In Lieu of a Linkdump

Here’s a rant the likes of which you rarely see on She’s Right. Sometimes my inner-bitch just takes over, I guess.

I was just reading this article about a group of teachers (and Progressive Party pols) criticizing NCLB (No Child Left Behind). They argue that the teachers don’t have time to teach because they are “teaching to the test.”

Here’s what I don’t understand. Why aren’t you people complaining that NCLB is unconstitutional? Forget this “teaching to the test” crap. Yeah, I have to teach to the “test” too. The damn VTDOE makes me prove that I am not educationally neglecting my children, so I have to periodically take time out of our real learning to work on our stupid portfolios.

Here’s a newsflash: read the effing constitution. The Federal Government has no right to control education. Tell them to take their money and stuff it. Oh, yeah, but you need the federal money. Yeah, well if you want to prostitute yourself, then stop complaining that your pimp is too harsh.

At least you get money for it. I have to waste my time reporting to the government that no longer considers people innocent until proven guilty when it comes to educational neglect and I don’t get a dime. In fact, I have to pay for everything, including my reports to the state. I must submit to an unlawful search and seizure of my private papers, or they will take my kids and force then back into those dreadful g-schools. (That’s government schools for all of you who are not part of the paranoid homeschoolers radical fringe.)

Oh, yeah. It’s not illegal because I consent. That makes it so much better.

More on Government vs. Business

In conversations about liberty and less government, someone inevitably brings up the big, bad Big Business. Obviously without government regulation, big business would take over the world. And since we can't vote Big Business out of office, we won't be able to do anything about it.

This is the justification for allowing the government power that it was not granted in the constitution. Obviously, our Founding Fathers did not foresee the evil of Big Business.

With this in mind, and not knowing how to bring my detractors into the light, I happened upon this great piece by John Stossel on Town Hall yesterday. And since I know that many of you wouldn't dare soil your computer with such right-wing filth, I will highlight a few points here.

The history books say that during the Progressive era, government trustbusters reined in business. Nonsense. Progressive "reforms" -- railroad regulation, meat inspection, drug certification and the rest -- were done at the behest of big companies that wanted competition managed. They knew regulation would burden smaller companies more than themselves. The strategy works.

...

Most people don't realize that Enron favored the Kyoto Protocol on climate change and wanted energy regulations beneficial to itself; Philip Morris favors tobacco regulation; Wal-Mart's CEO came out for a higher minimum wage; and General Motors embraces tough clean-air rules. Why? Because, as Carney points out, big companies with lots of lawyers and accountants can make the regulations work for themselves, while smaller competitors are hampered.

...

In a free market the consumer calls the shots. In the corporate state the business-government alliance restricts consumer choice.

Stossel's column was prompted by the new book, "The Big Ripoff: How Big Business and Big Government Steal Your Money" by Timothy Carney.

Sounds like a good one.

Who can we trust? (Part two)

In part one, I talked about why I think the Democrats appear soft on terrorism. Obviously, I had to generalize. Vermonter took issue with my generalizations, in particular saying that that is only a few Democrats that want to pull out of Iraq immediately.

That may be so, but as it is with the Republican Party also, the loudest voices frame the entire public opinion of the party and the impression is that the Democrats want to pull out of Iraq.

So, now I want to turn to the other part of the question: Do I trust the Republicans?

I think the Republicans have screwed up somewhat. In hindsight, Iraq was probably not a good idea, but to pull out now would be an even worse idea.

More importantly, the Republicans are not doing enough for domestic security. I personally do not feel like we are as safe as we could be here in this country, but to their credit, there have been terrorist groups and plots broken up since 9/11.

I don't think the Democrats would do any better and that is the heart of the question.

When it comes down to it, I just think Republicans seem tougher. For that, I think Democrats can partially blame themselves. They have spent decades trying to paint the Republicans as uncaring and unsympathetic and themselves as the ones who care about people.

Democrats fight for the rights of the downtrodden, while Republicans only care about themselves. Democrats want to help the poor or abused people who turn to crime, while Republicans just want to lock them up. Democrats are the nice guys, while Republicans are the meanies – or even evil.

Is it any surprise the Republicans would be viewed as tough on terrorists and the Democrats as soft?

Republicans have always been the ones who are tough on crime, which I think extends to terrorism and national security, or at least that has been the perception.

Is it reality? I am not sure. As I said, I do not think that the Republicans have done enough. I think they need to be tougher about homeland security. The question is: do I think the Democrats would do a better job? The answer to that at this time is no. I have no reason to think they would.

(Filed under: Politics: US)

Government vs. Business (Part Two)

This is a continuation of the previous post, in which I respond to some issues raised in the comments.

Should access to health care be a market commodity based on ability to pay or a common good that should be guaranteed for all, like fire protection, police, national defense, roads, parks, snow plows, courts, etc?

I have a few comments about this question.

First, the services that are paid for communally, through government, are done so because the individual cannot provide for it himself, or they are services that benefit the entire community as a whole uniformly. I don’t think the same can be said about healthcare. It is a service that the individual can provide for himself, if he chooses to do so. The vast majority of people have healthcare. The number of people who do not is too small, in my mind, to alone justify switching to a government-funded system.

If we look at systems that are government-run, like police departments and schools, they are also government-controlled and the employees are employees of the government. Unless you are proposing to do the same thing with healthcare, then we are really comparing apples to oranges.

There are a lot more complexities in simply using a government funding mechanism to cover the cost of a private healthcare system. For one, the government does not always pay as much as it actually costs to provide the service. One example: most dentists have to limit the number of Medicaid and Dr. Dinosaur (VT’s kiddie Medicaid) patients they accept because the government does not pay enough to cover the cost of the procedure. I do not mean that they fail to turn a profit, but they actually take a loss on Medicaid patients.

Speaking of police and schools, those are things that are provided for by the government, but it is only a base level. If one is unhappy about the level of security or the quality of the schools, one can hire a private security service or send their kids to a private school. Would we do the same for healthcare? If we did, then aren’t we back to a point where we are looking at healthcare as a market commodity, where those who can afford more have more? If we didn’t, doesn’t the government system seem to do more harm than good in the arena of liberty if it denies people the right to seek private care above what is provided by the government? That just seems so anti-American to me. And no offense to Canada, but it seems completely uncivilized to deny people the right to go outside the government system.

If the problem is that people who have more money have better access and better care, then how far should the government go to abolish that inequity? Rich people will have more and better quality of everything than people with less money.

Is healthcare the only “right” that the government should equalize? What about food? That is certainly a more immediate need than healthcare, perhaps even more important. How come rich people get more and better quality food than poor people? When do you think the last time Rich Tarrant (or Bernie Sanders for that matter) ate boxed macaroni and cheese for dinner or even worse, felt hungry because they did not have enough food? Should food be communally funded? If not, why not?

