I do apologize for being the last to do so… Well, no I don’t. I have to have the last word, you know. I’m the Emperor, after all. But I definitely can’t not personally wish you all a wonderful Christmas, Hanukkah, Solstice, whatever you celebrate this time of year.

It matters not. What matters is that we’re here, that we have each other, that we have things to celebrate together and things to reach out to each other over when things aren’t so bright. What flavor our faith is, or non-faith for that matter, isn’t really that important right now. To us as individuals, sure, but to us as a community, no.

If there’s one thing that this site has taught me, it is that we can all come together. Not on all things, there will always be issues on which we disagree most vehemently, and thank G-d for that or I’d be bored to death, but if we put our minds to it, we can simultaneously have spirited, heated arguments over that on which we don’t agree and get together on those issues were we do.

I’ve also learned that no man or woman with a community like ours is ever truly alone. To be sure, we may feel alone when life overwhelms us, I’m no stranger to that feeling, but we aren’t really. We’re no further from not being alone than a simple reach out to those who care, and they’re all around us. And this community has provided me and, I hope, all of you, with a readily available and easy way of reaching out when the need arises.

It’s funny when I think about it. This site started out more than 6 years ago because I needed a place to “vent.” I never expected anybody to really read it, much less be interested if they did, yet here we are today. This site, founded to be all about me, isn’t anymore. And I’m grateful for it. I have learned so much, got to know people that I’d have never known otherwise and got to feel the love and support of people I’d never met but, most of all, I have accomplished that which most people never are lucky enough to achieve: I’ve created something bigger than myself.

And I didn’t even know what the heck I was doing when I did it, but that’s true for much of my life. Mheh.

I’m thankful for each and every one of you. I am thankful for those who touched my life and helped me become a better person, those who came and went, those who are still here and those who have yet to show up.

All of you changed and will in the future change me, in some way, and all for the better. We’ve shared sorrows, we’ve shared joys, we’ve wasted retarded amounts of time being just silly, and all of that has been an energy source that would not otherwise have been available to me.

You’ve changed my life and, more importantly, in some cases I’ve been blessed enough to be part of changing some of yours as well, to be part of the rock that you’ve been for me throughout the years.

And all because somebody finally talked me through the easy steps of setting up a website.

Funny how that works, isn’t it?

So I want to thank every single one of you, because without you this site wouldn’t be what it is. It is as much yours as it is mine, if not more so.

I also want to thank every one of the contributors on the Imperial Staff who’ve helped keep the free ice cream flowing when I was too busy doing other stuff. Without you, this would have been a boring place indeed. And not “just” because of you “filling in”, but much more importantly because of your unique perspectives. You can write things that I never could because I’m not you, and Heaven knows that you haven’t been anywhere near sufficiently remunerated for your efforts. The Imperial Pay and Benefits Plan sucks.

And a special thanks to Dave who for years has been making sure that the pipes have kept piping and the pumps have kept pumping around here along with offering himself up as a loyal punching bag. If you want an example of how friendship and politics are two completely different and unrelated matters, you need look no further.

We’re a strange gang around here, but we’re a great gang, and I thank you all for being part of my life.

G-d Bless You All.

Mish

Captain Ed links to a very interesting article by the Anchoress and manages to miss the point. Well, sort of. Not entirely, as is obvious by reading his article and I’m probably just picking nits anyway, but it’s a point that bears repeating, in my not-so-humble opinion.

In the end, power will be the final arbiter, as it is in almost all human conflict. Until the risk/reward ratio gets to the point where supporting the radical Islamists costs more than it’s worth, we can discuss scriptures until we’re blue in the face without impacting the sympathy and support the terrorists receive from their co-religionists. That doesn’t mean we should keep God on the sidelines — I agree that we have to stop being afraid of our own heritage in this conflict — but that Napoleon’s famous axiom about the Almighty favoring the side with the most battalions will have more application.

And that’s where he’s wrong. Not in his assessment that you need a bunch of very secular kick-ass power in order to win a war, of course, he’s absolutely right in that, but by suggesting that faith is somewhat secondary to that necessity.

It isn’t. Allow me to explain, but first let me point out to all of my non-Christian LC friends that I’m not saying that I wouldn’t be honored to have you in my foxhole, I would, nor am I in the slightest suggesting that you can’t kick arse with the best of us. That’s not my point. It’s a bigger picture.

Physical, secular strength is what you bring to the battle to weaken, destroy and defeat your enemy. The strength of faith is what you bring to the battle to strengthen yourself, with “yourself” meaning your side as a whole.

When you remove the unity of shared faith, shared culture and shared history from a society, you create a vacuum within the individuals living in it. Nature abhors a vacuum. That vacuum will soon be filled by “something else”, the “something else” being something that replaces what is gone, the need to feel strong and united, the need to feel powerful and the need to have a spiritual bulwark against the enemies facing you. If you want to find out what happens when such a weakened society is faced with a culture and religion that exudes strength and unity, look no further than to what is going on in Eurabia right now.

People, without their centuries-old proud legacies to bolster their beliefs in their own worth, either cower or even convert to “join the winning side.” They give up the fight or fight less efficiently than they could because they have no banner to flock under, they have no “rock” to anchor themselves to, a rock that unites them all and gives them something worth fighting for as well as something from which they can draw the strength of knowing that there are millions who believe just as they do. The strength from knowing that hundreds of generations that went before are looking at them, judging them by their actions.

Does anybody honestly believe that the first Crusades would have been able to accomplish all they did against the far numerically superior Saracen hordes if they hadn’t had their faith and “Deus Vult” in their backs?

If so, I have a nice bridge in Brooklyn I’d like to sell them for a song.

Technology delivers power, Identity delivers morale, and morale is to sheer numbers as ten to one.

Could we come up with something other than Christianity to deliver that identity, that firm belief that we neither must, nor can lose? Why of course we could if we so desired. Besides, Christianity isn’t all that we in the West share, we have a long history and old culture behind us too (neither of which we’re allowed to be proud of either, according to “progressives”), but when you already have the necessary parts laying around, why go reinventing the wheel?

