The Fight Has Just Began

"An intellectual is a man who takes more words than necessary to tell more than he knows." — Dwight D. Eisenhower

Today was a bad day for those opposing the Affordable Healthcare Law (ObamaCare) and a presumed great day, by the mainstream media, for Obama and progressives. But was it?

I am writing this blog within hours of the United States Supreme Court’s 5-4 decision upholding ObamaCare and its mandate on the Constitutional grounds that it is a tax and the Commerce and General Welfare Clauses do not apply. This is a good thing as Congresses power to regulate has been set back a few yards or to sue a football term it was sacked.

While Chief Justice Roberts sided with the liberals on the Court he was correct when in writing the majority opinion that Congress does have the right to tax – Article I, Section 8.1.that states:

“The Congress shall have power to lay and collect taxes, duties, imposts and excises, to pay the debts and provide for the common defense and general welfare of the United States; but all duties, imposts and excises shall be uniform throughout the United States.”

This was the argument the government lawyers posed before the Court, an argument that was not in the original concept of the bill. Over and over Obama and the Democrats claimed it was not a tax or a penalty and was mandated under the abovementioned clauses of the Constitution. Roberts did not have to do this and grabbed the government’s last ditch argument to save the bill. Why he did this will always be a question and we shall never know. But, that point is mute and the decision is in and it stands as made.

This may have been a pyric victory for Obama where he won the battle but will lose the war. I believe this issue will move to the top of issues during the coming presidential campaign. President Barack Obama’s big win with the Supreme Court could come back to bite him at the election. The Supreme Court has spoken. This means the only way we can overturn this obnoxious law is by defeating Obama and capturing the Senate.

Now that the only way to get rid of Obama’s healthcare overhaul is via the ballot box, it could persuade more people to turn out and vote against him in November.

Polls have shown roughly 55 percent of voters oppose ObamaCare with 40 percent supporting it, even though the president holds a slight lead over Republican challenger Mitt Romney in head-to-head surveys.

So this really puts ObamaCare front and center as the leading issue in the 2012 campaign. In a real sense it makes the 2012 campaign a carbon copy of the 2010 campaign — and we all know how that turned out.”

In the short term that could give the president the edge as voters support him because the law has been ruled constitutional, but by the time November rolls around he predicted the fundamental economics of the law will lead to its rejection by a very large majority. The Supreme Court did not let Obama off the hook. By the time the election comes around, it could be lethal if the Romney campaign and his PACS can provide the right arguments to label Obama and the Democrats on the “tax” provision of ObamaCare — a provision that was constantly denied by Obama and his minions. This is the largest tax increase on the middle class and this issue has to be hammered into the brains of the voters from now until November. For a family earning $30,000 per year they will have to pay $2,080 per year for ObamaCare by 2016. This represents a tax increase of 7% of their income for a family that will no longer be receiving tax-free health insurance from their employer. That point must be driven home over and over again.

You can read a full list of new taxes imposed on the American taxpayer by Robert’s ruling by clicking here.

The decision makes ObamaCare a tax increase that falls primarily on young people and poor people who can’t afford it. With the Medicaid provisions struck down, government will not be there to help middle and low-income families who have to pay a huge percentage of their income for insurance or pay a large fine.

Seniors will also see the effect it will have on them by gutting Medicare and placing their health in the hands of government bureaucrats. Employers will begin cancelling tax-free health care benefits for their employees and giving them money to purchase their own health insurance and if they don’t they will pay a tax with penalties and interest. This tax could be as much a 7 or 8 percent or they would be forced to pay a fine. Wait until that happens.

The Supreme Court ruling upholding ObamaCare keeps the country on the path to socialism but may have done conservatives and Republicans a favor as the nation looks to the elections in the fall.

In many ways, if you really think about it, the Supreme Court might have done the conservatives and the Republicans a favor because they kept them alive now as the issue for the presidential campaign. And it’s an issue as a tax. So being an issue of a tax, it is something that could be attacked from those on the right, conservatives who want to lower our taxes and create jobs. As compared to those on left who want to raise our taxes and kill the job market.

So it’s important, if we really look at maybe, like Little Jack Horner, the plum in this whole thing is that it becomes the defining issue for the presidential election and makes it more important that we work harder to make sure that we replace the Senate, we replace the President of the United States and then the Congress has the complete power and the president to be able to repeal ObamaCare and have that signed by the President of the United States of America because now it has become a tax issue. This issue when tied to jobs could be a boost to Republicans across this country because the ruling keeps the issue alive for the fall and makes it imperative for the GOP to take not just the White House but the Senate. The country is on the path toward socialism and the 5-4 decision keeps the nation on that road.

ObamaCare was the biggest issue driving the Tea Party in 2010. The efforts of the Tea Party brought 67 Republicans to the House and almost 700 to various state legislators, along with several governors.

Within hours of the Supreme Court’s decision I received an e-mail from the Tea Party stating:

“Dear Patriot,

Today we had hoped that the Supreme Court would side with the constitution and strike down Obamacare but the court put the ball back in our court. The stakes were just raised in every federal election in the country.

If you are sick and tired of the lawless arrogance of the federal government you need to recommit to doing everything you can between now and the election. This election now remains our last opportunity to prevent the takeover of everything related to healthcare, you know, everything.

Don't let the Supreme Court decision discourage you, as one of our founding fathers John Paul Jones once said "We Have Not Yet Begun To Fight"!!

Since 70% of Americans are against Obamcare this will energize the voting population to vote out Obama and big government leftists in Congress and vote in common sense conservatives.

Are you on board? This organization has people meeting with members of Congress TODAY to begin the Repeal Process and we remain focused on the complete repeal of this legislation. We can win in November if you join us in directing our anger to the power grabbers. Contribute NOW:”

The Supreme Court has been wrong before. Just look at Dred Scott v. Sandford, Plessy v. Ferguson, Korematsu v. United States and Wickard v. Filburn. In fact Wickard may have been tossed into the trash by today’s ruling on the Commerce Clause, if so that is a positive outcome.

On the legal front Former Florida Attorney General Bill McCollum, a leading figure in the legal challenge to ObamaCare, said he is “disappointed and shocked” that Chief Justice John Roberts voted to uphold the individual mandate provision in the healthcare reform bill.

But he predicts that the debate over healthcare reform “has just begun” and will heat up in the wake of the Supreme Court decision.

McCollum was the lead attorney general in the lawsuit to overturn ObamaCare, arguing that the individual mandate is unconstitutional. His lawsuit was backed by 26 other states. In an exclusive interview with Newsmax, McCollum said:

“I am disappointed and shocked that Chief Justice Roberts chose to consider the individual mandate to be a tax. The states had argued, and I believe correctly, that you could not consider this a tax because it would be a direct tax, and under the Constitution it can’t be that, and he did a very contrived argument to come up with a conclusion that you could consider it a tax without having a constitutional amendment.

“He did however do one thing that was very positive. He ruled that the Commerce Clause could not be expanded to require individuals to purchase a product or service when there is no activity, when you’re not engaged in commerce — the thrust of our principal argument. He found a way to uphold the constitutionality of this law without dissecting it with this contrived method of calling it a tax.”

The high court’s ruling put some limits on the law's plan to expand the Medicaid insurance program for the poor, a joint effort of the federal government and states. It says the U.S. government cannot threaten to withhold a state's entire Medicaid allotment if it doesn't participate in the expansion.

