Matt McCall endorses RESTORATION of CONGRESSIONAL AUTHORITY!!!

"The soul of a lazy man desires, and has nothing;
But the soul of the diligent shall be made rich."
Proverbs 13:4

Back in the day this website focused primarily on national issues, the usurpation of the ELECTED Congresses' authority by the administrative state was one of our major bugaboos; thus, we were pleased to learn about this recent proposal from United States Senator Mike Lee:

First, Congress must reclaim its power of the federal purse. Our formal budget process, which dates to 1974, has fallen apart, and we must restructure it for a post-earmark world. We need to bring entitlement programs back onto the actual budget and bring self-funding federal agencies back under annual appropriation.

Second, we need to reform legislative “cliffs” that loom behind expiring legislation — at the end of the fiscal year and when the federal debt nears its statutory limit — to realign the incentives of the American people and their government. Congress must take back control of actual federal lawmaking. Today, the vast majority of federal laws are unilaterally imposed by executive-branch agencies.

Third, Congress must take back control of actual federal lawmaking. Today, the vast majority of federal laws are unilaterally imposed by executive-branch agencies. The bureaucrats in these agencies then serve as police, prosecutors, and courts in the ensuing cases. All major regulations should be affirmatively prioritized and approved by a vote of Congress.

Finally, we must clarify the law governing executive discretion, which right now allows presidents and federal bureaucrats to ignore or rewrite federal statutes, so long as they have a clever enough reason.

Reform in these four areas would put Congress back in charge of federal lawmaking and put the American people back in charge of Washington — just as the Founders intended.

Learn more about the Article 1 project here.

And guess who endorses the Article 1 project?!?

This is exactly right. I fully support the efforts of Mike Lee and Jeb Hensarling. The career politicians have created...
Posted by Matt McCall on Friday, February 5, 2016

Ted Cruz makes PETA angry

"Then God blessed them, and God said to them, “Be fruitful and multiply; fill the earth and subdue it; have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the air, and over every living thing that moves on the earth.”
Genesis 1:28

Apparently, Ted Cruz went shopping yesterday, cue progressive outrage:

Ingrid Newkirk, president of People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, issued a written statement criticizing the photo.

“If the rug is real, Ted Cruz's use of it reduces a majestic once-living being to a doormat,” she said. “Gunning down wildlife in order to make umbrella stands, rugs, and ornaments is frowned upon in the 21st century, as most people have come to learn from and be awe-inspired by the lives, intelligence, and social make-up of other living beings.”

We're sure PETA wants to extend similar protection to unborn babies....

John Cornyn's slimy interview with Glenn Beck

Kudos to John Cornyn for taking some tough questions, but his answers aren't particularly satisfying:


Highlights:

• "Republican on Republican violence."
• Cornyn changed the subject.

• Is Ted Cruz or Lindsey Graham and John McCain causing division?!?
• Again, Cornyn changed the subject.

• It's worth pointing out that Cornyn was a crappy chairman of the NRSC; in 2012, handpicked Cornyn candidates lost in Virginia, Montana, North Dakota, Wisconsin, and New Mexico.
  
• Removing name for the Lee letter.
• I "reconsidered"

• What exactly is the plan to get rid of Obamacare?!?
• Election 2014...don't get me started.

Freedomworks announces John Cornyn protests across Texas

From Freedomworks' Grassroots director:

John Cornyn  left from Senator Lee’s fight to Defund ObamaCare. 

Cornyn should be doing everything he can to fight Obama’s health care takeover. Yet pressure from Mitch McConnell made him squirm, and Cornyn abandoned Senator Lee.\ 

We need to find out why he refuses to stand with Mike Lee and do everything he can to protect Texas from ObamaCare. 

Will you join activists from across the Lonestar State as we pay a visit to John Cornyn’s district offices? 

Ted Cruz, Mike Lee, and Rand Paul are doing everything possible to stop ObamaCare from being implemented. Yet the GOP Establishment is working to stop them. 