Especially in the middle of a war. That’s no time to be experimenting.

Thatisall.

Do you see anything life-threatening in this picture?

Look below the fold for the answer.

Give us more, O Emperor! »« AIIIEEEE! My EYES!

And yes, it is that time of the year again, the time of year where a single post spurs a thread with comments counting in the hundreds, participants throwing insults in each others faces while completely and utterly ignoring the actual point of the post. Fun times, FUN times!

Yes, it is time for another post mentioning the battle between the theories of evolution, creationism and intelligent design and how this impacts on our school system.

This time it is just plain silly. The author of this hyperventilating editorial is whining, screeching and stomping his feet about how the Board of Education is about to “embarrass Texas” and send us all the way back to the Dark Ages, presumably, complete with witch burnings, feudal lords and Papal indulgences.

How? By allowing the theory of evolution to be as much as criticized in school.

A debate is raging over a state board requirement that students be taught the strengths and weaknesses of scientific theories as early as middle school. That “strengths and weaknesses” language is a way to attack evolution and clear the path for religious doctrines like creationism and intelligent design to be taught.

Of course it is! Teaching kids to remember to be critical of established theories could serve no other useful purpose than to establish a Christofascist, fundamental, Taliban-like religion. It’s not like any prior scientific theories have ever been proven wrong and replaced with better ones by critical thinkers in the past, after all, nor is this whole “questioning” and “criticism” nonsense in any way part of the scientific method.

Please note, before everybody flies off on a tangent in the comments, that nobody is suggesting forcing students in science class to memorize Genesis as holy writ, I’d be against that too in no uncertain terms, nor is anybody suggesting that the teaching of evolution be banned from the curriculum, something I would ALSO be very firmly and loudly against. It’s really irrelevant what I believe, the fact remains that evolution is the most thoroughly researched, well-documented and widespread secular theory about the origins of life there is and that removing it from the curriculum would be disastrously stupid and detrimental to the students, whether you believe that it’s bunk or not. You educate by broadening the student’s knowledge, not by limiting it.

No, what the author is catching the vapors over is the mere suggestion that students should be taught to look out for weaknesses in theories, holes that might merit further study either to fill in the blanks or to come up with new and better ones, and most particularly that anybody should ever be allowed to as much as question the Holy Writ of Darwin.

Fully 95 percent of college science and biology teachers in Texas oppose weakening the teaching of evolution by offering alternative explanations.

And there’s the rub. The theory of evolution must not be “weakened” by irresponsible questioning, by anybody!

Sorry, you twats, but if your precious theory is so rock solid and the opposing explanation so obviously nothing but silly superstitious nonsense, then it’s hard for me to understand how questioning it can possibly weaken it. Either you’re on solid ground or you’re not. You can’t have it both ways.

Again, note the difference: I’m a “fundamentalist” (by the definition of some, meaning “anybody who actually takes the Bible seriously”) Christian, yet I’m the one suggesting that anything, any theory is open to criticism and being absolutely unafraid in the face of it, even though it might conceivably mean that I’d one day see my entire established worldview crumble around me and find myself forced to find a new one.

And I’m the “fundamentalist?”

I’m sorry, but outlawing any sort of criticism of any theory is no different from the medieval flat-earthers who declared it heresy to suggest that the planet was round and orbited the sun. Fortunately, I’m not that mired in dogma.

Thatisall.

Naturally, there’s a whole lot of talk about running Governor Palin in 2012, if we can talk her into it.

His Imperial Majesty is not at all opposed to that idea, as a matter of fact he’d welcome it, but let’s not get too wed to one candidate at this point in time. 4 years is a long time, and who knows what other candidates might pop up between now and then.

Not to mention that we just went through a 2 year campaign season, which was about 1 1/2 years too much. We’re not about to wed ourself to one candidate at this point and make the next one a 4 year one.

So we’d rather say “let’s run somebody like Governor Palin.” If that turns out to be Governor Palin when the time comes to pick one, then that’s fine. If it’s somebody else like, say Jindal, Steele or who knows who else, then that’s equally fine. But let’s not fixate so much on individuals as on what type of candidate we want.

So what’s that type? Well, for one thing Reaganism isn’t dead, no matter what George Will, David Brooks and other establishment “conservatives” would have you believe. At least not according to the people who actually matter, which is to say the voters.

Amazing, isn’t it? The voters who brought the Obamessiah over the top (not the nutroots, they couldn’t win an election on their own outside of North Korea, and we’re not even sure that they could pull it off there) were voting, or thought they were voting for:

Smaller government.
Tax cuts.
Optimism. (”Yes we can.”)

That sounds an awful lot like somebody we remember. Sure, it was all a lie, but that matters not. What matters is what the voter believes when he’s in the ballot box. And why did they buy the lie? Obviously because the Obamedia utterly and completely refused to print anything that in the slightest questioned that this was what their Anointed One stood for, but also, and just as importantly, because that was exactly everything that the Bush Administration (and McCain) was not about. Except for the tax cuts, but those were so long ago that nobody remembers anymore and, besides, McLame never could quite figure out if he was for them, against them, or against them before he was for them.

So we know now what kind of philosophy our new front runner needs. Only we need one who actually does believe in it rather than just pay lip service to it in order to get elected.

What we also need is somebody who can deliver that message in a clear, unambiguous and very much un-”nuanced” way. A communicator, if you will. We need somebody who “connects” with the only people who matter. The voters. The Hell with what the Noonans and Parkers of the world think about such “plebeian” and “base” people, because they don’t matter. We can do nicely without their handful of votes. We can’t do without the votes of Main Street America. We need somebody with a stage presence, somebody who isn’t going to triangulate endlessly when asked a question and who can deliver a verbal jab on his or her feet without a teleprompter. We don’t need anybody who, impressive though it may be to wordsmiths and college professors, will launch into a philosophical dissertation about Thoreau, Voltaire or Rousseau and their influence on their political philosophy.

