Posts Tagged ‘Kevin DuJan
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Last Night To VOTE for HillBuzz Friend, Megan Fox as WLS-AM Talk Star!
Hi friends! I need your votes right now! Tonight is the last night to vote for me to get me into the final five! Here’s how it’s done! Go to this link HERE which looks like this:
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AND!!!! YOU MAY VOTE LIKE A CHICAGOAN in this election which means as many times as you want (even if you’re dead.) For detailed instructions on how to clear your cache in order to vote multiple times go to the WLS-AM link HERE that will tell you how!
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An Open Letter to Kevin DuJan about Ron Paul and September 11th
Hi Kevin,
We’re having this discussion in front of God and everybody, so I hope this will be an example of how people who believe different things can discuss things rationally and still respect each others’ basic goodness.
In tonight’s GOP Debate Live Blog, you say,
I am horrified by Ron Paul’s assertion that the United States government was gleeful after 9/11 or that our government knew the attacks were going to happen and let them happen anyway….After these 9/11 remarks, I’ve had enough of this garbage and no longer feel like indulging Fifth-Dimensional craziness in serious debate proceedings. I really hope Paul has to answer a question about his 9/11 remarks; I am sure my friend Jane will be looking down from Heaven with great interest to hear what he has to say.
You and I have not talked about Ron Paul’s comment in private and this is the first I’ve heard about your reaction to it. For those who aren’t familiar, it was part of a speech at the University of Iowa in which Dr. Paul was discussing his foreign policy of non-interventionism, and warning that the Obama Regime is making noises about going to war with Iran:
“Think of what happened after 9/11, the minute before there was any assessment, there was glee in the administration because now we can invade Iraq, and so the war drums beat…That’s exactly what they’re doing now with Iran.”
I think that after working with you for a year, and helping keep HillBuzz.org going at a significant personal investment of time and money, you know my character. I hope you understand me to be unwaveringly patriotic and dedicated to restoring America to the great Constitutional Republic that it once was. And I hope you know that I would never support a candidate who didn’t love America, the Constitution, and the Declaration of Independence as much as I do. So I hope you’ll evaluate what I’m about to say while keeping that in mind.
The concepts I’m going to touch on are tough. It takes an open and curious mind to get beyond the knee-jerk, emotional reaction the Democrat-Controlled Media is counting on you to have upon hearing a sound byte like this. Members of the Ruling Class are counting on a dumbed-down electorate who are incapable of critical analysis, and ignorant of even recent history, to keep them in power. I would ask you to take a deep breath and consider this as dispassionately as you can, given the loss of your friend.
Ron Paul has said repeatedly that he’s NOT a “truther” and does not believe that 9/11 was somehow an “inside job.” Dr. Paul has, however, called it (accurately) a massive failure of our intelligence agencies. In a statement before the House of Representatives in February of 2004, Dr. Paul said,
“There is plenty of blame to go around for the mistakes made by going to war in Iraq, especially now that it is common knowledge Saddam Hussein told the truth about having no weapons of mass destruction, and that Al Qaida and 9/11 were in no way related to the Iraqi government.
Our intelligence agencies failed for whatever reason this time, but their frequent failures should raise the question of whether or not secretly spending forty billion taxpayer dollars annually gathering bad information is a good investment. The administration certainly failed us by making the decision to sacrifice so much in life and limb, by plunging us into this Persian Gulf quagmire that surely will last for years to come.
But before Congress gets too carried away with condemning the administration or the intelligence gathering agencies, it ought to look to itself. A proper investigation and debate by this Congress– as we’re now scrambling to accomplish– clearly was warranted prior to any decision to go to war. An open and detailed debate on a proper declaration of war certainly would have revealed that U.S. national security was not threatened– and the whole war could have been avoided. Because Congress did not do that, it deserves the greatest criticism for its dereliction of duty.
There was a precise reason why the most serious decision made by a country– the decision to go to war– was assigned in our Constitution to the body closest to the people. If we followed this charge I’m certain fewer wars would be fought, wide support would be achieved for just defensive wars, there would be less political finger-pointing if events went badly, and blame could not be placed on one individual or agency. This process would more likely achieve victory, which has eluded us in recent decades.”
And this is the key point I want to make, Kevin. Ron Paul’s foreign policy comes from the same philosophical basis as his domestic and economic policy…Enlightenment traditions of individual freedom, personal responsibility, free market economics, and the Golden Rule. Treat others as you wish to be treated. His foreign policy views are based on the Constitution and advice of the Founders, including George Washington, who warned the young country to avoid “entangling alliances” in his Farewell Address in 1796. It’s also based on the concept of “just war.”
