My Beauty Best Teacher

For many years, African Americans in the United States have been a solid Democratic constituency. It didn't used to be this way- the Republican Party fought and died to free the blacks in the south from slavery, and for generations thereafter pushed for more equality and freedom for blacks in America. Even the great Civil Rights legislation of the 1960's that Democrats signed into law was only done so with the strong support by the Republican party, who overcame the Democrats from the south who filibustered it. But in recent decades, African American support for the Democratic party has been so solid (90-95%) that the Democratic party has taken it for granted, and instead of improving the situation for this constituency, the results have been considerably worse. Look at the results- after voting solidly Democrat for decades and putting Democrats in control of cities, states, and national government, look at the results- African Americans have far higher rates of crime, far lower rates of educational attainment, lag in income, and suffer higher rates of poverty. African-Americans voted for 'change' in 2008, and all that gave them was more of the same- more of the taxpayer paid dependency, welfare, and anti-school choice that have caused African-Americans to lag behind every single ethnic group in a range of measurable categories for years. That's bad, and I think that voting Republican might change things.

So do others. Despite largely unsubstantiated allegations of racism in 'Tea Party' organizations, the Republican Party, and conservative groups, 2010 has witnessed more black Republican activism than ever before. Thirty-seven African Americans in 16 states have been in contention for seats in the U.S. Senate and the House of Representatives this year. And unlike African-American Democratic candidates, the majority of the Republican candidates do not come from areas where African-Americans are the majority. They are just good candidates, running for office on a platform of liberty, freedom, and equality, and just happen to be black too.

This election, it is my hope that Americans of all colors, creeds, philosophies, ideologies, and parties will all unite and vote for the candidate who best represents the values and ideals and beliefs that made America great- an unshakable belief that America is exceptional, that governmental power should be limited to protecting life, liberty, and property, and that the ultimate goal of political power in America is to further the freedom and liberty of its people. Since there are very few Democrats who speak this message (are there any that do any more?), I guess that means you'll have to vote Republican.

Check out this great video (h/t to theblogprof) encouraging African-Americans to vote for candidates who all champion liberty, equality, and freedom. Unless you are a racist or someone who wants to keep blacks on the plantation, this should stir your soul and make you very proud to be part of the GOP:

For those who are interested, check out this book on this subject: Silence Makes the Loudest Sound: A Conversation between African Americans and the Republican Party

Mired in grinding poverty and social destitution, Africa cries for help. A cacophonous galaxy of rock stars, anti-poverty activists, and heads of state are calling on the G-8 countries to cancel Africa’s $350 billion crippling foreign debt and double aid to the continent. British Prime Minister Tony Blair will make aid to Africa the centerpiece in Britain's presidency of the G-8 meeting in Gleneagles, Scotland in July. Live 8 is planned for July 2. After meeting with President Bush on June 10, modalities are being worked out to cancel at least $34 billion in debt of 27 of the world’s poorest nations, mostly African. Will this African Marshall Aid Plan work?

Africa’s plight follows a ten-year attention deficit cycle. Every decade or so, mega-plans are drawn up and rock concerts held to whip up international rescue mission for Africa. Acrimonious wrangling over financing modalities ensues. Years slip by, then a decade later, another grand Africa initiative is unveiled. Back in 1985, there was Live Aid and a “Special Session on Africa” held by the United Nations to boost aid to Africa. Then in March 1996, the U.N. launched a $25 billion Special Initiative for Africa. In September 2005, the plight of Africa will again take center-stage at a U.N. conference with clockwork precision. Expect another major initiative for Africa in 2015.

Helping Africa of course is noble but has now become a theater of the absurd – the blind leading the clueless. A recent IMF study estimated that Africans in the diaspora remit $32 billion annually back to Africa, with the main destinations being Ghana, Nigeria, and Kenya. About $7 billion is sent to southern Africa (Ghana News Agency, Accra, May 31, 2005). The amount Africans abroad remit back exceeds the $25 billion Tony Blair seeks to raise.

Nigerian President Olusegun Obasanjo says corrupt African leaders have stolen at least $140 billion (£95 billion) from their people since independence. The World Bank estimates that 40 per cent of wealth created in Africa is invested outside the continent. Even the African Union, in a stunning report last August, claimed that Africa loses an estimated $148 billion annually to corruption – or 25 percent of the continent's Gross Domestic Product (GDP). Rather than plug the huge hemorrhage, African leaders prefer to badger the West for more money. And the West, blinded by its own racial over-sensitivity and guilt over the iniquities of the slave trade and colonialism, obliges. This is the real tragedy of Africa.

Between 1960 and 1997, the West pumped more than $450 billion in foreign aid – the equivalent of four Marshall Aid Plans – into Africa with nothing to show for it. Contrary to popular misconception, foreign aid is not free but a soft loan. Outright debt relief and massive inflow of aid without any conditionalities, safeguards or monitoring mechanisms is absurd. It is akin to writing off the credit card debt of a drunken sailor and allowing him to keep the same credit cards. No African government has been called upon to give a full public accounting of who took what loan and for what purpose since many of Africa’s foreign loans taken in the past were misused and squandered. No government official has been held accountable; instead, irresponsible past borrowing behavior is being rewarded.

