This gives a whole new understanding of No News is Good News!  A recession is a self-fulling prophesy, the more we talk about how bad the economy is, the worse it will get.  I’m not saying to put our heads in the sand and pretend nothing is wrong – but lets not bury the few peices of good news we get with negativity.

I heard a story recently that bears repeating:

A man owned a hot dog stand downtown and every day during lunch hour he would carry a huge sign and yell as loud as he could – ‘Hot Dogs! Get Hot Dogs Here!’, and business was good – very good.

One day his son came home from college and said, ‘Dad, I don’t know why you bother carrying that large sign everyday and spend all that time straining your voice – the economy is bad, people just aren’t going to buy hot dogs right now.’

So the man left his sign at home and didn’t bother yelling during the lunch hour.  When he came home he told his son that he was right, no body bought hot dogs that day – the economy must be bad.

The hot dog stand shut down and the man went on unemployment – later on welfare.  Now the man votes for the Democrats because the Republicans are talking about welfare reform and he isn’t sure he can make ends meet if those government checks stop coming.

I guess I should start thinking about which welfare program will meet my needs during this bad economy!

But if we don’t bail out the automakers, what will they do?  File bankruptcy!  Restructure their debt and de-unionize.  GM could stop making product lines like Buick which dropped almost 24% in sales this year.  Why don’t they you ask?  Oh, thats because they have contracts with dealers that they have to pay out if they stop making the line – they paid out one billion to STOP MAKING Oldsmobile… how could they possibly get out of making that mistake again… oh yeah, my government is giving my money away like candy on holloween.  Is there any doubt that Washington is going to continue the insanity???

Airlines, Banks, Automakers, who’s next?  Take a number… Get in Line… everyone will be served – oh, except us tax payers (which by the way, isn’t the poor – they don’t pay taxes, they are in line with the rest of the handout crowd).

McCain lost because he has 20 years of being a ‘moderate’.  Ann Coulter put it this way – “The Reign of Lame Falls Mainly on McCain”.  The reason liberals think Palin was the problem is because they honestly believe most of America is like them and want a liberal in office.  They believe that republicans want a liberal Republican in office and democrates want a liberal democrate in office.  I’m a conservative – I want a conservative in office!

Palin wasn’t as silk tounged as Obama is, but I do believe she is as qualified as he is.  That’s not to say I thought she were ready to be president – I don’t believe Obama is ready for the job he was just hired to do (unless of course, he plans to start his campaign for re-election on Jan 21, 2009, then he has years of experince).

McCain’s mother said of his run for office, “I think holding their [republicans] nose they’re going to have to take him.”  Until Palin, there was nothing but stink in the air.  If any fault lies with Palin, its that she wasn’t enough to pull McCain out of a 20 year history of being a “maverick” – which in this case means liberal.

McCain had three and only three things going for him in this election:

1 – He’s a war hero.  Held captive for years and tortured for this country – and while this story was told, he seemingly refused to capitalize on it.  Never once did I hear him ask what Obama has done for this country – how Obama has served this nation – outside of Obama’s short election driven political life.  Never once did I hear him slam Obama for not having joined the military.  Don’t tell me that should be off limits, Bush was shredded by the liberals because he only joined the national guard.  Those same liberals said dodging the draft was no big deal regarding Clinton.  Palin made McCain’s military an issue.  She said many times – McCain is the only man in this election that has ever REALLY fought for you!  Palin was not the problem.

2 – He’s pro-life.  I heard one of the ladies in my office say she was thinking about not voting for McCain because Palin was pro-life.  McCain has been pro-life his entire career, but he has been so good at blending in with liberals, no one seemed to notice until Palin joined the ticket.  Palin’s pro-life position encouraged the base and made us feel that McCain was serious about protecting life.  Palin was not the problem!

