Filmmaker Michael Moore has recently squatted down and dropped another steamy pile of “documentary” into the can. His new film is an attack on Capitalism which I have not seen and don’t plan to see. Because I have not seen it, this article will not be an attack on the content of the movie. I will give Moore the benefit of the doubt and assume that he has abandoned his previous techniques — sensational and sophomoric attacks — and has decided to finally become a true seeker of the truth.

I assume he went to the Mises Institute to interview Lew Rockwell, Jr. and discuss the economic theories of Ludwig von Mises, F.A. Hayek, and Murray Rothbard. I’m sure Moore provided an in-depth argument explaining why prices should be determined by the Labor Theory of Value and not by supply and demand in a laissez faire system. Moore no doubt backed up his arguments with Rockwell with volumes of evidence to show how planned economies have outperformed free economies.

While at the Mises Institute, Moore probably sat down with Thomas Woods, author of Meltdown, since Moore’s movie is supposed to be a look at Capitalism’s role in the financial collapse. They surely discussed the Austrian Theory of the Business Cycle and the role of interest rates in the market. They probably also discussed the role of the Federal Reserve in inflating the money supply and artificially setting interest rates and how that caused the housing bubble. Moore no doubt was able to show how it was capitalism that caused these problems and not the manipulation of the market by the Federal Reserve, government-owned enterprises like Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, and government action such as the Community Reinvestment Act. Moore also probably pointed out how the Stimulus and all of the bailouts have saved capitalism just like the New Deal “saved” it in the 1930’s.

After Moore’s intellectual debates with Rockwell and Woods, he probably hopped aboard the Amtrak and rode with the “common people” down to California to meet with Yaron Brook from the Ayn Rand Institute, to discuss the moral and philosophical implications of capitalism as explained by Ayn Rand’s Objectivism vs. Marxist and Rousseauian Socialism. Moore obviously made reasoned and logical arguments for why the ideas that people should be “forced to be free” and goods should be distributed “to each according to his need, from each according to his ability” are morally and philosophically superior to ideas like voluntary cooperation and working in one’s self-interest.

I’m sure that he didn’t resort to his usual tactics and stand in front of AIG with a megaphone shouting that he “is making a citizens arrest of the board of directors…” Oh wait, he did that in the trailer?!? I’m sure that was just to attract an audience, but the rest of the movie will be full of facts, logic, and deeply thought-provoking arguments.

Anyway, what I really want to know is, how is he going to handle ticket sales, and how will he pay his employees? After all, profit is bad, and Moore is the defender of the “common man” (i.e. the proletariat.) Perhaps he is going to use Marx’s Labor Theory of Value when deciding how much tickets should cost and how much his employees should be paid. Will people have to bring a pay stub and their recent tax return to determine their ability to pay? Will they also need to bring proof of their political and economic affiliations to show their “need”? Obviously libertarians and objectivists are the most in “need” of watching this movie since we are the ignorant masses that still believe that capitalism is the only way to ensure individual rights and liberty. Conservatives will have to pay slightly more, and progressives and socialists will pay the most (unless they are poor) since they don’t even “need” to watch this movie. How will we determine “need” vs. “ability”? How much would a rich conservative pay? Would a poor libertarian actually make money if they go? A rich progressive would have to sign over the lease on his Prius for a ticket. And how will Moore determine the cost of the labor applied to making the movie by his cameraman, writers, producers, grips, editors, etc.? How much is he going to pay himself? Is he making the same amount as the cameraman?

Or does this movie belong to the people (read: State)? How can Michael Moore claim any ownership of this film? Film is art and art belongs to the people, right? How very greedy of Mr. Moore to try to keep this movie to himself AND to make money off it! He should sign ownership of this movie over to the people of the world, and give all the money he has made from this movie and any of his other films to the government. Once he has signed over all of his property, he should work in whatever job the collective decides would most help the collective (the show Dirty Jobs has some great ideas), send all of that money to the government and sign up for welfare and Medicaid, so the government can take care of him just like in his favorite country, Cuba.

Todd Hollenbeck is a weekly contributor to The D.C. Writeup.

Yesterday, Speaker Nancy Pelosi became very emotional as she likened recent health care protests to anti-gay rights crusades that plagued San Francisco in the 1970s. She choked up explaining, “I have concerns about some of the language that is being used, because I saw this myself in the late ’70s in San Francisco. This kind of rhetoric was very frightening, and it created a climate in which violence took place.”