What about housing? The rich always have better access to nicer houses than poor people. I live in an apartment complex with no private yard space. Trust me, it sucks. Should the government supply houses to everyone?

At what point do we decide that a need becomes a right?

The things that I mentioned above, food and housing, are both provided by the government to poor people only. Why should healthcare be government system for everyone instead of being provided by the government only to the poor?

At this point, I think the market is a better provider of healthcare than the government. There are certainly things that can be done to make it a better system, but exchanging it for a socialist system that is shown to be full of its own problems is not the answer. Socialized medicine in other countries is also facing cost and access issues. Why not apply some of the known fixes to the problems with out current system instead of just trading it in for a new set of problems?

(Filed under: Political Thought)

Government vs. Business

(Filed under: Political Thought)

I want to address a point that was raised by Terje in the comments of the post, “I Want to Be a Liberal.” The comment can be viewed here.

It reminded me of the conversation I had with Scudder Parker at the blogger BBQ at North Beach this summer. When I indicated that I prefer free-market to government control, Scudder asked me who would protect us from the corporations.

He kind of caught me off guard because of the sheer inanity of such a question. I mean, corporations do not have the kind of control over us that the government does. Corporations cannot haul us off to jail. Corporations cannot take custody of our children. Corporations cannot take our money without our consent. Corporations cannot subpoena our library records, tap our phones, or search our homes.

After I thought about it some more, I realized that it really is true that the major difference between the conservatives and the liberals comes down to a fear of big government versus a fear of big business.

I tend to look at business as something I have a choice about. I can choose what store to shop at. I can choose what products to buy. I can choose where to work.

Where there is choice, we have the control.

There are areas where corporations can harm us without our consent. Most notably is the environment. I do not wish to return to the glory days when factories dumped waste into our waterways and buried toxic chemicals in the ground. I happen to like the environment clean. My choice to use natural products and eat natural foods for my own health and well being would be completely undermined if I was breathing, drinking, or otherwise consuming toxic chemicals against my will.

To me, that would be as much a violation of my rights as a more blatant personal assault. People should have recourse against such violations and therefore I agree that a certain amount of regulation or other method of government protection is necessary. I put that in the same category as other defense that that government is justified in providing.

What I feel like the liberal, or progressive, thinkers seem to forget is that a business is run by people who have rights. When the government is used to regulate and restrict businesses, it is infringing on the rights of the business owners.

Terje asked if the right to be free from discrimination was a public good that should be protected by the government.

I do not agree that we have the right to be free from discrimination. In fact, I think people have the right to discriminate.

I know it sounds harsh. The problem is that we discriminate all of the time. Walter Williams has a short, entertaining column about that very subject.

Once you decide that the government needs to uphold our right to be free from discrimination, where do you draw the line?

When my children were in public school, my oldest son, then in second grade, told me he never wanted to go back to school again because three boys in his class were taunting him (his word) on the playground. Was it because of his race? No. It was because his parents are Republicans.

No one seemed alarmed by this. Does it only matter that his feelings are hurt if the taunting is racial? It didn’t hurt any less, I am sure, and he can’t help his parents being Republicans any more than he can control the color of his skin. In fact, he never had anyone tease him for being the only child of color in his class.

Should the government protect against discrimination for political beliefs? If not, why not? Is one group of people’s feelings more important than another’s?

I think we would be better off self-policing discrimination. In this age of communication technology, we have the means to do that. Don’t think for a minute that the main-stream media wouldn’t jump at the chance to exploit inform the public about such incidents, too. Then there is always protesting, as an option, as well.

I also think that we have the capability to self-police other areas. Instead of having government inspections of foods, we could rely on private groups or guilds. Like the Good Housekeeping Seal of Approval, buyers could look for the symbol that lets them know they have the quality of product they are looking for. If the group let their quality slip, it would destroy their good name and put them out of business. That is their motive for excellence. What motive does the government have? When the government screws up, who holds it accountable?

The bottom line is that I am not compelled to distrust businesses to the degree that I distrust the government. Business is powered by the dollar and as a consumer, I have the dollars. I also have the ability to encourage others to withhold their dollars. When it comes to government, I have no recourse if it is infringing on my rights. And if I don’t want to give the government my dollars, it will just take them.

I also wanted to address another question, but I have run out of time and this post has run way long.

I will be back this afternoon to post up my response to this:

Should access to health care be a market commodity based on ability to pay or a common good that should be guaranteed for all, like fire protection, police, national defense, roads, parks, snow plows, courts?

I am also going to do a post this week on how I became so libertarian and I will finally get around to the second part of my National Security discussion with Vermonter. Stay tuned!

Good is Not Good Enough for Some People

(Filed under: In the News)

I am just catching up on some news while my kids are watching some Saturday morning cartoons. As I sit here and listen, I can not believe the crap that passes for children’s entertainment these days.

That is why I was so glad to find out last weekend that the show “Veggie Tales” is now on NBC. Since we only have networks, we have very few choices for cartoon viewing. My three-year-old has almost no good choices, since CBS stopped carrying Blue’s Clues and other Nick Jr. preschool programming on Saturday mornings.

For those of you who are not fundamentalist Christians who like to indoctrinate your children, you might not realize that “Veggie Tales” is a Christian cartoon. It is quite funny, too. My brother-in-law, who is a very liberal UCC Reverend, gave us about a dozen videos last year. They integrate biblical teaching with humor and cultural references.

I was shocked to see a religious show on network TV, but a quick Google revealed that they were being stripped of all references to God and religion, for the safety of all children viewing.

I was okay with this compromise. There is no way that non-Christian parents would want a Christian cartoon on network TV and I really can’t blame them.

The Veggie Tales bunch, lead by Bob the Tomato and Larry the Cucumber, present a wonderful alternative to the junk on TV. They present good lessons on things like sharing, telling the truth, and not judging other people who are different. I think our children today thirst for those values in their TV shows.

One day, when my kids had left the room to go do something else, I caught a glimpse of Bratz, the cartoon. I have all boys, so I don’t have to deal with “Skankz,” as my husband calls them. I was totally shocked that the characters were talking about one girl going out with another girl’s boyfriend and lying to her or some kind of drama like that. But what did I expect from the people who produce a line of baby dolls wearing sexy lingerie?

With this kind of influence pervading kiddie pop culture, wholesome shows like Veggie Tales are a welcome change of pace.

The last place I thought I would find opposition was from a group whose primary mission is “to promote and restore responsibility and decency to the entertainment industry in answer to America's demand for positive, family-oriented television programming.”

