September 11, 2012

Today I touch the memory of ordinary lives and extraordinary bravery. It's a day for honoring those who serve my community, my state, my nation.

It's time to visit again the aching grief, to embrace my rage and to shape anger into vigilance that guards my freedoms.

Whatever else I thought I needed to say can wait until tomorrow.

Today, I remember.

'More American Reserve Power'

This political season seems a good time to scroll back to a vintage ad first depicted on KintlaLake Blog here almost 18 months ago.

The year was 1919. The advertiser was Remington UMC, the campaign was "For Shooting Right" and post-war nationalism was the proud refrain. Remington placed a series of unapologetic ads in popular sportsmen's magazines like Outing and Forest and Stream.

The opening paragraphs of one of those ads -- "More American Reserve Power" -- should ring clear and true with every independent citizen-patriot:

"The strength that comes from the hills was never worth more in this country than it is today. Both to the man himself and to all about him.

"No poison-pollen of Old World imperialism gone to seed can contaminate -- nor any attempt of crowd-sickened collectivism undermine -- the priceless individualism of the American who truly keeps his feet on the earth."

I can't get those words out of my head. While the current campaign for President of the United States insults my intelligence and promises to assault individual liberties, strangely it's the century-old work of a Remington copywriter that resonates.

The passage offers me no solutions, of course -- it's merely rhetorical refuge from my frustration with a government gone mad and a People gone to sleep.

In a 1788 letter to Col. Edward Carrington, a Virginia Delegate, Thomas Jefferson wrote,

"The natural progress of things is for liberty to yield, and government to gain ground. As yet our spirits are free."

I see a nexus between the Remington ad and Jefferson's letter. Without expressing resignation, both acknowledge the enemies of Liberty, and both celebrate the wellspring of true independence:

"...the priceless individualism of the American who truly keeps his feet on the earth."

"...our spirits are free."

The key is this: Liberty resides in the individual spirit. Political winds may swirl around us and the burden of bureaucracy may bend our backs, but we remain Americans -- citizens of a nation, not subjects of its government.

'May posterity forget that ye were our countrymen'

"If ye love wealth better than liberty, the tranquility of servitude better than the animating contest of freedom, go home from us in peace. We ask not your counsels or arms. Crouch down and lick the hands which feed you. May your chains set lightly upon you, and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen!"

(Samuel Adams, whom Thomas Jefferson called "truly the Man of the Revolution," from a speech delivered at the Pennsylvania State House in Philadelphia on August 1, 1776)

'From my cold dead hands!'

It looks like I'm back for one more encore. I've been asked to serve a third term as your president.

I don't think anyone's done that before. But George Washington hung around until the Revolutionary War was won. Roosevelt hung around until World War II was won. Reagan hung around until the Cold War was won. If you want, I'll hang around until we win this one, too.

Do you feel that incredible energy in the air here today? I'll tell you what it is. It's the feeling you get when you're making a difference in the future of your country.

That was my goal -- to make a difference -- when I became your president two years ago. So I set some lofty goals. I said I'd do my part if you'd do yours. Now, just two years later, we've accomplished them all.

All except one.

First, I asked you to rebuild our NRA membership, and you have. Not by just a few thousand members, but by one million members.

Second, I asked you to rebuild our NRA war chest, and you have. I don't mean just in dollars, but in sense. The good sense of the NRA leadership you see here today. Your leaders are qualified, competent, unified, and believe me, fearless.

Third, I wanted to bring the NRA back to the table of mainstream political debate, and we have. You saw Wayne on that tape. I'd say we're not just at the table.

We're eating their lunch.

But more than anything else, I asked you to believe in each other again. To believe that gun ownership is as wholesome as it is constitutional. To believe that an NRA sticker on your windshield is a sign of pride. To believe that a kid who wants to plink at tin cans is not a kid gone wrong. To believe that the great flame of freedom our founding fathers ignited has not grown cold.

I declare that mission accomplished! I look around this great hall and I see the fire is in your eyes, the pride is in your hearts, and the commitment is here in your presence today. The NRA is baaaaaack...