We need a leader, not an intellectual. Granted, we do need somebody who knows the background for their philosophy and who is familiar with just why that philosophy is the right one, but we don’t need a blabber-mouthing snorefest putting everybody to sleep while communicating those ideas.

Intellectuals are great. Every political philosophy, if it is to endure for long, needs its thinkers who sit around and think deep thoughts, critiquing and coming up with remedies until the wee hours of the morning. But you don’t need them on the front line. That would be like jerking Oppenheimer out of the Manhattan Project, giving him a commission and putting him in charge of a company of infantry on D-Day. If you can find somebody who is a leader and an intellectual then great, but those are exceedingly rare. The traits needed in either type are seldom compatible.

Who is that leader going to be in 2012? Who knows? We’ll find out when we get there, but at least we know who and what to look for.

Thatisall.

UPDATE: Or not. The Imperial Educational Advisor points out that I’m basically saying that we should keep intellectuals and leaders separate and, looking at the above, that does indeed seem to be what I’m saying, doesn’t it? My bad. My maximum bad.

I do not at all intend to advocate that we should rally behind somebody who has not the slightest knowledge of history. Heaven knows we’ve had enough of that, particularly in the voting booths. If you don’t know your history, then you will repeat it, and you can’t communicate an idea effectively if you aren’t familiar with the background and history of it. It’s no good telling somebody what we need to do if you can’t tell them WHY it’s a good idea. Because they’re bound to ask, as well they should.

My mistake was using the “new” definition of “intellectual”, which seems to be “anybody who has a large library and can quote a hummingbird to sleep with elegant and florid words, yet has not the faintest clue about how to communicate that idea, much less how to turn it into action.”

Which is, of course, a wholly incorrect definition, but it certainly seems to me to be what the illiterati of the GOP establishment are prioritizing. “The Hell with the candidate’s ability to connect with the voter or condense his or her thinking into concise messages, as long as they can quote Ulysses from cover to cover. Oh, and stick out their pinky when they drink tea.”

So let me clarify my clumsy wording a bit: We need to prioritize leadership and communication skills, but that mustn’t mean that we forget that there has to be substance, knowledge and awareness behind those two skills. Most of all, it means that we have to start working on reversing four decades of teaching kids NOT to think and NOT to know history, but that’s the long run. In the short run, we need to find somebody who is A) a born leader and B) hasn’t been damaged by the “education” system.

Now I’ll go remind myself to practice what I preach and not use new “definitions” when I know the correct ones damn good and well and oughta know better. Words mean things.

In which we were, once again, to lay out in minute details just how insufferably stupid it is to be more concerned with being “nice” than with the archaic notion of “winning”, particularly when you’re fighting an enemy who wouldn’t know “nice” if it jumped up and bit his Marxist nose off.

But then we found out that LC & IB Mike had already said all that needs to be said on the subject, so why don’t you go read that instead?

So where do we go from here? I take it that quite a few among us are still shell-shocked, which is understandable, but we need to get started eventually. Suggestions have already been made in this post. Not nearly enough, but I’m confident that more will start rolling in at an ever more furious pace as we pick up steam. Yes, yes, I know that some are impatient, but throwing yourself at the enemy’s entrenched positions before you’ve rallied and made a plan isn’t going to work.

Another idea, and I’m sure you’re all going to think that I’ve lost my ever-loving Imperial mind but hear me out, is to read this book.

Put down the crucifix and the garlic, please. (But do keep the Brain Bleach handy).

Why should you read that book?

1) Because if you’ve found yourself thinking “how did it come to this?” over the last few days, that book will answer all of your questions. That is the manual that the radicals in this country have been following to the letter since it was written, and it explains in detail exactly how they pulled it off and how they managed to subvert, undermine and suppress everything that our nation once stood for. All while conservatives obsessed with “playing nice” obediently looked the other way.

If you’re going to beat an enemy, it behooves you to find out what makes him tick first.

2) Who knows, you just might find some ideas in there. Re-calibrate, flush out the Marxist drivel and… It worked for them, didn’t it? At the very least, you’ll be prepared for anything that comes and you’ll know ahead of time how best to sabotage it.

No, I’m not “nice.”

“Nice” is for losers. Such as McCain. And I don’t like losing. Particularly not when what I, what we all stand to lose is the only thing in this world worth having: Our liberty.

OK, folks I think that most of us have got-over the initial outrage, anger, angst, depression and all associated post-election emotional reactions. Nothing wrong with them, it’s only human and for our band of fellow Conservatives an even more bitter pill to swallow. We ran the ball for someone most of us couldn’t stand to begin with and now that’s increased by a quantum leap with the daggers in our backs for the effort as well. Begone you heap of Maverick-Shit, we wouldn’t piss in your mouth if your tongue was on fire and you can take all your pals in the RNC, RINOs and GOP eeyores with you. That by definition is the first step of the plan, no-brainer right?

Now the real question is where and how to start taking back the country? I can’t answer that right now, but we WILL come up with a plan, stick to it, adjust it to changing ground conditions and take the fight to the enemy tirelessly.

Founder Samuel Adams noted, “It does not take a majority to prevail … but rather an irate, tireless minority, keen on setting brushfires of freedom in the minds of men.” It’s our job from here on out to plan and set those brushfires of freedom, tirelessly, as it is slowly, incrementally eroded during the next 4 years or G-d forbid as long as it takes to prevail, but prevail we WILL.