Pelosi was referring to discriminatory sentiment that swept California and supposedly led to the assassinations of Supervisor Harvey Milk and Mayor George Moscone in ’78.  I personally believe she is using the incident, which recently gained publicity thanks to an over-hyped Sean Penn movie, to source her claims that today’s rhetoric will lead to violence.  But Nancy’s crocodile tears fall a bit short because Milk and Moscone’s murderer, Dan White, was enraged by an alleged job dispute, not anti-gay sentiment.  When you put this itsy-bitsy piece of information in context Nancy’s tears appear as artificial as the support she is trying to drum up for Obama’s health care plan.

Coincidentally, former President Jimmy Carter was in office when these assassinations occurred. Carter, too, has been generating headlines this week for publicly condemning Joe Wilson’s “You lie!” outburst as being racially driven.

Pelosi and Carter make quite the tag team when it comes to ridiculous and unsupported accusations.

Critics of the dynamic duo assert that the president’s color has no bearing on opposition to Obama’s reforms. House Republican Leader John Boehner maintains, “I reject this resoundingly. The outrage that we see in America has nothing to do with race,” Boehner said. “It has everything to do with the policies that he is promoting.”

Rep. Pete Sessions of Texas, chairman of the National Republican Congressional Committee, had even more scornful words for Pelosi: “The speaker is now likening genuine opposition to assassination.  Such insulting rhetoric not only undermines the credibility of her office, but it underscores the desperate attempt by her party to divert attention away from a failing agenda.”

Pelosi never offers specific examples of the dangerous anti-Obama rhetoric that offends her so much. All that is clear is that she wishes that we would all “curb our enthusiasm in some of the statements that are made.” Perhaps she is referring to posters a protester held at last weekend’s Tea Party rally that likened Obama to a witchdoctor.

Since there is scant footage in the mainstream media of the massive rally because most of the major news networks refused to cover it, it is easy for Pelosi to get away with telling the public that the protest was riddled with racist propaganda. The images most people aren’t exposed are ones like these. Nowhere, amongst the masses, do I see bigoted representation of conservative opposition to the president’s reforms. What I do see are emaciated piggy banks, but no sea of primitive Obama tribal men.

Nancy Pelosi, just so you know, I have concerns about some of YOUR language. Stop bracing America for the apocalypse, stop employing the politics of fear you purported to rail against for the last eight years, and lay off the ‘us/them’ rhetoric that was supposed to dissappear in this “post partisan” era of Obama.  And to conservatives, fight fair. Please don’t substantiate this woman’s fake hysterics with anymore of the isolated mudslinging the mainstream media will seize on.

Another day, another awesome new ACORN video. Wednesday’s installment in the ACORN corruption video saga comes to us thanks again to the under-cover work of James O’Keefe and Hannah Giles.  In  their fifth tape, O’Keefe and Giles visit an ACORN office in National City, California, near San Diego.

Even though we know exactly what’s coming, this stuff never gets old. They present the same story that we are all quite familiar with by: a pimp and a prostitute looking to open a brothel and bring in a dozen or so El Salvadorian girls to “work” for them.

An interesting thing to note about this particular office, is that they specialize in dealing with immigration issues. And the ever fortunate O’Keefe and Giles are able to counsel with another helpful ACORN employee who is devoid of any moral compass, Juan Carlos. Carlos is a lawyer who went to school in Mexico, did not take the California bar exam, and has contacts who are good at smuggling immigrants across the border.

During the course of their conversation, Carlos informs the two that Tijuana is the best place for the El Salvadorian girls to come through because he has contacts in the city who have experience with this. You just knew ACORN and TJ would be linked eventually.  He generously gives O’Keefe his cell phone number so that he can be contacted to help facilitate the operation.

Perhaps the best moment of the entire tape comes when Carlos asks Giles where she is located in San Diego and how much she charges for her “services.”

Last night on the Sean Hannity Show, Giles and Andrew Breitbart of biggovernment.com talked about the video. Breitbart said that these videos continue to show that ACORN as a whole “seem to be experts at facilitating crime . . . and helping bring the underclass to work the system as best they can.” As we have watched each of the five tapes that have been released, at no point does any employee look confused or befuddled as whether they should be helping O’Keefe and Giles evade the law. They also never have to think too long or too hard about what advice to give them.

More and more we continue to see that lying on government housing and tax forms, helping immigrants come to the country illegally, and advising prostitutes on how to hide money in a tin box and deposit cash without raising suspicion is common practice in this corrupt organization.

Finally, it seems that action is beginning to be taken to at least halt ACORN from doing any more damage and swindling even more of our tax dollars. On Wednesday, ACORN announced that it wouldn’t take any new clients until an independent auditor and investigator look into the organization’s practices. Republican lawmakers are also pushing for an investigation into ACORN and want to cut it off from the government entirely. Fox News reported that John Boehner, House Minority Leader, introduced legislation on Tuesday to do just that.

