'76 Blog

(Centennial Fellow) Nice guys don't always finish last.  Sometimes they win three states in a single day.   Rick Santorum's improbable hat trick - sweeping Republican presidential contests in Missouri, Minnesota and Colorado - provided yet another surprise in a wildly unpredictable nominating process.  It also ensures that the primary season will last longer, that we will learn more about candidates' strengths and weaknesses, and that voters in more states will have a say in selecting Barack Obama's opponent.   As much as we may grow tired of the campaign antics and the infighting, a longer nominating trail isn't necessarily a bad thing.  It didn't seem to hamper Obama after his lengthy slugfest with Hillary Clinton four years ago.   Pundits gave Santorum a fighting chance to beat Romney in Missouri without Gingrich on the ballot.  But wins in Minnesota and Colorado were particularly noteworthy because Romney had decisively won both states in 2008.  This time, Romney slipped from first to third place in Minnesota, and in Colorado, where he garnered 60% in 2008, finished second with 35%.   Despite his best efforts to persuade Republicans that he is conservative, "electable" and inevitable, Romney is unable to spark rank-and-file enthusiasm.  The intellectual case for Romney, as presented by National Review, is reassuring but not inspiring.   Romney exudes competency and tries to say all the right things, but it's so obvious that he's trying too hard - that it doesn't come naturally.     As was the case with his "I don't care about the very poor" gaffe (words that should never pass through a candidate's lips in any context), he over-corrected by advocating that the minimum wage be indexed for inflation - a progressive liberal's dream.   Worse still, as Marc Thiessen explained in the Washington Post, Romney seemed unaware that the conservative response to poverty isn't a government safety net but a growing economy that produces good jobs to make people self-sufficient.   Contrast Gingrich, who can turn a phrase and inspire an audience and who packs intellectual depth to back it up.  But Newt was much more likable as a second-tier candidate who played the father-figure in the early debates, reminding others to save their sharpest arrows for Obama's destructive policies.  That's Good Newt.   Once Gingrich surged toward the front, we saw Bad Newt: self-important, overly-defensive, sometimes-unprincipled.  He attacked Romney's business credentials from the anti-capitalist left, as if he had forgotten that economic growth usually means shedding older inefficient jobs in favor of new more productive ones.   Little Newt also emerged: the petulant politician who wouldn't extend to Romney the courtesy of a congratulatory phone call and whose astronomical "unfavorables" make reaching swing voters a daunting task.   Enter Santorum.  Nobody, except perhaps Ron Paul, seems as genuine.  It's that sincerity that helps conservatives forgive his few political transgressions and instead focus on his strengths:   Because he never supported mandatory individual health insurance, he contrasts Obama better than either Romney or Gingrich. On tax cuts, his record is flawless. He's been a courageous leader in reforming entitlements, including welfare and farm subsidies. He clearly understands that America is a beacon of freedom and that we have real enemies who will strike if America appears weak. He's consistently supported parental choice in education, measures to curb abusive lawsuits, and protections for the unborn.   Some social moderates profess alarm that his faith informs his philosophy.  Yet, that's further evidence of Santorum's sincerity.  Faith isn't something he does on weekends; it's so important that he lives his life accordingly.  To do otherwise would be hypocrisy.  It's hard to understand why even those who disagree with his philosophy wouldn't respect his integrity.   Americans cheer the underdog, and Santorum's tenacious campaign engenders admiration.  Now that he's a true contender, his task is to demonstrate that he represents the best chance to send Obama packing.