More distressing, much of the new aid money will flow directly into an African government budget – a huge black maze of vanishing tax receipts, extra-budgetary expenditure items, perks and off-budget “presidential privy accounts,” redolent with graft, patronage and waste. Over the past few decades, African budgets have careened out of control. State bureaucracies have swollen, packed with political supporters. Back in 1996, 20 percent of Ghana's public sector workforce was declared redundant by the Secretary of Finance and Guinea’s 50,000 civil servants were consuming 51 percent of the nation's wealth. In Kenya, civil service salaries take up half the budget; in Uganda, it is 40 percent. Zimbabwe has 54 ministers; Uganda with a population of 35 million has 70, while Ghana, with a population of 22 million, has 88 ministers and deputy ministers. With bloated bureaucracies, soaring expenditures and narrow tax bases, budget deficits have soared.

They are covered with World Bank loans and foreign aid (Ghana’s budget is 50 percent aid-financed and Uganda’s is 60 percent). If the aid is insufficient, the rest of the budget shortfall is financed by printing money. Even when is aid available for “budgetary support”, there is no guarantee that it will be used productively to generate a return to repay the soft loan. It could well be “consumed” when it pays for the salaries of civil servants. Writing off Uganda’s debt does not eliminate the aid dependency. In fact, when the World Bank canceled $650 million of Uganda’s debt in 1999, the first item President Yoweri Museveni purchased was a new presidential jet!


British Prime Minister thinks he can cajole or browbeat African leaders into curbing corruption and ensuring that resources released by debt relief are put to some good use – such as increased spending on education and health care. But the push for good governance and reform must come from within – from African civil society groups, organizations and the people. However, in country after country, chastened by diabolical restrictions, these groups have no freedom or political space to operate.

Carlos Cardoso, an investigative journalist, was murdered in November 2000 for uncovering a bank scandal in which about $14 million was looted from Mozambique's largest bank, BCM, on the eve of its privatization. The official in charge of banking supervision, Antonio Siba Siba, was also murdered while investigating the banking scandals. Such was also the fate of Norbert Zongo, a popular journalist in Burkina Faso, who was gunned down on Dec 13, 1998, while investigating official corruption. In September 2001, President Isaias Afwerki closed down all the independent media and arrested its staff, quashing calls for democratic reforms. In all, the government shut down eight private newspapers and arrested its journalists, picking them up in their newsrooms and homes and from the streets. They were held in a central jail until April, 2002, when they threatened to begin a hunger strike to protest their detention. They were then transferred to an undisclosed location.

In neighboring Ethiopia, President Meles Zenawi, a member of Tony Blair’s Africa Commission, just held fraudulent elections. Anticipating public outrage, he banned street demonstrations for one month and assumed full control of the country’s security forces. When the opposition rallied to protest the results dribbling in, the police opened fire, killing 26; opposition leaders have been placed under house arrest. Witness the election machinations in Egypt.

The paucity of good leadership has left a garish stain on the continent. Worse, the caliber of leadership has distressingly deteriorated over the decades to execrable depths. The likes of Charles Taylor of Liberia and Sani Abacha of Nigeria even make Mobutu Sese Seko of formerly Zaire look like a saint. In an unusual editorial, The Independent newspaper in Ghana wrote: "Most of the leaders in Africa are power-loving politicians, who in uniform or out of uniform, represent no good for the welfare of our people. These are harsh words to use on men and women who may mean well but lack the necessary vision and direction to uplift the status of their people (The Independent, Ghana, July 20, 2000; p.2).

The crisis in leadership remains a major obstacle to poverty reduction and has many manifestations. It is characterized, among others, by the following dispositions and failings: The "Big Man" syndrome, subordination of national interests to personal aggrandizement, super-inflated egos, misplaced priorities, poor judgment, reluctance to take responsibility for personal failures, and total lack of vision and understanding of even such basic and elementary concepts as "democracy," "fairness," "rule of law," "accountability," and "freedom" -- among other deficiencies. In some instances, the leadership is given to vituperative utterances, outright buffoonery, stubborn refusal to learn from past mistakes, and complete absence of cognitive pragmatism.

Believing that their countries belong to them and only them only, they cling to power at all costs. Their promises are worth less than Al Cappone’s. They stipulate constitutional term limits and then break them: Angola, Chad, Gabon, Guinea, and Uganda. African leaders themselves drew up a New Economic Partnership for Africa’s Development (NEPAD) in 2001, in which they inserted a Peer Review Mechanism (PRM), by which they were to evaluate the performance of fellow African leaders in terms of democratic governance. What happened? To be fair, they acted in reversing the “military coup” in Togo in February but went on vacation when elections were stolen in Zimbabwe and Togo.

Ask them to cut bloated state bureaucracies or government spending and they will set up a “Ministry of Less Government Spending.” Then there is the “Ministry of Good Governance” (Tanzania). They set up “Anti-Corruption Commissions” with no teeth and then sack the Commissioner if he gets too close to the fat cats (Kenya) or issue a Government White Paper to exonerate corrupt ministers (Ghana in 1996). To be sure, multi-party elections have been held in recent years in many African countries but the electoral process was so contumaciously manipulated to return incumbents to power. Four such “coconut elections” have so far been held this year: Zimbabwe, Togo, Congo (Brazzaville), and Ethiopia.

Ask them to place more reliance on the private sector and they will create a Ministry of Private Enterprise (Ghana). Ask them to privatize inefficient state-owned enterprises and they will sell them off at fire-sale prices to their cronies (Uganda). Or ask them to move a foot and they will demand foreign aid in order to do so. In 2003, some 30,000 ghost names were discovered on the payroll of the Ministry of Education, costing the government $1.2 million a month in salaries heisted by living workers. When Ghana demanded foreign aid to purge the payroll of these ghost names, Japan coughed up $5 million.

The reform process has stalled through vexatious chicanery, willful deception, and vaunted acrobatics. Only 16 out of the 54 African countries are democratic, fewer than 8 are “economic success stories,” only 8 have a free and independent media.