The new video is below:

Yesterday, another ACORN video was released showing that ACORN’s West Coast officials are just as gullible and corrupt as their Eastern branches.  The fourth installment of James O’Keefe’s—an independent filmmaker—undercover footage exposes ACORN consultant, Tresa Kaelke, endorsing prostitution from their office in San Bernadino, California.  Glenn Beck heavily promoted the audio and video on his radio and TV show.

Usually, a new tape triggers two immediate responses from ACORN headquarters: 1. Employees fired.  2.  Empty lawsuit threats launched at Fox News and O’Keefe.

Kaelke not only advised O’Keefe on how to evade the IRS, but also struck a common bond with ‘Eden’ as a former owner of an escort service. This time, however, ACORN is standing behind Kaelke because they believe she was clever enough to detect O’Keefe’s charades were a scam and her responses were provoked for shock value.  At one point during the consultation Kaelke states, ” … If I didn’t know better, and I don’t, but I would think this is a total setup.”

In a written statement ACORN reasons, “She matched their false scenario with her own false scenarios.”  But Kaelke’s suggestions that O’Keefe and Giles use a massage spa or vitamin distributor as a front for their brothel certainly sounds like it could be construed as legitimate advice.  ACORN also said the duo, “Were not believable.”  In fact, they were so not believable they’ve only managed to fool ACORN offices in four cities.  Or, perhaps, Tresa Kaelke is smarter than your average ACORN employee.  We hope ACORN isn’t counting on the latter.

Whether or not Kaelke’s responses were in jest, at no point does she turn the couple away or lead them to believe her advice for covering their prostitution ring’s tracks wasn’t in earnest.

Honestly.

If your organization’s defense rests on one employee who may have been smart enough to suspect a rouse related to smuggling underage prostitutes into the country, but not smart enough to tell the scammers to leave, then you’ve got some problems.

We would suggest stop grasping for excuses and find some new employees who don’t condone sex slavery.  More videos are going to break and these pitiful attempts to excuse your behavior are only going to look more pathetic.

Update 11:09am: Read more here about ACORN’s latest excuse for their California employee.  She was just joking.

Yesterday, we waited all day for the latest undercover video exposing ACORN. And boy, was it worth the wait. The video shows activists James O’Keefe and Hannah Giles going into the ACORN office in San Bernardino, California. The footage released in this fourth video is even more shocking and telling of the corruption that runs throughout the ACORN organization than the three that have preceded it.

The video, filmed on August 17, 2009, again features O’Keefe and Giles posing as a pimp, with the aspirations of a career in Congress, and a prostitute “Eden,” who are looking to open a brothel and bring in underage El Salvadorian girls to turn “tricks” for them.

The ACORN employee helping them is the enthusiastic murderer (more on that later) and former escort, Tresa Kaelke. She is informed about their “interesting line of work” and O’Keefe’s intentions to fund a future congressional campaign with the money the underage girls will earn in the course of their “activities.”

Once Tresa found out that Eden was a prostitute, her response was “Oh, okay!” Now stop for a moment and ask yourself, would this be your response if you were in Tresa’s position? Is this the response of any normal person with common decency? One would hope not. 

Oh, and we didn’t even mention Tresea admitted committing premeditated murder.  The tape shows Tresea bluntly talking about planning, then killing her abusive husband.  Of course we don’t condone spousal abuse, but then again we don’t condone murder, either.

In four separate instances now, we have seen ACORN employees do all that they can to enable and encourage illegal immigration and child sex slavery with the use of taxpayer money.

On his program last night, Glenn Beck continued to remind his audience that “This is not about ACORN . . . . We need to focus on the bigger picture.” He has a very valid point. Most likely, this pattern of corruption does not just exist in isolated offices and it is certainly not limited to less than a dozen ACORN employees. Beck is asking the right questions. But yet again, will we get any answers or see any action from government leaders?  Will mainstream media outlets bother to pay an ounce of attention?

Even as the Senate voted 83-7 to pass a bill to halt housing funding to ACORN, more steps need to be taken to uncover how deep the roots of corruption run.  The solution to this does not involve merely firing the employees that O’Keefe and Giles talked to or just cutting off future funds. From the look of things, and Beck’s numerous hints, this could very likely humble those holding the reigns of power.

Both Republicans and Democrats should join forces and launch a full-scale investigation into ACORN, its associates, and all of its practices. There is no place for partisan politics when our taxpayer money is being used to fund a corrupt organization who conspires to skirt tax laws, organize an underage prostitution ring, and lobby for liberal causes.  According to The Washington Examiner, Acorn has received $53 million in federal tax money since 1994.