But we must first plan, plan and plan some more BEFORE the execution phase. This isn’t a throw together ambush, it’s a war that will consist of many campaigns, just as the WoT. I see our role here at the Rott as shock troops. No ONE, can debate, down and dirty like our loyal readers. The leftards used gutter-tactics during the last two years. Our more reserved readers on a good day can explode their tiny turnips with a few lines. We need to start thinking of our own personal plan and how that can fit in with an overall master strategy. Take a few days or weeks or more, remember the strategic objective is to permanently destroy the progressive/socialist elements in our society and reestablish a Representative Constitutional Republic exactly as laid out and paid for by the founders and our forebears. We’ll figure out some mechanism to head-shed ideas en masse and see what we can come up with. Leave that part up to Teh Management™, just concentrate on your own plan, providing for your family and then move on to what you personally can or even more importantly cannot do. After all, an army needs cooks and surgeons as well as front line troops.

One of things we must do is to reach out and support larger organizations firmly in our camp and help them as much as we can. They have the connections and resources we could never get on our own out here in fringe seats. Most of you know that I read every word over at the Patriot Post as well as quote many of their articles on-the-air. It IS as their tagline says “The Conservative Journal Of Record”. Not only do they offer free e-mailing of their various weekly publications, the site has an extensive library of historic documents, providing a great source of facts to pound our liberal friends with, as is our custom. We eeeEEEVIL KKKKonseratives do love to cloud issues with, you know facts instead of emotions.

I received a notice of their annual fund drive, they’re entirely support by donors and accept no commercial or institutional backing whatsoever to keep their integrity. Please support them if you can, they’ll accept any amount and it goes directly into supporting a worthy organization.

Dismissed.

Well good. You earned it. Now back to work, unless you feel more like crawling into a corner in the fetal position, in which case you’re on your own. At least until you brush the sand out of your va-jay-jays, ruck up and decide to rejoin the fight.

It’s fine. I understand. I’m kinda shell shocked myself. Well, at least partially so. You take a hit to the gut, you need a few to get your shit back together. Nothing wrong with that. You’re all brothers and sisters and we all understand. Been there, done that, got the damn T-shirt.

So now that we’re all done hyperventilating, where do we go from here?

Well, remember how we all talked about in the past how if that sumbitch commie, terrorist-sympathizing usurper really managed to pull it off and buy/cheat/steal his way to the White House, we’d all buck up, assess the situation on the ground and transition into the decidedly disloyal opposition?

It’s not an “if” anymore. Welcome to the jungle. You’re now behind enemy lines with all odds against you, everyone is a potential enemy and you’re facing a long, uphill, seemingly hopeless battle. Welcome to dissent in a socialist country. It’s a fucked up mission, but it’s winnable. More importantly, we can’t NOT win it, because we’re just not wired that way. Defeat is not an option. Death might be, but defeat isn’t. Because that would be worse.

Feeling cheered up yet? I didn’t think so either, because you shouldn’t be. It sucks. Embrace it. It ain’t gonna change unless you make it so. Now you know how I and people like myself used to feel, which is something I wouldn’t wish upon my worst enemy, much less my friends. But we’re still around, and so will you be, if you buck up and bring it.

So let’s quickly summarize the extent of The Suck, shall we? We’re now looking at the reign of an illegitimate usurper who has made a joke of the election process in this country. He has feloniously gathered hundreds of millions in illegal contributions, he has used his arm, the so-called “press” to do his business by refusing to do the people’s business which is to vet people and ask questions, he has used uniformed thugs to intimidate voters at polling stations, he has used corrupt organizations and willing accomplices in state governments to illegally register ineligible people (quite a few of them dead and/or imaginary) to vote, and those are just some of his crimes against our Republic.

Gee, it feels like I’m back where I came from. Deja vu all over again.

So where does that leave us?

Well, there are a LOT of us. We may be scattered, we’ll have to work on that, but there are a lot of us. We’re also quite committed to the ideals upon which our Republic was founded, to the point where we really don’t give a shit whether we survive, we care only about what our ancestors fought and died for, and long may it live.

We know our neighborhoods, we’re intimately familiar with every nook and cranny of them. We know our enemy and we know how to identify him if he tries to hide.

And, most of all, we know that we’re right. Because we have the truth on our side.

We also know, from history, that the mirage that is socialist Utopia can never succeed because, well, it never has. Anywhere. We cannot lose this fight in the long run. You think we have it bad? Well, look at the Soviet Union and the poor people who had to live through THAT. Yet they not only lived through it, they WON.

Assessment of the enemy? We know that he controls the media, so don’t ever trust a word coming out of them. Never talk to a journalist and never listen to one either. They’re the enemy. We know that he controls the school system, because we were idiots enough to let them take it over. Work with your children and teach them well. De-programming is a bitch, but you have to do it. They’ll be continuing to do what they’ve done for decades while we were complacently letting them, which is “getting them when they’re young.” And we know, but we already knew that, that government is NOT your friend. It’ll get even worse now, but just keep that in mind. They’re the enemy. They long ago betrayed their oath to our sacred Constitution, and they’re not to be trusted. In any way.

And here is the good news: At the top of that hierarchy, they have a neophyte empty suit now. A clown who, while capable of reciting every word that Bill Ayers ever wrote from memory, has absolutely zero experience in how to run a country. Or a hot dog stand, for that matter. Unlike his ideological forefathers, the National Socialists and Soviet Communists, he doesn’t have a solid machinery and the experience already in place to run it. He’ll fuck up so bad every day that it’ll almost be too easy to skewer his ignorant ass. That dumbass fuckhead is in so far over his head that it’s not even funny.

It’s going to be nasty, but it’s going to be short. If we all buckle up and get ready to fight that usurper, Reichsführer Hussein, every step of the way.

So what did we lose?

Well, for one thing we “lost” that abomination called “compassionate conservatism.” We all know where THAT aimless piece of shit led to, don’t we? Since Ronald Reagan left office, we haven’t had a simple, unifying ideal to rally around because the Bushes and McCain never got around to thinking about one, they just wobbled around trying to catch every ball that was thrown at them.

Nation. Strength. Unity. Liberty. Prosperity.

That’s what we have. And we’ve managed, through this setback, to get back to basics.

Nation. Strength. Unity. Liberty. Prosperity.