John Cornyn is standing with the Republican elites instead of Texas. And you deserve to know why. 

Texans need answers on why their Senator is standing with the Republican Establishment instead of Texas. Join me and other activists as we visit his district offices to find out why.

You can find Senator Cornyn office locations here.

Senator Ted Cruz: #STAND4LIFE

Senator Ted Cruz gives a compelling address at National Right to Life:



Highlights:

•  The Declaration of Independence puts life first for a reason.

• Led the fight to defend Parental notification in front of the Supreme Court and won unanimously.

• Basically, he's kicked Planned Parenthood's butt multiple times in Court.

• Dems Gosnell counter-resolution condemned 'unsanitary health care conditions."

• "The U.S. Senate under Harry Reid has no interest whatsoever in even knowing what's going on."

• "The Obama administration with much fanfare repealed the 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' policy, yet sadly that seems to be their policy when it comes to late-term abortions."

• "When Rand Paul stood up to filibuster Barack Obama's drone policy, and when we stood up beside him, we were filibustering to protect the sanctity of unborn life from arbitrary government destruction; when Austin Democrats stood together in their filibuster, they were filibustering the ability to carry out late term abortions, to protect the ability to take unborn lives."

Senator Ted Cruz: The Secret Freedomworks Speech

Senator Ted Cruz made an unannounced visit to the Freedomworks Texas summit today:




Highlights:

•  We're winning and it's because of what folks like us are doing

•  The Obama people tried to protest the Senator's office in Dallas and Tea Party folks outdrew them 3:1.

• There are few things elected officials like less than getting heat from their constituents.

• "We've had five or six lunches with a bunch of Republican Senators standing up and looking at Rand [Paul] and Mike [Lee] and me and yelling at us at the top of their lungs...I mean really upset...and they say 'look, why did you do this, as a result of what you did, when I go home my constituents are yelling at me that I've gotta stand up on principle!"
• I'm really not making that up.

• Before you did that [threatened to filibuster gun control legislation] the politics were great, the Dems were the bad guys and the Republicans were the good guys; now we just look like a bunch of squishes.
• "Well, there's an alternative, you could just not be a bunch of squishes."

•  Gun control isn't over.

• How do you get something bad passed in Washington?!?
• You do it fast and in the middle of night.

• Success begets success; if we stand up once, we'll do it again. 

Update: Welcome New York Times readers.

Update II: Welcome NRO readers; thanks Ramesh Ponnuru!!! 

Tea Party will tame Mitt; an open letter to James Taranto

Dear Sir,

Yesterday, in your Best of the Web column, you engaged in the following speculation:

Since the House is expected to stay under Republican control, Romney may actually turn out to be the one who has the skills to tame the Tea Party.

Over my dead body.

The Tea Party is currently pulling Mitt, along with a number of U.S. Senate candidates, across the finish line.  When Mitt wins, which he will, Mitt will owe us.  We intend to collect.

One dirty little secret about the Tea Party is that we didn't arise in response to Barack Obama, we arose in response to TARP.  To be sure, Obamacare resistance put us on the national radar, but we were around before that.  The Tea Party cannot wait to hold a Republican President accountable.

I addressed this topic at length last month, but once we get into year two and three of President Mitt's administration, policy will take a major Tea Party shift.  We'll probably pass Paul Ryan's budget in year one, but in year two we will come back and demand Congress pass Rand Paul's budget followed by the Uproot and Overhaul proposal from Rick Perry's Presidential campaign.  Over the next decade, the Tea Party will follow Ted Kennedy's legislative strategy in reverse; take what you can get, then immediately ask for more.

In his speech at FreePAC Dallas July, Sen. Mike Lee pointed out that it took 15 years to get from the original Boston Tea Party to ratification of the Constitution.  America's founders got the country where it needed to get, but it didn't happen overnight.  This is a long-term fight, and the Tea Party is not going anywhere.