Extra Thoughts:  Just how many more videos do O’Keefe and Giles have hidden away?  We’d bet they got more than four offices in the sting.  Giles has hinted more await to be released.  We’ll be waiting.

New video:

During the 2008 Presidential election, Senator Obama’s face was plastered across Jones Soda Company bottles. Recently, however, he has gone against his one-time supporter and is throwing around the idea of creating a three cent soda tax. According to the Congressional Budget Office, the tax would generate 24 billion dollars over the next four years, and over 50 billion dollars in the next decade.

Over the past decade, our nation has doubled the amount they spend annually on obesity-related health care.  Currently, the United States of America spends 147 million dollars a year in this arena, and if drastic measures are not taken, the number will continue to rise.

Although it’s no secret that our country is over eleven trillion dollars in debt, why are we going after the soda industry? There has been at 12.3 percent increase in the five different “soda members” of the S&P soda index since the beginning of this year.  If there was a tax increase, the S&P soda index would drop drastically, hurting American soda giants such as Pepsi.  Recently, in New York, Governor David Paterson tried to create an 18% tax on empty, calorie laden beverages, but after encountering uproar from both New Yorkers and the beverage industry, Paterson removed the tax.

There is hope for this tax, in fact over a dozen states(including California and Texas), have already applied it for these sugary beverages.

Michael Jacobson, executive director of the Center for Science in the Public Interest notes, “Soda is clearly one of the most harmful products in the food supply, and it’s something government should discourage the consumption of.”

President Obama made a similar comment against soda in a magazine interview saying, “Every study that’s been done about obesity shows that there is a high correlation between soda consumption and obesity…. Obviously it’s not the only factor, but it’s a major factor.”

Now we need to decide what is more important: helping the soda industry, which in turn helps the economy, or attempting to lend a hand to the escalating percentage of Americans who are obese.  Will mandating a soda tax have enough of a effect on one of the markets to make it worth it for another one?  It’s a sticky situation.

Conservatives around the country are outraged by increasing government spending, and they aren’t being quiet any longer. On Saturday, September 12, tens of thousands of Americans joined together in the nation’s capitol to let their elected leaders know they are tired of the government encroaching on the liberties of the citizens.

The main sponsor for the march was Freedom Works, a Conservative organization that has worked to mobilize grassroots support for tea parties across the nation. Several other groups came together to organize this event, including Tea Party Patriots, National Taxpayers Union, and several other conservative grassroots organizations and think tanks. Known as the 9-12 March on Washington these groups invited people from all over the country to come to Washington, D.C. in order show government officials they were no longer going to stand idly by while Washington continues to spend excessively and strap citizens with trillions of dollars of debt.

Leaning on the words and actions of patriots throughout history including President Ronald Reagan, Abraham Lincoln, the Founding Fathers and other revolutionaries, protesters banded together to advocate less government spending, increased competition to guide health care reform, Constitutional government, and individual liberties.

Colorful signs and banners reinforced the protester’s messages. Some signs claimed President Obama and House Speaker Pelosi were pushing socialist agendas, while others claimed that November would be judgment day for Congressional Democrats. Many people made t-shirts, banners, and signs that included cries for liberty, evoking images of founding fathers and early revolutionaries whose vision was to create a government for the people by the people.

Rallying cries included “Don’t tread on me,” “Read the Bill,” “Go Green Recycle Congress,” “I am not your ATM,” and “You Lie” referring to the outburst Representative Joe Wilson made at President Obama’s health care speech on Wednesday. Obamacare protesters were not in short supply, thousands of people displayed intense disagreement for the health care plan. Protesters cried for politicians to read the bill and get rid of the public option.

Fox News anchor Glenn Beck, a strong advocate of the “9-12 Project” has been promoting the event for several weeks on his Fox News program. The “9-12 Project” is “designed to bring us all back to the place we were on September 12, 2001. The day after America was attacked we were not obsessed with Red States, Blue States or political parties. We were united as Americans, standing together to protect the greatest nation ever created.”

The 9-12 March on Washington was the climax of the Tea Party Express tour which began on August 28^th, in Sacramento, California, traveled over 7,000 miles, and visited 35 cities to end in the Nations Capitol. Citizens began by marching from Freedom Plaza to the West Lawn of the Capitol where the rally began.  The rally included speakers and musicians from around the country including businessmen, health care professionals, authors, and politicians such as Congressman Mike Pence. All of these speakers were protesting government run health care, government bailouts, and mounting deficits.

