THE AMERICAN TRINITY

The United States is built on a foundation of three unique, core values that shall be known as the American Trinity.

BALTIMORE MOM WHUPS SON... WAS SHE WRONG?

A Baltimore mom is being celebrated and criticized for aggressively beating her son during the Baltimore riots. Was she wrong to do so? Find out.

BEAT THE MEDIA, WIN THE WHITE HOUSE

Daniel Greenfield at Frontpage has good advice for the GOP's 2016 hopefuls:

One of the reasons that Romney lost is that he failed to take on the media. The ultimate lost opportunity came when CNN's debate moderator Candy Crowley directly inserted herself into the argument between Obama and Romney to declare her favorite right and Romney wrong.

Romney had won the Republican primaries, but had failed to absorb the lesson of his most tenacious opponent. Newt Gingrich did not treat the media as a neutral moderator, but as a debate opponent, challenging its premises and agendas. And so Romney was left unprepared for Crowley's attack.

A media smear campaign can't be met with sensible clarifications. They only strengthen the smear. Christie's clarification that he believes in measles vaccinations has allowed the media to begin spinning him as flip-flopping on vaccines. Any further statements explaining his views will be used to continue reporting on the manufactured story of the "Republican vaccine controversy."

The only way to break the cycle is for Republicans to stop explaining themselves and to challenge the narrative. The narrative is a lie, but no one will ever know that if the candidates don't challenge it.

The road to the White House is over the crushed and mangled narratives of the media. A Republican candidate who fails to take on the media will fall wrapped head to toe in lies and scandals. He will go on issuing clarifications and sensible statements while the media accuses him of murdering small children.

The media is not impartial. It is not even a forum. The national media is the political opponent of every Republican running for the White House.

It needs to be treated that way.

Be sure and read the whole thing! 

Also read: Reince Priebus Wins His Long War Against MSNBC

REAGAN FLASHBACK, 1964: A TIME FOR CHOOSING

Nancy and Ronald Reagan in 1964, the year he delivered "The Speech"

In honor of President Ronald Reagan's 104th birthday, here is the entire televised speech he gave on October 27, 1964 on behalf of the Goldwater campaign.  It was titled "A Time For Choosing" and now remembered simply as "The Speech."  The name of the program was "A Rendezvous With Destiny."  The speech raised $1 million for Goldwater's campaign and is considered the event that launched Reagan's political career.

Among other things, it is remarkable (and frightening) how eerily similar the problems he addressed on that day are to the problems we face on this day, except that today they are even more acute.  And the rhetoric of the liberals is also quite familiar to us.  During the speech, Reagan uttered this famous quote:

Yet anytime you and I question the schemes of the do-gooders, we're denounced as being against their humanitarian goals. They say we're always "against" things -- we're never "for" anything.

Well, the trouble with our liberal friends is not that they're ignorant; it's just that they know so much that isn't so.

You can read the complete transcript of the speech here.  I would strongly suggest that you take the time to listen to the entire speech and also read the transcript.  It is a magnificent example of why Reagan was known as the "Great Communicator" and it needs to be read as well as heard.  Here is an excerpt:

Not too long ago, two friends of mine were talking to a Cuban refugee, a businessman who had escaped from Castro, and in the midst of his story one of my friends turned to the other and said, "We don't know how lucky we are." And the Cuban stopped and said, "How lucky you are? I had someplace to escape to." And in that sentence he told us the entire story. If we lose freedom here, there's no place to escape to. This is the last stand on earth.

And this idea that government is beholden to the people, that it has no other source of power except the sovereign people, is still the newest and the most unique idea in all the long history of man's relation to man.

This is the issue of this election: whether we believe in our capacity for self-government or whether we abandon the American revolution and confess that a little intellectual elite in a far-distant capitol can plan our lives for us better than we can plan them ourselves.

You and I are told increasingly we have to choose between a left or right. Well I'd like to suggest there is no such thing as a left or right. There's only an up or down: [up] man's old -- old-aged dream, the ultimate in individual freedom consistent with law and order, or down to the ant heap of totalitarianism. And regardless of their sincerity, their humanitarian motives, those who would trade our freedom for security have embarked on this downward course.

In this vote-harvesting time, they use terms like the "Great Society," or as we were told a few days ago by the President, we must accept a greater government activity in the affairs of the people. But they've been a little more explicit in the past and among themselves; and all of the things I now will quote have appeared in print. These are not Republican accusations. For example, they have voices that say, "The cold war will end through our acceptance of a not undemocratic socialism." Another voice says, "The profit motive has become outmoded. It must be replaced by the incentives of the welfare state." Or, "Our traditional system of individual freedom is incapable of solving the complex problems of the 20th century." Senator Fulbright has said at Stanford University that the Constitution is outmoded. He referred to the President as "our moral teacher and our leader," and he says he is "hobbled in his task by the restrictions of power imposed on him by this antiquated document." He must "be freed," so that he "can do for us" what he knows "is best." And Senator Clark of Pennsylvania, another articulate spokesman, defines liberalism as "meeting the material needs of the masses through the full power of centralized government."

Well, I, for one, resent it when a representative of the people refers to you and me, the free men and women of this country, as "the masses." This is a term we haven't applied to ourselves in America. But beyond that, "the full power of centralized government" -- this was the very thing the Founding Fathers sought to minimize. They knew that governments don't control things. A government can't control the economy without controlling people. And they know when a government sets out to do that, it must use force and coercion to achieve its purpose. They also knew, those Founding Fathers, that outside of its legitimate functions, government does nothing as well or as economically as the private sector of the economy.

"Well, the trouble with our liberal friends is not that they are ignorant, but that they know so much that isn't so."

THE AMERICAN TRINITY

The United States is built on a foundation of three unique, core values that shall be known as the American Trinity.

FLASHBACK 1964: A TIME FOR CHOOSING

Nancy and Ronald Reagan in 1964, the year he delivered "The Speech"

In honor of President Ronald Reagan's 103rd birthday, here is the entire televised speech he gave on October 27, 1964 on behalf of the Goldwater campaign.  It was titled "A Time For Choosing" and now remembered simply as "The Speech."  The name of the program was "A Rendezvous With Destiny."  The speech raised $1 million for Goldwater's campaign and is considered the event that launched Reagan's political career.

Among other things, it is remarkable (and frightening) how eerily similar the problems he addressed on that day are to the problems we face on this day, except that today they are even more acute.  And the rhetoric of the liberals is also quite familiar to us.  During the speech, Reagan uttered this famous quote:

Yet anytime you and I question the schemes of the do-gooders, we're denounced as being against their humanitarian goals. They say we're always "against" things -- we're never "for" anything.

Well, the trouble with our liberal friends is not that they're ignorant; it's just that they know so much that isn't so.

You can read the complete transcript of the speech here.  I would strongly suggest that you take the time to listen to the entire speech and also read the transcript.  It is a magnificent example of why Reagan was known as the "Great Communicator" and it needs to be read as well as heard.  Here is an excerpt:

Not too long ago, two friends of mine were talking to a Cuban refugee, a businessman who had escaped from Castro, and in the midst of his story one of my friends turned to the other and said, "We don't know how lucky we are." And the Cuban stopped and said, "How lucky you are? I had someplace to escape to." And in that sentence he told us the entire story. If we lose freedom here, there's no place to escape to. This is the last stand on earth.

And this idea that government is beholden to the people, that it has no other source of power except the sovereign people, is still the newest and the most unique idea in all the long history of man's relation to man.

This is the issue of this election: whether we believe in our capacity for self-government or whether we abandon the American revolution and confess that a little intellectual elite in a far-distant capitol can plan our lives for us better than we can plan them ourselves.

You and I are told increasingly we have to choose between a left or right. Well I'd like to suggest there is no such thing as a left or right. There's only an up or down: [up] man's old -- old-aged dream, the ultimate in individual freedom consistent with law and order, or down to the ant heap of totalitarianism. And regardless of their sincerity, their humanitarian motives, those who would trade our freedom for security have embarked on this downward course.

In this vote-harvesting time, they use terms like the "Great Society," or as we were told a few days ago by the President, we must accept a greater government activity in the affairs of the people. But they've been a little more explicit in the past and among themselves; and all of the things I now will quote have appeared in print. These are not Republican accusations. For example, they have voices that say, "The cold war will end through our acceptance of a not undemocratic socialism." Another voice says, "The profit motive has become outmoded. It must be replaced by the incentives of the welfare state." Or, "Our traditional system of individual freedom is incapable of solving the complex problems of the 20th century." Senator Fulbright has said at Stanford University that the Constitution is outmoded. He referred to the President as "our moral teacher and our leader," and he says he is "hobbled in his task by the restrictions of power imposed on him by this antiquated document." He must "be freed," so that he "can do for us" what he knows "is best." And Senator Clark of Pennsylvania, another articulate spokesman, defines liberalism as "meeting the material needs of the masses through the full power of centralized government."

Well, I, for one, resent it when a representative of the people refers to you and me, the free men and women of this country, as "the masses." This is a term we haven't applied to ourselves in America. But beyond that, "the full power of centralized government" -- this was the very thing the Founding Fathers sought to minimize. They knew that governments don't control things. A government can't control the economy without controlling people. And they know when a government sets out to do that, it must use force and coercion to achieve its purpose. They also knew, those Founding Fathers, that outside of its legitimate functions, government does nothing as well or as economically as the private sector of the economy.

"Well, the trouble with our liberal friends is not that they are ignorant, but that they know so much that isn’t so."

TRIFECTA: MEET HEROIC MALALA YOUSAFZAI

The U.N. declared July 12 to be "Malala Yousafzai Day."  You can read about Malala's background here.

Addressing an assembly at the United Nations was an amazing way to celebrate her 16th birthday.  Sadly, many of her own countrymen and fellow Muslims were not impressed and, in fact, were highly cynical in their assumption that she is being exploited by the West.  Of course, it wasn't white men from the West who shot her in the head.  And it wasn't white men from the West who have forced an actress slated to portray Malala in a biopic to fear for her own life.

A member of the Taliban published a letter to Malala, ostensibly to explain why she deserved what happened to her.

The letter sent by a senior figure in the Pakistan Taliban to Malala Yousafzai setting out the case against her is an extraordinary document by any standards. It is an attempt to defend the indefensible – the attempted assassination of a 15-year-old schoolgirl.

In it, Adnan Rasheed deploys all the arguments he can think of, referencing Henry Kissinger (a Jew, he helpfully points out) and quoting Bertrand Russell on the way modern science might be manipulated – via diet and injections – to control populations. His letter complains that she is pushing UN propaganda, of promoting an education system that has no place for Islam and it wonders whether there would have been such an outcry if she had been injured in a US drone strike.

He knows his audience.

Apparently he does know his audience. Nevertheless, she has her defenders and admirers.  I certainly am one of those.  It's so easy to take an education for granted when it's not a matter of life or death.  I started watching the video out of curiosity but found I couldn't stop watching because it was such a well-done and inspiring speech.  I encourage everybody to watch the full speech below and pray for her continued safety.  God bless you, Malala!

PRAGER UNIVERSITY: THE AMERICAN TRINITY

RAFAEL CRUZ SPEAKS TO FREE THE PEOPLE

FreedomWorks hosted another grassroots training and networking opportunity last weekend for over 16,000 people. Free The People 2013 was held at the USANA Amphitheater in Salt Lake City, Utah.  One of the speakers was Rafael Cruz, the father of Texas Senator Ted Cruz.

As you can see from watching the video, the elder Cruz is a compelling speaker with an inspiring message derived from what has obviously been a very interesting life.  Now you know where Ted gets much of his own love of liberty and Conservative - that is to say American - ideals.

I dubbed Cruz "Senator Honey Badger" back in May.  Since then I've come across a couple more useful insights about the man.  It's not news to his supporters in Texas, of course, but he's a really good campaigner.  There is a nuts-and-bolts aspect of campaigning that cannot be overestimated.  Apparently Cruz has mad campaigning skilz!

Almost a year ago, on July 31, 2012, Cruz — formerly the nearly anonymous Texas solicitor general — pulled off an improbable victory against the Governor Perry–endorsed Dewhurst and jump-started a high-profile career in the U.S. Senate. And as Cruz's profile has risen, Dewhurst's fortunes have flagged.

The situation started looking grim at the state Republican convention, which came shortly after Dewhurst and Cruz took the top two spots in the primary, advancing to a runoff. At the convention, which more than 10,000 people attended, Dewhurst had a relatively small presence, with only one booth set up. Cruz, on the other hand, had numerous booths, with tons of volunteers passing out so many thousands of stickers that they had to order more during the convention, according to one Texas GOP source. Cruz shook hands for hours. Dewhurst's retail politicking wasn't as aggressive — the source describes him as personable but not charismatic. And Cruz gave his speech before Dewhurst did, rousing the already enthusiastic crowd. There were Cruz placards on every seat and hundreds in the air during his speech. Dewhurst passed out placards, too, but during his speech there were about as many signs waving for his opponent as for him, according to eyewitness accounts.

I've also learned the reason for much of the hostility John McCain and Lindsey Graham have exhibited toward Cruz.  It goes back to the 2000 presidential election.

Anything involving junior Texas Senator Ted Cruz is likely to invoke some level of toxic response from Senator John McCain of Arizona and his secondary outlet of public communication, Senator Lindsey Graham of South Carolina.

That Senator McCain harbors a grudge against "the Bushies" for the South Carolina primary defeat that ended his presidential run in 2000 is the worst kept secret in Washington. Having "his" candidate lose in his home state was also a blow to Graham. Known for his long memory, some Senate staffers joke the "R" behind McCain's name is for "revenge." Other quip Lindsey Graham is "the senator from McCain."

You'd think they'd be over it, but never has their ax grinding against former George W. Bush allies been more obvious and counter-productive than over the last few months.

Ted Cruz was a key Bush campaign staffer in 2000. Primarily a legal advisor, he also provided domestic policy advice and served as a contact for movement conservatives. A brilliant legal mind, Cruz was a critical asset to Bush's Florida recount team. Ted was well-liked and respected among campaign staff, and like Karl Rove, known to perform congressional district voter math in his head.

Including, no doubt, for the 2000 South Carolina presidential primary.

Fortunately, the future of the GOP lies with patriotic Conservatives like Ted Cruz and not with elitist, back-stabbing RINO losers like John McCain.

BILL WHITTLE: WHERE DO WE GO NOW?

I first posted this video on New Year's Day because I found it to be so incredibly inspirational.  Fans of this blog are now fully aware of my admiration for Bill Whittle. After the defeat in November I know that I needed to hear what he had to say.  Some of the things he mentioned in this talk - such as Mr. Virtual President - have been put into motion.  Even though this talk is now approximately eight months old it is still totally relevant and extremely inspirational.

So, for those who haven't seen it yet and for those who have seen it but need to see it again, I encourage everybody to set aside an hour to give this a listen.  If you're a Conservative I guarantee you won't regret it!

We must FIGHT ON because we OWE it to those who made the ULTIMATE SACRIFICE for this nation to do so!

BILL WHITTLE ON CIVILITY

WHEN REAGAN SPOKE AT THE BERLIN WALL

On June 12, 1987, President Ronald Reagan stood before the Berlin Wall, symbol of an atheistic, totalitarian empire that robbed millions of basic human dignity and freedom, and delivered one of the great speeches of the 20th century. More than a quarter century earlier, Soviet-backed East Germany had built the wall to keep its people from escaping Communist rule. Reagan, who knew his words would be heard on the other side of the wall, spoke directly to Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev...

BILL WHITTLE'S VIRTUAL PRESIDENCY

Bill Whittle gave a speech shortly after the election last November that I found incredibly inspiring.  During the hour-long talk he mentioned that he was planning a new project for 2013 and beyond in which he would be the Virtual President.  It sounded like a great idea and now it has become a virtual reality.  

He has already given his virtual inauguration speech.  Now that we've had Obama's SOTU address to Congress I'm sure that there'll be a virtual SOTU coming soon.  In the meantime, here is the virtual inauguration speech by V-POTUS Bill Whittle.  As always, it is remarkably inspiring and a powerful statement of Conservative principles.

Be sure and check out the website, sign up for e-mail alerts, etc.  Trust me, it's worth it.

MUST-SEE VIDEO FROM BILL WHITTLE!

I strongly encourage all Conservatives to set aside an hour and watch this video.  If you watch it once, I guarantee you'll watch it several times because Whittle really does a wonderful job conveying the message and explaining what it all means.  He also lays out some blueprints for what we have to do next to start turning things around.  He asks the toughest questions and provides answers and attitude that will stay with you. Please watch it in its entirety. I promise you it will be time well spent AND IT WILL MOTIVATE YOU!