STARTPOST TITLE: test AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 8/23/2008 11:41:00 PM ----- BODY:

test

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: good grief AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 10/28/2004 09:43:00 PM ----- BODY:

When you step into the voting booth Tuesday .. just close your eyes and recall this photo. The rest will come naturally.

Vote Bush.

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: almost done AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 10/27/2004 10:07:00 AM ----- BODY:

It is no secret that George W. Bush is fully endorsed by the editor of this site. With one week remaining before the presidential election, it should be known that it is my hope that the President wins a send term. If we are lucky, the election will not be close and we all be spared the plague of lawyers descending upon Florida and Ohio and Pennsylvania and anywhere else the Democrats believe they might recount the votes until it comes out in their favor. All that being said, I will be happy when this election is over. Clearly your humble author is a political junkie and voraciously consumes any and all political news, enduring spin and punditry and outrageous bias along the way. The depth to which this campaign has sunk, however, have made it difficult to simply watch the nightly news without becoming enraged.

The Democrats were upset about the 2000 election. We all get that. They continue to be angry about it and will not be happy until George Bush is out of office. To achieve this end, they have sponsored ads depicting the president as a Nazi, called him a deserter; accuse him of being a crazed warmonger, or even worse – gasp - a believing Christian. Not content to simply spread their vile hatred of the President, the left has undertaken an unprecedented campaign of deceit and corruption to reach their goal. John Kerry stands before a crowd of people (and via satellite before the nation as a whole) and lies each and every day. He knows with a certainty that there is no Bush plan to reinstate the draft and yet he continues to spread the rumor. The New York Times, deciding that the Kerry campaign needed some help, has published (twice) on it’s front page an article suggesting that the Bush administration allowed some 380 tons of explosives to disappear after the Iraq invasion. The story would have us believe that this huge cache went unguarded by troops and represents proof of administration incompetence. Soon after the Times ran their first story, it became clear that the facility in question was first discovered during April of 2003 (during the initial invasion and push towards Baghdad) and that the weapons in question were not there – they had likely been removed prior to the invasion. Embedded reporters traveling with the troops during the invasion confirm that the Times article is suspect at best. That the story has been debunked is of little concern to Kerry, who continued to pound on it Tuesday. Kerry and his advisors are well aware that the story has been discredited, but they continue to spread the (tall) tale.

In instance after instance, the Kerry campaign repeats charges against Bush that they know to be false. From Social Security fear-mongering to rumors of ‘disenfranchisement’, from inaccurate statements about the economy to outright lies about the Iraq war the Democrats have flooded the airwaves and the print media with unadulterated lies. One might think that a distinguished Senator of 20 years might run for President on his record and on his policy positions, but this Senator does not. He doesn’t because he cannot. His record is abysmal at best. After 20 years in Washington, Mr. Kerry cannot point to ANY significant legislation which he has authored or co-authored. Mr. Kerry has a record of voting against the military and against intelligence. He fought Reagan during the ‘80s suggesting that the President was making the world “less safe.” History has proven Ronald Reagan right and John Kerry wrong – the Soviets are long gone and the world no longer lives under the imminent threat of nuclear war. John Kerry sought to weaken the US stance during the Cold War by supporting a nuclear freeze. Today, Kohn Kerry suggests that George Bush has made the world, “less safe.” He was wrong in the ‘80s and he is wrong today. On every substantive issue, John Kerry either has a record from which he is hiding or his stance is far to the left of mainstream America. Lacking a record or a policy on which to run, Kerry has chosen to go negative and not finding valid criticisms of the President, he has lowered himself to making it up. This should come as no surprise, of course, as the Clinton attack dogs are now running his campaign. Bill Clinton made lying an art form – fortunately (or unfortunately) John Kerry is no Bill Clinton. Kerry bludgeons us over the head with his lies - so transparent and baseless they are. Unfortunately, the press does not keep the Democrats honest – in fact they seem to be in the business of doing much of the fabricating.

If the endless stream of untruths weren’t enough, the apparent corruption present in this election is horrifying. Many stories have been written telling us of entire counties in which the number of registered voters far exceeds the population of adults. Democratic registration drives in prisons and the trashing of registration forms wherein ‘Republican’ was marked are terrible examples of the corruption. Republican precinct workers have been receiving death threats and vandalism against Republican headquarters is commonplace. Any suggestion that the vote occur in accordance with the law receives charges of racism and attempts to suppress the vote. Unable to believe my ears, I listened to a Democratic campaign official state (on no less than two separate cable news channels) that, in reference to voting regulations, Republicans have “this strange hang-up about the rules.” Even quoting it, I cannot believe I heard it. “Hang-up about the rules”? What are rules for then? This, in the end, embodies the whole of the Kerry campaign. Unwilling and unable to run on ideas (or idears as Kerry might say), the Kerry campaign has run a smear campaign. And if the facts get twisted or completely tossed out the window in the process? - who cares. After all, we Republicans have this strange hang-up about the truth.

In a week it’ll all be over. God speed Mr. President. I hope for the sake of the nation it is a landslide (from an electoral standpoint at least). Maybe, just maybe things can settle down again and the anger from the left can be redirected towards those who would do us all harm – regardless of political affiliation.

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: The politics of fear AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 10/24/2004 01:03:00 PM ----- BODY:

It’s the end of a very close, very long campaign and the Democrats are resorting to desperate measures. Desperate though they might be, these tactics have been shown to work. The ploy in question is, of course, fear mongering. This is nothing new to our friends on the left. For years they have been telling us the world will come to an end if Republicans are elected. In 1964 the Johnson campaign ran the infamous ‘daisy commercial’ depicting a young girl counting the petals of a daisy which gave way to a countdown which then culminated in an enormous nuclear blast. The ad had one purpose: to frighten the American public and suggest that the election of Barry Goldwater would lead to nuclear annihilation.

Today, the Kerry campaign is presiding over a nonstop campaign of fear. On every issue, the Kerry team has cornered the fear market.

The War on Terror. On this issue George Bush holds a commanding lead over John Kerry. The American people believe that Bush can do a better job against terrorism. The Kerry response? Create fear. Kerry tells us that we are less safe today than we were prior to 9/11 and that the Bush administration has created a volatile world. Rather than address the issue, Kerry quickly points to Korea, Iran, and every bit of bad news available from Iraq. The hope is to misdirect the attention of the electorate. John Kerry proposed the gutting of our intelligence services – even AFTER the first World Trade Center bombing. John Kerry voted against every major weapons system available to our troops today who are fighting the war on terror. John Kerry supported a nuclear freeze in the 1980’s which would have allowed the Soviets to maintain power indefinitely. John Kerry voted against the first Gulf War which would have allowed Saddam Hussein to control Kuwait and may well have led to the invasion of Saudi Arabia as well. John Kerry voted against funding our troops in Iraq – an action he himself described as “irresponsible.” John Kerry has a record he desperately wants to avoid – his answer? Create fear and uncertainty about his opponent. The Democrats have even taken a page from the Lyndon Johnson playbook and have suggested that a nuclear war is likely if Bush is re-elected. Said Ted Kennedy, “The war in Iraq has made the mushroom cloud more likely, not less likely."

Social Security. The Democratic Party has been dealing in fear on this issue for years. The reality is that Social Security will not be available to future retirees. The fund is devised such that current payments are supported by current workers. The problem is that the baby boom generation will soon retire and there are not enough younger workers to take their place. This imbalance will completely deplete the trust fund and no monies will be available for the following generation. These are facts. The Democratic Party has chosen to ignore the facts and suggest that anyone willing to adjust the system is endangering their retirement. Al Gore ran with this lie in 2000 and had great success (Florida may not have even been close without the fear vote). Kerry continues the tradition by creating unreasonable fear in the minds of seniors. Recent claims by the Kerry team put forth the lie that Bush plans to cut Social Security by 30%-45%. The facts are that Bush has proposed no such cuts and that the specific information referred to by Kerry is one of three “reform models” put forth by a bipartisan commission in 2001. Even then the figures quoted by Kerry refer only to a slowing of growth and not cuts for current retirees. It is of little concern to the deceitful left that any plan to revitalize Social Security would guarantee payments to current and upcoming retirees. The Kerry campaign tells outright lies to seniors, telling them that their retirement checks may stop if Bush is re-elected. This is simply outrageous and despicable. Unfortunately, it is also par for the course with the left.

Health Coverage. John Edwards recently took morbid advantage of the death of Christopher Reeves and suggested that, "When John Kerry is president, people like Christopher Reeve are going to walk. Get up out of that wheelchair and walk again.” This may be a new benchmark low in American politics. Beyond the suggestion that John Kerry is possessed of powers heretofore maintained by God alone, the more subtle implication is an invitation to fear. Be fearful of the nasty Republicans who tirelessly work in the dark places of the world to keep the paralyzed down. This is ridiculous, unconscionable, and intended to frighten. Of course, the fear mongering doesn’t stop with the deification of John Kerry. Kerry repeats time and time again that 5 million people have lost their health care in America. This is simply ridiculous. No one has lost their health care in America – any person can secure health care regardless of their ability to pay. It may be that many people have lost their health insurance due to job losses resulting from the recession and 9/11, but those losses are greatly temporary as individuals acquire benefits in new jobs. Kerry intentionaly mislead on this issue. Of course the rationale behind the fibs is to keep Americans from focusing on the Kerry plan itself. Estimates suggest that Kerry scheme will cost as much as $1.5 trillion – and this is to cover the currently uninsured. What of the millions who will doubtless lose their health insurance if the Kerry plan is enacted? What incentive is there for a small business to maintain heath insurance for it’s employees if they can easily be added to a government program? The theme is becoming clear. John Kerry cannot run on his record and his programs cannot stand up to analysis so Kerry misdirects our attention with campfire horror stories.

Military Draft. John Kerry has been at his most irresponsible on this issue. He continues to repeats rumors that, if elected, George Bush will reinstate the draft. There was a time in this country that the press would blast a candidate for spreading such obvious falsehoods. George Bush has said flatly, “there will be no draft” while he is president. The military does not want a draft – they have learned that an all volunteer force is a far superior force. There is absoluetely NO basis for these rumors and yet Kerry continues to spread them. Why? There may be votes to be had if young voters can be frightened of a draft. Just another example of the shameful Democratic practices.

Racism. This nation has come a long way. Good men and women fought and died to secure the liberty of African Americans and fought tirelessly to ensure that they be treated equally under the law. To be sure, shadows of racism can be found in America and must be condemned when discovered, however, the blatent race-baiting of the Democrats in this and other recent elections does more to harm than help the cause. A recent Democratic flier produced by the Kerry front-group, Americans Coming Together, depicts an African-American getting hosed down by a fire hose and states, "This is what they used to do to keep us from voting,” and outlining fictitious voter intimidation, “this is how Republicans keep African-Americans from voting now." John Kerry himself spreads the unsubstantiated voter suppression claims saying, “Never again will a million African-Americans be denied their right to exercise the vote in the United States of America.” Of little concern to the Democrats or apparently to the media is the fact that the referenced voter suppression never occurred. Again we find that in the Kerry campaign facts take a back seat to fear.

The list goes on and on. From suggesting that we are in the midst of the “worst economy since the Great Depression” when we are, in fact, enjoying historic growth to claims that our environment is being polluted at an historic rate (it isn’t – in fact the air and water are cleaner, wetland loss has been reversed and our national parks are better funded, managed, and protected). John Kerry has made an art of the Chicken Little campaign. “The sky is falling” everywhere you turn according Mr. Kerry. Just what Kerry will do to stop the falling sky remains a mystery. He provides little other than, “I have a plan” and no attempts to garner more information about his plan or to review his 20 year history in the Senate will be tolerated. If people are frightened enough, the facts and the record may not matter at all – and that is exactly what Kerry is banking on.

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: a question of faith AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 10/18/2004 10:52:00 PM ----- BODY:

One reading the latest editorials from our moral and political shepherds in the press and listening to the elitist punditry on the talk shows will quickly recognize the latest attack on the president. The subject of his faith has become an object of ridicule and a supposed reason to fear him. Ridiculous claims from the left would have us believe that Bush thinks himself as some sort of modern day crusader and that he has abdicated his judgment to some mythical power run rampant.

Of course all of this stems from the fact that the most poignant point of the final presidential debate was when the two candidates spoke of their faith. Bush spoke humbly and sincerely as he had at no point prior in any of the three debates. This, it would appear, is all he needed to do. The dramatic hemorrhaging in the polls stopped and, in fact, reversed. The differences between Bush and Kerry could not have been painted more clearly by any pundit or political spin man. While Bush responded with an earnest forthrightness, Kerry spoke with the sort of canned answer that politicians fall back on when they are surprised by a question. Here was a man (Kerry) affectedly trying to please. Suddenly the portrayal of Kerry as a man willing to say anything to get elected was no longer abstract, but in plain view for all of the country to see.

The irony here is that the Kerry campaign has made such efforts to wear the religious hat. Speaking of his own faith at every opportunity, Kerry has tried to lay claim that he too can be trusted by the overwhelming majority (at least in the battleground states) of Americans who attest to a belief in God. On the one hand the left is screaming that Bush is a religious nut who is out of touch with reality, while on the other hand they tell Middle America that Kerry is a believer too. For Kerry, it would seem, belief is something you can leave at the door when you leave the house in the morning. The problem is that Kerry is he is applying for a position where the nation’s work is done in the (White) house.

The recent hatchet piece on Bush by Ron Suskind in the New York Times Magazine unleashes a reprehensible attack on the president’s faith. Clearly unfamiliar with our very history, Suskind claims that, “the nation's founders, smarting still from the punitive pieties of Europe's state religions, were adamant about erecting a wall between organized religion and political authority. But suddenly, that seems like a long time ago. George W. Bush -- both captive and creator of this moment -- has steadily, inexorably, changed the office itself. He has created the faith-based presidency.” The founders of this country did, in fact, assure that no official religion would be created in this country, but they were far from agnostics. A cursory reading of the founding documents by the giants of this land will find a deeply held belief in God and a willingness (indeed an outright need) to appeal to his guidance. In an era where we have seen thousands of innocent men and women viciously murdered and where further attacks seem unavoidable, perhaps having a man in the White House who seeks a bit of guidance is not such an outrageous thing.

It may be of some importance for men and women of faith who are leaning towards Kerry to fully understand his answer regarding Supreme Court nominees. When asked if he would apply any sort of litmus test when nominating a justice to the highest court, Kerry made clear that he would not nominate anyone who would endanger Row v. Wade. Leaving that whole debate aside for the moment, realize what that means. He will not nominate anyone who tries to take HIS VERY OWN position. Kerry has stated clearly that he believes “life begins at conception”, but absurdly he cannot allow “an article of faith” to interfere with his governing. If a potential justice were to allow that he or she believed that life began at conception, this would be reason enough to keep them off the court, by Kerry’s test. Take notice Catholics and liberal minded Christians, John Kerry has just stated for the record that no Christian (of any stripe) need apply for the position.

In the end, this latest attack by the left is no different than every example previous. Kerry saw that Bush held a clear advantage on the military so he came out of the gate running on his Vietnam record – nevermind his 20 years in the Senate (not to mention his post Vietnam anti-military work) where he has been the military’s greatest foe. Bush had the advantage on tax policy so Kerry upped the ante and suggested even further tax cuts (except for the rich of course) – and we should all ignore his record of voting for every tax increase that came by his desk. On the domestic front where Bush has spent even more than did Clinton, Kerry will now provide health care for one and all and increase every imaginable social program (all with the increased taxation of the rich) – again we are expected to not do the math and notice that the tax increase on the rich will come nowhere close to paying for all of this. Now Kerry sees a faith-gap and has decided that he too has faith, “really I do”, but he asks us to believe that his faith is to be separate from his ‘job’. This is a man without genuine conviction morally or politically.

We have a choice. We can have a man, in Kerry, who simply adopts the policy of greatest appeal at the moment and expects us all (ironically) to take it on faith or we can have the man who has exhibited true political and moral courage and who believes that faith cannot be separated from the individual. I’ll take Bush.

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: WMD AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 10/17/2004 02:21:00 PM ----- BODY:

The question of the Iraqi WMD, or more correctly the absence of Iraqi WMD has been the subject of a concerted misinformation campaign by the Democratic Party and it’s willing accomplice, the media. The recently completed report on Iraq’s prewar weapons programs by the CIA’s Iraq Survey Group has been used by opponents to the Iraq war to suggest that the Iraq War was, to quote Mr. Kerry, “a colossal mistake.”

To be sure, the report concludes that there were no stockpiles of weapons of mass destruction and that illegal weapons programs were likely discontinued in the 1990’s. The problem with the leftist spin on the report is that it uses this information out of context and completely leaves out the most significant findings. The Survey Group, headed by Charles Duelfer, reports that Saddam Hussein intended to wait out UN sanctions and subsequently resume his WMD program. Even more significantly the Democrats (and the media) fail to put the entire WMD question into the context of a post 9/11 world. An honest review of the Iraqi WMD question must take all factors into consideration.

Item 1. In addition to the American CIA, the British, French, German, Russian, and other intelligence services across the globe concluded independently that Iraq possessed weapons of mass destruction. The UN Security Council voted unanimously (15-0) that Hussein must come into compliance with UN sanctions. The clear consensus amongst the United States and her allies was that Iraq maintained an active weapons program and continued to possess deadly stockpiles.

