Love means never having to say "Hey was that anti-American?"

Just read this and be thankful that Thomas Sowell is alive and that you can read him for free.

Where the welfare state leads

This is the sort of country the Dims want to create.

A family where three generations have lived on the dole. I am sure there are examples of this here in the United States. Any inner city ghetto will provide you with ample evidence.

This story is the perfect microcosm of the cultural sickness that socialism and rampant leftism breeds.

No where in this story do the people mention not being able to find a job. They all just want to be lazy or simply did not like working. Where is the shame?

I love this line from one of these deadbeats: "It's my right to claim benefits. We're all entitled to do what we want in life. "

That line sums up the lie of modernity. Implicit in this is the Rosseauian idea of self fulfillment and authenticity being the highest goals of man. We are not entitled to do what we want in life. We must conform in some ways to society. In order for society to function, people must work.

The heartbreaking thing is how these people have little to no ambition outside of living on the dole.

During the New Deal, many people, including FDR, argued that those without the adequate means to live are not free. The reasoning was that if you could free these people from want, they would be just like the rest of society. The reality was that it enslaved those it was supposed to set free. It unleashed a blight of shiftlessness and laziness onto the people.

The reformers thought that they would remove the prisons of economics with generous payouts and social security checks. All they did was replace those prisons with prisons of the mind. They trapped people in poverty and blinded them to the higher aspirations. All these people want is government housing. At least the plebs of Rome only demanded bread and circuses.

Geraldine Ferraro: The Devil made me say it.

Rich Lowry asks: Was the firing of Geraldine a slap in the face to the Italian-American community?

I am still at a loss to understand Barack Obama. First of all, I am glad that the religious revival aspect of his campaign seems to have died off. A messiah is only as good as his last miracle and Barack has yet to deliver one.

I think that the religious aspect of his campaign says more about the sickness and spiritual emptinesss of our times than it does about any inherit virtue in Obama. We live in an age in which most children receive little or no religious training. Add to this the rejection of philosophy and the acceptance of psychology and sociology as the saving ideas of our times and you have a recipe for this sort of thing.

We have been deluded into thinking that the big questions are either irrelevant or nonexistent. Children are not taught to examine their natures for meaning. They are told that whatever they feel must be authentic and therefore good. But the new ways are not superior to the old. People are not insulated by the new ideas from seeking a genuine religious experience. They just do not understand what one is anymore. They confuse politics for religion and a superficial illogical compassion for piety.

I guess what makes me wary of Obama is his demand that we all must unite behind him and a hackneyed left wing ideology that has done nothing but fail. I am not going to unify with people I disagree with just to get along.

What is to happen to those of us who refuse to follow Obamchrist to the new Promised Land of socialized medicine and racial grievances for all? Are we to be marginalized? Do our opinions stop counting?

An Obama presidency will not end the racial strife in America. He will only exacerbate it. What will his loyal lap dogs in the media say when his plans and bills are defeated in the House and Senate? We all know that racism will be blamed.

New Hampshire, what shall become of thee

Mark Steyn's column in the Washington Times is a must read.

He is right about Obama. Anyone who tells you they support Obama because they want change is either an idiot or hiding something. Obama voters are not voting for change, they are voting for a black man. That is all. Obama is serving up the same liberal government knows best schemes that voters have rejected in the past. He is a new face for the old orthodoxy.

He is also right on Huck and his supporters. I agree that what threatens America is cultural and spiritual and not economic. They West itself is in a profound moral and spiritual crisis. We have imported the nihilism of Europe and called its practitioners realists.

No-Go Zones in Britain

Reverend Michael Nazir-Ali, a Bishop in the Church of England, is calling attention to the fact that parts of England are being taken over by Islamic radicals.

I'm actually quite impressed. The Church of England, and its American offshoots, are normally pretty spineless when it comes to dealing with threats to Western civilization.

Nazir-Ali is from Pakistan so he knows how minorities are treated under Islamic rule. He can see through the pie-in-the-sky, we-are-all-brothers-under-the-skin brainwashing of the Western Left. He knows that the Koran (it flushes ever so well) allows no compromise with those who will not submit to the will of its evil.

