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Mark Caserta: Job numbers obscure hardship felt by Americans

20 May

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Mark Caserta: Free State Patriot Editor

Anyone suggesting the current unemployment rate in our nation is truly at 5 percent is either being intellectually dishonest or wantonly ignorant about our nation’s job situation.

Frankly, Americans are tired of liberal Democrats paying homage to the Obama administration’s bogus “jobs creation” success. It’s shameful to ignore hurting families in lieu of their own political expediency.

It’s the type of representation Americans abhor.

Look around you. Where are the good-paying jobs?

The truth is Americans are falling out of the job force at an alarming rate. According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, (BLS) a record 94 million people were missing from the labor force last month with the labor participation rate reaching its lowest point in 38 years.

Most Americans aren’t aware of the ambiguity of the government’s monthly jobs report, nor of the Obama administration’s misrepresentation of the facts in order to shield their failing policies.

Understand the unemployment number being touted before the American people only counts people who don’t have a job, have actively looked for work in the prior four weeks and are currently available for work.

Everyone else falls out of the equation and are no longer counted in the total number of unemployed.

The truer number of total unemployed, including those who have stopped looking for work and those employed part time for economic reasons, is at 9.7 percent, according to the BLS.

But I believe even that number is too low. Here’s why.

Not many people consider how the government “captures” unemployment statistics. Some simply assume the government uses the number of people collecting unemployment benefits under state or federal programs. But some people are still jobless when their benefits run out.

Other people think the government counts every unemployed person each month. But this would require every home in America to be contacted to gather the information, making this method unrealistic.

Rather than formulate a viable, accurate method of measurement, the government opts to conduct a monthly survey called the “Current Population Survey” (CPS) to measure our nation’s unemployment.

Each month, “highly trained and experienced” Census Bureau employees contact sample households, either in person or over the phone and ask about the labor force activities or non-labor force status of the members of the household.

Now there are only about 60,000 eligible households in the survey sample, but they’re “supposed” to represent our nation’s workforce demographically.

Does anyone understand the potential obscurity of this process? The end result is precarious at best!

Further exacerbating the problem, of the jobs being created, the strongest growth has been in lower-paying retail and service industry jobs, according to BLS statistics.

The hardship felt by American families is very real. Tragically, it’s being mocked by progressive “elitists” like Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and other liberal Democrats trying to convince us our lives are getting better.

But it’s all about to change.

Americans are very angry. They’re weary of the deception.

I believe they’re about to collectively put an end to this “reign of oppression” from the political establishment.

Mark Caserta is a conservative blogger, a Cabell County resident and a regular contributor to The Herald-Dispatch editorial page.

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Mark Caserta: It’s time for us to unite to defeat Hillary

13 May

me

Mark Caserta: Free State Patriot Editor

Donald Trump has shocked the Washington establishment. And while he wasn’t my choice for the GOP nomination, it’s time to unite under one purpose. For when the smoke clears, I fully support defeating Hillary Clinton.

 

And right now, Trump may be our only hope.

 

Let me be clear. This election may offer the most important choice of our lifetime. Our nation is on life support and we’re in critical need of leadership. And sitting this one out is a vote for Hillary.

Let’s examine what’s at stake.

 

If Hillary is elected president, we’ll be giving the Supreme Court over to the progressive movement, literally for the rest of our lives. And you won’t believe how quickly our country will be inflamed with liberal pathosis.

 

The LGBT movement will have secured a victory far beyond achieving “acceptance” in our society. We’ll see an escalation of lawsuits against Christian business owners choosing to adhere to their religious principles like Aaron and Melissa Klein of Oregon. The Kleins were eventually forced out of their bakery business in 2013 following an anti-discrimination lawsuit in which the judge ordered the couple to pay $135,000 for declining to bake a cake for a lesbian marriage ceremony.

 

I believe we’ll see attempts to rescue Obamacare from obliteration through leveraging the tenacious tentacles of the most feared organization in our nation’s government – the Internal Revenue Service.

 

We’ll see a stalwart approach at identifying families and individuals who haven’t purchased healthcare due to cost or coverage and attacking them with merciless penalties.

I predict getting an abortion will be as simple as purchasing an “over the counter” drug. Liberals believe that a woman’s right to choose far exceeds the life of an unborn infant.

Babies will be tossed into the dumpster out of “inconvenience” or due to physical impairment. Partial birth and live birth abortions will likely be re-invigorated as they align with the progressive mentality of “choice supersedes life.”

