When Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. made his famous “I have a Dream” speech 47 years ago, he did it before a large and diverse audience full of both white and black faces, all united behind the cause of racial equality and equal opportunity for all Americans just because they were Americans, regardless of political, ethnic or social divisions. Today, while watching C-SPAN I saw the descendants of those who witnessed and even participated in King’s march on Washington gather in two largely segregated groups in an ironic segregation of the failure of King’s vision for our nation.

Not far away, at historic Dunbar High School, there were no good solutions to be found either. Before a small and unenthusiastic crowd which was uniformly dark skinned and had been bussed in by the SEIU, the AFT and the NEA, speaker after speaker repeated unionist slogans and socialist rhetoric with lukewarm response from the audience who had apparently been paid to show up but not to applaud. Unlike Dr. King’s spontaneous gathering of the people, this was a contrived event funded and manufactured by powerful special interest groups who have seized control of the government and promote an inhumane and exploitative ideology.

The contrast between the two rallies was striking.

Beck’s “Restoring Honor” event was enormous, far beyond anything I would have expected. Estimates of the crowd size place it well over 500,000 people, more than double the turnout for King’s original rally. In comparison Reverend Al Sharpton’s “Reclaim the Dream” event had a small and unenthusiastic turnout which may have barely topped 10,000, though comments from the podium suggested that the unions were still bussing in participants even as the original crowd was losing interest and wandering away during Sharpton’s speech.

The Beck event was largely apolitical. In fact, I found it troubling how heavily religious it was, with extensive references to Mormon symbolism and creepy religious figures spending time talking about moral values and vaguely threatening references to rechristianizing America. The most political speech came from former Alaska Governor Sarah Palin, but most of the speakers were pushing a religious message, including some black preachers who had marched with King and his neice Alveda King. The union-sponsored event was quite different. Everything was political and the preachers who appeared were among the most radical of the speakers. It was all about blaming Bush and asserting political dominance for unions and activist groups.

At the Lincoln Memorial Beck’s followers were dressed normally and mostly not carrying signs. They were hot but enthusiastic and engaged, though I can’t figure out how most of them could see or hear anything at all given the size of the crowd. Much of the crowd at Dunbar High School showed up in uniform, wearing SEIU provided t-shirts and obediently participating in displays of support, but seeming quite disengaged from the speakers, some of whom became quite frustrated at the lack of response from the crowd.

Frankly, the Beck rally bored the hell out of me. Aside from a creepy bit at the beginning with some blatant token Jews and Native Americans and a bizarre preacher who seemed to e some sort of dualistic or pantheistic heretic with a speech impediment, the only part which kept my attention was Palin’s speech. I wanted more politics and less moralizing. Too much flag-waving and religiosity and a lack of content left me uninterested.

The “Reclaim the Dream” rally kept me riveted because of the obvious anger, hate and frustration on display. It was like looking at the moment where a populist movement achieves victory and begins the transition to despotism and oppression. All they needed was Hugo Chavez on the stage, or maybe not since several of their speakers did a fair but unintentional impression of him.

The rhetoric of revolution sounds like the rhetoric of tyranny when it comes from those who already have power and who are the new establishment. When Marc Morial of the National Urban League talks about poverty it’s impossible to take him seriously when you know he makes $657,000 a year and has a 7 figure benefits package. It’s hard to stick it to “The Man” when times have changed and you are “The Man.”

Perhaps the most ominous moment was when a Gregory Floyd of Teamsters Local 237 in New York City said that “We stand in solidarity with this social movement. Labor and this social movement, this civil rights movement, are one and the same.” Words with terrifying implications from the spokesman of an organization which is notorious for denying workers their right of free choice and free association in the workplace.

Surprisingly, the strongest expressions of ugliness and hate from either event came from a hispanic speaker. Jamie Contreras of the SEIU called Beck’s rally a “shame” and announced that it represented “hatemongering and angry white people.”

Al Sharpton was not far behind, announcing that “they want to disgrace this day. And we’re not giving them this day. This is our day and we ain’t giving it away.” But it’s not and Dr. King would not agree. His message was for everyone and no one, regardless of skin color or political ideology can claim it exclusively for themselves.

47 years seems like a very short time for Dr. King’s dream to have soured and become so misunderstood. When the exploitative labor leaders and hatemongering activists stood up at Dunbar High School and declared that they wanted to “Reclaim the Dream” the sad truth was readily apparent that their goal was to take a dream which was meant for all people and deny it to some while perverting its intent to their own advantage.