The dead weight is gone. Never again will we be “led” by a clown who will say “either you’re with us or against us” one day and then, the very next day, say “unless we decide that maybe sucking up to you a little bit might be better. After all, the fwench might not like us if we don’t.”

Good riddance to bad rubbish.

What we need is a leader with a clear vision, and I don’t mean just words like the asshats who have led us up until now, but somebody who will follow through with actions. And we’ll get that, because now we’ve cut the rubbish loose. We had to, because now we know where THAT led us.

Time to get back to basics and carry on the fight.

Nation: Because we ARE the last, best hope of mankind. If we allow that candle to be extinguished, then this world isn’t worth the dirt it is made of. We may not always be liked, but we’re always right. Our nation is the blood of our forefathers. It is our past, our present and our future. Without it, we have nothing. It is the bond that ties us together, it is what we are. It is the thread that connects us with our Founding Fathers without whom we wouldn’t even be what we are today. We owe all that we are and have to them, and future generations depend on us to keep that thread going. It is bigger than any one of us, bigger than all of us together, because that IS the United States of America.

Strength: Without that, a nation won’t be a nation for long. It will be somebody else’s nation. The world doesn’t give a shit about “goodness” or “kindness”, all they care about is “who’s on top?” If you have something that somebody else doesn’t have but wants, rest assured that he’ll try to take it from you. And the only way you can keep him from doing that is through strength. Nobody ever won anything through weakness.

Unity: This ties into “nation.” We are a common front. We are family. The rest of the world doesn’t give two shits about us. We may bicker among ourselves, as any family does, but we must present a united front to the rest of the world or we will. not. stand. The loony left have done their damndest to destroy that because they can’t succeed if it exists. They have divided us into arbitrary cliques and they continue to do so under the guise of “fairness” and “affirmative action”, just to name two.

We are Americans. Period. First and foremost. Whatever else we feel a need to identify with is fine, but being American is what we are, first and foremost. Any attempt to divide us into subgroups, any attempt to Balkanize us must be resisted, fought and denied with everything in us.

Liberty: “With liberty and justice for all.” That’s not just a catchy slogan. That is what we are. That is what was bought with the lifeblood of countless patriots. Liberty means that the role of government in our personal lives must be limited to the utmost and that any attempt to infringe upon it must be resisted by any means. It means smaller government, and it means strict and uncompromising adherence to our Constitution, which was set up specifically to limit what government could ever do. We have failed in fighting for this, and that is why we are where we are today. It’s time to turn the tide. Slaves don’t accomplish anything, free men and women do. Fight the tyrants and eliminate them if you must. The Founding Fathers would approve. They didn’t show up at Lexington Green because they were bored and had nothing better to do.

Prosperity: This means the right to keep what you earn. What you have earned through your own sweat belongs to nobody but you. You can share it if you WANT to, but NOBODY has the right to take it from you and spend it on whatever cause they believe best serve their own ambitions. There are causes on which we all agree, on which the security and safety of our nation rests, and those are all already outlined in the Constitution. There’s a reason for that. Our Founding Fathers actually thought long and hard about that before they wrote it down and signed it.

Anything other than that is theft, plain and simple, and it should be resisted in the same way that you would resist a burglar.

Because if a citizen no longer owns the fruit of his labors, he is no longer a citizen. He is a slave.

These are our guidelines. If they seem hopeless and the obstacles under the reign of Reichsführer Hussein seem insurmountable, keep in mind that this nation was founded by a bunch of peasants fighting the world’s most professional and well-equipped army.

We’ve got it easy.

Now get up and fight, dammit.

Against tyranny and for liberty and justice.

I will never take a knee to a tyrant and cheat.

I would rather die.

And no, we’re not just talking about the recent, very recent, Zogby poll showing McCain/Palin ahead 48-47 in their latest one-day poll, even though that in itself might be reason enough for the exclamation marks.

We keep telling you: THIS AIN’T OVER.

Unless you decide to let the Eeyores convince you that it is. In which case the Obamamedia really ought to cut you a check for doing their work for them.

Yes, it’s Zogby. We know, we know. But don’t you think that it is at least a little bit newsworthy that, whereas all of the “tingles up and down our legs” Obamamedia polls predict a Reaganesque landslide of truly biblical proportions for their Messiah, this poll comes out with McCain/Palin leading?

Especially when you consider that all of the at least marginally reputable polls have shown a marked tightening of the gap over the last week or so?

But if that’s not enough to get you off suicide watch, we want to share something with you that was sent to us by LC & IB Rurik.

Remember how we’ve told you time and time again that the only polls you can even remotely trust are the campaigns’ internal polls? For the very simple reason that those internal pollsters have absolutely no agenda other than finding out what’s really going on in order to know what they should be doing next. Those pollsters, while certainly plagued by the same unknowns that every other pollster in history have had to deal with, have to get the right numbers or they could cause their campaigns to lose the election.

Ever wondered why both campaigns are investing heavily into, say, Pennsylvania, one of the states that, according to the Eeyoremedia, is going to go fully in the tank for the Obaminable Blowman to the tune of 127% voting for him and -7,443% voting for McCain/Palin? What? You think they like throwing money into already settled races, especially with so many much tighter races to choose from?

C’mon. Even Obambi isn’t daft enough to throw money into a race he’s leading by double digits and McCain/Palin, being considerably more strapped for cash since he hasn’t committed massive election fraud by deliberately turning off basic security features in order to get donations from various caves in Pakistan, certainly isn’t about to.

So, again: The only polls we’ve ever been interested in seeing were the internals, and neither campaign is particularly forthcoming with sharing those.

Until now. Apparently the people at the Quinn and Rose show have a contact in the Republican camp who is willing to share. Yes. the internal numbers.

A warning: When we checked out that link, it loaded horrendously slowly. But if you want a quick summary, here it is:

New Jersey: McCain 48% - Obambi 43% - Undecided 7%, undecideds currently breaking 4 to 1 for McCain.

