Chinese Vice President Xi Jinping came to the United States last week, and that set alarm bells clanging. Among those who sorely miss the Cold War, China serves as an endless source of fear and loathing.

Mitt Romney responded in tones appropriate for a bitter foe. Writing in The Wall Street Journal, he accused President Barack Obama of “weakness” that “has only encouraged Chinese assertiveness” while serving to “embolden China’s leaders at the expense of greater liberty.”

As for our economic ties, he wrote, “A trade war with China is the last thing I want, but I cannot tolerate our current trade surrender.”

Martial metaphors like that give the impression we are locked in a deadly struggle with Beijing. For that reason, it’s no surprise that in January of last year, China ranked first in a Pew Center poll as the country representing the greatest danger to the United States. In the latest one, it finished second only to Iran.

The perception of Iran is understandable, given that our leaders seem bent on taking us to war there. But China? If we’re going to have adversaries, China is the best kind to have.

For one thing, it’s no match for us militarily. The United States spends between two and nine times as much on defense as China. We have 11 aircraft carriers; they have one — which they bought, used, from Ukraine. We have nearly 3,700 modern combat aircraft to their 307.

“We don’t view China as a direct threat,” Vice Adm. Scott Van Buskirk, commander of the U.S. Seventh Fleet, said last year. “To look at China through the lens of an adversary would be counterproductive.”

It’s true that China has been upgrading its defense forces. But that’s what you would expect of a country that has gotten much richer in the past few decades.

It’s also what you would expect of a country surrounded by neighbors with which it has had military conflicts — including Russia, Japan, India and Vietnam. Not to mention that it has 9,000 miles of coastline on the Pacific Ocean, which is effectively owned and operated by the U.S. Navy.

Like any normal regional power, China aspires to have some capacity to dictate to others rather than be dictated to. That ambition could bring it to blows with the United States over Taiwan or over free passage in the South China Sea.

Rising powers often collide with established powers, which means there is certainly potential for China to clash with the United States. But the two sides have proved able to peacefully manage their chief disagreement, Taiwan, decade after decade.

Human rights will be a source of tension as long as Beijing persecutes dissidents, but it’s no cause for war. And the economic changes China has made are bound to lead, over time, to political liberalization.

CONTINUED at Reason. Written by Steve Chapman.

The United Nations may be able to seize an opportunity — presented by mass resistanceagainst the “carbon tax” on air travel imposed by the European Union — to extract global taxes from airline passengers, with claims that failure to adopt a worldwide taxation regime under the UN International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) could result in a “trade war.”

The EU, which has been among the chief promoters of international taxation, announced that it was open to discussions about substituting its own scheme for a global tax. Global airlines, meanwhile, are fervently pushing the idea of a UN-brokered “solution” to the impasse, saying the disagreements could affect global air travel and lead to counterproductive retaliation by governments.

“Europe deserves credit for pushing this issue up the international agenda and it is at the forefront on emissions trading,” claimed International Air Transport Association boss Tony Tyler during a speech at the Singapore Airshow Aviation Leadership Summit. “But its unilateral approach must change.”

In an interview with Reuters, the Director General the IATA — a lobbying group that represents over 200 airlines — alleged that the UN’s aviation arm was the “only” forum to resolve the controversy. He also said the EU would almost certainly cooperate to avoid further isolation.

“I very much hope that the EU and all its member states will work hard with ICAO to come up with a global solution,” he told the news agency, noting that the regional entity was generally supportive of a global tax instead. “It is not going to be easy.”

The EU’s tax on flying is supposedly based on dubious theories about “climate change” and the alleged effect of carbon dioxide released into the atmosphere by human activities – a tiny fraction of the overall “greenhouse gases” that exist naturally. Critics and cynics, however, argue that the regional body is simply desperate for its own independent revenue streams.

The EU taxation scheme, known as the “Emissions Trading System,” forces all passengers on flights to or from Europe to pay for so-called “emissions credits.” Much of the revenue generated from the controversial permits – which have been associated with widespread savagery from Uganda to Honduras as natives are kicked off their land to plant trees – goes to the budding regional government.

The problem for the EU, however, is that global opposition to the scheme has been overwhelming. From India and China to Russia and the U.S., dozens of governments and hundreds of airlines have balked at the idea of paying the regional entity for CO2 emissions.

CONTINUED at New American.

*Written by Rob Rimes.

I’m finally back home and have enough time to actually sit down and write. The drive back from Orlando last night, immediately after the debate was insane! Drivers on Interstate 4 are beyond awful and they have no regard for the written and unwritten rules of the road. I nearly died a few times and by the time I got home, I just needed to chill out with some rum and watch ‘Firefly’ on Netflix. I intended to write this immediately after the debate but it just wasn’t possible. Between the lack of sleep the night before, the traveling and the two days of heavy discussions and debate, I was a vegetable. Thank God for my own bed and a bottle of Cruzan Black Strap rum as I feel much more alive this morning.

To start the day, I rolled out of bed at 7:30, which was pretty hard considering I was up late writing and drinking the night before and I just couldn’t get to sleep in a strange bed. I’ve always had trouble sleeping on the road. In fact, the only hotel that I’m comfortable in is the Hampton Inn across the street from the New Orleans Convention Center. Hell, I even have a hard time sleeping in Vegas without a ton of alcohol as a sedative, which is still partially ineffective, as that oxygen they pump through the vents has me wide awake pretty quickly.

So I woke up, got ready and suited up for my day, packed my suitcase and took a few minutes to watch part of the first half of the Liverpool v. Manchester United game before I had to check out. I went downstairs about twenty minutes into the game and ate breakfast with my friends from the Libertarian Party of Collier County. Shortly after this, we headed into the banquet room for the Libertarian Party of Florida’s business meeting. I’m not going to discuss the details but the meeting was informative and entertaining. Like one would expect, peering behind the scenes of politics at any level, the meeting had it’s fair share of heated debates between different factions all vying for control of the Party. Don’t take this the wrong way, this isn’t a bad thing, it is a very healthy way of addressing issues and concerns. All in all, it was a cool experience to see how the Libertarian Party operates in Florida.

At around 11:30, we split for lunch and I took that time to go upstairs and meet with Gary Johnson one last time before the debate. It was your typical meet and greet but there were more people present at this one than the two that I went to on the previous day. I listened in for awhile but I didn’t really interject myself this round. I asked a lot of questions the day before and I felt it was only fair for those who missed out on the earlier meet and greets to have their chance at asking Governor Johnson whatever it was they wanted to know.

I left after about a half hour, as the subjects being covered were already addressed at the previous meetings. Plus, my claustrophobia was kicking in as ten to fifteen people in a small hotel room is too many. I went downstairs, had some killer buffalo wings and spoke to congressional candidate Calen Fretts. If you live in the Florida panhandle, you should vote for Mr. Fretts. He’s got a good head on his shoulders and is a true representative of liberty. I think that may have been an endorsement. Anyway, we all headed back into the banquet hall at 1:00 for the second part of the business meeting. At 3:00 the debate officially started.

