Follow Up: To all interested West Virginia Republican women

On Thursday, June 25, 2009, the Republican National Committee will kick off its Women’s Program with the first annual Women’s Summit. It will be held at the Capitol Hill Club in Washington, DC from 9:00 am to 5:00 pm. The mission of the RNC Women’s Program is to recruit, register, train and sustain a strong base of women activists and candidates to build the Republican Party, portray the GOP as the automatic choice for female voters and win elections. In order to do this, we need your help.

The State Party has been asked to select five to eight women from West Virginia to attend the Summit. These women should be strong leaders within our state party, volunteers that continue to shine throughout each election cycle, or new supporters who are interested in expanding their role within the Party. The goal is for the attendees of the Summit to serve as the new leadership of the RNC Women’s Program as Regional Chairwomen, State Chairwomen and Team Leaders. They will be counted on to implement the goals of the Women’s Program within their states and territories and to be the face of the Program across the country.

Although the Summit is free of charge, travel, lodging and incidentals will be the responsibility of the individual attendees; however, lunch and snacks will be provided on June 25. Additionally, rooms will be held at a discounted rate of $209.00/night for single occupancy and $234.00/night for double occupancy at the Capitol Hill Suites, 200 C Street SE, Washington, DC.

Please respond by email ( mriggall@wvgop.org ) if you are interested, along with a few lines about why you would like to be selected to participate in this project. Thank you as always for your hard work on behalf of the Republican Party.

Doug McKinney

Chairman

Darfur: One Big Reason Why the United States Should Stop Shedding Its Leadership Role

One of my favorite movie lines, as I have mentioned before, comes from Zulu, a film from the 1960s about 19th century British soldiers grimly facing down thousands of Zulu warriors. There were a little over a hundred British and the Zulus had a couple thousand rifles.

Before one assault on the small fortification, a frightened soldier asks his sergeant why they are fighting. The Sergent, in classic British Victorian fashion, answers "Because we are here, and no one else."

That describes perfectly the United States' role in the world up until 2009. We stand for freedom, we back democracy, we support capitalism. Why? Because no one else cares. We do it not for popularity but for principle. We know gratitude is fleeting, but we understand that the world is safer when it is free. At least we knew and understood those things until January of this year.

Darfur is an international outrage. Slavery and massacres of Christian blacks by Muslims continues unabated. I am not suggesting that we go into the region by ourselves like an Old West sheriff and clean up the town. Some situations call for the John Wayne treatment, this does not. What we need is to round up our posse. Get some old friends like the Poles, British, etc. and some new ones like Kenya and South Africa. Take on a leadership and organization role, but provide direct support mostly in logistics.

Fact is, though, our credibility gets shakier all the time. Who can trust our commitment to democracy when the president acts like Gordon Brown is the black sheep cousin while Hugo Chavez is the coolest guy on earth?

Darfur needs attention and our diplomatic ship needs righted. Too bad neither outcome looks feasible for at least, say, four years.

Sirius Radio Host Andrew Wilkow in Morgantown

I would say if you missed Andrew Wilkow in Morgantown, then you missed on of the great Republican dinners held this year in West Virginia, but you can watch it below. Andrew reminded us all of what it means to be a conservative. It was a great show and I would like to thank him for coming down. You can hear him weekdays on Sirius 144 between 12 and 3pm.

Ahem, Waiter, This Is Not What I Ordered

Imagine going to a restaurant one day. You eat there often and like the steak. Every time you go there you order steak and today is no exception. However, instead of a robust, tasty, juicy, tender steak, the waiter calls an audible and brings the tofu and vegetarian platter. He explains that the chef decided that he does not care for steak anymore and this has less fat. You have no choice, the dinner is completely unpalatable to you, but you are forced to eat it anyway. How disgusting!

This is precisely what Arlen Spectre did to a very large number of people. He presented himself as a Republican, part of the majority, called upon and received the support of President Bush to get reelected, and has now switched to the Democratic Party.

Had he done this in 2002 or so, Spectre could present this as a matter of conscience. At this point it looks like nothing more than sheer opportunism. Believe me, he will end up in a position of power in the Senate eventually, after the passage of an appropriate amount of time.

In his last go round, he faced a very difficult primary opponent. Perhaps he fears the infamy of losing a primary as an incumbent. In any case, he now faces the strong possibility of losing in the general. The formidible party network that got him elected will now be used against him.

Changing parties in midterm is fundamentally dishonest. Spectre has to live with his newly won reputation as a turncoat. Best of luck with that.

Gingrich to Waxman: Dont Punish Americans with Energy Taxes

To all interested West Virginia Republican women

Jan Larimer, Co-Chairman of the RNC, is building support for the annual Women’s Summit. If anyone is interested in being one of the five to eight women from West Virginia to participate, please let us know by May 29^th.

The RNC has spent the better portion of this week focused on the roll out of its women’s program. Please mark June 25, 2009 on your calendar. This is the date for the first annual Women’s Summit which will kick off the RNC’s women’s program. The goal of the program is to recruit, register, train and sustain a strong base of women activists and candidates to build the Republican Party, portray the GOP as the automatic choice for female voters and WIN elections.

You will receive a detailed letter next week from Co-Chair Larimer outlining the mission and goals of this program but more importantly asking for your help. We are being asked to nominate 5-8 women from our state to attend the women’s summit. The goal is for the attendees at the summit to ultimately serve in a hands-on leadership role for the program.

Again, please let us know by May 29^th if you are interested in participating in this program, and thank you!

Doug McKinney

Chairman

Socialism Made No Sense to Aristotle Either

This excerpt is from Aristotle's work The Politics written about 340 B.C. It describes that a system is much more fair when everyone pursues his self-interest. Aristotle also makes the correct point that a system without private property tends to have a dampening effect on benevolence and charity.