 

Hillary has already condemned a proposed “wall” closing our borders to illegals. A Hillary presidency would open our borders to illegals under the guise of “humanity” and then allow them to vote.

 

Liberals have long desired to relax the voting requirements on every demographic they’ve accused conservatives of trying to “disenfranchise” so they can buy their vote with your tax dollars!

Expect the same lackadaisical approach to ISIS. Hillary has already refused to utter the words “radical Islam,” just like Barack Hussein Obama. She will continue to refuse to identify our enemy in lieu of being a Muslim apologist.

 

And just last month, Hillary Clinton vowed to “put a lot of coal miners and coal companies out of business.”

 

Now, I’ve been to the coal fields of Southern West Virginia several times recently. The lack of jobs and ensuing poverty is heart-breaking. It’s impossible to understand Clinton’s “compassion” for illegals entering our country and her indifference for hard-working families in our area simply trying to make a living.

 

Hillary Clinton must not be elected president. And it isn’t about politics or even winning.

It’s about survival.

 

Mark Caserta is a conservative blogger, a Cabell County resident and a regular contributor to The Herald-Dispatch editorial page.

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New Trump Ad Hits Hillary Hard Over Benghazi Statements

11 May

hill

Would like to give her a lie detector test.

Randy DeSoto May 10, 2016 at 5:15pm

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Donald Trump released a new ad Tuesday with family members of Benghazi victims saying Hillary Clinton misled them to believe the 2012 Benghazi attack was the result of an internet video.

The video released on Trump’s Instagram account opens with Clinton speaking about the “awful internet video” that she proclaimed sparked the Benghazi attacks in remarks made at Andrews Air Force base shortly after the strikes on the American consulate and CIA annex.

Next comes news footage of victims’ family members, including Patricia Smith, mother of State Department employee Sean Smith; Charles Woods, father of Navy SEAL Tyrone Woods; and Kate Quigley, sister of Navy SEAL Glen Doherty, speaking about how Hillary Clinton did not tell them the truth.

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Mark Caserta: Consider impact of Obamacare when voting

7 May

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Mark Caserta: Free State Patriot Editor

  • May 6, 2016

As many of us are busy “revving our mental motors” to pick the most qualified 2016 presidential candidate, it’s time to revisit the impact of the largest form of socialist redistribution ever to be thrust upon the American people, as well as who supports keeping it.

 

Let’s begin with broken promises of Obamacare.

 

Remember when Barack Obama repeatedly told Americans, “If you like your healthcare plan, you’ll be able to keep your healthcare plan – period”?

In what Politifact called “The Lie of the Year,” Obama began perpetrating this canard upon the American people as early as 2009 to facilitate passage of his signature healthcare law. Millions of Americans have since lost their policies and have been forced to purchase another plan at an increased cost.

 

But for liberals, the end justifies the means.

 

During the 2008 campaign and healthcare reform debate in 2009, Obama repeatedly promised that under his administration, the typical American family would see their health insurance premiums decrease by up to $2,500 per year.

 

The reality is most Americans will see their premiums increase. According to multiple sources, including CNN Money, Obamacare premiums will increase an average of 7.5 percent for the benchmark silver insurance plan next year in the 37 states using the federal exchange, based on Department of Health and Human Services estimations.

 

Also during his 2008 presidential campaign, Barack Obama told Americans of his proposed healthcare plan, “I can make a firm pledge. Under my plan, no family making less than $250,000 a year will see any form of tax increase. Not your income tax, not your payroll tax, not your capital gains taxes, not any of your taxes.”

 

Isn’t it amazing Obama’s lies don’t matter to liberals?

 

As the Supreme Court ultimately ruled, the Obamacare Individual mandate is in itself a “tax” requiring individual workers to purchase health insurance even if they don’t want it! This mandate is critical for Obamacare’s viability as it must “take” from younger, healthier enrollees and “give” to clients with higher rates of claims.

 

But Obamacare’s impact is far-reaching.

 

The 40-hour work week is rapidly disappearing as businesses re-tool, re-staff and reschedule to stay under the Obamacare radar.

 

As part of the employer mandate, beginning in 2015, employers with 50 or more “full-time equivalent” employees were required to provide health insurance coverage for employees averaging 30 hours per week over the course of a month.