If they really believed in Dr. King’s dream they would have been at the Lincoln Memorial with Glenn Beck, demanding an equal voice and speaking to an audience which their presence would have made truly representative of the dream which both groups professed so stridently and unconvincingly to believe in and which neither was really doing anything to advance.

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I’ll be a guest on the Gary Nolan radio show tomorrow (saturday) morning with guest host Mike Ferguson. I’ll be on at 9:40am (central). We’ll be talking about the RLC and the Liberty Movement. If you don’t get the show where you are there’s a webcast of it. You can tune in and listen from the link to the right.

Dave

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About a year ago they replaced the old airport in downtown Austin with a fancy mixed retail and residential development with a Best Buy and a Starbucks and eventually as it filled up it got a new barbeque restaurant called Mr. Bones, which opened about two months ago. I drive by it almost every day, but yesterday I thought I’d give it a try.

I was predisposed to view the barbeque favorably, because I assume that Mr. Bones is the revival of the business of the same name which was at the heart of a notorious lawsuit against the city of Austin about a decade ago for the ridiculous action of terminating a contract with a black restauranteur because he refused to register as a minority owned business in order to fulfill their racial quotas. Their original location in north Austin has also had some good reviews, so I had high hopes.

Mr. Bones is located in a nice modern strip mall and the interior decor fits that setting, looking more like an upscale coffee shop than a barbeque joint. The menu is extensive with just about every meat you can imagine plus about a dozen sides. Atypically for a barbeque restaurant it has table service and waiters and waitresses dressed in traditional black and white outfits.

Now, I should have known something was not quite right when, after seating me, the hostess sat down at a corner table to eat a box of Popeye’s fried chicken. With the large selection of meats and sides on the menu, having the employees sending out for food from a chain restaurant doesn’t look good, and letting them eat it where customers can see is a huge managerial blunder which suggests that there may be problems in other areas of the restaurant as well.

As I usually do when trying out a new barbeque place I wanted to order a little bit of everything. Although they did list meat by the pound on the menu, when I tried to order that way my waitress told me that meat by the pound had to be ordered in half-pound amounts of more. Not wanting to kill myself and my wallet with about 4 pounds of meat, I instead decided to order a four meat plate. I wanted to try the beef ribs which a friend has spoken highly of, but they wouldn’t let me have beef ribs as one of the meats and they wouldn’t let me order just one on the side. Frustrating, and not great customer service, but I made the best of it.

From the selection of 8 meats I picked the pork butt, brisket, pork ribs and mutton. I eliminated sausage after being told that they just sell Meyer’s sausage from Elgin. It’s good sausage, but I’ve had it before. I also passed on the pork short ribs, which aren’t a good test of barbeque skill and the turkey and chicken which aren’t my favorites. And, of course, I wasn’t allowed to have beef ribs. My plate came with two sides and bread. I picked green beans and sweet potatoes.

My plate came out quickly and the meat servings were substantial. In volume it was worth the $11 price for the largest meat selection available. Normally I don’t like to put barbeque sauce on my meats, so I set it aside and dug right in and started trying things.

I started off with the brisket, which was not impressive. It had no smoke ring, which is a surprising failing in properly cooked barbeque, plus it was surprisingly tough and dry. Most disappointingly it had a kind of kerosene-like chemical aftertaste which I think might be the product of some sort of liquid smoke style flavoring.

I moved o to the pork butt, which seemed like an easy winner. It’s hard to make bad pork butt, but as far as I could tell the meat was roasted rather than really barbequed and it had no flavor to speak of – certainly not the nice smoked flavor I was hoping for. It still wasn’t bad, but it was disappointing. On the upside it didn’t have the weird chemical aftertaste.

Next I moved on to the pork ribs, which turned out to also be dry and quite tough, and they had been basted in something which again had that chemical aftertaste, but beyond that it seemed not to have imparted any identifiable flavor to the ribs. This aroused my suspicions and I decided to try the barbeque sauce. It was not impressive and clearly contributed to the problems with the meats. Although it was the right color, the sauce was thin and had very little flavor except for a slight sweetness. You can buy better sauce in the supermarket. Since this sauce was clearly used for basting the meats, it explains the general lack of flavor, though not the weird aftertaste.