All of which spells very serious trouble for a man named Gore.

Didja see that Gore rally in D.C. last weekend? One of the marchers said, "The hands that rock the cradle rule this nation." And I thought, No madam, the hands that rock the cradle rule our families and governments and corporations. The hands that wrote the Constitution rule this nation.

All the anti-gun celebs came out to march. Tipper Gore was there, Rosie O'Donnell was there (I like to call her Tokyo Rosie). A fine actress, Susan Sarandon, was there and shouted with great diplomacy and stateswomanship, "We Moms are really pissed off!"

I must ask, pissed off about what? If it's crime, why aren't you pissed off at the failure of this Administration to prosecute gun-toting criminals?

If it's accidents, why aren't you pissed off at swimming pool owners, or stairway owners, or pickup owners?

Why aren't you pissed off that gun accident prevention programs aren't in every elementary classroom in America?

As a matter of fact, why aren't you pissed off at parents who're oblivious that their kids are building bombs in their bedrooms?

Why aren't you pissed off that Mr. Gore wants registration and licensing instead of parenting and prosecution?

Which leads me to that one mission left undone: Winning in November. That's why I'm staying on for a third tour of duty.

Today I challenge you to find your third term, and serve it. Find your extra mile, and walk it.

Only you know what you can do between now and that decisive November day to turn the tide of these elections in favor of freedom. I ask you to find it and fulfill it.

Go the extra distance, find that extra member, write the extra check, knock on one more door, work one more hour, make one more call, convince one more friend, turn the other cheek if you must, but find your third term and serve it.

That's your part to play. What more important role can there be...than to bequeath our freedom to the next generation as pure and intact as it was given to us. As Mr. Lincoln commanded: "With firmness in the right, as God gives us to see the right, let us finish the work we are in...and then we shall save our country."

Each of us in his own way, plus all of us in our collective millions, must give that extra measure that freedom demands of us.

Let me tell you what I mean. Until a few hours ago I was finishing my 80th film in Vancouver, Canada. I was there because I love my craft and I love to feed my family.

So you'll forgive me if I'm a little tired. I flew all night, across a continent and three time zones, to be here with you. I'm here because I love my country and I love this freedom.

But it was just the most recent flight in thousands of flights, the most recent mile on thousands of roads I've travelled in my ten years of active service to this great Association. It's been a helluva ride.

I remember a decade ago at my first annual meeting in St. Louis. After my banquet remarks to a packed house, they presented me with a very special gift. It was a splendid hand-crafted musket.

I admit I was overcome by the power of its simple symbolism. I looked at that musket and I thought of all of the lives given for that freedom. I thought of all of the lives saved with that freedom. It dawned on me that the doorway to all freedoms is framed by muskets.

So I lifted that musket over my head for all to see. And as flashbulbs popped around the room, my heart and a few tears swelled up, and I uttered five unscripted words. When I did, that room exploded in sustained applause and hoots and shouts that seemed to last forever.

In that moment, I bonded with this great Association. And in thousands of moments since, I've been asked to repeat those five words in airports and hotels and rallies and speeches across this land.

In your own way, you have already heard them. That's why you're here.

Every time our country stands in the path of danger, an instinct seems to summon her finest first -- those who truly understand her. When freedom shivers in the cold shadow of true peril, it's always the patriots who first hear the call. When loss of liberty is looming, as it is now, the siren sounds first in the hearts of freedom's vanguard. The smoke in the air of our Concord Bridges and Pearl Harbors is always smelled first by the farmers, who come from their simple homes to find the fire, and fight.

Because they know that sacred stuff resides in that wooden stock and blued steel, something that gives the most common man the most uncommon of freedoms. When ordinary hands can possess such an extraordinary instrument, that symbolizes the full measure of human dignity and liberty.

That's why those five words issue an irresistible call to us all, and we muster.

So as we set out this year to defeat the divisive forces that would take freedom away, I want to say those words again for everyone within the sound of my voice to hear and to heed, and especially for you, Mr. Gore:

From my cold dead hands!