  (CU Grad Student) I’ve been like most Republicans…riding the wave after wave of candidates. Let me be more frank, I’m a recovering Perry supporter, who rode the Cain Train, and hesitatingly got off on Newt Station. So now, I believe in Mitt. Why? [Editor's Note: '76 Blog is editorially neutral in elections and between parties. We welcome all points of view. Readers who support a different GOP contender, or Obama for that matter, are encouraged to submit posts to Centennial@ccu.edu.] Karthik's post continues: There are three key reasons why I’m supporting Mitt. Before I begin, let me give a few more identifiers. I’m a proud Army officer, a conservative with not so hidden sympathies with the Tea Party and its principles, a man who seeks Biblical guidance, and the son of Indian immigrants dating a wonderful woman who is the daughter of Mexican immigrants - - easy to follow I’m sure. Those are my biases and here’s why I believe in Mitt. 1. It’s about fundraising…Obama raised $40 million in cash http://www.miamiherald.com/2012/01/31/2618023/obamas-supporters-deliver-40-million.html http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2012/02/01/obama-bundlers-include-advisers-tied-to-solyndra-corzine-eva-longoria/ Let’s face it, we are facing a fundraising machine. What caught my eye most, more than the primary, was the almost footnote-like headline above - - Obama raising $40 million dollars. I think this statistic deserves further scrutiny. A recent article (above) cited that more than 440 fundraisers collected at least $75 million to help Obama win a second term. Notables in this illustrious group include movie producers Jeffrey Katzenberg and Harvey Weinstein, Vogue editor-in-chief Anna Wintour, and actress Eva Longoria.   There is only one candidate that has been able to compete with this kind of funding - - Mitt Romney. Let’s face it, money has a huge influence in elections and in an election that will likely reach a billion dollars (can you believe it?), we need a candidate that can fundraise at the level of Obama. Romney is the only one coming close to Obama’s fundraising level.   2. It’s getting nasty out there http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2012/01/31/florida-primary-the-most-negative-campaign-ever-says-media-group/ Every election, we wonder - - can our elections get any nastier? Simply put, they can.  The Florida primary has been recorded as the most negative campaign ever.  Drawing differences between candidates is integral, but campaigns have become fixated on character assassination and personal attacks.  Succinctly, we are destroying ourselves and are setting the path for a candidate to limp into a general election against the Obama machine.  It’s time for tea partiers, social conservatives, neo conservatives, and liberty lovers of all backgrounds to coalesce around a candidate or face a reality of a general election with a candidate so denigrated by a bitter primary that he would begin a general election far behind Obama - - a position we cannot be in if we intend to win this thing!   3. Florida Primary - - it’s not only big, it’s indicative Other than the 50 delegates, Florida is indicative because of key Republican groups, including a large Hispanic population.  Florida is also unique because it is the first primary where only registered Republicans can vote. Romney’s ability to win Florida big clearly illustrates that he has the ability to coalesce these groups on a state wide basis. He’s done it a microcosmic level, the only candidate that has done this thus far, and based on this, I am confident he can do it on a macrocosmic, national level. That’s what we need more than anything; someone who can bring the party together. I’ll admit it; I love Newt’s big ideas and vision, Santorum’s compassion for the sanctity of life and for manufacturing, and Paul’s insistence that we truly shrink government and audit the Fed.  Romney has had issues with his stances on life and “Romneycare,” but he is the only candidate that can unite the party . Above all, he will give our party, and all its groups, a seat at the table, which will define his presidency.  Let’s be cognizant that Ronald Reagan, a unanimous favorite of conservatives, also had issues when he ran from California, including pioneering no-fault divorce.  My girlfriend always reminds me: “Sometimes you have to put your big boy pants on and make a decision.” It’s my time to wear those said pants. It’s decision time here in Colorado and I hope we can make our decision based on who best can beat Obama. For me, the answer is clear.  That’s why I believe in Mitt for 2012. Karthik is serving as the Legislative Aide to a state representative from House District 14(Colorado Springs) after recently completely his tenure as Staff Assistant to the Centennial Institute, a state based think tank located on the campus of Colorado Christian University in Denver, Colorado. He has been accepted and will pursue his higher education aspirations at the University of Colorado with a combined Master of Public Administration/Juris Doctor program.  He has voluntarily reassigned to the 1/157th Infantry Battalion Colorado Army National Guard in order to pursue his aspirations of deployment. These views are solely his and not reflective of any other organization.  

