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.

MOVIE REVIEW: "The Hope and the Change" by Citizen United Productions

This review is proof of God's all powerful sense of humor.  I've been in touch with the P.R. department at Citizens United for the past week to get my copy of "Occupy Unmasked."  For all that effort, last night I saw Citizens United's other new release, "the Hope and the Change."

This documentary is devastating to Barack Obama.  It chronicles the disillusionment and travails of a dozen or so 2008 Obama voters who will not vote for him a second time.  These are the voters who, in 2008, pulled Barack Obama across the finish line.

My biggest takeaway from the movie is the day-to-day struggle that life under Barack Obama has been for a substantial chunk of Obama's own voters.  While life has been (very) challenging for us all, for these 2008 Obama voters Obama's economic devastation is acute and unrelenting.  Comments like "I have never been more broke in my life," "I'm sick of only having ten dollars in my bank account," and "I am not seeing one ounce of benefit for all this debt" illustrate the economic calamity these 2008 Obama voters face.

For these 2008 Obama voters, Barack Obama's policies have been inexplicable and infuriating.  It started with the bailouts.  For these 2008 Obama voters, "bailing out car companies and banks surprised a lot of people."  Alongside the bailouts, "the stimulus was a shocker as well" because "I don't know where all this money is going," when, in reality, "we just printed more money."  Making matters worse, "I got really scared when I saw the Health Care package" since "the more I understood, the more I became concerned" when "there were better solutions" than this "tax on the middle class."  Obama's policies are divorced from these 2008 Obama voters' lives, but they understand they're getting stuck with the bill; "it's a complete hustle and we're the butt of the joke."  The anger is palpable.

For conservatives, it's important to understand that persuadable 2008 Obama voters aren't the morons or Jon Stewart's audience.  These are the folks Andrew Breitbart famously referred to as "Democrats by Osmosis."  Their family or social circle were Democrat, and they went along without thinking.  Most important, their underlying values are conservative.  Barack Obama has alienated the voters who pulled him across the finish line in 2008: "I work hard for what I have and I resent being told I have to give it to someone else."  In 2012, as Scott Rasmussen explained at RightOnline, we need to hammer results and record.  Over the longer term, however, we need to educate them to think ideologically.

On a personal note, I was struck by the section on National Security issues.  As regular readers know, I've been freaking out about National Security for the past couple months.  Persuadable 2008 Obama voters agree: "the United States is not respected the way it used to be" because Obama "has shown more weakness than strength."  For the record, all these interviews were conducted after the bin Laden raid but before our embassies were attacked.  For conservatives, this is a very encouraging sign.

For those of us who want to destroy the institutional left, "the Hope and the Change" is a priceless guide to the rest of this cycle and what comes next.  A substantial chunk of Barack Obama's 2008 voters do not share Obama's satanic values.  Persuadable Obama 2008 voters have conservative values, they just vote Democrat by default.  Between now and election day, hammer results; after election day, however, these folks need ideological education.  The good news is that these folks are very open to what we have to say, and "the Hope and the Change" is a fantastic guide for their concerns.

Author's note: Quotes are transcribed by hand; while a word or two might be off, the spirit is accurate.

Coming October 20th: Rage Against the Media

Big announcement via Facebook; on October 20th, Americans are going to come together to protest the media, from the Rage Against the Media Facebook page:

On October 20th, we will be holding a nationwide protest to express our well-founded rage at the media. From Los Angeles

 to New York City, and all points in between, we need to make our voices heard: for too long we have been hostage to their narrative, to their complicity with the "progressive" agenda, to their media malpractice, and it's time to say ENOUGH.

Without the media, the Freshman Senator from Illinois would never have even gotten the nomination, let alone the Presidency. And these entire nearly four years have been brought to us ONLY with the help of the Propaganda Arm of the Obama Presidency and of progressives as a whole.

We on the Right have been BETRAYED, but the Left has been DUPED. ALL Americans have suffered at their hands, and the damage doesn't end at our shores!!

The Arab faux-spring was sold to all of us by the media, hawking the Kumbayah peace, love and democracy party line, and now they are reaping what they have sown. And to make matters worse, they are betraying the very first amendment upon which they are dependent in order to CONTINUE to support this President.

 As is frequently true, Andrew Breitbart said it best:

Breitbart is here!!!

