Worcester County Freedom Trail

When it comes to politics, I like what I read at Heritage Foundation. And they’ve done a nice job compiling a solid top 10 list of resolutions for America for 2009:

Big changes are coming to Washington in 2009 with a new administration in the White House and a new Congress. As we prepare for these adjustments, here are the things we hope to see happen in the New Year.

- TRANSPARENT GOVERNMENT: Congress will provide open and honest debate on Obama’s proposed $1 trillion economic stimulus plan, so that American taxpayers can be assured they are not funding projects such as a snow-making machine.

- END OF TARP: Obama and the incoming Congress will end the Troubled Assets Relief Program (TARP) and deny any requests to use the second $350 billion of taxpayer funds. Instead , lawmakers should reform the nation’s financial regulatory system, including the laws governing mortgage lending and other requirements on financial institutions that appear to have exacerbated today’s problems.

- IRAN WITHOUT NUCLEAR WEAPONS: Obama will work ceaselessly to prevent Iran from attaining nuclear weapons and will lead an international coalition to impose the strongest possible economic sanctions and will mobilize allies to contain and deter Iran.

- NO NEW TAXES: Obama will make all of President Bush’s tax cuts permanent, understanding that tax increases harm economic growth, tax cuts lead to greater economic activity and government spending has little effect on stimulating economic activity.

- CHEAP ENERGY: The U.S. will authorize oil production in ANWR and other promising areas in the lower 48 states, remove restrictions on offshore oil drilling; reform the arduous permitting process for new nuclear power plants and avoid enacting global warming legislation that harms the American economy and increases the costs of energy for working Americans.

- STATE DRIVEN EDUCATION: The incoming U.S. Secretary of Education will agree that it takes leadership at the most local level to improve the public education system, and will enact proposals that grant states greater autonomy and flexibility in how federal funds are used if they agree to maintain academic accountability and transparency.

- NO SOCIALIZED HEALTH CARE: After a responsible amount of public debate and the rejection of both a Federal Health Board and a new government-run plan; the Congress and Obama will agree on real bipartisan health care reform that uses a consumer-choice system, like the one available to Members of Congress; provides incentives rather than government mandates and gives states the flexibility to be bold rather than imposing a national plan.

- FREEDOM TO WORSHIP: Obama will protect the ability of faith-based social service providers to honor their religious ideals; ensure the availability of federal conscience protections that allow doctors to serve patients without violating their religious beliefs and provide an honest environment for public policy debate – including debates about marriage – without fear of intimidation or reprisal.

- NON-ACTIVIST JUDGES: Obama will nominate judges who interpret the Constitution as written, rather than those who would treat it as living document into which they can read their own policy preferences.

- MISSILE DEFENSE: Obama will understand the need for a strong missile defense, knowing that in 33 minutes or less a missile launched at the U.S. can hit any target it is programmed to destroy, and he will ramp up efforts to build a missile shield in the United States and place missile defense installations in Poland, providing stability and security to all Americans.

- SUPPORT THE TROOPS: The Heritage Foundation hopes that in 2009, the U.S. continues its fight for freedom around the globe, and gives all of the support and resources necessary for our troops to bravely protect us and return home safely. God bless them, and to all of you, a Happy New Year!

How sad for us that someone who showed such blatant disrespect for the military during his run for president in 2004 has been appointed by President Elect Obama as the incoming Chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee.

More than three decades after he first appeared before the panel as a 27-year-old Vietnam veteran-turned-antiwar protester, Senator John F. Kerry will be named chairman of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, giving him enormous influence over President-elect Barack Obama’s foreign policy, according to congressional officials.

Kerry, who was elected to a fifth term from Massachusetts earlier this month, will be handed the gavel when the new Congress convenes in January, replacing Vice President-elect Joe Biden, the officials said.

Aides to Kerry said he is already laying out a broad agenda for the committee, beginning with new legislation to strengthen the United States’ hand against terrorists in Afghanistan and Pakistan; provide oversight of efforts to end the war in Iraq; and seize what he sees as a new opportunity to curtail the spread of nuclear, chemical, and biological weapons.

I hope Kerry follows through, otherwise we’re in for a long, painful four years. For those of you who may have forgotten, here’s one of his worst gaffes, from the Darwin Awards:

Under pressure from many Democrats, John Kerry apologised on Wednesday, two days after appearing to tell college students that if they did not get an education, “you get stuck in Iraq”.

In a written statement, Senator Kerry said his words had been “misinterpreted to wrongly imply anything negative about those in uniform, and I personally apologise to any service member, family member, or American who was offended”.

