I have long since pondered an article called “The Myth of a Mandate,” debunking the liberal mantra that since the November elections when Obama won and liberals captured majorities in both houses of Congress, that this means the people of the United States have given a mandate to the entire liberal social platform with Obama as the poster boy leading the charge.
I don’t believe it for a minute. Perhaps I will get the chance to research and write that article properly. For now, the waning of Obama in the policy polls is proving my original sentiments correct. Nevertheless, a question remains. Since January we have experienced some of the most sweeping legislation and proposals toward socialism in American history, and the question arises, how could even the most popular of governments change so much in so little time? Obama, even if he had a “mandate,” is simply not that popular.
Answer: he has a bulldog to do his dirty work for him.
The term “bulldog” as applied to a forceful front-man for another controversial polarizing figure goes back to Thomas Huxley, who dubbed himself “Darwin’s bulldog.” The more introverted Darwin retired from public view later in life, while Huxley, having grown so strongly convinced of Darwin’s theory, turned combative and defended Darwin vehemently. Huxley did Darwin’s dirty work for him.
So who is Obama’s bulldog? Who has nipped heel and threatened teeth-marks in defense of Obama’s food-bowl? To the last fire hydrant, Nancy Pelosi has marked the territory, using every dirty trick to stare, growl, and threaten the opposition out of even having a hearing.
This is no piece of mere rhetoric. An article by Representative John Carter (R-TX) has exposed Pelosi’s strong-arm tactics and covert methods of suppressing dissent on nearly every piece of major legislation this year. Readers must know two aspects of this virtual censorship of Congress: 1) the tactics, and 2) the extent. Carter explains the tactics:
Every day that the House is in session, following the final vote of the day, representatives are allowed the privilege of free speech on the House floor in what is known as “Special Orders.” They may speak for one minute, five minutes, or one hour segments, and must request their time in advance. Time is allocated equally to both parties on a first-come basis.
Since the advent of live C-SPAN coverage of the House, this has provided a national televised outlet for both Republicans and Democrats to speak to the nation on topics they feel were not adequately addressed during regular order in the House, during which the Democrat majority has the parliamentary ability to limit debate and speeches.
Special Orders therefore frequently serves as a political safety valve if the party in the majority becomes too dictatorial during debate, using their majority status to truly oppress the minority’s ability to debate and offer amendments.
That is now the case in the House, with the Democrat majority under Pelosi repeatedly rejecting House rules to ram a far-left agenda through before the public has time to learn what is actually in the bills.
This is what we were committed to bring to public light.
House rules require a bill be publicly posted for three days before it can be voted on. That basic rule was written by none other than Thomas Jefferson as part of the original rules package of the House, as it is essential to the survival of representative democracy.
The House can waive that rule if it chooses on specific occasions. The Republican-controlled House chose to waive it when considering the Patriot Act in 2001 following the terror attacks of 9-11. They thought there was enough of a national defense emergency to just bring the bill to the floor for a vote.
But Nancy Pelosi and her House Democrats have chosen to ignore the rule on every major issue taken up by the House this year. . . . [1]
Did you catch that Pelosi has denied both the public hearing of dissent against her and Obama’s agenda, and has consistently, routinely — now as a matter of policy — forced 1000-page bills through the House without even three days to read and debate the bill. Representatives — let alone the people — have no chance to read the bills before the bulldog forces the vote under pressure.
Notice that Carter says “every major issue” in the House this year. Here is his list. Some you will recognize; some of these ominous sounding, $ billion-debt-sagging bills I have not even heard of until now. Carter writes of the extent:
The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act – The Obama Stimulus: This one just had to pass that very day because time was a-wastin’ in getting those new jobs coming. We couldn’t wait for Members to read it. But then the President waited four days to sign it into law while he spent the weekend in Chicago, and months later none of the new jobs have come into existence.
The Children’s Health Insurance Program Reauthorization (SCHIP): Speaker Pelosi couldn’t wait on this one either, although the deadline for reauthorization was still two months away.
The Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act: Lilly was peddled as covering decades-old wage discrimination cases, but after waiting 20 years, Congress couldn’t wait one more day to let Members actually read the thing.
The Omnibus Public Land Management Act of 2009: No excuses at all on this one. They just didn’t want the details known.
The Omnibus Appropriations Act of 2009: This one has been languishing since last October, but we suddenly had to pass it that day.
