Both the Left and Right have recently had the uncomfortable experience of discovering that their various icons possessed feet of clay – worse, had been employed by the NeoConservatives. My liberal friends wince when I mention Hillary. I cringe when other names are raised.
It happened. All of us have been gulled not once but many times. Those operating the sock puppets have something in common. Left or Right, NeoCon or other ...ism, they are mostly working for corporations. Prominent among them are the self identified NeoCons. The NeoCons are a good example of the species.
Here is who the NeoCons are. It is not a large group. The NeoCons are the professional cadre, meaning they are compensated, who have provided the misdirection and chaff that kept Americans from seeing what was happening before their very eyes. They are in the media, policy, and write books that are intended to keep us in the frame most useful to their employers.
You know who a few of them are now. You do not understand how long they have been at this because you were not around. But your perception does not alter the reality. I have had the experience more times than I would have wanted of having to reconsider my trusts and assumptions.
Phyllis Schlafly is a good example of this. Look at Schlafly's site and her issues. Then consider the history of the freedom movement for the last 40 years. Do you really mean to tell women that they do not have the same rights as men? If so just fold up your tent and go away. You have decided that you are going to lose. The direction for humanity to towards freedom, not slavery. Servitude comes in many forms but all forms use the tool of government to eliminate choices, truncating our right to decide for ourselves.
If you are a proponent of freedom and understand Austrian School Economics then consider what those values mean. That is simple. You have the right to determine your own destiny. Rights don't give you control over anyone but yourself. That is axiomatic.
Therefore children do not have a 'right' to a family made up of a mother and father. You get what nature and events deliver to you. This assertion makes no more sense than saying you have a right to be pretty instead of ugly. It is like deciding your DNA should be rearranged and getting Congress to pass a law. In Phyllis's world children have a right to a Mom and Dad, evidently issued by the State, but no right to free speech.
Rights are simple. You have a right to life, liberty and to pursue your own happiness. Nothing more and nothing demanded, coerced or forced fro someone else.
Schlafly's site is full of inane arguments that lead to fascist outcomes. The only sovereignty we need to worry about is that invested in each of us. Schlafly invests that in the State. She is therefore a centrist, a fascist.
You may find her emotionally satisfying because you have a secret hankering to use force to get your way. Or you may be emotionally and culturally invested in the status quo so you can't see what freedom means. You can learn. If not, join another movement.
Schlafly's job was to maintain a presence in the movement while ensuring that women were persuaded to see the Freedom Movement as hostile to their attempts to assert their inherent rights. She has been a lot more effective than Karl Rove. No one has any illusions about Rove now.
This is what happened.
Irving Kristol originated the term, “Neoconservative,” using it in his book by the same name. He is not an ideologue but he uses ideas as his basic tools. He and others who can be identified by that term are opportunists who successfully profited by providing those services mentioned above, cultural and ideological positioning.
Today it is obvious to most people, ordinary Americans, that the War in Iraq was built on lies. Lying is one of the strategies those involved have used for several generations. Bald faced lies are so outrageous that we do not imagine anyone would say it if it was not true. Then we forget and then their strategy is to change the terms. For instance, we went into Iraq because of security and stayed to Make Them Safe for Democracy. Lies like this work very well. They deny the people access to the facts, provide justifications for all sorts of things and work to centralize power.
Those lies were constructed and inserted by a cadre of people with long term linkages to each other. They very knowingly reinforce each other's messages, helping to foster the feeling that the lies are true. Repetition is essential. These are the professionals mentioned above.
Those working for the corporations, the NeoCons and their friends, needed to ensure beginning in the 50s with the Goldwater Movement that the Republican Party was converted from an organization reawakened to the reality of freedom and individual rights to something they could control. They needed to quench and direct the spirit that had been fostered in that generation of activists through the merging of the Objectivist Movement and the Goldwater Revolution, so they would accept the rhetoric of freedom as a substitute to the living reality.
They had several target groups they knew would be a problem. Women were one of these groups. The Freedom Movement has an ugly tendency to vilify women. That is intentional.
That misdirect was accomplished through the work of a group of people who you can identify as NeoCon as well, although they can also be identified, quite truthfully, as the Public Relations arm of the corporations, a slightly different subset of individuals.
This is not really very hard to trace if you keep your mind clear and your eyes on the action instead of allowing yourself to be seduced by personalities and rhetoric.
The lynch pin was Ronald Reagan. Bill Buckley batted next.