No amount of debt relief and increased aid will help Africa until Africa cleans up its own house. But the leadership is not interested in reform. Thus, without new leadership and genuine reform, debt relief and increased aid would compound Africa’s problems and more African countries will implode. The continent is stuck in a veritable conundrum. What can Western donors do?

Smart aid would do one of two things. One, bypass the vampire state and target the people, who produce Africa’s real wealth. An African economy consists of three sectors: the traditional, informal, and the modern sector. The people who produce Africa’s real wealth – cash crops, diamonds, gold and other minerals – live in the traditional and informal sectors. Meaningful development and poverty reduction cannot occur by ignoring these two sectors. But in the 1960s and 1970s, much Western development aid was channeled into the modern sector or the urban area, the abode of the parasitic elite minority. Industrialization was the rage and the two other sectors – especially agriculture – were neglected. Huge foreign loans were contracted to set up a dizzying array of state enterprises, which became towering edifices of gross inefficiency, waste and graft. Economic crises emerged in the 1980s and billions in foreign aid money were spent in an attempt to reform the dysfunctional modern sector. Between 1981 and 1994, for example, the World Bank spent more than $25 billion in Structural Adjustment loans to reform Africa’s dilapidated statist economic system. Only 6 out of the 29 “adjusting” African countries were adjudged to be “economic success stories” in 1994. Even then, the success list was phantasmagoric. Ghana, declared a “success story” in 1994, is now on HIPC life-support system.

At some point, even the most recklessly optimistic donor must come to terms with the law of diminishing returns: That pouring in more money to reform the modern sector is futile. Greater returns can be achieved elsewhere – by focusing on the traditional and informal sectors.

Second, smart aid would empower the African people (African civil society groups) to monitor how the aid money is being spent and to instigate reform from within. Empowerment requires arming the African people with information, the freedom and the institutional means to unchain themselves from the vicious grip of poverty and oppression.

Africa already has its own Charter of Human and Peoples’ Rights (the 1981 Banjul Charter), which recognizes the right to liberty and to the security of his person (Article 6); to receive information, to express and disseminate his opinions (Article 9); to free association (Article 10); to assemble freely with others (Article 11); and to participate freely in the government of his country, either directly or through freely chosen representatives in accordance with the provisions of the law (Article 13). Though the Charter enjoins African states to recognize these rights, few do so. When President Thabo Mbeki called on June 3, President Bush should have handed him a signed copy of this Charter to be delivered to President Robert Mugabe of ‘Zimbabwe.

The institutional tools Africans need are an independent central bank (to assure monetary stability and stanch capital flight), an independent judiciary (for the rule of law), a free and independent media (to ensure free flow of information), an independent Electoral Commission, an efficient and professional civil service, and a neutral and professional armed and security forces.

Recent events in Ukraine (November), Ghana (December), Zimbabwe (March), Lebanon (April), and Togo (April) unerringly underscore the critical importance of these institutions. Without them, President Bush’s plan to spread democracy may stall. Democracies are not built in a vacuum but in a “political space” in which the people can air their opinion, petition their government without being fired on by security forces and can choose who should rule them in elections that are rigged by electoral commissions packed with government goons.

On May 13, thousands of Egyptian judges, frustrated by government control over the judiciary, agitated for full independence from the executive in their oversight of the electoral process. “The institutions are presenting Mr. Mubarak with an unexpected challenge from within, one that will be difficult to dismiss. The fact is, major changes in this country are going to come out of those institutions, not from the streets," said Abdel Monem Said, director of the Ahram Center for Strategic Studies in Cairo.

In the past 24 years, Egypt has received more than $55 billion in U.S. aid in direct government-to-government transfers. Smart aid would assist civil society in instigating institutional reform. Since this approach carries some risks, the same objective can be achieved by funneling aid through diaspora Africans and their organizations, as was the case with Soviet dissidents during the Cold War.

Africa’s long term growth prospects do not lie in rock concerts and increased dependency on Western aid but on the ability of the African people or civil society groups to instigate reform from within. Assistance to such groups – both at home and abroad – constitutes much smarter aid to Africa than all the LIVE AID concerts Bob Geldof can organize.
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The writer, a native of Ghana, is a Distinguished Economist at American University and President of the Free Africa Foundation. His new book is Africa Unchained (Palgrave/MacMillan). This article is culled from his May 10 testimony before the Standing Committee on Foreign Relations of the Senate of Canada.

Michael Cook at African Liberty writes:

The assumption is that dismantling so-called North-South trade barriers, cancelling subsidies by rich countries to their farmers and manufacturers, and an end to dumping their products on poor countries will provide a quick but enduring fix that will help the poor to trade out of poverty.
On average, sub-Saharan African countries impose a 34% tariff on agricultural products from other African countries and 21% on manufactured goods--the most protectionist region on Earth. International agencies estimate that eliminating such tariffs would generate immediate gains to sub-Saharan economies of $1.2billion...[continue reading]

Rejoice Ngwenya in African Liberty:

South Africans are a strange lot with a knack for trivia even when confronted with life-threatening tragedies. One would have thought they have learnt a lesson after the blistering criticism for the unforgivable xenophobic attacks on fellow African aliens last year. But now, even where the FIFA World Cup 2010 clock is ticking dangerously towards the goal line, the ‘rainbow nation’ is engrossed in the cameo tale of a disgraced sporting cheat, choosing to downplay the trinity of evil personified by crime, HIV/Aids and poverty.