Not only were the intelligence services concerned, but so were our elected leaders. While the Democrats would like the public to believe the lie that the Bush Administration misled us all, the facts are that the concern in Washington about Saddam’s weapons were alive and well prior to Bush’s election. The Clinton administration believed that Iraq had WMD and made regime change in Iraq the official policy of the United States. Notable Democrats such as John Kerry, John Edwards, Ted Kennedy, Al Gore, Tom Daschle, Joe Lieberman, Nancy Pelosi, Hillary Clinton, Dianne Feinstein, Wesley Clark, Dick Gephardt, and so many others made some of the strongest and most pointed statements regarding Iraq and the need to aggressively deal with the threat. The recent criticisms of the Iraq policy have only come in recent months and are clearly politically motivated.

This was clearly NOT a campaign of misinformation carried out by the “neocons” in the Bush administration. Foreign Intelligence services as well as the American CIA and leaders of both political parties including the Clinton administration all came to the same conclusion – Iraq possessed and continued to develop weapons of mass destruction.
[To see quotes from the people listed above and others, please follow this link]

Item 2. September 11, 2001. Prior to 9/11 America had the luxury of dealing with potential threats on our own terms and on our own timetable. We could wait things out and see how they developed. Nations developing illegal weapons could be dealt with diplomatically via the State Department and the United Nations. September 11th changed everything. On that horrible day, we all were awakened to the fact that our enemies were no longer content to target American interests abroad, but would now bring their violence and destruction to our own shores. The attacks on the World Trade Center and the Pentagon (in addition to the likely target of the Capitol Bldg) made clear that Al Queda sought to inflict maximum human, emotional, and financial damage. Information gathered regarding terrorist attempts to attain chemical, biological, or nuclear weapons increased the threat posed by Al Queda exponentially. In a matter of hours, Osama bin Laden was able to take 3,000 lives and inflict billions of dollars and immeasurable psychological damage to the United States.

How much more damage could be done if our enemies possessed weapons of mass destruction? The threat is obviously unacceptable. Given Saddam Hussein’s refusal to cooperate with weapons inspectors and the universal intelligence reports that he continued to possess vast stockpiles of WMD, the threat posed by any potential collaboration between Hussein and bin Laden could not be ignored. It must not be forgotten that Saddam Hussein maintained a desire to exact revenge upon the US for the humiliating defeat in the 1991 Gulf War. As Vice President Dick Cheney pointed out in the Vice Presidential debate, “this was the most likely nexus between the terrorists and weapons of mass destruction.” To have treated this threat as we did prior to 9/11 would have been simply irresponsible. A simple review of pre 9/11 security illustrates the fact that everything possible must be done to combat these threats BEFORE they are realized.

Item 3. In the lead up to the Iraqi invasion, many opportunities were provided to Saddam Hussein to open his doors to the UN weapons inspectors and prove that he did not have WMD. There is evidence to suggest that Saddam Hussein had received assurances from France that they would veto any vote to pursue military action in Iraq. These assurances came not only to protect Iraq, but to conceal Frances participation in illegal dealings with Iraq and their involvement in a corrupt UN oil-for-food program. Hussein did not open his country to inspectors for the simple reason that he continued to have something to hide. This leads us to:

Item 4. The Duelfer report showed us that, while no stockpiles of WMD remained, Saddam Hussein maintained his capability to produce such weapons. Clearly, if Hussein had intended to comply with UN sanctions indefinitely, he would have disassembled his weapons factories. Hussein’s hopes were to ride out the sanctions (with help from bribed nations such as France, Russia, and China) and to resume weapons production. As the report says, "Saddam sought to sustain the requisite knowledge base to restart the program eventually and, to the extent it did not threaten the Iraqi efforts to get out from under sanctions, to sustain the inherent capability to produce such weapons as circumstances permitted in the future.” John Kerry asserts that he would have pursued sanctions and inspections further. If that had been the chosen path, Hussein may have been able to conceal his manufacturing capabilities and the sanctions would have been lifted. Without sanctions and with the international spotlight removed, Iraq would have resumed weapons production completely unfettered and that danger would have been far greater than even the assumed threat perceived after 9/11.

The “primary goal” of Saddam’s regime was “to have UN sanctions lifted, while maintaining the security of the Regime. He sought to balance the need to cooperate with the UN inspections — to gain support for lifting the sanctions — with his intention to preserve Iraq's intellectual capital for WMD with a minimum of foreign intrusiveness and loss of face." The obvious implication is that continuing a policy of containment as Kerry and the left support would have left Iraq an even more dangerous threat and the possibility of this threat (in the form of WMD) finding it’s way into the hands of Osama bin Laden is one that cannot be underestimated.

The Duelfer Report’s findings do as much to validate the administrations actions than any stockpile of WMD could have done. The sniping and second guessing are easy to do in an election year. The charges of administration lies and cover-up are perpetrated by outrageous conspiracy theorists and have no place in a rational policy debate, yet the Kerry campaign has latched onto these charges in a desperate attempt to confuse the issue. The fact is that Kerry (along with the Democratic Party with their willing accomplices, the media) has misrepresented the facts, reversed his views, and ignored reality in his bid to curry political favor. George Bush, on the other hand, has done what he was sworn to do – protect the American people.

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: just a little comedy AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 10/13/2004 10:32:00 PM ----- BODY:

Many readers have taken the time to write in and share their comments. Both positive and negative comments have found their way to the ol' inbox. Often times the unintentional humor associated with such notes keeps the editor laughing. One such note was received recently and gives us a peek into the intellectual bankruptcy represented by the left. The utter incoherence of the following is a testament to the failure of the American educational system. Thank God George Bush has made literacy a top priority. Unfortunately his efforts are too late for the author (and I use that term loosely) of the following:

"Of course my opions will never make it to your sight. Lets not kid ourselves here yes im a 23 year old woman with not too much experience on life. But let me state that your website is a biast G.W. ass kissing load of crap. You post the sight as if it were un- biast but read over it as if you were a stanger. I think it is a joke that people like you who only see one side have the nerve to bradcast such blasphemy. may i ask a question where is G.W's weapons of mass destruction now? lost just like the feeble minded person who wrote this piece and made a fool of themselves by lacking the heart to be un biased. im not a kerry or bush fan but i'll tell you what your piece made me loathe the idea of keeping a man in office who brainwashes people into thinking he has heart. lets adress the weopns of mass destruction and then share an opinion on that"

- kim in nj

As with much of the mail received at my-orbit.com, a personal response was provided:

Dear Kim,

Thank you for your interest in the website and more importantly in the upcoming Presidential election. I would like to say that I respect your right to disagree with anything stated in the website or on the national political agenda. The ability to speak out for one's beliefs is fundamental to the inherent greatness of this nation. I would, however, respectfully suggest that you do not buy into the leftist hype. You apparently disagree with much of what is stated in the content of my-orbit.com, but you offer nothing of substance to counter it. The inarticulate vapid ramblings of the Democratic Party, based entirely on vitriolic contrarianism are echoed well in you note. I might make the following suggestion to you: do some research, don't just believe the Dan Rather and Michael Moore spin. Take the time to read, then read some more. In the end, perhaps you will be better able to substantiate your thoughts or (more likely) you will realize that the fodder being fed to you by the media is completely baseless. In addition, perhaps immersing yourself in the written word will have the added benefit of strengthening your own quite poor communication skills. Finally, I would point out that, of course my opinions are biased – no suggestion to the contrary is implied. Thank you again for your interest and I sincerely hope that you will continue to question – be open minded and you may be surprised at the answers.

Don Vanderpool

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: Kerry's military supporters AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 10/10/2004 09:31:00 PM ----- BODY:

Just a quick note about the support of some Generals for Mr. Kerry. First, I don’t believe that Kerry wants to get into a contest regarding military support. There will always be some dissent, but the support for President Bush from the military is overwhelming. It’s interesting how Kerry selectively finds importance in military subjects. When he is touting his time service in Vietnam or pointing out the three or four Generals who support him, he finds it of supreme importance, but when his fellow veterans criticize his ability to command or vast majorities of military commanders support Bush, they are of little significance and should be silenced (even at the threat of censorship and litigation). Bush cannot parade all of the Generals who support him in this time of war – it would be seen by the Kerry campaign and the media (is there really any difference?) as misusing his role as commander-in-chief.

Second, it is interesting that one of the Generals Kerry touts as a supporter of his is “General Tony McPeak, who ran the air war for the president’s father.” This is true, but the curious thing here is that John Kerry voted against THAT war too. If Kerry had had his way, not only would Saddam still be in power, but he would now own Kuwait and would likely be threatening Saudi Arabia even now. And we think we have oil problems now…

And third (and maybe most importantly), Kerry tells the tale of one General Shineski. Kerry has been stating on the campaign trail and again in the second debate that Shineski warned the president that additional ground troops would be needed for the Iraq war and that, “they retired General Shinseki for telling him that.” The fact is that Shinseki did suggest that several hundred thousand soldiers would be necessary, but it is patently untrue to claim that the administration forced him to retire. General Shineski’s plans to retire were reported in the Washington Times nearly a year (April 19, 2002) before his February 25, 2003 testimony. The administration (backed by several other Generals) and General Shineski disagreed about troop deployment – this much is true. To claim, however, that the Bush administration forced him to retire because of that disagreement is simply a lie.

Wouldn’t it be nice if the media could be counted on to report these lies .. err .. inaccuracies?

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: the second debate AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 10/10/2004 01:26:00 PM ----- BODY:

Friday night’s debate proved enlightening to anyone willing to listen closely to what the two candidates were saying. The two men were asked relevant questions by real people and the answers given should be of great use for those still undecided.

Unlike the first debate in which George Bush appeared exhausted and annoyed, this second round provided the president an opportunity to speak plainly and easily to the American people. Despite what many in the big media have suggested, Bush won this debate hands down. The very fact that the liberal media is allowing that the debate was a tie indicates that their man clearly lost. This debate was all about substance – the finely honed, austere debating style of John Kerry could not mask his actual answers on this occasion. Bush outmatched Kerry even in the first debate when one analyzes the actual substance of the material. Unfortunately, style points are indelibly married to this process and Kerry was, therefore seen as the winner. In the second debate, however, Bush beat Kerry in substance AND style. John Kerry came across as angry – often leaning into the president’s space and speaking in quite accusatorial terms. Kerry’s finger pointing (literally as well as figuratively) clearly illustrated his inability to confidently stand on his own record or elucidate on his agenda. Bush in contrast seemed confident and poised. He spoke with greater passion than did Kerry, but did not come across as angry. He seemed to better connect with the audience in attendance and understood that this was a human event.

As with the first debate, however, it must be emphasized that style must take a back seat to substance. Just as he did in the first, John Kerry offered little of substance in this second debate. Much of what he said was simply wrong, misleading, or intentionally too vague. It is the intent here to examine the substance of Kerry’s positions as presented in this second debate.

The debate began with a direct question posed to Kerry regarding the perception among most Americans that he is too “wishy-washy.” Kerry responded by suggesting that the Bush campaign has created this perception by deceiving the people. His very response attempts to take the focus off of his own record because he knows he has changed his positions on important issues facing this nation. A common theme throughout the night, and indeed for the past couple of weeks, is that he (Kerry) has maintained a single position on the war in Iraq. He now claims that he supported getting tough on Saddam, but that the war itself was a “colossal mistake”. The problem for Kerry on this is that he HAS taken different positions on the issue – sometimes within the same paragraph. Let’s just review for a moment. John Kerry himself made some of the most powerful arguments about disarming Saddam Hussein, calling Saddam a “grave threat” and explicitly declaring that we must disarm him – unilaterally, if necessary. He made clear that the war on terrorism did not “end in Afghanistan by any imagination” and cited suspected Iraqi WMD as an “unacceptable threat.” He followed that up with a vote to authorize US use of force to disarm Hussein. Kerry continued to talk tough after the war and stated that it was, “the right decision” to disarm Saddam. All of this was, of course, when public support for the war was almost universal and before Howard Dean emerged as the Democratic frontrunner in the primaries. Howard Dean’s clear antiwar stance propelled him to the lead in the early primaries and reduced Kerry and other pro-war candidates as irrelevant in the fight for liberal votes. Kerry then amazingly proclaimed himself as the “anti-war candidate.” Looking to substantiate this new mantle and out-liberal Dean, Kerry proceeded to vote against the $87 billion appropriations bill to fund the war and provide the troops with necessary weapons, ammunition, and body armor. Apparently Kerry had forgotten that he had previously stated that voting against the $87 billion would be, “irresponsible.” Today, of course, Kerry says that the war was a “colossal mistake” and that the president misled us into war and that the war was the “wrong war in the wrong place at the wrong time.” Even within his flip-flopping there are contradictions – earlier this year Kerry said that even knowing then what we know today he, “would have voted for the authority” and that there were no circumstances under which we should have gone to war, but he was still “right” to vote for it. Possibly the most evident example of his instinctive nature to change positions is his recent assertion that the determination of whether the war was worth it, “depends on the outcome.” Clearly Mr. Kerry has taken many positions on the war (even to the point of allowing for future changes in position – depending on the outcome) and his claim that he has not is simply laughable.

Kerry made several inaccurate statements during the course of the debate. He claims that 5 million Americans have lost their health care. This is simply ridiculous. No one has lost their health care in America – any person can secure health care regardless of their ability to pay. It may be that many people have lost their health insurance due to job losses resulting from the recession and 9/11, but those losses are greatly temporary as individuals acquire benefits in new jobs. Kerry also repeats the claim that the United States has spent $200 billion on the Iraq war. This is clearly false. All of the best information puts the number at around $119 billion. A good deal of money to be sure, but almost half of what John Kerry claims. Kerry further suggests that the “$200 billion” could have been better spent at home and then blames the expenditures as reasons for our deficit. Make up your mind Mr. Kerry .. if you would have spent that money here at home, we would therefore still have the same deficit. If you would simply have NOT spent that money (as a fiscal conservative, as you claim), your contention that it could have gone to schools and firehouses is simply a lie. The fact is that the money used to fight this war did not come out of the general budget – it, like all funding for wars, had to be specially appropriated. There was no $119 billion just waiting to be spent and Kerry’s suggestions to the contrary are consciously misleading. Kerry again poses the ridiculous charge that the Bush administration has under funded the No Child Left Behind Act. The facts are astounding when compared with the Kerry rhetoric. The facts are that the education budget has grown by an incredible 58% under Bush’s leadership and that a further 5% is proposed for next year. This is growth measured against the Clinton administration’s spending and certainly no Democrat would accuse Clinton of under funding education. 63% growth is historic, so the Kerry campaign has decided to simply lie about it. When looking specifically at the No Child Left Behind Act, these programs have increased by a sizeable 12%. The $28 billion referred to by Kerry represents the maximum allowed by the law. The Act is being fully funded and, as described above, expenditures for this program and education in general have never seen such growth. For Kerry to suggest otherwise is nothing short of a lie. The gloom and doom Kerry campaign can be counted on to consistently put the worst spin on any issue. Kerry trotted out one of his favorites Friday night when he said, “we’ve lost 1.6 million jobs.” While the facts of an inherited recession and the devastating attacks of 9/11 certainly did much damage to the economy and to jobs specifically, the Kerry number is simply untrue. The Kerry number counts only private sector jobs, but the numbers in terms of total employment – this includes teachers, firemen, police, etc – the real figure is about 821,000. The Bureau of Labor Statistics announced it would revise these numbers to add another 236,000 payroll jobs. The current job losses sustained by recession and 9/11 are therefore only 585,000 – a full third of the Kerry claim. The other reality avoided by Kerry is that the strong job growth sustained by this economy over the past year will likely continue and a net increase of jobs under this administration is still likely. To be sure we won’t have the final numbers on this until next February – long after the election, but Kerry’s blatant manipulation of the statistics is shameful at best and an outright lie at worst. Kerry misled throughout the debate and the instances are far too many to fully chronicle here, but the theme of it all is to tell a lie to create doubt then suggest he can do better.

Kerry mentioned his “plan” some 24 times by my count. He said, “I have a plan to put people back to work,” a “better plan” to fight the war on terror, a “plan” to clean up nuclear proliferation, a “plan” which will do “a better job” at building and maintaining coalitions, a “tort reform plan” (and if you believe that, I have some swampland to sell you), a “plan to lower the cost of health care,” a “plan to cover all children,” a tax “plan,” a “plan for energy independence,” a plan, a plan, a plan. The problem is that not on one of these occasions did he elucidate on just what the “plan” is. He then laughably said, “I want to talk about my plan some more – I hope we can.” What he meant is that he would like to have the opportunity to say the word, “plan” several dozen more times. Kerry cannot lay out the details for his plans, because in most cases there are no details and in the cases in which details exist, they are fundamentally in opposition to the beliefs of the American people.

One of the problems Kerry has with detailing his various plans is the inherent cost of it all. On every issue which Kerry criticizes the Bush administration, he proposes a plan which would cost billions of dollars to implement. In addition to all of these new plans, Kerry promises to reduce the deficit and further reduce taxes on all but the richest Americans. It does not require an economics degree to see that the Kerry spending proposals far outpace the savings achieved by rolling back the tax on people earning more than $200,000. By Kerry’s numbers, the tax cut going to the richest Americans amounted to some $89 billion – this is nowhere near the figure needed to fund all of his “plans.”