Rick Santorum will campaign at Colorado Christian University, Wednesday 10am. The GOP presidential contender will hold a press conference to announce new Colorado endorsements, then talk with students about the Feb. 7 caucuses. Anyone may attend. Doors open at 9:30. Address for GPS: 180 S. Garrison, Lakewood CO 80226. Santorum led off the CCU-sponsored Western Conservative Summit last July 29 in Denver, an event at which then-candidates Rick Perry and Herman Cain and then-hopeful John Bolton also spoke. "Since before the Summit last year, we've been in touch with most of the Republican campaigns, including those for Romney, Gingrich, and Paul," said John Andrews, director of CCU's think tank, Centennial Institute. "We'll keep the welcome mat out for all of them as Coloradans weigh the options in 2012." "We do not take sides in elections," Andrews added," but we're always honored to give a candidate or officeholder our microphone to talk about the issues and bring the democratic process alive for our students, faculty,and friends in the community."

(Centennial Fellow) Oh, what a relief it was when actual voters- normal human beings- began to cast real ballots!  After fourteen months of the punditocracy telling us what voters would do, should do, or might do based more on Inside the Beltway vanity, than real insight into the American mind, the people- starting with Iowa and New Hampshire- began to talk back and in doing so left many a prognosticator’s reputation in tatters. So, what have we learned from the quadrennial process thus far? First, the Debates have emerged in unprecedented fashion as the central methodology for winnowing candidates.  Owing to the national economic crisis and the angst it entails, people are attaching extraordinary importance to the coming election- and rightly so.  Accordingly the size of Debate audiences has increased dramatically, thus encouraging sponsors to have more of them. The Debates have also validated candidates who can think and speak well on their feet.  Thus a Newt Gingrich with little money or organization can be competitive simply on the basis of verbal prowess.  Conversely a Rick Perry with lots of money and organization can self-destruct simply on the basis of verbal ineptitude. The Debates pose a great disadvantage for a political party challenging a sitting President.  The more candidates on the Debate Stage, the smaller each one appears in comparison to an incumbent ensconced in the historic setting of the White House, and cast in the glamorous role of “Leader of the Free World”. Anything a challenger says can be dismissed as self-aggrandizing and “tawdry politics”.  The President on the other hand can do and say the most blatantly political things while piously claiming to be “merely doing his job”. In this context Republicans are particularly vulnerable since the Debates provide a “target rich” environment for a hostile “Mainstream Media” to denigrate GOP candidates and their beliefs under the guise of “objective analysis”.  Just as the media adored the “Maverick” John McCain whenever he criticized the policies of the detested Bush, this year the media trumpeted the moderate virtues of Jon Huntsman as a way to describe all other GOP candidates as “extremists”. A staple of these exercises is hearing the pundits say how ridiculous it is to grant little states like Iowa, New Hampshire, and South Carolina such prominent places in this solemn ritual of Democracy.  Regularly we hear calls for Regional, or National Primaries despite the obvious defect that either would exclude all but the wealthiest candidates owing to the stupendous amount of money needed for television advertising in such larger jurisdictions. Oddly enough, the aforementioned three states though small are very different, and in the aggregate they are a reasonable slice of Americana.  There is a certain virtue in having candidates spend large amounts of time with small groups of people who can look them in the eye, ask pointed questions, and get some sense of who this person is who wants the most important job in the world. As the people surveyed the field they frustrated the pollsters by constantly changing their minds.  Yet by granting multiple candidates the proverbial fifteen minutes of fame they subjected them to a scrutiny and heat that would eventually melt most of them.  Thus did Cain and Bachman disappear, and Gingrich, Santorum and Perry will likely follow soon. Huntsman said his third place finish in New Hampshire gave him a “Ticket to Ride”, but the mischievous nature of his media fuelled candidacy was revealed by exit polls that showed fully 51% of his supporters approving of Obama’s performance as President. [Editor: Ticket or not, a few days before South Carolinians would go to the polls, Huntsman ended his ride and endorsed Romney.] The dogged persistence of the quirky Ron Paul is tribute to an enduring streak of Libertarianism in the American electorate and its surprising appeal among young voters suggests it’s not going away.  Though he cannot say it Paul has telegraphed rather clearly that his real goal is influence not nomination. What Mitt Romney understands better than any candidate is that the November election will be decided by those free floating independents in the middle of the political spectrum who decide all Presidential elections.  His skillful, though unexciting campaign is built around that fact.  Exit polls show that Republican Primary voters prize “electability” above all else.  Democrats disingenuously say Romney is the Republican candidate they most want, but all polls and the money the DNC is already spending to trash him, reveal that he is the one who most threatens Obama’s appeal to those independents who elected him four years ago. Thus have voters not pundits given this race a clarity it heretofore lacked. _____________________________________________________________________________________ William Moloney’s columns have appeared in the Wall St. Journal, USA Today, Philadelphia Inquirer, Baltimore Sun, Washington Post, Washington Times, Denver Post, and Human Events.  