The one meat I had left turned out to be the best. Although it was basted with the same weak sauce, the mutton breast was pretty good. Admittedly it’s hard to make bad mutton, but the same cooking process which dried out the ribs and the brisket apparently made the mutton less greasy than it often is, so the end result was not bad. It still had a bit of that weird chemical taste, but by then I was used to it.

Overall the meats were just not good. Inferior sauce used to baste them rather than a stronger sauce or a nice dry rub, in combination with rushed cooking with a lack of real smoke and the application of some sort of chemical smoke substitute, produced a very unsatisfactory result. Ironically the best item I ate at Mr. Bones was the green beans, which were loaded with ham and quite flavorful. But it’s not good when the best thing at a barbeque joint is one of the sides.

Worst of all, that chemical smoke flavor stayed with me well into the next day. It was like it had coated the inside of my mouth and it just wouldn’t go away. It left me feeling vaguely nauseous through several subsequent meals.

I suppose that to be fair I ought to try Mr. Bones at its main location, but after this experience I was not encouraged to do it any time soon. I also suspect that because the strip mall location is ill suited to smoking meat they probably cook the meat at their north location and bring it in to this restaurant to serve, but I can’t be sure. Regardless of where they’re cooking it, they have a lot to learn about making barbeque up to the standards we’ve come to expect from the legendary barbeque which is easy to find all over the Austin area.

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On Wednesday afternoon U.S. District Chief Judge Vaughn Walker struck down Proposition 8 and reopened the door to same sex marriage in California. The case will now be appealed to the 9th Circuit Court and likely go from there to the U.S. Supreme Court.

Proposition 8 was a controversial ballot initiative to ban gay marriage which passed last year after a high pressure media campaign which pitted hardcore religious conservatives and the Mormon church against civil libertarians and Hollywood activists. The result was to override a prior court ruling which had led to a brief period of legalization for gay marriage under which 18,000 couples were married. The status of those couples and of future gay marriages in California remains unresolved until judge Walker decides whether or not to put his ruling on hold pending appeal.

Walker’s ruling depends heavily on the Constitution and focuses on the issue of equal protection under the law, rejecting the idea that a majority vote can take rights away from minority groups. The ruling is a very positive step forward for liberty in California and a triumph for the rule of law over the rule of the mob.

Perhaps the most interesting part of this story is that despite the fact that many conservative groups backed Proposition 8, in many ways this ruling is a direct product of a strong libertarian streak in the Republican party which is only getting stronger going into November’s election.

Ronald Reagan who once commented that he believed that the “heart of conservatism is libertarianism” essentially planted a liberty bomb decades ago when he appointed judge Walker to his first position on the bench. Walker was then and remains an avowed constitutional libertarian and one of only three openly gay federal court judges.

Reagan certainly knew who Walker was politically and personally when he made that appointment and it’s an indication of what direction he wanted the party to go in. No influence lasts longer than a court appointment, so in making appointments like Walker Reagan left an important libertarian legacy which outlived him.

Other Republicans also played leading up to this ruling. It was President George H. W. Bush who elevated Walker to his current position on the federal bench. One of the two lead attorneys suing to strike down Proposition 8 was Theodore Olson who was a Reagan appointee as Assistant Attorney General and was Solicitor General in the George W. Bush administration. And Republican Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger was involved in the decision not to have state attorneys argue on behalf of the proposition.

Despite the posturing of the religious right and the reverence in which Ronald Reagan is held throughout the party, Republicans may have to face up to the fact that it was Republican leaders both currently in office and going back decades whose practice of covertly embracing libertarianism has lead directly to Proposition 8 being struck down.

Those pro-liberty values are embodied in the Constitution and were the founding principles of the Republican party. They are also the key to revitalizing the party by taking it back to the Reagan era and beyond, when principle mattered more than political power and Republicanism stood for less government and more liberty.

As this court ruling has shown us, it’s time for Republicans to come out of the closet, embrace Reagan, embrace his legacy and embrace the most fundamental principle of liberty — that all men are created equal and should be treated equally under the law.