“There is a small victory in this for the states in the Medicaid portion,” McCollum states.

“We brought this. It was the only suit that questioned Medicaid. We thought it was coercive. [Roberts] said it was too but his conclusion in this is that he can just excise the provision, which he did, declaring it unconstitutional that if the states do not accept the Medicaid provision that they will be penalized by not being able to receive any of their existing Medicaid benefits.

“Now they’re going to have that choice, so we’ll have to see how that works out. I suspect many states will not be able to afford, or feel they can, the constraints in the new Medicaid provisions. They will reject them, they won’t accept them, and that may be very destructive to the main thrust of this legislation.

“It’s a very narrow ruling but it did rule in favor of the states on that point.”

Looking ahead, McCollum tells Newsmax the court ruling is “going to make [healthcare] a very big debate in this fall’s election and who becomes president and who the U.S. senators and Congress are going to be.”

Democrats who were looking forward to using job creation, Bain Capital, immigration, and the killing of bin Laden in this year’s election will now have to stand and defend ObamaCare and the largest middle-class tax increase in our nation’s history, something they thought they would not have to do has SCOTUS ruled against ObamaCare.

What we found out today is that you can’t count on the court; you can’t count on Congress, all you can do is count on ourselves. And we have to work hard, harder at being engaged so that we truly replace those people in the House, in the Senate that want to stay on the path to socialism.

The only way we’re going to get off that path is we have to take ourselves off that path by becoming more engaged and electing people who believe in capitalism, not socialism.”

The Tale of Two Cities

"Most bad government has grown out of too much government.” — Thomas Jefferson

A Tale of Two Cities is a novel by Charles Dickens, published in 1859, set in London and Paris before and during the French Revolution. With well over 200 million copies sold, it ranks among the most famous works in the history of fictional literature.

The novel depicts the plight of the French peasantry demoralized by the French aristocracy in the years leading up to the revolution, the corresponding brutality demonstrated by the revolutionaries toward the former aristocrats in the early years of the revolution, and many unflattering social parallels with life in London during the same time period. It follows the lives of several protagonists through these events. The most notable are Charles Darnay and Sydney Carton. Darnay is a French once-aristocrat who falls victim to the indiscriminate wrath of the revolution despite his virtuous nature, and Carton is a dissipated British barrister who endeavors to redeem his ill-spent life out of his unrequited love for Darnay's wife. The 45-chapter novel was published in 31 weekly installments in Dickens' new literary periodical titled All the Year Round. From April 1859 to November 1859, Dickens also republished the chapters as eight monthly sections in green covers. Dickens' previous novels had appeared only as monthly installments. The first weekly installment of A Tale of Two Cities ran in the first issue of All the Year Round on 30 April 1859. The last ran thirty weeks later, on 26 November.

My tale of two cities is not about the French Revolution, Robespierre or goutiness. It is, however, about aristocrats and peasants. Think of the aristocrats as the statist, utopians, and masterminds and the peasants as the taxpayers. As in Dickens’ novel the aristocrats are forcing tyranny upon the citizens and the citizens’ only recourse is at the ballot box. This is not working very well.

The cities I refer to are not London and Paris, but Stockton, California and Sandy Springs, Georgia, cities almost 2,000 miles apart. I will begin with Stockton. Once a thriving community located at the north end of California’s Central Valley and a virtual suburb of Sacramento Stockton, as city of 290,000 people is declaring bankruptcy. It is out of money and can longer meet its debts or obligations. Fox News reports:

“Officials in Stockton said Tuesday that mediation with creditors has failed, meaning the city is set to become the largest American city ever to declare bankruptcy.

City Manager Bob Deis said officials were unable to reach a deal to restructure hundreds of millions of dollars of debt under a new state law designed to help municipalities avoid bankruptcy.

Monday marked the three-month deadline for negotiations.

"Unfortunately we have no comprehensive set of agreements with our creditors that would eliminate the deficit and avoid insolvency," Deis said at a City Council meeting. He said, however, that the city was still negotiating with some creditors and could reach deals with as many as one-third of them.

"We think Chapter 9 protection is the only choice left. If we get any agreements, those will be honored in Chapter 9," Deis said.

The Council was expected to vote later on a special bankruptcy budget to plug next year's anticipated $26 million deficit.

The budget is expected to suspend debt payments, reduce payments for retiree medical benefits and increase revenue through code enforcement and parking citations, among other steps.

City lawyers could file for Chapter 9 protection in court as soon as Wednesday.

The river port city of 290,000 in Central California has seen its property taxes and other revenues decline, while expensive investments and generous retiree benefits drained city coffers.

In the past three years, officials in the city that was slammed by the collapse of the housing market dealt with $90 million in deficits through a series of drastic cuts.

They eliminated one-fourth of the city's police officers, one-third of the fire staff, and 40 percent of all other employees. They also cut wages and medical benefits.

To plug next year's anticipated $26 million budget shortfall, a proposed budget to be considered Tuesday night would suspend payments for debts and legal claims, reduce payments for retiree medical benefits, further cut some pay and benefits, and increase revenue through code enforcement and parking citations.

The proposed budget includes no major service reductions, Deis said earlier.

"The whole purpose of filing Chapter 9 is to avoid an uncontrolled chaotic situation," he said. "Bankruptcy provides the equivalent of a pause button. It retains services and provides structure so you don't have a bunch of lawsuits."

City officials say the city has run out of options. In recent years, thousands of new homes mushroomed in Stockton, part of a suburban housing boom that attracted buyers from the San Francisco Bay area and beyond.

When the economy crashed and the construction bubble burst, Stockton was battered by foreclosures and lost income from property taxes and other fees.

Multi-year labor contracts for city workers carrying escalating costs and generous retirement plans added to the burden.

In addition, expensive city investments -- a promenade, sports arena and hotel -- failed to produce an economic boon.

The city also has high crime and unemployment rates. It has twice topped Forbes magazine's list of "America's most miserable cities."

Under a bankruptcy filing, officials would retain power over day-to-day city operations and staffing, but a judge would take over all decisions concerning the city's debts, said Robert Benedetti, professor of political science at the University of the Pacific in Stockton.

The judge would decide which creditors should be paid, how much and in what order. He would make allowances for expenditures needed by the city to function, and it would be up to city officials to decide how to spend that money.

"One of the reasons a city might want to go the bankruptcy route is that they don't want a situation where they have to pay out debts and have to close the police or fire department," Benedetti said. "Filing for Chapter 9 means you're asking the court to protect you against lawsuits from people who hold your debt."

Stockton's bankruptcy would make it the largest city by population to file for Chapter 9 protection, according to Jim Spiotto, a Chicago bankruptcy lawyer who tracks such cases. He said Bridgeport, Conn., was the largest city to file for bankruptcy, which it did in 1991, followed by Vallejo, Calif., which filed in 2008.”

For years Stockton, like many cities in California and the nation, has been run by utopians and masterminds who have spent like drunken sailors and passed out entitlements like Chinese fortune cookies, with the biggest entitlement of all being the defined benefit and pension programs given their public union employees. All went well while the spending spree was going on, but when the recession hit in 2008 the city went into a tailspin.

As mortgages defaulted the tax base shrunk and the entitlements continued to escalate, especially for the unemployed and welfare class. As the State of California is also broke Stockton could and not expect any help for the state, nor should they. They made their bed with the public service and teachers unions and now they can lay in it.

