Redstate on Michelle and Jeb

Hensarling-Bachmann

I think having Jeb Hensarling as Conference Chair and Michelle Bachmann as Vice Chair would be a powerful duo. Hensarling is a very substantive policy guy. Michelle Bachmann gave up campaigning for herself to go all over the country for Republicans this year. She deserves a seat at the table.

Tom Price, a doctor, at Policy would be huge. I know him well. Having a doctor there would send a strong signal that the GOP is serious.

Also, Fred Upton as Chairman of Energy & Commerce is unacceptable to every single conservative I know. He is a union lackey and bad on virtually every fiscal issue. Shimkus, Stearns, or Pitts would be far better.

On Appropriations, not only do we need a guy like Jack Kingston who, by the way, was the only Appropriations Cardinal to turn in budgets balanced or in surplus. But that's not all. There need to be a sizable number of fiscal conservatives put on the committee. Start with Jeff Flake, but don't stop there. Tom Graves or Lynn Westmoreland from Georgia, other solid folks, etc. We need new blood on Appropriations.

Last, but absolutely not least, the Rules Committee absolutely must stop being a proxy for the Speaker. NO WAIVERS and load up Rules with good conservatives who are not tokens or proxies.

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Redstate Morning Briefing

Armageddon: What Democrats Are Hiding & Why They Are Really Scared
Unions and Democrats are scared. They should be.

Very soon, Democrats and their union bosses' worst fears may soon be realized and, if they cannot continue their slight of hand, it may threaten their very existence. While it is true that Democrats and their union bosses are facing possibly debilitating losses on November 2nd, they are hiding the really bad news from voters until after November 2nd.

Do you remember that promise we heard back in 2008 about transparency? Democrats and, in particular, then-candidate Barack Obama stated emphatically that "transparency and the rule of law will be the touchstones of this presidency." What a joke that was. Well, it's time to shed some light on the house of cards that is about to come crashing down on Democrats' and union bosses' heads.

In June, a conversation took place in a hotel restaurant in Washington. As a latecomer to the conversation, it was easy to pick up that the topic that was the $165 billion union pension bailout bill introduced by Sen. Bob Casey [D-PA] in March.
Upon introductions, one of the individuals stated, "this is Armageddon."

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Obama and Democrats lie about Citizens United and campaign money

...it is telling that this White House would invest so much energy on pushing an argument that is so fundamentally false on its face. It tells you something about their respect for the American people, their belief in the gullibility of the media, and their character.

Barack Obama and the Democrats have a story about this election. It goes like this. The Supreme Court ruled that corporations have free speech rights in the Supreme Court decision Citizens United. Since then, all this corporate money has flowed into campaigns, blah blah blah. And the press has completely accepted this line of thinking.

It is complete nonsense. They probably want to concoct a falsehood so that this election somehow is not about the White House. But the reality is that their core narrative is simply false on its face.

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The Heartbreak of Palin Derangement Syndrome.

It's sad that this needs to be brought up, but it must: it would appear that the Netroots - as per their continuing habit of acting as if the American political system was identical to a pre-Giuliani Times Square peep show emporium - has gotten themselves in a bit of a scrape, again. Specifically, they spent several cheerful hours hooting and hollering over the way that THAT WOMAN suggested that the Tea Party not "party like it was 1773? before they noticed that. well, that the Boston Tea Party was in, well, 1773.
A couple of things: first, this storyboard; which is both cruel and accurate.
Second, while I understand and expect that your average online progressive blogger has about much awareness of American history as, say. Oh, this is awkward. An online progressive blogger would be the actual yardstick for 'abysmally ignorant about American history.' Nonetheless, while I understand that the Online Left is dumb. really, Gwen Ifill. You're supposed to be one of the bright talking heads.
Tsk, tsk.