3 – His record of cutting pork spending.  He has always been against ‘Christmas tree’ bills with every spending whim attached like an ornament on a tacky looking tree with those big colored bulbs that flash out of sink with the other strings on the same tree.  But did McCain stand up during this financial crisis to stop wasteful spending?  NO!  He could have marched up the hill to demand we cut government programs that waste tax payer money in order to fund a bail out bill – but he didn’t!  He could have offered a plan to allowed Wall Street to insure their bad debt, making them liquid again – while paying insurance premiums rather than taking blank checks, but he didn’t – no that idea came from house republicans, the real conservatives in Washington.  Palin was kept outside of that process because she isn’t a member of congress – Palin was not the problem!

Out of the three – McCain refused to play hard ball on any of them.  He took the public funds dispite Obama’s refusal to do the same.  He supports the same insane regulations on energy efforts in the name of man-made global warming.  He built his campaign on a 20 year history of reaching across the isle and congratulating the democrates on a job well done – and Tuesday night was an apex to his life long career choices – and he nailed it in a single quote – “The failure was Mine”.

Palin was not the problem!

Both Obama and McCain have tax plans that would make almost 45% of the American people have zero tax liability.  I learned something in high school that I will never forget – if you don’t pay for it, you won’t respect it.  More than one of my fellow students that had cars bought for them totaled their car.  My class mates that paid for their own cars not only didn’t drive recklessly around town until the car was totaled, they took care of the car.  I saw brand new cars smashed up while old clunkers were waxed and polished.

How can we have almost half of all Americans paying nothing while the rest foot the bill?  How is it that people defaulting in their home loans are being told – don’t worry about it, you will get to keep your house, the rest of us will pay for it.  How is it that while 45% of us are paying nothing in income taxes, our leaders are declaring health care a right just as our freedom of speech, or our freedom of religion???  Our founding fathers would likely be bothered by both our choices for President for their economic policies among other things.

I don’t know who will win on Nov 4th, but as I see it, it won’t be America.

I found this picture in a news article this morning on the Google News page.  This is great for the McCain gang – but really bad for the Obama crowd.  Apparently, Obama made a comment saying “You can put lipstick on a pig… its still a pig” regarding McCain’s position that the republican ticket is the best for change.  The comment came a week after Governor Palin’s stated at the RNC that the difference between a hockey mom (which she is) and a pitbull is lipstick.  Did Obama mean to imply Palin was a pig?  The answer is Who cares… The damage is done!

In the court of public opinion, its like OJ and murder – did he do it?  You may convince me that there are people out there that don’t believe he did (in fact a Judge right now is trying to find 12 people to sit on a jury that don’t have an opinion on that old trial) but if you ask on the street that same question – some will say yes and some will say no – and both believe he did it.  The same is true here.  But that’s not the damage.  The damage is the picture above.  Shortly after this picture hit the internet, it quickly came down and dozens of similar pictures with Obama and McCain head to head began to show up (based on a page refresh of the google news page).  Why?  In my opinion its because there are a lot of Obama supporters out there that quickly realized that for Obama to win, he has to appear presidential, and pitting himself against the vp defeats that purpose.

The next article I read this morning was Obama’s reaction to the “lipstick” media coverage, in which he called the controversy “phony” saying, “I love this country too much to let them take over another election with lies and phony outrage”.  I remember once as a child I went into our pantry and grabbed a hand full of sugar cerial (which we rarely had in the house) and ate it in my room knowing I wasn’t allowed to.  My brother caught me eating it and I quickly denied it.  He wouldn’t let me get away with lying about it.  I was so intent on denying the charge that I went to my mother outraged that he would accuse me of lying.  I didn’t fool her for a second – I was busted!  Obama’s outrage on the matter reminds me of my reaction after getting caught – phony outrage.  So, I find it ironic that he uses those words to describe the media coverage and McCain reaction to the comment.

To accuse McCain of lies and phony outrage while demanding that we get back to the “issues” is like a throwing a punch while demanding civility.

