: Most conservatives want to do exactly this, but are afraid to say so in a political environment where even mandatory personal accounts are vilified as a ?risky scheme,? as Al Gore famously put it.

With all that and more gone from the federal budget, it?s not so nutty for Paul to talk about eliminating the individual income tax and the intrusive bureaucracy that administers it. Paul points out that today?s level of federal tax revenues, without the income tax, is sufficient to meet all the government?s expenses as they stood not so many years ago. The problem is that the size, scope, and cost of government has grown so much. Would it be such a nutty trade-off to roll back the clock on government expenditures if it meant eliminating income taxes for all Americans?

Paul deplores the federal deficit, but insists the only way ?to solve that problem is to cut spending, not to raise taxes ? or to not lower taxes when you get a chance.? As a first step he advocates the elimination of all taxes on capital ? estates, capital gains, interest income, and dividends. He told me, ?It?s capital that you need to make capitalism work.? He says the idea that most excites young voters is his proposal to eliminate income taxes on tips: ?It?s a big deal if you?re a family struggling and if a second member of the family is working and trying to pay the bills.? Nothing nutty about any of that.

Paul may be the anti-Reagan when it comes to foreign affairs and the military. But he out-Reagans Reagan in his unwavering opposition to the government regulation of business. He may have seemed like a nut when he was one of only three congressmen to vote against the Sarbanes-Oxley Act in 2002. But weren?t the real nuts the conservative congressmen who got swept up in a witch-hunt against ?corporate crooks,? and voted to impose the most sweeping, burdensome, anti-competitive, and costly financial regulation in a generation?

Paul is an advocate of free trade ? to a fault. He believes deeply in unrestricted trade between people and nations. Yet he votes against free-trade agreements such as NAFTA and CAFTA because he believes that trade is a right, not a gift for Congress to bestow in certain circumstances. Without such agreements, the reality is that trade is probably less free than it is with them. Is Paul a nut for letting the perfect be the enemy of the good? Perhaps, but for Paul it?s a point of principle. He told me, ?I don?t call them free-trade agreements; I call them managed trade agreements.? Instead, Paul would like to see a simple policy of ?low and uniform? tariffs for all products from all nations.

Perhaps the most unusual element of Paulonomics is the idea of abolishing the Federal Reserve. For Paul, this is another way to eliminate government interference and to lower taxes ? in this case to lower what he calls ?the inflation tax.? Do we need the Fed to be a lender of last resort to aid in financial crises, such as the present sub-prime mess? Paul says no: ?the lender of last resort is just the printer of last resort, the inflationist of last resort.?

Most politicians fall all over themselves in public adulation of the reigning Fed chairman. But Paul has had the courage to grill these unelected economic central planners when they come before his House committee. He asks the tough questions that others fear to ask, and they?re the same questions that are often asked by economic commentators on this website, including me. Most prominently, how is it the Fed continues to operate on the demonstrably false premise that rapid economic growth is, ipso facto, inflationary?

Paul, however, can be his own worst enemy on this subject when, in debates, he seems to blame all our economic challenges on inflation, or when he buys into some of the conspiracy theories that have surrounded the Fed in various forms since its inception. In a recent grilling of Ben Bernanke, Paul made an issue of the discontinuation of M3 monetary aggregate statistics, as though the Fed had done this in order to hide something. Okay, that was nutty.

But as a first step toward eliminating the Fed, Paul advocates ?legalizing competition ? allow gold and silver to circulate with the dollar, and take off all the taxes on gold and silver money.?

Ah, gold! The mere mention of it in today?s modern economy brands you as a nut, or at least an economic hick. But remember, American money was linked to gold in one way or another for most of our history, until 1971 in fact. In his first year in office as president, Ronald Reagan established a blue-ribbon commission to investigate a possible return to gold. It went nowhere, but was Reagan a nut to ask the question? More fundamentally, is there anything nutty about money that would be, as Paul advocates, ?convertible and redeemable in something of real value??

For all his apparent extremism, there?s no other candidate who has managed to excite both Democrat and Republican voters by combining an anti-war message that irritates conservatives with a free-market message that irritates liberals. Nutty? Or brilliant?

If I?m right and Ron Paul doesn?t just fade away as the primary season progresses, he?ll make a real difference. His anti-war message would make life difficult for Hillary Clinton, by drawing away the most pacifist elements of the Democratic base. But it?s on the economics side where I think he could make the biggest impact. In an election year in which bigger government, higher taxes, and protectionism seem to have so much momentum, Paulonomics may be just what is needed to rebalance the debate in favor of growth.

? Donald Luskin is chief investment officer of Trend Macrolytics LLC, an independent economics and investment-research firm. He welcomes your visit to his blog and your comments at don@trendmacro.com.
National Review Online - http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=Y2Q5MDM2NzZkNzU5ZDEwYTI3ODg5YjY2YWZlMjFkYTc=

Huckabee: Amend Constitution to be in 'God's standards'
01/15/2008 @ 7:31 am
Filed by David Edwards and Muriel Kane

The United States Constitution never uses the word "God" or makes mention of any religion, drawing its sole authority from "We the People." However, Republican presidential candidate Mike Huckabee thinks it's time to put an end to that.
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"I have opponents in this race who do not want to change the Constitution," Huckabee told a Michigan audience on Monday. "But I believe it's a lot easier to change the Constitution than it would be to change the word of the living god. And that's what we need to do -- to amend the Constitution so it's in God's standards rather than try to change God's standards so it lines up with some contemporary view."

When Willie Geist reported Huckabee's opinion on MSNBC's Morning Joe, co-host Mika Brzezinski was almost speechless, and even Joe Scarborough couldn't immediately find much to say beyond calling it "interesting,"

Scarborough finally suggested that while he believes "evangelicals should be able to talk politics ... some might find that statement very troubling, that we're going to change the Constitution to be in line with the Bible. And that's all I'm going to say."

Geist further noted of Huckabee that if "someone without his charm," said that, "he'd be dismissed as a crackpot, but he's Mike Huckabee and he's bascially the front-runner."


This video is from MSNBC's Morning Joe, broadcast January 15, 2008.

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Hier.