(Denver Post, Jan. 1) “Let us eat and drink,” said the beautiful people at last night’s glittering parties, “for tomorrow we shall die.”  Maybe they thought their insouciance fitting as 2011 ticked away, but they could not have thought it original.    It was Obama’s favorite economist, John Maynard Keynes, the original Mr. Stimulus, who remarked coldly in the 1930s that in the long run we’re all dead.  And Keynes was echoing the dissipated elites of ancient Israel 2700 years ago, says the prophet Isaiah.  Fatalistic irresponsibility endures though nations rise and fall.  Our fall may now impend, as 69 percent of those polled believe America is in decline and 57 percent expect our kids will live less well than we do.  Yet you saw little evidence of that somber outlook in the prosperous holiday bustle at suburban malls and downtown theaters.  A psychologist might call it cognitive dissonance. I’d call it either rank denial or good old American gumption.  But which? On this first day of a fateful election year the choice is entirely ours – and I choose gumption. Notwithstanding our fiscal and economic woes, political polarization, slumping demographics, nukes in Iran and North Korea, global jihad and sharia, the USA has the potential to come roaring back in 2012 and onward to 2020.  It starts with deciding we can. True, historians warn that great nations seldom make it to age 250, and we’re now 235. “Pessimism, materialism, an influx of foreigners, the welfare state, the weakening of religion, the love of money, and the loss of a sense of duty,” Sir John Glubb’s checklist for a country in decadence (from his 1976 book “The Fate of Empires”), fits us all too well.  Our advantage, though, is that there has never been an America before. Are we exempt from the undertow of history and the underside of human nature?  Absolutely not.  We do possess, however, resilient free institutions and an indomitable fighting spirit.  From this fortunate combination – representing for our generation a trust to keep, not a charm to boast on or coast on – a victory for the United States over decadence and decline, against the odds, remains possible. I’m no Pollyanna. Our state and nation are ill-led by Democrats and Republicans alike.  Judges flout the Constitution, producing tyrannous rulings like Colorado’s Lobato school case, and making it unlikely the Supreme Court will annul the disaster that is Obamacare. The spiritual poverty in today’s public square would appall the pioneers who put “Nil Sine Numine,” nothing without the Spirit, on our state seal. We face a stormy year.   But like many Christian and Jewish conservatives, I enter 2012 with a survival kit of ideas and ideals that keep me buoyant, storms or not.  Here on the shelf by my desk are wisdom-books giving timeless encouragement in the toughest times.  Enemy attack, economic crash, electoral defeat?  I hope and pray not.  Still in such volumes as these, there is sustenance to persist regardless. Of course my list of ten titles, compiled years ago for a friend, won’t match yours.  But I do recommend compiling your own.  It will ground you on bedrock and make 2012 go better. And what are the books on my shelf?  First is the Bible, alongside Chesterton’s “Everlasting Man” and Lewis’s “Mere Christianity,” for an anchor in eternity.  Next, “The Federalist” for politics and Bastiat’s “The Law” plus Hayek’s “Road to Serfdom” for economics.  Weaver’s “Ideas Have Consequences” and Goldwater’s “Conscience of a Conservative” diagnose America’s travails since 1945.   From literature, though a hundred come to mind, I complete my ten with Bolt’s “Man for All Seasons” and Tolkien’s “Lord of the Rings,” epitomizing moral integrity.  We’ll need a lot of that, and divine help besides, as beleaguered America turns the calendar page.  Happy New Year.   

