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I M P E A C H

The Sh*T Will Rise Float Again!

Memo from the Republican anti-union union verbatim:

Republican National Committee
To: RNC National Committee Members
Fr: Chairman Robert M. "Mike" Duncan
Re: The Center for Republican Renewal
Date: Friday, December 19

I am pleased today to announce the creation of the Center for Republican Renewal, a new office of the Republican National Committee that will identify, generate, and promote public policies that advance Republican principles of sound governance. I began exploring this idea in the days immediately following the November election. I would like to take this opportunity to explain the concept and how you as a Committee Member can participate in this exciting new endeavor.

Background and Context: Pre-Reagan and Pre-1994

The Center for Republican Renewal is a natural development given the political landscape and follows on previous efforts in this vein after the elections of 1976 and 1992. In each of those years, a Democrat was elected president with vague promises of change and came to power with strong Congressional majorities and a majority of governorships. Moreover, the Republican "brand" was in trouble due, in large part, to self-inflicted wounds.

As we all know, circumstances quickly shifted in our favor. In 1980, the party rebounded and we had Ronald Reagan in the White House, a Republican Senate, and several new Republican governors. In the historic 1994 election, we gained control of both houses of Congress and a majority of governorships - after earning only 36 percent of the presidential vote just two years prior.

Those quick comebacks in 1980 and 1994 did not just happen. They took hard work and smart thinking - not only from the standpoint of candidate recruitment, fundraising, and political strategy, but also from the standpoint of ideas. Put simply, Republicans gave voters a reason to elect them, and that reason was better policy. Each time, the driving force behind the resurgence of our Party was the Republican National Committee.

In 1977, RNC Chairman Bill Brock pushed the party into the work of ideas with twin endeavors: first, the creation of a quarterly public policy magazine, Commonsense, which embraced serious policy discussion as a vehicle for innovative policies and breakthrough ideas; and second, the formation of "Policy Councils," groups of public policy experts from across the nation who advised the party and its leaders on the best approaches to the nation's problems. These efforts were central to backing up the claim that Republicans were the "party of ideas," and were a precursor to the Reagan Revolution in 1980.

In 1993, RNC Chairman Haley Barbour responded to the previous year's defeats by committing the party to intellectual engagement, reviving the Commonsense magazine and going so far as to create a separate entity to develop policy alternatives. He explained this decision through "three premises: that fundamentally, ideas make a difference in politics; that, traditionally, ideas which make a difference have been associated with political parties; and, that currently, such ideas are less likely to be found inside the Washington beltway - and its thinking - than outside." The RNC's enthusiasm for debate and intellectual engagement fed directly into the development of the Contract with America and the Republican Revolution of 1994.

The common thread of these two periods - pre-1980 and pre-1994 - was that the Republican Party showed it was confident enough with its principles and core values that it could embrace debate and even disagreement in the pursuit of superior public policy solutions.

The Decision to Create the Center for Republican Renewal

It was in light of this history that I decided in early November to commit the RNC to a similar, policy-focused effort. Republicans have grown accustomed to having our party recognized as the "Party of Ideas," but we must acknowledge that many Americans today believe the party is stale and does not deserve that label. This is not a critique of our principles of a strong national defense, growth-focused economics, constitutionally-limited government, and a defense of traditional values. Rather, it is a reflection that we have not used our principles to provide solutions to the kitchen table concerns of middle-class America.

We must recognize that being the "Party of Ideas" requires daily effort to apply principles to the particular public policy questions of the day. All Republicans have an obligation to develop principled solutions rather than falling back on ideology alone; we must show how our ideology can be applied to solve problems. When we have a Republican President, that challenge falls to the White House and Congress. However, when the table is set as it is today, the RNC must play an enhanced role.

I believe we have an opportunity - and an obligation - to regain the American people's trust by showing them that it is the Republican Party that will provide the principled policies that will better improve the lives of all Americans. To do that, we must:

* Always bear in mind that good policy is good politics and that the Party should play a fruitful role in identifying and generating innovative ideas.

* Seek solutions outside of Washington, D.C. - listening directly to the American people and learning from those who are grappling with real problems.