Contrary to what I wrote before, Roger Gary was not a part of the debate. Also, Leroy Saunders, a candidate from the State of New York joined the debate. I don’t know much about Mr. Saunders but his involvement added some energy to the event. Unfortunately, he doesn’t have a Facebook page or anything else on the social networking level and that can only hurt his campaign, in my opinion. He does have a decent website however. The other candidates were mentioned in an earlier article, they are Gary Johnson, R.J. Harris, R. Lee Wrights, Bill Still and Carl Persons.

Before the debate, those of us who are members of the Libertarian Party of Florida were asked to write down any questions they had for the candidates. Two of my three questions were used in the debate and in fact, they were the first two questions used after the moderators were done asking theirs. The first question, which I asked in an effort to give a boost to Bill Still, went directly to Mr. Still first – how’s that for luck? The question was “What’s your plan to bring about economic recovery? Is it as simple as abolishing the Federal Reserve, returning to a gold standard and significantly cutting spending?” The reason I wanted this question to go to Still is that he takes the stance that a gold standard isn’t the answer. I wanted to give him the opportunity to explain his position, which he did by stating that the majority of the gold is held by the elite, so it isn’t a good way to give control of money back to the people and that throughout history, the gold standard hasn’t been as great as many economists claim.

The second question I asked that was used was “Is there ever a time when U.S. military intervention is necessary?” Most of the candidates said “no”. Gary Johnson however pointed to the Afghan War and said that he was for us going over there and wiping out Al-Qaeda but that we should have come back six months after going to war, as we sent the “evildoers” running for the hills. Leroy Saunders pretty much agreed with Johnson and added that if we are attacked, we have the right to go after the attacker and seek justice but other than that, we need to stay out of the business of all these other countries, except for trade – which should be free.

My third question “How would you curb the Supreme Court from making unconstitutional decisions?”, wasn’t asked. In fact, there was nothing asked about how they would work with the judicial branch, which was unfortunate. This is a subject I don’t hear libertarians discuss very often.

While watching the debate, I noticed that there weren’t a lot of philosophical differences between the candidates. They had different ways to achieve certain goals but for the most part, everything they said, I found to be correct and pretty on point. It’s hard to do a proper critique of the content, as these men know their stuff and were all pretty damn effective at expressing it and hammering their points. It’s really different when you have a debate where the candidates aren’t idiots and they don’t have to constantly explain their stance to an idiot crowd. Libertarians are cut from a different cloth and they typically educate themselves on a variety of topics. They are a group that is constantly in the know and on top of things. I’m not trying to toot my own libertarian horn here but those who truly represent our beliefs, don’t need to have everything explained to them. They are the self-educated minority and have reached a higher plane in their political philosophy that one can’t get to by blindly following mainstream ideas and not questioning what they’ve always been taught.

In the end, I felt that Gary Johnson did a solid job and articulated himself well. Bill Still did really good when the questions were economic based but needed to say more on some of the other subjects. R. Lee Wrights was great and really won me over. Even though I hope Johnson gets the nomination, I’d love Mr. Wrights as VP. R.J. Harris did alright but I was expecting a little more thunder, especially after hearing all the positive things my friends and colleagues have said about him. I wasn’t disappointed by my expectations of him but I wasn’t really impressed either. Leroy Saunders did a pretty good job but often times went on some tangents. He needs to get his talking points down and sharpen his skills. He’s a young guy though and he has a lot of time to get it right, just not in this race. Carl Persons had some sharp insight but he just didn’t bring the fire. I honestly can’t see him as a leader, which is unfortunate, as I did like the things he had to say. Truth be told though, I would take anyone of these guys over Barack Obama or the GOP contenders minus Ron Paul.

After the debate, I immediately left and drove home. I wish I could’ve mingled some more and gone to the Libertarian Party dinner but I really needed to get back. All in all it was a great weekend, I got to spend a lot of time picking Gary Johnson’s brain and I met a lot of like minded people from all over the country. It’s not everyday that an average joe can sit down with a presidential candidate and ask them questions face-to-face. I got to do it twice in one day.

*Written by Rob Rimes.

Continued from: The Mitt Romney Problem, Part I: Smaller Government.

“If Tyranny and Oppression come to this land, it will be in the guise of fighting a foreign enemy.” – James Madison

Foreign Entanglements:

Mitt Romney is like the world’s dumbest used car salesman for war. While that might sound like an unfair and unjust observation, let’s look at this guy’s ideas on what our foreign policy should be. To be frank, his actions either call for immediate war or create and perpetuate the environment for war. If Mr. Romney were to have his way, we’d be locked in wars with Iran and China not to mention all the other ones we’re involved in at the moment. Also, who’s to say that this guy wouldn’t pile on even more wars with his careless actions due to his inability to understand why other nations hate the American Empire.

Let’s first look at Iraq, an issue that Romney has either been confused by or has flip-flopped on, the latter is more likely as that is his modus operandi. On whether or not he has supported the war, Mitt’s stance has been cloudy to say the least. The main reason is that there isn’t any consistency between the different times he’s been asked the question. Recently in December of 2011, Romney said that if he had intel that said that there weren’t nuclear weapons in Iraq, then we shouldn’t have invaded that country. In fact, here is how that interview with NBC’s Chuck Todd went down:

Romney: ”If we knew at the time of our entry into Iraq that there were no weapons of mass destruction, if somehow we had been given that information, obviously we would not have gone in.”

Todd: ”You don’t think we would have gone in?”

Romney: ”Well of course not. The president went in based upon intelligence that they had weapons of mass destruction. Had he known that that was not the case, the U.N. would not have put forward resolutions authorizing this type of action. The president would not have been pursuing that course. But we did not know that. Based upon what we knew at the time, we were very much under the impression as a nation, our president was under the impression, that they had weapons of mass destruction, that Saddam Hussein was intent on potentially using those weapons, and so he took action based upon what he knew. But to go back and say, well knowing what we know now would we have gone in. Well, knowing what we know now, they did not have weapons of mass destruction, there would have been no effort on the part of our president or others to take military action.”

Odd, considering what he has said before this interview. During a 2008 presidential debate, Mitt Romney said the Iraq War was “a good idea worth the cost in blood and treasure we have spent. It was the right decision to go into Iraq. I supported it at the time; I support it now.” For the record, it was well-known in 2008 that Iraq didn’t have any weapons of mass destruction. You see, Mitt Romney’s stance in the Iraq situation is all over the place. Like most answers he gives, the words he speaks are dependent upon who he is talking to or what the political climate is at the time. Romney, like the professional politician he is – yet claims he isn’t, will say anything to win the hearts of the voter. The reason I have started with this example is to show you how soulless the man is and how his stance on the other foreign entanglements, which I’m about to get into, could be nothing but pandering bullshit and probably is.