(Denver Post, Nov. 27) “Thanksgiving and Christmas 2011, now those were tough times. The House and Senate couldn’t agree on raising taxes.  Denver and Aurora couldn’t agree on the Stock Show. “Democrats couldn’t get excited about Obama.  Republicans couldn’t get excited about anyone. It was grim, I tell you.  Worse than 1933, with unemployment over 20%, Hitler and Stalin menacing Europe.  “Worse than 1942, with the world in flames, the Allies beset by Germany and Japan.  Worse than 1968, with assassinations, race riots, failed presidencies, antiwar marches.  “No, youngsters, none of those dark days compared with the year we lost Steve Jobs.  Elway was dissing Tebow.  Big Air was cancelled.  Black December, we called it.  Be grateful you weren’t born yet.”  Will Grandpa be narrating such melodrama by a Colorado fireside decades from now?  Hardly.  So why the long face?  We’ve survived worse than this.  Purpose and grit will get us through.  Coloradans have backbone.  Our best days are ahead, there’s no doubt of it. Yet four out of five Americans in a recent poll said the country is now in decline. Maybe we are beginning to see ourselves as a people that things happen to, rather than what we’ve historically been since Pilgrim times – a people who make things happen.  It’s a huge difference; and fortunately, it’s still our choice. Local reaction to failure of the congressional “supercommittee” to reach a deficit-reduction agreement, as reported last week by the Denver Post, portrayed Colorado as an almost helpless dependent of the federal budget.  The state will be a less desirable place to live in dozens of ways, one gathered, if spending growth slows down to keep America from a Greek-style fiscal collapse.  Woe is us.  The obvious rejoinder is twofold, it seems to me.  First, let’s have some perspective here.  Spending growth HAS to slow.  Barreling along on the current unsustainable path is not an option.  It would make all 50 of the states a worse place to live.  Second, since the budget binge is clearly ending, deal or no deal, let’s make a virtue of necessity and get busy positioning Colorado for greater economic self-sufficiency.  The time should come when we’re NOT a groveling client of the Beltway.  How about both parties in the legislature and the Hickenlooper administration vying to outdo each other on reforms toward that goal, come January? New Year’s confetti will hardly be swept up, of course, when presidential politics goes white-hot with caucuses and primaries, Colorado included.  Some say that movement on policy will then halt because of election-year posturing.  But considering our state’s particular leverage in the 2012 race, why do we have to accept that?  We’ll not only be a battleground state again as we were in 2008.  This time, Colorado could play the decisive role that Florida played in 2000.  Strategists on both sides have spun out scenarios in which our nine electoral votes tip the balance of 269 to elect the incumbent or the challenger.  (Lucky we stayed off the National Popular Vote bandwagon.) So we will have, to put it mildly, the respectful attention of both Obama and his opponent – Romney, Gingrich, or whoever – all the way to November.  As individual voters and especially through our organized groups, we should be thinking about what we want from them.  I don’t mean our selfish wants, but our agenda for the civic good, for America’s renewal. Our state is being paid yet another compliment, if you can call it that, as pundits left and right predict that the “fear and loathing” attack campaign Obama used to rescue Sen. Michael Bennet’s reelection here in 2010 will become his own national theme against the GOP in 2012.  If true, too bad.  Such scaremongering demeans our intelligence and our backbone.  Will Coloradans stand for it?  Stay tuned.