* Remember that the laboratories for Republican policymaking are in the states, counties, cities, and towns of our nation, not in the halls of a Democrat-dominated Congress.

* Help coordinate policy approaches and alternatives between Congress, the Governors, and state and local officials.

* Be open to principled solutions no matter where they originate.

* Use new technologies to better create communities of support and innovation, and build those communities around shared ideas.
The Republican Party must not cede the policy field to the Democrats, and it must use the tools at its disposal to expand the portfolio of ideas that our candidates will have in the next cycle. As former Chairman Brock wrote in 1977, "the contest for votes must also be a contest for ideas." The Center for Republican Renewal will be dedicated to that proposition.

Structure and Leadership of the Center for Republican Renewal

The Center will be a division within the RNC and will operate from our national headquarters. Its budget has been approved by the RNC Budget Committee. At the outset, we anticipate a staff of approximately ten dedicated employees.

The executive director of the Center will be Steven J. Duffield. Many of you know Steven as the executive director of the 2008 Platform Committee, which produced a platform that was praised widely as being concise, principled, and forward-looking. Steven came to the Platform Committee after serving as a leadership policy advisor and chief counsel to Senator Jon Kyl (AZ) at the Senate Republican Policy Committee.

We will also be recruiting RNC Members and other conservative leaders to assist the Center with strategic planning and guidance as a Board of Advisors to the Center. In addition to RNC Members, this Board will include former Cabinet Secretaries, current and former Governors and Members of Congress, leaders of conservative Policy groups, and other Republican leaders.

Overview of Projected Activities

The Center will be aggressive and very active in the policy community. In general terms, we can group its projected activities into three areas: 1) increased policy focus through RNC activities; 2) nationwide policy outreach; and, 3) extensive policy debate and discussion.

First, the Center will be a resource to you as a Member of the Republican National Committee and to other Republicans because we will now have in-house experts on current policy issues and debates. The Center's analysts will create detailed policy products, from fact sheets and backgrounders to critiques of proposed legislation, which will be fact-intensive and professionally crafted to ensure accuracy. These products will be useful to RNC members, to our new Speaker's Bureau, to our Communications team, and to Republicans across the nation. This written product will be developed in cooperation with Republican elected officials both in Washington and in the states.

Second, the Center will engage in aggressive policy outreach throughout the nation. This will be one of many opportunities for your direct involvement with the Center. This outreach will include the reestablishment of the Policy Councils so that we can draw on the substantive expertise of policy experts who work with Republican Governors and legislators, Congressional leaders, and think tanks nationwide. The goal is to learn constantly and ensure that potential applications of our Republican principles are fully understood, shared, and promoted.

Third, the Center will be committed to the debate and discussion of ideas. We believe that it is best to have policy discussions within the party and that we should not fear disagreement. To that end, the Center will build on the 1977 and 1993 efforts with Commonsense by developing a new website devoted to public policy. We will invite original content from experts and then encourage debate. This will be another opportunity for Member involvement with the Center. The website also will host policy blogs that will provide forums for substantive analysis of the key issues facing the nation, and input from the public will be gathered on a systematic basis. Our goal is to grow a community founded on common goals and aspirations.

As the months pass, we anticipate the Center branching into other areas and finding other tools and tactics that will advance our ideas. It will be a nimble operation that is quick to shift when circumstances demand it.

Conclusion
I am very excited about the Center for Republican Renewal because I believe it is an integral part of our rebuilding process. I look forward to your suggestions on how to make the most of this new endeavor.

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end of memo

PS. John, all these "tax deductible" non-profits are suicidal for a Republic. Do the math. Tax money is going to fund the very people who want to destroy this nation.

How so? Is anyone confused?

Simplified Version:

A owes ten dollars.
B owes ten dollars.

A donates his ten to the Remembering Hitler's Better Qualities Foundation and doesn't pay it to the gubmint.

Who does?

Well, guess what. The gubmint suddenly finds itself having to raise taxes on the folks who don't use these political dodges (among whom you'll find a large number of anti-tax math wizards).

So B will still end up paying it all.