(National Rifle Association President Charlton Heston, in opening remarks delivered at the NRA Annual Meeting on May 20, 2000)

Flagg Day

James Montgomery Flagg's iconic image of Uncle Sam turned 96 years old yesterday.

Although most of us know the stern, finger-pointing Uncle Sam from the 1917 U.S. Army recruiting poster, he first appeared on the cover of Leslie's Weekly magazine over the caption, "What Are You Doing for Preparedness?"

Among the artist's other patriotic characters was the distaff Columbia. Flagg's Uncle Sam personified American power, authority and resolve, both at home and abroad, while his Columbia evoked Liberty, industry, unity, complacency -- human qualities, human aspirations, human failings.


In short, Uncle Sam embodied the U.S. government and everything it represents. Columbia stood for the People.

Of Flagg's many propaganda illustrations, perhaps my favorite is a menacing-looking Uncle Sam holding a pistol, from a 1917 Leslie's cover. It was captioned, "Get Off That Throne!"


I'll close with one more American propaganda image from the World War I years. This one was created not by James Montgomery Flagg but by renowned illustrator J.C. Leyendecker, a poster promoting the Boy Scouts of America's 1917 Liberty Loan Campaign.

Our Lives, Our Fortunes, & Our Sacred Honor

IN CONGRESS, JULY 4, 1776
The unanimous Declaration of
the thirteen united States of America

When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature's God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, — That whenever any Form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the Right of the People to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their Safety and Happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate that Governments long established should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly all experience hath shewn that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design to reduce them under absolute Despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such Government, and to provide new Guards for their future security. — Such has been the patient sufferance of these Colonies; and such is now the necessity which constrains them to alter their former Systems of Government. The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries and usurpations, all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these States. To prove this, let Facts be submitted to a candid world.

He has refused his Assent to Laws, the most wholesome and necessary for the public good.

He has forbidden his Governors to pass Laws of immediate and pressing importance, unless suspended in their operation till his Assent should be obtained; and when so suspended, he has utterly neglected to attend to them.

He has refused to pass other Laws for the accommodation of large districts of people, unless those people would relinquish the right of Representation in the Legislature, a right inestimable to them and formidable to tyrants only.

He has called together legislative bodies at places unusual, uncomfortable, and distant from the depository of their Public Records, for the sole purpose of fatiguing them into compliance with his measures.

He has dissolved Representative Houses repeatedly, for opposing with manly firmness his invasions on the rights of the people.

He has refused for a long time, after such dissolutions, to cause others to be elected, whereby the Legislative Powers, incapable of Annihilation, have returned to the People at large for their exercise; the State remaining in the mean time exposed to all the dangers of invasion from without, and convulsions within.

He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these States; for that purpose obstructing the Laws for Naturalization of Foreigners; refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new Appropriations of Lands.

He has obstructed the Administration of Justice by refusing his Assent to Laws for establishing Judiciary Powers.

He has made Judges dependent on his Will alone for the tenure of their offices, and the amount and payment of their salaries.

He has erected a multitude of New Offices, and sent hither swarms of Officers to harass our people and eat out their substance.

He has kept among us, in times of peace, Standing Armies without the Consent of our legislatures.

He has affected to render the Military independent of and superior to the Civil Power.

He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitution, and unacknowledged by our laws; giving his Assent to their Acts of pretended Legislation:

For quartering large bodies of armed troops among us:

For protecting them, by a mock Trial from punishment for any Murders which they should commit on the Inhabitants of these States:

For cutting off our Trade with all parts of the world:

For imposing Taxes on us without our Consent:

For depriving us in many cases, of the benefit of Trial by Jury:

For transporting us beyond Seas to be tried for pretended offences:

For abolishing the free System of English Laws in a neighbouring Province, establishing therein an Arbitrary government, and enlarging its Boundaries so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these Colonies

For taking away our Charters, abolishing our most valuable Laws and altering fundamentally the Forms of our Governments:

For suspending our own Legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever.

He has abdicated Government here, by declaring us out of his Protection and waging War against us.

He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people.