2,000 miles away lays the town of Sandy Springs, Georgia located just to the north of Atlanta. The left-leaning Huffington Post reports:

"In 2005, decades after Sandy Springs first attempted annexation to Atlanta, the Republican-dominated Georgia state legislature allowed the city, located adjacent to Atlanta, to break off and become a largely autonomous, self-governing entity.

Scrambling to ready themselves for the division, Sandy Springs effectively privatized the large majority of the municipal services by entering into a public-private partnership with CH2M HILL, a full-service operations company that now controls nearly all of the once-public sector, from road maintenance to cleaning up trash in the park.

"Nobody likes change," Sandy Springs Mayor and former economist Eva Galambos told Reason, a libertarian magazine. "But, if your city is fiscally bankrupt, there may have to be some change."

The city, sixth-largest in the state with a 2010 population of 93,853, wanted to separate itself from what it saw as wasteful government spending in surrounding communities. The city benefits greatly, though, from the number of Fortune 500 companies headquartered there, boasting an extremely high per capita income, with the median family household income, according to a 2008 census estimate, approximated at $129,810, and the average family income $169,815.

Comparatively, the surrounding Fulton County has a median family income of only $58,573. The median national income is $49,777.

Adding to that, only 3.1 percent of families — 7.9 percent of the entire population — live below the poverty line in Sandy Springs. The percentage of Fulton County families living in poverty, in comparison, is nearly four times higher at 11.5 percent. Without needing to provide to as many poverty-stricken families, who typically use more public services, Sandy Springs can more easily keep taxes at a lower, sustainable level.

Not all of Sandy Spring's public services have been privatized, however. Public safety continues to be handled by government police officers and firefighters, and the Fulton County School System still operates public schools within the city, something not noted in the below video by Reason magazine. Mayor Galambos also notes the city "made a clear decision" to not hand out "defined benefits" of any sort to police officers and firefighters, in order to keep taxes low and avoid future obligations.

In light of municipal budget crises wreaking havoc across the country, the fiscally-conservative Sandy Springs government is proud of their radical decision, which they say has left them with no long-term liabilities. The $25 million they paid to CH2M HILL for one year's work, Reason argues, is less than half what they would pay in a typical, government-run scenario.

Since 2005, four surrounding Georgia cities have adopted the model.”

I have written about Sandy Springs in the past so I will not give much time to how this Georgia city is fighting against the public sector unions by just not having any public sector employees of the city’s payroll, they outsource most all of the city’s services with the exception of police and fire. You can read that blog by clicking here.

For years government including federal, state, county, and municipal outsourced most of its needed public service needs to private contractors. This included public works, legal, accounting, maintenance, and construction. It usually excluded fire and law enforcement except for municipalities having volunteer fire departments. Even law enforcement was outsourced by some smaller towns and cities to county sheriffs’ or to an adjacent city’s police department.

I recall a close friend of mine who was the mayor of a small city in Orange County, California. The town did not have its own police department and was not in a financial position to form one. She was approached by the Orange County Sheriffs’ Department with an offer to contract for the town’s law enforcement. She was not happy with the OCSD’s offer so she put the contract out to bid to several adjacent cities. She selected one of the adjacent cities as their offer posed the best for cost and service and subsequently gave the contract to them. The OCSD was not too pleased with her action, but she obtained the best deal for the city. This is the way it used to work and still does in many parts of the country.

With the growth of the public service unions, in power and numbers, across the county since the early 1980’s cities, counties, and states have been sliding down a deep abyss into higher costs for public service and the real millstone of the liabilities for their unfunded defined benefit programs of pensions and lifetime health care.

Lately states such as Wisconsin and Indiana have begun to reverse this trend much to the hew and cry of union leaders and progressives who garner much of their political support from these unions.

On the same day the people of Wisconsin voted to support Governor Scott Walker in his battle against the public service unions the people of San Diego and San Jose voted by an overwhelming majority to curtail the influence and cost these unions are imposing on the cities. Too bad Stockton did not take this action years ago, but they were just too close to Sacramento – the home of public service unions and Jerry Brown.

Many cities and towns outsource most of their public service needs. When I was in business running a consulting engineering and land surveying firm we worked for some of these cities by providing civil engineering and land surveying. It was their belief that if you could buy something through the Yellow Pages, especially from a local business, there was no need to provide those services by in-house, permanent staff – a staff they would have to support until the day they died.

In years past government outsourced almost everything to qualified contractors from Jefferson giving Lewis and Clark a contract to explore and map the lands he purchased from Napoleon in the Louisiana Purchase to the surveying the lands for incorporation into the United States Rectangular Survey System, building of the Transcontinental Railroad, Hoover Dam, the Interstate Highway System, and thousands of other public works including your local post office. Government provided the funds for these projects, but not the public service employees. The planning, design, engineering, and construction was carried out by the private sector.

Consider the interstate highway system as a classic example of how this system worked and should work. In 1956 Congress passed the Interstate Highway Act and it was signed into law by President Eisenhower. The law imposed a federal tax on fuel and trucks. This tax would be collected by the federal government and placed in a Highway Trust Fund. This money was then apportioned out to the states to construct modern, four lane divided highways. The apportioning was done on the need for the highway and the and the state’s ability to pay for the highway. In this case some states were considered donor states, while others were deemed recipient states. As example the larger, more populous states like California, New York, and Illinois were donor states and states with small population such as Montana, Wyoming and Nevada were considered recipient states. This was considered fair and necessary as you could not have a true interstate highway system if the roads were not connected through the lesser populated states and if you did not purchase fuel you did not contribute to the Fund.

The monies from the Fund were usually apportioned back to the states on a 90-10 basis – 90% federal and 10% state or local. The states then provided all of the design, engineering, and construction services to build the roads. Fiducial and design standards oversight were provided by the federal government through the Bureau of Public Roads (now the Federal Highway Administration). The BPR and various state highway officials through the American Association of State Highway and Transportation Officials (AASHTO) set the design and construction specifications and standards for building the system. Items such as; lane and shoulder widths, percentage of grades, sight distances, curve radiuses, design speeds, bridge clearance heights, pavement types and structural sections, signage, and minimum median widths. These specifications and standards were incorporated into the design of any highway qualifying for federal funding under the Interstate Highway Act.

As the design, engineering and construction management were left to the states he door was opened to the public employees to move in. Some states, mainly in the south, outsourced most of this work to the private sector. Other states such as California, New York, and New Jersey brought this work in-house and began to build massive bureaucracies. As an example when I worked for the California Division of Highways (now Caltrans) from 1962 to 1972 the agency had about 9,000 employees and all design, engineering, and maintenance work was done in-house. Today Caltrans has 22,000 employees and a budget of $12.8 billion dollars and the Interstate System was completed years ago. Today they outsource about 10% of their design and engineering services, and that took a court decision and referendum (Proposition 35) to accomplish that.

Throughout the ensuing years The Professional Engineers in California Government (PECG), a public service union representing 13,000 state-employed engineers and related professionals responsible for designing and inspecting California’s highways and bridges, has held Caltrans hostage by constantly fighting against and outsourcing of these services to the private sector. They claim that state employees are better qualified and will do the work for less cost is fallacious and ridiculous. The average Caltrans employee earns $100,000 including benefits, benefits that will be paid for life. Also, Caltrans has no way to reduce their in-house staff due to civil service rules, even if there is no current work for them.