So, I was surprised to read that the Parents Television Council is complaining that NBC is removing the Christian references in Veggie Tales.

Says the groups president, L. Brent Bozell, in the AP story, "If NBC is so concerned about that four-letter-word God, then they shouldn't have taken 'VeggieTales'. This just documents the disconnect between Hollywood and the real world."

I say, get over yourself. Our children need good quality programming like Veggie Tales. They do not need you ruining it for them, either. Not all children are Christians, but all children can benefit from the positive messages that Veggie Tales provide, regardless of creed.

To complain about good quality children's programming because they removed the Bible verse and Bob and Larry's tag line, "Remember kids, God made you special and he loves you very much," is a bad case of throwing the baby out with the bath water.

This kind of complaint just documents the disconnect between L. Brent Bozell and the real world.


(On a some what related note: Check out the knit Bob and Larry stuffed animals ..er.. vegetables I made for my son Ethan, over at Crafty Mama.)

Friday Afternoon Blog-surfing: Nerd Edition

(Filed under: Blogging Stuff)

I think I am going to start doing Friday afternoon link dumps. This one is kind of late in the day, I know.

Get ready for the Nerd Edition, links to the nerdiest posts the blogosphere has to offer.

If you haven't already, you should take this short quiz and check your Nerd Score. I proudly displayed in this post that I scored an 81.

You have to watch this Weird Al video "White and Nerdy." I saw it on Candleblog, but I didn't watch it. When it showed up on the homeschool blog Nerd Family, I gave in. Weird Al is as relevant today as he was when I was in middle school.

Now that you are primed for nerdiness, check this out if you dare: Star Wars character blogs.

Just Padme (The blog of Padme Amidala)
The Misadventures of Anakin Skywalker
Chronicles of a Jedi Master (The blog of Obi-Wan Kenobi)

Ready for more nerdiness?

Check out this Nerd-a-licious T-Shirt.

Sorry for all the nerdy stuff, guys. I think using Bob the Optimizer's Linux laptop had adverse effects on me.

That reminds me, be sure to check out his favorite site: DistroWatch for all the Linux nerdiness you can handle.

Have a great weekend!

Fun with Senate Races

The US Senate race here in Vermont is heating up. The control of the Senate is at stake here. The outcome of this race will affect us for generations to come.

I think it’s time for a little break from all this seriousness. Today, I introduce “Fun with Senate Races.”

Fun with Tarrant:

Burlington Pol thinks that Tarrant looks like The Joker from Batman.

Vermont Daily Briefing thinks that Tarrant looks like The Bumble from Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer.

Now you have the final say.

Follow the links to view the pics, then vote in the poll.

Which character does Tarrant most closely resemble?
	The Bumble
	The Joker
Free polls from Pollhost.com

Fun with Bernie:

The Sanders campaign website has a Bernie video game, where Bernie flies around in a hydrogen-powered plane, avoiding the Extreme Right Wing, Big Money Interests, Fat Cats, and Mudslingers.

Click image to go play!

(Hat Tip: GMD)
Filed under: (Politics: Vermont)

Chittenden County State's Attorney Debate

Announcement:

State's Attorney Debate
Friday, September 22, 2006
5:30 - 7:30 PM
Billings Student Center , UVM

This is a debate between T.J. Donovan and John St. Francis, candidates for Chittenden County State's Attorney.

This is an important position and these two men have very different approaches to the job. It would be a shame to let this race slip under the radar. I plan to do a post about this race later, but I have to get to bed now!

(Filed under: Politics: Vermont)

I Want to Be a Liberal

(Filed under: Political Thought)

I really want to be a liberal. I really do. I mean, all the cool people are liberals, so why wouldn’t I want to be? I am not really into that whole rebellious thing. I like to be liked. I certainly don’t appreciate being called bad things, like racist and ignorant. Why wouldn’t I want to be a liberal?

It’s hard to be a conservative in Burlington, Vermont. I know, boo-frickety-hoo, break out the violins. I’m serious, though. I always feel like the odd man out. I used to dread school functions where I would have to listen to the other parents talk about how great being a liberal is. It was even worse when my secret got out and they knew that I was a conservative.

No one likes evil stares when they pull up to the school with their Bush-Cheney ’04 bumper sticker on their mini-van, least of all me.

How come no one ever cared that the soccer coach had a Dean for America sticker on his clip board? It just isn’t fair.

I’ve tried to be a liberal, honestly. I listened to Randi Rhodes drone on for hours on Air America. I watched Democracy Now. I read all of the liberal blogs. I tried to understand the liberal point-of-view. I even debated with Bob the Optimizer, taking the liberal side, while he took the conservative side. Well, for as long as we could both keep from laughing, anyway.

I know the liberal line, but I can’t seem to force myself to buy it.

I would have to say the issue that is most illogical to me is the area of economic justice. One would think that having grown up in a single-parent home with a mother who was on and off welfare most of my life, I would be a liberal. I think it was that experience that taught me that the welfare system is a trap that keeps people poor.

Liberals think that the answer is to expand the support programs, but there always will have to come a time when a person has to transition to self-sufficiency. The fear of leaving the safety of government care is what keeps a lot of people dependent on the government. That kind of economic slavery has no place in a free country.

People are more likely to only take the help they really need when they know the people supporting them. That is one of the reasons I prefer private, local, community-based support programs to government bureaucracies.

Their support for government welfare programs is only part of what keeps me from being a liberal. There is also the liberal solution to economic inequality in the private sector. The liberal goal is to abolish the rich/poor divide. That sounds nice, but it is so impractical.

For one thing, we do not all have the same monetary worth. My husband does not deserve to be paid the same as someone who is willing to work longer hours. He is rewarded in other ways, namely time with this wife and children. Someone who went to college for 8 years does not merit the same pay as someone who only has a high-school diploma, in general. A pre-school teacher does not deserve to be paid the same as a police officer because the officer is putting her life on the line every time she goes to work. There is a value attached to each type of work and some types have more value than others.

In the ideal liberal world, every job would pay a livable wage and include full health benefits and everyone would be happy. That is so awesome. Sign me up!

But, wait. Umm, if the guy bagging my groceries, the guy stocking the shelves, and the guy sweeping the floor of the store all make $15 an hour plus benefits, aren’t grocery prices going up?

Aren’t the guys driving the trucks to the store and the guys working in the factories making the goods going to want more money, too, since they have to be able to afford to buy the more expensive groceries? Isn’t their job valued higher, since they involve more risk and, in the case of the truck driver, special training?

And what about the teachers? We can’t have them making the same as a grocery bagger. It just won’t work.

After we raise everyone’s pay and the goods and services go up in price to pay for the higher wages, won’t we be back where we started?