On the ongoing war in Afghanistan, Romney has given us a giant spoonful of his bullshit rhetoric. He’s said that he will refuse to talk to the Taliban. Well okay asshole, how do you expect to get anything done or solve the problems over there if you aren’t willing to talk to the other side of the conflict? Romney is either a complete fucking idiot on this issue, a total coward or just pandering to the GOP voters in order to get cheap pops at the debates.

So with the moronic stance that Mitt Romney has, what can we expect for the future of the United States-Afghanistan relationship? Well, contrary to the sort of hype and bullshit that these politicians and pundits try to feed you, we cannot conquer Afghanistan and force our ways on them. The country doesn’t have the structure of a typical nation. It is made up of feuding tribes that fight for dominance and supremacy; there isn’t one organized enemy to point your guns at. Sure, the Taliban takes the blame for everything but the issue of Afghanistan certainly isn’t as black and white as that.

Besides, who gave the Taliban their power to begin with? Well, the United States did. Why? Because we were scared shitless of the Soviets during the Cold War and we training and gave arms to these men that we now call terrorists. If Mitt even listened to what the people in countries like Afghanistan said about us, he’d understand their hatred towards America. However, guys like Mitt (and Santorum and Gingrich for that matter) have all the answers and have apparently never heard of a little something called “cause and effect”. If he had, he’d know that these people are sick of us being in their country swinging our dicks around and telling them what to do. Common sense is just too fucking much for some people to muster!

On the issue of Libya, Mitt has also pandered and always found himself on the side of the issue that best fits his situation at the time. In March of 2011, around the time the conflict started, Romney immediately came out in a radio interview and said that Obama waited too long and should have acted earlier. He said that the president’s handling of the situation made him look “weak” and that we should have led the charge instead of following NATO. Jesus, where do I even start on how ridiculous his statements are? The truth is, we shouldn’t have been involved.. AT ALL! Once again, America intervenes and oversees a regime change. Throughout history, this action has always proved to be disastrous. Also, Romney apparently, at that time, didn’t care about the Constitution as the invasion of Libya wasn’t properly brought before Congress. None of this matters though, as Romney flip-flopped again and again on this – like every other issue.

Less than a month later, Ol’ Mittens was in Las Vegas to speak to the Republican Jewish Coalition. When asked about his stance on Libya, Mitt Romney ignored the concerns and refused to provide an answer. In fact, it was reported by Las Vegas Review-Journal that:

Romney was silent on Libya, the newest and stickiest military and U.S. policy problem as the United States and its NATO allies enforce a no-fly zone to help rebels oust Libyan leader Moammar Gadhafi. After his speech, Romney refused to take questions from reporters about his position on Libya. Instead, he and his wife, Ann, fled down a hallway and escaped up an escalator at The Venetian, where the event was held. ‘I’ve got a lot of positions on a lot of topics, but walking down the hall probably isn’t the best place to describe all those,’ Romney said, deflecting a Libya query as he walked quickly with half a dozen journalists trailing him.

Writing about this situation, Daniel Larison of American Conservative said:

Romney seems unable to stake out a foreign policy position until after the Republican consensus has formed, and he then adapts himself to whatever that consensus happens to be…This does save him from the acrobatics required to maintain an anti-Obama position when Obama switches from restraint to starting a war, but it is just another reminder that Romney doesn’t hold foreign policy positions so much as he mimics those who do….For someone who is so fond of mocking Obama’s leadership or lack thereof, it is revealing that when Romney has to stake out a position one way or the other on a controversial question he is unable to show any leadership at all.

So while Romney went from bashing Obama for acting too late and then went mute on the situation, he then flip-flopped completely and took the position that Obama was acting too aggressively! Mitt wrote an op-ed for National Review where he stated that Obama should have just enforced a no fly zone, this way Libya couldn’t bomb their own citizens. Right, the Libyans bombing the Libyans is what we need to worry about? Has Mitt seen the pictures of Tripoli before and after the NATO strikes? I think NATO shouldn’t have been flying over Libya because they treated the damn place like a litter box in the house of a cat hoarder!

Romney then decided that maybe he did like the Constitution and that the way this war started, being that it wasn’t approved by Congress, suddenly had Mitt’s panties in a bunch. He wrote:

Military action cannot be under-deliberated and ad hoc. The president owes it to the American people and Congress to immediately explain his new Libya mission and its strategic rationale.

Well shit man, you were all for it only a few months earlier, what-the-fuck-ever. Shortly after that he was quoted as saying:

Now the president is saying we have to remove Gaddafi. Who’s going to own Libya if we get rid of the government there?

Funny he should say that since Gaddafi was killed shortly after that. After Gaddafi’s death Romney said:

I have seen those reports and if accurate I think the response is it’s about time. This was a tyrant who has been killing his own people and of course is responsible for the lives of American citizens lost in the Lockerbie attack….I think people across the world recognize that the world is a better place without Moammar Gaddafi.

Apparently he wasn’t too concerned with who would take over for Gaddafi, as he was worried about it a few weeks prior. The truth is, the “freedom fighters” that the United States and NATO helped and have propped up as the new dictators are comprised of Taliban members – you know, those people Romney refuses to talk to. Point is, Mitt is all over the place on this shit and the term he is often times associated with, “flip-flopper”, is a massive understatement!

On Iran, Mitt Romney is already geared up to go to war if he is elected president. He feels that if they are developing a nuclear missile, then it is America’s job to go over there and bomb the bejesus out of them. The truth doesn’t matter to guys like Romney, even with Defense Secretary Leon Panetta recently admitting that Iran has no immediate plans for a nuclear warhead. Nope, who cares about the truth, lets just keep selling lies to the American people and push the nation towards war with Iran. But what’s the real issue here? If it is known that Iran is not making a nuclear bomb, then why is Romney (and also Gingrich and Santorum) so quick to go to war with them? Could it be because they just don’t want Iran working on getting any sort of nuclear capabilities or is it something more sinister?

Well, Romney wants to put serious sanctions on Iran, which will just harm the innocent people there and in turn, create another group of people who would have a reason to hate us. Romney also wants to focus these sanctions on the CBI (Central Bank of Iran). Why does Romney want to try and cripple the Iranian financial system? Maybe it’s just a way to thank all of his top ten contributors, each of which is a major banking firm. Now I am not trying to play conspiracy theorist here but when you destroy a country’s financial infrastructure, it isn’t hard to move your banks in and start trading off of the resources of that toppled country. When that main resource is oil, it isn’t hard to see where this is going. Hell, former economic hitman John Perkins has made a career out of writing about this stuff, which is a lot more common than people think.

What Romney should be doing is trying to tap into the growing liberty movement in Iran. The youngsters there want to be free and generation after generation, regardless of what their monstrous Iranian government tries to do to stop it, the people become more and more Americanized. Our influence on the younger culture of Iran is paramount and for a so-called leader to bomb them instead of reaching out to them, as the guard will change eventually, is completely careless, reckless and vile! It’s obvious that Romney doesn’t care abut the people of Iran or he just chooses to be ignorant of what is actually going on over there.

