BULLETIN: Can you believe the hubris, the arrogance, the tyranny of the majority! Now the Democrats in the House of Representatives are preparing to push through ObamaCare without a vote by merely deeming the thing to have passed.
A T. Wall communique says it: "The health care takeover is so unpopular that Democrats are willing to violate the Constitution to make it go away. House Democrats are now proposing to use the so-called 'Slaughter Rule' to say they have passed ... health care takeover, without having to cast a vote on it!"
Wall, of course, is asking his U.S. Senate opponent Russ Feingold to denounce Nancy Pelosi's end-around. For his part, the squire of Stately Blaska Manor is asking the once fearless State Journal to rain down some editorial fire and thunder.
The (not T) Wall Street Journal explains How Democrats may 'deem' ObamaCare into law, without voting.
Under this amazing procedural ruse, the House would then vote only once on the reconciliation corrections, but not on the underlying Senate bill. If those reconciliation corrections pass, the self-executing rule would say that the Senate bill is presumptively approved by the House-even without a formal up-or-down vote on the actual words of the Senate bill.
Didn't I tell you that Blaska's Blog knows why liberals distrust the people?
Here, as a public service, is how you can help stop "a Hail Mary of epic proportions to try to shove the Senate bill through the House so it can be signed into law by the President."
The tea partiers are ready
I thought the tea partiers were fired up Saturday in Wisconsin Dells! The Pelosi/Slaughterhouse rules will get them marching in battle formation!
The great thing about the tea party movement is that it has reclaimed Thomas Jefferson, the ultimate limited government guy, from the clutches of big-government collectivists like Ed Garvey, John Nichols, and Michael Moore.
That's what I learned when I attended my first tea party Saturday in Wisconsin Dells. Between 2,000 and 2,500 -- up from 800 last year -- attended this third annual "Defending the American Dream Summit," sponsored by the Wisconsin chapter of Americans for Prosperity. That puts the longer-established Fighting Bobfest in the shade, especially considering tea partiers ponied up $40 each to cover expenses.
The other thing I learned is that in any intellectual food fight, the conservatives are well armed and in a mood to fight.
Liberals should be afraid, which is why they go bananas on the subject. Witness the normally level headed Greg Humphrey at Caffeinated Politics, working with raw material from the N.Y. Times:
How To Describe Teabaggers? Crazed? Stupid? Racist? Dangerous?
Dangerous? To liberals, yes. Stupid? How many of you can recite the 10th Amendment* by heart?
"I was told you were an angry mob," one of the speakers, Wall Street Journal writer Steven Moore, observed Saturday, "but you are the nicest angry mob I've ever met."
State director Mark Block expects the movement to have 100,000 members by this July 4, wherein it will surmount the teachers union as the largest organization in Wisconsin.
Tim Phillips, national president of Americans for Prosperity, may have captured the essence of the movement: "We want to change Washington; Washington wants to change us."
Nineteen speakers, many nationally known (including Joe the Plumber and Lord Christopher Monckton of the U.K.), each gave a brisk but cogent 10 minutes. The most tepid reception, I thought, was accorded the chairman of the Wisconsin Republican Party. Rance Preibus apologized that his party had lost its way and promised to do a better job of getting back to basics. Then he introduced congressman Paul Ryan via videotape. Tea partiers are not automatic Republicans but the Democrats are doing their best to make them so.
The afternoon broke out into workshops: Global Warming/ Economic Suicide, Hands off my health care, ballot box protection, property rights, government transparency, fair taxation, free speech. In other words, the 2,000 to 2,500 in attendance are intellectually locking and loading.
Intellectually armed and ready to fight
The folks at the Chula Vista dome no longer fear being branded politically incorrect, a favorite diversionary tactic of the Left. They do not apologize for American exceptionalism. They recognize a scam (global warming/climate change) when they see one. They worry about a national debt that will within 10 year nearly equal the gross domestic product. They do not want to be told what car to drive or doctor to see. They work for their money and will gladly donate much of it so others can get a hand up but not a hand out. They are not embarrassed to pray or to salute the flag. They lump up when reminded of our military's sacrifice, whether at Valley Forge or Fallujah.
And they know their Constitution.
My friend Vicky McKenna exhorted the tea partiers that liberal/progressives never rest -- controlling others through the coercive powers of government is their life's work. Resisting that impulse requires dedication on more than just election day.
The hard Left loves to quote Jefferson to the effect that America needs a revolution every 20 years.
Michael Reagan, adopted son of Ronald Reagan, referenced the same quote:
"The tree of liberty must be refreshed from time to time with the blood of patriots and tyrants."
The difference between the liberal/progressives and us conservatives, of course, is that we have actual guns. We also have the energy and the momentum with the firm sense that history and the Constitution are on our side.
* The 10th Amendment is the ultimate limiter of federal government power: "The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people."
Reclaiming Mr. Jefferson
Just a sampler:
"A Bill of Rights is what the people are entitled to against every government."
"A wise and frugal government, which shall leave men free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned - this is the sum of good government."
"When the people fear their government, there is tyranny; when the government fears the people, there is liberty."
"I predict future happiness for Americans if they can prevent the government from wasting the labors of the people under the pretense of taking care of them."
Coffee?
The prog-libs, meanwhile, are trying to counter the tea party movement with some java jive. They're trying to put together a "coffee party." So far, it's more of a Facebook page.
Its mission statement:
We recognize that the federal government is not the enemy of the people, but the expression of our collective will, and that we must participate in the democratic process in order to address the challenges that we face as Americans.
"Collective will" -- God, that sounds like a documentary filmed at Nuremberg by Leni Riefenstahl. Did I tell you these people were collectivists?
Today's chuckle
The nanny state is the naughty state, apparently.
AMSTERDAM (Reuters) - A union representing Dutch nurses will launch a campaign Friday against demands for sexual services by patients who claim it should be part of their standard care. The union said that a 42-year-old disabled man asked a nurse to provide sexual services as part of his care at home.
Are we sure that's not somewhere in the 2,700 pages of ObamaCare? (That's what you get when you try grow government so that it will satisfy everyone's wants and desires.)