Enter price controls. The liberal solution for rising prices. Let the evil corporations eat the extra expense of the higher wages. After all, they are paying their CEOs gazillions of dollars. They can afford it.

Never mind the fact that price controls will create a shortage, since many business that don’t have gazillions of dollars lying around will not be able to financially sustain the increased cost of doing business coupled with the artificially low prices.

The problem for me is that I can’t ignore the economic reality that government controlled prices do not work in the real world. But don’t just take my word for it.

So, here I am. With liberalism being completely illogical from a practical standpoint (and I didn’t even get into the liberty issues), I remain a conservative. An outsider. An oddball. Shunned by the cool kids. Alone, with no one to talk to about organic oats and the benefits of buying local goods. Because you know, my conservative friends never like to talk about that.

Categories

(Filed under: Blogging Stuff)

I just added a new hack for categories. I’m not sure how well this will work. I was going to start using Technorati tags, but this was simpler to start with. The downside being, of course, that it will do nothing to drive traffic to my site.

I was looking for a new recent comments hack because my old one does not work with this template, and I came across this one for categories.

We’ll see how it goes.

For now, old posts are not categorized, so you won’t get much if you click on them right now. Maybe sometime when I am really bored, I will go back and categorize some of the older posts.

A Vermont Elections Post

I really should start doing a category system.

Anyway, for those of you who missed the Vermont gubernatorial debate on Switchboard last night, VPR has a podcast available here.

There was also coverage by
The Burlington Free Press
WCAX Channel 3
The Rutland Herald

And others, I'm sure.

I haven't had a chance to listen yet, but I will post something about it soon.

Using My Religion

I usually try to shy away from religion on She’s Right because the issues I talk about are political, not religious. There are some who mix the two, but I think that the principles of conservatism stand better on their own without a religious justification. In fact, I think it weakens them when religion is thrown into the mix.

That said, there are some on the left who think they can use Christianity to argue for liberal political views, such as government programs for the poor.

Today on Green Mountain Daily, there is a diary about the new blog God’s Politics. I have only read Odum’s GMD post, which I recommend, not the blog it refers to. I started to post a comment about it, but it got so long that I decided to post it here.

The gist of his post is that the Christian political agenda should not be about abortion and gay marriage, but about the causes of abortion, like the lack of support programs for the expectant mother, and the moral issue of fighting poverty.

I think what liberals do not seem to understand is that using the government for forced benevolence is not the only way to take care of the poor. In fact, one could argue quite well that it is the least effective and least efficient way to do so.

I oppose government programs to combat poverty, but that does not mean that I do not do my part to combat poverty. I donate money (even though I am considered “low income”) and I donate my time to help people who are in need. Our long-term financial plan includes a large amount of benevolent giving in the future when we have two incomes. And part of our homeschool objectives this year is to get involved in helping our community.

On the religious side, the liberal Christian argument never resonated with me. If God gave us free will and even He does not force us to do good, why would he want a government of man to force us to do good? It should be our choice.

It also removes the human element. Christians are supposed to let people see our good deeds, so they will praise our Father in Heaven. (Paraphrase of Matt 5:16) It doesn’t say, hide in a voting booth and let the government handle your good deeds for you.

The idea is to show others God’s love. Helping a neighbor in need because God loves them goes a lot further toward that end than voting for a liberal politician who supports government social programs.

Of course the approach that some on the “religious right” take goes a step further in the wrong direction by pushing people further away from God.

On a related note, John Stossel had a good column on Town Hall today about the federal funding of stem cell research. He says the conservatives miss the point when they use a moral, right-to-life justification for opposing federal funding.

The point is that conservatives should have the goal of limiting the government to the powers in the Constitution.

The government itself does not need to judge the moral value of issues that the public is divided on. The bottom line is that the government should not compel people to financially support things that the people might be morally opposed to. If the government left things to the private sector and stuck to the constitutionally enumerated responsibilities, this wouldn’t even be an issue.

Who can we trust? (Part one)

In the comments of yesterday’s post, a good point was brought up: handing victory to the Democrats in the age of terrorism is too risky a move just to teach the GOP a lesson and advance the cause of conservatism.

This has been a final sticking point in my decision about whether or not I should just hold my nose and vote Republican in November’s congressional races. The bottom line is that I do not trust the Democrats on security.

Vermonter asked me why I don’t trust the Democrats on security. At the risk of losing my status among the left-leaning Vermont blogosphere as the most palatable right-wing blogger, I will answer his question.

In general, the ideology of the liberals, who currently frame the positions of the Democratic Party, is based on a belief that everyone can live together in harmony when we remove the political, social, and economic injustices that exist.

We hear this type of rhetoric when there is a crime committed here in the States. The left is quick to jump in and point out the tragic circumstances of the misunderstood criminal, blaming society, treating him like the victim, and making excuses for his crimes.

In the mind of a liberal, crime happens when people are treated unfairly and if we could fix the inherent unfairness of the world, crime would not exist.

This view is also articulated in the Democratic Party’s “Real Security” plan.

Eliminate terrorist breeding grounds by combating the economic, social, and political conditions that allow extremism to thrive

This is a good goal to have, and one could argue that this was what Bush hoped to accomplish in Iraq, but the Democrats seem to miss one important piece of the bigger picture: the terrorists want to kill us.

This is not just about social, economic, and political injustice. These people have been conditioned to want to kill infidels, not to differentiate between a peace-loving liberal and a war-mongering neocon.

the only thing acceptable is a conversion or the sword

I have zero confidence that liberals get that.

There is no give peace a chance with these people. They want to kill us.

The Democrats want to pull out of Iraq immediately. Will that make us safer? Let’s just ask the organization of Sunni Arab extremist groups in Iraq, the Mujahedeen Shura Council.

You infidels and despots, we will continue our jihad and never stop until God avails us to chop your necks and raise the fluttering banner of monotheism, when God's rule is established governing all people and nations.

Trusting the Democrats on security requires believing that these guys are merely the misunderstood product of economic injustice.

Sorry guys. Just writing this is enough to convince me to give the GOP a free pass on the big spending.


The second half of Vermonter’s question was: Do you trust the Republicans? I will answer that in part two.
(Filed under: Politics: US)

"Time for Us to Go"

After the primaries last week, I said I was not going to support the Republican candidates for US House and Senate, Martha Rainville and Rich Tarrant. As I have written about that decision and read comments that have been left here, I have continued to think about and talk about it.

I am left with one little nagging doubt. Do I really want to play a role in allowing the Democrats to seize control of Congress? After all, I agree with the Democrats less than I agree with the GOP.

Then I read this commentary written by Richard Viguerie, from the Washington Monthly feature, "Time for Us to Go," a collection of commentary by conservatives on why the GOP should lose in '06.