Editor: Five hundred Colorado conservatives filled the Douglas County Events Center in Castle Rock on Nov. 7 for the “Obama 365” rally sponsored by Salem radio stations KNUS and KZNT, one year out from Election Day 2012.  Featured speakers were Salem radio hosts Dennis Prager and Hugh Hewitt.  ’76 Blog contributor Peg Brady produced another of her meticulously detailed steno summaries of the evening.  Here is Peg’s report:   DENNIS PRAGER   Having the State deeply involved in the lives of individuals replicates Europe’s old-style  patriarchal government, not America’s liberty-based ideal.  That outdated patriarchal model erodes personal responsibility, personal dignity and interpersonal civility.   Replacing BO will not be easy.  Although he has utterly failed with the economy, with foreign affairs, with protecting our borders, with maintaining the Rule of Law and any other aspect of the president’s domain, he mesmerizes voters.  Our GOP candidate must focus on the Conservative vision: • Explain why GOP values improve people’s lives: “The larger the government, the smaller the citizen.” • Don’t just criticize BO’s failures, even important ones like unemployment, debt and Obamacare   Liberals and their audiences make decisions according to feelings, and good intentions sway their emotions.  Conservative decisions derive from reason and results – but those logical, business-minded factors do not resonate with the public.  Liberals’ “logic” goes: • We care about “victims” and we are motivated by good intentions. • You GOP folks oppose our well-intended measures. • Ergo, you don’t care about people and you are bad.   Sadly, that makes sense to many voters.     This election is larger than just defeating BO, vital as that is.  2012 offers a golden opportunity to explain our vision and to expose the Liberals’ failed patriarchal model.  Even the President of the EU states, “The welfare state is unsustainable.”  Excessive debt undermines even the most robust economy.  Contrary to the media, it wasn’t “greedy capitalist” banks that brought about the mortgage, it was the Leftist government forcing banks to issue high-risk loans.   GOP candidates must elucidate the three high-level components to the GOP vision, presented on the coins in our pockets: • E pluribus unum • Liberals promote “multi-culturalism” which actually engenders the envy and mistrust characterized by racism and separatism. • We respect each individual’s heritage while seeking unity.  • In God We Trust • Liberals want a secular state with the government (i.e., themselves) as the revered patriarchal but unpredictable, capricious head. • We believe that faith in God imbues people with a high standard of responsible, civil behavior and with a commitment to Truth. • Liberty • Liberals distrust individuals and want to supplant individual self-esteem and personal liberty with collective dependence. • We encourage and bolster individual achievement.   It is sophomoric and irresponsible to try overriding reality with “good intentions.”  That is the level – and the age group – to which the Liberals’ utopian nonsense resonates.     HUGH HEWITT   The GOP presidential and vice presidential candidates’ acceptance speeches will be critical, the opportunity to elucidate to voters – and to an international audience – our vision and principles.    • Human dignity • Liberals believe, and want voters to believe, that elected officials and bureaucrats know best, that individuals are incompetent and that they are victims. • We believe in individual choice, individual achievement, and individual liberty. • Limited government • Liberals want an all-encompassing government with themselves in control. • We see a bureaucracy that is already so large and so convoluted that no one does his job and no one is held accountable for failing to do so. • Non-intrusive government • Liberals want government to control every aspect of everyone’s affairs, so that we all comply automaton-like to their dictates. • We know that excessive regulation stifles enterprise, initiative, invention and creativity.       • Public employees  • Liberals want public employees to receive higher pay and better benefits than private-sector employees, thus luring ever more people into government “service” and buying ever more votes (with taxpayers’ money).  • We oppose unionization of public “servants” and believe pay for all employees should align with performance.   The GOP presidential candidate and his choice for vice president must clearly and powerfully demonstrate three factors: • Character:  good, honorable and dedicated; loving America’s exceptionalism as the beacon of freedom • Capacity:  knowledge, commitment to hard work, readiness to seek factual input and ability to base wise decisions on complex data • Constitutionality:  firm resolve to honor and uphold our noble Constitution   Americans three-to-one believe that our nation has been moving along the wrong path.  Our task is to offer a clear understanding of our path.       JOINT COMMENTS   GOP candidates must be so honest and upright that there is no chance of an “October surprise” or any fodder for the Leftist media to demonize them.   As President Reagan recognized, it is ruinous to denigrate other GOP candidates during the primary races, for that just provides more fodder for Leftist “analysts” to slander us.   President Reagan also rightly urged us to back all GOP candidates who uphold our core principles, even if we differ on some points.   