This event was one of the largest gatherings of conservative activists on record with estimates ranging from tens of thousands to two million. This large showing of conservatives proves that a grassroots movement is growing. They have made it clear that they will not back down and will continue to put pressure on elected officials to end outrageous spending and offer common sense solutions to health care.

Did Obama and his Democratic colleagues get the message? Obama left DC on Saturday during the protest to attend his own rally in Minnesota where he pushed health care reform. Senator Jim DeMint, R-S.C., who spoke at the Washington rally, referenced Wednesday’s speech when he said that, “The president has warned us if we disagree with him he’s going to call us out.” DeMint then offered this piece of advice to Mr. Obama, “Well, Mr. President, we are out.”  Conservatives are not worried about being “called out” for their disagreements, they are pushing for a debate in Washington, a debate including their conservative ideas. President Obama, who is pushing to “improve” the health care bill, is not interested in starting over, a call Republicans are continuing to make.

Conservatives have had enough. They are standing up and will no longer let themselves be dominated by a Democratic agenda.  Only time will tell if Obama is going to stop pushing his floundering ideas and start engaging in true bipartisan debate instead of saddling us with an even larger deficit.

Students across the nation head back to school this week, and as they begin this new school year, they will be facing additional challenges as huge budget cuts plague schools all across the nation. School districts everywhere are forced to make hard decisions about saving money, many of these decisions include cutting teachers, staff, and programs.

Massive budget cuts across the nation have forced school officials to drastically cut teachers and staff. In some school districts, thousands of teachers have been cut. While some teachers have been rehired, many are still out of work, forced to find a job teaching a grade or a subject they may be unfamiliar with.

In some California districts such as the Los Angeles Unified District, almost nine thousand teachers have been laid off. Thanks to the stimulus bill, around seven thousand were rehired, however, some two thousand were left either with out a job or were hired as day-to-day substitutes.

The Los Angeles Unified School District stated that they are doing everything they can to manage under the severe budget cuts by cutting programs and increasing class size. Those that were rehired and placed in classrooms with a higher number of children. In the Mesa Public Schools District, some classrooms have between 35 and 40 students, making classrooms overcrowded and adequate space hard to find.

Public schools aren’t the only ones being affected by the budget cuts, colleges and universities have also been hit hard. Stanford University, one of the wealthiest universities in the nation, has had to layoff over 400 employees, with more layoffs expected. While the academic staff has been protected from these layoffs, those holding positions such as coaches, librarians, and accountants were not so lucky. With roughly fifty teaching positions left unfilled, the question still remains whether or not the quality of education will be affected.

Educators in the Kent School District in Washington State have gone on strike protesting large class sizes that have resulted from budget cuts. Teachers believe that the large class sizes have decreased the quality of education, and have turned the educator’s task into managing instead of teaching the class. Many classes are not only large, but they also contain a number of students with learning disabilities and language barriers, making it even more difficult to address the individual needs of students. Children in this school district will not be starting school until the teachers agree to stop the strike.

Will students face difficulties this year based on these far sweeping cuts?  Unfortunately, the difficult economic times will place an additional burden on schools and teachers by increasing class size and decreasing resources in schools across the nation.

Last week President Obama seized another opportunity to undermine the Bush administration while throwing a bone to his legions of liberal supporters dissatisfied by floundering health care reform.  Obama launched an attack, not against the terrorists threatening our nation, but on the CIA’s treatment of these detainees.  While it’s  admirable that liberal hearts bleed for the welfare of terrorists, what are their suggestions on how we are supposed to get extremists to talk when they are happily awaiting their 72 virgins?

Left-wingers have denounced interrogation methods including waterboarding, forced nudity, and mock executions.  In their defense, some of these measures are pretty harsh, if not exactly torture.  The Democrats have suggested that we instead start conducting high value detainee interrogations strictly by the Army Field Manual.  In light of their suggestion, let’s see what what the book’s 19 approved techniques permit:

The manual generously allows interrogators to ask suspects questions in “rapid fire” sequence.  They are also allowed to repeatedly ask the same question over and over.  If that isn’t grueling enough, they can focus on verbally exploiting the prisoner’s anxieties or fears.

By this point the prisoner should be reduced to a trembling mess, but for the tough cases interrogators are authorized to question them individually or not speak to them for days on end.  Your little sister is familiar with that last one, otherwise known as the “silent treatment.”    And if all else has failed, lying is sometimes authorized, but intentional deceit, such as bluffing, may only be employed under specific circumstances.

I believe they train middle school guidance counselors under the same code.