He is at this time transporting large Armies of foreign Mercenaries to compleat the works of death, desolation, and tyranny, already begun with circumstances of Cruelty & Perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the Head of a civilized nation.

He has constrained our fellow Citizens taken Captive on the high Seas to bear Arms against their Country, to become the executioners of their friends and Brethren, or to fall themselves by their Hands.

He has excited domestic insurrections amongst us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers, the merciless Indian Savages whose known rule of warfare, is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes and conditions.

In every stage of these Oppressions We have Petitioned for Redress in the most humble terms: Our repeated Petitions have been answered only by repeated injury. A Prince, whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be the ruler of a free people.

Nor have We been wanting in attentions to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here. We have appealed to their native justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations, which would inevitably interrupt our connections and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must, therefore, acquiesce in the necessity, which denounces our Separation, and hold them, as we hold the rest of mankind, Enemies in War, in Peace Friends.

We, therefore, the Representatives of the united States of America, in General Congress, Assembled, appealing to the Supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do, in the Name, and by Authority of the good People of these Colonies, solemnly publish and declare, That these united Colonies are, and of Right ought to be Free and Independent States, that they are Absolved from all Allegiance to the British Crown, and that all political connection between them and the State of Great Britain, is and ought to be totally dissolved; and that as Free and Independent States, they have full Power to levy War, conclude Peace, contract Alliances, establish Commerce, and to do all other Acts and Things which Independent States may of right do. — And for the support of this Declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of Divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our Lives, our Fortunes, and our sacred Honor.

Quote of the week

"['God Bless the U.S.A.'] is a country song. This is Brooklyn. This is not the country."

(Dina Rosado, president of the PTA for NYC P.S. 90, voicing her disapproval of the school's kindergarten class waving American flags and singing the Lee Greenwood classic near the school on Monday. A week earlier P.S. 90's principal, Gina Hawkins, barred the five-year-olds from performing the piece at their graduation ceremony, judging its lyrics "too adult" and offensive to "some people and cultures.")

On Decoration Day, Ingersoll

"These heroes are dead. They died for liberty. They died for us. They are at rest. They sleep in the land they made free under the flag they rendered stainless, under the solid pines, the sad hemlocks, the tearful willows, the embracing vines. They sleep beneath the shadows of the clouds, careless alike of sunshine or storm, each in a windowless palace of rest. Earth may run red with other wars; they are at peace. In the midst of battle, in the roar of conflict, they found the serenity of death. I have one sentiment for the soldier, living and dead. Cheers for the living, and tears for the dead."

(From speaker's notes attributed to Robert Green Ingersoll, said to have been delivered in his hometown of Dresden, New York on what we know now as Memorial Day, 1866. Mrs. KintlaLake gifted me with Ingersoll's words this morning.)

Remembrance

If you are able,
save them a place
inside of you
and save one backward glance
when you are leaving

for the places they can no longer go.

Be not ashamed to say
you loved them
though you may
or may not have always.

Take what they have left
and what they have taught you
with their dying
and keep it with your own.

And in that time
when men decide and feel safe
to call the war insane
take one moment to embrace
those gentle heroes
you left behind.

(Written on 1 January 1970 by U.S. Army Maj. Michael D. O'Donnell, a native of Columbus, Ohio. Maj. O'Donnell was listed as MIA on 24 March 1970 at Dak To, Vietnam, declared KIA on 7 February 1978.)

First words to the new soldier

I've collected hundreds of military manuals, in pdf form, over the last several years. It often strikes me how changes in mission and culture, beyond tactics and technology, have shaped their messages.

For example, the 2003 edition of The Soldier's Guide begins:

The Soldier is the ultimate guardian of America's freedom. In over 120 countries around the world, Soldiers like you are protecting our Nation's freedom and working to provide a better life for oppressed or impoverished peoples. It is no accident our Army succeeds everywhere we are called to serve -- the loyalty and selfless service of the American Soldier guarantee it.

Today our Army is fighting directly for the American people. This global war on terrorism is about our future. It's about ensuring our children and grandchildren enjoy the same liberties we cherish. While difficult tasks remain, victory is certain. The efforts and sacrifices of the American Soldier will assure it.