 

This job-killing mandate has discouraged employers from hiring above the 50-employee level and from scheduling employees 30 hours. As a result, employers are forced to demand more production from existing staff while many retail and service employees are having to work a second or third job simply to survive.

Remarkably, the government touts these as “jobs created” in their progressive world of Obamanomics.

 

But the thousands of families trying to make ends meet know the difference.

 

Now, Hillary Clinton wants to expand Obamacare if she’s elected president.

 

How will furthering this health debacle impact our nation long term?

 

I suggest you consider that question when you go to the polls.

Mark Caserta is a conservative blogger, a Cabell County resident and a regular contributor to The Herald-Dispatch editorial page.

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Mark Caserta: Rights not exclusive to LGBT community

29 Apr

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Mark Caserta: Free State Patriot Editor

4.29.16

Liberals seem to only focus on protecting the rights of individuals engaged in behaviors that align with their progressive ideology.

 

One timely example would be the promotion of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) lifestyle in America.

 

What seemingly began as a “simple pursuit” of acceptance has now expanded into a large segment of society boldly embracing their choice of an alternative lifestyle.

And I believe it is indeed their right to pursue their constitutional rights.

 

But not if it infringes upon mine.

 

In fact, no segment of society should have to sacrifice their rights so others can exercise theirs. One could easily call that “reverse discrimination.”

 

For many of us, gender identity wasn’t something we ever envisioned questioning. We simply accepted our physical characteristics as God’s will in our lives. However, through the years, progressives have encouraged parents to promote “healthy gender development” and allow their child’s gender identity to “evolve” as they grow older.

 

This gender “ambiguity,” while fully within a parent’s rights, has been an enabler to some ultimately choosing this lifestyle.

 

Through the years, we’ve seen the LGBT movement expand into nearly every segment of society – from scouting to sports teams. LGBT communities and organizations now thrive all around us.

 

And I have no reservation in stating that I believe they are deserving of respect and should be treated no differently than anyone else – period.

 

But they are in no way deserving of special treatment that infringes upon my rights. And that has nothing to do with discrimination.

 

Too often the LGBT community is portrayed as victims of hatred and persecution deserving of special protection and accommodation beyond existing laws on the books.

 

According to an October 2015 column in The New York Times by Richard Perez-Pena, California has become the first state with a policy of providing sex reassignment surgery for some prison inmates. And as advocates for the process move forward, it’s only a matter of time before your tax dollars will do the same in your state.

 

In 2015, Huntington Mayor Steve Williams formed the LGBT Advisory Committee to help advance the discussion about equality and justice for the LGBT community in our area. While the mayor’s intentions may be honorable, I believe it’s a mistake to expose our city to the same array of unintended consequences other cities now face.

 

Now, I have a few questions regarding my rights in this gender identity quandary.

 

“Which public restroom will they be allowed to use?” Will it be based on an individual’s “gender choice” or their biological persuasion?

Suppose a 30 year-old male chooses to put on a dress and walk into the same women’s restroom your 14-year-old daughter just entered.

 

Are we to assume this individual’s intentions are harmless?

 

How will law enforcement be forced to react if a citizen acts in such a situation?

 

We’ve allowed liberals to advance “political correctness” to mean some rights are more deserving of protection than others!

 

Not so!

 

Individuals outside the LGBT community also have rights which need to be protected.

 

Mark Caserta is a conservative blogger, a Cabell County resident and a regular contributor to The Herald-Dispatch editorial page.

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Doug Smith: Anatomy of a bully

17 Apr

DOUG SMITH

Doug Smith: Author, historian and lead contributor to Free State Patriot

4.17.16

I know The Donald well. Not personally, but he is easy to identify. You see, I was always the outsider. The kid from somewhere else. We moved around a lot. Perhaps you have a memory of kids who were in school with you for 12 years. I do not. A year or 2, then on to another adventure. Why another story, but the part of my story that resonates is like the inscription on the edge of old world maps:

“Heere there be Dragons”.

Yes, beyond the familiar, if you sail your ship there, there Be Dragons. Take care. And for the kid who was forever the new kid, there Be Bullies. They would always seek out that new kid. They liked to bluster, and punch, and insult, and steal, and fight. I was never sure what pleasure they took in hurting and humiliating a shy new kid, but they surely did.