Leading by example is certainly admirable, but I’d rather not see more headless Americans showing up in Al-Qaeda videos because we no longer can get the information we need.  Additionally, now that news of our national security’s passive aggressiveness is breaking headlines, we’re admitting to terrorists that we are legally restricted from causing them physical endangerment. Where’s your poker face, America?

Former Justice Department official, David Rivkin, fears the government is being naïve in treating alleged terrorists with the same precautionary measures as common criminals.  He says, “This is a full return to Sept. 10 mentality.”  Dick Cheney has also come forward to speak out against conducting CIA investigations.  He believes this will set a dangerous precedent for a President to challenge the legality of the work of a previous administration.  The ramifications will be felt more immediately as the CIA experiences low morale, loses veterans, and has trouble recruiting.

Let’s take a look at the facts….harsh interrogations work.  The following is a list of information disclosed by prisoners only after methods used in the Army Field Manual failed and waterboarding was employed.  The record speaks for itself:

•    Plans to attack the US consulate in Karchi, Pakistan
•    Plots to hijack and fly aircraft into Heathrow Airport
•    Derail a train in the US
•    Blow up US gas stations
•    Fly a hijacked plane into tallest building in California
•    Collapse bridges in New York
•    Reveal the names of 70 al-Qaeda members previously unknown by the US

Still think the CIA deserves to be punished for preventing the next 9/11?

Although some economists believe the recession has finally come to a close, some are predicting that the jobless rate will continue to rise for at least another year.

“The number of laid-off workers applying for benefits dipped to 570,000 last week from an upwardly revised 574,000. That was a weaker performance than the drop to 560,000 claims that economists expected.”

The Labor Department reported Thursday that those receiving jobless benefits increased by 92,000, rising to 6.23 million.  Thomas Reuters surveyed the economists who expected this number.

Even though numbers have improved since the recession’s high of 674,000 new jobless claims, numbers are still extremely elevated. 325,000 new claims show the country being in a “healthy labor market.”

In spite of these claims, Vice President Joe Biden expressed optimism about the current situation saying that the stimulus program has worked better “than we had hoped.”  Of course the V.P. would say this.  He wouldn’t want to scare the country any more than they already have been with the public option for health care and the depleting situation in Afghanistan.

Sal Guatier, senior economist at BMO Capital Markets, issued a fairer statement noting,“The lack of job creation remains a big headwind for cash-starved and credit-constrained consumers and thus a major impediment for the fledging recovery.”  This statement offers facts as opposed to Biden’s dry claim which only suggested that the situation is turning out better than planned.

Christina Romer, an economic advisor to President Obama, has expressed that before the country sees improvement, it is possible for unemployment to rise to 10 percent before the end of the year and even 10.3 percent before next summer.

As if that weren’t enough bad news, jobs are also continuing to be cut. Danaher Corp., a Washington-based manufacturer, is going to lay off 3,300 employees, nearly double the amount they laid off last spring.  California had the highest increase of claims at 8,632.  Alternately, Michigan saw the largest drop of claims at 2,968 thanks to fewer layoffs in the state’s auto driven workforce.

A resolution to the current job crisis is necessary to saving this country’s economy. It’s funny that economists offer more insight into the weakening situation, rather than the country’s leaders. Joe Biden cough cough.

As the war in Afghanistan enters its ninth year, we continue to see the increased sophistication of insurgent attacks. This past August brought the highest number of casualties since the beginning of the conflict in 2001. Given this, one has to wonder if the Obama Administration is doing enough to win  the war in Afghanistan?  General Stanley McChrystal claims in his report to Washington on August 31 that the situation is “serious,” but the war can still be won. While there are efforts being made to gain ground in Afghanistan, the Taliban regime is effectively countering our many of the moves we’ve made.

Not only have their attacks become more successful, but Taliban insurgents control enough territory they can train fighters in close proximity to their operations.  In addition, they have turned to professional fighters from Arab and Central Asian countries to help them in these efforts. We are not fighting a loose collection of insurgents, instead, we are dealing with an increasingly sophisticated force which calls for added attention to strategy, planning, and troop numbers to counter insurgent success.   Unfortunately, each new road, school, and police station the US builds is another target for the Taliban to attack, adding yet more concern for U.S. strategists.

Currently, U.S. Marines are looking to animals for assistance in the rugged terrain by training with mules. At the Mountain Warfare Training Center in the Sierra Nevada mountains, marines are taught how to work and train mules, and how to effectively pack and carry equipment. Mules allow marines to navigate areas where roads are inaccessible and the air is too thin for heavy helicopters. The U.S. military is trying to think smarter in the continuing effort to combat insurgent gains in the area and increase U.S. control of the rugged terrain.