The botched joke not only sapped momentum from his party in the final week of campaigning for the midterm congressional elections, it also dealt a blow to his 2008 White House aspirations.

Senator Kerry cancelled campaign appearances in three states, saying he did not want to be a “distraction”.

To our beloved military personnel, a heartfelt thank you on Veterans Day. We wouldn’t be the rambunctious, entrepreneurial, free-spirited success we are today without the ever vigilant support of our Army, Air Force, Navy, Marines, Coast Guard, and Reserves.

Military.org has a great tribute with videos, history, cards, and bumper stickers.

Kevin Kuros and State Rep. Paul Kujawski recently met in a debate for the state rep seat in the 8th Worcester district. Each candidate submitted questions ahead of time for the other to answer.

Here are the questions from Kevin Kuros for Rep. Paul Kujawski:

• Just 5 months ago in May, you voted for a state budget that increased spending by over $1B dollars. How can you, in good conscience, then immediately turn around and propose a tax on non-profit University endowment funds because “we’re facing a $1B deficit” as you were quoted in many places?

• You claim to represent everyone in your district. Can you please explain how voting to eliminate the home heating oil tax credit, and voting not to expand the number of senior citizens eligible for the Circuit Breaker tax deduction, directly helps anyone?

• Little League coaches, soccer coaches, and many municipal, government and private sector positions require a CORI check before the position can be accepted. Will you support Legislation that requires CORI checks for State Senators, State Representatives, and all State Constitutional offices?

• You voted and helped pass a law in 2005 that retroactively taxed capital gains dating back to 2002, essentially changing the rules after the game had already been played. Did you honestly think that was a good, fair taxation policy or were you following the Speaker’s lead?

• You’ve traditionally been a pro-life voice in the State House. Yet you recently voted against an amendment to the Life Sciences Bill that would have eliminated funding for embryonic “clone and kill” research. Has your position on life softened, similar to your position on traditional family values, or were you following the Speaker’s lead?

• The National Federation of Independent Businesses rates you a 60% (a D minus if you were in school) on their business-friendliness criteria. The Associated Industries of MA rates you an even worse 50% on their criteria. You just voted to raise taxes on businesses by nearly half a billion dollars. And you were openly against a mall in your own home town. What do you propose, specifically, to help create jobs?

• 12 years ago in a debate like tonight’s, you said it was important to re-elect you because “an experienced, watchful eye” is required to keep an eye on the “Big Dig” so that we don’t end up paying a disproportionate amount for it. It’s become the biggest public works boondoggle in the country. What, exactly, has your watchful eye bought us?

I must say, I was not impressed with Kujawski’s answers. Besides the fact that he didn’t answer a lot of the questions:

• Kujawski completely ducked the question about whether he’d support legislation that would require CORI checks of state senators, state reps, and state constitutional positions.

• Kujawski got rattled and denied voting against Rep. Karyn Polito’s amendment to H.4811 this year, requiring mandatory 10 year sentences for anyone who rapes a child. He did, in fact, vote against it.

• Kujawski dodged the question on the retroactive capital gains tax — was it fair and equitable? His reply, “The job is about making tough decisions, not all of them are popular.” I know that, but what’s his answer?

• Kujawski said the MassGOP was running Kuros’ campaign. I am involved in the MassGOP State Committee and I know, for a fact, that they are not.

• Kujawski deflected the question about lobbyist support by pointing out that GOP leaders who have also accepted lobbyist money. I love Kuros’ response, “I’m not running against them, I’m running against you [Kujawski] and I’ve accepted $0 from lobbyists while you’ve accepted $5400 from 37 lobbyists.”

Why is it that every time there’s a close election, someone, somewhere tries to disqualify the votes of our courageous men and women in uniform? I find this quite distasteful and disgraceful. A Virginia Registrar is disqualifying military votes on the grounds that they didn’t include the address of their witness. But the ballot doesn’t say they have to provide an address, only a signature and date.

From Human Events:

Fairfax County Registrar Rokey Suleman is disqualifying an overwhelming majority of the military federal write-in absentee ballots received in his county on the basis that no address had been given for those witnessing the voter signatures on the ballots. According to Springfield District Supervisor Pat Herrity and four former members of the military who held a press conference on Thursday, over 98 percent of these military absentee ballots in Fairfax County are being rejected.

“The federal write-in absentee ballot is a federally mandated ballot that allows military service members and their dependents to cast an absentee ballot when they haven’t received a [state] ballot before the election,” Herrity said. “For them it’s a safety net. It allows them to vote if the mail truck hasn’t reached his or her remote base in Iran or Afghanistan in time to cast a regular absentee ballot.”