While Sandy Springs is not the only municipality to outsource most of its public services it is certainly one of the best. Other towns, cities, counties, and states are beginning to see the light and eliminate their public service staff, thus reducing their costs and unfunded liabilities.

On This Day In 1788 The U.S. Constitution Was Ratified

“We the people of the United States, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and secure the blessings of liberty to ourselves and our posterity, do ordain and establish this Constitution for the United States of America.” — Preamble to the U.S. Constitution

On this day in 1788 New Hampshire became the ninth and last necessary state to ratify the Constitution of the United States, thereby making the document the law of the land.

By 1786, defects in the post-Revolutionary War Articles of Confederation were apparent, such as the lack of central authority over foreign and domestic commerce. Congress endorsed a plan to draft a new constitution, and on May 25, 1787, the Constitutional Convention convened at Independence Hall in Philadelphia. On September 17, 1787, after three months of debate moderated by convention president George Washington, the new U.S. constitution, which created a strong federal government with an intricate system of checks and balances, was signed by 38 of the 41 delegates present at the conclusion of the convention. As dictated by Article VII, the document would not become binding until it was ratified by nine of the 13 states.

Beginning on December 7, five states--Delaware, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, Georgia, and Connecticut--ratified it in quick succession. However, other states, especially Massachusetts, opposed the document, as it failed to reserve undelegated powers to the states and lacked constitutional protection of basic political rights, such as freedom of speech, religion, and the press. In February 1788, a compromise was reached under which Massachusetts and other states would agree to ratify the document with the assurance that amendments would be immediately proposed. The Constitution was thus narrowly ratified in Massachusetts, followed by Maryland and South Carolina. On June 21, 1788, New Hampshire became the ninth state to ratify the document, and it was subsequently agreed that government under the U.S. Constitution would begin on March 4, 1789. In June, Virginia ratified the Constitution, followed by New York in July.

On September 25, 1789, the first Congress of the United States adopted 12 amendments to the U.S. Constitution — the Bill of Rights — and sent them to the states for ratification. Ten of these amendments were ratified in 1791. In November 1789, North Carolina became the 12th state to ratify the U.S. Constitution. Rhode Island, which opposed federal control of currency and was critical of compromise on the issue of slavery, resisted ratifying the Constitution until the U.S. government threatened to sever commercial relations with the state. On May 29, 1790, Rhode Island voted by two votes to ratify the document, and the last of the original 13 colonies joined the United States. Today the U.S. Constitution is the oldest written constitution in operation in the world.

The U.S. Constitution has served this nation well for 224 years even though from time to time politicians and administrations have attempted to work around the letter of the Constitution in the various laws they have passed. Over the ensuing 224 years Congress has passed and the states ratified 17 more amendments to the Constitution with one of those amendments (the 21^st ) canceling a previous amendments (the 18^th). The 18^th Amendment, ratified in 1919 forbade the sale of alcohol and instituted prohibition — a disastrous attempt to regulate behavior through the coercion of law. Prohibition caused crime and most people ignored it. This government policy became so onerous and ignored that Congress reversed themselves in 1933 when the 21^st amendment was ratified by 75% of the states.

The biggest and most used clause of the Constitution for the progressives, statist, and utopians has been the commerce clause: This clause, found in the enumerated powers to Congress in Article I, Section 8 states:

“To regulate commerce with foreign nations, and among the several states, and with the Indian tribes;”

Over the years Congress has passed numerous laws under the egis of the Commerce Clause with the courts striking down some and upholding others. The most egregious of these being the Agricultural Adjustment Act of 1938 ,which was upheld by the U.S. Supreme Court in its 1942 affirmative decision in the landmark case of Wickard vs. Filburn. Since then much mischief has been fostered on the American people under the guise of the commerce clause including the passage of ObamaCare that is currently under review by the Supreme Court.

Today we have a president who, while claiming his knowledge of the Constitution due his being lecturer on Constitution Law at the University of Chicago, has little or no respect for the Constitution. Two of latest examples of this disdain are his granting amnesty to illegal immigrants through executive fiat and his granting Executive Privilege to Attorney General for his part in the gun running program which caused the death of Border Patrol agent Brian Terry by members of the Mexican drug cartels in 2010.

In the case of immigration Article I, Section 8 gives Congress the sole power for the regulation of immigration and naturalization:

“To establish a uniform rule of naturalization, and uniform laws on the subject of bankruptcies throughout the United States;”

Few powers are more fundamental to sovereignty than the control over immigration and the vesting of citizenship in aliens (naturalization). According to the Declaration of Independence, "obstructing the Laws for the Naturalization of Foreigners" was one of the grievances that led the American colonists to break with Britain.

Under the Articles of Confederation, each state retained authority over the naturalization of aliens. This resulted in widely varying state practices, which James Madison in The Federalist No. 42 called a "fault" and "defect" of the Confederation. At the Constitutional Convention, there was virtually no opposition to moving the naturalization power from the states to the new national government, and in the ratification debates only a handful of Anti-Federalists even raised the issue. James Madison seemed to speak the sentiment of most when at the Convention he expressed his wish "to invite foreigners of merit & republican principles among us. America was indebted to emigration for her settlement & prosperity."

Eleven months ago President Obama stated to a reporter that he had no authority to regulate immigration and naturalization and this was a power vested in exclusively in the hands of Congress and it was the duty of the President and Chief Executive Officer of the United States to enforce the laws passed by Congress or those expressed in the Constitution. Now he has reversed himself in claiming that for the reason of “social justice” he can, by Presidential fiat, change the law of the land. This is a total “spit-in-the eye” of the Constitution and the rule of law.

On the Executive Privilege he wants to invoke to protect his Attorney General, Eric Holder, from standing in contempt of Congress for his lies and obfuscations regarding his role in Fast and Furious Obama has once again overstepped his authority under the Constitution.

As the Supreme Court recognized in U.S. v. Nixon, the Executive Branch has a legitimate interest in confidentiality of communications among high officials so that the President can have the benefit of candid advice. However, as President Washington himself recognized, that privilege does not protect the President or his underlings from embarrassment or public exposure for questionable actions.

As the Supreme Court has also recognized repeatedly, the Congress, in the exercise of its constitutional powers, has the essential power to investigate the actions of the Executive Branch.

In this case, the exercise of Executive Privilege seems, in its timing and over-inclusiveness, to be nothing less than a political delaying tactic to prevent exposure of wrongdoing and incompetence that resulted in the murder of a American law enforcement agent and injury and death of many others. Further, a wholesale claim of privilege is facially improper: the President should be held to the standard that anyone claiming privilege is held to: identify each document in a log so that privilege can be disputed. (U.S. v. Nixon, 1974)

Because among the categories of documents sought are all those relating to the recantation by Holder of testimony before Congress, the demand goes to the core of the Congressional power under Article I. In this respect, this is not a general or oversight inquiry but a determination of why the Attorney General of the United States testified falsely before Congress about his own knowledge of a federal program. Presumptively, none of this category of documents is protected by Executive Privilege for wrongdoing per se is not protected by the privilege.