McChrystal wants the U.S. military to transform the way they think in order to turn the war in their favor. The General suggests that “brute force” will not help us win the war, instead we must work to change our strategies, improve intelligence, and work towards decreasing civilian deaths. McChrystal’s recent report to President Obama has not directly called for additional troops. However, White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs suggested that the efforts in Afghanistan have been “underresourced.”

Now, The D.C. Writeup wonders: Is Obama willing to spend money where it really counts?

California’s struggle with wildfires has been attributed to global warming but it’s time to take a realistic approach and review the poorly designed environmental rules and regulations that contribute to the annual infernos that rage across my state.

Protecting human habitats is a secondary concern for many environmentalists who zealously push to protect any animal on the “endangered species” list without an eye for the broader implications of their policies.  One animal in particular is the kangaroo rat.  Because of it’s endangered status farmers, ranchers, and property owners are forbidden from clearing shrubbery where the rodent lives.  This shrubbery and undergrowth on California’s hills and back country is allowed to slowly build until it becomes a tinder box waiting for ignition.

For example, San Diego has protected over 170,000 acres of habitat for more than 1,000 plant species and 380 animal species.  The urge to protect endangered species is admirable, but the resulting fires burn with such intensity that it actually makes it harder for the animals and the habitat to recover.

California, and the federal government, need to loosen environmental regulations and make way for common sense.  For example, San Diego recently burned fifteen acres of grassland at the March Stephens’ Kangaroo Rat Preserve in an effort to prevent wildfires.  This is sound environmental policy that, unfortunately, is not duplicated on a widespread basis.

“The core problem is that species protection prohibits many ordinary fire precautions,” wrote Hugh Hewitt, a California radio talk show host. “You cannot clear coastal sage scrub, no matter how dense, if a gnatcatcher nests within it – unless the federal government provides a written permission slip which is extraordinarily difficult to obtain.”

Environmentalists and CNN have attempted to link the fires to global warming, but employing commonsense strategies, such as cleaning up the brush and using controlled burns, will prove far more beneficial to both humans and animals than slinging wild accusations.  The environmental movement has noble goals but they need to seriously examine the side effects of their policies.

“Marriage is one of the ‘basic civil rights of man,’ fundamental to our very existence and survival.” – Chief Justice Earl Warren

As chronicled by a recent New York Times article, many conservatives are shocked that Ted Olson is leading the federal challenge to Proposition 8, California’s prohibition of gay marriage. Olson is a powerhouse Republican. He served in the Reagan administration; he represented President Bush in Gore v. Bush, and after winning that case, he became solicitor general from 2001 to 2004. As if further evidence of Olson’s conservative credentials were needed, the second line of his Wikipedia entry (the resolving force of all disputes) reads, “[Olson] is a major figure in the conservative legal movement.”

Clearly, then, something went wrong. After all, Republicans don’t support gay marriage, right? Heck, not even our current President—a true blue Democrat—supports gay marriage. Maybe Olson was standing on his toilet seat, hanging a clock, then slipped and hit his head on his sink and discovered not the flux capacitor (which makes time travel possible), but that gays should be allowed to marry.

That is, of course, one possibility, but it’s also possible that Olson has reconciled gay marriage with Republican principles. A rough Republican break-down of gay marriage would look something like this:

Pro Republican Principles:

Equality under the law. So long as you are citizen of the United States, you should have equal standing before public institutions and public law. Just as Olson argued against affirmative action based on its disparate treatment of different racial groups, he now argues against the distinct treatment of people of different sexual orientations.

Free to Choose. The Republican Party has long stood for individual autonomy. The individual should be free to act so long as he does not violate the rights to non-interference of fellow citizens. Gay marriage is pretty harmless on this account.

Pro marriage. This is one of the best stances of the Republican Party. The effects of marriage are overwhelmingly positive. It seems natural that a Republican would want to share the benefits of marriage with as many as possible.

Pro family. Republicans are similarly quick to recognize the benefits of family. Currently 200,000 children are raised in gay households. This number would go up if gay relationships were solidified through marriage. More children in the country would grow up with two loving parents linked by an “indissoluble” bond. Perhaps, or even probably, heterosexual parents do a better job raising kids. But homosexuals won’t be stealing children from heterosexual parents—most of the kids belonging to today’s homosexual couples are adopted from broken families or from families that can’t support the child.

Anti Republican Principles:

If it ain’t broke, don’t fix it. We Republicans don’t usually like tinkering with what works, and the institution of marriage as one man and one woman has been fundamentally successful for… quite a bit of time. There are always unintended consequences that accompany change. And in this case, if you give the marriage mouse a cookie… then he might ask you to sanction polygamy as well.