When asked how many ballots had been rejected, Herrity responded, “Out of the 260 military federal write-in ballots received to date, only five included an address for the witness. The other 255 have been set aside for rejection.”

On page two of the Voters’ Declaration/Affirmation-Federal Write-in Absentee Ballot (FWAB) at the very bottom of the form is the signature block for the “Witness/Notary and Address (if required)”. Note the instructions given to Virginia service members, “Block 7: Sign and date in the presence of a witness. The witness must sign and date the form.”

That’s it. No instruction given on any requirement for the witness to give an address. This has resulted in only 2 percent of the military ballots received to date including an address for the witness.

Obama is turning into yet another politician who talks out of both sides of his mouth. Too bad most of his talk is looking like self-serving rhetoric. For instance, he wants troop withdrawals, but it turns out he doesn’t want them until the new administration is in office. I’m sure he’s assuming it will be his team leading the effort (and taking the credit). Too bad for Obama that troop reductions have already started, but on the military’s timeline, not Obama the politican’s.

Thanks to Earl for a heads up to this article from the New York Post:

While campaigning in public for a speedy withdrawal of US troops from Iraq, Sen. Barack Obama has tried in private to persuade Iraqi leaders to delay an agreement on a draw-down of the American military presence.

According to Iraqi Foreign Minister Hoshyar Zebari, Obama made his demand for delay a key theme of his discussions with Iraqi leaders in Baghdad in July.

“He asked why we were not prepared to delay an agreement until after the US elections and the formation of a new administration in Washington,” Zebari said in an interview.

Obama insisted that Congress should be involved in negotiations on the status of US troops – and that it was in the interests of both sides not to have an agreement negotiated by the Bush administration in its “state of weakness and political confusion.”

“However, as an Iraqi, I prefer to have a security agreement that regulates the activities of foreign troops, rather than keeping the matter open.” Zebari says.

Though Obama claims the US presence is “illegal,” he suddenly remembered that Americans troops were in Iraq within the legal framework of a UN mandate. His advice was that, rather than reach an accord with the “weakened Bush administration,” Iraq should seek an extension of the UN mandate.

While in Iraq, Obama also tried to persuade the US commanders, including Gen. David Petraeus, to suggest a “realistic withdrawal date.” They declined.

Obama has made many contradictory statements with regard to Iraq. His latest position is that US combat troops should be out by 2010. Yet his effort to delay an agreement would make that withdrawal deadline impossible to meet.

It is long past time for Senator John Kerry to retire. I can’t think of anything important he’s done for our country or our state in the last 10 years. There are plenty of times he’s embarrassed us by dissing the military and anyone who’s not part of the rich elite.

The good news is that I’m happy to report that we have an excellent candidate running against him, Jeff Beatty, from Cape Cod. This from Human Events:

The fact that almost 1 in 4 Democratic delegates want to see someone else represent Massachusetts as senator is astonishing.  Recent polls have shown even more shocking results for the Democratic presidential nominee of ’04.  A recent poll taken by Suffolk University (the only ones to get New Hampshire’s primary right) shows that only 38% of voters want to see Kerry re-elected. After the primary, Kerry has one of the best stories in the 2008 election season waiting.

Meet Jeff Beatty. Beatty is a retired US Army Delta Force assault team commander, a former CIA counter-terrorist agent and served the FBI as a hostage crisis analyst. Beatty, a Harwich, Massachusetts resident recently sold a security consulting firm which he founded and ran for 12 years. This guy would make Tom Clancy blush. Beatty has appeared on all major television networks as a national security analyst.  In that capacity:

• He predicted a package bombing 6 months before the 1996 Olympics in Atlanta

• He sent letters out to major airlines warning them to “harden the cockpit doors”.  He urged security measures to prepare for hijackers who may use the planes as missiles. These letters went out in April of 2001.

• He was on the first Black Hawk helicopter ever shot down and then rescued American medical students in Grenada after he was wounded in the crash.

Now Jeff Beatty is ready to take on Senator Kerry who was once thought to hold one of the safest seats in Washington until only a year ago. A  Zogby Poll taken in July of 2007 showed that Kerry soundly defeats any Republican, Beatty included. However, the same poll shows a statistical tie when the same voters were allowed to review Beatty’s credentials.

Beatty’s donor list is well over 30,000 and has the backing of many Special-Ops alumni.