And John, it's the same with churches and charities. Any "gift" to the poor that involves a payback is a "sale to the poor".

We AREN'T BUYING IT!

We want our country and our Constitution back. Take your faith based and politically based and ulterior based "gifts" and shove it.

Amen. :-)

Christians: Don't give me any static. Find "you rob the poor". And if you can't find that, just use your heads. Tax Deductible = Sale. Gift = two pennies in the box, and I'm pretty sure you know what that means. Camels and needles are an exception, not the rule. You are soooooooo wrong.

And your right is who's left? Think about it. Are you God? (Look up that reference and find out who were the sheep and who were the goats.)

The Confederacy http://usconstitution.net/csa.html#Preamble should have taken the hint. Unsalty salt is good for what? (Need a hint? See the title of this post.)

NO SALE!

Neither then nor now.

Now this time all together, please.

Amen.

Thanks.

Will Obama Pull A Clinton On Us? A Cheney Perhaps?

Or will he pull a Constitution on us. I could handle that.

Barack Obama has said he aims to close the Guantanamo Bay detention centre and put a clear end to torture in the US within two years of becoming president.

The president-elect told Time magazine he aims to restore the balance between US security needs and the Constitution.

Outgoing Vice-president Dick Cheney has said he does not see how the Guantanamo facility can be responsibly closed until the "war on terror" was over.

He also justified using water-boarding on some detainees during interrogation.

He said the technique, which simulates drowning, was an appropriate means of getting information out of suspects such as Khalid Sheikh Mohammed, the alleged mastermind of the 11 September attacks on the US.

more here: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7789005.stm

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The reason this is significant is because waterboarding has been considered a violation of international law since ??? (and anyone who is stupid enough not to be able to figure out if it's torture or not should resign from the human race) AND we have an acid test for Obama.

Will he pull a Clinton on us or will he stay on track...

US Constitution or bust.

Here's the bottom, people. It's where change comes from. Save the numbers. Use 'em.

Congress switchboard (202) 224-3121
Toll free (some may not work): 1-800-828-0498 or 1-800-4591887 or 1-866-340-9281 or 1-877-851-6437

APPENDIX

Amendment VIII - Cruel and Unusual punishment. Ratified 12/15/1791.

Excessive bail shall not be required, nor excessive fines imposed, nor cruel and unusual punishments inflicted.
http://usconstitution.net/const.html#Am8

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Waterboarding#Legality

Wikipedia on Legality of Torture in International Law:

All countries that are signatory to the UN Convention Against Torture have agreed they are subjected to the explicit prohibition on torture under any condition, and as such there exists no legal exception under this treaty. (The treaty states, No exceptional circumstances whatsoever, whether a state of war or a threat of war, internal political instability or any other public emergency, may be invoked as a justification of torture.) Additionally, signatories of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights also agreed to its Article 5, which states, No one shall be subjected to torture or to cruel, inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.

United States

• In 1947, the United States prosecuted a Japanese military officer, Yukio Asano, for carrying out a form of waterboarding on a U.S. civilian during World War II. Yukio Asano received a sentence of 15 years of hard labor.^[45] The charges of Violation of the Laws and Customs of War against Asano also included "beating using hands, fists, club; kicking; burning using cigarettes; strapping on a stretcher head downward."^[46]

• In its 2005 Country Reports on Human Rights Practices, the U.S. Department of State formally recognized "submersion of the head in water" as torture in its examination of Tunisia's poor human rights record, ^[47] and critics of waterboarding draw parallels between the two techniques, citing the similar usage of water on the subject.