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Under the provisions of the Digital Millennium Copyright Act passed in 1998 the Obama administration has shut down 73,000 blogs this week which were hosted on the Blogetery.com WordPress based hosting service. Initially the target was a small group of sites which were incolved in illegal file sharing, but ultimately a request was issued to BurstNet, the Blogetery.com’s hosting provider, to shut down the entire network of 73,000 blogs, most of which were engaged in no illegal activity, including harmless sites like Science Experiments for Kids and political sites like Tea and Politics.

This is the first use of the DMCA on this scale and it has frightening implications for the future. Under the act no warrant or any kind of due process is required because the government makes its request directly of the ISP involved and can penalize it administratively if it fails to comply. There is no standard for proof of illegal activity and the target of the action has no protection under the act. Many on both the right and left are concerned that this could lay the groundwork for the shut down of political sites critical of the administration, either arbitrarily or as part of some future campaign finance or net neutrality legislation.

It would be virtually impossible to run a site hosting service with any large membership without having some users engaging in some sort of questionable activity and it is unrealistic to expect a hosting company to police thousands of individual users. Critics of this action believe that first amendment rights and due process should be respected and that the burden of proof should fall on the government to identify and punish only the actual wrongdoers rather than shutting down thousands of innocent sites to get a few malefactors.

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It always fascinates me how politicians who are running for office find ways to warp and spin their records to appeal to every audience regardless of what their past positions and actions really were. Ambiguous votes on peculiar bills, supporting legislation they know will get voted down just to get it on their resume, authoring hopeless bills which die in committee to pander to a single-issue constituency, trading endorsements with other candidates which are full of qualifiers which can then be quoted out of context — all of these are fair game when it’s time to hoodwink the voters.

Here in the Austin area, Democrat Mark Strama (Texas House District 50) (see permanently sneering image to right) has been particularly adept at trading favors and distorting his record to try to strengthen his position in a district which is fairly evenly split between Democrat and Republican voters. To win and hold his seat he has had to make deals with Republicans and do everything he can to win Republican votes, but since he doesn’t actually vote much like a Republican that means misrepresenting the substance of his record on key issues. He’s clearly feeling the pressure from insurgent Republican Patrick McGuiness and the resulting mendacity is enlightening.

To win over Republican voters, Strama has made use of supportive quotes from Republican Representative Jim Keffer (Tecas House District 60) to look like a model of bipartisanship. In 2006 Keffer said that Strama “worked with Republicans to cut property taxes and keep our public schools open.” Yet further investigation demonstrates that Strama really didn’t do either of these things.

The truth is that Strama did not work on or support any major education initiatives and actually voted against property tax reductions twice in 2006. I can’t imagine how voting against property tax reductions can possibly be defined as working for them, except maybe by a definition broad enough to classify opposing legislation as an important collaborative role.

What Strama actually did do in 2006 was to support Keffer’s anti-business, job destroying and tax increasing franchise tax bill, one of the most negative pieces of legislation to come out of the Texas legislature this decade. This is a classic example of a corrupt bargain. Keffer needed votes from Strama and other Democrats to pass his tax increase, and as payback he provided Strama with a supportive quote to use in his next campaign to hoodwink fiscally conservative Republicans into voting for a tax and spend leftist.

So not only did Strama not cut property taxes as claimed (though the legislature did it without his support), he helped create a whole new strongly anti-busienss tax structure with the collaboration of big government Republicans. Yes, this was certainly bipartisan, but is being bipartisan a good thing when it sells out the best interests of the voters? Bad legislation doesn’t become good just because unprincipled legislators from both sides of the aisle support it.

Despite Strama’s attempts to draw Republican votes by presenting himself as a tax cutter, what we learn from the facts behind his claims is that he opposed tax cuts and supported tax increases, and what’s more that there are some Republicans like Jim Keffer who maybe ought to be looked at with a skeptical eye. Keffer not only authored the franchise tax, but also opposed the indian gaming bill which would have brought in substantial additional revenue for the state without imposing new taxes on the public. Someone with more authentic Republican principles ought to think about running against Keffer in the GOP primary in 2012.

For voters in Texas House District 50 the maxim “fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me” ought to apply. Strama may have fooled them through his tit-for-tat with Keffer and by misrepresenting his record in the past, but in this election Republicans and moderate but fiscally sensible Democrats ought to know better and vote for Republican challenger Patrick McGuinness instead.