The AIG Bonus Tax Act: This had to get through right then, don’t mind the details, we just had to go after those bonuses. Only when we read what passed after the fact, the bill contained waivers for all of the same executives the bill was supposed to reign in, many with curiously close ties to Treasury Secretary and tax cheat Tim Geithner.
The Supplemental Appropriations Act of 2009: No rush whatever on this one time-wise, the Democrats just didn’t want people talking about the hundreds of billions given to foreign banks that should have gone to our troops.
The American Clean Energy and Security Act/National Cap-and-Trade Energy Tax:
No excuse was offered on this one, the Speaker just didn’t want anybody reading Henry Waxman’s 300 page amendment he sneaked in overnight before we were forced to vote. Three weeks later, the Senate shows no intention of taking up the bill before the opening day of dove season, if then. [2]
I knew of most of these bills, and have written about them, but I didn’t know some of these covert details. I also didn’t know about a couple of the bills: the Supplemental Appropriations Act of 2009 which grabbed a mere $100 billion for war funding as Democrats who consistently opposed war under Bush now all of the sudden want to fund it; as well as the Omnibus Public Land Management Act of 2009 which consolidated Federal lands and grabbed an additional 2 million acres and a thousand miles of rivers as Federally “protected land.” After being defeated under normal rules (2/3 vote), Pelosi suspended the rules which led to a passage by a simple majority. And these slid by almost completely unnoticed in the shadows of the other $1–2 Trillion of Obama’s deficit legislation.
Meanwhile, while the $ trillions in debt pile up, let’s hear what Pelosi had to say last October 3, 2008, after vehement opposition to the Bush bailout package:
With a new president of the United States [looking ahead to Obama], “NO NEW DEFICIT SPENDING” must be our mantra. (listen here, at 9:55 and forward)
So much for one more promise.
Meanwhile, Pelosi’s censorship of all opposition to Obama’s leftist agenda has grown strong. Representative Tom Price (R-GA) exposed this underhanded Bulldogging recently. He said in congress,
Speaker Pelosi told members of your [Chairman George Miller’s (D-CA)] conference that if you talk with Republicans about this you’ll be shut out of the room.[3]
If that’s not deliberate suppression of info from the public and from other members of Congress — that is, Censorship — I don’t know what is. Rep. Carter mentioned that the Bulldog has eliminated the “special order” sessions in which House debate can alert the public to vital information in bills. Well, he explains why: because,
we had planned to speak on the lack of transparency of the House since Democrats took control. We had planned to criticize Speaker Pelosi for repeatedly denying Members, the media, and the public to right to read legislation before it was voted on. We were set to discuss House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer’s statement last week that if his Members were required to read the Democrats’ healthcare reform package before it was voted on, it would fail.
So the Speaker obviously feels that if the public is truly aware of her party’s agenda, they will reject it.[4]
These statements do not exaggerate at all. Rep. Steny Hoyer did actually say that. Here’s the report:
House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) said Tuesday that the health-care reform bill now pending in Congress would garner very few votes if lawmakers actually had to read the entire bill before voting on it.
“If every member pledged to not vote for it if they hadn’t read it in its entirety, I think we would have very few votes,” Hoyer told CNSNews.com at his regular weekly news conference.[5]
The dishonesty and corruption involved here should call for resignations. It is this type of corruption that has been necessary to maintain the myth of a mandate. Meanwhile, the polls are exposing an ever-weakening favor for Obama’s agenda, as “A Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll in late July found that support for Obama’s healthcare plan had dropped: 42% called it a bad idea and 36% said it was a good idea. In mid-June, opinions were about evenly divided.”[6] Just image what the public would think if they knew the truth about these strong-arm tactics and Bulldogging behind the scenes.
Yet, support is weakening enough — in fact, opposition is mounting considerably as actual parts of the 1000-page Healthcare bill have leaked into the public — that angry citizens have begun overwhelming town hall meetings. Representatives in favor of the bill have met loud opposition and drowning jeers for their dogged support, many wanting to know if their guys have even read the thing. Yet, instead of taking the hint that the people don’t want the socialist healthcare bill, Pelosi has blamed the people for being irrational and disruptive. Through her spokesperson she said, “These are screamers, not rational debaters. . . . Regular constituents are not getting heard. They shut down any other voice than their own.”[7] In other words, when the people who agree with her can’t be heard, that’s unacceptable. Meanwhile, she suppresses and threatens those in Congress who wish to dissent. And this is supposed to be rational debating? This is not even irrationalism. It is tyrannical evil, totalitarian wickedness.