More here

Leon Louw at African Liberty, outlines fundamental weaknesses in African democracies:

There are 25 or so “checks and balances” in most Western democracy constitutions, almost none of which have been incorporated in Third World “democracies”, including Kenya. One of the most important is the rule of law, which has, sadly, become a largely contentless cliché.

He distils the most important components:

- Laws must be objective not discretionary
-There must be a Separation of Powers

Franklin Cudjoe writes in African Liberty:

Even old Socialist or even Communist States are fast embracing reforms and doing the obvious, instituting property rights and freedom of trade. Some are making the mistake, however, of adopting mercantilism, thinking that using the state’s power to gain access to resources abroad through bribes will command global respect. Africa is one place they are casting their glance.
Africa ought to position itself in time for the next biggest hunt for its resources. The onslaught however is on, and aggressively led by China with many offers. We seem to be buckling under the good old magical hand of foreign aid again.

Image via Wikipedia African Liberty reports:

Senegalese Members of Parliament voted to amend the constitution to extend the presidential term from five to seven years amidst opposition from many Senegalese. The government has flouted the constitution by modifying an aspect that can only be amended through a referendum.
There have been several changes to Senegal's constitution in recent years and some local analysts claim the move is to prepare the ground for the Presidents' son to be able to succeed his father...[continue reading]

Joshua J. Omojuwa writing in African Liberty:

As Nigerians celebrate 50 years of nationhood today, the promise of independence- a nation of free people living at peace with itself and neighbours, undergirded by individual and economic well being is still a distant dream. The President and his Governors may cut mammoth cakes and pop champagne and toast to success, perhaps personal success. Yet, this artificial success is derived from plunder and supervised penury foisted on the poverty industry and fueled by years of bad governance.
Little wonder remnants of the disaggregated development plague us; dysfunctional educational system, bad energy policies, bad roads, offensive electricity supply, armed rebellions in resource-rich regions, religious and tribal wars, kidnappings and a habitation for corrupt political grand masters and scammers. Clearly we are a nation of perpetual anomalies. Yet, we are one of the richest oil-producing nations on earth able to dish out billions of Naira for the wasteful jamboree in the name of Independence...[continue reading]

Franklin Cudjoe and Richard Tren write in the Bangkok Post:

The question is whether or not developing nations should be permitted to harness their natural resources to lift their people out of poverty. Many rich-nation delegates, particularly from Europe, say "no" as they fear such development will exacerbate climate change and ecological degradation

More here via African Liberty

Rejoice Ngwenya writes in African Liberty:

By the time you finish reading this piece, one hundred illegal immigrants will have crossed the border into South Africa and Botswana, two of their colleagues will have been murdered in xenophobic Alexandra, ten men will have been infected with HIV, one Movement for Democratic Change [MDC] activist will have been beaten up, maimed or killed in Uzumba Marambapfungwe, one child will have died of malnutrition in Matebeleland, ten people will have lost their jobs in Harare and ultimately, the Reserve Bank of Zimbabwe [RBZ] will have pumped one billion worth of valueless bearer cheques into the system.

Pat Utomi writes:

Recently I advocated that if we are really serious at making our political office holders more sensitive to the people we have to enact laws that make it MANDATORY for ALL political office holders to receive medical services ONLY in Nigerian hospitals and for their children to attend ONLY Nigerian schools. I argued that the reason they do not care about the decay in Nigeria’s infrastructure and social services is because they do not access them and how can you advocate for something you do not use. Imagine my surprise when I received emails from a few Nigerians complaining that my idea was unconstitutional and will affect people’s liberty. To those who said that, I ask what they understand by the term government. Isn’t government meant to guarantee the welfare of the poeple?

More here

Joe at jgeldhof@comcast.net sent me an email recently called 'identify yourself', where he displays all the typical racist, angry, sexist, and ignorant views that are common to liberals and Democrats. For amusement, here is his email, which is the kind of typical stuff I have to read from his kind. I apologize in advance for the language:

This person by themself is simply a harmless, angry, sexist, racist individual. But put this person in a position of power over me or you, and he is dangerous. Make him a bureaucrat in charge of your healthcare choices, or in charge of your energy uses, or in charge of regulating your company, and he degrades the human condition and represents a threat to your life, liberty, and property. This person is the reason why our Founding Fathers wisely made government divided, conflicted, inefficient, weak, and limited- not because in hands of great people government can't do great things, but because in the hands of Joe, government could be very terrible. Thanks for pointing this out Joe.

UPDATE: For those who are curious, Joe sent me further emails... here is some of the stuff that he wrote...
He further proves my points above about how dangerous someone like him is with political power.

I'm not a right wing wack job that listens to the pictures drawn by the likes of: palin, Cheney, lieberman, bush, bush, and bush, and Rush, and hannity, and o'reilly (who got his nuts twisted by women). keep defending these buttocks and we'll see how long this country lasts.... hooray for the African American in the white house. Makes you guys look like wimps... where do you store your white sheet and hood... you're a facist... you're a communist...

He is just further proving my point that it will not be a good thing for him and his kind to have power over me and my kind (and me and my kind don't want any power over him and his kind).