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Paleocon and Southern Nationalist Thomas DiLorenzo has made a career of writing books with the objective of redefining the causes of the Civil War and rewriting the history of the Lincoln presidency. While he has been scoffed at by mainstream historians, he has gathered a following among deluded quasi-libertarians through his association with the Von Mises Institute and Lew Rockwell's peculiar brand of post-libertarian, anti-government extremism.

In honor of Independence Day a few years ago, DiLorenzo came up with an article which ably demonstrates the kind of distorted reasoning and poor research he has used to suck willing dupes through the looking glass into his bizarre alternate history of America. In this article DiLorenzo makes an argument that secession was always intended to be allowed under the Constitution on the basis of a few selected comments from Thomas Jefferson.

The foundational fallacy in his argument is the mere act of looking to Jefferson as an expert on the Constitution. Not only was Jefferson opposed to the Constitution, but he was not at the Constitutional Convention and was in France throughout the convention and for much of the ratification process. DiLorenzo realizes that Jefferson is highly regarded by libertarians and that he was critical of the Constitution in some areas, and just assumes that people will not notice that his appeal to authority is to an authority with little or no connection to the subject matter he is addressing.

The members of the paleocon choir to which DiLorenzo preaches make a very big show of exalting the Constitution and demanding that it be observed and adhered to in every possible particular. But I find it hard to believe that even they can buy into his argument that Jefferson had anything more than a tenuous connection to the Constitution or held it in the same regard which they do.

The actual author of the Constitution, as much as it had one, was Jefferson's friend James Madison, who was at the convention and probably understood the document it produced better than any of his contemporaries. But even Madison, who was the Constitution's greatest champion, did not have the kind of sacramental regard for it which modern paleocons have developed.

One of the peculiarities of the mindset of DiLorenzo and his followers is that they have become convinced that the Constitution, which was specifically written to turn a loose confederation of unorganized states into a permanent and binding union, somehow sanctions and justifies the Civil War and even modern secessionism. It is particularly ironic that they claim to regard the Constitution so highly and yet understand its content and purposes so poorly.

That DiLorenzo should choose to selectively ignore Madison's thoughts on the Constitution is convenient, self-serving and deceptive and characteristic of his approach to history where only those sources which agree with his politicized vision of the past are given an airing. It's a particularly shameful deception, because Madison wrote at length on secessionism and the Constitution in the early 1830s.

Madison outlived Jefferson and lasted long enough to see the first major crisis in the ongoing struggle which eventually led to the Civil War, the Nullification Crisis. As the Nullifiers began talking about secession and breaking up the union, people wrote to Madison and asked for his opinion on whether it was legitimate for states to leave the union or for a minority of states to dissolve the union and he was quite willing to share his expertise.

In a letter on this subject to Senator Daniel Webster in 1833, Madison wrote:

"It is fortunate when disputed theories can be decided by undisputed facts: and here the undisputed fact is, that the Constitution was made by the people, but as imbodied into the several States who were parties to it, and therefore made by the States in their highest authoritative capacity. they might, by the same authority and by the same process, have converted the Confederacy into a mere league or treaty, or continued it with enlarged or abridged powers, or have imbodied the people of their respective States into one people, nation or sovereignty; or as they did, by a mixed form, make them one people, nation or sovereignty for certain purposes, and not for others.

"The Constitution of the United States being established by a competent authority — by that of the sovereign people of the several States who were parties to it — it remains only to inquire what the Constitution is; and here it speaks for itself. It organizes the government into the usual legislative, executive and judiciary departments; invests it with specific powers, leaving others to the parties to the Constitution. It makes the government, like other governments, to operate directly on the people; places at its command the needful physical means of executing its powers; and finally proclaims its supremacy, and that of the laws made in pursuance of it, of the Constitutions and Laws of the States, the powers of the Government being exercised, as in other elective and responsible Governments, under the control of its constituents, the people and the legislatures of the States, and subject to the revolutionary rights of the people, in extreme cases.&quot

Here we see Madison arguing the supremacy of the Constitution and the fact that it was created as an alternative to various other forms of less centralized government and structured in such a way that the people would have a voice at multiple levels and would not need to secede from the union it had created.
In another letter to journalist and diplomat Nicholas Trist on the same subject in 1833, Madison wrote:

"The essential difference between a free Government and Governments not free, is that the former is founded in compact, the parties to which are mutually and equally bound by it. Neither of them therefore can have a greater fight to break off from the bargain, than the other or others have to hold them to it. And certainly there is nothing in the Virginia resolutions of –98, adverse to this principle, which is that of common sense and common justice. The fallacy which draws a different conclusion from them lies in confounding a single party, with the parties to the Constitutional compact of the United States. The latter having made the compact may do what they will with it. The former as one only of the parties, owes fidelity to it, till released by consent, or absolved by an intolerable abuse of the power created."