So, I know The Donald well. He was in every school I ever attended. And he sought me out. He might want to shake me down for lunch money. He might want to beat me up. He might want to sick his buddies on me while he watched and egged it on. If things did not go his way, he would be the first to cry about it and shout over the unfairness. Just like Donald. But as long as you seemed weak and a likely victim, he would take your milk money, knock your books out of your hand, knock you down, and swagger away, feeling smug and satisfied.

There were 4 ways of dealing with the “Donalds” in a new school.

  1. Avoid him.
  2. Give him what he wants.
  3. Become a toady. Praise him lavishly. Help him beat up someone even weaker. His ego is enormous and fragile, so if you learn to stroke it, he will mostly laugh at you and leave you alone. Although, if you don’t please him, he will still beat you up now and then. Because he can. For example, watch The Apprentice, or Chris Christie doing his “ Donald’s Stray Dog” act. This is the least risky course of action, although it takes a strong stomach.
  4. Having determined that you are going to get beat up regardless, and that you do not have the stomach to crawl to your own personal Donald any more, grit your teeth and say no. Then follow up with a haymaker right to the nose. And jump on him and do your dead level best to just beat the living crap out of him. If he should fight anyway, don’t stop hitting him. He may win, and he may beat you up again, but be a madman. In your mind determine that one of you is going to die, and you want it to be him. Fight till you cannot rise, or until someone pulls you off.

And an amazing thing happens. You may, indeed, get beat up. But when it actually costs him pain and blood, he loses his enthusiasm for you as a target. You figure out that for all the Donalds, at all the schools you will attend, the sooner you identify the Donald, and fight him tooth and nail ( that is not metaphorical) , and hurt him as badly as you possible can, regardless of the cost, the sooner the Donalds will leave you alone.

You don’t have to win, but you do have to fight. Because the Donalds don’t want to fight, (or debate, for that matter,) they just want to bully and beat down someone weak. When their victim chooses not to be a possum, or an old kicked dog, but turns into a tiny, snarling wolverine, the Donalds don’t know how to handle it. They move on.

A hard lesson. But a survival skill. You surely do not want your Donald to become class President, or Mayor, or heavens, President!

So well done, Colorado. Maybe there is something to that medical marijuana, after all. But the Donald did not get one Colorado delegate. He didn’t do his homework, and now he wants to copy yours. And he is whining that you won’t let him.

Colorado, you learned how to deal with the Donalds in your school. Now everyone else, you can ignore the toadies, the Christies, and the Trumpkins taking smack about riots. We do not do politics based on the bullies and the mob in this country. We are not Venezuela.

In 1968, the Democrats, ( including Barack Obama s buddy Bill Ayers) tried to use the rule of the mob and riots in the streets ( of Barack Obama ‘s Chicago) at the Democratic convention. It was ugly. The police had to deal with it and it was in all the papers. I remember reading about it and seeing the riots on live TV. Democrat National Convention Riots.

I also remember that in 1968, we elected Richard Nixon, a Republican.

Americans, for the most part, do not like a bully. Now, The Donald has his toadies, but he cannot command a majority of even the party for which he is running, in even one state. More people dislike than like him.

I stand by the article I wrote about Trump back in September of 2015. He is an ass. And a Bully. And beating up people, or insulting everyone who disagrees with him, or just being mad at the same time that I am mad, does not make him a good leader.

He sort of reminds me of Walter Matthau and Jack Lemon in Grumpy Old Men. Their characters and just what the title implies, with plenty of PUTZ! And yelling and dirty tricks on each other. They took a perverse delight in growling and knocking each other around.

But the quiet, competent son of one of the GOM was the mayor.

Perhaps Life will Imitate Art?

 

 

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Truth and Consequences

16 Apr

DOUG SMITH

Doug Smith: Author, historian and lead contributor to Free State Patriot

4.16.16

There used to be a TV game show called Truth “or” Consequences. It was around when I was a kid, and fans of Bob Barker will remember him as the long time host and face of the show.  The premise was to ask a trivial or nonsense question, which of course could not be answered, then have a “consequence of some fun or silly activity. It was fun.

bob

Today, we are engaged in a global game of truth or consequences, but the questions, and the consequences, are far from trivial. Now, I worry all the time about being politically incorrect, and the truth is rarely “correct” but just for fun, I’m going to try a little foray into truth.

Truth.