Franklyne Ogbunwezeh writes:

For our democracy to shed its pretences, and sustain a vibrant dynamic, which would uphold democratic principles, Africa must groom an enlightened followership. Without this, African leaders will always fall for the temptation to omnipotence. Without an enlightened followership, there would be no credible critical mass of opposition to challenge the excesses of an incompetent government. In fact, “a responsible leadership can be nourished and sustained only by an enlightened and responsible followership, which will constitute an effective check on its exercise and excesses. This holds true because an enlightened followership would be vigilant on things that concern their welfare. This eternal vigilance, which is the price of liberty, is the basis for an effective foreclosure of despotism, abuse of office and trust, rise of tyranny and kleptocratic governance, et cetera

More here

Monique Maddy writes:

More than anything else, what Africa and the African people need to escape the abyss of poverty and the vicissitudes of Mother Nature is jobs. This need is fundamental because it is the passport to personal independence and to the freedom to pursue life, liberty, and prosperity, and all that it entails, including such basic essentials as clean water, food, health, and education. A job provides an opportunity to live a meaningful life and to contribute to society.
Africa needs the kinds of jobs that are created primarily by foreign and local investors and entrepreneurs -- jobs that will provide its people with incomes that allow them to produce, to consume, and to educate and care for their children.

"Learning to Love Africa" - Monique Maddy speaks at Google

This week someone said something that I thought was really perceptive- she said that the reason why so many people voted for Obama, particularly young people, is that they wanted to get there name in the record books. People who lack self-esteem, people who lack self-worth, people who haven't yet made a difference in this world, all wanted to point to electing an African-American and say "see- look what I was a part of- look what I did- look at the change I made."

That's a good point. Now days are searching for self-worth, and what better way to gain some personal worth, when professionally or personally you are doing poorly, than to say that they put Obama in the White House. Your job is unproductive, your personal life is unfufilling, so you can point to your vote and say "look what I changed!"

This feeling might have been something we could all be a part of- for instance, many recall 9-11 and our response to it as the 'change' that will forever effect our world. But if you have forgotten 9-11, or believe that it was our fault we were attacked, or have been soured by the Iraq War, you might instead say that voting for Obama is the event that changed the world. And they are probably right.

Obama being our President will change things. He will raise taxes on the rich, which will mean lower investments in companies, resulting in lower job creation, lower profitability, and lower competitiveness overseas. Obama will lower real supplies of energy by drilling less for oil, bankrupting coal producers, making nuclear energy tougher with more environmental standards, and this will mean higher gas and heating costs. Obama will put in place economic protectionism, which will drives up costs for everyone. Obama will sponsor more government regulation of businesses, meaning less innovation and more red tape. Obama will change our foreign policy, which will mean we will be challenged internationally. He will change our policy in Iraq, emboldening our enemies, giving up on millions of free people, and giving terrorists bases to train. He will change the courts interpretation of our god-given rights, taking away our liberties and freedoms, pressuring for more 'fair speech' and more politically correct speech. In every way, America will change, and not for the better.

I for one believe in life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, and that's as simple as it is. It's too bad America has to change to a country that doesn't believe in these things.

Yesterday at the Mackinac Republican Leadership Conference I went to a workshop called GOPAC- 15 Keys for a Candidate to Win in 2010, featuring David Avella. It was interesting, and for anyone out there thinking about running for office or helping someone run for office, there were some good pieces of advice.

One piece of advice for people running for office is to think about the difference between issues and vote-deciding issues, and then focus on vote-deciding issues. There are real issues out there- like 2nd amendment, water quality, etc- but what voters want to hear from you is where you stand on vote-deciding issues, like the economy and jobs.

Another piece of advice from David Avella is that candidates must be the ones who communicate the message and raise money. All other functions can be taken care of by others, but it is the candidate who must be the point person and the main focus for communicating the message of their campaign, and they must be the person who is raising money.

Realize that what voters are voting for on election day is you- your vision and your message. The reason why Obama won the last election is that voters liked his vision and his message, and they bought that, and now many would like a refund because the product doesn't measure up to what they were sold. But they did buy it, and if you run for office, you need to learn how to sell your message and vision to voters.

Another piece of advice was that to win elections you need to understand what makes your opponent vulnerable and then put a contrast in front of voters- point to where your opponent's record is out of line with his or her districts. This doesn't mean run a negative campaign, but if your Congressman works in a district that is heavy in manufacturing and voted for the cap-and-tax bill, then your Congressman needs to be hammered on that.

Last piece of advice is that a party that ignores minorities will be a minority party. The Republican party can not afford to ignore minority groups- African Americans, Latinos, women, union workers, Ron Paul supporters- anyone who wants to promote life, liberty, and the protection of property needs to be welcomed with open arms into our party. Think big, and big results will follow.

I hope that these pieces of advice are helpful!

Climate change (global warming) is caused by the sun. This may be a shock to you, but strangely enough, the same sun that causes the earth to grow warmer in the summer and colder in the winter also has long-term variations that cause long-term variations in the global temperature. Oh, I know what you are thinking "Humans are causing global warming by driving SUV's and being evil towards Mother Earth and the solution is to adopt Communism." But the truth of the matter is that humans and our actions are probably one of the smallest variables involved in 'climate change'. That doesn't mean that we can pollute as much as we want, but it does mean that most of what environmentalists say and do and believe isn't right either.

It's pretty simple once you become educated. Here is an article from Dr. Harrison “Jack” Schmitt, former US Senator from New Mexico, a geologist, and a former Apollo Astronaut (read his book Return to the Moon: Exploration, Enterprise, and Energy in the Human Settlement of Space), that was found in the The Science and Environmental Policy Project weekly newsletter:

THE CENTRAL ROLE OF THE SUN IN CLIMATE CHANGE
Policy makers at the head of government in the United States and elsewhere apparently want to believe, and to have others believe, that human use of fossil fuels accelerates global warming. They pursue this quest in order to impose ever greater and clearly unconstitutional control on the economy and personal liberty in the name of a hypothetically omnipotent government. There exists no true concern by the President or Congressional Leadership about the true effects of climate change - only a poorly concealed, ideologically driven attempt to use conjured up threats of catastrophic consequences as a lever to gain authoritarian control of society.