Compare that to the opening paragraph of the 1941 edition of the Soldier's Handbook:

You are now a member of the Army of the United States. That Army is made up of free citizens chosen from among a free people. The American people of their own will, and through the men they have elected to represent them in Congress, have determined that the free institutions of this country will continue to exist. They have declared that, if necessary, we will defend our right to live in our own American way and continue to enjoy the benefits and privileges which are granted to the citizens of no other nation. It is upon you, and the many thousands of your comrades now in the military service, that our country has placed its confident faith that this defense will succeed should it ever be challenged.

Notice that the more current version of the basic field manual alludes to (so-called) "nation building" and carries an unmistakably political tone. Sixty years earlier, it was all about defending the homeland.

This independent citizen-patriot, for one, favors the 1941 version.

May 9, 1754

On this date 258 years ago, the iconic Join, or Die. political cartoon, conceived (and perhaps drawn) by Benjamin Franklin, was published for the first time. It appeared in Franklin's Pennsylvania Gazette.

The Choice

From early childhood, words attributed to Patrick Henry were imprinted both in my head and on my heart:

"Give me Liberty, or Give me Death!"

Such expressions of commitment and courage are anathema to today's youth and, sadly, to the masses that choose entitlements over independence. These citizens dismiss the wisdom of our Founding Fathers, favoring instead the likes of Bill Maher:

"Well, sometimes you do need a nanny state -- that old thing about, 'the Constitution isn't a suicide pact.' I mean, at what point does the environment get so bad that we -- that the government says, 'Yes, we're going to have to infringe on your freedom a little'?

"These people don't want any infringing on freedom. That, to me, is a suicide pact."

Patrick Henry, I think, would have been proud to count himself among "these people" so maligned by the patronizing Maher.

I know I am. Like Henry, I choose Liberty.

I'll wrap with a video released by Free Market America on Earth Day 2012, which was observed last Sunday. The video makes a powerful statement about how our government has squashed economic Liberty and, in the process, sabotaged our future.

In truth, fact

"It seems to me that the federal government just doesn't want to know who is here illegally and who's not."

(Chief Justice John G. Roberts of the Supreme Court of the United States, speaking to U.S. Solicitor General Donald B. Verrilli during today's oral arguments over Arizona's controversial immigration law. The federal government, represented by Verrilli, wants to prevent Arizona from requiring that state law-enforcement officials determine the immigration status of anyone they stop if an officer has reason to suspect that a person may be in the U.S. illegally.)

'The Heritage Guide to the Constitution'

It's part of our duty as citizens, in my opinion, to educate ourselves about the Constitution of the United States -- in fact, we should know it through-and-through. Just today I discovered an excellent tool for the task: The Heritage Guide to the Constitution.

The Guide presents the complete text of the Constitution, of course, hot-linked to explanatory notes and illuminating essays. I especially like the Teacher's Companion to the Guide, each section of which can be saved as a pdf.

It's fair to point out that the The Heritage Foundation, which publishes the Guide, is a think tank devoted to formulating and promoting "conservative public policies based on the principles of free enterprise, limited government, individual freedom, traditional American values, and a strong national defense."

I've added a permanent link to The Heritage Guide to the Constitution in the right-hand column of KintlaLake Blog.

It bears repeating

"I hold it that a little rebellion now and then is a good thing, and as necessary in the political world as storms in the physical. Unsuccessful rebellions, indeed, generally establish the encroachments on the rights of the people which have produced them. An observation of this truth should render honest republican governors so mild in their punishment of rebellions as not to discourage them too much. It is a medicine necessary for the sound health of government." (Thomas Jefferson, 1787)

"Our defense is in the preservation of the spirit which prizes liberty as the heritage of all men, in all lands, everywhere. Destroy this spirit, and you have planted the seeds of despotism around your own doors. Familiarize yourselves with the chains of bondage and you are preparing your own limbs to wear them. Accustomed to trample on the rights of those around you, you have lost the genius of your own independence, and become the fit subjects of the first cunning tyrant who rises." (Abraham Lincoln, 1858)