Here Madison states unambiguously that states cannot leave the union without the consent of the other states once they have all agreed to what is essentially a contract. In the same way that the parties to a commercial contract cannot dissolve that agreement unilaterally the states cannot act individually or as groups to break up the union and negate the Constitution.

Madison goes on to actually cite Jefferson himself, taking note of one of Jeffersons opinions which DiLorenzo has chosen to ignore in his own writing on the subject.

"It is remarkable how closely the nullifiers who make the name of Mr. Jefferson the pedestal for their colossal heresy, shut their eyes and lips, whenever his authority is ever so clearly and emphatically against them. You have noticed what he says in his letters to Monroe & Carrington (Pages 43 & 203, vol. 2,1) with respect to the powers of the old Congress to coerce delinquent States, and his reasons for preferring for the purpose a naval to a military force; and moreover that it was not necessary to find a right to coerce in the Federal Articles, that being inherent in the nature of a compact. It is high time that the claim to secede at will should be put down by the public opinion; and I shall be glad to see the task commenced by one who understands the subject."

There's nothing equivocal about Madison's position or his exhortation to Trist to use his very sharp pen to disabuse the nullifiers of their dangerous and unconstitutional notions.  What Madison makes clear is that the Constitution created the union specifically to bind the states together and the union is the embodiment of the Constitution

To secede or to overthrow the union is to overthrow the Constitution, because it binds the states and the people together under a system of government which should protect the rights of minorities and individuals and should make secession unnecessary, except in the most extreme of circumstances where a true second revolution is called for.

Yet in 1833 or in 1865 or today when the issue has been raised again, no one has come forward with a cause of sufficient merit to justify the dissolution of the union and the shredding of the Constitution. It is certain that slavery is not such a cause, nor is dissatisfaction with the Federal Reserve or with Obamacare.  The claim from DiLorenzo and his neo-secessionist followers that secession is somehow constitutional or even a defense of the Constitution is utterly delusional and southerner and slave owner though he was, Mr. Madison certainly would not have approved.

This article previously appeared on Blogcritics Magazine in a somewhat different form.

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If you’ve ever wondered who the idiots are in the Republican Party — you know, the folks who lost us the presidency and both houses of Congress — you need look no further than the catalog of prominent pundits and politicians now calling for the resignation of Michael Steele.

They’re not calling on Steele to resign because of inefficient fundraising or staff members expense accounting strip club trips. They’re after Steele for making a clear and sensible statement on the war in Afghanistan which echoes what many Republicans of the more sensible variety have been saying for years.

Steele was at a fundraiser in Connecticut and in a rambling speech he made a statement which was so clear that he had obviously been thinking about it a great deal — as have many of us for some time — pointing out that the war in Afghanistan was never a good idea, a basic truth which applies to the everyone who pushed for that war, even if he couches it as a criticism of Obama.

“This was a war of Obama’s choosing. This is not something the United States had actively prosecuted or wanted to engage in…Well, if he’s such a student of history, has he not understood that you know that’s the one thing you don’t do is engage in a land war in Afghanistan, because everyone who has tried over a thousand years of history, has failed. And there are reasons for that. There are other ways to engage in Afghanistan that do not…”

Much of the rest is inaudible, but he does go on to talk about how the ongoing war gives Democrats the opportunity to continue to blame Bush and transfer some of that blame to Republican candidates despite the fact that the war is now very much Obama’s war. These are sensible and perceptive observations of the kind I’m glad to see coming from the party’s leader.

Not everyone shared my happy response…

If you thought the part of the Republican party which favored mindless war and endless nation building was dead and discredited, the cries for his resignation in response to Steele’s comments proves that they still have a lot to say even if fewer and fewer Republicans are listening to them.

In his response, arch-neocon (and I only use that term when it is accurate) William Kristol quotes from DNC Chairman Tim Kaine, agreeing that Steele is at odds with “about 100 percent of the Republican Party.” Well, Kristol is as wrong about this as he was about invading Afghanistan in the first place. Kristol goes on to call Steele unpatriotic and an embarrassment, but some of us have been embarrassed by Kristol and his irresponsible promotion of unnecessary wars which put us a trillion dollars in debt. Perhaps he should go back and rejoin the Democrats since they have so much in common.