• On September 6, 2006, the United States Department of Defense released a revised Army Field Manual entitled Human Intelligence Collector Operations that prohibits the use of waterboarding by U.S. military personnel. The department adopted the manual amid widespread criticism of U.S. handling of prisoners in the War on Terrorism, and prohibits other practices in addition to waterboarding. The revised manual applies only to U.S. military personnel, and as such does not apply to the practices of the CIA.^[48] However, under international law, violators of the laws of war are criminally liable under the command responsibility, and could still be prosecuted for war crimes.^[49]

Effectiveness as an interrogation technique therapy

Harsh interrogation techniques lead to false confessions according to some experts. 'The person believes they are being killed, and as such, it really amounts to a mock execution, which is illegal under international law,' claims John Sifton of Human Rights Watch'." It is "bad interrogation. I mean you can get anyone to confess to anything if the torture's bad enough," said former CIA officer Bob Baer^[50]. The Independent reports "legal experts said Khalid Sheikh Mohammed appeared to be exaggerating his role for his own self-aggrandizement and may also have deliberately floated false claims to send US investigators on wild goose chases."^[51]

^References

1. ^ In April 2006, in a letter to Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, more than 100 U.S. law professors stated unequivocally that waterboarding is torture, and is a criminal felony punishable under the U.S. federal criminal code.

Quail Thing

You make my heart stop
You make everything... groovy

Please click on the Badge and go and sign the Petition to the Attorney General Designate to appoint a Special Prosecutor to investigate the war crimes of the Bush Administration!

"There is nothing to fear but fear itself."
Franklin D. Roosevelt

...but instead, they decided to bolster their union ranks through a mechanism to supply parts for their pieces of crap cars, instead of protecting the existing jobs by producing a product that wouldn't be so disposable.

How many parts distributors would have died natural deaths, instead of growing unsustainably obese, if the "industry" actually cared about the quality of their product?

Previous generations of Americans couldn't afford to buy inferior products, nor would they consider profitting from the continued production of inferior products. In effect, by allowing our Government to subsidize GM through State and Government contracts, even though the purchase of these substandard products generated never ending repair and replacement costs, they encouraged the concept of failure as winning, at the expense of the people who depended on their product.

They invested in an economy based on fixing bad products, instead of success.

Kinda like the Iraq war. Professionalism would have ended it years ago, but incompetance means the profits keep on coming.

Our forefathers would have seen to it that they joined Studebacker in the dustbins of History long ago.

They want jobs? Turn them back into hemp farmers.

Mathis had this to say about the auto industry in general on Travis Smiley. (The original air date on PBS was December 8th.)

Tavis: You mentioned a moment ago you were from Detroit. News, of course, out of Detroit, out of Washington today vis-à-vis Detroit, that it looks like the Big Three are going to get some money from Washington; I'm hearing about $15 billion, a car czar comes along with that. If they don't meet the timetables and the expectations, the money can be pulled back.

But somebody's going to oversee this, but it looks like they are going to get some money to prevent this bail-out, which raises two questions for me. Number one, what do you make of the Big Three and your hometown being bailed out, for starters?

Mathis: Well, let me put it in this frame of reference - the auto companies, in my opinion and the opinion of many others, built industrial America. Now we see that the finance companies, to a large extent, built corporate America in recent years. So I think if anyone is entitled to a bailout, it's Detroit and the auto industry. Fifteen billion versus $700 billion. We're about $685 billion short of the bailout for Wall Street, who put us in the condition of the financial crisis we're dealing with now.

Certainly Detroit bears some blame, or the auto industry some blame for their condition, but to a larger extent the finance corporations of America also has put us in this condition.

Tavis: Talk to me about the impact this has on everyday people, because the one thing I've been complaining about consistently here, and said so some weeks ago, that there's been a lot of conversation about Wall Street, a little conversation about Main Street, but not much conversation about the side street, not much conversation about poverty and its impact on everyday people.

I saw, as I'm sure millions of others did, today on the cover of "The New York Times" and now all over the news, a church that we know well in Detroit, Greater Grace, Bishop Charles Ellis, who we both know, had a service at his church yesterday where they put three SUVs up on the stage and basically had prayer and worship and speaking in tongues, asking God to bail out Detroit.

Something must have happened, because the word came today that Detroit's going to get something. But talk to me seriously about the impact on everyday people in Detroit.

Mathis: And first let me clarify that those SUVs that those SUVs were hybrids.

Tavis: They were hybrids, indeed they were.

Mathis: Because one of the news broadcasts tried to make it appear as if it was some type of conflict. However, I think once again that the spirit of Detroit has risen, and that has worked. I really believe that prayer had something to do with it, (laughter) I do. We needed it and it happened, and I think that the bailout is a result of many industries - both the corporate leaders, secondly the labor unions, and the activists.

