Withhold the consent of the governed; Stimulus spent on dems, not unemployment; 56% Disapproval rating

"Guard with jealous attention the public liberty. Suspect every one who approaches that jewel. Unfortunately, nothing will preserve it but downright force. Whenever you give up that force, you are inevitably ruined." --Patrick Henry, speech in the Virginia Ratifying Convention, 1778 1) We Are No Longer a Nation of Laws. Senate Sets Up Requirement for Super-Majority to Ever Repeal Obamacare If ever the people of the United States rise up and fight over passage of Obamacare, Harry Reid must be remembered as the man who sacrificed the dignity of his office for a few pieces of silver. The rules of fair play that have kept the basic integrity of the Republic alive have died with Harry Reid. Reid has slipped in a provision into the health care legislation prohibiting future Congresses from changing any regulations imposed on Americans by the Independent Medicare [note: originally referred to as "medical"] Advisory Boards, which are commonly called the “Death Panels.” It was Reid leading the Democrats who ignored 200 years of Senate precedents to rule that Senator Sanders could withdraw his amendment while it was being read. It was Reid leading the Democrats who has determined again and again over the past few days that hundreds of years of accumulated Senate parliamentary rulings have no bearing on the health care vote. On December 21, 2009, however, Harry Reid sold out the Republic in toto. Upon examination of Senator Harry Reid’s amendment to the health care legislation, Senators discovered section 3403. That section changes the rules of the United States Senate (emphasis mine). To change the rules of the United States Senate, there must be sixty-seven votes (emphasis mine).  Section 3403 of Senator Harry Reid’s amendment requires that “it shall not be in order in the Senate or the House of Representatives to consider any bill, resolution, amendment, or conference report that would repeal or otherwise change this subsection (emphasis mine).” The good news is that this only applies to one section of the Obamacare legislation. The bad news is that it applies to regulations imposed on doctors and patients by the Independent Medicare Advisory Boards a/k/a the Death Panels. …Senator Jim DeMint confronted the Democrats over Reid’s language. In the past, the Senate Parliamentarian has repeatedly determined that any legislation that also changes the internal standing rules of the Senate must have a two-thirds vote to pass because to change Senate rules, a two-thirds vote is required. Today, the Senate President, acting on the advice of the Senate Parliamentarian, ruled that these rules changes are actually just procedural changes and, despite what the actual words of the legislation say, are not rules changes. Therefore, a two-thirds vote is not needed in contravention to longstanding Senate precedent. What can I say about this? This is tyranny. If this continues, the “consent of the governed” will NO LONGER BE GRANTED. See: http://www.redstate.com/erick/2009/12/21/we-are-no-longer-a-nation-of-laws-senate-sets-up-requirement-for-super-majority-to-ever-repeal-obamacare/ 1a) An ugly finale for health-care reform …On Saturday, [Senator] Coburn likened the current situation to the period preceding the Civil War. "The crisis of confidence in this country is now at an apex that has not seen in over 150 years, and that lack of confidence undermines the ability of legitimate governance," he said. "There's a lot of people out there today who...will say, 'I give up on my government,' and rightly so (emphasis mine)." Earlier Sunday, Coburn, a medical doctor by training, held another news conference and accused Democrats of "corruption" in drafting the bill. He then went out onto the floor two hours later to discuss his prayer that one of the Democrats wouldn't make it to the chamber. A few days earlier, Republican Sens. Jim DeMint (S.C.) and Sam Brownback (Kansas) joined a public prayer for the bill's defeat… See: http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/12/20/AR2009122002872.html?hpid=topnews 1b) Everyone is asking, "What can I do?" Refuse to obey. Withhold the consent of the governed. CALLER: Longtime listener. Listen, I think even though I'd love to talk to you, I want to talk to small business in this country. I think small business could stop this health care dead in its tracks. All we have to do as small business for a short term pain for a long term gain is just shed your payrolls down 50%. Let's overrun the unemployment offices to where they cannot deal with this crisis and let them know that we as small businesses in this country are the ones in charge and without our money they can't do any of this. We are the ones that allow them to do to us what they are doing. If we quit sending our money to these people, they cannot implement these programs. They work for us. We do not work for them. I'm tired. I've run a company for almost 30 years. I'm in the housing market and I manufacture window products. And I can tell you this. I know that everybody this time is hurting, but you know what? For about two weeks we could bring Washington to their knees. …CALLER: They will not be able to sustain. They need unemployment numbers not to be at 500,000. They need them to be at 1.5 million for a week and then panic is going to have set in to let them know, "Look, business in this country runs this nation. You don't. And either you come back down to the table and talk to us --" we as businesspeople across this country have to make them come to us and then maybe we can get a dialogue. The way we're going about it now, there will be no