In a similar vein, Erik Erikson who has whored himself to CNN as their token blogging psychopath, declares that Steele has “lost all moral authority to lead the GOP.” Because apparently morality comes from rounding out a full decade of incredibly expensive and utterly pointless warmaking.

Liz Cheney joined the chorus by defending her father’s disastrous legacy, callng Steele’s comments “deeply disappointing and wrong.” Because nothing could be more right than spending untold money and lives in an effort which is utterly misdirected under rules of engagement which make success impossible.

Surprisingly, other Republican pundits have taken issue with Steele’s assigning of blame for the continuation of the war to President Obama, but the truth is that Obama promised to get us out of the war and has instead dragged the war out and done it under restrictions which make a useful resolution impossible. In fact, Steele has hit on a valid campaign issue which smart Republicans could make use of as November approaches.

Perhaps most important — and the clearest indication that Steele has thought about this question — is his final hard to hear comment about other means of engagement in Afghanistan. This is something which has been clear to sensible observers of the war of all political persuasions since the beginning of the conflict. An invasion and occupation was the wrong way to approach Afghanistan and the wrong way to exact retribution for the attack on the World Trade Center. It has left us fighting people who were not involved in the attack on us, while accomplishing little against the actual villains and wasting lives and money. From the beginning we should have taken a different approach with a quick and overwhelming strike against bin Laden himself which was resolved quickly either by catching him, killing him or declaring it not to be worth the effort. Punishing evildoers (in Bush’s words) is important, but there have to be limits and somewhere we lost track of that fundamentally Republican pragmatism. Steele seems to have rediscovered it.

Unfortunately, Steele has issued a statement to some degree countering his clearly well considered comments which were caught on video. I’d certainly prefer that he stuck by his guns, but caving in to critics is one of his major character flaws. Nonetheless he deserves some credit for saying publicly what so many of us have known since the war turned from efficient manhunt to endless and unproductive occupation. Perhaps raising this issue will help out the many Republican candidates who have been questioning our role in Afghanistan and legitimize their concerns.

Whatever else comes of it, one positive outcome is that the issue has become a kind of litmus test for who the biggest idiots in the Republican Party are. Michael Steele’s comments are absolutely true and sensible and the people who are attacking him are being exposed as kind of dogmatic buffoons who got us into these senseless wars and who have and will continue to harm the Republican party by their actions.

It is not unpatriotic and it is not a disservice to the troops to question the decisions of the government or the wisdom of a war. The United States should not be a nation which engages in mindless militarism. Questioning how our military is used and making sure it is used wisely are the minimum standard of responsibility we should demand from our leaders. To waste lives profligately in a war which has deviated so far from its stated purpose is irresponsible and a betrayal of our best ideals and our best interests.

Republicans who are unclear on this issue need look back no farther than the days of Ronald Reagan. He deployed troops a number of times, but in all cases for short durations with specific objectives. Reagan did not engage in nation building or long term occupations. He saw things which needed to be done, used the military effectively to do them, and knew when the job was done. Reagan was a real patriot who had respect for the military and showed it by using them well and not wasting their efforts. Reagan would applaud Michael Steele for his good sense.

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As a delegate to the Texas Republican Party Convention, a Precinct Chair and someone who cares about the future of the Republican Party in Texas, I’ve become increasingly aware of how important it is for the party to have good leadership which listens to all Republicans and is open to new ideas, including being willing to work with pro-liberty grassroots activists like the Republican Liberty Caucus and the Tea Partiers.

The GOP has lost ground to Democrats in recent years because they have become highly organized by activists from outside the state who have brought in new methods and additional resources and are determined to make Texas into a blue state. Groups like MoveOn.org and Organizing for America are very active here now and they aren’t going to go away. To stop them we need Texas Republicans to be just as well organized and led. At the Republican State Convention on June 10th-12th in Dallas one of the most important activities will be the election of a new Republican Party Chairman.

Of the three candidates one is clearly the most effective advocate for both liberty issues and party reform, and with the problems our state faces and the substantial debt and legacy of mismanagement in the state party we need someone as State Republican Chairman who has the right experience and the right values to turn things around.