This brings me to China, a country that has more in common with Iran than most people know. This is because China also has a younger generation who are sick and tired of the archaic ways of their leaders and want nothing more than a freer society that resembles something along the lines of the American Dream as opposed to the stifling grip of communism and tyrannical control. Instead of recognizing this and working towards a better situation with China through free trade and friendship, Mitt Romney wants to get stricter and punish China, who we do a lot of business with.

Mitt Romney wants tariffs and sanctions and all types of stupid crap, which will just hurt China and hurt us in the long run. Romney believes the fairytale that if we make business difficult for those we don’t like then somehow they’ll bow down to the great and powerful America and thus jobs and prosperity will magically return to the United States. I guess Romney can’t wrap his head around the fact that a tariff is a tax that will just be pushed on to the end consumer, that being the American people. Essentially, we will have to pay for this form of punishment from China, as they will just pass the buck to us. Doesn’t Romney the self-procliamed King of Business understand how this stuff works?

He talks about how China needs to be slapped around because they manipulate our currency. I guess Mitt fails to understand something else. The truth is, we manipulate our own currency by allowing the Federal Reserve the power to print money and manipulate the markets! Romney wants to punish China over an issue where we are the real criminals! I hear him talking all this trash about being strict and not rolling over for the Chinese but I don’t hear anything about shutting down the Federal Reserve. Oh yes, I almost forgot, Mitt has all those big banks in his pocket and he wouldn’t want that!

Mitt Romney’s stance with China can only lead us down one path and that is a trade war with the biggest manufacturer in the world. We will lose more American jobs, people will buy less from us and our currency will continue to be devalued because this puppet of the corrupt financial system either can’t see for the forest for the trees or he has to obey the masters who own his campaign.

On foreign policy, Mitt Romney is a joke and a whole slew of disasters just waiting to happen. For someone who claims to be so business savvy, you’d expect him to bring some actual knowledge to the table. His understanding of foreign affairs and economics is about as on par as that moronic blowhard Bill O’Reilly. Chances are Mitt, like O’Reilly, has probably never heard of Keynesian economics. He certainly doesn’t know how to take this great country of ours and pull it out of the depths in an attempt to set it back on the right track. Mitt Romney’s foreign policy will cost us so much money that our economy will become a sinkhole. The damage is already damn near irreparable and Romney will only make it worse. This shuckster should either open a used car lot or a pawn shop because if he has his way, we’ll be in a few more expensive wars and in a trade battle with China. Mitt Romney wants America to wear cement shoes to the pool party.

“Domestic policy can only defeat us; foreign policy can kill us.” – John F. Kennedy

Continued shortly in Part III..

*Written by Rob Rimes.

I was late watching this debate, as I had to check the replay. Unfortunately, I wasn’t home and I was unable to take serious notes on it. I was at my boss’ house due to it being the annual national sales meeting for my real job and between the alcohol and festivities, this thing was hard to watch in any serious sort of manner. I regret not being able to give it my full attention but the whiskey and wine were flowing, the girls were distracting to say the least and the copious amounts of food transplanted from several of the world’s most exotic regions somehow took precedence over watching the most recent episode of ‘Three Tyrants and a Wizard’. I do apologize as I have been trying to chronicle every damn one of these things but there are just so many, seven this month alone, and turning down a chance to literally spend the night at a party thrown at the mansion of the Indian version of Caligula is incredibly hard to pass up. Bourbon soaked tits are better to stare at than three dudes arguing over their dicks and the fourth shaking his head because America’s fallen so far that we’re literally having a debate about three dicks.

Now I did go back and read the transcripts from the debate and I did watch Ron Paul’s highlights – the only important parts, as the other three’s highlights would’ve put me to sleep in my hungover stupor. If it wasn’t for my boss’ brother handing me a Bloody Mary when I walked through the office door this morning, I’d probably be curled up in a ball under my desk hiding from the flickering power-draining headache-inducing fluorescent lights over my head. Needless to say, I am not a Bloody Mary fan by any stretch of the word, as it just conjures up the thought of drinking vodka with some ketchup spilled in it, but that fucking cocktail hit the spot today and I’m about 70 percent recovered from guest-starring in the Bollywood version of ‘Eyes Wide Shut’.

I know I’m rambling about my drunken escapades and that might disinterest you, as you came to this article to experience my certain style of critique on these things, so for that I’m sorry. I will do my best to give you the rundown of the debate, as I saw it between nude champagne showers and Chilean sea bass dodgeball.

So I’m just going to go down the line and analyze the candidates one-by-one starting with Rick Santorum. He started by talking about illegal immigration, border fences and telling the story about his immigrant family for the umpteenth time. He got into it with Ron Paul on foreign policy and failed miserably as he tried to cover up the fact that he’s a goddamned idiot on the affairs of Central and South America. I’ll write more on this when I get to Ron Paul, who owned Santorum like a twenty dollar prostitute. Santorum goes on to bitch about Fannie and Freddie and in turn blasts Newt and Mitt for playing personal politics and distracting everyone from discussing the real issues. On the subject of space, Santorum said that America is a frontier country and space is the next frontier to conquer. He calls for the private sector to be more involved with NASA but doesn’t fully support government being out of it. On health care he goes on and on about how awesome he is for trying to create health savings accounts. If you were so awesome, you would’ve got it done pal! He then gets into a health care argument with Romney that is neither interesting or worth writing about but what the hell, I’ll give you the nutshell version. Basically it went something like this:

Rick Santorum: “Fuck Romneycare”
Mitt Romney: “But it was only at the state level Ricky Baby!”
Rick Santorum: “I don’t care Mitt! You’re a bitch and you gave Obama the blueprints to evil!”
Mitt Romney: “Ricky Baby, you’re so silly!”
Rick Santorum: “Jesus Bible! No health care for the gays!”

Mitt Romney and Newt Gingrich spent most of their time arguing about who was a bigger bastard while both looked like big bastards. Mittens talked about “self-deportation” again. If these guys believe in such a thing as an effective way of handling a situation, can we get them to believe in “self-governance”? If they trust those illegal immigrants to leave on their own accord after sneaking in here in an effort just to come back in a way that is much more difficult, they’ve got to believe that we’re all capable of managing every other aspect of our lives? I mean, they are putting blind faith into something so farfetched that they’ve got to be down with just saying “fuck it” and letting us run our own shit, right?

On the immigration subject, Newt says that Romney is the most anti-immigrant candidate out of the four. Romney gets all pissy and pulls his two Latino cards. The first he pulls is Marco Rubio, the Cuban American senator that came to his defense on immigration. The second card Mitt pulled was Mexico, as his father was born there. I was born in a hospital bro, that doesn’t make me a doctor!

