Forty-five years ago tonight, a call was sounded that lives on and is as true today as it was then. More so. Ronald Reagan: Great president. Better prophet? Here is what is simply known as The Speech in its entirety (29:33). Enjoy.
The Great One gives the Great One. Perhaps the most memorable political speech in modern American history, it launched the career of America’s greatest modern president on values and policies that resonate now more than then because they are the enduring principles of a constitutional, limited, God fearing government . . . the simple principles upon which the country was founded.
If you think ceding your freedom to choose your doctor to the government is bad, or forcing medical professionals to perform services contrary to their religious beliefs (such as abortion) is reprehensible, or eliminating employees’ rights to a secret ballot in determining union representation is undemocratic, or the suppression of free speech through the re-institution of the “fairness” doctrine is unconstitutional, or if any of the other numerous proposals of government consumption of individual and family rights under consideration by the fringe left that controls Washington, D.C., concerns you — as they all should — then just wait until you hear about the . . .
United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child.
If you think Washington controls too much of our lives now (not to mention what might happen in the next four years) wait until decisions about your child come to you from New York. No, the capital isn’t reverting to the Big Apple, where it was when George Washington took the first presidential oath of office. But if the U.S. Senate approves the UNCRC, and the U.S. becomes a party to it, you may want to hesitate before you sign your children’s permission slips or allow them to go to camp until you hear from the U.N.
Okay, enough from me. Let’s turn it over to Terry Beatley of Lancaster, who is with ParentalRights.org, a Web site you should see to further educate yourself on the most serious assault on parental rights in American history.
The same folks that once put Syria in charge of its human rights commission and advocate for teaching five-year-olds masturbation, want to tell you how to raise your children.
Come this General Assembly, Delegate Brenda Pogge (R-96, Yorktown) will co-patron a resolution for Virginia to formally oppose this treaty’s ratification by the U.S. Senate. If ratified, it will represent the greatest loss of state and national sovereignty in our nation’s history.
There also is federal legislation: H.J. Resolution 42 and S.J. Resolution 16, the parental rights amendment, would guarantee the rights of parents to raise their children without government interference. Ask your representative and U.S. Senators Mark Warner (804-739-0247) and Jim Webb (804-771-2221) to co-sponsor this legislation, and for the senators to oppose the the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child.
This morning on Richmond’s Morning News With Jimmy Barrett (WRVA-AM in Richmond), Democrat gubernatorial candidate Terry McAuliffe made a comment that may have slipped through the cracks to most, but here’s my take on it:
He slammed the two men whom he hopes to succeed — fellow Democrats Mark Warner and Tim Kaine. That can’t go over too well with Democrat primary voters.
Here’s what happened: Barrett asked T-Mac about charges he’s carpetbagging. As usual for a rookie candidate, he went on too long. He listed a line of successful Virginia politicians who were not born here. Instead of stopping there, couldn’t contain himself and continued:
What’s immediately hysterical is that this comes from Bill Clinton’s DNC chairman, where McAuliffe was one of the most partisan figures in recent American history. So he’s going to be the one to end partisanship? (Wasn’t Barack Obama supposed to have ended that by now, anyway?)
But here’s where T-Mac slams Virginia’s latter day Democrat icons: They’ve been running the show the last eight years! Partisan and not getting things done? Warner, another self-proclaimed non-partisan, can’t be happy with that. Is T-Mac blowing his cover? Is he criticizing Kaine, the new DNC chairman (by definition, the Democrat partisan-in-chief), for trying to do both jobs at once?
Maybe he has a point. He’s either brutally honest and candid or he’s slamming them for his short-term political gain. Either way, Virginia’s two most prominent Democrats, as well as the rank-and-file, won’t like that, whether true statements or not, whether he meant them like that or not.
He may backtrack, but at the least, he’s admitted it takes two to tango — a governor and a legislature. But media, pundits and liberal interest groups have told the public the last eight years that the roadblock to Nirvana in Virginia has been House Republicans. So, however he spins it, Terry McAuliffe has laid at least some blame on the last two governors. Not quite what we’re used to hearing, is it?
Remember U.S. Representative Jim Moran’s outburst to a constituent who simply asked if he would agree that everyone in Washington should take responsibility for the mortgage crisis? Virginia’s 8th District Congressman blew up at the constituent and said she didn’t know what she was talking about.
CAGW gave Moran the award, presumably against stiff competition, for this remark:
Now, in the last seven years, we have had the highest corporate profit ever in American history, highest corporate profit. We’ve had the highest productivity. The American worker has produced more per person than at any time. But it hasn’t been shared and that’s the problem. Because we have been guided by a Republican administration who believes in this simplistic notion that people who have wealth are entitled to keep it and they have an antipathy towards the means of redistributing wealth. And they may be able to sustain that for awhile, but it doesn’t work in the long run.
Rep. Moran’s punitive conclusion about creating wealth reflects the prevailing ethos of the current Congress. His remarks offer a window into the soul of the congressional leadership and offer a bare-knuckled preview of the kind of confiscatory policies taxpayers can expect now that there are even fewer fiscal conservatives on Capitol Hill. This Congress intends to reward hard work and productivity with a government-mandated ‘sharing’ program.
So, we are sure we speak for millions of Virginians from Alleghany to Accomack and from Westmoreland to Wise and everywhere in between: Congratulations, Congressman Moran! You’ve made Virginia proud!
Again, we’ve been prescient. After several posts on this topic, Hentoff’s nationally syndicated column today addresses an incident that truly defies credulity: Brandeis History Professor Donald Hindley, who has taught there for 48 years with not a complaint on his record, was teaching class one day in his course on Latin American politics. At one point he made a historically accurate, albeit sad, fact that some Americans used to call Mexican immigrants “wetbacks.” Mind you, he wasn’t calling Mexicans that. He wasn’t apologizing for that fact. He simply stated an unfortunate truth in the context of teaching his class.
A student complained, the administration took offence and now Professor Hindley may be on the verge of losing his job. Instead of explaining to the student the facts of life and being an adult, the university provost is on a child-like rant himself. But, the scary thing is, he has real authority, complete with reprimands, demands and threats to Professor Hindley. It’s as if you cannot say, “Blacks once were slaves in America.” How can we educate young people, much less publicly discuss important issues as a nation, if we’re not even allowed to accurately teach history?! He made a simple statement of fact. But liberal extremism not only wants to stifle free speech, it wants to whitewash history, a history you’d think they want exposed so we don’t repeat terrible mistakes. Read today’s column by Hentoff here. Rather than rare, occurrences such as this are much more rampant on campuses than widely realized.
As terrible as this horrible twin scourge of whitewashing history and restriction of free speech, there is one thing sadder: The ruination of a man’s reputation. But that’s not of consequence for America’s Animal Farm gang — anything, anything at all, to advance their addled, lockstep ideology.