We (unintelligible) hundreds of thousands of people in both cities around the country - Detroit, Chicago, and Washington D.C. - to agitate and to lobby on behalf of the auto companies, and it was successful. And so I believe that if we continue to fight for side street America, we'll win.

Mentioning side street America and Detroit being the most impoverished city in America, the reason it's the most impoverished city is because over the last few years we've lost hundreds of thousands of jobs in the auto industry, and so had we continued to lose or go into bankruptcy and lose millions of jobs, not only would Detroit be the most impoverished city, the United States would be the most impoverished country.

Tavis: Talk to me about the psyche of the city. This is obviously - this news today is good news for the persons in that city, disproportionately Black, who work in that auto industry, but you've got an auto industry that's in trouble; to your point, it is the poorest big city in the country, the drama with the former mayor, Kwame Kilpatrick, who we both know, the Lions 0 and 13. (Laughter) On a serious note, the psyche of the city has got to be taking a beating right about now.

Mathis: Well, we're used to challenges. We are perhaps the largest city with the largest economic deprivation in the country as a result of corporations moving out into the city. They remove the jobs and replace them with guns and drugs for us to kill ourselves with. Those left standing went to prison, and that movie has been played over and over throughout the years with failed education systems to go along with it.

However, I think that Detroiters are fighters. Our morale is still there, and we haven't given up. And despite what the obstacles might be, I think we're going to continue to be fighters. We fought this time with the bailout, and we won, and we're going to continue to fight and I think we'll continue to win. We'll overcome all the scandals - even the Lions one day. (Laughter) They're going to win.

... Oh really?

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I M P E A C H
THEM BOTH !!!

Stay TUNED for the next exciting episode of Keystone Kongress in Krisis:

Pelosi's, Hoyers', Conyers', and (or) Waxman's contribution to liberalism!

Don't get left out. Subscribe today with a tax deductible contribution to the American Nancy Party.

Since the mid '90s we've been living under a dark cloud of unenlightenment where people said they would govern America like they would run a business and unfortunately, they meant it.

But daily, not just once a year, we experience firsthand the incredible (meaning unbelievable) paradox of our own existence and the even more impressive implications of the existence of others. But businessmen don't plot blood, bones and tears on their stock market charts. That happens on another plane at right angles to the only one they can see.

I could go on about that and I could mention of the tragedy of a "winners and losers" philosophy in the domain (or kingdom) of ethics, but right now I just want to tease those of you who might be inclined to think theoretical physics is something that needs to be done on a whiteboard by mathematicians.

Imagine a disk in space with a radius of 186,000 miles made of the substance of imagination (for now) and capable of handling all the forces that work upon it when we set it in motion revolving around its axis.

Draw one straight line drawn out from the center to the rim

As we know, nothing can travel past the speed of light (186,000 miles per second.). Rotate the imaginary disk at 2 radians per second so that a point on the line at say, a foot out from the center will travel in an arc two feet in length every second.

What will the "real" shape of the once straight line be after two revolutions (of it's center) as viewed from high above the disk?

It would be (approximately) a spiral, the center having gone around twice and the edge having gone around (at most) once, limited by the speed of light.

What is the shape of the once straight line after 4 revolutions? Eight?

[Advanced: After a minute at 2 rad/sec stop it suddenly. What happens to the spiral, does it continue to unwind at the rim or does it remain in whatever shape it was in when it was stopped? Will this appear the same to an observer from above as it would to an observer at the hub? Does the disk get distorted or does space? If space is distorted permanently, is it elastic or fluid and does each object define it's own dimension?]

By simply thinking about it we KNOW we can find out something by studying rapidly rotating objects even at slower rates in the real world.

What if we can't use the knowledge?

Who cares, and what if we can.

Kongress saved us the price for recycling two aluminum cans per man woman and child PER YEAR! by cutting funding of the collider at Fermi.

But this thought experiment can still be done and even more cheaply.

Don't look now, Congress, but...

You are NOT alone.