Ronald Reagan was not a conservative. He was never a Conservative. If you read my article titled, “Ronald Reagan – An Ugly Truth,” you will see that this is well documented and attested to by Connie Ruffley, the present co-chairman of United Republicans of California, the same group that issued the resolution citing its causes and urging that no Republican support him in a bid for president for a possible Reagan candidacy in 1974.
Ronald Reagan was positioned to take over the Conservative Movement by a powerful group of men who proceeded to pay his bills forever after. Many of these were connected to USC. Before 1960 his politics were very different.
Since Ronnie was a friend of my Dad's I knew him. I also knew he was no Conservative. As Connie affirms and as I knew at the time Ronnie's record as governor of California clearly identified him as a corporate placement. He instituted withholding taxes. He prepared the ground for the new wave of Federalism to come in a variety of areas, including education. See the UROC resolution.
Ask yourself: Who today is publicly identified as the examplar of Conservativism?
Answer: Ronald Reagan.
That allowed them to steal the vision of freedom and recalibrate the definitions of the next two generations.
To steal a movement you need to do several things. For one thing you need a spokesman/leader who will be popular enough to quiet opposition. At the time we knew the people who went after the Conservative Movement and the John Birch Society as Rockefeller Republicans. William Buckley, whose attempt to take over the John Birch Society failed in 1965 – 1966, identified himself as a Conservative. Since he never held office it is impossible to see action as you would with someone who was elected. But if you examine what and who he supported over the years you will see that he was no such thing. He prides himself as having marginalized the JBS after his take over attempt. He attacked Welch for opposing the Vietnam War.
Then you need to get rid of anyone who will see that this is wrong and inappropriate and object. Women were targeted for that reason. Ronald Reagan delivered the final stroke.
During the 1980 Presidential campaign he met with a group of activist Republican women in a hotel in Los Angeles. His daughter Maureen was there as well. Reagan refused to listen to them and took the ERA out of the GOP platform. He did this to ensure large donations from corporations, including Coors but not limited to Coors.
The activist women left politics, leaving the GOP open to the faction then being organized for political activism by Part Robertson and Ralph Reed, just as they planned.
Today we recognize that the undeclared war in Vietnam was illegal. It benefited Halliburton, who was employed there, and other contractors including Koch Industries. These huge corporations with intimate connections to the Bush Administration are in Iraq today on cost plus contracts. On shore they enjoy protection from Bush as they did from his father.
Did you recognize at the time you had been deceived? Today many people who have spent a life time in the freedom movement are finding common ground with leftists and progressives on issues. That is not new ground, the potential existed back then.
You can always know what happened if you follow the money. Notice who got rich. We used to say, and it is still true, that to have a million dollars as a Libertarian activist – start with two million.
To create the opportunity to make money without working your need to hold power. To do that you redefine the terms by changing what the words mean. Clinton might have redefined 'is' but he learned from experts.
A Goldwater Conservative is a Libertarian today, very close to the same positions held by Ron Paul. Very far from the positions of Ronald Reagan who is clearly a centrist. At one time privatization meant returning control to the individual who was paying. Today this term is best understood as corporatization.
Conservationism did not change. It was hijacked.
So you think that Phyllis Schlafly just wandered in there, all innocence and good intentions? Same for Ann Coulter and the other blond bimbos? Lets look at a few things.
The story about Laura comes straight from a mutual friend who knows her and was horrified. The story about Kellyanne and Fred also comes from people who know them very well. I used to be active in those circles and attended numerous Republican events in DC. Read my book, GREED: The NeoConning of America if you want to know what they are really like.
Goldwater and his wife helped found Planned Parenthood in Arizona while he was defining Conservatism. The Right to Life Movement was taken over in the 70s by a group that moved from persuasion to using force. Bombings and murder of personnel became daily hazards. I had been answering the phone for Right to Life in Los Angeles. That was when I left.
As to Anne Coulter. You may not be aware that she is guilty of lying about her residence, a felony, when registering to vote in Florida. Her personal behavior includes muscling anyone who calls her on her hate talk, including real Conservatives. Coulter solicited and encouraged the harassment of another woman, Lydia Cornell, the mother of two children in Beverly Hills. Coulter published Cornell's home phone number and address and suggested her supporters harrass Cornell. Cornell had called her to ask some questions for an article she was writing. Coulter never returned the call, instead putting this personal information up on her site. Cornell was harassed, her home damaged, and her children terrified. Both are still in grade school. You can hear the interview on my show, the Spiritual Politician.