There has been an absolute natural increase in global surface temperature of half a degree Centigrade per 100 years (0.9 degrees Fahrenheit) over the last three and a half centuries. Observational climate data and objective interpretations of those data strongly indicate that nature, not human activity, exerts the primary influence on this current long term warming and on all global climate variations. Human influence through use of fossil fuels has been and remains minor if even detectable. Claims to the contrary only find support in highly questionable climate models that fail repeatedly against the reality of nature. What, then, stimulates historically and geologically observed, sometimes slow and sometimes radical, changes in climate?

The primary alternative hypothesis to human-caused global warming is natural climate change driven by the Sun. Unfortunately, the "human-caused global warming" or “carbon dioxide forcing” hypothesis has become embedded in the minds of otherwise strong teams of observational scientists and their publication outlets. They cannot entertain any other alternative to enhance and amplify variations in the natural heating of the Earth by the Sun - nor can they prove their own hypothesis of human-caused global warming.

As many scientists have documented, the position and orientation of the Earth in its orbit around the sun, and the Sun’s variable influence and activity, determine weather and climate. Seasons vary because of changing solar energy input in annual response to the varying orientation of Earth’s Northern and Southern Hemispheres. Indeed, the Earth’s 23-degree inclination to the rays from the Sun and its annual orbit around that star guarantee large seasonal changes away from the equator. Further, variations in solar radiation received by the Earth correlate with short-term variations in Earth’s weather, based on the slow movement of loops called "Rossby waves" in atmospheric jet streams.

Observations by astronomers over the centuries, as well as studies of tree rings,stalagmite layers, and other pre-historic and geological records, have defined an 11-year sunspot cycle superposed on a number of longer climate cycles. Much modern research documents that the sunspot cycle also correlates with variations in stratospheric winds13 and ozone production, cosmic ray flux, ionospheretroposphere interactions, and the global electrical circuit that exists between the ionosphere and the Earth's surface.

Correlations of records of seasonal changes, solar activity cycles, and local and regional rainfall oscillations all confirm that in some way radiation emanating from the Sun drives changes in weather and climate. Solar interplanetary magnetic fields, whose polarity varies every 22 years or twice the sunspot cycle, may play an additional role as their strength varies directly with increases and decreases in numbers of sunspots.

As a further natural demonstration of the importance of the Sun in determining climate variation, the well-documented solar shielding effects of atmospheric ash and aerosols from volcanic eruptions document the tie between solar irradiance and at least short-term climate swings. Particularly illustrative have been eruptions such as Huaynaputina (1600), Tambora (1815), Krakatoa (1883), and Pinatubo (1991).

More broadly, geological and planetological observations show that major perturbations in climate relate to the position and orientation of the Earth in its orbit around the Sun. For example, as Serbian mathematician Milutin Milankovic pointed out in 1941, as have many others since, initiation of the major ice ages on Earth correlate with a 23,000-year precession cycle, a 41,000-year obliquity cycle, and a 100,000-year eccentricity cycle in the position of the Earth relative to the Sun. Cyclic variations measured in oxygen isotope ratios that correlate with the growth of ice sheets and biogeochemical responses closely reflect the 23,000-year precession cycle. Also, a half-precession cycle appears to be related to the dynamics of the East African Equatorial monsoon. In addition, the 41,000-year obliquity cycle shows strongly in North American marine depositional records.

Climate cycles related to internal solar activity are superposed on long-term orbital cycles. For example, the Medieval Warm Period (800-1300) and the Little Ice Age (1400-1900) correlate, respectively, with very active and very passive periods of recorded sunspot activity. As a fairly recent example of solar influence on climate, the Little Ice Age occurred during a 500-year long sequence of three deep reductions in sunspot frequency. The coldest temperatures came during the last of these minima, a 70- year period of exceptionally few sunspots (the Maunder Minimum). The Medieval Warm Period, (when the Vikings colonized Greenland, glaciers retreated, and farmers could at least survive) also correlates to repeated multi-century long, high sunspot frequency. Since the end of the early 1900s, peak values in sunspot activity rose steadily until 1960, leveling off at higher than normal values until apparently starting to fall about 2000.

The 11-year sunspot cycle repetitions are superposed on a number of long-term cycles of past highs and lows in solar activity. For example, the Gleissberg cycle has imprecisely defined periods of 90±30 years in length. More energetic sunspot activity in the Gleissberg cycle may correlate with temporary decades of warming, such as in the 1930s and 1990s with the reverse being true in the 1810s and 1910s. Analyses of tree rings, lake levels, cave deposits, tree ring variations in cosmic ray-produced isotopes (14C and 10Be), and oxygen isotope ratios record what appear to be other long period solar cycles, specifically, 2400, 1500 years, 200, as well as the Gleissberg cycle.

Many advocates of human-caused global warming agree that solar cycles show correlations with regional climate variations; but, absent a proven amplification mechanism to enhance small solar energy (irradiance) variations, they reject nature in favor of fossil fuel burning. These reviews all document broadly accepted relationships of weather and climate with many different repetition cycles in solar activity, ranging from significant but random solar flares affecting jet stream tracks, to the 11-year sunspot cycle, to the long-term Milankovic orbital repetitions discussed above.

Specifically with respect to the last 120 years, the correlation of measured solar energy input variations with global surface temperature and sea surface temperature is very strong. The statistical correlation of solar irradiance with air temperature has been about 79%. In contrast, during the last 50 years, the correlation of measured carbon dioxide increases with global surface temperature has been only about 22%. This directly contradicts the assumption that carbon dioxide has had a large influence on climate in the last 50 years.