Should the citizens of the perfect state have their possessions in common or not? Three cases are possible: (1) the soil may be appropriated, but the produce may be thrown for consumption into the common stock; this is the practice of some nations. Or (2), the soil may be common, and may be cultivated in common, but the produce divided among individuals for their private use; this is a form of common property which is said to exist among certain barbarians. Or the soil and the produce may be alike common. When the farmers are not the owners, the case will be different and easier to deal with; but when they till the ground for themselves the question of ownership will give a world of trouble. If they do not share equally enjoyments and toils, those who labor much and get little will necessarily complain of those who labor little and receive or consume much. These are only some of the disadvantages which attend the community of property; the present arrangement, if improved as it might be by good customs and laws, would be far better.

Property should be in a certain sense common, but, as a general rule, private; for, when everyone has a distinct interest, men will not complain of one another, and they will make more progress, because every one will be attending to his own business. And yet by reason of goodness, and in respect of use, 'Friends,' as the proverb says, "will have all things common." Even now there are traces. For, although every man has his own property, some things he will place at the disposal of his friends, while of others he shares the use with them. Again, how immeasurably greater is the pleasure, when a man feels a thing to be his own; for surely the love of self is a feeling implanted by nature and not given in vain, although selfishness is rightly censured. No one, when men have all things in common, will any longer set an example of liberality or do any liberal action; for liberality consists in the use which is made of property. Such legislation may have a specious appearance of benevolence; men readily listen to it, and are easily induced to believe that in some wonderful manner everybody will become everybody's friend, especially when some one is heard denouncing the evils now existing in states, suits about contracts, convictions for perjury, flatteries of rich men and the like, which are said to arise out of the possession of private property. These evils, however, are due to a very different cause---the wickedness of human nature.

Thomas Jefferson, Woodrow Wilson, Franklin D. Roosevelt, and John F. Kennedy Are "So Yesterday" According to Hillary Clinton

Thomas Jefferson: "We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain inalienable rights . . ."

Woodrow Wilson: "I have called the Congress into extraordinary session because there are serious, very serious, choices of policy to be made, and made immediately . . . Our motive will not be revenge or the victorious assertion of the physical might of the nation, but only the vindication of right, of human right, of which we are only a single champion. . . . To such a task we can dedicate our lives and our fortunes, everything that we are and everything that we have, with the pride of those who know that the day has come when America is privileged to spend her blood and her might for the principles that gave her birth and happiness and the peace which she has treasured. God helping her, she can do no other.

Franklin D. Roosevelt: "Our national determination to keep free of foreign wars and foreign entanglements cannot prevent us from feeling deep concern when ideals and principles that we have cherished are challenged."

John F, Kennedy: "Let every nation know, whether it wishes us well or ill, that we shall pay any price, bear any burden, meet any hardship, support any friend, oppose any foe, in order to assure the survival and the success of liberty. This much we pledge—and more."

Hillary Clinton: "Ideology is so yesterday."

Great. The ideology of Marx, the principles of a vacuum, the foreign policy of Richard Nixon, and the speech patterns of a valley girl. Ladies and gentlemen, this is your secretary of state.

Congratulations.

US annouces it has no plans to invade Canada

US announces it has no plans to invade Canada and we probably haven't even thought about it since the War of 1812. I'm pretty sure will not have any plans to invade Canada anytime soon. That headline makes you think, it makes you wonder what atrocity Canada committed, but if you don't read this story you will wonder that. You may even panic if you live on the border, but that story title is 100% accurate. We have no plans to invade Canada.

The White House Cabinet will be releasing Swine Flu information that basically says everything is normal, but the titles will indicate otherwise. Rahm Emanuel has said you never want to let a crisis go to waste and this will be no exception.

With the administration under heavy attack from the average American about out of control spending, ever increasing taxes, bailing out banks and businesses while many Americans are loosing their jobs and homes the administration is wanting to divert attention from their unpopular policies. The Swine Flu outbreak just gave Rahm Emanuel a crisis to use to the administrations advantage.

Now the flu is not to be taken lightly as it is a leading cause of death in the US every year, but we should not panic. The worst flu pandemic on record is the Spanish Flu break out of 1918-19 where and estimated 28% of the US population caught the flu and of those about 500,000 died. To put that in perspective about 200,000 people each year are hospitalized with the seasonal flu and of those about 36,000 die according to the Center for Disease Control (CDC) . Today we have the best health care system in the world and many treatments are available now that would have saved most of those in the 1918-19 outbreak.

In 1976 an outbreak of the Swine Flu created a panic in the US. The government launched a massive immunization campaign in which 24% of the US population was vaccinated. At the time about 25 deaths from Guillain-Barre syndrome were brought on by the vaccination program and the program was stopped. No pandemic ever materialized and the panic subsided.

If you have symptoms of the flu, head to the doctor immediately and get checked out in the best health care system in the world. Don't take any chances, but don't panic either because the odds are stacked very heavily in your favor.

You're going to see lots of flu reports in the news coming up and you can be assured that many of them are going to be politically driven from the White House trying to draw attention away from the economic problems the administration is prolonging. Rahm Emanuel is not going to let this crisis go to waste and they are going to fan the flames to make it grow. Look at the already increasing volume of non-stories. "US says not testing travelers from Mexico for flu," OK, that is just normal. Have you ever received a flu test when you got off a plane? No. You're finding most of the headlines are panicky, but the stories are stories saying we are not doing anything differently. It is business as normal.

Keep in mind, the CDC monitors these outbreaks all the time and has plans already in place. Much of the information I quoted in this blog comes from CDC reports and plans.

West Virginia wake up, Cap and Trade will kill our state