Religion. We also have a profound respect for the wisdom of our Western religions. According to most interpretations of these religions, homosexuality is none-too-kosher, and marriage is supposed to be a heterosexual affair.

These lists are by no means exhaustive, and they’re not meant to be. But they do prove that gay marriage is not as clear cut for Republicans as the reaction to Olson would suggest.

All in all, as Olson begins his crusade on behalf of the roughly 12 million homosexuals in this country, we can presume that he is still in his right mind and that he is still a solid Republican.

Stephen Richer is a regular contributor to The D.C. Writeup.

The delta smelt is a blue, 2-inch long fish native to California’s Sacramento River delta.

It’s also a symbol of environmentalism gone awry.

Two years ago, Federal District Judge Oliver Wanger imposed restrictions on how much California’s state water authority can pump out of the Sacramento River, on the grounds that the water pumps were drawing in and killing the endangered delta smelt, in violation of the federal Endangered Species Act. The pumps supply millions of Californian farms, businesses and consumers with water.

The pump restrictions may be good for the delta smelt, but they’re awful for California. As a result of the restrictions, thousands of acres of farmland in the once fertile western San Joaquin Valley are drying up, 85,000 Californian farmers and laborers are out of work, and whole towns are dying. In Mendota, a century-old farming town west of Fresno, unemployment has reached 41 percent. In nearby Firebaugh, the unemployment rate has reached 40 percent. Overall, the pump restrictions are expected to cost California’s agriculture industry upwards of $500 million per year, indefinitely.

In April, thousands of farmers gathered at the San Luis Reservoir near Los Banos, Calif., to protest the pump restrictions. The Stockton (Calif.) Record interviewed one of those protestors, a 55-year-old almond farmer named Sharon Wakefield. At the time, the federal government was preparing to completely shut off the flow of water to Wakefield’s farm. Without water, Wakefield’s almond trees will die.

“I don’t know what we’re going to do,” Wakefield said. “My family came out [to California] with the Dust Bowl, and I’m not going back.”

Wakefield is one of the human victims of modern environmentalism, a movement that increasingly ignores the human costs of its efforts. What was once a movement dedicated to serving humanity and grounded in reason has gradually morphed into an ideological crusade grounded in hysteria. And what was once a campaign to improve the quality of life of humans is now fighting to improve the quality of life of fish — at the expense of humans.

This is insane. And yet, this sort of environmental radicalism creates an opportunity that the Republican Party can easily exploit: an opportunity to steer the environmental movement down a more moderate path by offering pragmatic solutions to America’s environmental challenges.

So far, Republicans have failed to do that. According to a 2008 Pew Research Center poll, 65 percent of voters believe that Democrats are better at protecting the environment than Republicans. Only 21 percent of voters told Pew that Republicans are better than Democrats at protecting the environment.

With environmentalism surging in popularity, Republicans can no longer afford to be seen as the anti-environmental party. According to a 2008 ABC News/Planet Green/Stanford University poll, 41 percent of Americans now describe themselves as environmentalists and 42 percent of Americans now say they prefer to vote for environmentalist candidates over non-environmentalist candidates. Only six percent of Americans would prefer to vote for a non-environmentalist candidate over an environmentalist candidate.

In the coming years, environmentalism is likely to grow even more popular — which is why the GOP can no longer afford to cede environmental issues to the Democrats. Instead, the Republican Party needs to engage in environmental debates, gain credibility with voters on environmental issues, and start to influence and shape environmental debates, from what to do about global warming to what to do about delta smelt.

For this to happen, the Republicans need an environmental vision. They need to define what a Republican approach to environmentalism would look like.

It could look something like this:

First, a Republican approach to environmentalism would recognize that, while new environmental regulations may be necessary, those regulations don’t need to be oppressive and economically debilitating. Liberty and a healthy environment are not mutually exclusive.

Second, a Republican approach to environmentalism would emphasize personal responsibility. This means relying on individual initiative instead of government mandates; and on private-sector, free-market solutions to environmental challenges instead of on massive government interventions in the economy.

Finally, a Republican approach to environmentalism would consider environmental needs in light of human needs.

In the context of the delta smelt debate, a Republican environmentalist would have a simple solution: install filters on the Sacramento River’s water pumps. This would save most, but not all, of the delta smelt, and would spare California’s farms and farmers from economic destruction.

As Republican strategists prepare to revamp the GOP’s overall message in preparation for the 2010 and 2012 elections, they’d be wise to incorporate some form of environmentalism into that message. Doing so would benefit both the Republican Party and the country.