Since the end of the last Ice Age 10,000 years ago, the increase in total energy from the Sun has been about 0.6 watts per square meter, an increase of less than 0.05% over an average total of about 1367 watts per square meter. On shorter time scales, total variations reach about 3 watts per square meter, or 0.22% from the average. Considering the actual amount of possible atmospheric heating (30% ofincoming solar energy is reflected to space), this variation results in a third to a half a degree Centigrade(0.6 to 0.9 degree Fahrenheit) global temperature change over seven years, that is, a half solar cycle.

Various natural mechanisms for visible, infrared, and UV light reflection, adsorption, emission, and water vapor feedback determine the net solar heating effect on the Earth. Global atmospheric circulation moderates the short-term solar energy inputs, particularly upward convection of oceanic heat and water vapor in the large scale equatorial Hadley Cells that span latitudes from 30ºS to 30ºN . Ocean circulation overall moderates the long-term transfer of solar energy around the globe.

Evidence for the existence, if not the nature, of a means for amplifying solar energy-solar magnetic field interactions with Earth comes from the oceans. Determination of the total contribution of the oceans to heating of the atmosphere, using three independent observational measures of oceanic heat flux, shows that the oceans' heat contribution to be five to seven times larger than variations in total solar energy input.

Additional support that an amplification mechanism exists comes from recent observational data on variations in stratospheric water vapor concentrations over three decades. These data suggest that decreases in water vapor have contributed to amplified sea surface cooling since 2000 while increases between 1980 and 2000 accented surface warming. This relationship may correspond with stratospheric cooling and lower water retention due to lower than average solar energy input since 2000.

Climate change driven by the Sun constitutes a strongly competitive, purely scientific hypothesis to the climate modeling-political hypothesis of human-caused global warming advocated by climate modelers and their acolytes in the science, media, and political establishments. Solar influence ranges from significant but random solar flares affecting jet stream tracks, to the 11-year sunspot cycle, to the 22- year magnetic cycle, up to the long-term Milankovic orbital repetitions discussed above. The current decade or longer period of cold winters in the northern United States and Europe coincide with a relatively prolonged reduction in sunspot activity below even the norm for a minimum in the 11-year cycle.

Actual observations show that climate varies in response to natural forces and that human burning of fossil fuels has had negligible effect over the last 100 years. Lets us hope that State and national policy makers taking office in 2011 and 2013 will understand the facts about natural climate change and the fictions about human influence on change before taking enormous constitutional and economic risks - and before liberty and incomes suffer further erosion.

This is the whole article, although I have edited off the footnotes which document the research. You can believe this sort of logic, or buy into the pseudo-religion backed by computer modeling produced by the Al Gore's of the world.

Times have to be getting rough on those who worship the Green God; science and reasoning are killing their religion in a way that it never could do with Christianity. For years people have been preaching that humans are the cause of global warming, that global warming is bad, and that the only way to reverse this climate change is to repent and tithe. Symbols of the evil of humans abound to these true believers- SUV's, air conditioning, electric power, comfort, happiness, etc- and these modern-day followers of Mandaeanism inevitably preach that humanity is responsible and needs to turn towards communism in order to stop the rise of the seas and the heating of the earth.

But it turns out this entire religion is built on a false premise- humans are largely not responsible for the changing of the climate and thus bear no obligation to give up any sort of symbols of progress to fix a problem that isn't theirs to fix. That doesn't mean that humans can pollute as much they want- there is still the tragedy of the commons, which can be solved by stronger rule of law and more property rights, which is the exact opposite of what environmentalists preach. But it does mean that government policies discouraging certain things and encouraging other things are built on a faulty foundation of unreality that will do more harm to society than good if continued.

Humans are not responsible for any sort of change in climate, and thus we should dash the dreams of Democrats and liberals and environmentalists and wake them out of their paradise world of railroads, bike paths, windmills, and other relics of the 1800's. CAFE standards, denying permits to mining and drilling companies, using the laws of the national government to stop developments everywhere, and cap-and-trade schemes are unreal, in the sense that they do not reflect the reality of the world. The only thing that these policies do in reality are empower elites in society to take and keep control of the means of production in order to put in place a more unjust world where life, liberty, and personal property is attacked- they do not do anything to the temperature of the globe or the environment or the climate.

The reason that these policies do not work is because humans are not responsible for any sort of changes in climate- the sun is. Shout it from the rooftops and yell it with passion at any environmentalist or liberal or Democrat whose party has been captured by these believers in the false Green God-

THE SUN IS RESPONSIBLE FOR TEMPERATURE OF THE EARTH!

This is a central fact about global warming that I learned several years ago that blew my mind and illuminated a truth that was previously hidden- that it is changes in the sun that cause the temperature of the Earth the change.

Oh, it is not fully understood yet how changes in the sun affect the temperature of the Earth, but it has been quite clear for some time that changes in sunspot activity correspond to changes in the temperature of the Earth. In times of active sunspot activity, the Earth gets warmer, such as in the 1980' and 1990's when there was considerable sunspot activity observed, or during the Medieval Warm Period (800-1300). And in times of passive sunspot activity, the Earth doesn't get warmer, such as the 2000's when sunspot activity slowed and so did the increase in global temperatures (if any of the data can be believed, seeing as so much of it has been purposefully falsified by worshipers of the Green God) or during the Little Ice Age (1400-1900), which only ended when sunspot activity began to increase again and was not related in any way to the start of the second Industrial Revolution.