The right way to proceed is to hold Holder in contempt by resolution of the House and seek authorization from the House for the Committee, by its Chairman, to proceed by civil action to compel production of the documents. (Holder will not enforce a holding of contempt against himself — and by the way, he should have authorized, say, the assistant attorney general for legal counsel, to handle the contempt matter once the House voted as at that point he is representing his own interests and not those of the nation generally). Chairman Issa should file suit in federal court in DC and seek expedited action. There is no need for Senate action. The use of this procedure has been acknowledged by the Congressional Research Service in a 2007 study. Further, a privilege log should be sought by Issa and ordered produced immediately by the court, in camera inspection done promptly by the judge, and a final order entered compelling production of all documents for which no legitimate reason justifies Executive Privilege.

Yes, some documents may be covered by Executive Privilege, but the blanket attachment of that label flouts the law and the Constitution, and harms the legitimate assertion of Executive Privilege by Presidents of either party in the future. The Constitution is far too important to be subject to the caprice of this President and an Attorney General who, on its face, wants to be free from scrutiny about why he testified falsely before a Committee of Congress.

Executive Privilege is a very important implied executive power, used in various forms since the presidency of George Washington. Therefore, its misuse and abuse, to cover-up wrongdoing, conceal embarrassing information, or advance a political agenda, diminishes the ability of future presidents to assert it legitimately.

Barack Obama and Eric Holder can leak intelligence affecting our national security without a second thought, yet they clam up when it comes to releasing documents that Congress has requested — documents that would be embarrassing or political damaging to Obama’s administration.

We have an Imperial President who makes Richard Nixon look like an amateur. Barack Obama believes he can do whatever he wishes as long as he keeps up toothy smile, chin tilt, and cool community organizer rhetoric. He believes that as long as he follows the words on his teleprompter and looks cool he can transform the United States in his personal view of Ameritopia. It’s time for Congress to take a stand and do the right thing by holding Eric Holder in contempt and making him face a grand Jury as they did with Roger Clemens.

The Fascination with the 50’s

"The difference between a welfare state and a totalitarian state is a matter of time." — Ayn Rand

On our drive home from our road trip to Glacier National Park in Montana my wife and I were getting hungry around 12:30 pm as we drove south on I-15 though the Mojave Desert in California. As far north as Las Vegas we began seeing billboards advertising Peggy Sue’s 50’s Diner. We had passed these signs numerous times during our trips up and down I-15, bur this time we decided to stop at Peggy Sue’s for lunch. When we reached exit 191 on I-15 we turned off to Yermo Road by the big Marine depot and pulled into the parking lot for the diner.

There we were in the middle of the Mojave Desert about to walk back into the 1950’s. What an experience. The place was packed on this Saturday afternoon. There were cars, trucks, and RVs with license tags from as far away as Pennsylvania and Alberta, Canada. When we walked through the door was greeted by a mannequin of a buxom 1950’s car hop standing next to a sign telling us to seat ourselves and a waitress would be there to serve us, and by golly this is what happened. It took about a minute for a pleasant waitress to come to the table with eating utensils and menus and ask us what we wanted to drink. The service was great!

The menu was pretty comprehensive with items ranging from 50’s style milk shakes to burgers and deep fried dill pickles. Kathy ordered the Patti Page, of “How Much is the Doggie in the Window” fame patty melt and I choose the 50’s style burger. All of the menu items were named after various 50’s movies stars and recording artists such as Buddy Holly, Chubby Checker, and Marlon Brando.

The food was delivered hot and it tasted great. As we ate I began looking around the diner and I was amazed at how much 50’s memorabilia adorned the walls and floor including a juke box and figures of Elvis, the Blues Brothers and of course the figure of Marylyn Monroe in her iconic pose from the movie “The Seven Year Itch”. The walls were adorned with posters and photos of movie stars, films and recording stars from the 50’s and off course there was music from the 50’s coming from the speakers including Buddy Holly’s version of Peggy Sue.

Behind the diner there was a small park with a pond and fountain along with figures of prehistoric animals including a statue of King Kong. This was called Peggy Sue’s Diner-Saur Park, There was also a pizza shop. One of the unique items was the flower arrangements on each table resembling a 1950’s milk shake – quite cute.

Peggy Sue's Diner and Dinosaur Park is the perfect midway pit stop between LA and Vegas – Peggy Sue's '50s Diner is a true gem along part of Historic Route 66 (this section of I-15 follows the original track of Route 66 from LA to Barstow. Originally built in 1954, Peggy Sue and her husband Champ brought it back to life in 1987. Peggy Sue was a celebrity featured in over 100 films and commercials and even had a song written about her ("Peggy Sue" by Buddy Holly and The Crickets), and Champ worked at Knott’s Berry Farm before they decided to bring a taste of Hollywood to Yermo, California.

According to Peggy Sue:

“Champ and I came from Southern California in 1981, reopened the diner in 1987 and attempted to restore and preserve it in its original state. Before moving to the desert in 1981 Champ worked for Knott’s Berry farm and I worked in the movies. The diner was the perfect place to display our extensive collection of movie and TV memorabilia.

To complement the cozy atmosphere of the Diner, we wanted good homemade food and great 50’s music. We used my grandmother’s family recipes, made the old fashioned way. Thanks to the support of our Loyal Locals, Trusty Truck Drivers, Mighty Military, and Terrific Tourists the diner prospered and became more popular. We ran out of room, so we decided to expand the Diner into a real Old Fashioned Tourist Stop. Just like we remembered when we traveled across country as kids. We opened a 50’s style 5 & Dime Store with Curios and Memorabilia, Soda Fountain, Ice Cream Parlor, and Pizza Parlor. We even created or own Diner-Saur Park with larger than life Dinosaur Sculptures, Waterfalls, Fountains, Ponds, Grass and Trees for our guests to take a stroll. We appreciate you visiting with us at Peggy Sue’s. Hope you relived some old memories and made some new ones.”

There were numerous other 50’s diners along our route of travel and our Historic Lincoln Highway road trip last fall including one in Green River, Wyoming. There is also one several miles from my house in Murrieta, California called Richie’s Real American Diner where the menu is based on comfort foods of the 50’s.

Why this fascination with the 1950’s a time where I came of age. I clearly recall those times. These were great times and they were troubled times. The Korean War had just ended when I graduated high school, but we still had the selective service, something I needed to register for. There was the Cold War and the threat of Soviet Communism. There was still “Duck and Cover” in the schools and of course there was tail gunner Joe McCarthy. There was fear of a nuclear war with the Soviet Union and the destruction of the planet. Francis Gary Power’s U-2 spy plane was shot down over the Soviet Union and Nikita Khrushchev came to the United Nations and pounded his shoe on the table stating the USSR would bury us.

Yes there were troubled times but there were many more great times. Even with the troubles the 50’s were a time of great optimism and opportunity. You did not need a college education to get a good job and if you were willing to apprentice yourself and work hard the sky was the limit. Young people knew they could succeed if they worked hard and played by the rules. They married young and knew they could buy a home and car in a few years. As examples; I 1954 the average annual income was $4,000 per year ($35,000 adjusted for 2012 dollars according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics CPI inflation calculator). A new home was $10,250 ($87,500) or 2.5 times the average annual salary. A new car was $1,700 ($14,000), in fact I purchased a 1954 Chevrolet Belair four door sedan with the deluxe package for $1,900. The tuition to Harvard University was $800 ($6,800) per year and state colleges were much less. Gasoline cost $0.22 per gallon ($1.88) and a postage stamp was $0.03 ($0.26).

