Posted on 10/19/2004 11:28:38 PM PDT by goldstategop
I didn't vote for George W. Bush in 2000.
Though faced with a dismal choice that year, I chose to sit out the presidential election – even though Bush's opponent, Al Gore, was part of an administration that spent years terrorizing me and other critics of Bill Clinton, using all the awesome power of the federal government.
In fact, ever since 2000, my news organization has been the target of a $165 million lawsuit by Gore's chief fund-raiser in Tennessee. It seems the former vice president and his supporters there believe a devastating 18-part investigative series on Gore's history in his home state contributed mightily to his defeat in Tennessee – and, thus, a loss of electoral votes and the White House.
Still, I couldn't support Bush in 2000 because I did not believe he would govern according to the limits of the U.S. Constitution. That is my minimum standard requirement for support of any candidate for federal office.
Until recently, I was planning to sit out the 2004 presidential election, too, for the same reason.
When it comes to the U.S. Constitution, Bush doesn't get it. He doesn't understand the strict limits on federal authority. He doesn't understand how this sets us apart as a free nation from all others in the world.
However, three years ago, this nation was attacked as it has never been attacked before. We find ourselves in a global conflict with a radical ideology of evil comparable to our titanic battles of the past with Nazism and communism. It's a fight to the finish. It's a fight for our lives. It's a fight that will never end until one side or the other is vanquished.
I have come to conclusion that, like it or not, Osama bin Laden and his jihadist allies have one short-term goal above all others – defeating George W. Bush at the polls Nov. 2.
A victory by John Kerry, a lifelong appeaser of totalitarianism, would hand the terrorists their biggest morale boost since Sept. 11, 2001. If you doubt what I am saying, look no further than the "endorsement" of Kerry by Yasser Arafat's Palestinian Authority. Arafat is the father of modern-day Arab terrorism.
So this election for me is not so much about Bush. It's about you. The election has now come down to something very simple. It is your chance to send the terrorists a message. It is your moment to make the terrorists hear from you.
A mandate for Bush will send the terrorists just such a message. It will tell them we have stood up as a nation. It will tell them we will continue to hunt them down – no matter how long it takes and no matter what the cost.
A close election – or, God forbid, a Kerry victory – will actually encourage the terrorists. It will send them the message that you are tired and weary and that your will to fight them to the death is giving out.
Ask yourself today: Will America be safer with Bush or Kerry in the White House?
That's how simple the choice is today. All other considerations merely muddy the water and complicate what is seen by our enemies as a clear choice.
If we were at peace, this might be an opportune moment to consider building a third party. It might be a great chance to protest the choices we have. But we are not at peace. We are at war.
A Kerry victory – or even a close election, decided days or weeks after the vote – will increase exponentially the danger our country faces, the risk to our children, the threat to our way of life.
That's what this election comes down to for me. It's not about Bush. It's not about Kerry. It's about you. It's about the message you send to the enemy – to the beast.
If we rise up Nov. 2 and send the beast a message, we will have taken our most dramatic step toward victory in this global conflict.
This is your moment to make your voice heard – all the way to the caves in Afghanistan, the terrorist cells in Chechnya, the dismal slums of Fallujah and teeming streets of Gaza.
It's time for you to be heard. It's time to fight back. It's time to make your stand.
Vote for George W. Bush Nov. 2.
Farah and buchanan both in one...yawn...day.
Farah sounds like a fiscal conservative like me who really dislikes large government. I am in the same mindset as Farah. Bush may not always get it right, but at least he knows how to define evil, and has the will fight it.
How many times has America flinched? Iran under Carter. Pulling US troops out of Lebanon. I mean we haven't flinched near as many times as the Europeans, but we have flinched enough that the enemy is still more than willing to test our resolve.
The last strict constitutionalist President was George Washington !
Washington probably wouldn't make Farah happy.
"Joseph Farah Swallows Pride And Urges Vote For President Bush Nov. 2."
It's about time. I stopped reading WorldNetDaily, when Farah turned it into a Bush bashing site.
Smart decision on Farah's part--after Bush is re-elected, we'll still have a constitution--and our heads will still be attached, too.
Kerry is so dirty with mullah money and love of the anti-US, anti-Israel UN--
--not to mention Kerry's affirmation of al Sadr as "a legitimate voice"--
Farah's more of a libertarian - he dislikes government, period. That's why he hates the conservative label on the grounds conservatives are "conserving" everything that needs to be swept away if we are to get back to the kind of country the Founders bequeathed to us. As he said, he thinks President Bush hasn't gone in the direction we need to go. But he reluctlantly has come to endorse Bush since despite everything many small government folks detest about Bush, the truth is if this country is destroyed by its enemies, what we want won't matter. Right now, the first and foremost duty of the President is safeguarding America from its enemies. President Bush gets it and Senator Kerry doesn't. Its that simple.
So do most of us but Farah is way out there sometimes.
You say it's up to us? Well I think Bush has followed the law and took the right measures to protect the United States. I support President Bush all the way for another 4 years. I will not sell out our security and interests to the United Nations or subject our military to the World court. There, 3rd world countries that hate America and American values would seek revenge on our military.
 WHAT A NUISANCE!
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"I stopped reading WorldNetDaily, when Farah turned it into a Bush bashing site."
I did the same.