This of course brings us to yet another laughable statement made by Kerry Friday night. When asked to look into the camera and pledge that he would not increase the tax burden on American families, Kerry did just that, assuring the American people that, “I will not raise taxes.” The facts are that John Kerry voted 98 times to increases taxes, totaling $2.3 trillion, he voted at least 126 times against tax cuts totaling $5.3 trillion, and he voted for higher gas taxes 10 times. Kerry’s proposals add up to over $2 trillion and would add as much as $2.5 trillion to the deficit over the next ten years. John Kerry has never met a tax increase he didn’t like and he now expects us to believe his statement that he won’t raise our taxes. Simply unbelievable.

Kerry’s attacks on the President aren’t credible when viewed in the full light of day and his suggestion that he can do better is simply political rhetoric. The fact is that John Kerry has a 20 year record in the United States Senate through which we can filter his claims. He says he will be strong on defense, but his record would indicate otherwise. He claims he will not raise taxes and yet his 20 year contradicts that assertion. He would have us believe that he can reform Medicare, reinvent the health care system, and introduce tort reform, but nothing in his Senate career would indicate his ability to lead on any issue, let alone these controversial issues. John Kerry continues to exhibit style, but fails miserably on substance. George W. Bush was the clear winner Friday night and we must work hard to ensure his reelection.

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: just who is supporting a draft? [home] AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 10/05/2004 09:11:00 PM ----- BODY:

Today the House will vote on a Democratic bill to reinstate the draft. President Bush and Republicans oppose a draft and seek defeat of this bill. Sen. Kerry and Sen. Edwards wrongly claim it is Republicans who support this, yet it is John Kerry who said he may be open to a draft. Below is more information about this bill, who sponsored it, what Sen. Kerry and Sen. Edwards are saying as well as the truth about President Bush's position regarding it. It is not Republicans who support this bill, it is the Democrats.

DEMOCRATS PUSH
DRAFT IN CONGRESS
President Bush Opposes Draft And Republicans
Will Ensure Defeat Of Bill, Kerry Open To Idea
____________________________________________________

JUST WHO IS PROPOSING A DRAFT?

Democrat Congressman Charles Rangel (D-NY) Introduced The "Universal National Service Act Of 2003" To Reinstate Military Draft. "A BILL To provide for the common defense by requiring that all young persons in the United States, including women, perform a period of military service or a period of civilian service in furtherance of the national defense and homeland security, and for other purposes." (H.R. 163, Introduced 1/7/03 By Rep. Charles Rangel)

Today, House Of Representatives Will Vote On Rangel's Proposal, Which House Armed Services Chairman Duncan Hunter (R-CA) Vows Will Receive "Very Little Congressional Support." "Later today, the House of Representatives will debate and vote on H.R. 163, the Universal National Service Act - commonly known as the Reinstate the Draft Bill. There is very little Congressional support for reinstating the draft." (House Armed Services Committee, "House To Vote On And Reject Military Draft Bill," Press Release, 10/5/04)

Democrat Senator Ernest Hollings (D-SC) Has Introduced Identical Military Draft Legislation. "A BILL To provide for the common defense by requiring that all young persons in the United States, including women, perform a period of military service or a period of civilian service in furtherance of the national defense and homeland security, and for other purposes." (S. 89, Introduced 1/7/03 By Sen. Ernest Hollings)

KERRY AND EDWARDS CLAIM IT'S REPUBLICANS WHO
WANT DRAFT, BUT KERRY IS OPEN TO DRAFT

Kerry Raised Possibility Draft Is Returning Under Bush. "Democratic presidential candidate John Kerry, citing the war in Iraq and other trouble spots in the world, raised the possibility Wednesday that a military draft could be reinstated if voters re-elect President Bush. ... Answering a question about the draft that had been posed at a forum with voters, Kerry said: ‘If George Bush were to be re-elected, given the way he has gone about this war and given his avoidance of responsibility in North Korea and Iran and other places, is it possible? I can't tell you.'" (Mary Dalrymple, "Kerry Raises Possibility That Military Draft Could Return If Bush Is Re-Elected," The Associated Press, 9/22/04)

Edwards Hinted Draft Would Return Under President Bush. "Edwards drew his biggest applause from the audience, which was heavy on union members and laid-off workers, when he responded to a question from a woman who said that her 23-year-old son recently graduated from college, and that she is worried about a draft being instituted for the war in Iraq. ‘There will be no draft when John Kerry is president,' Edwards said, to applause and a standing ovation." (Jim VandeHei, "Kerry Accuses Bush Of Dishonesty On Iraq," The Washington Post, 9/16/04)

Yet Kerry Told Reporter That If Large Mobilization Is Needed, Draft Is "Only Fair Way To Do It." REPORTER: "Senator, some in your party have called for reinstating the draft. Do you think that is a good idea?" KERRY: "Not at this moment. I don't. If we had a need for a general mobilization at some time in the future, then I think that's the only fair way to do it." (WLVI's "Keller At Large," Interview Taped 12/2/03, Aired 9/26/04)

ADMINISTRATION HAS BEEN CLEAR:
PRESIDENT BUSH OPPOSES DRAFT

Secretary Rumsfeld Called Allegations "Absolute Nonsense." "Defense Secretary Donald Rumsfeld heatedly denied yesterday that the military plans to bring back the draft and boost reserves and National Guard callups after the November election. ‘That is absolute nonsense,' Rumsfeld told the Senate Armed Services Committee. ‘It's absolutely false that anyone in this administration is considering reinstituting the draft.'" (Richard Sisk, "No Draft, No Extra Troops - Rummy," [New York] Daily News, 9/24/04)

Vice President Cheney Said Rumors Were "Hogwash." "And the notion that somebody's peddling out there that there is a secret plan to reinstitute the draft, hogwash, not true." (NBC's "Nightly News," 9/29/04)

President Bush: "We Don't Need The Draft." "No, we're not going - we don't need the draft. Look, the all-volunteer Army is working. ... I know Senator McCain and I agree on this issue for certain, the all-volunteer Army works." (President George W. Bush, Remarks At Okaloosa-Walton College, Niceville, FL, 8/10/04)

- from the Republican National Committee

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: remembering the attack [home] AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 10/03/2004 07:10:00 PM ----- BODY:

The suggestion was made in a previous post to find and view video of the 9/11 attacks. Most media outlets have banned airing footage of the attacks as it is deemed too disturbing. It is our position that we never forget the attack on our nation that day and that perhaps we all need to be 'disturbed' to recall why we fight today.

The following are links to video of the attacks. The footage is indeed disturbing and heart-wrenching. We must never forget.

Second plane hits World Trade Center
Exclusive video of plane crashing into WTC
Video shows second WTC attack
Trade Center Tower falls
the above video footage is from CNN

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: Fahrenheit 9/11 rebuttal films [home] AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 10/03/2004 06:11:00 PM ----- BODY:

Visit this site to see the trailer for a new movie coming out soon. Celsius 41.11 is a response to Farenheit 9/11 and should hit selected theaters around October 15th (the website indicates release in September, but not so). If you are interested in getting this film shown, you can go here to sign a petition to show theater owners that there is an audience for this film. A $25 donation to Citizens United will secure a copy of the Celsius 41.11 DVD. If nothing else, please visit the site and view the trailer as it is a powerful indictment of the liberal minset.

Another rebuttal piece coming to DVD is Fahrenhype 9/11. The site says this movie (and companion book) will be in store October 5th. I don't kow what resellers are planning to carry this, but based on the Swift Boat book, it is going to be hard to find. The DVD and book can both be purchased online.

the above is informational only and no specific endorsement of Celsius 41.11, Citizens United, or Fahrenhype 9/11 is intended

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: Kerry's frightening foreign policy [home] AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 10/03/2004 06:03:00 PM ----- BODY:

John Kerry claims that the Iraq war was a mistake. “The wrong war at the wrong time in the wrong place” is how Kerry characterizes our actions in Iraq. Of course John Kerry voted to authorize the use of force in Iraq, but he now claims that he intended that only as a vote to threaten the use of force. Now, let me understand this. Kerry and the Democrats actually believe that it is more palatable to the American public that he intended only to threaten Saddam Hussein? 17 UN resolutions all threatened the use of force if Iraq did not comply and yet Saddam continued to scoff at us all. This is the greatest difference between John Kerry and George Bush. Kerry is content to threaten, while Bush understands that action must be taken.

This is a larger issue than even the Iraq situation, however. If the United States ever threatens force, force had better be on the way. The very integrity of United States foreign policy rests on our ability to follow through with our promises or our threats. If we had simply threatened Hussein and then followed that up with further sanctions and talks and summits, Saddam and every unfriendly leader across the globe would be given the clear message that the United States does not back up it’s word. Would Qaddafi have given up his WMD program if we hadn’t followed through in Iraq? - of course not. The Democrats are currently doing a lot of pointing to North Korea and wailing that they are the real threat. North Korea is a real threat and what sort of message would have been sent to Kim Jong-il if we had backed away from Iraq?

Kerry and the Democrats simply don’t get it. They never have. They were afraid we might upset the Soviets throughout the Cold War and steadfastly clung to the fantasy that summits would bring about a peaceful coexistence. Victory was not even in their vocabulary. They were happy to allow 300 million Russians to live under tyranny – just as long as we could reduce the threat of nuclear war. Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher believed differently. They knew that the best method of eliminating the nuclear threat was to defeat the nation poised to launch such a war. Today, Kerry and the Dems believe only Osama bin Laden is a viable target for US action. It was all well and good to allow Saddam Hussein to develop chemical, biological, and nuclear weapons because he wasn’t flying an Al Qaeda flag over Baghdad. The threat that Al Qaeda might try to secure this technology or materials from Iraq is incomprehensible to them.

John Kerry has said famously that “any attack will be met with a swift and certain response.” The obvious flaw in this thinking is that we have to be attacked before Kerry is willing to take any action. 9-11 changed the way we must operate. No longer can we simply wait for the enemy to launch an attack. The enemy has shown itself to be brutal and will not discriminate between soldier and civilian, man and woman, adult and child, or Democrat and Republican. It is unfortunate that the major media outlets have banished video of the 9-11 attacks. We have largely forgotten what happened that day. In a fury of committees and finger-pointing and political posturing we have lost sight of the horrible attack which was brought to us all on that fateful day. I would encourage anyone to find and watch video of those attacks and then place into context Mr. Kerry’s comment that he will meet an attack with a swift response. We simply cannot wait to be attacked again before we act.

George Bush does get it. Unwilling to allow the elitist media to sway him and unwavering in the face of ugliness coming out of Iraq, he has made it clear that we must defeat this enemy to make us safe. Just as Reagan had done before, Bush sees that safety lies not in appeasement or sanctions or summits, but in the defeat of those who would do us harm. The critics of Reagan were wrong. While they cowered in the dark and proclaimed that Ronald Reagan had made the world unstable by taking the fight to the Soviets, the Reagan doctrine proved correct and Soviet Communism has been eradicated from the planet. The same critics (including one Mr Kerry) now say all the same things about the current President, but like Reagan, Bush is too busy fighting and winning the war to take notice.

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: the first debate AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 9/30/2004 11:10:00 PM ----- BODY:

The long awaited first Presidential debate has come and gone. President George Bush and Senator John Kerry immediately left the debate to attend campaign rallies and only the pundits remain to grapple with the question of who ‘won’. In terms of style and pure debating skill, John Kerry was the clear winner. He managed to rise above early nervousness (his hands visibly shook throughout the first several minutes) and settle into what he does quite well – answer questions in a deliberate, convincing, and well mannered style. Kerry’s passion for debating proved valuable as he managed to effectively keep Bush on the defensive. When presented with topics not to his liking Kerry smoothly manipulated his answer to tell the story that he came to tell. Kerry’s main objective, it seemed, was to project himself as ‘presidential’. This he did well from a stylistic standpoint – removing politics (and policy), I doubt many who watched the debate would have difficulty imagining John Kerry as President.

In contrast, George Bush seemed to be weary and uncomfortable. His answers were often rambling as he sought to fill his allotted time. On more than one occasion the President seemed eager to rebut Kerry comments, only to fumble and find great difficulty in finding the appropriate words. Unlike Mr. Kerry, the President seemed rather at ease at the beginning of the debate and did well early on in terms of presenting a consistent message. At a point not halfway (perhaps a third) through the debate however, Bush appeared to lose focus. His responses began to repeat themselves and he failed to effectively challenge Mr. Kerry. By the end of the night, Mr. Bush seemed exhausted and exasperated. Only a question regarding Kerry’s character seemed to unleash Bush’s easy style as he generously praised Kerry on everything from his military service to his family to his years in the Senate. Unfortunately for the President, this debate format did not lend itself to the familiar, friendly style at which Bush excels.

For many the style points of this debate will be the extent of their thinking. For them, Mr. Kerry won the debate. Quick polling after tonight’s debate show that while many believe Kerry to have won the debate, the overall support for both candidates remains unchanged. What remains, however, is the substance of this first debate. Kerry repeated several times that his position on Iraq has been consistent, but this clearly flies in the face of the facts. As outlined elsewhere on this site, John Kerry has taken several distinct positions on the Iraq war and has done so for purely political purposes. This will not be lost on the Bush campaign and we are likely to see damning ads over the next several days which highlight the Kerry morph. That George Bush was not more aggressive in pointing to specific Kerry statements to illustrate his changing positions was a serious misstep and may be a result of his apparent discomfort. When Kerry told of military families buying body armor for their relatives in Iraq, Bush missed the opportunity to respond that Kerry himself voted against funding that very body armor. John Kerry continues to toss around a “$200 billion” cost for the Iraq war when the actual figure is $119 billion. No small number to be sure, but a deliberate mistruth nonetheless. On many occasions, Kerry made statements which were not directly countered by the President.

It was not a total loss for the President, however. A hint of Kerry’s willingness to defer to international bodies slipped out when he suggested that he would only engage in a preemptive strike only if the situation passed the “global test.” The President jumped on this (though he did not follow through for the kill) and made the point that America does not require permission from any foreign nation or body. Expect more on this from Bush-Cheney. Mr. Bush did well in making his point that you cannot lead the country, and indeed the world, if you waver on the issues. Bush pounded on this – perhaps more than he should as he missed other opportunities in so doing. Bush made a very strong point tonight in explaining that Kerry might find it difficult to build strong international partners with nations and leaders he has denigrated by casually dismissing their contributions in Iraq. Bush also did well in making the case that the best form of homeland security is in taking the war to the terrorists on their own ground. The old idea that the best defense is a good offense will play well for most Americans. While many viewers may not understand the complexities of the current Korean negotiations, Bush was right on that issue and every expert on the issue has stated such. As people begin to analyze this event, the conclusion at which many will arrive is that John Kerry did not suggest what he might do differently than the President (in fact, most of his ‘plan’ is basically the Bush strategy) – only that he would do it better. He will fight a war he does not believe in better than a man who is morally convinced of its rightness. He will doggedly pursue Al Qaeda and kill them, all the while making sure his actions pass the “global test.”

The bottom line is that Kerry did what he needed desperately to do – he stayed in the race. A strong Bush win tonight would have probably sealed the election. As it is, Kerry may well pick up a point or two or three. His base will certainly be more energized as they were beginning to smell defeat. Ironically, this may be a good thing for Republicans. Complacency, I fear, has been creeping in among the ranks. Polls have been enticing and all too many have believed the race to be over. This may well wake the faithful and remind them that there is a long way to go. Next week, the two candidates face off again – this time in a “town hall” format. This bodes well for Mr. Bush as he is much more comfortable in such situations. The downside is that most people don’t watch beyond the first debate. These are extraordinary times and people are engaged in this election so that trend may be reversed this year. Hopefully, Mr. Bush will get some sleep before the next one and be ready to pounce when Kerry wanders into his fantasies.

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: follow flipper! AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 9/27/2004 09:53:00 PM ----- BODY:

courtesy www.flippercam.com

Follow flipper as he makes his way across the battleground states. Catch every flip and flop as chronicled extensively at www.flippercam.com

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: Register to vote! AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 9/26/2004 09:53:00 PM ----- BODY:

With the election only a few weeks away, it's time to start thinking seriously about what you can do to help re-elect George Bush. While bumper stickers, yard signs, and witty rejoinders all contribute to raising awareness and making the case for GWB, the single most important thing to do is register to vote. Even if you do not live in a "battleground" state, know that your vote is important. One lesson learned in 2000 was that every vote really does count. We have all seen the insolence towards the President by the left as a result of Bush not having won the national popular vote. This year, we need to push towards not only an electoral majority, but a significant popular vote win as well. The only time I want to hear the word "fictitious" used next year is to descibe CBS News. Below are suggestions from Ken Mehlman, Campaign Manager, Bush-Cheney '04.

1. Make sure you are registered to vote. In many states only two weeks remain before registration closes. If you aren't registered, do it now. You can register or update your voter registration at www.GeorgeWBush.com/Vote. You can do this from this website for wherever you live in the country. Please take a moment to register.