The Interstate highway system was just getting underway and the Ohio Turnpike opened to traffic in 1955 and you could drive across the state without stopping for one traffic light. Cars were getting larger and more powerful and tail fins were in vogue. In 1955 Chevrolet, which had always had an in-line six cylinder engine, introduced its brand new V-8. America was on the move. One of the most popular singing commercials of the 50’s was Dinah Shore singing “See the USA in your Chevrolet.” And, Rock and Roll was here to stay.

I believe people are yearning for those days of the 50’s when things were clearer and opportunity was the watchword of the day. Unlike today where the federal state governments infringe on all aspects of your life to 50’s provided unlimited opportunities for those who wanted to succeed, especially in the realm of small business. The music had a beat and you could understand the lyrics. Films were, for the most part inspirational and the guys in the white hats always won out in the end. Patriotism was in vogue and kids recited the Pledge of Allegiance or Preamble to the Constitution in school and Santa Claus or the Baby Jesus was not banned from the public schools or Public Square. The only social networking going on was when a group of guys or gals would gather on a warm summer evening to gossip and exchanges their dreams for the future.

These are the days people see when they walk into a diner like Peggy Sue’s. It’s not the food as much as the memories places such as Peggy Sue’s invoke. The next time you motor along I-15 in the Mojave Desert in your imported Japanese car look for exit 191 and pull off for a stop at Peggy Sue’s for a burger or a milk shake and reminisce on those halcyon days of the 1950’s. See you later alligator.

Obama Will Not Commemorate D-Day

Obama Will Not Commemorate D-Day

"In selecting men for office, let principle be your guide. Regard not the particular sect or denomination of the candidate — look to his character." —Noah Webster.

Probably no one over the age of twenty does not know that June 6^th marks the anniversary of the D-Day landings on the coast of France in 1944. Most of us have seen films like “The Longest Day” and “Saving Private Ryan” with the latter depicting the horrific conditions on Omaha Beach and the later giving may details of Operation Overload. Both films are classics when it comes to telling the story of both the airborne and seaborne landings.

On this day in 1944, Supreme Allied Commander General Dwight Eisenhower issued this charge:

"You are about to embark upon a great crusade. The eyes of the world are upon you. The hopes and prayers of liberty loving people everywhere march with you. You will bring about the elimination of Nazi tyranny over the oppressed peoples of Europe. Your task will not be an easy one. Your enemy is well trained, well equipped and battle hardened, he will fight savagely. And let us all beseech the blessings of Almighty God upon this great and noble undertaking."

More than 160,000 troops landed on a 50-mile stretch of heavily fortified beaches along the Normandy coast of France in what was largest invasion force in history, involving more than 5,000 ships and 13,000 aircraft. Some 9,000 Allied soldiers were killed or wounded than day. We owe these Patriots and generations of others an enormous debt of gratitude, and we owe them our steadfast devotion to Liberty over tyranny in our own day, so that the gift of Liberty may be extended to the next generation.

So what is Obama doing on this 68^th anniversary — he is hitting the beaches – of sunny California!

Instead of scheduling a brief event to mark this 68th anniversary of America’s brutal landing on the shores of Normandy, Obama is already on his way to San Francisco, where he will hold two fundraisers before moving on to Beverly Hills to stage two more.

Obama failed to mark D-Day with either a speech or a written proclamation both last year or the year before. He did give a speech in 2009, the 65th anniversary of the event.

First Lady Michelle Obama, who has made much of her “Joining Forces” campaign to support military families, also has nothing planned for D-Day. She’ll be in New York City for a fundraiser and then in Philadelphia to meet with campaign volunteers.

Obama’s failure to mark D-Day in any significant way is both a shame and a political mistake.

According to the Department of Veterans’ Affairs, two critical swing states – Florida and Pennsylvania, are among the top five states in terms of veterans’ population. Within the top twelve are four others — Michigan, Ohio, Virginia and North Carolina — all states Obama desperately needs to carry.

But what does Obama know about how the American people think and what they revere? The latest recall election in Wisconsin demonstrates this very well. All he gave his union supporters there was a tweet. Why should we expect anything else from our campaigner and fund raiser in chief.

I realize D-Day is slowly growing into a historical memory like the Battles of Saratoga and Yorktown and like the winter at Valley Forge and the Battle of Gettysburg. But to Obama, the great intellectual, these historical events have little or no meaning. To him it’s all about the money and his silly campaign speeches.

There are numerous historical reenactments of the battles of the Revolutionary and Civil War at the various battle sites. But it’s pretty hard to reenact the Normand landings when they took place on the coast of France. However, one president did honor those men as eloquently as Lincoln did after the Battle of Gettysburg — his name was Ronald Reagan. Who can forget his moving account of the “Boys of Pointe du Hoc” on the 40^th anniversary of D-Day.

We see news reports of the war in Afghanistan on a daily basis. We see the most well-equipped, modern military in the world. We know of battlefield medicine that can save 99% of the wounded if they survive the first 24 hours after being wounded. This was not the case in 1944.

Many of the soldiers landing on the beaches of Normandy were young men who were drafted for the duration. They were equipped with the best available arms and equipment of the times. They did not have body armor. They had eight-shot M-1 Garand rifles and just enough training to know how to shoot and care for the weapon. In many cases the only shots they had ever fired were during target practice. They had never killed anyone.

These young men were tasked to exit a wooden Higgins Boat in chest-deep water under fierce and accurate fire from experience German troops, advance to the beach, climb the slopes overlooking the beach and secure a beachhead for the landings. They were not facing Islamic rebels branding AK-47s and yelling Allah is Great. They were facing some of the best troops the Rommel could put on Hitler’s Atlantic Wall. There were also concrete bunkers almost impervious to naval bombardment and aerial bombing. Bunkers that had to be taken by direct infantry assault. And what did these troops do? They succeeded. Hitler’s Atlantic Wall lasted less than 24 hours. As the late historian Stephen Ambrose quipped; “It was the Boy Scouts against the Hitler Youth and the Scouts carried the day through their infinitive.”

None of us can ever understand the fear these soldiers had when they exited the landing crafts or jumped from a C-47 in the dark of the Norman night. Fear many did not talk about even to the day they died. How many of these soldiers (and Marines from the more violent Pacific Theater) suffered from Posttraumatic stress disorder? We will never know as PTSD was not even in the medical encyclopedias of the day. The most common term used was “Shell Shock” and the psychological community did not know how to handle it.

Many of us have or had grandparents, fathers, uncles, or other relatives who served in WWII and returned with PTSD. Sometimes this condition manifested itself in alcoholism and sometimes in abuse. I know from personal experience this to be the case as my uncle, a decorated veteran of D-Day and the Battle of the Bulge was unable to cope with civilian life upon his return from his service.

These veterans are called the “Greatest Generation.” I take some umbrage with this term coined by Tom Brokow. The men of all generations who fought for freedom area part of the greatest generation including the Revolutionary War, Civil War, Korea, Vietnam, and those sacrificing their family life in the mountains of Afghanistan.

Obama, like most liberals will use the veterans as a backdrop to their campaign speeches, but when it really matters they ignore these men and women who sacrificed so much.

So when Obama can find the time to jet off to California to raise money without even a mention of the sacrifice the D-Day veterans did it is nothing but shameless.