America was a colonial outpost of a Imperial superpower on which the sun never set, and where the King’s word was law. One of my ancestors took up arms against the British Empire and fought under George Washington’s command, creating what was, at the time, the only country on Earth where citizens held free elections to choose their leaders.
A scrappy, ragtag band of rebels fought and died to found the United States of America, defeating the world’s greatest superpower at the time. And their fight was based on ideas and ideals, one of which was “just war,” a very old concept that had been discussed extensively in the 13th century by Thomas Aquinas. To many who believe in the “just war” concept, pre-emptive war is considered immoral in nearly all cases.
If you went to government schools (as I did), this may be hard for you to comprehend. It’s astonishing how ignorant and unschooled we all are, compared to our forebears.
Here’s where I admit that I didn’t vote for Bush. I’m a libertarian, and Bush was a big-government, big-spending conservative. Not my cup of tea. And my personal feeling is that George W. Bush is an honorable man who loves America, and loves the military, but made some really bad policy decisions that I can’t support. (Even so, he was a vastly better president than our first postracial, non-Muslim, Marxist and probably gay president, Barack Hussein Obama.)
I think any American with a heart still has a little PTSD about September 11th. And because September 11th was so horrifying and traumatic, it’s very hard for us to remember anything that was happening in the Bush administration prior to that date. Frankly, most of us (including me) weren’t paying much attention.
But several members of the Bush administration have said that from Day One, a number of Bush advisors and members of his administration were, in fact, eager to go to war and affect a regime change in Iraq, and were looking for any excuse to do so.
This goes against everything Ron Paul, and libertarians like me, believe in–the initiation of the use of force in the absense of a a confirmed, imminent threat to national security. And it goes against what I think America stands for.
In an interview on “60 Minutes,” former Treasury Secretary Paul O’Neill said “From the very beginning, there was a conviction that Saddam Hussein was a bad person and that he needed to go….For me, the notion of pre-emption, that the U.S. has the unilateral right to do whatever we decide to do, is a really huge leap.” [emphasis added]
And this is the beef I have with George W. Bush. As a libertarian, I don’t believe in pre-emptive war, just as I don’t believe in pre-emptively executing people who might commit crimes but haven’t actually done anything yet.
A story on CNN continues [emphasis added],
O’Neill and other White House insiders gave him documents showing that in early 2001 the administration was already considering the use of force to oust Saddam, as well as planning for the aftermath.
“There are memos,” Suskind told the network. “One of them marked ‘secret’ says ‘Plan for Post-Saddam Iraq.’”
Suskind cited a Pentagon document titled “Foreign Suitors For Iraqi Oilfield Contracts,” which, he said, outlines areas of oil exploration. “It talks about contractors around the world from … 30, 40 countries and which ones have what intentions on oil in Iraq.”
In the book, O’Neill is quoted as saying he was surprised that no one in a National Security Council meeting asked why Iraq should be invaded.
“It was all about finding a way to do it. That was the tone of it. The president saying ‘Go find me a way to do this,’” O’Neill said.
Paul O’Neill’s assertions are backed up by former CIA director George Tenet in his book, At the Center of the Storm. In a 2007 article in the Washington Post, Karen DeYoung writes [emphasis added],
White House and Pentagon officials, and particularly Vice President Cheney, were determined to attack Iraq from the first days of the Bush administration, long before the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks, and repeatedly stretched available intelligence to build support for the war, according to a new book by former CIA director George J. Tenet.
Although Tenet does not question the threat Saddam Hussein posed or the sincerity of administration beliefs, he recounts numerous efforts by aides to Cheney and then-Defense Secretary Donald H. Rumsfeld to insert “crap” into public justifications for the war. Tenet also describes an ongoing fear within the intelligence community of the administration’s willingness to “mischaracterize complex intelligence information.”
“There was never a serious debate that I know of within the administration about the imminence of the Iraq threat”…The debate “was not about imminence but about acting before Saddam did.”
According to Ron Paul–who is in a position to know, as a civil libertarian having served 10 terms in Congress–various provisions of the PATRIOT ACT had been floating around Congress for years prior to September, 2001. And after the attacks, in the tradition of Rahm Emanual, Congress “didn’t let a good crisis go to waste,” bundling up a number of privacy-killing, civil-liberties-killing chunks of legislation that had been seen as too extreme into a bill that most Representatives didn’t actually read before signing, and wouldn’t have voted for had it not been called the PATRIOT ACT.
So, in the eight months before the September 11th terrorist attacks, several members of the Bush administration were eager for an excuse to invade Iraq. Several members of Congress were eager for an excuse to start spying on Americans without due process.