With their record over the past few years, the Big Government Republicans in Washington do not merit the support of conservatives. They have busted the federal budget for generations to come with the prescription-drug benefit and the creation and expansion of other programs. They have brought forth a limitless flow of pork for the sole, immoral purpose of holding onto office. They have expanded government regulation into every aspect of our lives and refused to deal seriously with mounting domestic problems such as illegal immigration. They have spent more time seeking the favors of K Street lobbyists than listening to the conservatives who brought them to power. And they have sunk us into the very sort of nation-building war that candidate George W. Bush promised to avoid, while ignoring rising threats such as communist China and the oil-rich “new Castro,” Hugo Chavez.

Okay, this is nothing new. While much more specific and condemining, this is exactly what I have been saying.

He continues,

But a Republican loss of one or both houses of Congress would turn power over to the likes of Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid. Dare we risk such an outcome?

This is the very question that I have struggled with. His answer:

The answer is, we must take that chance. If Big Government Republicans behave so irresponsibly and betray the people who elected them, while we blindly, slavishly continue backing them, we establish that there is no price to pay for violating conservative principles. If we give in, we are forgetting the lesson that mothers teach their daughters: Why buy a cow when the milk is free?

(Do mothers even teach that to their daughters these days?)

He goes on to say,

Sometimes a loss for the Republican Party is a gain for conservatives. Often, a little taste of liberal Democrats in power is enough to remind the voters what they don’t like about liberal Democrats and to focus the minds of Republicans on the principles that really matter. That’s why the conservative movement has grown fastest during those periods when things seemed darkest, such as during the Carter administration and the first two years of the Clinton White House.

I have been saying that same thing for months, privately. Sometimes you have to lose the battle in order to win the war. In order for conservatism to make a comeback in any meaningful way, the Big Government GOP needs to be sent a strong message. The only way to send that message is for them to lose the majority, as painful as that will be.

As Viguerie concludes,

If Democrats win in November, it will seem like a dark time. But the darkest time comes before the dawn.

(Hat tip: Crunchy Con)

What is a Conservative?

I want to clarify something for She's Right readers.
Two things, actually.

1. Those are not pot leaves on the template. If they are pot leaves, then they are only there to make the hippies feel at home here.

Okay, now that that's cleared up...
2. I want to explain what I mean when I say that I am a conservative. There are many different kinds of conservatives. Two of the most talked about and immediately recognizable in today's political climate in the US are the neoconservatives (neocons) and the social conservatives.

Neocons are the conservatives that drive the Bush Administration foreign policy.

Social Conservatives are the ones who focus on the conservative social issues, such as abortion and gay marriage. They are sometimes referred to as the "Religious Right."

While I am a social conservative, in the sense that I have traditional values and I find it appalling that a civilized society such as ours deems killing an unborn child an acceptable method of dealing with unintended pregnancy, I am not a social conservative that believes in using the government to impose a conservative value system upon free people.

I am what is called a "small government conservative": a term all but obsolete in our modern day federal government.

According to the Vermont Libertarian Party Chair, Hardy Machia, small government conservatives are a sub-set of Libertarians.

I used to think that small government conservatives (SGCs, as I will henceforth refer to us as) were a part of the GOP. That was true at one time, or so I am told, but that is no longer the case, which is the explanation behind my post-election rants.

Ideally, I believe that government is best which governs least.

Wait, where have I heard that before. Oh, yeah, Thomas Paine of American Revolutionary fame said that. It's almost as if that was one of the principles this country was founded on.

As an SGC, I firmly believe that the federal government is too powerful. Many of the regulatory functions of the current federal government were reserved to the states by the Constitution and are therefore un-Constitutional.

An example of this would include the United States Department of Education (which rightly should be abolished), and the Republican-supported No Child Left Behind Act, which significantly expanded the DOE's control over local education decisions. As an SGC, I do not support this kind of federal government control.

I know, I am a crazy, radical extremist because I want to abolish the US DOE.

So, there you have it; a brief introduction to the radical mind behind She's Right. I have been wanting to do a post about my basic ideology for, well, as long as I have been doing this blog. Now I have.

More to come.

Related Links for 9/15/06 Show

Here are the related links from this evening's "She's Right" on Channel 17.

Essex Shootings:
Essex Teacher Wanted Restraining Order
Shooting Suspect Accused of Assaulting Officers

That was the only thing I talked about that had links. This will be a regular feature posted after the live show airs.

The podcast of the show should be up Monday. I'll post with a link when it is available.

She's Right - Tonight

I have no time to post today because I am busy preparing for tonight's live call-in "She's Right" show on Channel 17 in the Greater Burlington area.

It airs at 5:25 PM.

On this first anniversary of "She's Right," I will be discussing where the show is headed in the upcoming year, along with a look at some of today's most talked about issues.

Continuing my rant from yesterday...

I feel like I need to expand on a few points from yesterday’s post.

First, I would like to be clear about what I liked about the Republican Party in the first place.

• Fewer government programs
• Lower taxes/less government spending
• Parents’ rights in education
• Personal responsibility
• Personal freedoms
• Tough on crime
• Gun rights
• Term limits

Next, I would like to be clear about what the Republican Party has become.

• Expand government, add new programs
• Cut taxes, yet increase spending and create deficits
• Expand Federal Government role in education
• Scaling back personal freedom
• Expansion of Federal Government role over the States
• Willing to betray principles to stay in power

An anonymous commenter on that post described my mindset as, “I don’t agree with a candidate on a single issue so they don’t belong in the same party as me.”

This is not about a single issue.

This is about the fact that the Republican Party has expanded the role of the federal government and increased government spending.

Spending under President Bush has increased at twice the rate it did under President Clinton. The Republican apologists (along with the anti-war crowd) would like us to believe that the spending is all due to military and post-9/11 budget items. This is not so.

Non-defense, non-homeland security, non-Hurricane Katrina discretionary spending has increased 22% (after adjusting for inflation) from 2001-2005.

The Republican Party no longer represents fiscal responsibility.

The No Child Left Behind Act dramatically increased the federal government’s control over local educational decisions. By doing so, they also caused an increase in federal education spending of 100% from 2001-2005 ($35 billion to $70 billion).

The Republican Party no longer represents smaller government.

One part of your characterization of my mindset was accurate, Mr. Anonymous. I do not belong in the same party as these people.

Go ahead and dismiss me as some right-wing extremist, single-issue voter, without whom your party will fare just fine. Just don’t be surprised when the GOP loses elections. (Or in Vermont's case, keeps losing elections.)

The Return of Tirade25

Tirade Parade is back on the sidebar. She finally made it to NYC and is back with a new post. Check it out!

Primary Postmortem

The first time I ever voted was in 1994. That was the year I turned 18.