"The most important thing in this world is liberty. More important than food or clothes -- more important than gold or houses or lands -- more important than art or science -- more important than all religions, is the liberty of man." (Robert Green Ingersoll, 1887)

"I would rather be exposed to the inconveniences attending too much liberty than to those attending too small a degree of it." (Thomas Jefferson, 1791)

"The balance of power is the scale of peace. The same balance would be preserved were all the world destitute of arms, for all would be alike; but since some will not, others dare not lay them aside. And while a single nation refuses to lay them down, it is proper that all should keep them up. Horrid mischief would ensue were one half the world deprived of the use of them; for while avarice and ambition have a place in the heart of man, the weak will become a prey to the strong." (attributed to Thomas Paine, 1775)

"Before a standing army can rule, the people must be disarmed, as they are in almost every kingdom in Europe." (Noah Webster, 1787)

"The most foolish mistake we could possibly make would be to allow the subject races to possess arms. History shows that all conquerors who have allowed their subject races to carry arms have prepared their own downfall by so doing." (Adolf Hitler, 1942)

"The right of citizens to bear arms is just one more guarantee against arbitrary government, one more safeguard against the tyranny which now appears remote in America, but which historically has proved to be always possible." (Hubert Humphrey, 1960)

"Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety." (Benjamin Franklin, 1759)

April 6, 1320

The Declaration of Arbroath was penned 692 years ago today. This declaration, in the form of a letter to Pope John XXII, affirmed Scotland as independent and sovereign, asserting its right to respond by force-of-arms to unjust attack. Alba gu bràth!

Using an Etch A Sketch as a national-security tool

An open mic caught Pres. Barack Obama and current Russian Pres. Dmitri Medvedev wrapping up their discussion today about Russia's demand that the U.S. abandon its plans for a missile-defense shield.

"This is my last election," Pres. Obama said. "After my election I have more flexibility."

"I understand," Pres Medvedev said. "I will transmit this information to Vladimir" (referring to incoming Russian Pres. Putin).

It's a window into classic lame-duck politics, what virtually every elected official does without the burden of another campaign.

But here, on this subject and with these stakes, it's scary as hell.

Watch the video of today's unguarded moment (below) and ask yourself: How many times has this president has offered similar assurances, abroad and at home, and to whom?

Meet the majority

Earlier today I asserted that those of us who treasure our Liberty are "in the minority." Now permit me, please, to introduce a proud representative of the majority.

When Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney held an event yesterday at Bradley University in Peoria, Illinois, a young woman (reportedly a Bradley student) took the microphone:

"So you're all for like, yay, freedom, and all this stuff. And yay, like pursuit of happiness. You know what would make me happy? Free birth control."

Fresh from Occupy, here we have a card-carrying member of the entitled masses, a citizen exercising her First Amendment rights by deriding the Declaration of Independence. Nice.

How did Romney respond?

"Let me tell you something -- if you're looking for free stuff you don't have to pay for? Vote for the other guy, that's what he's all about, okay? That's not what I'm about."

In principle it's a fine comeback, all things considered. It may well go a long way toward helping Romney win primary voters.

I predict, however, that neither this nor any other GOP candidate will have the stones to strike such a libertarian pose should he land his party's nomination. See, we're getting the campaign we deserve, too.

A 'Super' decision

So-called "Super Tuesday," including Ohio's primary, is less than 72 hours away. Since I won't be voting to give Pres. Barack Obama a second term -- not on Tuesday and not in November -- I've been paying close attention to what the Republican Party has to offer.

Not much, really.

But because I oppose Obama, I guess I'm supposed to choose among Mitt Romney, Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum. Such conventional wisdom presents me with (respectively) an unprincipled dolt with deep pockets, a nutty professor who rises in the polls only when he quarrels with those who buy their ink by the barrel, and a Benedictine acolyte who campaigns as if Jesus is the answer to our economic woes.