I have no reason to believe that members of the Bush administration were happy that nearly 3,000 Americans died on September 11th. None at all. And that isn’t what Ron Paul said, though that is what “news” coverage has implied.
But the record and several contemporary accounts support Ron Paul’s statement, made to a packed house of over 1,300 at the University of Iowa:
“Think of what happened after 9/11, the minute before there was any assessment, there was glee in the administration because now we can invade Iraq, and so the war drums beat…That’s exactly what they’re doing now with Iran.”
Dr. Paul discussed his statement in an interview on Fox News, starting at about the 5:00 mark:
The money quote is:
“This doesn’t mean [the administration] had glee about 9/11, that’s a total misinterpretation. They had pleasure in knowing that they had an excuse now to do what they’d been wanting to do for so long and what did they do? They marched into Iraq based on lies, there was no Al Qaida, no weapons of mass destruction, and look at the tragic outcomes from that effort. Undeclared war…matter of fact, that is carried over into Afghanistan, it looks like it won’t ever end unless we change the administration.”
Kevin, I sincerely hope that you’ve taken the time to read this whole letter, which, I grant you, is probably only of interest to other liberty wonks like myself.
Most people won’t have read this far. Most Americans–if they’re paying attention at all–will still make their voting decision as though they’re watching an episode of American Idol, thanks to decades of hard work by the teachers’ unions.
But I hope, at least, that you hold me in enough regard to know that both Ron Paul and I recognize the September 11th attacks for what they were–horrible, gutwrenching tragedies. And I hope you believe me when I say I’m terribly sorry for the loss of your friend Jane.
But I think that the loss of civil liberties, and endless, unconstitutional, undeclared wars are equally tragic. Because that means that the sacrifices of those who fought and died to protect those hard-won liberties–including my Revolutionary War ancestor, Moses Gee–were in vain.
Kevin, I know you aren’t going to vote for Ron Paul, but I hope that after reading this, you don’t respect me any less for my decision to do so.
Sincerely,
Kathleen Gee
********************************************
Dear Kathleen,
I’ve never censored anything from you as a Ron Paul supporter and have given you free rein to write as much as you want about him, even though I am not a supporter of his. This generates considerable hatemail for me from people out there who think Ron Paul supporters should never be given a forum, but I’ve never interfered with your making your case for Ron Paul.
The reason I’ve done this is because not only do I respect you on a personal level as a friend and as a writer, but because like him or not, Ron Paul is a phenomenon and he attracts scores of devotees coast to coast. There’s a reason that so many people are so excited by his candidacy…and I want to understand what they are so excited about.
I have tried numerous times to understand this excitement, but every time I try to dig deep and appreciate what Ron Paul is all about, something horrifying jumps out like his feelings toward 9/11.
In the debate tonight, Dr. Paul went on a tear about how we should close the Embassy in Baghdad and bring troops home from shuttered bases all over the globe, with America withdrawing all personnel to the continental US. That’s madness. Pure and utter madness.
While I do believe there are bases that are no longer needed and forces should be shifted in many cases, I don’t think Dr. Paul has a real appreciation of the ripples his dream plan would cause. I do think the US needs to start charging hefty fees for the protective services the country’s military provides, so that American taxpayers are not footing the bill for this ourselves. But I can only listen to Dr. Paul for a few minutes before he goes off the deep end with me.
I don’t think I’m alone in this, and in fact feel I’m more fair to Dr. Paul than 95% of people out there because I do keep trying to understand him and the phenomenon that surrounds him.
But 9/11 is sacred to me, as it’s sacred to many Americans. And Ron Paul’s comments on 9/11 are horrifying to me. So much so that he’s really crossed a line this time. These remarks lost a good deal of whatever credibility I had for Dr. Paul. I’m not sure why his supporters will continue to stand with him after these 9/11 remarks, but I certainly will never see Dr. Paul the same way after this.
I encourage you to keep writing about Dr. Paul and the clear media push against him (which is indeed real). I also think you may be right that Dr. Paul will win the Iowa Caucuses, since ground game is everything there and Dr. Paul’s supporters certainly are motivated to head out into the cold and vote for him. If Huckabee won in 2008, and his “I Heart Huckabee” supporters were only a fraction as devoted as the Paul supporters are, then there’s a very good chance that Paul could, indeed, win Iowa.
To be totally honest, I hope Paul DOES indeed win Iowa…because this might be the final straw that forces the parties to remove Iowa as the first in the nation state come primary season. It’s high time Iowa lost this honor, and a Paul victory following Huckabee’s the cycle before that could be just what’s needed to change the nomination calendar in the future.