So, thanks to the well-summarized column by Rep. Carter, and the comments by Rep. Price, and a few other means, we now know who, exactly, is trying to “shut down any voice other than their own.” Obama’s Bulldog, Nancy Pelosi, has her teeth sunk into corruption all the way up to her turned-up nose. And while she’s trying to stop other representatives from even holding town-hall forums — in order to avoid the obvious opposition — we know she’s behind the scene barking and threatening her way (and ours) toward a socialist destruction of honesty and freedom in this nation. Now we know.
Last fall, we saw the failure of the representative system when Congressional offices were inundated with calls opposing the $700 billion bailout. The Congressmen knew it, they publicly admitted and stated it, and yet they voted (in a re-vote) to pass the legislation. One banker had more sway over Congress than the collective voice of the entire people. Paulson was the Bailout Bulldog. Now Pelosi is playing that role for Obama and the leftist agenda. The only hope we have is not only to inundate Congress with our voice, but clearly to let that Congress person know that you will vote to unseat them, no matter who their opposition is, if they do not faithfully represent you in this issue.
Once in a government healthcare plan, we will never get back out. Like the behemoths of Social Security and Medicare, both of which strain under the weight of $ trillions in debt and both of which will fail, a government run healthcare plan will lock us in to the bitter end with no escape. It will breed its own constituents once in place, and will be impossible to vote back out. Such a plan is unbiblical as it supplants the family in God’s plan. This is unbiblical especially when forced upon a nation using censorship and forced ignorance on the public. God help us to stop it.
Article posted August 7, 2009
Related posts:
- The Politics of the Government Healthcare Bill
- Pelosi Health Care Rush Vote, Saturday – CALL CONGRESS NOW
- Obama Hood and Obamanomics
- Stimulus 101: Obama Vs. Reagan
- Obama: First Father, Chief Principal, and Head Psychologist
Obama’s Bulldog
I have long since pondered an article called “The Myth of a Mandate,” debunking the liberal mantra that since the November elections when Obama won and liberals captured majorities in both houses of Congress, that this means the people of the United States have given a mandate to the entire liberal social platform with Obama as the poster boy leading the charge.
I don’t believe it for a minute. Perhaps I will get the chance to research and write that article properly. For now, the waning of Obama in the policy polls is proving my original sentiments correct. Nevertheless, a question remains. Since January we have experienced some of the most sweeping legislation and proposals toward socialism in American history, and the question arises, how could even the most popular of governments change so much in so little time? Obama, even if he had a “mandate,” is simply not that popular.
Answer: he has a bulldog to do his dirty work for him.
The term “bulldog” as applied to a forceful front-man for another controversial polarizing figure goes back to Thomas Huxley, who dubbed himself “Darwin’s bulldog.” The more introverted Darwin retired from public view later in life, while Huxley, having grown so strongly convinced of Darwin’s theory, turned combative and defended Darwin vehemently. Huxley did Darwin’s dirty work for him.
So who is Obama’s bulldog? Who has nipped heel and threatened teeth-marks in defense of Obama’s food-bowl? To the last fire hydrant, Nancy Pelosi has marked the territory, using every dirty trick to stare, growl, and threaten the opposition out of even having a hearing.
This is no piece of mere rhetoric. An article by Representative John Carter (R-TX) has exposed Pelosi’s strong-arm tactics and covert methods of suppressing dissent on nearly every piece of major legislation this year. Readers must know two aspects of this virtual censorship of Congress: 1) the tactics, and 2) the extent. Carter explains the tactics:
Every day that the House is in session, following the final vote of the day, representatives are allowed the privilege of free speech on the House floor in what is known as “Special Orders.” They may speak for one minute, five minutes, or one hour segments, and must request their time in advance. Time is allocated equally to both parties on a first-come basis.
Since the advent of live C-SPAN coverage of the House, this has provided a national televised outlet for both Republicans and Democrats to speak to the nation on topics they feel were not adequately addressed during regular order in the House, during which the Democrat majority has the parliamentary ability to limit debate and speeches.
Special Orders therefore frequently serves as a political safety valve if the party in the majority becomes too dictatorial during debate, using their majority status to truly oppress the minority’s ability to debate and offer amendments.
That is now the case in the House, with the Democrat majority under Pelosi repeatedly rejecting House rules to ram a far-left agenda through before the public has time to learn what is actually in the bills.
This is what we were committed to bring to public light.