Sincerely,
Adam Cahn
Austin, TX
November 1, 2012

President Mitt: The Long Haul

I want to touch on an aspect of Mitt that many have missed: over time, I think President's Mitt's administration will be more open to conservative influence than any administration in recent memory.

As I said when I endorsed him, I only have two expectations for President Mitt: sign the legislation a conservative Congress sends him and be a better Commander-in-Chief.  Any other domestic policy leadership Mitt shows is a bonus.  I also think that, given his business background, Mitt might produce many Tea Party friendly outcomes for different reasons than tea partiers might name.

That's fine.

Big picture items will dominate President Mitt's first year: Economic Recovery, Entitlements, Cleaning up the mess abroad, Vladimir Putin, and Repealing Obamacare.  I'm not sure anything Congress and President Mitt produce that first year will set hearts afire, but it'll be good enough.  The 60 to 70 percent of what we want that we'll get under President Mitt is a lot better than the zero percent we'll get in an Obama second term.

Once we get into year two and three of President Mitt's administration, however, I think we could see policy take a major Tea Party shift.  The silver lining of the late Bush/Obama spending spree is that it woke up the conservative grassroots.  The conservative grassroots is more engaged than we've been in a long time.  We've learned that it's not enough to elect our candidates, we have to influence the policy-making process as well.  We're not going anywhere.

The tea party is going to grow more mature and sophisticated over the next five years.  As Sen. Mike Lee pointed out at FreePAC Dallas, it took 14 years to get from the Boston Tea Party to the Constitution.  Tea Partiers understand this is a long term fight, and we're in it to stay.

President Mitt's first year will be (a lot) better than the alternative.  It might not be great, but it'll be good enough.  From year two onward, however, a maturing Tea Party could exert tremendous influence over his administration.

A Republican Party in Transition

I want you to think back to Wednesday, November 5, 2008; the day after Barack Obama's election.

Today, the Republican VP nominee is publicly identified with entitlement reform.  Audit the Fed is part of the party platform.  The Republican Party's central economic message is opportunity via entrepreneurship.

If I had offered you this situation in November 2008, would you have taken it?!?  Heck, if I had offered you a Mitt Romney/Paul Ryan ticket in November 2008, would you have taken that?!?  I certainly would.

This convention, and the entire campaign, is taking place at a weird moment in the history of the Republican Party.  The Tea Party has created a new political reality, but the institutional Republican party has yet to fully adjust.  While the Republican Party isn't maximizing this opportunity, it's light years ahead of where it was in 2008; that's good enough.

The institutional Republican party, even now, doesn't understand Barack Obama.  They don't understand the Fabian Socialists.  They don't understand the Frankfurt School.  They don't understand Saul Alinsky.  They don't understand Frank Marshall Davis.  They don't understand the long term objectives of the Weather Underground.  They don't understand third-world anti-Colonial thinking.  That's unfortunate, because if the institutional Republican party understood the a fore mentioned aspects of twentieth century progressivism, they could illustrate how the economic, geopolitical, and moral devastation Barack Obama has wrought has been deliberate.

That being said, consider how far we've come.  If the Republicans win, we'll get meaningful entitlement reform, tax reform, and constraints on the Federal Reserve.  This will alter the trajectory of federal spending, grow our economy, and prevent our central bank from printing money willy-nilly.  Four years ago, a Republican President "abandoned free-market principles to save the free-market system."  We've already come VERY far; heading into November, it's good enough.

In his speech at FreePAC last month, Sen. Mike Lee pointed out that it took fifteen years to get from the Boston Tea Party to ratification of the Constitution.  This is a long-term fight.  It will continue past this convention, and past this election.  We still have A LOT of work ahead, but compared to November 2008, we've already covered A LOT of ground.

FreePAC: Sen. Mike Lee (R-UT)

Awesome speech from Sen. Lee:

Highlights:

• Had the Boston Tea Party been a one off event, it'd be forgotten.
• From the Boston Tea Party (1773) to Constitutional ratification (1788) took 15 years.
• "What's coming up this fall and in future cycles is going to make 2010 look like a Sunday picnic."