United Liberty

It looks like House Speaker Nancy Pelosi will force a final vote on ObamaCare this week despite the fact that the public wants Washington focus on other priorities, such as jobs and the economy, and without the support of pro-life Democrats. The House Budget Committee released the 2,309 page bill on its website last night and a final vote is expected by Sunday.

President Barack Obama even delayed an overseas trip by a few days in anticipation of the vote. No doubt he will be involved in the arm twisting of on-the-fence members.

Some Republicans, such as Rep. Paul Ryan (R-WI), are warning that reconciliation shouldn’t be the focus of the opposition against the bill because if the House passes the Senate version, it’s game, set, match. If you want to get an idea of the process that will take place, check out this post from Jamie Dupree.

Denial. It’s not a river in Egypt.

Still, as President Obama and D.C.’s majority legislative leadership strain our belief in a rational governing and representative body, it’s difficult to deny that something has gone terribly awry.

Not to belabor a point so many have made over the last year – and in some cases, decade(s) - but these Democrats don’t seem so concerned with my ability to access affordable, adequate health care as they do their ability to decide without me just what exactly defines adequate, affordable and accessible care.

So I’d like to report that their collective voice raised so stridently on my behalf (declaring as they do my “right” to all the government largesse they propose to provide) no longer has the power to shock my libertarian sensibilities. Yet day after day I find myself wondering how these men and women, whose primary attribute seems to indicate an infinite willingness to pretend two and two equals zero, were ever elected in the first place.

And therein lies the rub.

The Alan Graysons, Nancy Pelosis, John Lewises, Charlie Rangels, Harry Reids and other idealogical heirs to the late Sen. Ted Kennedy were all elected by the people and for the people. We may not like what they’re doing but someone voted for them just as they did Obama.

How did it happen? Good question and one with a plethora of philosophical and political answers. But the most important reason is too close to home for comfort. Thus, we can continue to play the blame game, or we can stop denying the unpalatable truth.

Continuing our “Liberty Candidate Series” of interviews, Jason and Brett talk with John Dennis, discussing his opponent, Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi, liberty in San Francisco, and his candidacy.  Dennis is a “Pro-Liberty” Republican candidate for U.S. Congress in California’s 8th Congressional District.

This special edition podcast is the fifth in a series devoted to showcasing liberty candidates nationwide.  Dennis talks about his liberty-focused campaign against the Speaker of the House in California.

You can download the podcast here. The introduction music is “Silence is Violence” by the always lovely Aimee Allen.

You can subscribe to the RSS of JUST our podcasts here, or you can find our podcasts on iTunes here.

This has been an interesting week, largely due to the reaction towards ObamaCare and these town hall meetings springing up all in different parts of the country. People are angry and they want to be heard. Whether politicians want to listen is a different story, as always.

Liberals and Democrats are correct to point out that they’ve previously been shut out of public debate on certain issues, such as the war in Iraq. Republicans mishandled and chided the anti-war crowd, sometimes questioned the patriotism, either directly or indirectly, of those speaking out against what they saw as a wrong.

Taxes were very high, but no real revenue was coming in. That’s because the system of taxes at that time was an early form of income tax that centered on the government taking a large percentage of a farmer’s crops.

So Ching Ti did something bold and innovative: he cut taxes.

Overnight, taxes went from over 50% down to about 3%. Farmers, who had fled to the hills to escape draconian tax rates, now came home and began farming again. To make a long story short, Ching Ti’s greatest problem while governing was trying to keep all the grain in his barns from spoiling.

It seems that ancient Chinese history is good for more than just cutesy script on a fortune cookie.

Though I don’t always like his politics, I like Congressman Dennis Kucinich.  Frankly, I gotta love anyone who’s willing to file articles of impeachment against Dick Cheney.  Out of the Democrat Presidential Candidates, Kucinich had been my favorite; but, unfortunately the media gave him about as much attention as they gave Dr. Paul.

During Fox Happy Hour, Dennis answers a myriad of questions about the TARP bailout, the impending sweep by the Democrats in Congress and Nancy Pelosi’s strange insistence that a heavily Democrat Congress will actually be “more bi-partisan.”