Have you put the razor down yet?

Michigan, the state that the McCain campaign hasn’t put much of an effort in at all, thinking it already lost: McCain 44% - Obambi 42% - Undecided 10%

OK, now here’s the bad news. There’s a state where Obambi leads.

California: Obambi 44% - McCain 43% - Undecided 9%.

People, if Dear Leader isn’t landsliding by double digits in the People’s Socialist Republic of Kalifornikate??? We rest our case.

Oh, and the state we mentioned before that Obambi is supposedly going to carry in a double-digit clobbering, yet for some reason he is focusing a LOT of effort in?

Pennsylvania: McCain 55% - Obambi 33% - Undecideds 10%

We guess they really don’t like being called racist, redneck, bitter, gun and bible-clinging xenophobes after all. Imagine our surprise.

Number one reason among Democrats breaking for McCain? They’re pissed off that he’s cheating and trying to buy the election.

And that’s all from the horse’s mouth, pollsters who have absolutely zero interest in being wrong and who will most likely never work again if they are, so it’s safe to assume that they’re working their little butts off overtime trying to identify and eliminate whatever unknowns they can find. And we can guarantee you that those are the same numbers staring the Obamessiah in the face from his internal pollsters, because they’re operating under the same conditions.

Which would go a long way towards explaining why he’s been so pissy and irritable as of late, kicking reporters from newspapers whose only offense has been not endorsing him and generally being a whiny little pissant.

“But… but… but… HOW? Surely all of those other polls realize that it’s not a Good Thing to be caught being stupid either? They have to work for the rest of the time between now and the next election.”

Yes, they do. So you should expect a lot of polls looking like Zogby’s over the weekend. Which is why we sort of think that Zogby is on the ball here. Say anything you like about him, but he’s a businessman and a very shrewd one at that. We wouldn’t be at all surprised for him to be ahead of the game here. And the rest will follow.

And, of course, Keith Olberdouche will, once again, be curled up in the fetal position under his desk Tuesday night.

Of course, this could all be crap, but we don’t think so. Because this Impending Avalanche of Inevitable Obamania™ just isn’t evident anywhere. And American voters aren’t even close to being as dense as Dear Leader and his Obamamedia think that they are. This is the home stretch and this is when the majority of voters, the bloc that matters in the final tally, start paying attention.

How about some anecdotal evidence, but we’re sure that you can tell us similar stories. Still, the plural of “anecdote” isn’t “evidence”, but it’s something we’ve noticed.

During the 2004 season, when there wasn’t nearly the amount of Democrat enthusiasm that we allegedly have now, we saw plenty of Kerry/Edwards stickers and signs. Not a sea of them, but this is Texas. There was no shortage of them. We couldn’t leave the house without seeing at least half a dozen vehicles sporting a Fuckface/Silky Pony sticker.

This year, when the Obamamedia claims that the entire nation, all 57 states, are awash with yearning and desire for Hope and Change™, on the other hand?

We have counted two stickers and not one sign with Obameinführer/Hairplugs on them. Two and none, respectively. Over the entire season.

We’ve said it before and we’ll say it again: The Obamamedia are deliberately engaging in psyops. They want to, they NEED to convince you that the race is all over, that it’s a foregone conclusion, because then there’s a good chance that any among you leaning McCain but not all that fired up about it will just take the day off.

So get out the bloody vote. Not so much you Rotties, we know you’re going to vote anyway, but we’re sure there are friends and family of yours that belong to that “we’ll vote if it’ll make a difference” group.

It WILL make a difference. It IS making a difference. And if those people don’t vote, there are going to be a whole lot of really nasty differences happening to our beloved nation. So get them to the polling place. Offer them lunch afterwards if you need to, offer to mow their lawns, offer to have their babies (OK, not if they’re family, that’s just too weird), but get them to fucking VOTE.

Don’t do PMSNBC’s work for them.

For fuck’s sakes. You withstood almost five decades of Soviet propaganda. Surely you’re not going to let yourselves or anybody you know cave in to the propaganda of the New York Times?

VOTE!!!

Thatisall.

Sorry for being such a pissant, but sometimes you reach the point where you just need a break. I believe I’ve found mine. I’ll be back, I may bend but never break, but right now I just can’t take any more of this Book of Job bullshit.

Pardon me, G-d, I’m not denouncing You, nor has my faith in You lessened, I just need a break. You don’t owe me anything, if anyone is in debt here it’s me because I haven’t always been the best child of Yours to put it very mildly, but I’m really in need of a breather here. I know I was tempting fate when I noted that the clutch of my crappy old car was dying but still working, but I didn’t expect it to crap out on me entirely a few hours later. It’s not that I mind walking my kids to school, Heaven knows that it’s not exactly an immense tribulation compared to the other things that people have gone through, but it does rather limit my ability to go interview for jobs. And no, I can neither afford to have it fixed, nor can I afford to buy another car.

Not that I’m getting a whole lot of replies to my applications, so maybe my despair at not being able to go see employers is ridiculous, because apparently my credentials are either worthless because they were accumulated in a country where applicants for higher education are actually required to be able to read and be conversant in at least two different languages, not to mention that ridiculous requirement of knowing your classics and the history of the continent on which you live, as opposed to here, where anybody with vital signs can get an embossed, gilded diploma from one of our numerous diploma mills, OR they’re relevant enough to deem me “overqualified” for any position that I apply for.

I’ve fucking well had it. I don’t give a shit what anybody asks me to do, if they’ll pay me to do it I’ll do it, I have the supreme priority or directive of having a family to take care of, but apparently that’s not good enough. Because I’m not a native. I was born in a country where you actually had to have a brain to get a diploma. Not to say that anybody with a diploma here doesn’t have one, but from having to read the barely literate drivel from some of them, I can surely say with confidence that a lot of the bachelors and masters weren’t overburdened by an abundance of scholarly knowledge. Or basic intellect, for that matter.