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Redstate Morning Briefing

1. On the Battle Between Midgets vs. Tigers
In the battle between midgets versus tigers, the midgets can win. But a few of the midgets must sacrifice themselves to distract the tigers.
This is precisely what is happening in the battle between the tea party and the establishment. The establishment controls the major party machines, the media, the fundraising tools, etc. The tea party is not in a fight against the Democrats or Republicans, but the establishment, which has grown out of touch with the people and is destroying the country. Democrat and Republican alike, the leadership of each is terrible and given voice by a media that is largely incapable of relating to the concerns of a group labeled fringe yet driving the election.
The tea partiers are the midgets. The establishment politicians and media are the tigers.
In Delaware, Christine O'Donnell is the midget sacrificing herself to the tiger of the mainstream media and establishment.
Because of Christine O'Donnell's willing sacrifice, the tigers are distracted. With only about twenty-two days left, the tigers are just now trying to refocus on Sharron Angle, Ken Buck, Mike Lee, Joe Miller, Marco Rubio, Rand Paul, Pat Toomey, and Ron Johnson. Meanwhile, for the past five weeks or so, these candidates have built up leads or drawn even with their opponents.
While the tigers have been taking out Christine O'Donnell, these candidates have surrounded the tigers and are preparing to slay the beasts.
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2. Are You Astroturf?
For the last year and a half the TEA Party movement has rallied Americans around the cause of bringing fiscal responsibility back to our Government. We have protested. We have made catchy t-shirts. We have raised awareness. We have confronted our liberal representatives and served notice that they will soon join the unemployed.
Each of those activities is important and has a place but now it's time to put your money where your mouth is: Protest must become action.
Winning requires action! It's politics 101 that if you want to make policy then you must win politically. The only way to do that is to get more of your people to vote than the other guy turns out.
On November 3rd, as we look back on this election, there will be no comfort in saying, "Well, we lost by 5% but check out those awesome signs and pun-ridden bumper stickers we had!!"
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3. David Frum and the Limits to Deviancy
NewsReal Blog has done an investigative piece into one of its former writers. The writer, Alex Knepper, now writes for David Frum.
Alex Knepper is a 20 year old adult who wrote longingly of CHILF's. You, like I, probably have no idea what that is. If you know what a MILF is (NSFW, but you can google it), substitute the "mother" for "child".
What makes this relevant, despite its sordid nature, is NewsReal Blog having tipped off Frum to his employee's behavior and other conservative sites giving this Alex Knepper character a forum. You'd like to think that had they known of his predilections, they would not.
Beyond this being a derivative and foreseeably byproduct of sexualizing teens like Mylie Cyrus and the whole Bratz phenomenon, the problem we have here is people like David Frum giving a 20 year old who goes on a gay teen forum to engage in fantasies about sex with underage boys a forum to espouse views that Frum and others characterize as conservative or libertarian, thereby giving him a legitimacy no one should.
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4. Turning the Lights On #2: Tim Walz & Nancy Pelosi's NRA Endorsements
By now, you've probably heard that the NRA has endorsed Nancy Pelosi.
Okay, so the NRA hasn't officially endorsed Pelosi, but it's leaders seem just fine with signing a Devil's Pact with her.
Having been a NRA member off and on for many years, like many, I too was a believer that the venerable gun-rights group was a firm defender in America's Bill of Rights-all ten of them. At least that's what I believed until recently. As it turns out, though, save the 2nd Amendment, the NRA no longer seems to care about the rest of the Bill of Rights at all.
Especially troubling about today's NRA is that fact that the organization has endorsed so many big-government Democrats in so many races, that gun owners might actually still take the NRA's endorsement seriously. This is especially the case when the NRA endorses certain Democrats who, like Nancy Pelosi, would just as soon use the Constitution as a piece of Charmin, as opposed to the guiding principles to which our nation should be governed.
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5. "Economic Treason" & the Confiscation of America
Over the last year (and longer), we've written on the union push to nationalize America's retirement system and how important the $165 billion union pension bailout bill is to union bosses and their lackeys in the Democratic Party. Moreover, for two years, we've written how America's health care system will be socialized medicine within three to five years. We've also forewarned, before it was too late, how "Wall Street reform" opens the door for unions to re-order America's companies into their own unionized image. We've shown how today's union bosses are wholly lined up with global socialists and you saw the Marxist March on Washington last weekend. And, finally, we've told you how unions or their allies may already be stealing the November elections.
Why has all of this been put before you? Very simply, to show you how unions and their minions in the Democratic party are stealing the nation out from under all of us.
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