Romney and Gingrich argue about immigration for awhile and then they argue about Fannie and Freddie and who is the biggest crook. Newt, once he gets away from the lame feud for a minute, goes on some tangent about making a moon base. Newt later said that Jacksonville was going to get big pimpin’ because the Panama Canal was widening and would bring them more boat traffic. Shortly after that we were treated to a Santorum-Gingrich-Romney three-way which was like stumbling upon a middle-aged homosexual version of Cinemax at three in the morning. It was a bitch and rant fuck fest that no one in their right mind needed to see, unless of course you’re into middle-aged gay men. If you are, I mean absolutely no disrespect. Do ya thang homegirl!

Fuck all these queens, let’s get to Ron Paul, the only adult in the room. On immigration, he says that if we had a working healthy economy we wouldn’t be so worried about the immigration issue as we’d be looking for workers to fill jobs. He adds that the way we are handling our borders is actually harming our economy. He points out that we don’t have the right amount of resources on the border and that we should pay more attention to our border instead of the border between Pakistan and Afghanistan.

On the Latin America issue, Ron Paul says, “Free trade is the answer.” He throws in the fact that we’d be a lot better off if we practiced free trade with Cuba. He adds that he doesn’t like the idea that America thinks that they can go down to Central and South America and try to dictate which kind of leaders they need down there, as it is none of our business. He says that the best way to influence other nations isn’t by telling them what to do, it is by practicing friendship and free trade. Paul then references Santorum who said that we have to stand up for these nations. Paul explains that standing up for nations often times comes with us imposing ourselves on the people of these countries while picking their dictators, undermining their government and sending them a lot of money. He warns that this sort of tactic always backfires and the people we are “supporting” end up hating us. Ron Paul calls Rick Santorum’s ideas on foreign policy the “bully way”. Paul adds that he knows a better to way to work with people other than using force. Santorum shakes his head, mumbles some stupid crap and then changes his tampon while wiping his bitch tears. Checkmate Paul!

Ron Paul is asked if Mitt and Newt should return the money they’ve made off of Fannie and Freddie and he responds to thunderous applause when he says, “That subject doesn’t interest me a lot.” Paul says that Fannie and Freddie should have been auctioned off right after the crash came. He said that if it was sold, the problem would’ve been “cleansed” by now. Ron Paul says that he’s been trying to prevent this stuff which is why we need to end the Federal Reserve.

CNN’s Wolf Blitzer asks says that Ron Paul, if elected, would be the oldest president ever. He asks Paul if he would make his medical records public to show the people that he is healthy. Blitzer basically wants to paint Ron Paul as a geezer who could croak tomorrow and I find the question to be repugnant, just as I found it distasteful when the same issue was brought up with Ronald Reagan years ago. Paul said that he’ll prove how healthy he is by delivering an open challenge to all the other candidates to face him in a 25 mile bike ride in the heat of Texas. Ron Paul face-palmed the shit out of Wolf Blitzer and the other candidates with that answer. He also took a shot at Wolf himself when he jokingly pointed out that there are laws against age discrimination and that Blitzer should be careful. Wolf, after getting bitchslapped, tries to cover up the stupid question by asking the other candidates if they’d release theirs. What a tool.

On space spending, Ron Paul says that he would only approve funding on stuff that fits under defense. He says that going to the Moon and Mars is fantastic but that it could be done better by the private sector if their hands weren’t tied. Ron Paul then takes a shot at Newt, saying that he has stretched the truth with all his “balanced budget” claims from the days when he was Speaker of the House. Ron Paul is taking solid shots backed by facts and there is nothing that can be done about it when he brings these guys a dose of the truth. Strangely, Newt Gingrich was very polite and gracious to Ron Paul all night and gave him props for his ideas in several areas.

In the end, the debate was lightyears better than the NBC debate a few days prior. CNN does the best job, in my opinion, and I’ve watched every single one of these debates. Kudos to Wolf for rocking the house, even with a few prickish questions. Ron Paul owned the motherfucker, Santorum did decent if you are into his religio-fascist bullshit while Newt and Mitt looked like a few bickering Tinas arguing over the last pack of Lee Press-On Nails at K-Mart.

And that’s all I got because I immediately returned to my whiskey-scented orgy on the south lawn.

Grading Scale:
Grade A+: Ron Paul
Grade C-: Rick Santorum
Grade D+: Newt Gingrich
Grade D: Mitt Romney

*Best debate moment in recent memory:

*Written by Tho Bishop.

Giving us another example of what happens when you mix ego and poor primary performance, the major story going into the South Carolina primary is the new line of attack being employed by Newt Gingrich and Rick Perry on Mitt Romney. Failing to win over voters by attacking Romney’s record as governor, the pair has turned their sights on Romney the CEO. While Rick Perry has introduced us to “Vulture Capitalism”, Gingrich is employing a 22-minute film criticizing Mitt’s time at Bain Capital, depicting Romney as “worse than the evil banker in “It’s a Wonderful Life.””

This approach has appeared to backfire with the conservative base.

Though their critiques on Bain Capital seem more appropriate coming from Chicago, Perry and Gingrich’s underlying instincts are correct. The primary, insofar that it is a referendum on the establishment-favorite, has little to do with Governor Romney, whose only real noteworthy achievement is the despised Romneycare. No, the candidacy of Mitt Romney is based entirely on his history in the private sector. It is his success as a CEO that allows him to claim he is the one candidate who understands “the real economy”.

Unfortunately for the country, Romney’s economic literacy is the biggest myth of the primary.

It would be too easy to highlight the fact that Romney subscribes to the same flawed belief that “fair and affordable housing should be a right, not a privilege,” a major contributor to the environment that created the disastrous housing bubble (after all, he said that as Governor, and Candidate Romney is nothing like Governor Romney). Instead, let’s take a look at one of Candidate Romney’s favorite topics: China.

If you have tuned in to any of the GOP debates, you should already know that he is not a big fan. On the subject of trade policy, his website highlights a plan on “Confronting China,” including the aggressive action of labeling the pseudo-Communist nation as “currency manipulators.” He goes on to criticize the Obama Administration’s “acquiescence to the one-way arrangements the Chinese have come to enjoy.” America, he believes, must be we must be “willing to say “no more” to a relationship that too often benefits them and harms us.” To anyone who would argue that there are benefits to our current relationship with the Asian power, you are being “played like a fiddle.”

As such, it is interesting that one of his top economic advisers is Harvard professor Greg Mankiw.

In 2009, Mankiw took to the New York Times to criticize the Obama Administration for threatening much of the same policy his candidate now advocates. In what would be a fitting response to Romney’s accusation of “cheating”, Mankiw writes:

“Like many economists, I cringe whenever I hear the term “fair trade.” It is not that I am against fairness — who is? — but the word “fair” is so amorphous in this context as to defy definition. Most often, the slogan “fair trade” is little more than a rallying cry for protectionism.”

Protectionism? From the man who believes he is the only one who can save capitalism from Barack Obama? Adam Smith is rolling in his grave.

But what of China’s “currency manipulation” Professor Mankiw?