House rules require a bill be publicly posted for three days before it can be voted on. That basic rule was written by none other than Thomas Jefferson as part of the original rules package of the House, as it is essential to the survival of representative democracy.
The House can waive that rule if it chooses on specific occasions. The Republican-controlled House chose to waive it when considering the Patriot Act in 2001 following the terror attacks of 9-11. They thought there was enough of a national defense emergency to just bring the bill to the floor for a vote.
But Nancy Pelosi and her House Democrats have chosen to ignore the rule on every major issue taken up by the House this year. . . . [1]
Did you catch that Pelosi has denied both the public hearing of dissent against her and Obama’s agenda, and has consistently, routinely — now as a matter of policy — forced 1000-page bills through the House without even three days to read and debate the bill. Representatives — let alone the people — have no chance to read the bills before the bulldog forces the vote under pressure.
Notice that Carter says “every major issue” in the House this year. Here is his list. Some you will recognize; some of these ominous sounding, $ billion-debt-sagging bills I have not even heard of until now. Carter writes of the extent:
The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act – The Obama Stimulus: This one just had to pass that very day because time was a-wastin’ in getting those new jobs coming. We couldn’t wait for Members to read it. But then the President waited four days to sign it into law while he spent the weekend in Chicago, and months later none of the new jobs have come into existence.
The Children’s Health Insurance Program Reauthorization (SCHIP): Speaker Pelosi couldn’t wait on this one either, although the deadline for reauthorization was still two months away.
The Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act: Lilly was peddled as covering decades-old wage discrimination cases, but after waiting 20 years, Congress couldn’t wait one more day to let Members actually read the thing.
The Omnibus Public Land Management Act of 2009: No excuses at all on this one. They just didn’t want the details known.
The Omnibus Appropriations Act of 2009: This one has been languishing since last October, but we suddenly had to pass it that day.
The AIG Bonus Tax Act: This had to get through right then, don’t mind the details, we just had to go after those bonuses. Only when we read what passed after the fact, the bill contained waivers for all of the same executives the bill was supposed to reign in, many with curiously close ties to Treasury Secretary and tax cheat Tim Geithner.
The Supplemental Appropriations Act of 2009: No rush whatever on this one time-wise, the Democrats just didn’t want people talking about the hundreds of billions given to foreign banks that should have gone to our troops.
The American Clean Energy and Security Act/National Cap-and-Trade Energy Tax: No excuse was offered on this one, the Speaker just didn’t want anybody reading Henry Waxman’s 300 page amendment he sneaked in overnight before we were forced to vote. Three weeks later, the Senate shows no intention of taking up the bill before the opening day of dove season, if then. [2]
I knew of most of these bills, and have written about them, but I didn’t know some of these covert details. I also didn’t know about a couple of the bills: the Supplemental Appropriations Act of 2009 which grabbed a mere $100 billion for war funding as Democrats who consistently opposed war under Bush now all of the sudden want to fund it; as well as the Omnibus Public Land Management Act of 2009 which consolidated Federal lands and grabbed an additional 2 million acres and a thousand miles of rivers as Federally “protected land.” After being defeated under normal rules (2/3 vote), Pelosi suspended the rules which led to a passage by a simple majority. And these slid by almost completely unnoticed in the shadows of the other $1–2 Trillion of Obama’s deficit legislation.
Meanwhile, while the $ trillions in debt pile up, let’s hear what Pelosi had to say last October 3, 2008, after vehement opposition to the Bush bailout package:
With a new president of the United States [looking ahead to Obama], “NO NEW DEFICIT SPENDING” must be our mantra. (listen here, at 9:55 and forward)
So much for one more promise.