In my opinion and based on some basic research, the right choice for Chairman is Steve Munisteri. I’ve spoken with him at length and asked some very pointed questions and I’ve also spoken with others who are supporting him to get a real feel for his beliefs. I’ve done this because like any smart candidate he’s being very cagey in his public statements, but I’m here to tell you that even if he’s putting up a bland and generic front in his campaign, he really is the only real advocate for liberty, reform and fiscal responsibility in the race.

Steve Munisteri has worked on scores of political campaigns, including working for Ronald Reagan and Jack Kemp, and has experience as a grassroots organizer. He knows how to get good candidates elected and will use those skills to fight back against the highly organized effort to move Texas to the left orchestrated by powerful groups from outside the state. Steve was one of the founders of the Young Conservatives of Texas and knows about reaching out to younger voters and new activists so he can grow the party. He’s also a successful lawyer and businessman who is recently retired and ready to dedicate his skills and experience to making the Texas GOP more effective.

As for the other candidates, both are strongly anti-liberty and offer no new ideas and no passion for reform. Current Chairwoman Cathie Adams has been unable to balance the party’s books since she’s been in office and she is closely associated with the anti-liberty extremists of Eagle Forum. Tom Mechler is a hardcore anti-reform conservative who commented at a recent event that he opposes a policy of "inclusiveness" for the party in a context which showed clear hostility to liberty activists and the tea party movement. That’s not a great attitude at a time when we need to grow the party and bring in new blood. In comparison,

Steve Munisteri has been seeking advice from grassroots activists and from the Ron Paul organization. Penny Langford Freeman from Congressman Paul’s staff confirms that "Steve called the office to ask legislative questions and to discuss policy. He is also using some of the old Paul campaign team for his race."

I’m not going to pretend that he’s a hardcore libertarian or the candidate I would put in office if I could pick anyone in the state and just give them the job, but of the three candidates he is clearly the most pro-liberty and the most qualified to do the job well. Most importantly Steve has an open mind and a willingness to work with all elements of the party and that means he won’t stand in the way of those of us who are working to return the party and the nation to the core values of constitutionally limited government and individual liberty.

If you want to help out the Munisteri campaign at the convention, contact Liz Young. For more information see Steve Munisteri’s website at www.stevemunisteri.com. Even if you aren’t a convention delegate you should keep an eye on this election and encourage delegates from your area to vote for Steve Munisteri.

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With the inevitability of the crash at the end of the course of a runaway train, the disastrous political career of former Republican Party of Florida Chairman Jim Greer came to its inevitable and embarrassing conclusion today when he was arrested at his home and booked at the Seminole County Jail, having been indicted by a statewide grand jury with six felonies, including fraud, money laundering and four counts of grand theft.

Greer resigned late last year as Chairman of the Republican Party of Florida as the result of controversy over his extravagant spending, travel and use of party credit cards and because of his misuse of the powers of his office in attempting to influence the Florida Senate race in favor of Governor Charlie Crist.

Crist also became notorious for his attempts to purge opponents from the party hierarchy, including elected party officers who were members of the Republican Liberty Caucus and other grassroots reform groups. Greer came gained negative nationwide attention because of his open hostility towards tea party groups and libertarians within the Republican Party and his witch hunt against anyone diverging from a strict ideological loyalty to the McCain campaign and the party establishment.

The indictments against Greer are based on his management of the fundraising company Victory Strategies LLC, in which he was the controlling partner. Greer has been accused of transferring all party fundraising to his company without authorization from the Executive Committee, while keeping that action secret from them. He is also accused of misdirecting additional existing party funds to his company without approval.

At a noon press conference, State Prosecutor William Shepherd said that Greer took at least $100,000 from the Republican Party for his personal expenses and that Victory Strategies was a shell company created primarily to divert money illegally to Greer.

Greer has been a close political ally of Governor Crist and this indictment is likely to further weaken Crist’s efforts agains the insurgent senatorial campaign of former House Speaker Marco Rubio going into the August 24th primary.

The Greer indictment leaves a lot of Republicans in Florida unsurprised and should be a warning to party officials in other states that this kind of all-to-common misuse of funds and efforts at personal enrichment at party expense is not the gray area many assume it to be and is, in fact, criminal and could land you in a cell with someone like Jim Greer.

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