The Patriot Post Brief 7-26-2010

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The Patriot Post Brief 7-26-2010
From The Federalist Patriot
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The Foundation

"Newspapers ... serve as chimnies to carry off noxious vapors and smoke." --Thomas Jefferson

Re: The Left

"The Journolist has started to leak like an overripe diaper. Just in case you've been living in a cave, or if you only get your news from MSNBC, here's the story. A young blogger, Ezra Klein, formerly of the avowedly left-wing American Prospect and now with the avowedly mainstream Washington Post, founded the e-mail listserv 'Journolist' for like-minded liberals to hash out and develop ideas. Some 400 people joined the by-invitation-only group. Most, it seems, were in the media, but many hailed from academia, think tanks and the world of forthright liberal activism generally. They spoke freely about their political and personal biases, including their hatred of Fox and Rush Limbaugh, and their utter loyalty to the progressive cause and Democratic success. That off-the-record intellectual bacchanalia has started to haunt the participants like an inexplicable rash after a wild party during fleet week. ... Perhaps stretching the diaper metaphor too far, what's inside Journolist may stink, but it's no surprise that it does. ... Journolist is a symptom, not the disease. And the disease is not a secret conspiracy but something more like the 'Open Conspiracy' H.G. Wells fantasized about, where the smartest, best people at every institution make their progressive vision for the world their top priority. ... For a liberal activist that's forgivable, I guess. But academics? Reporters? Editors? Even liberal opinion writers aren't supposed to 'coordinate' their messages with the mothership." --columnist Jonah Goldberg1

Opinion in Brief

"The real problem with JournoList is that much of it consisted of exchanges among people who worked for institutions about how to best hijack their employers for the cause of Progressivism. Thus, the J-List discussion revealed [last week] in the Daily Caller was about how the group could get their media organizations to play down the Reverend Wright affair and help elect Barack Obama. Were I an editor of one of these institutions, I would instantly fire any employee who participated in this gross violation of his/her duty. For example, the J-List included Washington Post reporters, and the idea that the paper has been turned into a propaganda organ is a big reason it is bleeding readers and influence. Of course, it is possible that the Post's editors were on the list, since the membership is not known, in which case the corporate executives should fire the editors, or the board should fire the executives, or the stockholders should fire the board. (If Director Warren Buffet was on J-List, I give up.) So here, JournoList is composed not of reporters who happen to be 'Progressives,' but of Progressives who boast about how to perfect and use their capture of their employers. This is in itself institutional rot, but the more serious rot is the failure of the managers of those institutions to react to the problem." --James DeLong2 of the American Enterprise Institute

Government

"Congratulations are due to the Washington Post. 'Top Secret America,' its in-depth, multi-part, two-year investigation into the vast network of government security agencies and private contractors is an eye-opener -- obvious Pulitzer bait. Reporters Dana Priest and William Arkin have revealed a 'hidden world, growing beyond control.' Within this 'alternate geography' of the United States, they found some 1,271 government organizations and 1,931 private companies at work on programs related to counterterrorism, homeland security and intelligence in about 10,000 locations across the United States. Over 850,000 Americans have top-secret security clearances. They spend 'a gusher of money' that has flowed since 9/11. And -- this will blow your socks off -- the Post found that there is tremendous waste, duplication, and lack of accountability. Really? In a government program? ... But why do they tend to notice government waste only when it applies to national security? The Post and other liberal organs have been quick to record how much the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq (particularly Iraq) have cost taxpayers. But they seem much less curious about waste, duplication, and even fraud in other areas of government spending." --columnist Mona Charen3

Liberty

"Like the Founding Fathers, including Thomas Jefferson in the Declaration of Independence, conservatives believe that our rights as human beings come from God. They do not come the state or the ruling class. If the state can grant rights to you -- civil rights, parental rights, or any others, they can take them away. Ask residents of the former Soviet Union what is was like to have no rights and that they only existed at the whim of the ruling party. When the government gets in the business of granting rights or dispensing charitable deeds, it does it on the premise that it knows what is best. Thus, the bureaucracy, the government institution, not the individual, will determine who is worthy of receiving those funds. And when an institution becomes self-perpetuating the people become secondary. Thus, the ultimate goal is to shrink the independence of men and women, but enlarge their dependence on government. ... The fundamental principle of conservatism is freedom." --columnists Diana Banister and Craig Shirley4

The Gipper

"The American people, the most generous on earth, who created the highest standard of living, are not going to accept the notion that we can only make a better world for others by moving backwards ourselves. Those who believe we can have no business leading the nation. I will not stand by and watch this great country destroy itself under mediocre leadership that drifts from one crisis to the next, eroding our national will and purpose. We have come together here because the American people deserve better from those to whom they entrust our nation's highest offices, and we stand united in our resolve to do something about it." --Ronald Reagan5

Political Futures

"Over the past year, the Democrats fixed on what they thought was a devastating four-word slogan to defeat Republicans in 2010: 'The Party of No.' Unlike many campaign slogans, it was fair enough. After all, the Republicans had opposed almost unanimously all of President Obama's major bills (socialized health care, stimulus, nationalization of GM and Chrysler, 'cap and trade,' financial overregulation, multitrillion-dollar yearly deficits, tax increases, etc.) But the Democrats seem to have stopped using that phrase in the past several weeks as, apparently, White House strategists have come to appreciate that the only people screaming 'no' louder than the Grand Old Party are the American people. ... Instead, for the past few weeks, the president has been publicly testing a new message: Remember, you would not only be voting against Democrats in November, you would be voting for Republicans. In other words, the public seems to have made the Democrats the issue in this election, and the Democrats would like the election to be a vote on the Republicans. This is a plausible strategy. If Mr. Obama can persuade the public to vote up or down on the Republican Party, it probably would be down. But of course, in midterm elections, the public usually (and seemingly overwhelmingly in 2010) plans to vote up or down (in this case, down) on the president's party -- not the opposition party." --columnist Tony Blankley6