Coulter had Dan Borcher, who is undoubtedly a long time Republican activist and Conservative, physically assaulted and forced from the CPAC conference earlier this year by the use of false charges of stalking. In fact, Dan's offense was to have criticized Coulter for her hate talk and for plagerism. Dan read her books exhaustively and noticed the many passages lifted whole. He pointed this out. The use of power to stifle the expression of opinion is business as usual for Coulter.
If you go to the Eagle Forum site you find some interesting things. First, Phyllis does not mention Ron Paul's candidacy. Mentions of him appear earlier and then the site goes silent. Some things are advertised on every page. These are Newt Gingrich, Anne Coulter, the Fair Tax. You might remember that Fair Tax oppose Ron's candidacy and are affiliated with Iowans for Tax Relief, the same people made sure that Ron was not invited to participate in the Forum in Iowa.
The Forum site is full of shrill pleas on the present Marriage Amendment. That is opposed by Ron Paul. I disagree with Ron on this because I personally think government has no role in determining personal relationships. Government should not be licensing marriage at all. Marriage is a private and contractual matter more properly handled through churches. But Phyllis takes the position of this administration, extending the power of Federalism.
The bottom line with Phyllis is justifications to use issues that have marginalized women to move us ever further towards Federalism.
All legislation passed even noticing gender should be rescinded. Today's feminists agree with that. Equality means government ignoring differences between its employers, us. It has nothing to do with the choices made by individuals even when we disagree with those choices. Legislating our lives violates our inherent rights. It is not any business of the state to engage in social engineering, not with a 1700s agenda and not in any later agenda either.
Phyllis Schlafly and her campaign of lies is the reason the Equal Rights Amendment was not ratified in the 70s and so was vulnerable to Ronald Reagan. You might look around and see where her funding originated. You might be shocked. The ERA was never intended to impact private decisions, but simply to keep the government from treating people differently because of gender. Allowing government to make determinations about what individuals may and may not do destroys the basis for individual rights that precede government.
Unisex bathrooms? Keep women from serving in the face of enemy fire? These were the arguments Phyllis recycled over and over again.
The Draft? We should never have one for anyone. If wars are worthy we go voluntarily. Personally, I think the Dept. of Defense should focus on defending the borders.
Phyllis had it down to a science. She would come in with lies at the last minute, allowing no time for debate or real discussion.
Do you WANT government in your bedroom and in your personal life? Do you want them deciding for you in any part of your life? That was not and is not the basis on which America was founded. That makes government our master instead of our contractor. It makes us subservient.
This is the Mission Statement
“We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness. — That to secure these rights, Governments are instituted among Men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed, —“
Mercantilism, the desire for special favors from government by wealthy ship owners and merchants was a significant force in achieving a Constitution that was far too powerful. In the aftermath of the Revolution the Exeter Revolt and Shay's Rebellion and then the Whiskey Revolt sent the message that ordinary Americans who wanted nothing from government would be marginalized.
Mercantilism begot the Robber Barons who begot the present line of Grid Corporations.
If women had exercised their inherent rights there would have been a lot of dead politicians.
The hired hands of the people who were known in the 50s – 60s as Rockefeller Republicans (Big Oil) slowly morphed into the group we now know as the NeoCons, the people who provide the justifications and rhetoric that serves to deceive.
The People of the Grid (you can also spell this GREED) believe that they have a right to expect government will ensure their continuing profitability and discourage their competition. What is in a name? They are the mercantilists, Robber Barons and now the People of the Grids or Monied Elite of today. They employ the ambitious who want the money to rub off on them, those we know as NeoCons.
In the mid 70s a group of ambitious Young Republicans got together to look at how they could change the direction of the Republican Party, allowing them to keep control for those they wanted to work for, the Monied Elite.
The group of Young Republicans included Karl Rove, Pat Robertson, Ralph Reed, Jack Abramoff, among others. The group sat down and came up with a plan for determining the direction of the Republican Party, which was the Party that championed suffrage for women. The power of the Republican Party at one time came from its activist women. That has now changed. Today the GOP is actively hostile to women who do not repeat mindlessly the NeoCon line of propaganda. Most of the intelligent activist women left in the early 80s.
Then, there was no division between women, right and left, on social justice issues. There was no division on the issue of clean air and clean water. There were fewer divisions all around. Those chasms of distrust were created by those who wanted to control us. “Why don't you guys fight?”
By dent of hard work and persistence women were making strides towards freedom. It was not perfect, human action never is nor can it be.