There is no magic. Merlin was not a court magician to Arthur Pendragon, Once and Future King. Yea, I’m disappointed too, because I loved the stories of Gawain and Lancelot and Merlin and Wart and the Lady of Shallot. But sadly, Merlin, such as he was, was a bright charlatan who used some knowledge to paint a magical picture of himself and con people, and was puffed into a lot more than he was by writers trying to sell a manuscript and earn a buck. Arthur was not turned into a bird, did not have a magic sword, and is not holding it in suspended animation till the day of England’s greatest need, when he will return to lead them once more. He is dust. Dead. Gone.

Darn.

But on the subject of magic, it is also not possible to pass a law to make water run uphill, or make wealth magically appear by ordering it to be given to a certain group of people. You cannot make a poor man rich by taking wealth from a rich man and giving it to him. History has shown that is a path to misery as the mob strips the producers of their wealth, and their ability, and motivation, to produce more, and, having eaten the seed corn, becomes an equal distribution of misery.

Truth.

Islamic people, mostly men, commit acts of terror, murder, bombings, shootings, beheadings, stabbings, at an appalling rate. I m a little tired of having to say, no it’s not all of them. But it is enough of them that reasonable people worry about Muslim enclaves in Brussels, Paris, and Dearborn.  Stop lecturing me about Islamophobia and backlash against Muslims. There has not been a backlash. If the worldwide rash of murders and atrocities continues, it is likely there will be.  And, by the way, Islamophobia: Fear of Islamists? That is not a mental condition. It is a reasonable reaction to the actions of Islamic people around the world.

 The Leftist apologists, the gutless cowards on the Right, and the endless stream of Muslim talking heads notwithstanding, you cannot, in truth, get away with saying a Muslim who hears Death to America shouted over and over, it is the West’s fault that your country is a poverty stricken sewer, and it is your duty to go kill them so you can get out of it and go to paradise, is suddenly NOT a Muslim as he shouts an Islamic call to war and opens fire on innocents.

Yes, he is. And you all know it. And you are all liars. That is truth.

And the Consequences?

147 individual acts, not counting the daily atrocities in the cesspool of the Middle East war zone, in the past 30 days. They netted over 1000 deaths and over 3000 injuries in 25 different countries. 27,000 acts of terror and murder around the world since Barack Obama stepped onto the world stage, countless, mostly ignored acts of barbarism, genocide, and atrocity in the Middle Eastern lands controlled by Muslims.

Truth

More people from more nations and more cultures have come to, or tried to come to the United States than any other country or empire in history, now or since the dawn of civilization.  Self-loathing Lefties can’t figure it out. People who escaped Vietnam in 1975 can. People who escaped the Castros can. People who made it out of East Berlin can. Millions around the world don’t risk life and limb, and run away with nothing but their lives to come to the horrible, repressive, racist, world the Left thinks we have. The do run from the Socialist paradise the think is Cuba or the Soviet Union. We have never had a problem of limiting migration into the Middle East because of people yearning to live under Sharia law and work on the oil rigs. We never will.

 Consequence

Everybody wants to come here. But not everyone can.

Truth

If we permit “Multi Culturalism” nonsense dilute or destroy who we are, and transform the US into a mix of the horrible places from which so many want to escape, there will be no escape, anywhere. There will be no shining city on a hill. There will be misery, and tyranny, or despair, and there is in so much of the world, and as has been the norm in so much of human history.

 Technology is not the key to advancing liberty.  Ask a slave who died in the arenas how much he appreciated the fine 1000 year Roman roads which brought him to his death. Rome had a towering civilization, with ruins still extant today, 1600 years after it fell. Yet they did not spread freedom, and the Republic died quickly and gave way to the Empire. It died rather more slowly.

America is a unique nation, a new concept within history. If that history is forgotten, and that light extinguished, the lives of many around the world may well become what Hobbes feared: “No arts, no letters, no society, and which is worst of all, continual fear, and danger of violent death: and the life of man, solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short.

 Look around. How many people do you see now living precisely that life?

Are we going to be a bulwark against such a world?  Or surrender to the mob and centuries of darkness?

Wait! Don’t answer. Think about it before you do. Think carefully. Because truth, and choices, do have consequences.

 

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The 3% Lamborghini

15 Apr

DOUG SMITH

Doug Smith: Author, historian and lead contributor to Free State Patriot

 

“Tell a lie big enough, and long enough, and people will start to believe it. “ Joseph Goebbels is credited with “The Big Lie” approach to propaganda, but I doubt he invented it

Still, the Big Lie technique is around, alive, and well. And just occasionally, inadvertently, one of the Big Liars lets a big of light shine through.