2. Make sure your family is registered to vote. Encourage them to register if they aren't already or to update their voter registration as necessary. People often relocate or cicumstances are such that voter registration is easliy forgotten. Kindly remind them and point them to this webpage or the site linked above to register now.

3. Think creatively about others who may not be registered to vote. Softball team, church choir, parents group, or people on your Christmas Card list. Chances are that we all know people who have let their voter registration slip by. Take a moment to remind them of the courageous leadership President Bush has provided for this nation and let them know that their vote is needed.

4. Make sure your friends who are dedicated to Bush's re-election are all on board with the above.

Remember, even if you live in a state where Bush is well ahead or in a state where Kerry is a lock, get out and vote. This election looks to be quite close and will decided by a small margin. Let's push Bush over the top!

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: Kerry continues to be wrong AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 9/25/2004 10:09:00 PM ----- BODY:

When John Kerry returned from Vietnam he embarked on a campaign against that war. His chief point when discussing an exit strategy was to promote a date certain for US withdrawal from Vietnam. He was wrong then and he is wrong today.

In recent weeks, John Kerry has finally begun to solidify a stance on Iraq. Never mind that he was for aggressive US action against Iraq during the Clinton administration and that he voted for the war as a US Senator. Forget his declaration that not funding the war would be “irresponsible” and attacking Howard Dean for being against the war. Leave behind all memory of his subsequent flip-flops in regards to all of the above; that he voted against the funding (after having voted for it?), and that when behind in the Democratic Primaries he proclaimed that he was “the anti-war candidate”. No, all of that is behind him now. He has at long last developed a firm position on the war (well, at least for the time being). He has come down firmly on both sides. He describes what he sees as failures of the Bush administration and outlines his plan for the future in Iraq. Very little is different from the Bush plan by the way, only that he would magically do it better (and have the French involved). On one point, however, he makes a tragic departure from the Bush agenda. He, as President, would declare a firm timetable for US withdrawal from Iraq.

What Mr. Kerry did not understand in 1971, and what he continues to fail to comprehend is that setting a date certain works directly into the hands of the enemy. Perhaps it was his direct involvement with the North Vietnamese after returning home from that conflict which makes him comfortable with aiding and abetting the enemy. I don’t know. The facts are, however, that if you tell the terrorists (or insurgents as the media demands) that we will be leaving on such and such a date, the terrorists simply need only wait until one day later and then launch a full scale attack on the fragile Iraqi democracy. Why would the insurgents risk their efforts attacking us now if they know we will be leaving in so many months? The goal of the insurgents is not to do harm to the US, but rather to prevent a democracy from taking hold in the Middle East. They well know that a democratic nation in that region is their greatest enemy. Imagine if the United States had declared that we were to pull out of NATO by a predetermined date. Does anyone truly believe that the Soviet Union could not have managed to hold on just a few more years knowing that Europe would all be theirs if only they waited us out? The folly of declaring a date for leaving Iraq is undeniable to anyone who has the broader interests of America AND Iraq at heart. Kerry’s desire to pull out of Iraq is motivated entirely by politics. He is unwilling and unable to do what is necessary to win the war in Iraq and indeed the war on terror.

After months (and indeed years) of waffling on the Iraq situation, John Kerry has finally come down with a solid stance. And wouldn’t you know, it’s the wrong one. If he cannot get this issue right after having years to formulate a decision, how can he be trusted to make any correct decision as President?

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: the memos AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 9/19/2004 11:32:00 AM ----- BODY:

With the exception of Dan Rather, nearly everyone now agrees that they are fakes. In addition, Col. Walter Staudt, who was cited in the fake memos as pressuring special treatment for then Lt. George Bush, has now come out and denied any suggestions of the kind. “I never pressured anybody about George Bush because I had no reason to,” explains Staudt. He says that Bush was among the top 5-10% of pilots applying for Guard service and that he was directly responsible for his acceptance into the Guard and no special treatment was asked of him to get Bush in. All of this should put to rest questions about Bush’s Guard service.

The larger issue on the table is that forged documents (forged federal documents – a felony) have been put into the public arena with the explicit purpose of influencing a national election. You cannot have the slightest scandal today without adding the suffix –‘gate’ to the end. We have had Tailgate, Travelgate, Whitewatergate, Monicagate, and any number of additional ‘–gates’ to recon with since Watergate. The current fake document scandal may be the most appropriate candidate to carry on the ‘–gate’ tradition, however. Watergate was a stupid incident perpetrated by inept players. Low level thugs broke into the Watergate Hotel in an attempt to bug the Democratic National Committee offices. The subsequent connection between these burglars and the Nixon White House soon brought down President Nixon. The actual crime was minor, but it was the larger context of the crime (the corruption of a presidential election) and the later obstruction of justice charges which allowed this petty crime to bring down a President. The situation today is quite similar. The forgery of 30+ yr old documents is not the greatest of crimes and the bungling amateurishness with which it was executed is certainly reminiscent of the Watergate burglars. The intent of both instances was to influence a Presidential election – and this is where the petty criminal act takes on greater significance.

CBS News should be horrified that 60 Minutes and their respected anchorman, Dan Rather, were used in an attempt to alter the election. The opportunity to fact-check and authenticate the documents was lost to a sloppy CBS team blinded by their own biases, but a new opportunity for CBS News to redeem itself is within its grasp. Who created these forgeries? What was their motivation? How dare they suborn the integrity of a respected news organization to promote their cause. Further questions must also be asked. What is the connection between the Democratic National Committee and these forgeries? In September of this year, DNC Chairman Terry McAuliffe announced the launch of “Operation Fortunate Son,” which calls into question Bush’s Guard service and suggests that he received special treatment to get in. This just happens to coincide perfectly with the Dan Rather report on 60 Minutes. Early indications are that the likely perpetrator of these “documents” is a longtime Texas Democratic operative, handpicked by LBJ as his successor. Further investigation has revealed that he contacted both the Kerry campaign and the DNC with “information” regarding Bush’s National Guard service. We now know what that “information” was, but what of the DNC and Kerry campaign’s role in propagating this mischief? This appears to go well beyond CBS simply being duped by a sloppy fake. Where are all the future Woodward and Bernstein’s? The bloggers did their part in showing the memos to be fake, now it is time for journalists to set aside their personal biases and investigate this story – regardless of how high it goes.

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: an open letter to conservatives AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 9/19/2004 01:53:00 AM ----- BODY:

The old political truism states that he who frames the debate wins the argument. This has clearly been the case throughout the course of the 2004 presidential election. John Kerry now finds himself trailing President Bush after having led consistently during the early stages of the campaign. The Swift Boat Veterans were the first to wrestle control of the debate from the Kerry camp. While the leftist media has largely come to the aid of John Kerry in response to the Swifties, the questions brought forth by the Swift Boat Veterans had already caused Kerry to get defensive. On the heels of the Swift Boat ads, the Republican Convention presented a strong message and seized control of the American conversation. Since the convention, we have had something of a vacuum. While storm after tragic storm continues to pound Florida and the Gulf Coast, the best efforts of the Kerry campaign have fallen on deaf ears. Noting the inability of Kerry to gain any traction, the left placed its hopes in the formerly respectable Dan Rather and his phony documents. The fiasco which has followed has further damaged Kerry’s ability to even be heard. Many Republicans view much of this as politically positive, as John Kerry continues to be pushed off the front page. The problem here is that Bush is also forced from the headlines. The momentum gained at the convention is now lost. Polls continue to show a medium to strong Bush lead, but there can be no doubt that the Bush campaign is no longer framing the debate.

The aforementioned vacuum will be filled by someone. The hurricanes and Dan Rather will both stop blowing and the spotlight will once again fall on the ‘race’. If John Kerry is able to grab the reins, the polls will quickly reverse and we will all be asking why Bush wasn’t more aggressive. If Bush can regain control of the debate, he should win the election handily.

It is my belief that the War on Terror is the most significant issue facing the country (and indeed the world) and Bush must continue to present the case that he can be better trusted to wage this war. John Kerry cannot reasonably make this issue a winner for him as he has presented a schizophrenic stance on terror, the Iraq War, and National security. While Bush must continue to make this point, he must understand that Kerry is now forced to focus elsewhere. Elections are always about the economy. Another age old truism is that Americans vote their pocketbook. Will 9-11 be the exception which proves the rule or will the War on Terror, in the end, be a secondary issue?

Kerry has no choice but to pound on the economy. Bill Clinton advised Kerry to focus on domestic issues and Bill Clinton knows a thing or two about winning elections. George Bush must beat Kerry to the punch and begin this final push of the campaign by framing the debate on the economy. As detailed exhaustively on my-orbit.com, the current US economy is in pretty good shape. According to every major economic indicator, the current economy bests that of 1996 when Clinton won handily. While our economy was rocked by a recession and 9-11, the Bush stimulus package has created an environment of job growth and historic growth in productivity and GDP. High rates of home ownership, non-existent inflation, small business growth and lower taxes are the results of the Bush plan. George Bush and everyone who is fighting for his re-election must get this message out. If we frame the debate on the economy, John Kerry will be forced to bring out his big bag of gloom and doom. In the face of truly positive economic numbers, Kerry’s claims that we are in the midst of the worst economy since the Great Depression will be laughable at best. The key here is that the right must frame this debate. If we wait until Kerry controls the conversation, we will be forced on the defensive.

All too often we on the right take comfort in the fact that the truth is on our side. The economy is in quite good shape and we expect that everyone will see and know that. Bush 41 lost because he wrongly believed that the American people would see the truth and vote accordingly. The press can certainly not be trusted to make the truth known. This is a press corps so eager to see Bush defeated that they presented clearly forged documents to support the Democrat’s own, “Operation Fortunate Son”. In the end it is not enough to know we are right. We must make the case that we are right. To all who have a voice, I plead, “make the case.”

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: CBS memos - fake AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 9/09/2004 10:49:00 PM ----- BODY:

Several months ago the Democrats tried to impugn President Bush’s military record. This attempt fell flat with voters and the press had little to run with other than simple Bush-bashing. With John Kerry falling badly in the polls and desperation setting in, the Dems figure they will give it one more try. The press, suddenly fearful that Bush might actually win, has willingly gone along with this Trojan Horse.

The accusations seem to center on the ideas that Bush received preferential treatment to get into the National Guard and that Bush failed to perform his duty while a member of the Guard. Unwilling to allow the incompetence, which has defined the Kerry campaign of late, to ruin this new assault, the left has assigned the big boys to this task. None other than Dan Rather came up to the plate to offer up juicy details and long lost memos. The hope is to neutralize the damage done to Mr. Kerry by the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth. The Swifties have called into question Kerry’s actions during and immediately following his service in Vietnam and they have done so with compelling eyewitness accounts and well researched historical facts. The latest barrage of anti-Bush information, however, fails to achieve any credibility whatsoever.

The very basis of all of the new accusations – the actual memos – seems to have been fabricated. Several forensic experts have agreed that the memos appear to be fakes – that they were likely NOT written in the early 1970’s as purported. The most basic element of these memos has given them away. The typesetting of these memos is inconsistent with what would have been found in a ‘70’s era typewriter. The memos (provided on CBS’s website in pdf format) display proportional spacing (this spacing, common to professional typesetting and computer typography, allows thin characters to be spaced closer together than wider characters), while a typical typewriter circa 1972 would have used monospace, which spaces all characters equally. Anyone who is familiar with older typewriters knows exactly what this looks like and how a contemporary word processor produces a much different look. In addition to the spacing, the font used in the memos appears to be Times New Roman, a font readily available on any word processing programs (and indeed the default font in Microsoft Word). This typeface was simply not available on most typewriters in 1972. As with the spacing and font, other clues tell us this was not written over 30 years ago. The memos contain superscript elements, such as “187th”. A typewriter from that era was typically not capable of producing superscript, and the rare machines that could, would simply place the “th” higher than the “187”, but it would be the same size. Not so in our uncovered memo. Also, the apostrophes are curved – consistent with a current word processor, but very much inconsistent with the straight marks created on that old typewriter. The kearning, line breaks, margins, tab stops, spacing, and font are ALL an exact match with Microsoft Word default settings (a comparison between the “memo” and the same document created on Word with default setting can linked to below).

The only possibility that the documents exhibited by CBS as proof of their story are authentic is if the original memos had been subsequently transcribed. This, of course, would then call into question the “aged” appearance of the memos. This is a clear hack-job forgery. If the Democrats had simply dug up a 30 yr old typewriter to produce these memos, we might all believe these to be the genuine article. As it is, we will doubtless hear that these are, in fact, reproductions due to the fact that the originals were becoming illegible. Unfortunately, that will not add legitimacy to the issue as the documents were presented as original (not to mention the fact that some new hack is furiously trying to reproduce the memos on an old typewriter as we speak). CBS news should be held to account for this episode. Their eagerness to strike a blow to the President is shameful at best.

For further information on this issue please see the following:

Bush Guard Documents: Forged – Charles Johnson, Little Green Footballs
A great source on this – contains comparative documents (the “original” memo as well as the same document produced in Word

The Sixty-First Minute – Scott Johnson, Powerline
More detailed analysis of the “memo”

Is it a Hoax? – Stephen F. Hayes, The Weekly Standard

Are the CBS National Guard Documents Fake? – INDC, indcjournal.com

Interview with Farrell Shiver, owner of Shiver & Nelson, a document investigation lab. HughHewitt.com

PDF copies of Original Documents - MSNBC

CBS's Big Blunder - John Podhoretz, The New York Post

What the Bush Guard Papers Really Say - Byron York, National Review

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: A note from Ed Gilespie AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 9/08/2004 07:35:00 PM ----- BODY:

September 8, 2004

To: Bush-Cheney '04 Grassroots Team
From: Ed Gillespie, Republican National Committee Chairman
Subject: Brace Yourselves

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
In response to President Bush's Agenda for America's Future and a critique of his policies and Senate record, Senator Kerry's campaign is implementing a strategy of vicious personal attacks against the President and Vice President.

The campaign is bringing in a bevy of former Clinton henchmen, including CNN commentators James Carville and Paul Begala. In August alone, Begala called President Bush a "gutless wonder," said he has a "lack of intelligence," and called Vice President Cheney a "dirt bag." Carville said the President is "ignorant big time" and said "George W. Bush and Dick Cheney are a couple of nobodies."

It's not like Bob Shrum needed encouragement to engage in personal attacks. At a Kerry rally Friday morning in Ohio, campaign surrogate John Glenn compared the Republican Convention to a Nazi rally, and Kerry called the President unfit to lead our nation and once again sought to divide the country by who served and how 35 years ago.

Of course, the President was called a "cheap thug," a "killer" and a "liar" at a Kerry-Edwards campaign event in New York, Mrs. Kerry has called the President's policies "unpatriotic" and "immoral" and DNC Chairman Terry McAuliffe falsely accused the President of being AWOL.

Democratic strategist Susan Estrich outlined the strategy last Wednesday in a column warning Republicans to "watch out." "I'm not promising pretty," she wrote before going on to call President Bush and Vice President Cheney alcoholics, then ask "is any alcoholic ever really cured?" ("I can see the ad now.") She deems the President's service as a National Guard fighter pilot "draft dodging," and says, "a forthcoming book by Kitty Kelly raises questions about whether the President has practiced what he preaches on the issue of abortion." (Interestingly, the New York Daily News reported back in February that the Kerry campaign intended to spread such a rumor in pro-life chat rooms late in the campaign.)

So the former Dukakis campaign manager has an advance copy of Democrat donor Kitty Kelly's book, which promises to throw unsubstantiated gossip at President Bush in the same way she falsely maligned the late President Reagan as a date rapist who paid for a girlfriend's abortion and wrongly castigated Nancy Reagan as an adulterer who had an affair with Frank Sinatra. A recent story says Kelly's book alleges President Bush used cocaine at Camp David while his father was President, which is as credible as her story that then Governor and Nancy Reagan smoked marijuana with Jack Benny and George and Gracie Burns.

And tonight on CBS, longtime Democratic operative Ben Barnes-a friend of, major contributor to and Nantucket neighbor of Senator Kerry's and vice chair of the Kerry Campaign--will repudiate his statement under oath that he had no contact with the Bush family concerning the President's National Guard service. (Anyone surprised that Barnes would contradict a statement he made under oath probably doesn't know his long history of political scandal and financial misdealings.)

So brace yourselves. Any mention of John Kerry's votes for higher taxes and against vital weapons programs will be met with the worst kind of personal attacks. Such desperation is unbecoming of American Presidential politics, and Senator Kerry will pay a price for it at the polls as we stay focused on policies to continue growing our economy and winning the War on Terror.

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: Unfit for Command AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 9/07/2004 08:14:00 PM ----- BODY:

Unfit for Command
by John E. O'Neil, Jerome R. Corsi Ph.D.

The issue of John Kerry's service in Vietnam and his actions upon returning home from Vietnam has become a controversial part of the 2004 Presidential campaign. There are many who would like Vietnam to remain in the past – John McCain, for example has made the point that he (and we all as a nation) have spent the past 30 years trying to heal the wounds inflicted by our Vietnam experience and that reopening those wounds today is a tragic mistake. In most basic terms, I would agree with that sentiment. Unfortunately this issue cannot be seen in 'basic' terms. John Kerry is seeking the job of Commander-in-Chief of the United States - a position which commands the most powerful military on Earth. If his actions during or after that conflict were contributory to the undermining of American interests and, indeed, of US servicemen engaged in combat, Kerry's ability to lead the current war on terror must be called into question.

