J.C. Watts for vice-president

I would like to push a new idea for Senator McCain for his vice-presidential choice. J.C. Watts is a preacher, a Christian conservative, former star quarterback at Oklahoma, and former congressmen from Oklahoma. He built quite a good conservative reputation while in congress in the 90’s and early 2000’s. He would help solidify the conservative base of the south and mid-west. He could even help make in-roads into the African American community as he himself is an African American. I do however only mention that he is black because someone else is bound to mention it. He has fine credentials and I believe if he would be willing to come out of retirement and take the job he could put Senator McCain over the top.

Time for a Revolution

On July 4^th, 1776, men from all around the American colonies met in Philadelphia to sign the Declaration of Independence. These men along with a number of their fellow colonist felt that the control of the British government had gotten to be too much of a hardship and they felt as if they had no control of their own destiny or lives. The British government routinely passed new taxes and tariffs and laws on the colonist. When colonist government officials would protest they would be removed, replaced and sometimes arrested. The same men who wrote and signed the Declaration become the early leaders of the new government after Independence from Britain. They wrote another document that was going to form a new type of government the world had never seen. This document known as the US Constitution framed the government we still use today. These brave and knowledgeable men however would be shocked to see what this government has become today, but more on that later.

In December of 1860, South Carolina seceded from the U.S. union. Within the next seven months, several other states had joined the new Confederate States of America. These states left the U.S. for several reasons, slavery was a big reason but by far, not the only reason or the most important. Many in the south felt their very way of life were in peril. They were upset about over protective tariffs and taxes being imposed on them by the bigger more powerful northern states. (Sound familiar) Also, they were concerned that as more non-agricultural areas were added to the union then these taxes and tariffs would be imposed and their small amount of power in the senate would be diminished to where they would be completely under the power of other states and they figured from events of the past forty years of congressional and Supreme Court rulings had began to reinforce federal power and lowering state’s rights. This made them feel as though they had no control over their own destiny and futures. (Sounds familiar) Unfortunately for states’ rights they lost the war and the power of the federal government grew to what it is today.

Fast forward to 2008. Everyday more and more of our rights are taken away. First the Supreme Court took away prayer in schools and continues to erode any mention of Christianity in schools or public places. They do this based on a false pretense of the so called “Separation Doctrine”. This is based on a single letter that Thomas Jefferson sent to a Bishop in answer to a question of government interference in religion. When the Constitution was ratified, many states had official religions. The wording of the First Amendment clearly says congress, not any mention of the states. Any person who studies the Constitution will agree that when the document says congress it means clearly the legislative branch of the federal government. When the Constitution says state it means the individual states. So clearly from this, then local communities and states have the right to have public displays of Christianity. However as we all know, this is not the case. Another important part of the First Amendment is the free speech part, this has been trampled on by the Campaign Finance laws of a few years ago. Another threat to this is the Fairness Doctrine which affects radio and TV shows. The democrats want to enact this to stop conservative talk shows from being on the air by requiring stations to air an equal amount of the other side. However liberal talk radio has failed except for Air America which is constantly on life support. My question is, will CNN, NBC,CBS, and ABC news be required to give conservatives an equal chance after their liberal anchors give their version of the news each night. Also with the possible election of Barak Obama to the Presidency with the democrats continuing to hold to congress could put into jeopardy the Second Amendment rights to gun ownership, as could the Supreme Court ruling on D.C.’s gun ban. This could lead to the federal government taking away all our guns which would make the liberal elite happy since us rural folk have to have our guns and God to hold onto. The U.S. Senate is also debating a global warming bill that could severely damage the economy and lead to even higher energy cost and huge new taxes. Now imagine a federal government who over taxes you, over regulates your life, (they want to outlaw SUVs and trucks), and even tells you what to eat. Does any one else besides me see the pattern here? The liberal elites want control of our children, what we can drive, what we can eat, and how about soon where we can live. This is a scary prospect for the nation that was founded on freedom from government being the most important God given right! Also lets look at the fact that the liberals are willing to destroy our economy by not allowing domestic oil drilling or liquefied coal. They will bow to their special interests and friends and ignore the pleading of the people of the nation for relief at the gas pumps. It seems that a few senator and congressman from a few states will try and control the rest of the nation and the will of the majority be damned. I will leave you with my favorite part of the Declaration of Independence and you draw your own conclusions of it’s meaning.