In Missouri, State Legislators have subpoenaed documents relating to the Abortionists (well, Doctors, in total fairness, but abortion is their trade) who were caught on tape merrily discussing the price of a liver from a baby, cut carefully from inside his mother, so as to maximize the viable organs available for sale, in order to facilitate her purchase of a Lamborghini.

(For us folks who work for a living, and have never cut up an 8 month fetus as a down payment, and drive a Mini Van, that would be a 200,000 to 500,000 dollar Italian sports car).

Now the big Lefty propaganda machine is working desperately to get us back on the Big Lie track by calling the tapes “debunked”.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MjCs_gvImyw

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zyhz8Zjm1i0

Still, they are out there for anyone to see, and very clearly these “Doctors” are haggling over the price of livers and limbs of aborted babies. Which is a violation of federal law. (How fortunate for them, as for Hillary, that they are Democrats.

But as for debunking the evidence of the crime, well, we can all see what it is they are getting away with.

So where does the Big Lie come into this? Well, in Mo, Lefties protesting State legal actions against Planned Parenthood (how do they come up with that name? Nobody who uses their services is becoming a parent. ) noted that actions which may shut down PP of Mo would be bad, because (pay attention 🙂 Planned Parenthood of Columbia is the ONLY abortion provider in Missouri. The Big Lie? Listen to any Pro Abortion advocate, or read on PP s website, or listen to MSNBC, ( no really, Don’t listen to MSNBC, I don’t want to be responsible for you tossing your cookies, that was a figure of speech,) and they will all say , Oh NOOOOO, Planned Parenthood is about Women’s Health, not Abortion. Abortion is ONLY 3% of what we do.

But the Lefties shriek (as Lefties always do when challenged) loudest in what they do NOT say.

They do NOT say, if PP of Columbia is closed, women won’t get Mammograms. (Since, of course, no Planned Parenthood facility anywhere has ever provided or facilitated a Mammo for a woman.)

They do NOT say, close down PP Columbia, and no women can get birth control.

They do NOT say, the day you close PP of Columbia, STD s will run rampant because no woman can get tested, ever again.

What they shriek from the rooftops, (using, no doubt, only 3 % of their voices) is that shutting down PP of Columbia would mean no Abortion providers remained in the State of Missouri.

So, in deference to Joe Goebbels and Margaret Sanger, they continue to tell the 3% lie, 100% of the time. Now Sherlock Holmes indulged in the 7% solution (of cocaine) to numb his active mind. The Abortion Industry, and the Lefties, hope that the 3% solution will numb the brains of the folks to reality.

That logic breaks down, however. If Abortion is a question of right and wrong for its opponents, and a question of convenience for its supporters, then whether its price tag is 3% or 97% hardly matters.

I wonder if we would accept from Dr Goebbels the argument that the Final Solution was ok because after all, it is only 3% of the German budget, was only going to kill 1% of the population, and besides, we can recoup enough to buy everyone a Porsche by selling the Art and Jewelry of dead Jews. I hope not, but of course, I’m not a Lefty, and it is hard to tell just what they might buy.

Well, perhaps that is not precisely true. We do know they want to buy abortions. And Lamborghinis.

 

 

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Conservatism is an enduring ideology

15 Apr

me

Mark Caserta – Free State Patriot Editor

  • 4.15.16

I don’t subscribe to the liberal narrative that the principles of conservatism have moved “far right” of mainstream America.

 

And you shouldn’t either.

 

Understand, the entire premise of the progressive movement is based on our actions and behaviors being weighed and measured on a sliding scale of standards with no immovable principles. It isn’t conservative principles which are moving; it’s the progressives who continue to advance their agenda further “left.”

Liberals always seem to spin their motives with the thread of “human kindness” while painting conservatives as staunch, uncaring radicals. But you may be surprised at just how conservative you really are when examining the truth.

 

Conservatives believe liberty is a God-given right and not a “gift” from government. We agree the Constitution of the United States is the supreme law of the land and may not be altered except by amendment. In fact, our continuance as sovereign nation rests on adhering to the rule of law penned by our framers.

 

We believe our faith in God is integral to the success of our nation and the two cannot be separated. Americans have a right to exercise their freedom to worship, uninhibited by anyone, including the government. And our right to expression is not limited by the amount of offense it may be to others, for they have the same right.