About time! Glad to see he realized we are fighting for survival.
I stand corrected.
I should have said I stopped reading Joseph Farah on WND not that I stopped reading WND.
I kind of liked Harding and Coolidge, myself, but then, they were dead before I was born.
In 1929,after the crash, the first reaction of the government was that, since there had been too much speculative cash in the system, creating a bubble, the right thing to do was to tighten government spending and lending. By the time they loosened the reins of fiscal and monetary policy it was TOO LATE.
There is a time and place for fiscal conservatism. But 2001-2002 was NOT IT. The wild party of the dot-com bubble (aided and abetted by Clinton's gang at treasury, who had a deliberate policy of jacking up the US dollar to suck money into the US stock and bond bubble) was the BIGGEST financial bubble in history! The bursting of that bubble, compounded by 911, created a serious danger of a deflationary collapse. That was no time for fiscal or monetary conservatism. It was time to SPEND and LEND.
The "downside" of Bush's economic policies was a decline in the US dollar. But this has only amounted to reversing the untoward gains of the Clinton years, brought on by his massive tax increases. Tax increases, everywhere in the world and every time, lead to a rise in currency value. A rising currency is great for wall street, but very bad for US farming, mining, and manufacturing. Farmers in particular have favored a lower value for the dollar since the beginning of time :).
It is interesting that the 1920's were similar to the 1990's in that stock markets boomed (along with a rising US dollar) while farmers suffered. Bush's policies offered some quick and much needed relief to all US commodity producers. Bush's policies were not fiscally conservative, but they were right for the time.
You nailed the grim reality that these Pseudo Perfect Conservatives have failed to realize:
Smart decision on Farah's part--after Bush is re-elected, we'll still have a constitution--and our heads will still be attached, too.
"However, the current Treasurer has committed to maintain that strong dollar policy. The dollar has simply been falling due to market forces beyond even the President's control."
Watch what they DO, not what they say. Every Treas. Sec. must say he's for a strong dollar or there would be a precipitous collapse, which we have not seen. The idea is a gradual decline. This is NOT beyond political control, but rather a direct consequence of tax cuts, just as the Clinton/Rubin dollar rise came from their tax increase.
"I know the SPEND and LEND is the typical Keynsian answer to economic collapses, but a false one IMHO"
Keynes understood markets and market economics with great insight, even brilliance. For example, he was a brilliantly successful investor of his own and other people's money.
Here is a problem for economic conservatives. The twenties were an era of very low government intervention, bureaucracy, spending, and borrowing. There were very low tax rates. Yet the depression hit and hit hard. The great lesson of 1929 is that, when a bubble breaks, if action is not taken immediately, psychology will go sour, and a liquidity trap will develop. Once that happens, the government can lend and spend all it wants and it will not work because the liquidity they try to inject into the system will be "trapped" in the lowest risk investments (government bonds and under the mattress).
Even though they relied on the unpleasant tool of a tax increase and dollar rise,the early economic policy of Clinton/Rubin was not kooky. Rubin understood markets and gave them a nice boost. My biggest problem is that it amounted to a zero-sum game with producers such as farmers given the shaft while consumers and wall street got the benefit. But, hey, farmers didn't support Clinton, urban consumers did. What they did, at first, was reasonable coalition politics.
But where Clinton/Rubin went wrong is that they didn't cool things off when the thing began to go wild, which they could have easily done via moderate tax cuts. This would have lowered the value of the dollar and given pause to the foreign money that eventually inflated the preposterous dot-com bubble. I believe Clinton/Rubin neglected their duty deliberately because of the campaign contributions from the dot-com entrepeneurs who wanted to cash out their options, and who could only do so if the bubble stayed up as long as possible.
We are generally in agreement on bailouts, though it is the Mexican bailout that I am more familiar with. To me the proper levers are general fiscal and monetary policy, which shows less favoritism than direct bailouts.
The audio is compelling. He smacks Peroutka near the end.
http://www.radioamerica.org/Program2003/worldnetdailyreport.htm
It would be interesting to know the conversations between Rubin and the dot commies in 1999-2000, because I feel sure he knew very well that a bubble was forming. But there doesn't have to be a conspiracy to make my observation right. Let's just say that the dot commies supported Clinton because his policies were good for them. Just as the farmers supported Dole because his policies were good for them.
Greenspan certainly was not part of this game. He blasted the "irrational exhuberance" right as the bubble began to form in 1996 (IIRC). He could only have killed the bubble through massively jacking up interest rates, and, in the absence of inflation that was not part of his mandate. Similar to the 1920's the strong currency actually kept a whiff of deflation in the air. Jacking up interest rates would have made the dollar soar, compounding the problem.
The right medicine was a corrective in fiscal policy (slashing taxes, creating a fiscal deficit and driving the dollar down).
By the way, I think the Bush team's economic management has been supurb. The stock market decline was deep enough to get rid of the crazy valuations and excesses, but not so fast as to destroy confidence. The decline in the dollar has been steady but measured. The damage to the real economy from popping this bubble has been so small as to be almost miraculous. A correction is a proper event in a market economy, to get rid of excesses, and that is what we have had. A DEPRESSION, on the other hand, is an altogether bad thing were matters spiral downward out of control and damages the real economy.
After Farrah votes for Bush on Nov 2nd, he should take some free time to re read the constitution.
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