But who cares? I’m just another bitter, gun-clinging moron in dire need of a break from this whole load of barely literate nonsense, and I’m about to take one right now.

I’ll be back. Maybe. It’s not like it fucking well matters anyway. And maybe it shouldn’t.

But for now, I’m on strike. I don’t expect it to make a heck of a difference, it’s not like I’m going to Change The World™, but I’ve just. Had. It.

Goodnight, and good luck.

Thatisall.

[Update- OK gang y'all know what we need to do. G-d knows he's done it for me. Give till it hurts, then check the cushions for change. Maybe skip a pack of cigaretters or the 6-pack of brewskis. We CAN do it. Meanwhile, we've made contact with the rest of the family in the DFW area and have some of the best networking going to locate someone that can help the Boss, and find him some employment. Appropriate imprecations to the deity of your choice are also in order. I'll be on the horn with the Boss later after the show, and I don't expect him to even want to think hard enough to pull off his slot tonight, and he better pick up the phone, lest an O'Dark Thirty knock on the door happens, I'm NOT KIDDING. -JB and the La. HQ Gang]

I don’t often talk about the family. This is only because I’m a private kind of person and, I suppose, a bit paranoid about “letting it all hang out” on the Internet, particularly these days when passing brownshirts might catch on and decide to demonstrate their “tolerance” and “Hope and Change!” by destroying my life like they have tried to destroy people like Joe the Plumber.

Which is sad, because I love to talk about my family. I love them more than life and I am so very, very proud of them.

One such time when my heart skipped a beat and I choked up about how blessed I am was recently. My Heirs have been going through election stuff in 1st grade because, well, we have an election coming up, which makes it sort of relevant. All that stuff about how elections work and how your right to vote is very, very important and how you need to exercise it no matter what. I appreciate that. We’ve already taught them that, but I don’t mind the reinforcement one little bit.

So, anyway, the oldest Heir (by all of two minutes) is sitting there with me, asking me about the candidates in this election, and somehow the conversation drifts to whether they have families too. He asks me whether the Obamessiah has any siblings and I answer, truthfully, that I only know about a half-brother living in Africa on a dollar a month, relying on the kindnesses of strangers to get by.

“Doesn’t Obama have money?”, he asks me.

“Sure”, I say, “more than we’ll probably ever have.”

“Why doesn’t he give some of it to his brother, then?”

“I don’t know. I guess he doesn’t want to.”

The Heir thinks about that for a moment and then says: “Well, dad, when I grow up and make a lot of money, if I make a thousand dollars, I could send them to his brother so he could have a house and some food to eat.”

See? That’s redistributing wealth done the right way. Not at the point of a gun, but because my kid thought that he wanted to help this guy that he didn’t even know.

Yeah. I choked up alright. Great kid. Here we are, stuck in shit so far it’s creeping into our nostrils, yet he still has the heart to feel for a complete stranger. A complete stranger whose own brother doesn’t give a shit, I might add. Hearts of pure gold, both of them. If there’s anything that I might have had a hand in teaching them that I feel proud of, that would be it.

Like the other day when I was driving them to school and the old clunker with its broken clutch that I can’t afford to repair was giving me the usual trouble while I was trying to match the revs and get it in gear anyway, and they both offered to break their piggy banks they’ve been saving up in so I could buy a new one. Never mind that their combined savings wouldn’t do a bit of good and that they’d been saving up for stuff they desperately want for themselves, they just wanted to help out old daddy.

I love them. I love them so much.

OK, the room is getting dusty, so I’ll sign off.

Thatisall.

The Imperial Firearms Advisor encounters yet another example of idiots, in this case idiots who ought to know better, using the old canard “it’s not really socialism unless the government takes over everything.”

We’re used to hearing this dodge coming from socialists who are trying to hide the fact that they’re socialists, but we’re really disappointed to hear that particular bit of idiocy coming from people like Krauthammer and Barnes.

As the Imperial Firearms Advisor correctly points out, it’s not how you redistribute wealth that defines socialism, it’s the fact that you do it at all.

If you take the money that somebody earns and gives it to somebody who didn’t, then you’re a socialist or as a minimum, that particular act is a socialist act. Period. Full stop. End of discussion. If you endorse it as a “generally good idea to run a society”, then you ARE a socialist.

Again: End of discussion.

The reason I’m bringing this up, apart from my dismay at seeing two people whom I thought were endowed with brains spouting nonsense, is that it’s used so much by lefties and I’m getting sick and tired of the hair-splitting.

And I’m going to be a bit long-winded here since it’s a subject that I’ve spent a lot of time studying, so I’m sticking the rest beneath the fold. You might want to read through it anyway, though, because it’s a quite important point, if I do say so myself. But I’ll leave you with the option to skip it.

Free choice, baby!

Give us more, O Emperor! »« AIIIEEEE! My EYES!

Okay folks, that’s it for me for now. That’s my last article for the moment.

No, I am not going anywhere, but we are now down to the wire..and like any good friend, I am stepping back, handing you your ammo, and wishing you Godspeed.

Much as I wish I could be part of this, I am a foreigner, I cannot vote, so this battle is yours and yours alone…which is as it should be, anyway.

I’ve done what I can, tried to keep your spirits up (Not that you needed me for that, you are some of the strongest people I have known) and looked for things to keep you thinking, make you smile, take the edge off what have been, I know, some hard and difficult times.

Misha has been gracious to allow me a voice here, we’ve argued, we’ve joked…and we’ve been all too aware of what the future holds for all of us if the nightmare becomes real.

You know what you have to do.

You know why.

You know what’s at stake.

You know why.

Do it.

-LC Brendan.

Since His Imperial Majesty likes rambling on and on about fake, skewed polls and what they’re intended to achieve by the ones publishing them, why not explain ourself a bit and, in the process, point out at least one possible unintended consequence of the Obamamedia trying to game the system in this fashion?