It was an off-year election and there wasn’t anything memorable going on with the Vermont ballot, for me at least.

What was memorable about that day was the triumphant victory of the Republican Party, which claimed control of the Senate and the House of Representatives with a little help from a thing called the "Contract with America."

I was a sophomore at UVM at the time and had developed a real interest for politics. I was enamored with Newt Gingrich and the emergence of the Republican Revolution. From that point on, I no longer felt like a leper for having a conservative ideology. I was not alone, despite the insistence of most of my university classmates and professors to the contrary. There were many others like me, in fact a majority.

From that day on, I always felt that I had a home in the Republican Party with like-minded thoughtful conservatives.

Today, I mourn the loss of that feeling. This is not just overly dramatic prose brought on by post-primary blues. This is something that has been festering in the deepest recesses of my psyche for some time now, only to be confirmed last night.

I started to feel this way when I was chair of the Burlington GOP. (That was September 2003 – September 2005, in case you were wondering.) My official (and truthful) reason for stepping down from the position at the end of my term was that I had decided to homeschool, but what made it so easy was the feelings I had that the Republican Party in Vermont, as a whole, does not reflect my views. And the fact that the scandal-ridden Republican politicians in Washington had wandered away from their conservative principles did not help things.

In the past, I have often wondered why someone would “waste” their vote by voting for a fringe third party candidate that had no chance of winning. Shouldn’t they at least pick the major party candidate that is the better of the two? Don’t they have at least some interest in whether the Democrats or Republicans have control of congress?

Well, now I finally get it. The current system is corrupt. The Democrats and the Republicans, not to mention certain independent lifetime politicians, are entrenched in out-of-control spending of other people’s money, big-daddy/nanny-state-style government, and the quest for power at any cost.

I am tired of taking the “lesser of two weasels” approach. I am no longer going to sell-out my vote to the candidate that I find less repugnant.

I had a long talk with Bob the Optimizer last night (who many of you She’s Right newcomers might not know because he hardly ever comments anymore ever since they took away blog-surfing “rights” at his work). We both voted for Shepard and Parke. We are both very conservative, though he ever so slightly more than I. We both revile at the thought of supporting Rainville or Tarrant.

Rich Tarrant has already made it clear that he doesn’t need Republicans to win. He categorized Greg Parke, with whom I share many views, as an extremist. He wants to expand Medicare. Expand Medicare! He wants to raise the minimum wage to Vermont’s level. He wants to expand federal education spending. Then, just to remind us of his contempt for the Republican Party, he claims to be shame-filled of the way the Republicans in Washington are spending our tax dollars. Well, shame-filled he should be, if not for the way he proposes to increase that spending exponentially in an attempt to woo voters.

My vote for US Senate? I’ll probably write-in Bob the Optimizer.

And then there is Martha Rainville, the darling of the state GOP. The only difference between her and Democrat Peter Welch is her stance on the war in Iraq and future use of the military. Not being much of a neocon myself, that is not much of a selling point. Oh yeah, the other difference is that Welch can at least articulate some forward thinking ideas, even if I abhor his socialist-leaning ideology.

From a distance, this race looks like the white zebra with black stripes vs. the black zebra with white stripes. SSDC – same stuff different candidate. A closer look reveals a Bernie Sanders wannabe vs. a vapid candidate-in-a-box, pre-packaged by the Moderates R’ Us wing of the Republican Party.

No, thanks.

For a moment, as we were talking last night, I considered voting for Rainville in order to help the GOP keep the majority, or rather to stop the Democrats from having it because heaven knows the GOP has done nothing to deserve to keep it. It’s great having a husband who holds no allegiance to the Republican Party, who can quickly remind me that the GOP has done nothing to earn our support.

I guess I’ll sit this one out, too

So now I get to experience democracy from the same vantage point as people like the Greens and the Libertarians. I get to walk into the voting booth in November knowing that I will not see a candidate on the ballot that I can vote for with at least a minimum level of confidence that he will represent my views and “throw away” my vote in an insignificant attempt to make a statement, hoping that someday soon things will be different.


Afterthought...
On a slightly more positive note, the blog is going to be more issue-oriented from now on instead of so election coverage heavy. I was getting kind of bored with that approach anyway. I’ll leave that up to the unbiased blogs like Politics VT. I am going to try to carve my niche elsewhere. Stay tuned.

Lt. Gov. Dubie delpoyed for short-term assignment in Iraq

Breaking news from the Burlington Free Press website:

Lt. Gov. Brian Dubie has been deployed to Iraq, serving as a member of the U.S. Air Force Reserve on a field assessment team on a short-term assignment, according to the Air Force.

Maj. John Elolf, spokesman for U.S. Central Command Air Force, said that Dubie is now in Kirkuk, Iraq, and will be returning before the end of September. Dubie was deployed on Friday.

“It’s not a flying status as far as I understand it,” Elolf said, declining to describe Dubie's mission in any more detail.

On a lighter note...

I am taking a break from politics today. With all of these pre-primary posts, I thought it was time for some levity.

Okay, so is anyone else watching Rockstar: Supernova?

This is the final week. Who do you think is going to win?

Come on, I cannot be the only one watching this. Usually these kind of shows are not my thing, but come on, it’s a band with Tommy Lee (Mötley Crüe), Gilby Clarke (Guns N’ Roses), and Jason Newsted (Metallica). Those were my three favorite bands when I was in middle school/high school. I had to watch it.

Tonight the final four compete to be the lead singer of Supernova and tomorrow night the winner is announced.

And you thought the only important vote going on today was the primary.

Primary Primer

Tomorrow is Primary Day here in Vermont. If you haven't ever voted in a primary, or even if you have, here is a little primer on the process.

You will be given four ballots, one for each major party. (Democratic, Republican, Progressive, Liberty Union)

You can only vote on one.

The other three get thrown into a “secure garbage can.”

The one you voted on goes into the voting machine and is tabulated.

You need not tell anyone what ballot you are using. This waste of paper is to protect your privacy, so that, for example, no one has to know that you are one of the five people in the state taking the Liberty Union ballot.

Personally, I enjoy the nasty glares I get when asking for the Republican ballot, but those days are gone now.

If you are voting in the Republican Primary, I have a few words for you to consider.

Some people like to approach the primary in terms of who is more likely to win the general election. This served Republicans well back in 2004 when the Democrats used this strategy to select John Kerry as their presidential candidate.

Many people think that Martha Rainville and Rich Tarrant are more likely to win in the general election because of their so-called moderate positions.

Historically however, Republicans win when they stand up for conservative principles, not when they disappear into the mushy middle, positioning themselves as democrat-lite on issue after issue.