I love Ron Paul’s zeal for cutting spending, but am horrified by more of what he says than I’m appreciative of his willingness to go out on a limb. Just as I see the need to recognize the fact that Ron Paul generates such fervent support amongst his supporters, Paul supporters like yourself need to understand the horror Dr. Paul strikes into the hearts of many when he talks about his dreams for American foreign policy.
Ron Paul has a very real problem, in that I am certainly not the only person horrified by his 9/11 remarks. Dr. Paul has a very real communication problem since there always seems to be such a solid disconnect between what supporters like you say he really means as opposed to how non-supporters like myself interpret the words he says.
Respectfully,
Kevin DuJan
Why Ron Paul Will Win Iowa Caucus: Tune in at 10pm EST and 9pm CST HillBuzz & Mrs. Fox Show
What: The HillBuzz & Mrs. Fox Show
When: November 18th, 2011
Time: 10pm EST and 9pm CST
Topic: Why Ron Paul will win the Iowa Caucus
Guest: Kathleen Gee, Ohio author and political analyst
[ Click here to listen or call 818-431-8246 to hear the show on your phone ]
Join us on The HillBuzz & Mrs. Fox Show tonight for a very controversial episode, where Ohio author and political analyst Kathleen Gee will talk about her belief that Ron Paul will win the Iowa Caucus.
Join us for an interesting hour where we take a hard look at the agenda-driven media’s campaign against Ron Paul and why his supporters stand with him no matter what’s thrown at their candidate.
Whether you like Ron Paul or not, you have to admit there’s something that appeals to many people in his candidacy and he’s certainly not going away before this election is over.
Tune in for a controversial hour that will address everything related to Ron Paul, with a guest expert on the Paul campaign.
[ Click here to listen on your computer: 10pm EST and 9pm CST...or call 818-431-8248 to hear the show on your phone ]
Troy, Michigan Mayor Janice Daniels Talks About Alinsky Tactics Used Against Her — 8pm EST and 7pm CST 11/16/11
Join us on The HillBuzz & Mrs. Fox Show tonight at 8pm EST and 7pm CST 11/16/11 to hear Troy, Michigan Mayor Janice Daniels discuss the Alinsky tactics and Union thuggery used against her in the recent election.
Mayor Daniels is an example of a regular citizen who got fed up with wasteful spending in government, knew she could do a better job in office than the permanent political class forever in power, and decided to stand up and do something about it.
The Union thugs threw the Alinsky Rules Book at her, but Mayor Daniels prevailed.
Find out how she did it…and how YOU have the potential to run for office yourself or help a friend or family member do it too!
[ Click HERE to listen: 8pm EST and 7pm CST November 16th, 2011 ]
or call 818-431-8248 to listen on your phone
HillBuzz & Mrs. Fox Show: Monday at 10pm EST and 9pm CST — What is it Like to Live in a Commune?
Tonight on The HillBuzz & Mrs. Fox Show, we speak to the survivor of life on a commune to find out exactly what a “socialist paradise” is like (you know, like the kind the Occupy Wall Street crowd and others on the Left want forced upon us in this country too).
Tune in at 10pm EST and 9pm CST for the show.
You can listen to it HERE on your computer.
Or call 818-431-8248 to listen on your phone.
Don’t forget tomorrow’s episode: an exclusive interview with Larry Sinclair at 10pm EST and 9pm CST 11/15/11
HillBuzz Open Thread: Friday November 11th, 2011
[ NOTE: The video above is from the old TV show "What's My Line?", where a panel of celebrities had to guess a famous person's identity by asking a series of questions. It's sad that Elizabeth Taylor is gone. She was a marvelously kind woman who was so good to so many...and who was sadly remembered for too long for being sick and in a wheelchair. It's nice to look back on her in all her glory. ]
Today in History:
2008 – RMS Queen Elizabeth 2 (QE2) sets sail on her final voyage to Dubai. This was supposed to be turned into a hotel like the Queen Mary in Long Beach, California, but because Dubai’s economy collapsed that never happened. It’s weird, but just a few short years ago all the travel magazines and publications like TIME and Vanity Fair or whatever were claiming Dubai would become this futuristic wonderland with all sorts of amazements…but anyone who has ever studied the people who actually live in Dubai knew that would never happen.
2004 – The Palestine Liberation Organization confirms the death of Yasser Arafat from unidentified causes. Mahmoud Abbas is elected chairman of the PLO minutes later. Honest to goodness, there are pictures of Yasser Arafat hanging in Chicago Public Schools like he’s a hero. It’s beyond sick.