Sarah Palin

I’m watching the Palin speech right now… WOW! This chick is rockin’. Palin hit Obama again and again with her wit, sharp tongue, and best of all – substance. When I first heard of Sarah Palin – it was when McCain annouced her as his VP pick. My reaction was the same as most of you – Sarah who? The news media frenzy that ensued was staggering! I found out that she has a pregnant daughter out of wed lock! AND that her husband got a DUI twenty years ago! I learned about how she is accused of firing the Public Safety Commissioner because he wouldn’t fire her ex-brother-in-law.  I was most concerned when I heard she was cited with “Fishing without a license“!  Amazing!

Well, if you can forgive her of the wanton disregard for the laws of fishing… you might find this was a great move by John McCain.  Until last Friday, the media continued to tell us that we had the chance to make history with our vote in November.  Obama was “the fullfillment of Martin Luther King’s I have a dream speech” according to the media and a vote for him was a historic vote.  A vote for McCain was not only voting for another four years of old white guys running things – it was border-line racist.

BUT… after the Palin Pick, it’s no longer a historic vote – its an historic election.  Either way you vote, you are a part of history!  Now, we can stop focusing on the color of skin, and start to focus on the actual canidates!

Mrs Palin was charismatic, energetic, and enjoyable.  Her ability to give a speech that kept the audience involved matched or surpased that of Obama, not to mention that she is easy on the eyes as we used to say back home in North Carolina.  My favorite quote from the night – “Here’s a little news flash for all those reporters and commentators: I’m not going to Washington to seek their good opinion. I’m going to Washington to serve the people of this country“.

Just a quick note to say that I hope I am wrong about the American people’s willingness to elect a Mormon to the office of President. Since Duncan Hunter and Fred Thompson are both out, I strongly feel that Mit Romney is the only chance conservatives have left. A friend recently asked me why I was against Mike Huckabee and the best answer I could give was this -

“I don’t know much about him other than he was a Baptist Pastor, and he wants to go with the ‘Fair Tax’ plan, but Rush Limbaugh, Sean Hannity, Lora Ingram, Ann Coulter, as well as many other talking heads that I trust, tell me that he is bad for America and that he is not conservative. *”

On the surface, Huckabee seems like he could be a guy I could vote for, but I don’t have the time or the energy to look into every politician’s record that is running for office. As some point, I have to trust some of these pundits to inform me as to what is going on. While I never agree 100% with any of the talking heads I’ve listed above, I do tend to agree with all of them on quite a few issues – and when they all say the same thing – I have to pause and take note. They all seem to agree that Mit Romney is the only conservative choice left in the race for GOP nomination.

Rush Limbaugh recently said this on his show,

“I think now, based on the way the campaign has shaken out, that there probably is a candidate on our side who does embody all three legs of the conservative stool, and that’s Romney. The three stools or the three legs of the stool are national security/foreign policy, the social conservatives, and the fiscal conservatives.”

His website is quoted as saying “The choice is clear, but the decision is yours”. I have to agree. If you look back at my earlier post regarding Fred Thompson verses the rest of the Republican playing field, you will see that I didn’t believe Mit Romney had any chance of winning the general election – I’m still not sure that he does, but I am sure that if McCain is the nominee on the Republican ticket, we are in for a rough four years.

* On another note, I recently learned that Huckabee suggested that the reason Mit Romney is picking up in the polls is because of “the fact that Bain Capital owns a major stake in Clear Channel and is on Sean’s network, that maybe there’s a correlation.” Either Huckabee was outright attempting to deceive people, or he is completely ignorant – Mit Romney is no longer associated with Bain Capital, Bain Capital doesn’t own Clear Channel (yet), and Sean Hannity isn’t contracted with Clear Channel – only a few of their channels even carry Hannity.

Well, as I said in my last post – I am hopeful, just not for the GOP.  Who knows, maybe Romney will take the nomination and the Christian conservative Bible Belt voters will over look his Mormon faith.  And if he picks up Thompson as veep, maybe we will actually have a chance at the next four years not being Hilary socialism… maybe.

My future is secure and whether we get a Demicrate or a Republican in office one year from now – this Nation will survive… and so will I.  I find hope in my faith not my government!