It must be stated for the record that this author did not serve in Vietnam and will render no judgment or opinion as to who is telling the truth. The current controversy generated by the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth recalls an attitude of convenience towards the US military by our friends on the left. For years and through many elections, the Democrats suggested that military service was irrelevant and they treated the military with contempt. This year with a Vietnam veteran running as the Dems nominee, military service has leapfrogged to unfamiliar prominence. The last time the left seemed to think military service was important was in 1988 when Dan Quayle was running for Vice President. The left painted Quayle’s Nation Guard service as tantamount to draft-dodging. This attitude was quickly reversed when Bill Clinton, who clearly did dodge the draft, was the Democrat’s leading man. The Clinton administration treated the military with an outward contempt which is still hard to fathom from a commander-in-chief (the Clintons required White House military aides to dress in civilian clothes at non-official functions as the military uniforms offended Mrs Clinton). Upon the completion of the Clinton years, the Democrats sought to disallow military votes in the 2000 election in a purely political move to gain the Presidency. Following September 11 of 2001, the Democrats actually behaved like mainstream Americans for a bit and waved flags and praised the President’s actions in the war on terror. Once the 2004 election was on the horizon, however, the left began to reveal its true colors once again. Howard Dean became the front-runner by adopting an anti-war stance and a flailing John Kerry voted against necessary funding for our troops just to keep up with Dean. It worked and Kerry captured the nomination. The Democratic Convention tried ever so hard to look like a Republican Convention – flags as far as the eye could see and military references all around. The Vietnam War, which John Kerry had begun his political career opposing, was now the centerpiece of a suddenly pro-war, pro-military effort. Soon after Kerry had made his military service in Vietnam the focal point of his campaign, a group of veterans who had served with Kerry came out in opposition to him and his candidacy. Suddenly, once again, the Democrats reverted to their standard mode of operation and treated these veterans with disdain and attempted to censor them by threatening media outlets with legal action should they carry the Swift Boat ads and further attempted to suppress the publication of the book, Unfit for Command.

Kerry himself has had an ever changing attitude towards the military and his own service in Vietnam. He once famously threw his medals into a trash bin at an anti-war rally. Further investigation revealed that he had not thrown his medals, but rather his ribbons into the trash. Kerry explained that his medals were back at home and he would have thrown them had he had them. Subsequently Kerry has used those same medals to his advantage when running for the US Senate. I wonder .. if Kerry had intended to throw them away, why doesn’t he do so now?

The medal tossing episode and Kerry’s ever changing explanation about it is discussed in Unfit for Command as is Kerry’s service in Vietnam and his behavior upon returning home. The book makes the point that Kerry’s claim to have “volunteered” for military service is not quite as heroic as it might sound. In fact, Kerry attempted to secure a deferment (just as Dick Cheney has been vilified for doing by the Kerry campaign), and was denied. At that time, if you were drafted, you had an opportunity to join your choice of military branches – otherwise you headed straight to the Army. Kerry may be many things, but he is not stupid. Given the absence of significant Navy action in Vietnam, Kerry chose to join the Navy rather than go to the Army by default. There should be no criticism of Kerry on this point – he acted as many in his situation did – as allowed by law. The Swifties simply intend to make the point that Kerry’s “volunteer” status isn’t quite what he would have us believe. The authors then offer detailed analysis of Kerry’s service. They dissect his training and his 4 months of duty in Vietnam. The actions (sometimes questionable) surrounding his purple hearts, bronze, and silver stars are explored in detail and eyewitness accounts and military documents are provided. The Swifties advance the idea that Kerry worked the system, fabricated details, and went outside normal operating procedures to obtain his medals and secure himself an early exit from the war - all the while generating an exaggerated resume to propel his drive towards a political career. The fact that Kerry received purple hearts for wounds which amounted to a pinprick and did not result from enemy fire (self-inflicted?) is the basis for much of the book. As stated before, I was not there and cannot say who is telling the truth on these issues. I will say that it is my opinion that Kerry served and was awarded honors by his country and I will stand by that. If John Kerry did in fact work the system to obtain his medals and an early out, he did so within a system which allowed it. I cannot condemn Kerry for this, but neither can I support the censoring and smear campaign brought upon the Swift Boat Veterans by the Democrats. Unlike me, they WERE there and, as such, have every right to have their story heard.

Of greater relevance is the discussion of Kerry’s activities upon returning home from Vietnam. It is clear that Kerry did not understand then nor does he now understand that his anti-war activities were damaging to the US position and, in fact, prolonged the war – causing unknown additional casualties. His words were used by the North Vietnamese to demoralize US combat troops and prisoners. His assertion that only a couple thousand Vietnamese might be assassination targets (in the wake of America's departure) for the North was gruesomely wrong as millions were put to death in the aftermath of America’s withdrawal. Kerry’s testimony before the Senate about American was crimes was based on completely fabricated stories. Many of the 'witnesses' to these atrocities were later found to have never served in Vietnam (some weren’t veterans at all). Kerry’s own account of “atrocities” has never been fully explained and yet he expects to be commander-in-chief. A photograph of John Kerry is on display in a war museum in Vietnam – he is a hero to the communist government which committed genuine atrocities against the people of Vietnam.

These later issues are relevant to the election of 2004 as they provide deep insight into a man who would lead today’s soldiers into battle - a man who would require the trust of the American people. John Kerry’s actions and his subsequent explanations of those actions were wrong after his return from Vietnam. During his time in the US Senate he has often been wrong – from proposing over 7 billion in cuts in intelligence spending (AFTER the first attack on the World Trade Center) to voting to cut every major weapons system in the US arsenal to his shameful vote to deny funding to our troops in combat in Iraq. Luckily for America, John Kerry was always in the minority on those votes. Members of the Senate from both parties saw the need to maintain America’s intelligence and weapons systems and funding for our troops. Kerry was safely voted down on these occasions – the difference today is that he seeks the office of the President where his is always the final vote. This is a danger we cannot allow.

The Swift Boat Veterans for Truth stand against John Kerry because they genuinely see him as unfit for command. Each individual must decide for him or herself whether Kerry’s actions in Vietnam are fair issues in this election and what to make of his behavior since. One thing should be clear - these veterans, who all served honorably and collected a multitude of medals of their own, deserve the right to heard. The press would find much to question Mr. Kerry about had they the courage to do so. Until then go out and find, buy, and read this book.

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: best wishes Mr. President AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 9/03/2004 11:46:00 PM ----- BODY:

After complaining of chest pains and shortness of breath Thursday, former President Bill Clinton checked himself into a hospital. Test results showed that Clinton has significant blockage in his heart arteries and a quadruple bypass is scheduled for early next week. It is our most sincere hope that Mr. Clinton will enjoy a successful surgery and a most speedy recovery. Our thoughts and prayers go out to President Clinton, his wife and daughter.

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: now what? AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 9/02/2004 09:41:00 PM ----- BODY:

The Republican Convention is over and it was, by all accounts, quite successful. The themes and speeches will resonate with voters in the coming days and a Bush bounce of some measure will likely occur. The bounce will certainly erode and things will tighten up again as we head into the debates. Expect John Kerry to come out fighting. His campaign is a mess - a desperate shake-up of campaign staff is a good indication of this - and he has been tactically beaten on Vietnam/Terror/Iraq in the weeks since his own convention.

It's desperation time in Kerry-land, but he is by no means out of the race. Most indicators would suggest that he continues to be the frontrunner in the electoral college race and the slowing economic expansion helps him in all of the battleground states. Nonetheless, he is slipping - fast - and he will need to make a splash.

The candidate who frames the debate over the next few weeks will gain the momentum. The Bush campaign has done a good job of staying on message and pounding home the idea that the war on terror is what this election is all about. This was undoubtedly a successful strategy, however, the Republicans were also fortunate to have unexpected (and uncoordinated) help. The Swift Boat Veterans have managed to derail the Kerry campaign. Deciding to defend themselves and play wounded was a huge tactical error. Not only did team John get off message, but they exposed themselves as legalistic bullies as they attempted (in some cases successfully) to threaten media outlets with legal action should they carry the Swift Boat commercials. Not only did the Swifties pull Kerry off message, but they effectively forced him to back away from a "commander-in-chief" campaign. The central theme of Kerry's campaign will be abandoned as Kerry will now focus solely on the economy.

The Democrats tried to tell the country that they could be trusted with the war on terror, but the Republican Convention made clear that the GOP is the real deal and the Dems were just pretending. The economy is now Kerry's best chance and he will mold his campaign around that. One could get whiplash following Kerry. Expect a return (in moderation) to the anti-war stance. Tonight, after Bush's acceptance speech, Kerry returned to the old line about Bush having "misled us into war". This, of course, does not jibe with Kerry's admission on August 9th that even knowing then what we know now (no WMD, flawed intelligence, etc), he would have voted to authorize Iraq war. How can that be "misled"?

It is going to get ugly. The press, who couldn't mask their positive reaction to the RNC convention over the past few days, will begin to rewrite history. Expect them to talk of "attacks" and "fear". Kerry will turn loose on the country his private attack puppy, John Edwards. Edwards will do most of the heavy lifting in attacking Bush while Kerry will come in after to tell us how awful everything is. The coming weeks of Kerry '04 will read like pamphlets from doomsday cultists. We will hear about the great depression, lost jobs, outsourcing, oil prices, and the falling sky from Kerry-Little. Expect more desperation and more vitriol (if that's even possible). The Kerry campaign and it's surrogates will call George Bush and Dick Cheney draft dodgers and liars. The language recently heard from the Michael Moore left will now make it's way into the campaign.

Things have been good the past two weeks. The President has pulled ahead in the polls and we have had a phenomenal convention, but we cannot be complacent. If you were doing anything to help the W cause - continue. If you have yet to enter the fray - now is the time. The past four nights have made clear that this upcoming election is as important as any we will likely see in our lives. Let us not be drunk with euphoria .. we have much work to do.

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: in case you missed any of it... AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 9/01/2004 10:47:00 PM ----- BODY:

Thursday night is W's night at the convention. Leading up to his big night, however, we have been treated to some rousing speeches by other Republicans (and even some Democrats). If you missed any of it, the following are the prime-time speeches thus far.

John McCain (AZ) [read text]
Former NYC Mayor Rudy Giuliani [read text]
Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger (CA) [read text]
First Lady Laura Bush [read text]
Senator Zell Miller (D-GA) [read text]
Vice President Dick Cheney [read text]

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: some good words from Arnold AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 8/31/2004 09:52:00 PM ----- BODY:

"My fellow immigrants, my fellow Americans, how do you know if you are a Republican? Well, I tell you how. If you believe that government should be accountable to the people, not the people to the government, then you are a Republican.

If you believe a person should be treated as an individual, not as a member of an interest group, then you are a Republican.

If you believe your family knows how to spend your money better than the government does, then you are a Republican.

If you believe our educational system should be held accountable for the progress of our children, then you are a Republican.

If you believe this country, not the United Nations, is the best hope for democracy, then you are a Republican.

And, ladies and gentlemen, if you believe that we must be fierce and relentless and terminate terrorism, then you are a Republican.

Now, there's another way you can tell you're a Republican. You have faith in free enterprise, faith in the resourcefulness of the American people and faith in the U.S. economy. And to those critics who are so pessimistic about our economy, I say: Don't be economic girlie-men."

-California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, 8-31-04

[full transcript]

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: another liberal myth AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 8/29/2004 09:38:00 PM ----- BODY:

In recent weeks a new term has made its way into the popular lexicon of political discussion: “527”. The Democratic Party and its willing ally, the press, have long propagated the untruth that the Republicans are the party of the rich and are funded by rich donors. Thomas Oliphant, one the most left of the leftist media, recently described the upcoming Republican convention as a gathering of “business tycoons”. He is, of course, not alone in his misleading description. The truth is that in recent elections the Republican Party has been funded by smaller average donations than has the Democratic Party. The single largest donations have gone to the Democratic candidate. Despite the actual figures, many on the left (and amongst the general population) continue to believe the lie that Republicans are funded by “big money”. This unfounded belief has led many to fight for campaign finance reform. In 2002 they got their wish. Campaign finance reform in the form of the Bipartisan Campaign Reform Act (BCRA), otherwise known as McCain-Feingold was enacted. In response to this legislation, much of the large-donor contributions are pouring into 527 groups. 527 refers to the section of the federal tax code which allows non-profit groups to raise (and spend) money for voter registration and issue advocacy. These groups may not specifically endorse or call for the defeat of any particular political candidate, and they may not coordinate with specific campaigns.

Recently, one such 527, the Swift Boat Veterans for Truth, have been the focus of much attention as they have called into question Senator Kerry’s Vietnam record and his statements and activities upon returning home from Vietnam. Soon after the first Swift Boat television commercial ran, the Democrats were wailing, “unfair, unfair”. Never mind that Kerry made Vietnam the centerpiece of his convention and said, “bring it on” in response to a debate over his war record. The very idea that a tertiary group would dare question Kerry’s Vietnam record was seen as the epitome of dirty politics. As with the myth of political contributions before McCain-Feingold, the facts belie the hysteria. Liberal 527s have been working long and hard and have spent vast sums of money towards the cause of defeating President Bush. Only 4 of the top 527s are friendly towards George Bush. The other 16 are decidedly anti-Bush. Little mention is ever made of these organizations. In dollar terms, of the $424,310,794 spent by the top 20 527s since 2000, only $66,868,566 was spent by Republican-friendly groups (that’s only 16% for those who don’t wish to do the math). A simple review of 527 donors reveals a startling revelation (well, maybe to those under the misconception that the rich only support Republicans): much of the money pouring into these groups comes from many of the same people. Rich Democrats.

Please follow this link to see a list of the top 20 527s and their donors. The facts are enlightening and should put to an end the idea that the Republicans Party is the party of the rich (if only the media would allow the facts to be told).

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: a question for Senator Kerry AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 8/25/2004 10:47:00 PM ----- BODY:

Mr. Senator, you have recently called for the resignation of Secretary of Defense Rumsfeld, citing the Abu Ghraib prisoner abuse scandal as sufficient cause for his removal. In 1971 you admitted to personally committing “atrocities” and engaging in other illegal activites while in Vietnam. Will you today, Mr Senator, bow out of the Presidential race in accordance with the standards you have set for Mr. Rumsfeld?

And as a follow up question:

By what standard of logic is it that the humiliation of Iraqi prisoners (while deplorable) warrants the removal of the Secretary of Defense (who has been shown to have had no knowledge of the actions), while burning down villages and firing on civilians (according to your own testimony) does not preclude you from being the President?

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: e-mail rebuttal part I AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 8/25/2004 10:39:00 PM ----- BODY:

The following e-mail has been circulating amongst the anti-Bush crowd. A friend asked me to provide a response from a conservative point of view. (The original e-mail content is displayed in red, while my response is shown in black.)

Things you have to believe to be a Republican today:
This is already a typical leftist ploy, rather than allow conservatives to explain their ideology, the left will tell you what we believe.

Saddam was a good guy when Reagan armed him, a bad guy when Bush's daddy made war on him, a good guy when Cheney did business with him and a bad guy when Bush needed a "we can't find Bin Laden" diversion.
The above is precisely why most Americans tend to trust Republicans to better handle foreign policy - the left is simply too naive to understand the complexities of geopolitics.

Did the United States (not Ronald Reagan alone) help to arm Saddam Hussein? You bet it did. It did this because at the time, the most dangerous force in the Middle East was Iran - a regime which had shown no fear in brutally taking and holding hostage some 66 Americans. The Ayatollah had created a frenzied anti-American atmosphere, which coupled with the billions in military assets the Shah had stockpiled created a delicate situation in the Middle East - threatening Israel, US diplomatic and strategic interests, as well as the world's oil supply. Aiding Saddam in the Iraq-Iran war was not a unique situation. The United States and the western allies fought in a tenuous alliance with the Soviets against Nazi Germany in WWII. Did this mean that America was part of some devious plot which created the post WWII Soviet Union? Of course not. By locking Iran into a war with Iraq, Iran was constrained. This is geopolitics and it has worked this way, like it or not, for millennia. The interests of the United States caused us to aid Iraq in opposing a dangerous Iran.

Similarly, US interests were in play in the Gulf War. This wasn't "Bush's daddy making war on [Hussein]", this was the United States coming to the aid of worldwide interests, including our own. Bear in mind that Iraq had invaded Kuwait and had driven it's forces across that small country and was poised to invade Saudi Arabia. This is where the left will chime in that it was all about oil. Well, yes, yes it was. This isn't nearly as insidious as they would have it sound, however. The anti-war crowd wouldn't make it to the next peace rally if they couldn't fill their VW bus with gas. The Abarbian Peninsula supplies a huge percentage of the world's oil. The French, the Japanese, and countries across the globe rely on that oil to keep their economies moving. It might be idealistic to say that we should consume less or that we should find an alternative source of energy, but the present situation is what it is and the world depends on oil and the United States is the only power left on the planet which can protect that oil. Let's not forget that a sovereign nation had been invaded and was subsequently liberated by our actions in the Gulf War. The left has a wonderful history of taking a hard line against dictators and despots. They should have been thrilled at the prospect of overturning a despotic action.