The Election Is Over, But The Spin Is Just Beginning

"The difference between a welfare state and a totalitarian state is a matter of time." — Ayn Rand

Last night I received an e-mail alert from the New York Times stating “Scott Walker, the embattled Republican governor of Wisconsin, narrowly survived a recall vote on Tuesday, defeating a union-led effort to remove him from office for pushing laws to restrict the collective bargaining rights of state workers.”

What caught my eye was the use of the adverb “Narrowly” in the lead statement of the NYT. I had just finished watching the Wisconsin recall election coverage and at the time I turned it off Walker was ahead by 10 points with 88% of the ballots counted and his opponent Tom Barrett had just given his concession speech. (Walker’s final margin of victory was 7%, pretty much as the polls predicted).

When I opened the link to the Times article I saw a different report on the election than the lead stated. In the article it stated that Walker “soundly defeated Barrett. How interesting that the Times headline writer thinks 7 points is a “narrow” margin. But, this is just the beginning of the spin the progressives will put on the election rather than looking at the plain and simple truth — the voters are feed up with large government union pensions and benefit programs.

In a related, but little reported, election the voters in California’s San Jose and San Diego Counties overwhelmingly approved measures to cut retirement benefits for city workers. In San Diego, 67 percent voted in favor of Proposition B while 33 percent were opposed. The margin in San Jose was even wider, with 71 percent in favor of Measure B and 29 percent opposed

Fox News Reported:

“San Jose Mayor Chuck Reed called the vote a victory for fiscal reform.

"The voters get it, they understand what needs to be done," he said in an interview.

Supporters had a straightforward pitch: Pensions for city workers are unaffordable and more generous than many private companies offer, forcing libraries to slash hours and potholes to go unfilled.

"We believe people are tired of having services cut back because of big pensions," San Diego Mayor Jerry Sanders, a Republican who is being forced from office by term limits, said recently.

Shrinking tax revenues during the recession are also responsible for service cuts, but pensions are an easy target. San Diego's payments to the city's retirement fund soared from $43 million in 1999 to $231.2 million this year, equal to 20 percent of the city's general fund budget, which pays for day-to-day operations.

As the pension payments grew, San Diego's 1.3 million residents saw roads deteriorate and libraries and recreation centers cut hours. For a while, some fire stations had to share engines and trucks. The city has cut its workforce 14 percent to 10,100 employees since Sanders took office in 2005.

San Jose's pension payments jumped from $73 million in 2001 to $245 million this year, equal to 27 percent of its general fund budget. Voters there approved construction bonds at the beginning of the last decade, but four new libraries and a police station have never opened because the city cannot afford to operate them. The city of 960,000 cut its workforce 27 percent to 5,400 over the last 10 years.

Opponents, led by public employee unions, say the measures deprive workers of benefits they were counting on when they got hired. Some workers decided against potentially more lucrative jobs with private companies, figuring their retirement was relatively safe.

"This is part of a broader effort to attack workers and to make their lives miserable," San Diego Councilman Todd Gloria said during a debate on the San Diego measure.

Thom Reilly, former manager of Clark County, Nev., and now a professor of social work at San Diego State University, said opponents face a difficult task. He expects the California measures may spawn similar efforts elsewhere if they pass.

"The ones who are actually paying the taxes will never see these benefits in their lifetimes, so there's not a lot of sympathy in the public," he said.”

The "it's gonna be a late night in Madison" notion was virtually over by the end of Happy Hour — which no doubt did cause some very late nights instead in Washington and Chicago. With little or no happiness at all. And naturally there were also the comparisons to the vibes of the night Scott Brown took down the Kennedy seat in 2009

The real story is: what happened this spring in Wisconsin was not a recall election at all. Pure and simple, it was a mulligan. A childish do-over. Moreover, it was a battle of government union members and their families against pretty much everyone else. And when that really crystallized in the minds of the voters, the unions' cause was doomed. The name Tom Barrett is irrelevant here. The biggest losers last night — and there were many — were big labor generally and public service unions specifically, and it’s about time.

Succinctly put, the petty, protected, pampered lefty government and teachers unions — still indignant over Scott Walker's 2010 win — simply threw a 75 million dollar tantrum as a third do over on that same election. And the unions' reward from the citizens of Wisconsin for a year and a half of hell was a resounding "go to hell" of epic proportions. And if anyone doubts that there is a God — and that He has a sense of humor — the Wisconsin State Motto is, yep, "Forward."

You can't make this stuff up.

Making stuff up, however, is what the entire leftist media-Democratic Party complex is doing today, blaming everything and everyone from the Citizens United decision, voter fraud, a bogus robo-call, George Bush — and probably even Brett Favre. MSNBC's Lawrence O'Donnell even pretended the election did not happen, focusing on Mitt Romney's job creation record in Massachusetts instead. It's all very funny. And satisfying.

Now the losers:

Big Labor: Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell didn't want to admit it on Fox, but big labor was absolutely the huge loser last night and in fact, they have been losing ever since Walker took office. It was the behavior of the unions in the Madison riots that really started the general public's focusing in on just how much these "public servants" are now making in salaries, pensions and health care, and how damned entitled they feel to all of this. That is what started all of this mess. The public was also tuned in to the unseemly nature of public sector unions per se and their relationship with politicians they get elected. And perhaps most devastating of all is the fact that some government unions in Wisconsin have lost over half of their own membership during this protracted battle. And oh by the way, public sector unions started in Wisconsin —in 1959.

Democratic Party: It goes without saying that if big labor loses, the Democratic Party loses. Actually, we have Wisconsin to thank that this now goes without saying. The past 21 months have been a highly visible object lesson for all to see. Moreover, the Democrats have lost much of their built in fund raising via the union mechanism thanks to some of Walker's reforms.

MSM and their exit polling: As 9pm EDT rolled around last night, all media outlets were buzzing with word that the exit polls were 50-50 and Ed Schultz was settling in "for a long night." He had no idea at the time. These exit polls excited the same fantasies that these same media outlets had been feeding that "the race was tightening" in the final week. Actually, it was not tightening at all. One thing the exit polls showed was that almost everybody who voted had long made up their minds. And why not? You're either on the public sector gravy train or you’re not. What's to decide? ow this escaped the geniuses in the media is another story. But they lost last night in a big way.

Obama: This one is a no brainer, and was pretty much obvious when he decided to avoid Wisconsin this week like yellow in the game Twister. But it goes deeper than that. His failure to do more than send a last minute Twitter message in support of Barrett has to infuriate the unions, who have in the past done so much to get Obama and other Democrats elected. Looking ahead to November, their coffers are depleted, and enthusiasm for giving money to Obama, manning phone banks, and canvassing drives has to diminish not just in Wisconsin but beyond.

GOP Establishment: Setting Reince Preibus aside for a second, the GOP Establishment took a bit of a whipping last night — because Walker is exactly the kind of Republican the establishment constantly warns us is poison for the party. Preibus gets a lot of grief because he is RNC Chair and they normally deserve it. But Preibus was key to Walker's first win as well as Senator Johnston's defeat of Russ Feingold in 2010. We can only hope that now Preibus will have more influence in the halls of the RNC offices inside the Beltway.

GOP Consultants / Conventional Wisdom See above, but the consultant class deserves their own space in the biggest loser category. They have cost us many elections over the decades, and last night was a huge blow to their entire foundational template. This may be Walker's biggest gift of all to conservatives.