In this primary, we have a clear choice for US House and US Senate. Mark Shepard and Greg Parke are solid conservatives. They will be willing to stand up for those principles. I encourage you to consider voting for them tomorrow.

Happy Birthday, She's Right (the show)

I was looking for a blank tape earlier to tape "The Path to 9/11," and I came across the first episode of "She's Right." It was from September 16, 2005. That makes this Friday's show my first anniversary.

Now you have to tune in!

In other self-congratulatory She's Right news, I received an e-mail today from a Channel 17 viewer.

Dear Charity,

After watching your interview with Mr. Parke on Channel 17, I have decided to vote for him instead of Mr. Tarrant in the Primary.

So there you have it folks. An opinionated stay-at-home mom who likes to hear herself talk can make a difference. So can you. Just remember that.

If you want to listen to my interview with Greg Parke, just click here for the podcast.

And don't forget to vote in this Tuesday's primary!

Tarrant Does Not Need Republicans

Attention Republican primary voters:
Tarrant does not need you to get elected.

From this morning's Rutland Herald:

"I don't need the Republicans or their money to get elected."

Good to know. I guess we won't vote for you then. Good luck winning the primary with that strategy, Mr. Independent.

Click on the link above to read the full Herald article. There is also an awesome comment from lesser-known candidate Cris Ericson, made to the Herald reporter, that makes it well worth the read. She's a firecracker. It would be fun to see her and Sanders go head-to-head.

That being said, I still support Greg Parke - the Republican candidate in the race.

With the primary coming up on Tuesday, She's Right will have much more primary coverage over the next couple of days. And you can tune in to She's Right on channel 17 in the Burlington Area on Friday, September 15 @ 5:25 PM for a post-primary wrap-up.

Tarrant's New Ad

Rich Tarrant’s new Bernie ad is up, here. It is of a single mom who is upset that Bernie voted against extending the Child Tax Credit, which was set to expire and revert back to $700/child (from the $1000/child it was raised to as part of the Bush tax cuts).

It also mentions that Bernie voted against pension portability.

In the ad, the voice over, which I like to refer to as the Fact Check Lady, came on and said that only 24 people voted against the pension bill. The problem was that Fact Check Lady started talking about that vote while the screen was still showing the text of the Child Tax Credit bill. I felt like she was trying to imply that he was in a small minority on that vote, too.

Let’s check Fact Check Lady’s facts. The Child Tax Credit bill passed by 271-139. That means that Bernie was in the company of 138 others in that vote - hardly a radical position.

The group “Fair Taxes for All,” which uses the word “fair” loosely, lobbied representatives to vote against the bill. Their reasoning was that the bill also raised the income one could earn and still get the tax credit. They, much like Bernie, consider a “fair” tax system to be one that redistributes wealth.

There is plenty there to criticize, Rich. Plenty. In fact, maybe I will write my own ad on this issue just to show those folks you’ve got working for you how to do it right.

How about one that features a couple like my parents-in-law, who struggled hard when they were younger, but after decades of hard work and sacrifice, finally have achieved a comfortable lifestyle. They were unable to save for retirement when they were struggling to raise a family, so now they are working extra hard and extra long hours to save enough for retirement.

When Bernie Sanders talks about “taxing the rich” to help out hard working Vermonters, he is talking about them! Bernie wants to tax them more, after they worked their whole lives to try and make a good life for themselves.

The ad would have to show their house, which is really nice, but small – not extravagant at all. Maybe it could show the man working on the house, since the reason it is so nice is that he did all the work himself.

Of course, my husband is a Masshole, so they couldn’t really show my parents-in-law, but there are others out there that fit the description.

The point is that the tax policies of Sanders and others working for a “fair” tax policy are punishing people who have worked all their life to get what they are.

The Child Tax Credit bill did not extend the tax credit to billionaires, not even to millionaires. The people Sanders considers rich are not just the trust fund babies like Paris Hilton. Most of them are hard working Americans who struggled their whole life to get where they are.

Obviously, people like my in-laws, who are nearing retirement age, do not have minor children. I know. It is the “tax the rich” philosophy that I am disagreeing with here. To Bernie Sanders, the “rich” are not only millionaires and billionaires. This vote reflects that. I was just connecting the dots.

The reason people keep voting for Bernie is that they do not take the time to extend what he is saying to its logical end. If he voted against the extension of the Child Tax Credit because he wanted to keep the cut-off at $110,000 for a married couple, then that is his cut-off for “rich.” Two veteran teachers would make more than that. I have never in my life heard anyone consider public school teachers “rich.” I thought they were underpaid.

If you take Bernie’s entire philosophy and look at it together, he is very far out of the mainstream, even in Vermont.

There is no need to twist his record. Tarrant does not need to paint the picture of the Bernie who loves child molesters and terrorists and doesn’t care about children or single mothers. No one is going to believe that anyway.

As I said before, show Bernie as people know him and explain why you are a better alternative.

If you are.

(HT: PoliticsVT)

Meeting Mark Shepard

What better way to spend a sunny Labor Day than at Oakledge Park with Republican US House candidate Mark Shepard?

Shepard showed up in his campaign RV, with his 9 year-old son, to greet a dozen or so supporters. It was a nice, intimate gathering where people could just hang out, meet Mark, and talk issues. My kids had a great time running around with Mark's son and we all enjoyed the delicious grinders the campaign brought.

It might seem like a small crowd one week before the primary election, but Mark was very optimistic. The side of his RV says, "Tell ten. We win!" He's growing support by taking the time to really talk to voters and encourage them to tell ten people about him.

I have met my share of politicians in this state from all different parties and I have yet to meet someone with such unshakable integrity as Mark Shepard.

He was talking about the way politicians today are so focused on the end that they will use any means to get there. This has led to corruption, negativity, and a failure to stand up for what they believe in. He believes that as long as he continues to always make sure the means are just, the end will fall into place.

I knew that I was going to vote for Mark Shepard before today for his views on limited government, free-market economics, personal responsibility, and individual liberty, but now I am going to make sure that I go out and tell ten more people to get out and do the same.

For more on Mark Shepard:

• Visit his web site at www.shepardforcongress.org.
• There was also an article in the Free Press on Sunday, written by Terri Hallenbeck, about that primary race.
• Another great article was this one from the Vermont Guardian, written by Shay Totten.
• Shepard faces off with Martha Rainville on Tuesday September 5 at 7:00PM on VPR's Switchboard.

All's Fair in Love and War - and Senate Races

Have you heard about the latest scheme cooked up by the Vermont left? They are attempting to make sure that no one runs against Bernie Sanders in the November election.

That’s right. The self-righteous lovers of democracy, caretakers of the poor, and knowers of what is best for everyone, want their golden boy, Bernie Sanders, to run for a six-year term in the United States Senate with no opposition.