As to the Dick Cheney allegations, it is almost too ridiculous to respond, but I will. The United Nations had set up a regime of sanctions against Iraq in efforts to force Saddam Hussein to comply with UN demands (and in a more remote hope of exciting the populace to overthrow Hussein). One vehicle towards humanitarian efforts made available by the UN was its oil-for-food program by which Iraqi oil could be sold under close scrutiny by the UN and the proceeds would go towards humanitarian efforts in Iraq (to offset the economic squeeze which the general sanctions had created). This program suffered due to the inability of Iraqi oil fields to produce much oil without the necessary spare parts which had been unavailable under UN sanctions. 1998 the UN passed a resolution allowing Iraq to purchase spare parts for its oil fields. During this time Dick Cheney was CEO for Halliburton. Halliburton is the largest oil-services company in the US, and is one of very few companies which even produces most of the equipment necessary to maintain an oil production facility. Halliburton was contracted to provide the necessary spare parts as called for by the UN resolution. This is the horrible controversy - that Dick Cheney while CEO of a company which sold parts, actually did what his company is supposed to do and .. sold parts - to the benefit of humanitarian efforts in Iraq. If you really want a controversy here, it is that many UN officials were skimming off the top of this oil-for food program and they subsequently worked to sabotage the passage of authorization for US actions so that they could continue to line their pockets.

Finally, the "we can't find bin Laden" diversion. Laughable. This is just a complete lack of logic. The United States cannot do anything further until we find bin Laden? What if we never find him? Does this mean that we cannot engage any further threats? In a speech before congress, the President made clear that we (the United States) were going to go after terrorists and any nations who gave them safe harbor. He made a clear distinction between the two. I heard and understood it, Congress seemed to hear it as they all rose to their feet in applause (both sides of the aisle). He didn't say then, nor has he ever said that Iraq had anything to do with 9/11 (this is where the left screams, "yes he did" .. well, produce the transcript - every word that comes out of the President's mouth is transcribed and available). He simply laid out the facts that Iraq is a dangerous producer of weapons of mass destruction (an idea supported by every intelligence service on the planet) and that Iraq is and has been a safe haven for terrorists (as proven by the discovery of terrorist training camps in Iraq). This combination is a dangerous one and had to be dealt with. Saddam Hussein could have precluded it all by simply allowing the inspectors back in unfettered, but he did not. He shut down every UN demand and left the world with the impression he was hiding something. Sometimes bluffs get called. The world is better off without a brutal dictator in Iraq.

Trade with Cuba is wrong because the country is communist, but trade with China and Vietnam is vital to a spirit of international harmony.
Policy towards an unfriendly state cannot be made in blanket terms. Even the simplest reviews of the global situation make that clear. Trade with China is creating an engine of economic prosperity there which is forcing the Chinese to adopt an increasingly capitalistic reality. This is good for the Chinese and good for the world. A society which fully embraces capitalism cannot coexist with communist principles. This isn't about "international harmony" .. that's how the left thinks. This is about sparking an economic revolution which may do in China what a violent revolution never can.

Cuba is a different situation. Castro has thumbed his nose at American for decades and continues to export his brand of communism into South America. This cannot be rewarded with trade which will only make Castro stronger.

A woman can't be trusted with decisions about her own body, but national corporations can make decisions affecting all mankind without regulation.
Who said that a woman cannot be trusted with decisions about her own body? The Republican Party is made up primarily of conservatives. There are, however, many kinds of conservatives. A large part of the Republican Party consists of those who hold conservative political and fiscal values. These people tend to believe that the best thing the government can do is stay out of our lives .. this includes taxation, social welfare, and overreaching regulation. Many of these Republicans don't particularly want abortion to be a part of the political agenda. They feel that it is a social and moral issue which should be dealt with personally. At most they believe it is an issue which individual states should rule on. This segment of the party is not a small minority, nor is it suppressed by the party as a whole. Many Republicans are, in fact, pro choice. Among them are: Secretary of State Colin Powell, former New Jersey Governor and current Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Christie Todd Whitman, Former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani, current New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg, New York Governor George Pataki, former Pennsylvania Governor and current Director of Homeland Security Tom Ridge, Senator Arlen Specter, and California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger. Not exactly politicians who have been shuffled to the back of the room by the Republican Party. In addition, many pro life Republicans such as Senator John McCain have come out against repealing Roe v Wade. The title of the original e-mail is "things you have to believe to be a Republican today". Clearly not the fact.

Now, there is, in fact, another segment of the Republican Party which is made up of social conservatives. This segment of the party is indeed vehemently pro life, but not because they believe that a woman cannot be trusted with her own body, but rather because they believe that there is another life involved. A life which has been denied the rights guaranteed to every other American. The position here is an honest one - that life begins at conception and is, therefore, worthy of every protection of the law. The woman was not, after all, abducted and implanted with some alien seed, nor was she possessed by a demonic force. She willingly entered into activities which resulted in her pregnancy (let it be said here that even the most conservative of social conservatives is willing to make an exception in the instances of rape, incest, and life of the mother.) The left often claims that the right wishes to regulate a woman's reproductive rights - this is blatantly untrue. The right believes that a woman has every right to control her own reproductive life, but that once she become pregnant, there is another person with rights involved. The most basic understanding of Constitutional law is that one's rights extend only insofar as they do not inhibit or trample the rights of another. The pro life person simply believes that there are two lives involved and that the rights of the mother do not supersede the rights of the infant.

As far as the second part of the statement goes, Republicans certainly do NOT believe that any corporation has the right to affect all of mankind without regulation. This is typical leftist propaganda. The fact is that large corporations support both Republicans and Democrats alike. It is in their interest to not get on the bad side of any potential President. Figures for the last election cycle actually show that there were somewhat greater corporate donations given to Gore than to Bush. Republicans do desire lesser regulation, but not to the extent that the greater public is harmed. We tend to think that the 50,000+ pages of the current Federal code are a bit excessive.

Jesus loves you, and shares your hatred of homosexuals and Hillary Clinton.
A reference to the "religious right" I suppose. The fact is that most Christians hold to the idea that God does not hate the sinner, but the sin. That, however, has little to do with the Republican Party. Conservatives tend to not worry a great deal about homosexuality actually. What people do in the privacy of their bedroom is their own business - just don't ask for a governmental stamp of approval. Republicans support all anti-discrimination laws as they refer to sexual orientation and are typically in favor of some form of domestic partnership which would provide committed gay couples all of the same rights provided to married people. The big hubbub is over the term "marriage". This all started because gays felt they were being discriminated against in that they were cohabitating, but could not benefit from the tax code or employment health insurance policies. This has been seen to be unfair by even the most conservative of Republicans. Now, however, a legal domestic partnership is not enough and gay activists seek to suborn marriage itself. Now Hillary Clinton on the other hand ...

The best way to improve military morale is to praise the troops in speeches while slashing veterans' benefits and combat pay.
We are talking about John Kerry now, right? Flag waiving, Vietnam touting "war hero" who just happens to have voted against every modern weapon system used by our troops in our current conflict. Kerry also voted against funding the troops after he voted to send them to war .. potentially leaving them without necessary equipment and pay. Republicans have tirelessly fought to maintain a vigorous armed forces and has typically had to force military spending down the throats of the left. This is an argument the Democrats cannot win. Roosevelt, Truman, and Kennedy were the last of the pro-military Democrats and the party resents the fact that the Republicans have been better trusted to handle military matters. All they have left is to throw bombs.

If condoms are kept out of schools, adolescents won't have sex.
I don't really recall this as being an official part of the Republican platform. What conservatives would like to see is sexual education which presents abstinence as at least an option. The facts are undeniable, abortion, HIV and other sexually transmitted diseases, teen pregnancy, and many other sex-related problems would be vastly improved if people simply did not engage in sexual activity as casually as they too often do. The only way to not get pregnant or become infected with HIV, etc is to not engage in sexual activity. Educating adolescents about safe sex practices is important in the efforts to protect our citizens, but it is important to remember that children who cannot go to a museum field trip without a permission slip from their parents shouldn't be expected to always make appropriate decisions regarding sex. That being said, will many adolescents continue to engage in sex even if provided with the best information? Of course they will. Social conservatives believe that more intimate discussions about sexuality should occur in the home - parents are better to pass along values than is the state (after all, don't we constantly hear this from the left in regards to morality?). Providing a condom is validation of the act. Should the state (an authority figure) be validating the moral choices of children? The bottom line is that this is a tough issue and for the record, Republicans do NOT have an official stance on it. Most Republicans would feel that this is exactly the sort of issue which local communities are best suited to resolve.

Providing health care to all Iraqis is sound policy. Providing health care to all Americans is socialism. HMOs and insurance companies have the best interests of the public at heart.
Providing aid to a nation where precious democracy may well have a chance at blossoming IS sound policy. A free democracy in the Middle East will have a positive impact on the region and indeed the world.

Providing health care to all Americans is socialism. It looks like they got this one right. What's the issue? Why is it that people from nations with socialized medicine travel across oceans to seek medical care in the US? It is because we have the best, most technologically advanced medical treatment available in the world. Citizens in Canada and Great Britain face long waits for basic care. Cutting edge imaging machinery which can be found in almost every American hospital are rare in many European nations. Prescription drugs may be cheaper, but new pharmaceutical advances are becoming the exclusive domain of US companies. Why? The drugs we buy in America carry the cost of new R&D. Companies which have their prices set by government cannot afford to do the research necessary to develop new drugs.

HMO's are precisely what Republicans are fighting against. Republicans want individuals to have the ability to choose any doctor and be provided with a wide array of insurance choices. Socialized medicine will essentially be one large government run HMO. Sounds great. (For the record, HMO's may well be the best choice for many individuals, but one size does NOT fit all and the Democratic ideal would be just that.)

Stay tuned for part II

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: The GOOD news from Iraq AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 8/16/2004 10:29:00 PM ----- BODY:

To watch the nightly news - especially as it is presented by the big three along with CNN and the other assorted left-of-center media outlets - one would think that Iraq is a complete disaster. Rarely does a word of good news find its way to our television screens. Thankfully, an Aussie blogger, Arthur Chrenkoff, has taken up the challenge of chronicling an impressive stream of good news. Take the opportunity to check out this site and see what Peter, Tom, and Dan aren't telling us.

Good news from Iraq, part 8

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: George Bush. Bumbling Idiot or Evil Genius? AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 8/16/2004 10:12:00 PM ----- BODY:

It’s getting hard to decide just where the liberals come down on this question these days. The official party line is, of course, that Bush is a moron. An individual incapable of leading the Hokey-Pokey, let alone the entire free world. The problem is that calling Bush a simpleton doesn’t always fit with their other shameful attacks. The charge that he is a liar is the most common in the wake of the Iraq war. To accept this charge, however, one must question just what was he lying about?

The answer of course – weapons of mass destruction. Bush lied to the American people about Saddam Hussein’s possession of WMD. The problem here is that everyone in the world believed Saddam to possess WMD. The Brits, Russians, Egyptians, Israelis, and even the French and the weak and corrupt UN believed that Iraq had (and was hiding) the very same weapons they were caught with previously. This belief among the different nations derived from their own intelligence services. This was certainly not a case of George Bush bullying sovereign nations into believing a lie. Even here in the United States, Bill Clinton stated unequivocally that Hussein possessed WMD and actually made regime change in Iraq the official American policy. Other notables such as John Kerry, who claimed to be well ahead of the commander in chief (this was in 1998 when the commander in chief was Bill Clinton) on the issue, stated clearly a belief that these weapons existed and that he [Hussein] must be disarmed.

Now, the only way George Bush could have lied, therefore, was to be the only leader who knew what all of his peers did not. In claiming that Bush knew there were no WMD, the left implicitly makes the case that Bush was smarter than, and indeed capable of far better foreign-affairs insight, than were Clinton, Kerry, Chirac, Putin, and Kofi Annan. Then, even though he knew Hussein was unarmed, he created this huge lie that everyone already believed, and then proceeded to start a war for reasons the left has still yet to decipher. The evil Bush-genius has, no doubt, some devious plan he is secretly waiting to spring upon us all. An interesting conundrum.

So which is it Michael Moore? If he is the fool you portrayed him to be, how did he manage to know what the rest of the world did not and THEN proceed to pull the wool over obviously more intelligent people? If he is the cunning liar you claim him to be, doesn’t that then kick him back up to the status of evil genius?

People, people .. the Republican National Convention is just days away – let’s at least get the story straight.

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: external articles AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 8/12/2004 11:12:00 PM ----- BODY:

Just a word about the links to articles found to the left.

Please take the time to read some of the articles provided on the left sidebar. These have been culled from a wide variety of sources. Newspapers, magazines, interviews, and online forums make up the bulk of the stories and editorials found here. Some of the linked websites require a one-time registration to view their content. These registrations are always free and no solicitation will result. The authors write with an ease and agility which is inspiring to your most humble host. Check it out.

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: Kerry on Iraq AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 8/09/2004 08:13:00 PM ----- BODY:

In previous postings, much has been said about Mr. Kerry's inability to maintain a intellectually sustainable position on the war in Iraq. In fairness to Mr. Kerry, perhaps we should allow him to present his stance on the issue. Please follow the appropriate link below to see the John Kerry Iraq Documentary. The movie is 11 minutes in length.

Real Player

Windows Media

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: 2005 AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 8/07/2004 02:48:00 PM ----- BODY:

A year from now ...

President Kerry announces that his administration has managed to reach agreements with the French and German governments, bringing them on board with continuing reconstruction operations in Iraq. The agreement will protect France and Germany from scrutiny in regards to their cozy (and illegal) relationships with Saddam Hussein. The Press rejoices and proclaims the deal a victory for diplomacy.

Michael Moore wins the academy Award for Best 'Documentary' and celebrates with the Hollywood elite by gushing over new hero John Kerry and gets in one two parting shots at former President Bush. Smiles and kisses all around.

The Kerry administration recognizes a paradigm shift in the American workforce and announces changes to the way employment statistics are maintained. The household survey will now be factored in due to the increasing number of self-employed entrepreneurs. Employment figures skyrocket when these people are added to the 'employed'. No mention of the fact that millions of these people were conveniently uncounted during his 2004 campaign of pessimism. The Press swoons and heaps praise upon Kerry for 'producing' millions of already existing jobs.

In other economic news, the recovery continues to roll. A period of prosperity ensues. George Bush, like his father before him, can only watch his predecessor take credit for the recovery created under his watch.

The administration announces that the promised tax cuts for 98% of taxpayers cannot be delivered due to the enormous cost of new social spending. Tax rates rise across the board.

US forces, with the help of allies, capture Osama bin Laden. It is a genuine victory for America and for free people around the globe. Kerry praises the steadfast effort of the intelligence services which he had fought against his entire Senate career.

The armed forces, coming off tough, but valiant victories in the war against terror, see huge budget cuts as social spending increases. Kerry effectively ends the war on terror.

.............................................................................

If you don't like the looks of the above, get out there and do something about it. As of this writing, John Kerry holds a small, but consistent lead over the President in national and, more importantly, battleground state polls. While polling can often be deceiving, we must all be made aware that it is quite likely that George Bush will not win re-election. The scenario feels all too similar to that of the 1992 election. Republicans wrongly believe that the moral and intellectual validity of our beliefs will ensure victory. It will not. So, do something. Volunteer with a local GOP chapter, contribute financially if possible, get a yard sign or bumper sticker at the least. Let people know that everyone is not in favor of a change - despite the media's portrayal.

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: the Kerry record AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 7/31/2004 11:03:00 PM ----- BODY:

Well, the Democratic National Convention is done. All the confetti and balloons have been swept away and Boston will soon be allowed to function normally once again. By most accounts it was a successful convention. Kerry and Edwards both executed well written speeches and accepted their nominations in front of packed and cheering crowds. The Kerry-Edwards team is now prepared to take it’s message to the rest of the country. The question is – just what is that message?

Based on the rhetoric at the convention, the message is that John Kerry is prepared and able to be an effective commander in chief. We are, after all, living in a time of war. Gone are the days when the Democrats denounced any and all sympathies for the military. In fact, a casual observer might have thought they were viewing a Republican convention. For a candidate who only managed to rise above of his competitors in the primaries when he assumed an anti-war position, it was interesting to see the unabashed pro-military, hawkish stance taken by Kerry in his acceptance speech. In light of this perplexing contradiction, perhaps the prudent thing to do would be to examine Mr. Kerry’s speech by putting it to the test of his own words, “I ask you to judge me by my record…Values spoken without actions taken are just slogans.” The following is a modest attempt to match Mr. Kerry’s words with his actions.

While we were told that this would be a positive convention and speech, Kerry wasted little time attacking the President.

“That is my first pledge to you tonight. As president, I will restore trust and credibility to the White House. … I will be a commander in chief who will never mislead us into war.”