Soon after those pimply YRs put together their plan for changing the Republican Party Rove went to work for Bush Senior. Robertson and Reed went on to their alloted life's work, too. They had managed to get hired on to jobs as corporate operatives. It was lucrative for all of them.
George H. W. Bush was a hired operative himself. That is the normal career path for the Bush – Walker Family.
Slowly slicing off pieces of our rights had become their normal harvest over the 150 years since they immigrated here from Germany.
Those original errors by the men who thought the Constitution was a swell idea had borne some nasty fruit.
Failing to affirm rights for everyone made the Civil War and the many generations who necessarily struggled for individual autonomy unavoidable. Government did not have the right to barter rights that are inherent in each of us.
Since you cannot have a free market without each individual exercising their right to decide for themselves how they will drive their small part of the whole the world has never had a free market. Since you cannot be free until you give freedom to everyone we were all slaves, and vulnerable to the government that mercantilist greed had spawned.
Women kept trying to change things through persuasion.
In 1848 the first Women's Convention would nearly replicate the Declaration of Independence with the Declaration of Sentiments, which simply demands their inherent rights be recognized. Those women understood the intention and truth of the idea that rights are inherent. Generations of women have lived and died without achieving simple equality. Instead, frustrated, they began to ask for simulations of equality, which used legislation that dictated to private choices instead of limiting itself to government. They were following the model they had seen not working for over a century. It took them 150 years to give up and settle for less, but they did.
Simulated freedom is not freedom. Freedom is getting the State, all states, out of your life so you are the one to decide how you will live your life. You may be foolish or wise but it is your choice, your life, the gift of God to you as an individual.
At the failure to affirm rights for women and blacks in the aftermath of the ratification of the Constitution State legislatures began passing 'laws' that prevented women from having any control of their own persons and property. Women became de facto property. This was not what they expected.
The women of the Revolution Generation who capitalized the War, providing the needed goods and services to keep their households and the economy going, expected that at the close of that war they would be free. For a while some states, for instance New Jersey, gave women the right to vote. This was withdrawn. Very soon women began organizing and began to open Dame schools and seek educational opportunities that included both their sons and daughters. They recognized they would need these tools to achieve their independence.
They hungered mightily to control their own lives. Some of you may understand how they felt.
Generations struggled for an education so they could get jobs at 1/3 - 1/2 the wage granted to men. They did not ask for anything but the opportunity although they were excluded from schools that were supported by taxes they were forced to pay.
They started their own privately funded colleges.
In comparison the Revolution was a cake walk.
In my family line seven generations of women have worked for freedom, not just for themselves but for all women and for blacks during the Abolitionist period. Their husbands shared those goals and signed marriage contracts that refuted the right of the state to determine the terms of their relationship.
My great-grandmother graduated from medical school in 1880 and went on to run women's clinics, educating women on matters that gave them control of their lives. It was not legal but it was right. We all have a right to the truth if we can find someone willing to tell us.
Those Pimply PR agents were prospering in their careers but they wanted more.
They needed a spokeswoman to sell the idea of continued slavery – to women. Shflafly was delighted to take the job. Schlafly has made her living telling women they should be satisfied to live through the state. She is a traitor to freedom, well paid for her services. Sometimes she comes out on the right side of an issue. But overall she pulls the discourse towards fascism. Schlafly supplies the emotional poison that divides us.
Those pimple faced YRs knew that they needed someone like her. They needed to excise women from positions of power in the Republican Party and replace that voting block with people who would vote as told without asking questions. That is why they loved the idea presented by Reed and Robertson to politicize the least educated evangelical church goers moving the Republican Party South with recently reregistered Yellow Dog Democrats. They knew perfectly well that the intention there was to displace the common law with the Bible, a book that lets you think big about control.
They got rich doing that. So did Phyllis. If you look over sites on the web that purport to be Republican you will notices that many carefully ignore Ron Paul. That is a good indicator. Sites that do that are NeoCon positioning to confuse you.
As long as they can divide us, selling state mandated privilege instead of freedom we will ALL remain slaves. Together we can evoke change.
The original model for America was cooperation, local control, individual rights and Christian tolerance. Those original Christian churches, the Puritan, Quaker, Baptist and Methodist are now viewed as 'liberal.' But it was from their considered understanding and hard lessons that came the idea that each of us is connected to God not through a church and not through government but immediately, personally, and completely.
The only consistent and free market viewpoint is freedom. You will not have it yourself until you find the honesty and courage to give it to everyone. - Melinda