“Perhaps the oddest thing about [the criticism of currency manipulation] is that [the] complaint seems out of date. The yuan-dollar exchange rate has moved considerably in recent years. After a long period of completely fixing the exchange rate, China allowed its currency to start moving in July 2005. Since then, it has appreciated by 21 percent.” (Since this article was written in 2009, it is worth noting the information is not out of date. The Chiense yuan hit an 18-year high in April of 2011.)

So according to Romney’s own expect, his major claim against China is a complete fabrication.

A cynic may argue that Romney doesn’t believe any of the baloney he preaches about China. That he is using our economic rival as a scapegoat for a public looking for someone to blame for their economic pain. This would contradict a POLITICO report that “Romney is dead serious about…putting new tariffs on Chinese imports,” but information from unnamed insiders isn’t always reliable.

So we must conclude that either Romney doesn’t fully understand the trade policy he advocates, or Romney is a demagogue not above misleading the American people to win an election. Sadly even the latter explanation doesn’t defend the governor from Mankiw’s criticism:

“Directing attention to the China currency issue amid a worldwide recession and growing fears of depression is more than a distraction. It is downright counterproductive.”

If we are to brand Romney an economic expert because of his success in the private sector, how does the GOP defend itself from the criticism of Warren Buffet? Or Bill Gates? Being a good President is different than being a savvy CEO. The failure of Romney’s opponents to credibly attack Romney’s credentials in the economy is the reason Romney’s candidacy has the strength it does today. Interestingly, the candidate who is criticized for “crank economic theory”, almost as frequently as Romney is praised for his understanding, is the only one in the GOP field who identified the housing bubble years before it crippled the US economy – Ron Paul.

Written by Murray N. Rothbard.

The Austrian theory of money virtually begins and ends with Ludwig von Mises’s monumentalTheory of Money and Credit, published in 1912.[1] Mises’s fundamental accomplishment was to take the theory of marginal utility, built up by Austrian economists and other marginalists as the explanation for consumer demand and market price, and apply it to the demand for and the value, or the price, of money. No longer did the theory of money need to be separated from the general economic theory of individual action and utility, of supply, demand, and price; no longer did monetary theory have to suffer isolation in a context of “velocities of circulation,” “price levels,” and “equations of exchange.”

In applying the analysis of supply and demand to money, Mises used the Wicksteedian concept: supply is the total stock of a commodity at any given time; and demand is the total market demand to gain and hold cash balances, built up out of the marginal-utility rankings of units of money on the value scales of individuals on the market. The Wicksteedian concept is particularly appropriate to money for several reasons: first, because the supply of money is either extremely durable in relation to current production, as under the gold standard, or is determined exogenously to the market by government authority; and, second and most important, because money, uniquely among commodities desired and demanded on the market, is acquired not to be consumed, but to be held for later exchange. Demand-to-hold thereby becomes the appropriate concept for analyzing the uniquely broad monetary function of being held as stock for later sale. Mises was also able to explain the demand for cash balances as the resultant of marginal utilities on value scales that are strictly ordinal for each individual. In the course of his analysis Mises built on the insight of his fellow Austrian Franz Cuhel to develop a marginal utility that was strictly ordinal, lexicographic, and purged of all traces of the error of assuming the measurability of utilities.

The relative utilities of money units as against other goods determine each person’s demand for cash balances, that is, how much of his income or wealth he will keep in cash balances as against how much he will spend. Applying the law of diminishing (ordinal) marginal utility of money and bearing in mind that money’s “use” is to be held for future exchange, Mises arrived implicitly at a falling demand curve for money in relation to the purchasing power of the currency unit. The purchasing power of the money unit, which Mises also termed the “objective exchange-value” of money, was then determined, as in the usual supply-and-demand analysis, by the intersection of the money stock and the demand for cash balance schedule. We can see this visually by putting the purchasing power of the money unit on the y-axis and the quantity of money on the x-axis of the conventional two-dimensional diagram corresponding to the price of any good and its quantity. Mises wrapped up the analysis by pointing out that the total supply of money at any given time is no more or less than the sum of the individual cash balances at that time. No money in a society remains unowned by someone and is therefore outside some individual’s cash balances.

CONTINUED at the Ludwig von Mises Institute.

*Written by Rob Rimes.

Now I have often times given Newt Gingrich props in my critiques of the numerous debates that have been hitting television screens nearly once a week, and in some cases more, since earlier this year. I’ve often referred to him as the “Honey Badger” due to the fact that he was at the bottom of the barrel when he entered the race but through his ferocity, fire and heart has clawed his way through the competition and proved that he is probably the best debater in the game today. Newt is a fucking wordsmith and perfectly capable of handing Obama his ass if they were ever to go head-to-head. However, as exciting as he is to watch and as bad ass as he can seem when smacking some toad moderator for belching a “gotcha” question at him, Newt does have a track record that is horrendous and many of his positions, when really looked at, paint the man as a wannabe dictator vying for the American throne so he can impose his tyrannical will on us under the false guise of liberty, freedom and security. This guy has grown on me, as far as his debate skills go, but I still would never vote for him or brush aside his incredibly awful baggage. Newt who likes to throw the term “enemy combatant” around must fail to realize that he is an enemy combatant of the Constitution.

Now I know one of the biggest criticisms of Mr. Gingrich is his infidelity and the fact that he served his wife with divorce papers while she was in the hospital. As I’ve stated elsewhere, I don’t really care about such things when it comes to the job of being a political leader. It doesn’t excuse Newt’s actions and he is still a bag of shit for it but as long as he can do the job, I’m not too concerned with his slippery prick. Besides, honey badgers are animals and therefore cannot help behaving like animals. Newt is, in many ways, the worst kind of animal. Besides, focusing on his dick’s misadventures is what the mainstream media is doing because they are pulling at the morality strings of the undersexed over-religious GOP voter base and thus distracting from the real issue: Newt’s bi-polar record.

This establishment bastard has been in the game for so long, I don’t feel like I need to really dig all that deep in finding questionable acts to stick to this man. Unlike my critiques on Herman Cain and Rick Perry, this piece doesn’t need to pull back the layers and expose the leech covered sores. Newt wears these disgusting lesions proudly and so many people don’t even seem to care! Some of these people that are defending and supporting this monster are the very same Tea Party people who claim they are against Newt’s specific type of evil. I guess this is what happens when you allow your movement to be overcome and dictated to by primetime talking heads who spew nothing less than concentrated idiocy and establishment gibberish under the guise of freedom, liberty and “fiscal conservatism”. And when these overpaid overly-opinionated ass clowns are the top spokespeople for the cable news network that employs Newt Gingrich, you can expect a special sort of bullshit being rolled up and served to the easily influenced Tea Party majority.