 

We believe government’s power should be derived from the “consent of the governed,” as stated in the Declaration of Independence, and anything less is tyrannical. We stand for limited government, lower taxes and more state-based solutions. We feel Washington is operating far outside the boundaries of the Constitution and must be reined in.

 

Conservatives believe in the sanctity of human life. The Guttmacher Institute has tracked roughly 50 million abortions since 1973. This is a travesty for which we will have to give account before the Almighty someday. Historically, there have been two other times when babies have been murdered on a large scale. Both times, a deliverer emerged – Moses and Jesus. We expect this will happen again.

 

Conservatives believe in the free-market principles of capitalism. Hard work and commitment should be rewarded with performance-based dividends. The socialist concept of “spreading the wealth” creates a slothful society where too many individuals feel they have a “right” to something without having earned it.

 

We believe in Ronald Reagan’s philosophy of “peace through strength.” Our military strength is non-negotiable. There are too many nations who see the United States as vulnerable. We owe the brave men and women who guard the walls of liberty every opportunity to win, unconditionally.

And finally, we believe in the exceptionalism of America and do not believe it must be “fundamentally changed.” The Obama presidency has successfully dispelled that myth. Voters are “champing at the bit” to rid our nation of this failed liberal experiment.

 

So while the dangerous, unrestrained ideology of progressivism has indeed taken a toll on our nation, the enduring principles of conservatism have helped us remain the greatest nation on earth.

 

And mainstream America hasn’t gone anywhere.

 

Mark Caserta is a Cabell County resident.

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Mark Caserta: Gitmo not symbolic of U.S. malfeasance

8 Apr

me

  • 4.8.16  

Frankly, I’m tired of liberals maintaining that the Guantanamo Bay (Gitmo) detention camp in southeastern Cuba is a recruitment tool for radical Islamic terrorists and must be closed.

gitmo 1

News flash for progressives: Gitmo was constructed to house war criminals captured by U.S forces in Afghanistan, Iraq and other theaters of the war. The intelligence acquired from detainees has, in fact, saved American lives.

And Americans are weary of our president apologizing for it.

According to “The Religion of Peace” website, “the Quran contains at least 109 verses that call Muslims to war with nonbelievers” for the sake of the Islamic Caliphate. It further states that Muslims who don’t join the fight are called “hypocrites” and warned that Allah will “send them to hell” if they don’t join the slaughter.

It’s very naive to believe groups like ISIS would attempt to leverage Gitmo interrogation techniques as a recruitment tool, while they’re busy chopping off heads, burning people alive and drowning them in cages.

The truth is the expansion of Islamic terrorism on behalf of Allah began decades ago.

In November 1979, Iranian militants seized the U.S. embassy in Iran and took 52 American diplomats as hostages. For 444 days, Americans were held hostage while a feckless Carter administration attempted to negotiate with Iran’s revolutionary leaders. The event captivated our nation and helped give birth to an era of terrorism and regional instability in the Middle East.

In October 1983, 220 Marines, 18 sailors and three soldiers were killed as Islamic terrorists drove a truck carrying explosives into the Marine barracks in Beirut, Lebanon. Shortly afterward, 58 French paratroopers were killed in a similar attack. It was reportedly the deadliest attack on the U.S. Marine Corps since the battle of Iwo Jima during World War II.

In February 1993, New York experienced the first attack on the World Trade Center when Islamic terrorists parked a rental van in a garage below the twin towers packed with explosives. Six people died and more than 1,000 people were injured in what was, at the time, one of the worst terrorist attacks ever to occur on U.S. soil.

And the list goes on.

Incidentally, after closing Gitmo, President Obama plans to relocate these Islamic extremists to prison facilities in the United States.

Now, prisons are filled with individuals potentially dismayed with their lives in the U.S. What successes would these Islamic leaders have within the confines of their prison walls in the recruitment and training of domestic terrorists?

Terrorists are far more empowered by Obama’s tepid response in curtailing their activity than they are by Gitmo. Obama and his liberal followers want Gitmo closed because they’re desperate for accomplishments in his fruitless legacy – period.

Gitmo is not symbolic of U.S. malfeasance as liberals maintain, but rather our resoluteness against terrorism.

Mark Caserta is a conservative blogger, a Cabell County resident and a regular contributor to The Herald-Dispatch editorial page.

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