Archive for February 6th, 2010

Watch out for GOP wooden nickels

February 6, 2010

“Watch out for wooden nickels,” is something my Grandpa used to tell me when I was a kid.  The sentiment couldn’t be more apt now though.

I’ve watched with some skepticism as Establishment Republicans have been swept into office on a tide of genuine political discontent.   As the GOP claims “great” victories in states like Massachusetts and Virginia, gun owners should be hesitant to jump on the GOP bandwagon.

On Tuesday evening, GOP pundits were championing Congressman Mark Kirk’s victory in the Illinois Republican U.S. Senate primary.  Many of those same talking heads are enthusiastically trumpeting Representative Kirk’s chances to win the Senate seat formerly occupied by President Barack Obama.

Is this Republican success reason for gun owners to be optimistic?  Hardly.

Congressman Kirk has long been an enemy of gun owners, supporting legislation to close the so-called “gun-show loop-hole”, ban certain types of semi-automatic rifles and require background checks to purchase ammunition.

Kirk is not the only anti-gun Republican looking for a promotion.  His gun-hating compadre Congressman Mike Castle of Delaware is preparing to make a run for the Senate as well.

What does this mean for gun owners?

We cannot allow ourselves to be sucked into the hallow victories being celebrated by the Republican Party.  Gun owners must be able to discern between the pro-liberty, pro-gun candidates and the anti-gun wolves hiding in Republican clothing.

That’s why your involvement with the National Association for Gun Rights is so important.  We are here to help you cut through the election year lies, through the political propaganda and expose the anti-gunners from BOTH parties.

Right now the staff at the National Association for Gun Rights is assembling data on candidates from across the country. We’re beginning to target House and Senate races, and we’re preparing our candidate surveys.

Gun rights surveys are an important part of holding politicians accountable and finding out their views on the Second Amendment.   If you’d like to read our survey, you can click here.

Please take a moment to forward this e-mail to your freedom and gun loving friends and family members, remind them that just because a politician has an “R” after their name doesn’t mean they’re pro-liberty or pro-gun.

For liberty,

Dudley's Signature
Dudley Brown
Executive Director
National Association for Gun Rights

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Posted in Editorial, Opinion, Education, Gun Control, Hoplophobia, Law, Local Politics Colorado, Local Politics Wyoming, News, Politics, Wordpress Political Blogs | 2 Comments »

Profiles of Valor: U.S. Army Major Brent Clemmer

February 6, 2010

On Jan. 28, 2007, while commanding the Charger Company of 2nd Battalion, 3rd Infantry Regiment, United States Army Major Brent Clemmer received notice that a helicopter had been shot down near Najaf, Iraq. Responding coalition forces were under heavy gun and mortar fire. Clemmer moved his company approximately 60 miles to connect with a Special Forces team to establish a perimeter between the downed chopper and the enemy. From there, he directed the recovery of the wreckage and the bodies of the two pilots killed in the crash. Clemmer’s unit fought off numerous enemy attacks and prepared for a full assault on the town where the insurgents were entrenched.

At dawn the following morning, however, wounded women and children began coming from the town, signaling the jihadis’ surrender and turning the would-be assault into a humanitarian mission. All told, Clemmer and his soldiers killed about 250 insurgents and captured more than 400. In addition, they recovered stockpiles of ammunition and weapons. Upon receiving the Silver Star for his actions, Clemmer said the award was a reflection on the performance of the nearly 170 soldiers in his company.

SOURCE

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Epic Fail obama: FY 11 Budget

February 6, 2010

Responding to The One’s latest budget proposal, Rep. Mike Pence (R-IN) commented from the House floor, “[W]hen I look at the president’s budget for fiscal year 2011 [FY11], I think about what Albert Einstein said one time. He said that ‘doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result’ is the very definition of insanity.” Congressman Pence went on to note how Obama’s budget fits squarely within that definition, including the defense portion of that budget.

While Department of Defense (DoD) and administration staff juggle numbers at the fringes — witness the ongoing discussions over canceling the C17 Globemaster III production line and killing an alternative engine for the F-35 Lightning II — the reality is that both DoD and the administration are happy to continue the status quo.

The evidence? Despite the rhetoric-du-jour, the rubber meets the road with dollars, and notwithstanding pervasive hope ‘n’ change speechifying, virtually nothing has changed with respect to the U.S. defense budget. In this budget submission, for example, military outlays remain virtually unchanged, save a slight increase (less than two percent) over inflation.

Also, the president apparently has included supplemental budget items as an integral part of his FY11 proposal. Translation: The commercial sector’s interfacing with DoD might actually be able to depend on the budget for once rather than having to wait for end-of-year fallout money or congressional plus-ups to end the year in the black. That predictability should mean lower overall costs, rendering savings for national defense.

On the down side, however, we note that neither a new National Security Strategy (NSS) nor National Military Strategy (NMS) — the key “vision” pieces to national security — has been published since 2006. This demonstrates that despite all the hype about “change,” at least with respect to defense, not much is different — save, perhaps, a burning (dare we say, “flaming”) desire to appease the far left by eliminating DoD’s “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” policy. Therein lies the rub: We have no real vision for tomorrow’s defense, but we face very real military budget tradeoffs today.

Budgets involve choices. What should we buy? What programs should we kill? What should we merely sustain? But these types of questions can’t be answered cogently without an overarching set of objectives. For national defense, those objectives should be articulated in both the NSS and the NMS.

The real issue for the president is determining our focus with respect to national security. Is it fighting a peer/near-peer nation? Is it conducting so-called “overseas contingency operations”? Is it some combination of both? Or is it something else? Unfortunately, the vehicle that should have answered these questions — the Quadrennial Defense Review — has become little more than a political football and/or shill for the service-of-the-hour. What is needed is an objective, disinterested look at the nation’s true national security requirements from an outsider’s perspective. Ultimately, this will lead to rational decision-making when it comes time to draft a viable national defense budget.

Fortunately, the president isn’t cutting the military to the bone, but this fact stands in contrast to the Left’s objectives, so expect considerable push-back on this portion when the budget arrives on House and Senate floors for review.

Barack Obama’s 2011 NASA budget will effectively terminate America’s manned space flight program, leaving space exploration leadership to the Chinese and the Russians. Read more here.

SOURCE
Oh, and the impostor in chief showed his true feelings about respecting the military…


At the National Prayer Breakfast Thursday, the commander in chief not only got a sailor’s name wrong, but couldn’t figure out how to pronounce “corpsman.” Yes, he said “corpse-man.”

Watch the video.


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Posted in Economics, Editorial, Opinion, Education, Law, News, Politics, Wordpress Political Blogs | 3 Comments »