Not to go off on a separate tangent but I truly miss the Tea Party that was created by Ron Paul’s 2008 campaign. Yes, Ron Paul created the Tea Party. The same Tea Party that pretty much loathes his ideas in favor of the same old, tired, never-worked establishment Republican policies that got us into this fucking mess to begin with. Yes, a mess these people bitch about yet continue to perpetuate by supporting anyone else in the GOP primary that isn’t Ron Paul, Gary Johnson or Jon Huntsman. Johnson got so sick of this goddamned idiocy that he left the party and has now joined up with the Libertarian Party. If Paul doesn’t get the GOP nomination, Johnson will be the one getting my vote in November. I refuse to choose the lesser of two bastards any longer. Hell, I refuse to even entertain the idea that political parties even mean anything or stand for something anymore. All they stand for is toeing the line and maintaining power, by any means necessary. Well, when you have a large pile of red shit and a large pile of blue shit, it’s time to wipe your ass and flush them both.

Getting back to Newt, someone recently posted a comment on a poll I put up on my website TheSwash.com. The comment listed dozens of negatives that Newt Gingrich has on his record. Now I am not going to run through all of them but I will mention some. I truly hope that most of you reading these words that I am frantically typing like the over-caffeinated jackrabbit I am right now, already know the majority of this information. As I’ve said, this dickhead has been in the spotlight for far too long and his shitty record is widely known. For those who aren’t aware, prepare to swallow some bitter pills, especially if you are a supporter of this two-bit cockroach.

Going back to 1987, when Mr. Gingrich was just a congressman and not yet Speaker of the House, he co-sponsored the Fairness in Broadcasting Act of 1987 (H.R. 1934). This bill wasn’t just unconstitutional, it was anti-constitutional. The original Fairness Doctrine was introduced by the FCC in 1949 and its purpose was to force the holders of broadcast licenses (according to Wikipedia) “..to both present controversial issues of public importance and to do so in a manner that was, in the Commission’s view, honest, equitable and balanced.” In essence, radio and television stations were made to follow these guidelines regardless of whatever it was that they wanted to present. This was an attack on the First Amendment. In fact, even the FCC saw this eventually and they voted 4-0 to abolish it in 1987. Unfortunately, Newt Gingrich co-sponsored the bill that would bring this tyranny back to broadcasting and in the end Congress passed the bill. Luckily for us, Ronald Reagan grabbed his pen and vetoed the shit out of it. Then in 1991, the first Bush vetoed another attempt at bringing back the Fairness Doctrine from Newt and his anti-Constitution cronies.

Also in 1991, Newt Gingrich voted for an amendment that would have created a national police force. Newt has always been a pimp for the police state. Between this attempt at disregarding the Constitution, once again, and his undying love for tyrannical nonsense like the PATRIOT Act, Mr. Gingrich wants us all to be ruled over by an iron fist. It also doesn’t help that he continually preaches to us about all of the “threats” out there who want to kill us because we’re free. Newt’s fear-mongering insanity knows no bounds and it is all really just a smokescreen to coerce the easily duped public into thinking that we need to live behind a giant “protective” wall.

A few years later, in 1993, he voted for the North American Free Trade Agreement Implementation Act or NAFTA. This is a bill that also slaps the Constitution in the face as it wraps its clenched fist around the throat of American sovereignty. This bill essentially created a union between the United States, Canada and Mexico in a similar way to the European Union but not as widely known or publicized. First of all, the government can’t legislate free trade. That idea is Orwellian doublethink and doublespeak at its absolute finest! Free trade CANNOT be legislated, it has to be free of law to be free trade, that is common sense. No laws, restrictions or regulations over trade IS free trade. The whole NAFTA issue is something that deserves its own article as I do not have the time or the space to fully dissect it here without getting completely sidetracked and writing a piece that completely gets away from the point of this article. I will say this however, between the NAFTA madness, the police state insanity and the broadcasting bullshit, it isn’t hard to see what Mr. Gingrich’s true agenda is. For those unable to connect the dots thus far, Newt wants to control us all through fear so he and his crony colleagues can elevate themselves as our masters and rule over us lesser beings who need to be provided for and looked after. Newt Gingrich believes himself to be smarter than every last one of us and he believes that it is his destiny to manage us as he sees fit because we are too stupid and naive to be free.

In 1994, He supported the GATT Treaty which gave sovereignty to the United Nations. Aha! Newt is a globalist shitcock! Now his previously mentioned power grabs are starting to make even more sense! You see, GATT or the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade attempted to create the International Trade Organization (ITO) but ultimately failed. Unfortunately for us, and UN countries all over the world, the ITO was the framework that in just a year’s time became the WTO or World Trade Organization: same damn thing, just better sounding name. At it’s core the WTO is unconstitutional, in fact it more or less vetoes the Constitution in that it is made up of multinational corporations out for their own interests at the expense of the citizens of all the nations forced to be involved in this charade. As with NAFTA, this whole bullshit mess needs its own piece written on it. The fact of the matter is, the four biggest legislative nightmares that Newt supported before even becoming Speaker of the House, are all attacks against the Constitution. Newt is NOT the Tea Party candidate, well unless the Tea Party is now just a marketing and propaganda tool of the establishment GOP. At this point, it is. Swallow that pill and accept it kiddos because that ship has already left the fucking harbor. You may have seen it floating by with Bill O’Reilly, Sean Hannity, Glenn Beck, Newt Gingrich, Herman Cain, Michele Bachmann, Rick Santorum, Tim Pawlenty and Sarah Palin all waving from the stern as it went off into the sunset. Rick Perry and Mitt Romney were in a little dingy frantically rowing after them.

What are some other tyrannical and questionable things that Newt has done? Well, in 1995 he said that drug smuggling should carry a death sentence. He later said that someone charged with having marijuana should be executed! In fact, he introduced H.R. 4170 which demanded a life-sentence or execution for someone bringing just two ounces of marijuana across the border! Is he fucking insane?! Between this and wanting to bomb everybody, Newt is so quick to want to murder people. Honey badgers must eat their own shit when they can’t find bees and cobras to dine on. In 1996, he tried to create his own CIA mission to kill off the Iranian leaders. You see, Gingrich has had it out for the Iranians since day one. Maybe he just isn’t a fear-monger, maybe he actually believes the bullshit he espouses. Then again, it was probably just for an oil grab. Also in 1996, he voted for and supported the largest increase ever on Federal education spending. Around this time he wrote the foreword to a book by Alvin and Heidi Toffler called “Creating a New Civilization: The Politics of the Third Wave”. That book’s premise was about how technological advancement would change civilization and because of that we needed to basically throw out the Constitution and the old ways and move forward into the future in new ways. It sounds compelling if you are an idiot. The new way proposed in this book is essentially the blueprints for a fascist world government. No thanks assholes.

Southern Avenger Jack Hunter actually talks about the issue of Newt and the Tofflers in this great video.