But it was not clear how or why sunspot activity affected temperatures on Earth, so those who believe in the Green God rejected this science in favor of believing that they held the power to control the whole globe in their own hands and that they are the source of evil in the world and that they can transcend this evil by denying themselves pleasures and modern comforts and making the world in general better by telling other people that they are evil and working to deny them pleasures and comforts as well.

BUT THE SUN IS RESPONSIBLE FOR TEMPERATURE OF THE EARTH!

Henrik Svensmark, a Danish physicist, has for many years studied the effects of cosmic rays on cloud formation. His research and data forced him to present a new hypothesis: that solar activity is an indirect cause of global warming, and that the how and why sunspot activity was responsible for temperature changes on earth was a link through the interaction of the solar wind and cosmic rays and cloud cover.

The basic theory is that clouds are formed when cosmic rays hit the atmosphere. The more clouds in the atmosphere, the more sunlight that is reflected off our globe, and our globe cools. When the sun is very active, it's magnetism draws cosmic rays to it rather than earth, resulting in less cosmic rays hitting the atmosphere, less clouds, less cooling effect of these clouds, and temperatures go up. When sun is inactive, it has fewer sunspots, fewer magnetic activity, more cosmic rays hit the earth, resulting in more clouds, resulting in more cooling, and the temperature of the Earth goes down.

And when our solar system, Earth included in it, go through one of the denser star areas of the Milky Way, it doesn't matter what our own sun is doing, because the surrounding stars make lots of cosmic rays and overcome the sun's activity, resulting in many cosmic rays hitting our planet, leading to increased cloud cover, leading to a cooling effect, and temperatures go down.

It is a nice theory, and advances us just a little bit closer to understanding climate change. We now know that major perturbations in climate relate to the position and orientation of the Earth in its orbit around the Sun. For example, as Serbian mathematician Milutin Milankovic pointed out in 1941, as have many others since, initiation of the major ice ages on Earth correlate with a 23,000-year precession cycle, a 41,000-year obliquity cycle, and a 100,000-year eccentricity cycle in the position of the Earth relative to the Sun. Cyclic variations measured in oxygen isotope ratios that correlate with the growth of ice sheets and biogeochemical responses closely reflect the 23,000-year precession cycle. Also, a half-precession cycle appears to be related to the dynamics of the East African Equatorial monsoon. In addition, the 41,000-year obliquity cycle shows strongly in North American marine depositional records (source: The Science and Environmental Policy Project weekly newsletter).

And now we also suspect that suns, both our own and other suns who we may near by, also affect our climate by bombarding us with cosmic rays that escape from suns when they have periods of lower magnetic activity and less sunspot activity and more cosmic rays and more clouds and lower temperatures, or periods of higher magnetic activity and more sunspot activity and less cosmic rays and less clouds and higher temperatures.

To advance our knowledge a little bit more on this, we have to figure out what function high energy particles might have on cloud formation- in other words, what effect does cosmic rays have on cloud formation- do more of them create more clouds? This is exactly the sort of science that can be tested and verified. And that's what CERN recently did.

Via Ace of Spades I read that the CLOUD (“Cosmics Leaving Outdoor Droplets”) experiment, which examines the role that energetic particles from deep space play in cloud formation, has been successful in producing some sort of results, although those results are currently being actively suppressed by CERN Director General Rolf-Dieter Heuer because the results of these experiments "would go immediately into the highly political arena of the climate change debate," one imagines that if they prove that cosmic rays indeed do cause increased or decreased cloud cover, it would be yet another nail in the already buried coffin to the theory that global warming is caused by man. These findings are called "bombshell" by the Linking Canada Free Press.

For those of you who are interested in fully understanding how cosmic rays may affect cloud formation which many affect the temperature of our planet, there is a documentary film on Svensmark's theory, The Cloud Mystery, that came out in 2008 and is on youtube. It is broken up into 6 parts- check out part 1 by following this link.

Henrik Svensmark is also the author of The Chilling Stars: A Cosmic View of Climate Change.

On July 6, 2010- Stephanie McCrummen, a Washington Post writer featured a story about Sousa Middle School Principal Dwan Jordon, titled : "D.C. Principal's hands-on tack transforms Sousa Middle but also ruffles feathers" Sousa Middle School is located at 650 Ely Pl. SE, Washington, DC. The problem with McCrummen's story is that it reads like the political propaganda that we have come to expect from the Washington Post with Jordon being featured as Superman who comes to save the day of course courtesy of Chancellor Michelle Rhee who handpicked him. At first glance, I couldn't help but wonder how this local story made the front page of a major newspaper but it is to be expected given the Post's unequivocal history of supporting anything Chancellor Rhee. As DC activist, Robert Brannum reiterates in his DC Examiner column, "major newspapers like the Post are all too often willing to advance Chancellor Rhee and her protege's as innovators who all by themselves save public education." McCrummen unjustly portrays Sousa's former teachers in a demeaning light by using one example of a teacher being physically abusive towards a student when she digs her fingernails into him and other negative laden adjectives describing teachers as resistant to Jordon's strategies and emotional when she refers to them as humiliated and traumatized. At no time does this reporter take the time to examine what positive attributes (other than Jordon) these teachers had at their disposal that contributed to their ability to significantly raise test scores at Sousa before they were terminated or left of their own accord. Even the sub headings in this story credit Principal Dwan Jordon with positive captions like "Prove Everybody Wrong," " It's Beautiful" and "What's Wrong? " while teachers were conveniently featured under the one heading of "Feeling Humiliated". The problem with this type of reporting is that it is a fairy tale that doesn't exist and as Conducting the Inner Light teacher turned blogger writes: "it is fluff reportage that only compounds the problem DCPS has, a problem that will not improve through such one sided reporting nor one sided debates."