First, they organized to put Bernie on the Democratic Party primary ballot, so that no other person seeking the Democratic nomination would be able to oppose him.

Bernie of course will then decline the nomination because he is after all an independent. Just disregard all that Democratic Party fundraising for him.

Now the left is organizing a campaign to get people to vote in the Republican primary to write-in the deceased Fred Tuttle, eradicating any opposition from the Republican Party.

This would leave Bernie on the ballot facing no major party candidate, ensuring an easy victory.

This is what socialism is, folks, and this is why conservatives and libertarians fear it so. Socialists think they know what is best for mankind and therefore the end justifies the means.

So what if there was no fair election?

So what if there were no other candidates?

Bernie knows what is best. He will represent the people.

The end justifies the means.

Second Amendment Debate Heats Up

Thanks to a little help from the gun nuts over at Alphecca, the comments thread of my Second Amendment post from Wednesday is heating up. It's like a primer on gun rights, right here on She's Right. (That was a lot of rights.)

I just thought I would bring it up, in case anyone wants to join in the discussion.

Update: I also want to give a thanks to Say Uncle, which had a post about it, too.

Update 2: I was not trying to be offensive by using the term "gun nut." That is how Jeff refers to himself on Alphecca, so I thought it was okay to say. Kind of like how Bob the Optimizer is a computer nut. I did not realize "gun nut" was a derogatory term.

Many thanks to Jeff for the post. I have learned a lot about the Second Amendment from all of his (and Say Uncle's) readers who have visited here.

The VPR Republican Senate Debate

Earlier this week, the candidates seeking the Republican nomination for US Senate debated on VPR’s Switchboard. This is a very important election coming up on September 13. The winner of this primary will go on to face Bernie Sanders in a race to win the US Senate seat previously occupied by Jim Jeffords.

The candidates seeking the Republican nomination are Rich Tarrant, Greg Parke, and Cris Ericson.

With apologies to Ms. Ericson, I am going to focus this post on Greg Parke and Rich Tarrant. I am going to try to do a post about her candidacy later. In the mean time, check out her website if you are interested, here.

I have had my mind made up about this race for some time now, but I did want to give Rich Tarrant one more chance to convince me to vote for him. This debate was that chance. He did not fair well.

For one, he used to be a Democrat. That does not sit well with me, but since the Democratic Party used to be more conservative and I do know some very conservative Republicans who used to be Democrats, I was willing to set that aside.

Overall, I think Tarrant is too comfortable with government regulation. In response to a question about farms, he proposed that the government limit how much the price a farmer gets for milk can fall in one year.

She’s Right is opposed to all government subsidies to farms. (Yes, you read that right. I am a radical, lunatic, fringe extremist. I know.) If the price of milk is too low, we have too many dairy farms. Personally I do not think that all small dairy farms will go out of business because there are so many people, myself included, who will not drink milk that comes from large agri-business farms that pump their cows full of chemicals and hormones. There will be enough demand to support a certain level of supply and unfortunately, the other farmers will have to find something creative to do to stay afloat. Why should farming be any different that any other business? Either you adapt to the market, find your niche, or go under.

Greg Parke did not articulate what I just said. That was my opinion.

He did say that the way to help farmers is for the government to remove the regulation that is making it difficult for them to do business. This position comes from what he learned during the time he spent actually working on a farm.

When it comes to the war, Greg Parke has military and diplomatic experience in the Middle East. He understands the root of the violence in that region and how to tackle those root causes.

Rich Tarrant suggests moving our troops out of harms way right now. He likened it to teaching a kid to ride a bike and the need to let go of the bike and let the kid fall, so he can get back up on his own.

Cute analogy, but too simple. As Greg Parke pointed out, we need to keep our word to the people in Iraq.

A caller brought up the Defense of Marriage Act. Tarrant said that marriage is between a man and a woman, but that a constitutional amendment is the wrong way to go; it goes against what the constitution was intended for. Two points for Tarrant.

In a great rebound, Greg Parke brought up that this is a sticky and contentious issue and an amendment would force it to be voted on in every state, letting us know once and for all where people stand on the issue of marriage. I had never thought about that. It is indeed a good point. However, that could also be accomplished with a national referendum vote.

When a caller brought up a woman’s right to choose, Tarrant answered that "Roe-Wade" is the law of the land and that is a court issue, not one for the Senate. Either Mr. Tarrant is an idiot or he thinks we are. Okay, “idiot” is probably too strong a word there, but everybody knows that the Senate confirms the judges, so to say that it is an issue for the courts and not an issue for the Senate is either disingenuous or ignorant.

Parke came out as pro-life, then noted that women do not have a real choice. Studies have shown that 60% of abortions are coerced. He would support a bill that made it illegal to coerce a woman to have an abortion. He also wants more options. He noted that when returning from a trip to Moscow – where he saw first hand the effect of capitalism on a formerly socialist country and it was great (you should really hear that story if you haven’t already) – there were three couples who had just returned from adopting Russian babies because it is too hard to adopt in the US. He recommends making it easier to do adoptions in the US so that would be a viable option for pregnant woman.

Both men supported having a sunset provision on all programs so that they come up for review in order to gauge their effectiveness. This would reduce unnecessary spending.

Both men said that they want to cut spending, but Parke had more specifics on what should be cut, including defense waste, and Tarrant could not mention specifics.

In their closing statements, Tarrant said he despises partisan hatred and would put Vermont and America before party. He stressed throughout the debate that he is "independent."

Parke on the other hand is a solid Republican, who is not afraid to admit where the party has gone wrong in recent years. He is a Vermonter, has worked on a farm, has served in the military, returning to face unemployment for a year. He understands Vermonters needs, as well as understanding conservative fiscal policies that keep money in the hands of the people who earned it, cut government waste, and end unnecessary regulation that serves as a barrier to prosperity. He also has valuable experience in the Middle East, which is greatly needed in our Congress at this time.

My vote in the Republican primary for US Senate will be for Greg Parke.

Senate Debate and Shepard in Burlington

Later today, I am going to do a post about the VPR Republican Senate debate between Rich Tarrant, Greg Parke, and Cris Ericson. I haven't been able to get it done yet this week because I have been busy with homeschool stuff.

If you want to listen to it yourself, you can go here to the Switchboard website and scroll down a little.

I should have the write-up posted later this afternoon.

Speaking of Republican primaries, Mark Shepard, who is facing Martha Rainville in the primary, will be in Burlington for an informal campaign event on Monday. If you are thinking about voting in the GOP primary and want to meet Mark, e-mail me using the link in the left side-bar and I will let you know the details.

I will have a write-up of this event early next week.