Always hating pro-constitutionalist Ron Paul, Newt actually used his power to help popular Democrat Greg Laughlin switch parties in an attempt to beat Republican Paul in the 1996 primaries for a congressional seat. The attempt failed but that doesn’t excuse Newt of trying to sabotage a fellow Republican by siding with a rival and abusing his power to help that rival against his own party. Newt is a fucking scumbag, only out for his own gain and if any of us oppose him, he will stop at nothing to try and destroy us. Truth be told, leading up to this incident, Newt Gingrich urged fellow Republicans to tone down their conservative views and to modernize going into the future. Newt has never really been a Republican or a conservative and, in his heart, apparently hates his party. Then again, so do many Republicans, which is why the party has turned into a shell of what it once was decades ago.

Some other things worth mentioning about Newt after he was embarrassingly forced out of office for unethical penile conquests that cost him a record breaking $300,000 are some of the bullshit things he has said. In 2006 he said that, “Free speech should be curtailed in order to fight terrorism”. He also added that he wanted the terrorists to be blocked from using the Internet and said that we needed to have a “..serious debate about the 1st Amendment.” Gingrich then went on to call for a Geneva Convention for terrorists so that it would be clear and concise on who the Constitution did not apply to. He supported Bush’s proposal for mandatory carbon caps and went on to make a climate change commercial with Nancy Pelosi, one of the most vilest women the world has ever seen. He also lobbied for ethanol subsidies and suggested that Flex-Fuel vehicles be mandated for Americans.

Gingrich has supported the TARP bailouts in the past. He was paid $300,000 by Freddie Mac to halt Congress from bringing necessary reform and thus, he benefitted from the tyranny that caused the housing bubble to burst. He calls for Singapore-style drug tests for Americans. He calls for us to attack Iran, North Korea and other nations. Newt wants us in perpetual war which sounds like he comes from the same mold as Big Brother in George Orwell’s “1984″. He opposes property rights, especially for the owner of the infamous mosque being built near Ground Zero in New York City. In fact, Mr. Gingrich has compared the mosque supporters to Nazis. Newt has even defended Romneycare in the past! He has said that a website owner, reporter or a blogger that promotes transparency at the expense of secrecy (in this case Julian Assange of Wikileaks) is an enemy combatant that needs to be hunted down and executed for publishing leaked government memos. There he goes trying to murder someone again! Maybe Newt hasn’t heard of the Pentagon Papers case that went before the Supreme Court in the early 1970′s which protects journalists from this sort of tyranny. Then again, Newt said very recently that, as president, he would ignore the Supreme Court if need be.

Just this year alone, Newt has said that we are “losing the War on Terror” and that the conflict will last as long as the Cold War. He has flip-flopped on the Libyan situation again and again, depending upon who he is talking to and who he feels is listening. He says that America is being attacked by Islamic atheists.. huh?! He has taken credit for helping develop the model for Homeland Security. Yeah, that’s something to be proud of dude. He has criticized the United Nations several times recently because it is the popular thing to do now. Unfortunately, his record shows that he has done nothing but support the UN and their world government agenda since before he was even Speaker of the House.

On medical issues, he claims to have no regrets in supporting Medicare drug coverage and he said that the GOP’s plan to cut back on Medicare, in an effort to control spending, was “too big a jump.” He supported individual health care mandates even more than Mitt Romney. He has even backed Obama’s individual mandate by saying, “All of us have a responsibility to help pay for health care.” In 1993, he endorsed individual mandates when the Clintons pushed for their brand of universal health care.

As far as his campaign goes, one of his major video ads said that he wants to “find solutions together, and insist on imposing those solutions on those who do not want to change.” What?! His staff quit his campaign en masse several months ago. Amazingly he has bounced up to the top of the pack, although he is now falling back down. Maybe it is because his poorly managed campaign is over $1 Million in debt! The most laughable thing about his campaign is that he hired a company to create a fake Twitter profile to appear as if he had a solid following. But out of all his promises and crazy schemes, nothing is more scarier than the fact that he plans to sign as many as 200 executive orders on his first day as president! That would be the biggest abuse of power in a single day.. ever.

Newt Gingrich is the last man that should be running for president. Personally, at this point, I could give two shits about the Republican Party. However, I do care about conservatives and libertarians. This guy is neither of those, he is at the very opposite end of the spectrum and to entertain the idea that he isn’t is foolhardy, careless and naive beyond any measurable calculation. Mr. Gingrich can talk his way out of any situation but so can the Devil. Whereas the Devil quotes scripture to dupe the masses, Gingrich talks of liberty and freedom. However, the reality is that Gingrich has no intention of promoting liberty and freedom, his only intention is to impose his will on all of us and to squash any of us who may speak out against him. Newt Gingrich wants us all to live in fear of all these “threats” but the biggest threat to our lives, our liberty, our freedom and our future is Mr. Gingrich himself. Don’t buy into the hype and keep this bastard at bay!

*Written by Rob Rimes.

Gordon Gekko affected me as a child. When I first saw the film ‘Wall Street’, I was around nine or ten-years-old. I remember my father watching it on HBO or Showtime. I certainly didn’t understand the film at that time but I do remember my first impression of Gordon Gekko and knowing, even at that young age, that the film misrepresented him and made him the villain when in reality, he was the hero.. or at least, the anti-hero. I didn’t know why he was the hero at the time, I just remember being somewhat afraid of him but also respecting him and seeing him as sort of a mentor. Granted he was a mentor to Bud Fox in the film but I saw him as a mentor to the film’s audience. Something about that character stuck with me and became a weird obsession. I didn’t know what he meant with his “greed”speech but I knew it was important and the most pivotal point in the film. It was ‘Wall Street’ and Michael Douglas as Gordon Gekko that really got me into being a huge fan of film on a more intimate level. ‘Indiana Jones’, Hammer Horror, Back to the Future and ‘Predator’ mixed with Oliver Stone’s masterpiece ‘Wall Street’ made me want to be a filmmaker.

I never became a filmmaker, unless you count videos of me chugging vodka and shooting bottle rockets from my mouth on YouTube as real cinema, but I did become a writer. Often times I would write outlines and even scripts for films that I wanted to make. At 15, I started to write a script called ‘Gekko’ which was a sequel to ‘Wall Street’ that had a time traveling twist to it. Essentially, the film ended with Gordon Gekko, as a member of the “Greed Party” defeating FDR and Herbert Hoover in the presidential race of 1932. Yeah, it was a fucking horrible idea and I think I used the script as scrap paper for another project I started writing; I think that one was about vampires and the Culper Ring during the Revolutionary War. Anyway, Gekko obviously affected me and influenced some of my creative endeavors during high school.

As I got older, I was more of a liberal shit. Still, something about Gekko continued to resonate with me. At that point in my life, I had more of a mentality like Bud Fox and his father but deep down, I knew they were wrong. I mean, Bud Fox was a snitch and a bitch in the end and with that, he lost any street cred he could’ve potentially had. As I educated myself, learned the ways of the world and experienced things, I became a libertarian. In many ways I have also become an objectivist. Having that stance and knowing what I know, I truly understand why Gordon Gekko was the hero of the story in ‘Wall Street’, contrary to what the director himself tried to convey.

CONTINUED at Original Post.