Kerry’s implication is that Bush lied to America and to the world leading up to the Iraq war. Disagreement over policy and even in the conclusions which led to war are one thing, but it is quite another to accuse a sitting President of deception. So much for not going negative. Of course the substance of Kerry’s claim that Bush misled us should be weighed against Kerry’s own conclusions about Iraq. The following are just a few statements made by Mr. Kerry regarding Iraq:

"[I]t is something that we know-for instance, Saddam Hussein has used weapons of mass destruction against his own people, and there is some evidence of their efforts to try to secure these kinds of weapons and even test them." (CBS’ "Face The Nation," 9/23/01)

"He [Saddam Hussein] is and has acted like a terrorist, and he has engaged in activities that are unacceptable." (Fox News’ "The O’Reilly Factor," 12/11/01)

"I think we ought to put the heat on Saddam Hussein. I’ve said that for a number of years, Bill. I criticized the Clinton administration for backing off of the inspections when Ambassador Butler was giving us strong evidence that we needed to continue. I think we need to put the pressure on no matter what the evidence is about September 11." (Fox News’ "The O’Reilly Factor," 12/11/01)

"I think we clearly have to keep the pressure on terrorism globally. This doesn’t end with Afghanistan by any imagination. And I think the president has made that clear. I think we have made that clear. Terrorism is a global menace. It’s a scourge. And it is absolutely vital that we continue, for instance, Saddam Hussein." (CNN’s "Larry King Live," 12/14/01)

"I agree completely with this Administration’s goal of a regime change in Iraq ..." - John Kerry, 7/29/02 Remarks at the 2002 DLC National Conversation, NY (Senator John Kerry, Speech To The 2002 DLC National Conversation, New York, NY, 7/29/02)

Even prior to the 2000 presidential election, Kerry took a decidedly anti-Hussein stance:

KERRY: "[I] believe he is the kind of threat that has been described. I believe that in the post-Cold War period this issue of proliferation, particularly in the hands of Saddam Hussein, is critical. It has implications for a Qaddafi, for a Sudan, for other countries in the world in the future." (ABC’s "This Week," 2/22/98)
GEORGE WILL: "Senator Kerry, you’re way ahead of the commander in chief [Bill Clinton] in this regard." (ABC’s "This Week," 2/22/98)
KERRY: "I am way ahead of the commander in chief, and I’m probably way ahead of my colleagues and certainly of much of the country. But I believe this. I believe that he has used these weapons before. He has invaded another country. He views himself as a modern-day Nebuchadnezzar. He wants to continue to play the uniting critical role in that part of the world. And I think we have to stand up to that." (ABC’s "This Week," 2/22/98)

And finally, Mr. Kerry voted in favor of the Iraq war (Iraq War Resolution 10/11/02 (H.J. Res. 114, CQ Vote #237: Passed 77-23: R 48-1; D 29-21; I 0-1, 10/11/02, Kerry Voted Yea)

Clearly Mr. Kerry wasn’t misled, in fact, his statements were among the strongest in opposition to Hussein. In addition, Mr. Kerry spent 8 of his 19 years in the Senate in the Senate Intelligence Committee and was well aware of the most sensitive intelligence regarding Iraq. Claiming to be misled simply does not agree with his previous statements and actions.

Kerry continued, “As President, I will ask hard questions and demand hard evidence. I will immediately reform the intelligence system so policy is guided by facts, and facts are never distorted by politics.” Kerry has been critical of intelligence failures in the wake of 9/11, but his record is one of ambivalence towards the intelligence committee. While a member of the Senate Select Intelligence Committee, John Kerry managed to attend only 11 of 49 public hearings. Among those he missed is a hearing in June of 2000 which warned of the terrorist threat we now face (report of the National Commission on Terrorism). This cavalier attitude towards the intelligence mechanisms of the United States certainly does not sound like that of a man who will “demand hard evidence.” During his time on the Intelligence Committee, Kerry never once sponsored legislation which would increase funding for human intelligence, and in fact, he proposed over $7.5 billion in cuts to the intelligence budget. (S. 1826, Introduced 2/3/1994; S. Amdt. 1452, Introduced 2/9/94; S. 1290, Introduced 9/29/95). Thankfully, his proposed gutting of the intelligence budget was rejected by both Democrats and Republicans.

Kerry actually managed to almost completely avoid mentioning his time in the Senate. Perhaps it is his record there he was trying to avoid. Kerry’s autobiographical speech would have us thinking that he is currently in his mid-twenties. After reviewing his childhood, he mentions time and again his service in Viet Nam and then we find ourselves in the present. It could be that Kerry simply hasn’t bothered to take his job as a Senator seriously. In the current congressional session, Kerry has been present only 36% of the time. Even former Clinton presidential advisor Dick Morris notes Kerry’s avoidance of his time in the Senate, “Oddly, his absence of biography confirms the impression I formed of him during my White House years: He's a back-bencher. I never can recall a single time that his name came up in any discussion of White House strategy on anything. He was the man who wasn't there.” (Dick Morris, "The Bagel Candidacy," The New York Post, 7/30/04). With his time in the Senate effectively unmentioned, Kerry continued his assault on the President’s handling of Iraq.

“I know what we have to do in Iraq. We need a president who has the credibility to bring our allies to our side and share the burden, reduce the cost to American taxpayers, reduce the risk to American soldiers. That's the right way to get the job done and bring our troops home.

Here is the reality: that won't happen until we have a president who restores America's respect and leadership — so we don't have to go it alone in the world.”

“Go it alone in the world”? I wonder how the leaders and citizens of the following countries feel about that statement:

Afghanistan
Albania
Angola
Australia
Azerbaijan
Bulgaria
Colombia
Costa Rica
Czech Republic
Denmark
Dominican Republic
El Salvador
Eritrea
Estonia
Ethiopia
Georgia
Honduras
Hungary
Iceland
Italy
Japan
Kuwait
Latvia
Lithuania
Macedonia
Marshall Islands
Micronesia
Mongolia
Netherlands
Nicaragua
Palau
Panama
Philippines
Poland
Portugal
Romania
Rwanda
Singapore
Slovakia
Solomon Islands
South Korea
Spain
Tonga
Turkey
Uganda
Ukraine
United Kingdom
Uzbekistan

These are the countries which made up the coalition in support of Operation Iraqi Freedom. Apparently when Kerry says “allies” he really just means the French. Never mind that the French had their own reasons for standing against the United States in Iraq. Namely, they were engaged in illegal trade with Saddam Hussein wherein they were able to buy billions of dollars worth of Iraqi oil for less than its market value. It is no wonder that the UN sanctions weren’t hurting Hussein – the French were subsidizing his murderous regime. Other non-coalition members had their own embarrassing reasons as well. The Germans desperately wanted to avoid the fact that Iraq had obtained centrifuges from German sources in their attempts to develop nuclear capabilities. While Kerry claims that President Bush has damaged the United States’ standing with her allies, it is a terrible slap in the face to our coalition allies to suggest that their support is meaningless. This from a man who would be President.

Kerry’s deepest descent into fantasy came when he began to talk about his support for the military.

“I defended this country as a young man and I will defend it as President. Let there be no mistake: I will never hesitate to use force when it is required. Any attack will be met with a swift and certain response. I will never give any nation or international institution a veto over our national security. And I will build a stronger American military.

We will add 40,000 active duty troops, not in Iraq, but to strengthen American forces that are now overstretched, overextended, and under pressure. We will double our special forces to conduct anti-terrorist operations. And we will provide our troops with the newest weapons and technology to save their lives and win the battle. And we will end the backdoor draft of National Guard and reservists.

To all who serve in our armed forces today, I say, help is on the way.

As President, I will fight a smarter, more effective war on terror. We will deploy every tool in our arsenal: our economic as well as our military might; our principles as well as our firepower.”

Let me be clear on one point – John Kerry’s service in Viet Nam was honorable and brave and I thank him for it. His record since those earlier days, however, leaves much to be desired. The following is a record of Kerry’s ‘support’ for the military during his time in the Senate:

Senator Kerry Voted Against B-1 Bomber. (S. 3189, CQ Vote #273: Passed 79-16: R 37-5; D 42-11, 10/15/90, Kerry Voted Nay)
Senator Kerry Voted Against B-2 Stealth Bomber. (S. 3189, CQ Vote #273: Passed 79-16: R 37-5; D 42-11, 10/15/90, Kerry Voted Nay)
Senator Kerry Voted Against F-14. (H. R. 5803, CQ Vote #319: Adopted 80-17: R 37-6; D 43-11, 10/26/90, Kerry Voted Nay)
Senator Kerry Voted Against F-15. (S. 3189, CQ Vote #273: Passed 79-16: R 37-5; D 42-11, 10/15/90, Kerry Voted Nay)
Senator Kerry Voted Against F-16. (S. 3189, CQ Vote #273: Passed 79-16: R 37-5; D 42-11, 10/15/90, Kerry Voted Nay)
Senator Kerry Voted Against AV-8B Harrier Vertical Takeoff And Landing Jet Fighters. (H.R. 2126, CQ Vote #579: Adopted 59-39: R 48-5; D 11-34, 11/16/95, Kerry Voted Nay)
Senator Kerry Voted Against AH-64 Apache Helicopters. (H.R. 2126, CQ Vote #579: Adopted 59-39: R 48-5; D 11-34, 11/16/95, Kerry Voted Nay)
Senator Kerry Voted Against Patriot Missiles. (S. 3189, CQ Vote #273: Passed 79-16: R 37-5; D 42-11, 10/15/90, Kerry Voted Nay)
Senator Kerry Voted Against Aegis Air Defense Cruiser. (S. 3189, CQ Vote #273: Passed 79-16: R 37-5; D 42-11, 10/15/90, Kerry Voted Nay)
Senator Kerry Voted Against Trident Missile System For U.S. Submarines. (S. 3189, CQ Vote #273: Passed 79-16: R 37-5; D 42-11, 10/15/90, Kerry Voted Nay)
Senator Kerry Voted Against M-1 Abrams Tanks. (S. 3189, CQ Vote #273: Passed 79-16: R 37-5; D 42-11, 10/15/90, Kerry Voted Nay)
Senator Kerry Voted Against Bradley Fighting Vehicle. (S. 3189, CQ Vote #273: Passed 79-16: R 37-5; D 42-11, 10/15/90, Kerry Voted Nay)
Senator Kerry Voted Against Tomahawk Cruise Missile. (S. 3189, CQ Vote #273: Passed 79-16: R 37-5; D 42-11, 10/15/90, Kerry Voted Nay)

1991 - Kerry voted to cut defense spending by 2 percent. Kerry was one of only 22 senators voting for this measure and the proposed cut was defeated.
1991 - Kerry voted to cut over $3 billion from defense and shift the funds to social programs. Kerry was one of only 28 senators voting for this measure and the cut was defeated.
1992 - Kerry voted to cut $6 billion from defense. Republicans and Democrats alike successfully blocked this attempt to cut defense spending.
1993 - Kerry voted against increased defense spending for a military pay raise.
1993 - Kerry introduced a plan to cut the number of Navy submarines and their crews; reduce tactical fighter wings in the Air Force; terminate the Navy’s coastal mine-hunting ship program; force the retirement of 60,000 members of the armed forces in one year; and reduce the number of light infantry units in the Army down to one. The plan was DOA.
1995 - Kerry voted to freeze defense spending for seven years, cutting over $34 billion from defense. Kerry was one of only 28 senators voting for the freeze and the measure was defeated.
1996 - Kerry introduced a bill to cut Defense Department funding by $6.5 billion. Kerry’s bill had no co-sponsors and never came to a floor vote.
1996 - Kerry voted yes on a fiscal 1996 budget resolution – a defense freeze that would have frozen defense spending for the next seven years and transferred the $34.8 billion in savings to education and job training. The resolution was rejected 28-71.

Kerry has repeatedly voted to cut the military and against the most successful weapons programs and yet he has the audacity to look our servicemen in the face and say, “help is on the way.” To be fair it is well understood that this is a much different world today than before 9/11. Perhaps we should give Mr. Kerry the benefit of the doubt – maybe in this new and unsafe world, Kerry can be trusted to support our troops. In Kerry’s own words, "I don’t think any United States senator is going to abandon our troops and recklessly leave Iraq to whatever follows as a result of simply cutting and running. That’s irresponsible... I don't think anyone in the Congress is going to not give our troops ammunition, not give our troops the ability to be able to defend themselves. We're not going to cut and run and not do the job." (CBS’ "Face The Nation," 9/14/03)

Kerry was then afforded an opportunity to back up his assertion that he would not leave the military high and dry.

He promptly voted against the $87 billion to fund our troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. It was “complicated” he explained. His further explanation really cleared things up:

"I actually did vote for the $87 billion before I voted against it ..." (Glen Johnson, "Kerry Blasts Bush On Protecting Troops," The Boston Globe, 3/17/04)

Ironic considering that in his acceptance speech he stated clearly, “as President, I will not evade or equivocate.”

Kerry then launched into his version of family values (a topic we’ll be discussing here later). Even on this new and politically safe topic, Kerry could not avoid the bizarre:

“You don't value families if you force them to take up a collection to buy body armor for a son or daughter in the service…”

The very $87 billion appropriation that Kerry is proud to have voted against contained $300 million for additional body armor to be provided to our troops.

“I'm proud to say that John [Edwards] joined me in voting against that $87 billion…"
- John Kerry, July 12, 2004

Kerry and Edwards are two of only four senators who voted for the use of force in Iraq to subsequently vote against $87 billion supplemental appropriation. Now THAT’S support.

Kerry wrapped up his acceptance speech by making a plea:

“My friends, the high road may be harder, but it leads to a better place. And that's why Republicans and Democrats must make this election a contest of big ideas, not small-minded attacks.”

Is it his hope that his opponents won’t delve into his actual record and call him on it? Is that the kind of small-minded attack he hopes to avoid? Perhaps, but on the other hand, he did ask that we, “judge [him] by [his] record.” And so we shall.

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: coming ... AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 7/29/2004 07:46:00 AM ----- BODY:

It’s been a busy week watching the Democrats play make-believe at their convention. We will have a full review of many of the policy statements made in Boston and compare them with the actual legislative record complied by Kerry-Edwards. Stayed tuned.

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: never forget AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 7/25/2004 12:33:00 AM ----- BODY:

"I think there has been an exaggeration" of the terror threat.

"this war on terror is .. more of an intelligence-gathering, law-enforcement operation."

- John Kerry

both comments made during current Presidential run

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: personal responsibility AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 7/24/2004 11:16:00 PM ----- BODY:

American conservativism is largely based on the idea of personal responsibility. While there are several themes which are clearly a part of conservative thought, it is this idea of personal responsibility which can be found, in obvious and subtle ways, throughout. This idea was fundamental among the first explorers and colonists who bravely ventured across the ocean to an uncertain future. The same ideology was alive in the 18th century and gave birth to revolution. Our fathers found it unacceptable to be governed from afar and correctly believed themselves to be capable of self-rule. While many societies have been willing to exist as colonies, Americans sought to take responsibility upon themselves. These quintessential American qualities of independence and personal responsibility are inseparable and they are the foundation of conservative ideology.

The casual political observer might describe the GOP as the party of lower taxes and limited government. While this observation is typically accurate, it must be understood that lower taxes and a small government are simply expressions of a deeper political philosophy. While the left seems to believe in the idea of “government as parent”, the right holds to the tenant that we as citizens don’t require further parenting. Dependence is the lynchpin behind leftist power and most liberal ideology. To fund the massive bureaucracy required in their codependent vision of America, Democrats have developed a voracious appetite for our tax dollars. The answer to every problem faced by our society is, in the eyes of our friends on the left, a government program. While there is a certain admirable, if naïve, nobility is this approach, it is most often the most ineffective and inefficient method to solve any given problem. A trip to any local DMV is an excellent reminder of just how inefficient the government handles any task. Why should we entrust the management of our retirement or health care to a system which cannot even hand out driver’s licenses effectively? Government programs tend to spend more money on administration than on the declared objective of the program. In example after example we have seen that private companies outperform government programs. From schools, to prisons, to charities, to picking up the garbage, private enterprise produces better results, with smaller operating costs. While the ineffectiveness of government is a compelling case against government programs, it is actually beside the point. A more intrinsic question of responsibility should be asked.

Too often the voter asks, “what’s in it for me?” This is a far cry from the powerful words spoken by John F. Kennedy, “ask not what your country can do for you--ask what you can do for your country.” It would seem that the very party which has deified JFK has forgotten his charge to them and to all of us. Ironically, it is the Republican Party which has followed Kennedy’s words more closely. It is the right which has sought to reform government entitlements which hold their recipients in an endless cycle of dependence. Conservatives demand that people take responsibility for their lives. Liberals have, in recent years, sought to remove all traces of personal achievement and merit. Schools have been urged to do away with grades, as they might discourage a child who fails. Physical education classes are doing away with competitive sports which might allow one child to be seen as more successful than another. In the classroom, curriculum seeks to equate all cultures and discourage any thought that Western ideology is superior to any other. Indeed, most discussions of Western civilization focus on the oppression by the West on other cultures. This systematic removal of personal responsibility has led to a generation of children which finds it difficult to relate to the real world where achievement is actually rewarded.

The left’s war on personal responsibility does not end with our public schools, however. Individuals who have experienced failure are encouraged not to look within and attempt to better themselves, but to seek out someone to blame. Violent criminals are simply victims of their poor upbringing; the intoxicated driver who runs down a child is really a poor soul who suffers from a disease. In fact, in today’s climate no one is to blame for their actions and those who would demand accountability are seen as insensitive, or racist, or cruel.