Of course the good Muslims of Britain are calling him a Nazi and accusing him of whipping up anti-Islamic sentiment in England. As if more could exist after practitioners of the "Religion of Peace" detonated themselves on the London subway. I find it funny that a Muslim would accuse anyone of acting like Nazis. They support the goals of the Nazis: killing Jews and destroying Christianity.

The Muslims also pull out the old canard that it is the policies of the United States and Britain in the Middle East that are fueling Islamic extremism. Isn't it funny that Muslim radicals and Leftists are always reading from the same script.

It is obvious to anyone who reads what our enemies say to us and to each other that this is about Jihad. It is not about securing better working conditions for textile workers in Mosul or a reaction to Western aggression. Imperialism is also a shallow excuse. The only imperial power in the Middle East for most of the second millennium was the Islamic Ottoman Empire.

In fact, Christians can lay claim to be the victims of Muslim imperialism with more creditability than vice versa. Ask the people of Greece and the Balkans if they feel bad about Western imperialism against Muslims. They will look at you like you have lost your mind. The people of Europe have been the victims of Muslim depredations for centuries. Islam has cast a shadow over Europe ever since that pervert Mohamed and his savages Arab tribesmen rode out of the wilderness to spread their blasphemy.

The West needs a spiritual renewal badly, but I am afraid that it will come with burkas, tyranny, and the primitivism of the Middle East.

WordBearer's election primer

Well now that we are a few days out from the Iowa Caucus, the political equivalent of a circle jerk, I think it is time I weighed in with my opinions on the Republican front runners.

The candidates will be ranked on a scale of 1 to 10. 10 means that I would burn down the house of anyone who criticized the guy. 1 means that I would rather be raped by a grizzly bear with AIDS and then set on fire than vote for this person.

Mike Huckabee - I really dislike Mike Hikeafee. I feel that he is the easiest Republican to beat because of his poor record on taxes and immigration.

I also find Huckabee supporters insufferable. They do not want to talk about real issues, just how Huck is a Christian. Great, that is wonderful but I want to talk taxes not theology folks.

Score: 3

Mitt Romney - I like Mitt. That being said, there are real trust issues. It is natural for a conservative like me to distrust the former governor of Taxachusetts. Mitt has answered many of these questions, but I still want to see more. From what I am hearing, he seems pretty committed to the War on Terror and to the social issues that are important to the conservative movement.

My real problem with Mitt is trust. He seems very polished and slick. In fact he seems almost Clintonian.

Score: 6

Fred Thompson - I love Fred. He is on the ball in dealing with Islamofascism and on taxes. He also has said all the right things when it comes to social issues. Fred is my choice right now and I hope he will win.

Score: 8

John McCain - I am ambivalent when it comes to McCain. I distrust him more than I distrust any candidate in the Republican race. He has made his bones in Washington by being a "maverick." Mavericks are loved by the media and are always hailed as "bi-partisan" and "independent" but when push comes to shove and the maverick needs that support of the party faithful, they come up short.

McCain really has no chance because the rank and file Republican base see him for what he is: a man willing to say and do anything to be loved by the media and to get elected. He seems to forget that the Republican base distrusts the media.

McCain has been a stalwart on foreign policy and deserves credit for that, but he is opposed to renewing the Bush tax cuts and is soft on immigration. Additionally, McCain-Feingold was one of the worst ideas in history and significantly hampers freedom of speech.

Score: 4

Rudy Giuliani - I'm still on the fence with Rudy. The most important issue of our times is the threat from Islamic fundamentalism and Rudy seems to get that better than any other candidate. Still his social liberalism is a concern, but he governed as a social conservative in New York.

Score: 5

All in all, I am very happy with the Republican field this year. There are a variety of opinions represented and we are having real dialogue about the future of the conservative movement and the Republican party.

The media portrays the Republican party as the monolithic, homogeneous, machine in which all independent thought and disagreement are prohibited. This could not be further from the truth. The Republican party is intellectually diverse in ways that the Dims could not possibly ponder. The Republican party is not made of single issue constituencies like the Dims. One can not pander to the Republican base by addressing just one issue which is why Huck will probably not win.

I would offer this advice to the candidates: Look at someone like me. I am a typical conservative. I am not a single issue guy. I base my decision by aggregating the positions of the candidates on national security, economic/tax policy, and social issues. I need to hear about more than your Christianity or thrilling life story. Tell me you are going to kill terrorists, cut taxes, and appoint good judges and you have my vote.