Bipartisanship / No Labels Crowd: The stunning vitriol and passion in this election, along with the results of the recent Pew Research findings, have dealt the notion of "getting along" and bipartisanship a huge blow. Actually, reality is the problem with bipartisanship. This is a nation divided on the role of government and government unions and all of the attendant spending and control in our lives. Many of us knew that already. Those that didn't surely should now, after seeing the last 21 months unfold in Madison and after perusing the Pew results as well.

Julia: The entire nanny state government dependency mindset — as demonstrated by the Obama 2012 cartoon character Julia — took a big whipping last night as well. The folks who pay for all of the government union members and for all of the Julias had a collective awakening and said enough is enough. If there's another installment of Julia, and I suspect there will not be, she would be very unhappy watching MSNBC in last night's episode.

Now, as pleasing as this result is, this is not an indication that Mitt Romney can necessarily come rolling into Wisconsin and win. While Walker,his Lt. Governor Rebecca Kleefisch and several State Senators won last night, surveys indicate that even in this environment Romney would have lost. Besides, rarely has Romney shown the cojones on any issue that Walker has shown consistently.

Which brings us to the contrast with the Brown win in 09. The Walker win is even sweeter and more significant. Scott Brown campaigned on tea party principles, and while avoiding the term celebrated those principles in his victory speech. But he has not always voted that way — and will run against Indian Princess Warren as a moderate.

Scott Walker meanwhile campaigned outwardly as a tea party type in 2010, governed that way absolutely — campaigned again as a tea party candidate this year — and won an even bigger victory. Now, in his speech last night, Walker said that "he's committed to working together" and is determined to "put this election behind us." Of course he was sounding the obligatory good winner attitude, as he should have. We all know better. The liberals, their unions, their President, their media — all have to be defeated because there is no working with them. The word compromise only refers to conservatives.

Remember, the left was perfectly fine with money in politics when they thought Barack Obama was going to raise $1 billion with which he would bludgeon the GOP. Now that it is not happening, money in politics is again evil. It is no coincidence that the left seized on this talking point even before the polls closed. They think it sells well. But it doesn’t. Remember in 2010, they tried to claim the Chamber of Commerce was spending foreign money to help the GOP? Lot of good it did them then.

These are also the same people who once told us the Wisconsin recall was a harbinger of GOP overreach and voter retaliation would ensue. Suddenly, the recall means nothing according to these same people. The Chairwoman of the Democratic Party once called last night a “dry run” for the general election.

I maintain that special elections mean very little to general elections. The flawed exit polls were flawed because people who vote in recall elections vote in different ways from general elections. There was a massive union vote in Wisconsin last night. We can conclude that Scott Walker winning big with a big union turnout means even private sector union members hate public sector unions. But we should be careful not to over conclude things based on Wisconsin.

Republicans around the country should take note of that. While I maintain recalls and special elections are not really good indicators of anything beyond the dynamics of those races, there are a few things Wisconsin tells us that do bode ill for President Obama and that are easy to conclude.

The first thing we can conclude is that defense of public sector unions is now a non-starter even in the birthplace of American progressive politics. Union voters voted for Scott Walker. Republicans have a new battle tested issue that sells well even in blue states.

The second thing we can conclude is that the same winning coalition of disaffected independent voters, tea party activists, and Republicans held together in Wisconsin to keep Scott Walker. More importantly, and perhaps most importantly, the demographic shift that saw the Democrats lose their hold over the rustbelt in 2010 has continued to the Democrats’ disadvantage. Couple that shift away from the Democrats with the Republicans’ new found strengths in Appalachia and the Democrats who like to claim Republicans cannot win in New England will have an even harder time winning in the heartland. Both in North Carolina with gay marriage and in Wisconsin with the recall, a real silent majority stood up to be counted and heard.

For all the Democrats’ talk about their growing strength in the west, it is still going to take several decades for them to make up the votes lost in the rust belt and Appalachia. Wisconsin’s recall election shows that the demographic trends against the Democrats are starting to lock in, including losing blue collar white voters and even a number of private sector union workers. Scott Walker won by a larger margin last night than Barack Obama did against John McCain nationally. Nonetheless, some in the media would have you believe Walker only barely got by.

The third thing we can conclude from Wisconsin is that the Republican Party’s use of technology in its Get Out The Vote efforts really paid off. We should be thanking the Democrats for giving us an opportunity for a live test of our new GOTV tools and ground game. Scott Walker’s thumping of Tom Barrett showed the GOP, in a blue state, has the ability to pinpoint voters and get their voters to the polls. 2012 will be the first truly technology driven Presidential campaign, run on iPads and iPhones. The Democrats handed the GOP a marvelous gift of a recall that went on and on and on. By the time everyone got to the gubernatorial recall, the GOP had its GOTV tweaked perfectly.

It exceeded expectations.

The fourth thing we can conclude from Wisconsin is that Barack Obama is extremely nervous. He would not campaign for Tom Barrett. Only on Election Day did he tweet out his support for Barrett in 140 characters. Barack Obama has batted 1000 in seeing those candidates with whom he campaigns for statewide office go down in flames. Despite their bold prognostications that Wisconsin does not matter and all is well and Obama was just too busy, the Democrats know that they poured in a lot of resources only to lose Wisconsin while giving the GOP multiple recall votes to get their GOTV right. It should speak volumes to Democrats everywhere that Bill Clinton was happy to go campaign for Tom Barrett in a state Barack Obama’s campaign considers a swing state, but Barack Obama was not willing to get tied to a loss there.

The fifth thing we can conclude is that exit polling does not work well for recall elections. Consider that voters were evenly split going into the polls on whether they supported Scott Walker’s reforms or not. Likewise, roughly two-thirds of voters either were or were related to union members, which was a bit higher than in 2010. The presuppositions were therefore that this would be close. It’s not so much that the exit polling was wrong, as it was that the presuppositions that went into formulating the exits and, more importantly, into interpreting the exit polling was wrong. The presuppositions the media makes headed into November desperately need to be recalibrated. The media is still operating on FDR Coalition presuppositions in their formulation of and analysis of exit polling data.

The sixth thing we can conclude from Wisconsin is that Barack Obama is still the favorite there, but, while I hate to be repetitive, the Democrats’ continued recall efforts have made the state much more competitive for the GOP in that state.

Here’s one thing I don’t think we can easily conclude, but I would take away from Wisconsin. Anger does not win elections. In November, the GOP should be happy warriors, not angry. Let the left be angry. One of the things the left did in Wisconsin that has not been well reported is send mailers to voters documenting their neighbors’ voting history. Think about that. A leftwing group sent mail pieces to voters trying to shame them into voting by revealing how much or how little they choose to participate in the democratic process. How many voters turned out to vote mad as hell at the left for stooping to this level?

Lastly, I hope the GOP in Washington, which is often afraid of its own shadow is watching this. In Wisconsin, the Republican Governor was willing to pick a fight on a core Democrat issue, stick to his guns, and go through a recall process. And he won. Sometimes, Messrs. Boehner and McConnell, you don’t have to compromise. You can stick to your guns and still win. Perhaps with the overwhelming votes against the public sector unions on San Diego and San Jose counties and the defeat of Prop 29 governor Moonbeam will begin to get the message that Californian are getting ticked off at big government.