Yes, we know, you’re probably already a-twitter with excitement faced with the prospect of yet another endless stream of consciousness published by His Imperial Majesty, but try to contain yourselves…

First of all, the “influence turnout by massaging the numbers” approach is a two-edged sword. Why is this? Because of the theory behind it. The goal is, we should point out, NOT to make dyed-in-the-wool, hardcore conservatives stay at home on election day. That’s simply not possible. People like you and ourself are going to turn out and vote no matter what. We’re the hardcore “exercise your right no matter what” zealots who understand that our right to vote is one of the most important, if not THE most important right that we have. We also understand that if we fail to exercise that right, then we automatically forfeit our right to bitch about the result.

We’re not the target.

The target is the group of voters who definitely lean in one direction, in this case Palin/Whassisface?, but aren’t particularly committed. In real life terms, they’re the ones who will definitely go vote if the race seems to be close, but if it’s a foregone conclusion then, “oh well, why bother? It’s not all that important and, at any rate, we’re busy at work these days and all of that absentee voting hassle is really too much if my vote isn’t going to make a difference anyway.”

On our side, that demographic would mainly be blue-collar and lower middle class voters who are quite busy making a living and, let’s face it, voting does mean taking time out from other chores in a day that is already too short to go stand in line. If you’ve become convinced that the outcome is pre-ordained and that your vote isn’t going to make a lick of difference, then why cram another obligation into an already stuffed schedule?

So what’s the silver lining? The silver lining is that the other side has a demographic like that too. More importantly, part of that demographic is the notoriously fickle “youth vote” that the Democrats keep trumpeting every election season, yet we haven’t seen them actually show up to vote yet.

They, being young and generally less obsessed with issues of sweeping, national import than with having a good time, are extremely vulnerable to the “why bother?” factor. Only in their case, it’s not because of demoralization, it’s because of overconfidence. Why take time out from such vital pastimes as playing WoW, banging your girlfriend or huffing on your bong if it’s already “in the can?”

Whether the Obamamedia’s strategy will backfire more than it will achieve remains to be seen, but it’s important to remember that there is a flip side to that coin as well.

Bottom line: It comes down the “leaners.” If you know anybody who fits in that category, people who really, generally do like Palin/Whassisface? better than the ObaMarx but aren’t truly committed to the whole thing, then it is vitally important that you make them understand that their votes, no matter what the polls say, really DO count. If ObaMarx wins, then those who didn’t vote will have no right to complain about the consequences. Also remind them that we have men and women overseas fighting and dying for their right to cast that vote.

It’s really not that much to ask that they exercise that right to show their appreciation for their sacrifices, even if it all seems “hopeless” to them at this point.

First a word from the Great One, Mark Levin (excerpt):

But beyond the elites and the media, my greatest concern is whether this election will show a majority of the voters susceptible to the appeal of a charismatic demagogue. This may seem a harsh term to some, and no doubt will to Obama supporters, but it is a perfectly appropriate characterization. Obama’s entire campaign is built on class warfare and human envy. The “change” he peddles is not new. We’ve seen it before. It is change that diminishes individual liberty for the soft authoritarianism of socialism.

…

Rather than pursue the American Dream, he insists that the American Dream has arbitrary limits, limits Obama would set for the rest of us — today it’s $250,000 for businesses and even less for individuals. If the individual dares to succeed beyond the limits set by Obama, he is punished for he’s now officially “rich.” The value of his physical and intellectual labor must be confiscated in greater amounts for the good of the proletariat (the middle class). And so it is that the middle class, the birth-child of capitalism, is both celebrated and enslaved — for its own good and the greater good.

And no, it really isn’t new. We’ve seen it all before. A smooth, charismatic demagogue stirring the fires of class warfare at huge, carefully choreographed and orchestrated mass rallies, declaring one small group (in this case the “rich” as defined by Dear Leader’s arbitrary, personal definition of what “rich” is) The Enemy while promising another, much larger group that he will take their wealth and “spread it around”, meaning “giving it away to the have-nots.”

There is nothing new about said leader building a cult of personality around himself, with his visage decorating walls, cars, office walls, billboards, buildings etc. etc. etc., nor is there anything new about said leader creating a new symbol, an icon if you will, symbolizing his campaign platform and plastering that symbol over everything. The only thing that deviates from what we’ve seen before is that his followers haven’t been told to wear said symbol on an armband. Yet. Perhaps that would be too obvious.

Also not new is Dear Leader relying on organized groups of thugs not nominally under his control (so’s to maintain “plausible” deniability) to “get his message out” and, more importantly, make people think twice about crossing him. Joe the Plumber is the most publicly known example of what those thugs are capable of, but he’s not the only one.

There is nothing new about avoiding, at least in public, that great socialist booga-bear of nationalizing private enterprise and making everybody wards of the State. At least not formally so. He’s not the first one to realize that leaving private enterprise on private hands while at the same time defining just how much “free” individuals can earn without having it confiscated is much more palatable than just taking it outright, while achieving much the same effect as a blatant take-over. You may think that you still own your small business, after all your name is on the paperwork, no?, but you don’t really when the State gets to define your maximum allowable income. Expect mandatory production “guidelines” telling you what and how much you should produce and what price you may sell it at. Also expect mandatory wage “guidelines.” Eventually it’ll be just as if the State owned your business, they’ll be making all the decisions for you, but you’re no more the owner of it than a renter is the “owner” of the apartment in which he dwells. It’s socialism, just with a bit of lipstick smeared on the pig to make it look like something else.

And we’ve seen it all before.

So will the people of Main Street be as susceptible to this old package and its new charismatic leader as the Volksgenossen of Hochstrasse?

It remains to be seen and it is still up to each and every one of us whether we’ll let it happen. Will we stand idly by like “Good Germans” and let it happen, or will we stop it while there’s still time?

That is the question now, isn’t it?

Vote on Nov 4th, and get your friends and families to vote as well. All is not lost yet, unless we choose to lose it.