The Left’s demand for compliance with “politically correct” speech is yet another control technique.  They in fact protect as “free speech” only the expression of their own opinions. Their ultimate ideal is totalitarianism.    We can counter a Liberal’s accusation of not caring about needy people’s problems by demonstrating that genuine results trump good intentions.   Education and health care are the Liberals’ most common attack arenas, yet we can readily prove the welfare state’s failure in both.  Moreover, the welfare state’s taxation and debt erode productivity and promote hyperinflation.  Europe’s financial crises arise from just that cause.   Rather than imposing Obamacare on us all, “health stamps” (in parallel with food stamps)  would meet the Liberals’ assertion that needy people require health care.  That would disarm the Liberals’ argument without Obamacare’s huge cost and unconstitutional intrusion.  If they didn’t concur, they would reveal that control, not help for the needy, is their genuine goal.   The GOP has learned from 2008’s debacle and now is actively using social media.  Reaching young people through their media is vital.   As John Andrews and others aver, we need to restore Americans’ sense of individual responsibility.  Teaching responsibility, like teaching other moral values, can be done through our own behavior, one person at a time.  This is especially true for inculcating values for our children.  Americans, young and adult, need to learn history and citizenship.  And our public schools at all levels need to teach facts, not doctrine.   Faced with the question of whether or not to compromise with Liberals (i.e., to be “purple”), a GOP candidate should retain his/her core principles yet demonstrate respect for others’ views.  That isn’t compromise; rather that is sensible and civil.  And it’s practical, because we must WIN in order to have a role in leadership.   Either Marco Rubio or Paul Ryan would be good choices for vice president because they both excel at explaining our principles and (on the politically practical level) they would both be likely to carry their home states, which would garner large electoral counts.   “Pundits” predict that eight states will determine the 2012 presidential election: Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Iowa, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania and Wisconsin.   Even if we win in 2012, it may take a decade to undo this administration’s fiscal damage, international disgrace and moral erosion.  If we lose in 2012, the outcome is too bleak to contemplate.     NOTE:  All this advice applies to all GOP candidates, not just to our presidential contender.

(Centennial Fellow) There is much doom and gloom out there in the economy.  Many say America’s best days are over, and that we will be eclipsed by Europe or China. That just will not happen.  Thirty years ago everyone talked about how America was in decline, that Japan would pass us.  That was until the Reagan administration turned our country back toward free markets (allowing greater innovation and a technological revolution), while Japan hit a glass ceiling (their production possibility frontier).  Europe’s economic problems are currently worse than ours (a deeply embedded culture of socialism and a dismal birthrate).   China will soon hit their glass ceiling, caused by a lack of freedom (they still have a communist bureaucracy) and geographical disadvantages (having only one coast, while Siberia and the Himalayas define their other borders). What we need to do is vote Obama and his ideological cronies out of office, which will happen next year. Then we can turn again to free markets, freeing our economy to soar once again.  This can be done by lowering (if not eliminating) capital gains tax, lowering (if not eliminating) oppressive regulations, and begin drilling once again for oil (in Alaska, off our coasts, anywhere it can be found).  All of these things were done by the Reagan administration in the 80s, the last time our nation rebounded from lethargy. President Obama often claims he “inherited” a bad economy from the Bush administration.  Nonsense!  Financial markets don’t trail after events; they are leading indicators.  They move by expectation of what the future will bring.  The closer Obama got to the White House, the more cash was moved out of markets into someplace where socialist-minded bureaucrats couldn’t seize it, and the more investors panicked about what the economy would look like with an intrusive government pushing a left-wing agenda.  Some may say I am ignoring the housing crisis, but that too was caused by excessive government intrusion. The good news is that America is resilient.  We are a free people who can succeed, if the government doesn’t get in the way and punish the successful while rewarding the indolent.  Socialism has not yet produced the culture of entitlement in America to the degree that it exists in Europe.  We also have great ports on two great oceans, military domination of the seas and air, reasonably stable borders, and a constitution which protects its citizens from government tyranny (if we care to keep it). Don’t sell America short.  We will rebound, if we can move once again to free markets.  The year before Obama became president was a bad time to invest in the market, but the year before his removal will be a great time to get back in.  As investors become more confident in America’s recovery, they will take the money kept in reserve and reinvest it, but only after they regain trust once again in a free America.