#WAR

10,000 Clicks -- Thank You to the Readers!!!

To my readers:

Yesterday, Cahnman's Musings received it's 10,000th click.  Thank You so much!!!  Cahnman's Musings wouldn't be anything without you.

This blog began last February at the end of an e-mail I'd spent 20 minutes preparing.  Since then, I've gotten to go to RightOnline, Interviewed a U.S. Senate Candidate, and gotten to praise the Lord.  I'm incredibly excited to see where this is going.

Thank you for reading this blog and feel free to let me know anything I could do better.

Thank You,
Adam Cahn
Austin, TX
July 25, 2012

P.S. I'm strongly considering turning this blog into a commercial enterprise, which shouldn't change anything for you readers; let me know your thoughts in the comments!!!!

Right Online: Independence Day Posts

The RightOnline e-mail group has been trading Independence Day posts this afternoon, these are ALL Awesome:

Sybil West -- Ramparts360
- Dear Government: I Declare My Independence

Warner Todd Huston -- Publius Forum
- 236 Independence Days and Counting: What does it all mean?!?

Rick Sincere -- Rick Sincere Thoughts (Author's Note: He also has video from RightOnline Speakers)
- Marking Independence Day with Ronald Reagan and John Quincy Adams
- Congressman disses my call for Investigating John Roberts for Impeachment (Author's Note: I'm not going away on this one, and I'm perfectly willing to see you in 2014/15)

Steve MacDonald -- GraniteGrok
- It's one thing to declare Independence, it's another to entirely have it
- Resolve to be Free From Tyranny

They're all awesome; I highly recommend all!

RightOnline 2012: The Biggest Takeaway

I attended the RightOnline 2012 Conference this past weekend.  It was awesome.  We're winning and we just need to keep going.

I sat down to write a review of the conference, but there were 25 separate items I wanted to discuss.  A detailed review isn't feasible, especially with Biblical Prophecies coming true in today's headlines.  Instead, I wanted to share a strategic observation on the broad trends we're facing.

The big takeaway is that we're winning.  The most important action we can take is to continue doing exactly what we're doing.  This process is a long-haul, but as long as we maintain consistent, persistent, pressure, we'll win.

In terms of substance, Scott Rasmussen was the most important person I had a chance to speak with.  His point was simple: the public outrage is real, it began with TARP and was solidified by Obamacare, and it has transformed the electorate.  Even when they don't follow politics closely, the public instinctively understands the size of the problem, and they're open to big solutions.  The Wisconsin recall results confirmed something I've suspected for awhile.  Scott Rasmussen's analysis, in both public remarks and our personal conversations,  was further proof.  Update:  Rasmussen Speech Here

One modest caveat is that, in the realm of public opinion, results are more important than theory.  As Scott Rasmussen said "people don't care about limited government, they care about the type of society limited government will create."  Although the public in Wisconsin supported Scott Walker in the Abstract, it wasn't until their property taxes went down that Scott Walker won the election.

Thank you to Eliza Vielma, the new media person at AFP-Texas, who is the main reason I was able to go.  Thank you also to Peggy Venable, AFP-Texas State Director, for much the same reason.  Thank you to AFP National, and Stephanie Fontenot in particular, for the work you did to pull this off.  Thank you also to Cindy Malette, formerly of AFP-Texas, for pestering me to blog for two years before the message sunk in.  Finally, of course, thank you to God, because without him, the rest of this is irrelevant.

Finally, I want to close by mentioning Andrew Breitbart.  For obvious reasons, Andrew was a major topic of conversation this weekend.  Andrew's #1 objective in this world was to empower the rest of us to take on Hollywood and the corrupt media.  Just today, Chris Cilizza of Washington Post came up with this whiny crybaby piece, that Rush brilliantly destroyed.  That Cilizza piece proves how much trouble the left is in.  The best way to honor Andrew Breitbart is to continue doing exactly what we're doing.  We're winning, and as long as we stay in the fight, we're gonna kick their ass.

Update: Tom Tillison has more.

Sarah Palin to Headline RightOnline 2012

So, a couple of hours ago, I learned this:

Sarah Palin will be the headline speaker at this conservative celebration, which runs from June 15-16 at the Venetian Resort and Casino.

This was my reaction: