Friday, May 15, 2009
Thursday, May 14, 2009
The politicians are the real story here
Wonder what former Mayor Teresa Isaac has to say about the Fayette jail inmate abuse scandal now that three of the five indicted officers have filed guilty pleas.
Newberry will not comment. We know that. TI should face some tough questions.
Surely the MSM will wake up to this story now.
Newberry will not comment. We know that. TI should face some tough questions.
Surely the MSM will wake up to this story now.
Birds of a feather...
In 2011, when Gov. Steve Beshear is pretending he never heard of Pres. Barack Obama, remember that just as Obama was breaking his transparency promise, Beshear was cynically doing something very similar.
Begging for a lightning strike, Jennifer?
Funniest news item of the day: Michigan's Governor Jennifer Granholm is going to speak in a church about how great the Obama stimulus plan is for her state.
That would sure get the Tea Party crowd stirred up in Kentucky if Gov. Steve Beshear tried to spread some fiscal hokum from the pulpit. To his credit, Beshear has kept his nonsense out of houses of worship.
And speaking of Tea Parties, I'll be on Bill Bryant's WKYT Newsmakers program with Mica Sims Saturday at 11am talking about what is next for the small-government movement.
That would sure get the Tea Party crowd stirred up in Kentucky if Gov. Steve Beshear tried to spread some fiscal hokum from the pulpit. To his credit, Beshear has kept his nonsense out of houses of worship.
And speaking of Tea Parties, I'll be on Bill Bryant's WKYT Newsmakers program with Mica Sims Saturday at 11am talking about what is next for the small-government movement.
A full schedule
I'm in meetings much of today and will host a tax reform forum tonight at 6:30 pm at The Inn on Broadway. Check back for updates.
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
Fayette jail pucker factor update
Ahead of next month's federal trial in the Fayette County Detention Center inmate abuse trial, sources report three of the five defendants have worked out plea bargains with prosecutors.
This is really bad news for those at the jail who haven't been indicted yet and horrible timing for a couple of politicians (here and here) who really want it all to go away.
This is really bad news for those at the jail who haven't been indicted yet and horrible timing for a couple of politicians (here and here) who really want it all to go away.
Senate race update
I'm headed to Lexington for a meeting of the Women Republicans of Central Kentucky. The speaker today is Secretary of State Trey Grayson.
Check back for updates and, probably, video.
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Here you go:
Check back for updates and, probably, video.
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Here you go:
A little skepticism would go a long way here
As the political effort to ram through a total federal takeover of the healthcare system marches on, Kentucky's big-spenders are using similar tactics to force acceptance of casino gambling.
The up-tempo campaign style is designed to limit careful thinking and the doomsday predictions of billion dollar shortfalls are laid out to shock the electorate into submission.
Cooler heads may want to turn their attention to Maryland, where the plan isn't fairing so well. From Governing Magazine:
Meanwhile, the need for a Kentucky horsing bailout may be overblown. You should read this.
The up-tempo campaign style is designed to limit careful thinking and the doomsday predictions of billion dollar shortfalls are laid out to shock the electorate into submission.
Cooler heads may want to turn their attention to Maryland, where the plan isn't fairing so well. From Governing Magazine:
Meanwhile, the need for a Kentucky horsing bailout may be overblown. You should read this.
Tuesday, May 12, 2009
The "fix" is in
The radical left now suggests going to socialized medicine will "fix" health care, "fix" the economy, and create 3.5 million jobs.
This would be a bad Saturday Night Live skit if it weren't true.
These utopian schemes always cost way more than they are supposed to and create more problems than they solve. "Conservative" and "Moderate" Democrats are the ones who will be blamed the most for this nonsense going through.
In related news, Social Security trustees reported today their estimate that the program will go into the tank in 2016. That's when we start to realize that the Social Security Trust Fund really doesn't have any money in it.
Media reports that Medicare Hospital Insurance costs will exceed program revenues until 2017 ignore the fact that Medicare Supplementary Medical Insurance is already pulling general revenue dollars and is only getting worse. Very convenient to leave out the more expensive part.
Remember how much fun we had with the "There is no crisis" gang just four short years ago, when Rep. Ben Chandler was claiming Socials Security could go for "generations" without reform?
And these are the people who are going to create our new health care system.
This would be a bad Saturday Night Live skit if it weren't true.
These utopian schemes always cost way more than they are supposed to and create more problems than they solve. "Conservative" and "Moderate" Democrats are the ones who will be blamed the most for this nonsense going through.
In related news, Social Security trustees reported today their estimate that the program will go into the tank in 2016. That's when we start to realize that the Social Security Trust Fund really doesn't have any money in it.
Media reports that Medicare Hospital Insurance costs will exceed program revenues until 2017 ignore the fact that Medicare Supplementary Medical Insurance is already pulling general revenue dollars and is only getting worse. Very convenient to leave out the more expensive part.
Remember how much fun we had with the "There is no crisis" gang just four short years ago, when Rep. Ben Chandler was claiming Socials Security could go for "generations" without reform?
And these are the people who are going to create our new health care system.
For stabilizing the art market?
It's a whole lot less taxpayer money than we are pouring into, say, bad real estate investments, but it seems that if we are going to ever prioritize government spending that now would be a good time to start. And this would be a good thing to cut.
Bunning in Lexington in June
Sen. Jim Bunning said on his weekly media conference call that he has a Lexington fundraiser scheduled for the first week of June. He declined to say who will host the event.
Monday, May 11, 2009
Going around again on "home" economics
Gov. Steve Beshear has a big cardboard $2 million novelty check for Bowling Green today for your children to redeem later.
A quick check of my state and federal constitutions shows nothing about a government role in anything like his claim to "stem the decline in surrounding property values..." and, while my economics texts mention propping up aggregate demand, they contain nothing to suggest borrowing public money to give to low income people to make them homeowners will work any better than reducing credit standards did.
A quick check of my state and federal constitutions shows nothing about a government role in anything like his claim to "stem the decline in surrounding property values..." and, while my economics texts mention propping up aggregate demand, they contain nothing to suggest borrowing public money to give to low income people to make them homeowners will work any better than reducing credit standards did.
Leland Conway is NOT a jerk
I am a Conservative, Not a Jerk
By Leland Conway
I recently gave a speech in which I stuck around to answer questions from the crowd. One question that was posed was “How do we change the public perception that conservatives are jerks?”
As a conservative, I’ve never thought of myself as a jerk, but the question was perhaps the best question that could be asked of one who would see conservatism re-establish itself on the stage of American thought – because the more you think about it, the more you realize that this is exactly the way the conservative ideology is painted in the mainstream.
The mainstream accuses us of being jerks because we apparently don’t want to help the poor, we don’t want every child to have free health insurance, we want to tighten border security and we believe in things like sovereignty and actually defeating the enemies who attack us. We must be jerks because we want to keep what belongs to us so we must by extension also be very selfish people. We are cold hearted because we push policy that increases personal responsibility and does not necessarily mitigate individual risk.
This false perception of conservatism is exactly the reason I’ve always hated the term “compassionate conservatism,” which George W. Bush made popular during his 2000 campaign.
I never liked that term because words mean something to me. By putting the term compassionate in front of conservative, you are implying that there is no compassion in conservatism. You mean to say that compassion is an additional ingredient which, like kitchen spice, must be added to our ideology in order to make it more palatable.
By making this term popular, the Republicans may have unwittingly set their party back a generation. They were admitting to the American electorate that to live by the ideology of conservatism was indeed selfish and uncompassionate and that we somehow needed a strong dose of leftism in order to make us whole.
Where we, as conservatives went wrong, was in not rejecting this notion outright the moment it was introduced into the mainstream. Instead we embraced it. In so doing we became fearful of practicing our own principles and while we had theoretical control of government we didn’t actually implement very much conservative policy.
As a consequence, the American electorate was left confused about what a conservative actually is. Therefore it was easier for them to be confused and misled by a false messiah – Barack Obama.
Conservatism does not need the word compassion attached to it, because it is by its very nature the most compassionate form of political ideology.
Before you reject my premise, answer honestly the following questions.
What is more compassionate than the conservative notion of preserving the vision of our founding fathers in the protection of individual liberty? What is more compassionate that the protection of individual property rights? What is more compassionate than believing in and attempting to inspire individuals to reach their fullest potential and limiting the amount of government involvement in their lives? What is more compassionate than lowering American’s tax burden so that they can keep more of what they have earned with their own hands? In short, what is more compassionate than an ideology that when practiced with principle simply promotes individual liberty?
What you are seeing in the main stream of late has been a systematic intolerance of conservatism, ironically under the banner of tolerance for other ideologies. The widespread perception of conservatism as a selfish ideology simply will not change until we begin to effectively articulate the truth about what we believe. In doing so, rather than attaching platitudinous words like “compassion” to the beginning of our thought process, we should actually demonstrate how what we believe is actually more compassionate by its nature.
The Republican Party is at a crossroads. They can no longer afford to co-opt conservatism with other words while not actually practicing the principles of conservatism. These principles can be easily boiled down to one word, liberty. By practicing this word in action, for all people, conservatism will rise again as the primary thought process of the average American.
By Leland Conway
I recently gave a speech in which I stuck around to answer questions from the crowd. One question that was posed was “How do we change the public perception that conservatives are jerks?”
As a conservative, I’ve never thought of myself as a jerk, but the question was perhaps the best question that could be asked of one who would see conservatism re-establish itself on the stage of American thought – because the more you think about it, the more you realize that this is exactly the way the conservative ideology is painted in the mainstream.
The mainstream accuses us of being jerks because we apparently don’t want to help the poor, we don’t want every child to have free health insurance, we want to tighten border security and we believe in things like sovereignty and actually defeating the enemies who attack us. We must be jerks because we want to keep what belongs to us so we must by extension also be very selfish people. We are cold hearted because we push policy that increases personal responsibility and does not necessarily mitigate individual risk.
This false perception of conservatism is exactly the reason I’ve always hated the term “compassionate conservatism,” which George W. Bush made popular during his 2000 campaign.
I never liked that term because words mean something to me. By putting the term compassionate in front of conservative, you are implying that there is no compassion in conservatism. You mean to say that compassion is an additional ingredient which, like kitchen spice, must be added to our ideology in order to make it more palatable.
By making this term popular, the Republicans may have unwittingly set their party back a generation. They were admitting to the American electorate that to live by the ideology of conservatism was indeed selfish and uncompassionate and that we somehow needed a strong dose of leftism in order to make us whole.
Where we, as conservatives went wrong, was in not rejecting this notion outright the moment it was introduced into the mainstream. Instead we embraced it. In so doing we became fearful of practicing our own principles and while we had theoretical control of government we didn’t actually implement very much conservative policy.
As a consequence, the American electorate was left confused about what a conservative actually is. Therefore it was easier for them to be confused and misled by a false messiah – Barack Obama.
Conservatism does not need the word compassion attached to it, because it is by its very nature the most compassionate form of political ideology.
Before you reject my premise, answer honestly the following questions.
What is more compassionate than the conservative notion of preserving the vision of our founding fathers in the protection of individual liberty? What is more compassionate that the protection of individual property rights? What is more compassionate than believing in and attempting to inspire individuals to reach their fullest potential and limiting the amount of government involvement in their lives? What is more compassionate than lowering American’s tax burden so that they can keep more of what they have earned with their own hands? In short, what is more compassionate than an ideology that when practiced with principle simply promotes individual liberty?
What you are seeing in the main stream of late has been a systematic intolerance of conservatism, ironically under the banner of tolerance for other ideologies. The widespread perception of conservatism as a selfish ideology simply will not change until we begin to effectively articulate the truth about what we believe. In doing so, rather than attaching platitudinous words like “compassion” to the beginning of our thought process, we should actually demonstrate how what we believe is actually more compassionate by its nature.
The Republican Party is at a crossroads. They can no longer afford to co-opt conservatism with other words while not actually practicing the principles of conservatism. These principles can be easily boiled down to one word, liberty. By practicing this word in action, for all people, conservatism will rise again as the primary thought process of the average American.
Supersized socialism for lunch
I'll be on a White House conference call this afternoon with Secretary of Health and Human Services Kathleen Sebelius talking about Pres. Barack Obama's healthcare reform plans.
Check back for details.
Check back for details.
Sunday, May 10, 2009
Is a new message breaking through?
Sen. Damon Thayer spoke this past weekend at the Scott County GOP Lincoln Day dinner. He addressed Pres. Barack Obama's wild spending and nationalization moves and Gov. Beshear's tax and spend policies. Thayer's alternatives should strike a chord with Kentuckians who are ready for a little common sense.
Thayer also spoke about the need for real spending transparency in state government and said he is working on a bill to mandate setting up a web site listing each public expenditure for everyone to see.
Thayer also spoke about the need for real spending transparency in state government and said he is working on a bill to mandate setting up a web site listing each public expenditure for everyone to see.
Saturday, May 09, 2009
David Williams speaks
Senate President David Williams started his speech by thanking Jim Bunning for his service and said that if there was any question about Bunning's electability, it is because of Bunning's "scar tissue."
This is the old David Williams speaking, before the talk of him running for U.S. Senate. He's calling the state's two Democratic congressmen "Johnny Yar-mouth" and "Unhappy Chandler" and chastising them for taking orders from Nancy Pelosi.
Williams spoke proudly (and deservedly so) about the state Senate's efforts to improve education in Kentucky and promised "Armageddon" on taxes and spending when the state legislature reconvenes.
This is the old David Williams speaking, before the talk of him running for U.S. Senate. He's calling the state's two Democratic congressmen "Johnny Yar-mouth" and "Unhappy Chandler" and chastising them for taking orders from Nancy Pelosi.
Williams spoke proudly (and deservedly so) about the state Senate's efforts to improve education in Kentucky and promised "Armageddon" on taxes and spending when the state legislature reconvenes.
Mitch McConnell speaks to state GOP dinner
Sen. Mitch McConnell said he thought the decade-long Republican majority in the Kentucky state Senate was probably the most important achievement for the GOP ever in Kentucky.
Mentioned Joe Biden's swine flu gaffe and informed the audience that the day after telling everyone to stay off planes and trains, Biden got on the train and went home to Delaware.
"Proving that not even Joe Biden listens to Joe Biden," McConnell said.
"The President campaigned as a centrist and it was my hope that he would govern as a centrist, but so far it hasn't worked out that way."
"We're spending $100 million a day in interest on the stimulus package."
Sen. McConnell spoke against the idea of closing Guantanamo Bay. He then spoke about the Supreme Court vacancy, saying that the upcoming process will be "fascinating."
McConnell only mentioned Bunning to agree with him about the stimulus package.
Mentioned Joe Biden's swine flu gaffe and informed the audience that the day after telling everyone to stay off planes and trains, Biden got on the train and went home to Delaware.
"Proving that not even Joe Biden listens to Joe Biden," McConnell said.
"The President campaigned as a centrist and it was my hope that he would govern as a centrist, but so far it hasn't worked out that way."
"We're spending $100 million a day in interest on the stimulus package."
Sen. McConnell spoke against the idea of closing Guantanamo Bay. He then spoke about the Supreme Court vacancy, saying that the upcoming process will be "fascinating."
McConnell only mentioned Bunning to agree with him about the stimulus package.
Jim Bunning speaks to state Lincoln dinner
Sen. Jim Bunning echoed many of the same economic points he made at earlier GOP Lincoln dinners.
He repeated his line about not being "anyone's puppet" and repeated his pro-life and pro-Second Amendment stances. He said he is running for a third term to fight for his values.
He repeated his line about not being "anyone's puppet" and repeated his pro-life and pro-Second Amendment stances. He said he is running for a third term to fight for his values.
Friday, May 08, 2009
Preparing for the tax battle ahead
Please join a public discussion of Kentucky tax reform in Lexington on Thursday, May 14, 6:30 pm, at The Inn on Broadway.
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