It goes without saying that a society possessed of greater personal responsibility would require smaller government, and therefore, fewer taxes. Beyond this, however, the conservative seeks to improve society with the idea of accountability. Many studies have shown that crime is significantly less in communities where the citizens are actively involved in their own policing. The polarizing issue of abortion would be greatly affected by a society in which people engaged in sexual conduct only when they were willing (and able) to take responsibility for their actions. Neighborhoods taking care of their own and demanding that those who can work do would obviously reduce the government’s need to parent us. And maybe, just maybe, when some idiot spills hot coffee all over themselves, they shouldn’t be able to sue for millions of dollars.

The problem with all of this is, of course, the fact that the Democrats like it the way it is. An army of ‘victimized’ people looking for someone to tell them it isn’t their fault need look no further than the Democratic Party. Indeed, the left draws much of its power from maintaining a permanent underclass. They all talk about being the party of the common man, but how many common men are worth close to a billion dollars (Kerry) or even 50 million (Edwards)? With the Democrats beholden to Union special interests, personal responsibility is further restricted by a political force dedicated to the elimination of merit. The final piece of the left’s triumvirate is the trial lawyers - a group of aggressive parasites feeding on those who have actually achieved success. Many talented, creative people have been forced out of their chosen professions by the rising cost of liability insurance, while corporations are fearful of firing even the most incompetent of employees due to the threat of litigation. Entitlement, special interests, and trial lawyers are the very core of the American left. It isn’t difficult to understand that personal responsibility is not, therefore, high on their list of priorities.

The political left is made of up opposite ends of the socioeconomic spectrum. The “haves”, who are rewarded with a special feeling of moral superiority when promoting a government which takes care of the downtrodden, and the “have nots”, who have been conditioned to look to government to sustain their very lives. The first group is made up of the likes of the Hollywood liberal, who mistakes their popularity for intellectual legitimacy, the intelligentsia, who have comfortably avoided reality within the safety of universities across the country, and the leftist news media, who continue to think of themselves as middle of the road. The second group is made up of people who seek to avoid responsibility for their actions. This group tends to believe that the government or corporate America, or their next door neighbor owes them something. These two groups form a symbiotic relationship and ensure the continued existence of the other.

Conservative thought, when given the opportunity, has proven successful in practice. In the 80’s when Ronald Reagan slashed taxes, the liberals bemoaned what the loss of revenue would do to their favorite programs. What happened, however, was that revenues to the federal government DOUBLED, despite the tax cuts. Lower taxes allowed the economy to function more efficiently – the wealthy, allowed to keep more of their own money, spent more (which, in turn created jobs) and hired workers. The average person also had more money to spend and did just that – on homes and cars and such, which again, created more jobs. The expanded work force now produced far greater tax revenues (at a lower rate) than did the smaller work force paying higher taxes. This success story could not be embraced by the Democrats because, while they had MORE money to spend in Congress, their power base (the government dependant) was declining. A more clear example of the left’s true motivations cannot be found.

Jefferson’s words in the Declaration of Independence that, “all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness”, are guiding words for conservatives. One single word in that passage defines the differences in liberal and conservative thought. The left tends to read over the word, “pursuit”. No government can or should try to guarantee happiness, but it can maintain an environment where the pursuit of happiness is always available. To be sure, we all have different obstacles to overcome and we begin the pursuit from different starting points, but if we accept responsibility for our lives, the goal is always within reach.

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: get over it AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 7/21/2004 11:47:00 PM ----- BODY:

All but the most politically unaware have noticed the outright contempt displayed by Democrats towards the President. A few weeks ago I decided that I would like to purchase a Bush T-shirt ... nothing like a weekend stroll through the aisles of the local Home Depot, proudly displaying your support for W. I soon became aware that finding a pro Bush T-shirt was a little more difficult than I had imagined. I did what any modern American consumer does when searching for that special something ... I went to Google and entered,"George Bush T-shirts". Much to my dismay, I had to wade through several pages of anti Bush propaganda before I found what I wanted. Shirts depicting George as Adolph Hitler or a terrorist were readily available as were slogans with questionable references to the President's name. I knew that the left hated Bush, but I was honestly surprised at the extent to which they have gone to express that hatred.

It all goes back, of course, to the 2000 election. Democrats continue to believe that Bush somehow "stole" the election. It is true that Gore won the nation-wide popular vote, but that isn't how we elect Presidents ... and while this may surprise most liberals, George Bush didn't make up that rule. Nor was Bush the first to win the election while losing the popular vote, John Quincy Adams, Rutherford B. Hayes, and Benjamin Harrison all were elected President after having received fewer votes than did his competitor. The left doesn't care much about history or the Constitution and was, therefore, surprised and infuriated that Gore lost. Now, let's be fair here ... if the situation had been reversed (as many pre-election scenarios wrongly predicted), we on the right would have been disappointed as well. Disappointment isn't the issue, however. An abject unwillingness to move on is. Even with all of the ridiculous counting and recounting of the votes in pivotal Florida, one thing was consistent - Bush won. He won the original count, the recount, the recount of "selected" counties, and the counts of every journalistic investigation since the election. Even the New York Times begrudgingly had to admit that Bush won Florida after it's investigation. Somehow the conspiracy theorists, who have a stranglehold on the far left, continue to float wild stories about the "stolen" election. I guess it was the same "vast right wing conspiracy" silently manipulating hanging chads in the dark of night.

Just get over it already. No love is lost between American conservatives and Bill Clinton, but we have moved on. At the height of the anti-Clinton atmosphere, it didn't begin to compare with the negative political climate today. Clinton was called a womanizer and a liar, but he actually was a womanizer and a liar. One can disagree with Bush ... even be upset with the manner in which he won the election, but he isn't a Nazi. Silly, incompetent liberals. Bush stands a good chance losing this election, but it is this wild-eyed hatred towards him that just might guarantee him reelection. For every empty-head who walks out of Fahrenheit 911 thinking, "wow, that reallymakes sense", there will be two who know that this rhetoric is simply overthe top. The average American remembers what happened on that fateful day in September of 2001 and they remember who stood tall and helped us all feel proud, even in our grief. So, I appeal to the left to just get over it already. It was four years ago and the world is sadly a much different place today. Enter the debate with real issues, bring fresh new ideas to the table. Let's focus on solving our problems here at home and abroad, but ifyou insist on continuing the adolescent polemic, ok. Having the political equivalent of Beavis and Butthead as the chief Kerry supporters may just work out fine for Bush.

And, hey, I'll take one of those W hats too.

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: and so it continues AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 7/21/2004 05:37:00 PM ----- BODY:

Today's unsolicited subscription comes to me from the Freedom Socialist Party. Apparently the left knows that it cannot win a mannered debate on the issues and resorts to attacking and harassing those with whom they disagree. As detailed elsewhere on this site, upon the publication of this site, I have been the focus of a ridiculous campaign of harassment and vandalism. The good part of it all is that I get to visit strange liberal (cyber) places and see for myself the insipid, paranoid, and delusional dialogue of those society has correctly left behind.

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: inevitability AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 7/20/2004 11:44:00 PM ----- BODY:

For all of their flawed thinking, I have to admit that I admire the child-like idealism exhibited by the left. They want everything to be warm and happy and fuzzy and, hey, I can appreciate that. I want that too. The problem is that too many Democrats do not seem to understand that these good things only happen as a result of specific actions. Too often the liberal intelligentsia refers to great achievements as being inevitable. During the recent remembrances of Ronald Reagan, many commentators made sure to point out that the Soviet Union would have collapsed of it’s own accord without any outside influence .. Reagan had little to do with it really. The end of slavery in this country is typically taught in our schools as an inevitable occurrence – that the horrid practice ended despite the best efforts of the establishment to keep it going. Man went to the moon. No big deal, we were bound to explore beyond the planet at some point. Even the birth of this country is often thought of as more evolutionary than revolutionary.

This is the thinking of the left. This is the thinking that recoils in horror when people take definitive actions. No wonder they hate Bush. This complete inability to understand cause and effect has obscured their understanding of history and made impossible their ability to take action regarding the future. This failure to measure human events has rendered the Democratic Party irrelevant as a vehicle for social change and geopolitical leadership. The party of Kerry, Kennedy, and Clinton is capable of bureaucracy only, of establishing and maintaining itself for political power alone. Among the clearest recent examples of this was Al Gore’s stringent promise to create a Social Security “Lockbox”. Every projection for Social Security has the system facing bankruptcy – the only issue at play is how soon it will happen. This eventuality presents us with two possible courses of action. We can simply ignore the problem and hope it goes away (maybe by putting it in a lockbox), or we can take bold steps to address the problem now. Then candidate Bush proposed a plan by which people might begin to fund and manage their own retirement accounts. Is this the perfect solution? Who knows, but at least it opens the door to finding a solution. The Democratic answer is simply to avoid it altogether. Why? Because it might be scary to some voters, and maintaining power is the ONLY rationale behind Democratic politics. The specter of entitlement makes it impossible for Democrats to honestly search for a viable solution. If we are lucky enough to find bold and innovative leadership on this issue, the left is sure to fight tooth and nail against the solution, but will, a generation later, casually express how the solution was inevitable.

Today we find ourselves fighting a war against terrorism. A war brought to our doorstep by those who would seek to destroy us. How we proceed may well shape the world for generations. Toward that end the examples of the past are instructive. The Cold War was won because of a bold strategy laid out by Ronald Reagan. Unlike his predecessors, Reagan was willing to defeat the Soviet Union. Reagan well understood that the Soviets could not keep pace if they were pressured on every front. As a result we opposed them in Afghanistan and elsewhere. We rebuilt a military which had fallen into shameful disrepair. And we always maintained our advantage – SDI and Reagan’s refusal to put it on the table broke the Soviet’s back. Inevitable? Had the logic of the preceding generation prevailed, the Soviet’s could have gone on indefinitely. Had we not opposed them in Afghanistan, perhaps they would have made their way to the Mideast oil as was their goal. A Soviet Union in control of the oil supply would have made the world a much different place indeed. No, our Cold War victory wasn’t inevitable, specific events in time gave birth to history as we now know it. The left howled that Reagan was a cowboy who was itching to start a war. They said that the world was less safe then than at any other time. It all sounds terribly familiar. Today, Bush is the cowboy who recklessly looks for war. Bush has created a less safe world than the one he inherited, we are told. Never mind that whole 9-11 thing. Bold actions need be taken to defeat terrorism and Bush is taking them. Today Bush and Blair stand where Reagan and Thatcher once did, where Roosevelt and Churchill did before them. This is worth remembering. Hitler didn’t give way to passivity – it was passivity which allowed him to trample Europe.

We mustn’t fall into this intellectual trap of cowardice or someday future generations will look at the ashes of our society and shrug their shoulders because, hey, it was inevitable.

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: website problems AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 7/20/2004 08:21:00 AM ----- BODY:

Hello to anyone reading this - and thanks for the interest. I am currently experiencing some difficulties with the links on this and other pages of this website (my thanks to MV for making me aware of the issue). The problem will be fixed as soon as possible.

I am not certain as to the source of the difficulties at this point, but I can’t rule out malicious activity. The content of this site is new – only recently is it a political-based site. I will probably write more about this later, but the short story is as follows. Within hours of this site being published, it was hacked and I was personally signed up for several leftist newsletters and other unwanted websites. My inbox was filled with subscription notices to the John Kerry campaign, Ralph Nader campaign, several far-left magazines, porn sites, and even the American Nazi party. Many of these notifications contained all of my personal information, including name, address, and telephone number. Subsequently my home has been vandalized as well .. coincidence? Luckily I was able to secure an IP address of whoever it was that did this – we’ll see what happens.

In any case, efforts are being made to resolve these issues.

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: choice AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 7/19/2004 10:31:00 PM ----- BODY:

American liberals would like you to believe that choice is the exclusive property of the Democratic Party. Certainly any large gathering of such people is sure to be dotted with placards proclaiming PRO CHOICE. Case closed, right? Well, maybe not.

The national conventions for the two major political parties are to be held over the next several weeks and it is clear that one party supports choice while the other clearly does not. Several prime time speakers at the Republican convention in New York City are noted politicians with a pro-choice stance. Among them are, California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger, New York Gov. George E. Pataki, New York Mayor Michael R. Bloomberg and former Mayor Rudolph W. Giuliani. Meanwhile the Democrats actively exclude any dissenting voices at their convention. Ironically, no pro-life speakers will be heard in Boston as the DNC refuses speaking slots to any who disagree with “choice.” One noted pro-life Democrat, Sen. Zell Miller of Georgia, will be allowed to speak, but he will be speaking at the REPUBLICAN convention.

Sounds like one of our national parties is fairly open minded about the sensitive topic of choice, while the other refuses to even allow dissent to be heard. Choice does mean choice doesn’t it?

John Kerry has stated definitively that if elected, he will make sure he has a pledge from any potential Supreme Court nominee that he or she will uphold Roe v. Wade. Meanwhile President Bush has stated on many occasions that no litmus test would be a part of any Supreme Court nomination and that only strict constitutional interpretation is a requirement. Additionally, Bush is against a pro-life amendment to the Constitution. One can find pro-choice members of Bush’s cabinet (Powell and others) – good luck finding a pro-life member on Kerry’s team. Once again, we find that one of OUR choices actually supports differing viewpoints (that's choice right?), while the other demands all to be in lock-step with a particular point of view.

The pro-choice gang was aghast recently when courts considered a ruling in which the murder of a pregnant woman resulting in the death of the fetus might be considered a double homicide. This, they claimed was simply a first step in outlawing abortion. Let’s avoid the whole abortion issue for the moment and concentrate on choice. If the pro-choice movement is truly about ensuring a woman’s right to choose, shouldn’t they stand behind whichever choice the woman makes? If a woman becomes pregnant and chooses to bring that life into the world, the pro-choice movement should celebrate and defend that choice with all of the vigor with which it defends abortion. The woman who chooses life for her fetus and is murdered or otherwise harmed - bringing an end to her child’s life - ought to be able to count on the pro-choice lawyers to bring the same swift and heavy-handed tactics against the purveyor of the foul deed as they do against any perceived threat to abortion. Of course the pro-choice people have no interest in the murdered woman or her dead child because in their minds, her choice wasn’t what they are all about. A supposedly pro-woman, pro-choice organization might want to consider changing their slogans until they actually DO support a woman’s right to choose.

More on choice (in all aspects of our lives) to follow.

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: the disingenuous left AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 7/18/2004 07:23:00 PM ----- BODY:

I find it infuriating that the left is fueling itself with so much weeping and gnashing of teeth regarding Iraq. Of course the standard line is that George Bush misled us and carried the country off into an ill conceived war. The problem with this is that our leaders in congress were given all of the most pertinent intelligence regarding WMD in Iraq and possible connections with Al Queda. To cast a vote in favor of going to war and then to later say that they were misled is simply irresponsible. Only one of two possibilities exists for these people (read Kerry and Edwards among others) ..

ONE .. they ignored the intelligence reports provided to them and simply voted without understanding the issue or

TWO .. they were fully aware of the intelligence reports and, as such, are being completely disingenuous and duplicitous now.

Which is it Mr. Kerry? For a US Senator with several years of experience on the Senate Intelligence Committee to be unaware of how intelligence assessments are made and the tenuous nature of them is simply unbelievable. The information was made available to Mr. Kerry and all the rest and he is every bit as responsible for his conclusions as is the President. To defer to George Bush on such a matter seems irresponsible for someone who has expressed utter contempt for the President and his decisions. Yet he and the rest of the leftist rabble run through the streets crying,” he misled us .. woe are we." We hear on a daily basis that the President is responsible for making conclusions based upon faulty intelligence and yet the members of congress who AUTHORIZED the President to act on his conclusions are somehow exempt?

As bad as it is for Kerry to be claiming innocence by ignorance, it is absolutely unacceptable for Mr. Edwards to do the same. He is a SITTING member of the Senate Intelligence Committee. If the intelligence was so obviously flawed as the left would have us believe, why didn't Mr. Edwards make it known then? He was privy to all of the most sensitive information and bears an even greater responsibility than does My Kerry. But we don't hear about any of this do we? The press is only interested in fueling the fire. No need to ask embarrassing questions of team John. And should some intrepid reporter dare to bring up Kerry and Edward's support for going to war, it is immediately diffused by the notion that they simply had the wool pulled over their eyes by the great and evil Bush.

So .. are we more comfortable with the idea that two leading members of the Senate voted for something they knew was wrong or that they simply didn't bother to read their intelligence briefings? Or does it make us feel any better that they believed exactly what every intelligence estimate said - that Iraq possessed WMD and was actively seeking to attain nuclear capabilities - but are now claiming to have been in the dark purely for political purposes? We are making a decision for the President of the United States here and neither of the scenarios for team John bode well for their ability to lead this country.

----- ENDPOST STARTPOST TITLE: welcome AUTHOR: Don Vanderpool DATE: 7/18/2004 07:10:00 PM ----- BODY:

this is a test for the my-orbit blog ..

I guess we'll see how it works and whatnot

----- ENDPOST