Meanwhile, Pelosi’s censorship of all opposition to Obama’s leftist agenda has grown strong. Representative Tom Price (R-GA) exposed this underhanded Bulldogging recently. He said in congress,
Speaker Pelosi told members of your [Chairman George Miller’s (D-CA)] conference that if you talk with Republicans about this you’ll be shut out of the room.[3]
If that’s not deliberate suppression of info from the public and from other members of Congress — that is, Censorship — I don’t know what is. Rep. Carter mentioned that the Bulldog has eliminated the “special order” sessions in which House debate can alert the public to vital information in bills. Well, he explains why: because,
we had planned to speak on the lack of transparency of the House since Democrats took control. We had planned to criticize Speaker Pelosi for repeatedly denying Members, the media, and the public to right to read legislation before it was voted on. We were set to discuss House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer’s statement last week that if his Members were required to read the Democrats’ healthcare reform package before it was voted on, it would fail. So the Speaker obviously feels that if the public is truly aware of her party’s agenda, they will reject it.[4]
These statements do not exaggerate at all. Rep. Steny Hoyer did actually say that. Here’s the report:
House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) said Tuesday that the health-care reform bill now pending in Congress would garner very few votes if lawmakers actually had to read the entire bill before voting on it. “If every member pledged to not vote for it if they hadn’t read it in its entirety, I think we would have very few votes,” Hoyer told CNSNews.com at his regular weekly news conference.[5]
The dishonesty and corruption involved here should call for resignations. It is this type of corruption that has been necessary to maintain the myth of a mandate. Meanwhile, the polls are exposing an ever-weakening favor for Obama’s agenda, as “A Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll in late July found that support for Obama’s healthcare plan had dropped: 42% called it a bad idea and 36% said it was a good idea. In mid-June, opinions were about evenly divided.”[6] Just image what the public would think if they knew the truth about these strong-arm tactics and Bulldogging behind the scenes.
Yet, support is weakening enough — in fact, opposition is mounting considerably as actual parts of the 1000-page Healthcare bill have leaked into the public — that angry citizens have begun overwhelming town hall meetings. Representatives in favor of the bill have met loud opposition and drowning jeers for their dogged support, many wanting to know if their guys have even read the thing. Yet, instead of taking the hint that the people don’t want the socialist healthcare bill, Pelosi has blamed the people for being irrational and disruptive. Through her spokesperson she said, “These are screamers, not rational debaters. . . . Regular constituents are not getting heard. They shut down any other voice than their own.”[7] In other words, when the people who agree with her can’t be heard, that’s unacceptable. Meanwhile, she suppresses and threatens those in Congress who wish to dissent. And this is supposed to be rational debating? This is not even irrationalism. It is tyrannical evil, totalitarian wickedness.
So, thanks to the well-summarized column by Rep. Carter, and the comments by Rep. Price, and a few other means, we now know who, exactly, is trying to “shut down any voice other than their own.” Obama’s Bulldog, Nancy Pelosi, has her teeth sunk into corruption all the way up to her turned-up nose. And while she’s trying to stop other representatives from even holding town-hall forums — in order to avoid the obvious opposition — we know she’s behind the scene barking and threatening her way (and ours) toward a socialist destruction of honesty and freedom in this nation. Now we know.
Last fall, we saw the failure of the representative system when Congressional offices were inundated with calls opposing the $700 billion bailout. The Congressmen knew it, they publicly admitted and stated it, and yet they voted (in a re-vote) to pass the legislation. One banker had more sway over Congress than the collective voice of the entire people. Paulson was the Bailout Bulldog. Now Pelosi is playing that role for Obama and the leftist agenda. The only hope we have is not only to inundate Congress with our voice, but clearly to let that Congress person know that you will vote to unseat them, no matter who their opposition is, if they do not faithfully represent you in this issue.
Once in a government healthcare plan, we will never get back out. Like the behemoths of Social Security and Medicare, both of which strain under the weight of $ trillions in debt and both of which will fail, a government run healthcare plan will lock us in to the bitter end with no escape. It will breed its own constituents once in place, and will be impossible to vote back out. Such a plan is unbiblical as it supplants the family in God’s plan. This is unbiblical especially when forced upon a nation using censorship and forced ignorance on the public. God help us to stop it.
[1] John Carter, “Pelosi Censors Republicans,” HumanEvents.com, July 16, 2009, (accessed Aug. 6, 2009).
[2] John Carter, “Pelosi Censors Republicans,” HumanEvents.com, July 16, 2009, (accessed Aug. 6, 2009).
[3] Listen Here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SD_YOlUBoIk (accessed Aug. 6, 2009).
[4] John Carter, “Pelosi Censors Republicans,” HumanEvents.com, July 16, 2009, (accessed Aug. 6, 2009).
[5] Monica Gabriel and Marie Magelby, “Democratic Leader Laughs at Idea That House Members Would Actually Read Health-Care Bill Before Voting On It,” CNSNews.com, July 08, 2009, (accessed Aug. 6, 2009).
[6] Janet Hook, “Healthcare debate gets uglier,” LATimes.com, Aug. 6, 2009, (accessed Aug. 6, 2009).
[7] Janet Hook, “Healthcare debate gets uglier,” LATimes.com, Aug. 6, 2009, (accessed Aug. 6, 2009).
Article posted August 7, 2009
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