dialogue. And the only way there's no dialogue now is we keep sending them our money. …Now, I don't think you would even need to layoff workers to do this. Just don't send the tax payments to Washington. That would be one way of doing this. Because Jim in St. Louis was right, I mean the feds rely on all those payroll taxes from all these businesses, sales tax and all this. If every business just banded together and said we're not sending the money, just stop sending it, put it in an escrow account, the feds do not have the personnel to even to attempt to collect those taxes. (interruption) Well, that's the thing, they'll just print the money, but, no, that would be unrest they would have to deal with. Here's the next AP headline: "After Calling for Mass Firings, Limbaugh Calls for Mass Tax Evasion Two Days Before Christmas." (laughing) Probably right. That's probably what's going to happen. …And people ask me all the time, "Rush, do you think that there would ever be a revolution?" Let me just tell you this. Here's the third AP headline, Snerdley. I do think the American citizens and their anger is going to translate into some sort of citizen action. You can feel it percolating in every one of these phone calls that we've taken for the past six months here. Rebel, maybe, I don't know how it would manifest itself. Firing people, laying people off, not paying taxes, it could be any of these things but it's going to be something huge. I don't pretend to know what it is. But with all of the millions of Americans out there asking, "What can I do?" Snerdley, tell me the truth, every call, if you chose to, you could have put up there for the past two months, "What can I do?" Every single call could have been, "What can I do?" Everybody out there wants to know what they can do, and at some point this is going to translate into action (emphasis mine). …No, no, no, that's what she did. She and some stupid hare-brained actor have cut a video for Rock the Vote and they basically tell people who don't support them on health care they're going to be frozen out of the bedroom and they're advocating everybody do that. Fine, you go play those games. We will withhold the consent of being governed (emphasis mine). …I just got a note here, a press release: "Today, US Senators Jim DeMint (R-South Carolina) and John Ensign (R-Nevada), raised a Constitutional Point of Order on the Senate floor against the Democrat health care takeover bill on behalf of the Steering Committee, a caucus of conservative senators. The Senate will vote tomorrow on the bill’s constitutionality. 'I am incredibly concerned that the Democrats’ proposed individual mandate provision takes away too much freedom and choice from Americans across the country,' said Senator Ensign. 'As an American, I felt the obligation to stand up for the individual freedom of every citizen to make their own decision on this issue. I don’t believe Congress has the legal authority to force this mandate on its citizens.' 'Forcing every American to purchase a product is absolutely inconsistent with our Constitution and the freedoms our Founding Fathers hoped to protect,' said Senator DeMint (emphasis mine)." See: http://www.rushlimbaugh.com/home/daily/site_122209/content/01125111.guest.html 1c) Health Care Bill’s Individual Mandate Is Unconstitutional, Conservative Group Argues (CNSNews.com) - Conservatives are discussing a constitutional challenge to the Democrats’ health care legislation, if and when it becomes law. Aside from constitutional questions about Sen. Ben Nelson’s deal with Democrats on behalf of Nebraskans, conservatives are eyeing the bill’s individual mandate – the requirement that every American citizen must purchase health insurance. See: http://cnsnews.com/news/article/58900 1d) Ala. Dem defects to GOP over health care, policy HUNTSVILLE, Ala. (AP) - A U.S. House Democrat who opposes the health care overhaul announced Tuesday he is defecting to the GOP, another blow to Democrats ahead of the midterm elections. U.S. Rep. Parker Griffith spoke to reporters at his home in northern Alabama, a region that relies heavily on defense and aerospace jobs. "I believe our nation is at a crossroads and I can no longer align myself with a party that continues to pursue legislation that is bad for our country, hurts our economy, and drives us further and further into debt," Griffith said as his wife Virginia stood by his side. See: http://apnews.myway.com/article/20091222/D9COJHCO0.html 1e) Left Now Admitting Obamacare Full of Budget Gimmicks President Barack Obama again asserted today that his health care plan would be deficit neutral chiding: “The argument that opponents are making against this bill does not hold water.” But while the President’s most ardent supporters are trying to explain to each other why the benefits of the bill do not start until 2014, they are openly admitting that Obama’s deficit busting claims are complete fiction: The Washington Post’s Ezra Klein: “The delay is a budget trick, an attempt to lower the 10-year cost of the bill at the expense of the very people we’re trying to help.” Mother Jones‘ Kevin Drum: “I’m pretty sure the 2014 date is mostly due to budget finagling. This stuff can’t be done overnight, but I’ll bet most of it could be implemented within 12 months, and it could certainly be implemented within 24.” Talking Points Memo’s Josh Marshall: “My impression is that some of the delays are there because it makes the budgetary accounting work better in terms of deficit neutrality. And I know the Dems would likely lose critical support without being able to show that the overall bill actually lowers the deficit. But if that’s the main reason, I suspect the legislative