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 abolish it and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizations its power in such form, as to them shall most likely to effect their safety and happiness.

A Modest Energy Policy Proposal

I am just a veterinarian with very little economic or political experience outside of running a successful business for six years, however I have thought long and hard about an energy bill for the US to solve the current crisis. So, please bear with me a let me know who would support this.

First, we must solve the gasoline and diesel crisis. The best ways to do this would be by opening older capped wells in the United States, begin drilling in ANWAR, North Dakota, and increase drilling in the Gulf of Mexico and the Carolinas. I know everyone is convinced that this will not help with the price of oil on the open market, but please bare with me. This increased drilling would have to be coupled with a 10% increase in the size and capacity of our current refineries without having to build new ones. Next we would have to unfortunately put price controls on oil or not put our domestic oil on the open market. As much as I hate any government interference in private industry, this would be necessary in the short term. While adding this extra oil won’t completely solve the problem, we can fill in the gaps with liquefied coal. This can be done very safely and according to new research after the refining process the liquefied coal actually has less carbon emissions then oil based gasoline. The U.S. Air Force recently announced that they are going to begin using this technology for jet and diesel fuel and not rely on oil based products. If the government can do this, then why can’t this be used for civilian use? By using these two products we can lessen our use of ethanol and begin bringing back down the price of feed corn which will lower the price of meat and corn based products. I have to admit I used to be on the ethanol band wagon, but now I see the error of my ways. I still believe in using bio-diesel which is recycled materials. I believe by doing these three simple ideas, we could quickly bring down gas and diesel prices, which then in turn would bring down food and other retail prices and begin bringing us out of the recession. Now I realize that doesn’t break us of our oil dependency, but we should put a time limit on using these resources. I recommend putting a ten to twenty year limit on drilling and then only use the coal if needed afterwards. This gives us time to develop alternative sources such as hydrogen powered cars. I understand that the major car makers say they need ten years to perfect hydrogen fuel cells for cars. This would also give us time to put the hydrogen infrastructure in place. We need time to build refineries and put pipelines and pumps at fuel stations throughout the nation. Also in these ten years we can give a large government prize for developing safer hydrogen fuel cells or other alternative energy. I don’t mean government research grants which have proven to be inefficient and unproductive or tax credits which don’t give incentive to make new discoveries, but a cash prize to inventors who make big breakthroughs in new energy sources. Newt Gingrich really deserves credit for this idea in his new book he chronicles why cash prizes are better then grants.

As far a producing electricity, I would suggest shutting down all oil fueled electric plants and begin replacing them with nuclear, solar and cleaner coal facilities. The cleaner coal plants that pump the sulfur and carbon emissions into the ground where they are filtered by the earth before coming into the atmosphere is a great idea and would help with green house gas problems. Windmill farms on federal grazing areas in the Midwest could help as well. With new highly efficient solar panels for houses, people could produce a large amount of their own electricity and lower the need for bigger plants.

I believe these common sense ideas could go a long way to solving a lot of our national problems while not endangering the environment. Please give me feed back and lets start a debate. We the people have to lead this charge because congress and our government as a whole are completely inept and too dependent on special interest groups and their money.

Presidential Idol

I have an idea to make sure that everyone in America gets a fair shot to vote for President in both primaries and the general election. This would also put the contest into a form which the American people would understand.

First we create a new show (probably on FOX) called Presidential Idol. In March of an election year we have a week of 2hour shows. The first four nights rotate two for Democrats and two for Republicans. The last night we have the three major third parties share one show. (Libertarians, Greens, and Constitution Parties) On each show, each candidate gets an equal amount of time to present his case, to audition as it were for the job. After the first set of shows people then vote in an on-line and phone-in primary. Each party gets a pin number sent to it’s registered voters and each can only vote in his/her own primary one time. The technology to regulate this already exists with on-line primaries. Independents can vote for any party they want.

After the primaries, then we have a two month period of campaigning and debates then reassemble the five candidates for another week of speeches (auditions) and one big debate. Then we have our national vote and we have a new President.

I truly believe in American society today, this idea would work great and since most elections are more popularity contest then about ideas and issues then we can be spared the usual rhetoric. This would also plicate the lazy American culture and allow them to vote without having to leave their couches.