Did you ever have to make up your mind?
Pick up on one and leave the other behind
It's not often easy, and not often kind
Did you ever have to make up your mind? *

At a time when government is both broken and broke, every one of those candidates would expand it. Gingrich's idea-a-minute approach to governing, for example, spends money faster than China could lend it to us. Romney doesn't seem to have an approach at all, so he'd choose "all of the above" to avoid offending anyone. And Santorum, the guy who's hailed by neo-cons as the only true conservative in the race, does talk about shrinking the scope of government -- that is, as long as it's allowed to invade our bedrooms.

No, thanks.

The biggest difference between the 2008 presidential campaign and this year's (so far) is that today we're hearing more about matters of constitutional principle. Things like individual liberties and personal responsibility, global interventionism and bureaucratic dinosaurs, states' rights and out-of-control entitlements -- these now are part of our national conversation.

There's a reason for that, and his name is Ron Paul.

No, he doesn't have a shot at winning the GOP nomination or even the Ohio primary, but that's not the point. Neither is unseating the incumbent -- it's absurd to believe that it's in the best interest of our country, short-term or long-term, to replace a bloated-government Democrat with a bloated-government Republican.

Did you ever have to finally decide?
Say yes to one and let the other one ride
There's so many changes, and tears you must hide
Did you ever have to finally decide? *

The issues that matter to Paul are issues that matter to me. His principles are, by and large, my principles. For the sake of our nation, the debate he's helped to shape must continue. If that's to happen, independent citizens must raise principled voices at the polls.

On Tuesday, this citizen will raise his voice in support of Ron Paul.



*The Lovin' Spoonful, 1966

Iconic, ironic or patriotic?

Each of my favorite Super Bowl commercials, posted here yesterday, promotes a venerable American brand.

Chevy. Chrysler. Budweiser.

None of those corporate icons represents what it once did. Chevrolet (founded in 1911) and Chrysler (1925) survived Chapter 11 thanks to billions in taxpayer-funded bailouts and, in the case of Chrysler, because an Italian carmaker bought almost 60% of the company. Budweiser (1876) is the flagship brand of a brewer headquartered not in St. Louis, but in Belgium.

Ever since the commercials ran on Sunday, pundits have been cranking out commentary after ironic commentary. The Chrysler ad has come in for special criticism.

Pres. Obama's backers see the spot as supporting his approach to our national economic crisis. Conservative klaxons view it the same way, accusing Clint Eastwood of being a shill for the administration.

When you're a hammer, as it's said, everything looks like a nail.

Of all the perspectives I've read and heard, only three ring remotely true with me. The first came from Jay Leno:

"One of the most talked about [Super Bowl] commercials was the one with Clint Eastwood, where he said, 'It's halftime in America, and our second half is about to begin.'

"The bad news? China has the ball and we're down $15 trillion."

The second belongs to John Avlon:

"When the next Republican assumes the Oval Office, whether in four years or eight, he or she will find that the political culture is set up to destroy rather than build. Unifying the nation absent an urgent crisis is increasingly difficult, if not impossible. The organized activist class from your own party will not tolerate dissension from ideological purity, even in the face of real-world responsibilities. The opposition will have been conditioned to reflexively attack, demonizing the duly elected president almost regardless of what policies he proposes. This cannot be good for the country."

Last, here's what Eastwood himself said to FOXNation:

"I just want to say that the spin stops with you guys, and there is no spin in that ad. On this I am certain.

"I am certainly not politically affiliated with Mr. Obama. It was meant to be a message...just about job growth and the spirit of America. I think all politicians will agree with it. I thought the spirit was ok.

"I am not supporting any politician at this time.

"Chrysler, to their credit, didn't even have cars in the ad.

"Anything they gave me for it went for charity.

"If...Obama or any other politician wants to run with the spirit of that ad, go for it."

Now permit me, please, to offer my own view: Attacking Chrysler's "Halftime in America" commercial because it's somehow pro-Obama is intellectually dishonest and ideologically crippled.

There's nothing so patriotic as (to quote Avlon) "making the case for American resilience." That's what the ad did, simply and with the conviction of an independent citizen, and that's why I love it.