1993 – A sculpture honoring women who served in the Vietnam War is dedicated at the Vietnam Veterans Memorial in Washington, D.C. Have you ever been there and seen it in person? It’s incredible.
1940 – World War II: Battle of Taranto – The Royal Navy launches the first aircraft carrier strike in history, on the Italian fleet at Taranto. Whenever I think of aircraft carriers, I think of the giant G.I. Joe aircraft carrier playset from the 80s that I obsessively wanted one Christmas but was too expensive to get…and it was like this mythical thing always hearing that somebody’s friend’s cousins’ neighbor had it, but I never saw one in the flesh (or, plastic, as the case may be).
oday I think I want to learn why Route 66 faded away. It goes right through the middle of Chicago, you know. Someday, I think it would be fun to drive it. Has anyone done that?
What’s going on in your part of the country today?
What, in your opinion, was the big story from this week?
1030pm EST & 930pm CST: the HillBuzz & Mrs. Fox Radio Show talks about Operation Gratitude’s fall efforts for our troops
Tune into The HillBuzz & Mrs. Fox Show tonight at 1030pm EST and 930pm CST to learn about Operation Gratitude’s fall mission to support our men and women in uniform overseas.
Our guest tonight will be Penny, an Operation Gratitude volunteer in Van Nuys, California who will give us the scoop on how you and your families can get involved in a coast to coast effort to thank our troops and give them the psychological and emotional reinforcements they need to keep fighting for our shared freedom overseas.
Are you noticing a lot of Halloween candy discounted down by 50-75% this week?
How about grabbing as many great deals as you can find and packing up these treats to send to Operation Gratitude for distribution to our troops?
Did you know that Beanie Babies and other small plush toys can save the lives of Marines?
Listen to the show tonight and hear Penny’s account of how Beanie Babies sent to Afghanistan and Iraq by Operation Gratitude built so much rapport with local children that they started telling soldiers where insurgents were hiding IEDs. So, a small stuffed animal that a family didn’t want anymore ended up saving the lives of service members thousands of miles away.
It’s remarkable what an impact YOU can have on the lives of those in uniform if you find your own individual way to make Operation Gratitude a part of your family’s activities.
TUNE IN TONIGHT AT 1030pm EST and 930pm CST to learn more!
[ Click above for direct link to the show, or listen on your phone by calling: 818-431-8248 ]
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Obama’s dirtiest secrets, America’s hidden enemies: Live Open Thread with author Trevor Loudon
The HillBuzz & Mrs. Fox Radio Show talks to author Trevor Loudon tonight at 8pm EST and 7pm CST.
Please use this thread to comment on the show, or talk about Obama’s dirtiest secrets and America’s hidden enemies. That’s the topic of Loudon’s book, which he’ll tell us all about on the show. Barack Obama and the Enemies Within is a MUST READ…and Trevor Loudon will tell you why live on HillBuzz & Mrs. Fox tonight.
Have a question you want to ask him?
Any thoughts on the book?
Share them now and help make the show tonight a big success!
CLICK HERE to listen to the HillBuzz & Mrs. Fox Show live at 8pm EST and 7pm CST
CALL IN at (818) 431-8248 to ask Trevor Loudon a question or to listen to the show on your phone instead of your computer.
Tune into the HillBuzz & Mrs. Fox Show tonight at 830pm EST/730pm CST – topic: the Romney campaign’s attacks on Herman Cain
Tune in tonight to the HillBuzz & Mrs. Fox Show at 830pm EST and 730pm CST for a look at the Romney campaign’s latest round of attacks on Herman Cain.
It’s clear to me the weekend hit job on Cain came straight from Willard “Mittens” Romneycare himself…and was timed so that attention in the political world would be directed at Cain this week, and not at Romneycare for either George Will’s recent negative column about Mittens or for the flip-flopping Romneycare did in Ohio regarding curbing Union power there.
When a Cocktail Party GOP establishment guy like Mittens wants to deflect attention from himself, he gins up a controversy to attack a rival. This is classic Romneycare strategy.
Don’t be fooled: timing is everything in politics. These attacks on Cain aren’t originating in the Left because the Left would have timed this to come out two weeks before the Iowa Caucus when they could have done the maximum damage to Cain. Instead, this attack was launched when it could do maximum benefit to Willard “Mittens” Romneycare and the Cocktail Party GOP establishment.
We’ll talk more about this on the air tonight.
[ Click here to listen to the HillBuzz & Mrs. Fox Show at 830 pm EST and 730pm CST ]