Beatty, who was adopted at the ripe old age of 4 days, doesn’t know what his ethnicity is other than to say he is an American.  He claims he never thought of himself as someone who would run for office but after 9/11, he knows, in his mind, America can do better than John Kerry who missed over 75% of the Select Senate Committee on Intelligence meetings during the 1990s when the US was under constant attack by Islamic zealots (for those paying attention and not catching the waves on Nantucket). Beatty thinks he will be more engaged than Kerry who wasn’t present for one committee meeting for over a year after the first bombing of the World Trade Center.

Beatty is also making inroads with territory thought to be a Democratic given; labor. Beatty is meeting with union officials reminding them of Kerry’s coddling of illegal immigrants who are seizing their jobs. Beatty also points out that the New Bedford fisheries union has disintegrated without any resistance from Senator Kerry.

Michelle Malkin is always thinking of great ways to make a difference in the lives of others. She’s a huge supporter of those who are putting themselves in harm’s way to protect our lives and our freedoms.

Just six more days ’til the awesome event I told you about over Memorial Day weekend. “From the Frontlines” is a joint project of Melanie Morgan’s Move America Forward, UStream.TV, and Hot Air.

On June 26, from 4pm Eastern/1pm Pacific to 12midnight Eastern/9pm Pacific, Melanie and I will be anchoring a livestreamed, 8-hour fund-raising “web-a-thon” to send the largest number of care packages to our troops overseas in U.S. history.

We’ve got a star-studded line-up participating in this effort to support our military, including Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Mark Levin, Laura Ingraham, Dr Laura Schlessinger, Ollie North, Monica Crowley, Ann Coulter, Nancy Reagan, actor Kelsey Grammer, and Five for Fighting’s John Ondrasik. You’ll be able to tune it at Hot Air and on UStream, embed the broadcast on your own blogs, and even catch some of the show on your radio dial if you’re lucky to be in the listening area of a radio station partner.

You can purchase care packages right now, right here, in advance of the web-a-thon. Buy early and often! MAF has raised over $200,000 in advance of the telethon. Our goal is $500,000.

Here is an inspirational story about our last remaining World War I veteran, Frank Woodruff Buckles:

Frank Woodruff Buckles is stooped and bent from his 107 years, but he is not bowed. His spirit glows with the life he has lived.

First and foremost, according to the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs, Buckles is America’s last doughboy.

Of the more than 4 million who served in World War I, called the Great War, he has outlived everyone.

In loving memory of our fallen heros and heroines on this Memorial Day.

Things are getting a little hot in the race for John Kerry’s U.S. Senate seat. Candidate Jeff Beatty is calling on Kerry to match his rhetoric with deeds regarding our troops and veterans.  Beatty points to Kerry’s appearance Monday on the Don Imus radio program where the junior Senator criticized people for using our troops as “props” for photographs.  Beatty says this is more proof of the Senator’s hypocrisy.

“History is repeating itself,” said Jeff Beatty, a former Delta Force officer, “Kerry has a long record of denigrating our armed services and now exploits them for his own political gain. Kerry continues to use our troops to boost his political fortune. Actually, it is Kerry who has exploited and degraded two generations of veterans — including our troops currently serving on the ground in Iraq and Afghanistan.”

Kerry served as spokesman before the “Winter Soldier Investigation,” testifying before the Senate foreign relations committee.  During that session, Kerry, recounted the testimonies of alleged atrocities committed by American soldiers:

“They told stories that at times they had personally raped, cut off ears, cut off heads, taped wires from portable telephones to human genitals and turned up the power, cut off limbs, blown up bodies, randomly shot at civilians, razed villages in fashion reminiscent of Genghis Khan.”

Despite his testimony, no charges were ever filed as there was no evidence to substantiate the allegations.

Kerry exploited unfounded sensational allegations about American service members gaining him  national TV exposure in 1971 during the Vietnam War which helped launch his political career.  Today, the North Vietnamese honor Kerry’s role in their victory in their War Museum.

“Kerry voted to send our troops to war in Iraq, because it served his 2004 Presidential ambition,” acknowledged Beatty.  “Now, despite urging the President to cut and run from Iraq, Kerry continues to use our troops and our veterans for his own political purposes.  He is making the rounds of troops in the field and veteran centers at home posing for photos and using our veterans and troops as ‘props.’  It’s another example of his incredible hypocrisy.”

“In spite of Kerry’s efforts, the hard work of service men and women is prevailing,” says Beatty. “We are now winning in Iraq. Yet Kerry persists in pursuing tactics that weaken our efforts, not strengthen them. Is Kerry going to be honored with another plaque? This time from Bin Laden and Al Qaeda just like he was from the North Vietnamese?  It’s time to replace John Kerry with one of us.”