authors may be too clever by half since they may be slitting the bill’s and perhaps their own throats in the process.” See: http://blog.heritage.org/2009/12/21/left-now-admitting-obamacare-full-of-budget-gimmicks/?utm_source=Newsletter&utm_medium=Email 2) Daily Presidential Tracking Poll The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Tuesday shows that 25% of the nation's voters Strongly Approve of the way that Barack Obama is performing his role as President. Forty-six percent (46%) Strongly Disapprove giving Obama a Presidential Approval Index rating of -21 That’s the lowest Approval Index rating yet recorded for this President (see trends). Fifty-three percent (53%) of men Strongly Disapprove along with 39% of women. Most African-American voters (58%) Strongly Approve while most white voters (53%) Strongly Disapprove. Seventy-four percent (74%) of Republicans Strongly Disapprove as do 52% of unaffiliated voters. Forty-seven percent (47%) of Democrats Strongly Approve. For the second straight day, the update shows the highest level of Strong Disapproval yet recorded for this President. That negative rating had never topped 42% before yesterday. However, it has risen dramatically since the Senate found 60 votes to move forward with the proposed health care reform legislation. Most voters (55%) oppose the health care legislation and senior citizens are even more likely than younger voters to dislike the plan. …Overall, 44% of voters say they at least somewhat approve of the President's performance. Fifty-six percent (56%) now disapprove. See: http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/obama_administration/daily_presidential_tracking_poll 3) Is Obama's $789 billion buying votes instead of jobs? Studies show 'stimulus' spent on Democrats, not unemployment A pair of studies analyzing U.S. jobs and the effects of President Obama's American Reinvestment and Recovery Act suggest the so-called "stimulus" bill has boosted partisan interests far more than employment figures. White House projections in February claimed the $789 billion in spending would "create or save 3.5 million jobs over the next two years" and that over 90 percent of those jobs would be in the private sector. One year into the two-year projections, however, the studies show that not only has the money failed thus far to deliver on either of those promises, but it also has been doled out disproportionately to districts with Democrat representation. See: http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=119441 4) China warns Obama deficit spending must stop Beijing reluctant to keep bankrolling president's belt-buster budget One day after the Chinese Prime Minister Wen Jiabao snubbed President Obama at the United Nation's Copenhagen Climate Summit, the Chinese warned the United States that China's ability to continue buying U.S. Treasury debt was limited. Zhu Min, the deputy governor of the People's Republic of China, told the Shanghai Daily that it is getting harder for the People's Bank of China to buy U.S. Treasuries because the shrinking U.S. current account is reducing the supplies overseas. This was dire news for the Obama administration that in 2010 and for the foreseeable future will be dependent on China to buy U.S. Treasury debt in order to fund the trillion-dollar federal budget deficits projected over the next decade. The Shanghai Daily reported that Zhu told an academic audience that it was inevitable the value of the dollar would fall in value given the increasing reliance of the Obama administration on issuing U.S. Treasury debt to finance deficit spending. "The United States cannot force foreign governments to increase their holdings of Treasuries," Zhu said. "Double the holdings? It is definitely impossible." Zhu's warning was clear. "The world does not have so much money to buy more U.S. Treasuries," he said. See: http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=119537 5) Shocker! Detroit unemployment approaching 50% Workers who have abandoned job search not included in official count The mayor of Detroit, Mich., has hit the nation with an unemployment shocker. Despite an official rate of 27 percent, the city's actual unemployment rate is closer to 50 percent, according to Detroit Mayor Dave Bing. He said the higher rate is more accurate after taking into account those who have given up finding a job and those working fewer hours than they want, Jerome Corsi's Red Alert reports. See: http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=119695 6) EXCLUSIVE: Transvestites, Mao And Obama Ornaments Decorate White House Christmas Tree Why let a holiday season come between the White House and making some political statements? The White House pegged controversial designer Simon Doonan to oversee the Christmas decorations for the White House. Mr. Doonan, who is creative director of Barney’s New York has often caused a stir with his design choices. Like his naughty yuletide window display of Margaret Thatcher as a dowdy dominatrix and Dan Quayle as a ventriloquist’s dummy. For this year’s White House, he didn’t disappoint. These photos (see link at end of this article) of ornaments on the White House Christmas tree in the Blue Room were taken just days ago. Of course, Mao has his place in the White House. And, of course, it wouldn’t be Christmas without an ornament of legendary transvestite Hedda Lettuce. He/She even signed it: And, so soon after collecting the Nobel Peace Prize, why wouldn’t the White House have an ornament super-imposing President Obama onto Mt. Rushmore: All around, a very Barry Christmas! See: http://biggovernment.com/2009/12/22/transvestites-mao-and-obama-decorate-white-house-christmas-tree/