E-Newsletter No. 36 _____ December 2016
On November 8th, the American electorate declared “It is time to drain the swamp”. Now that the elections are behind us, in the words of President-elect Trump, “… it is time for America to bind the wounds of division… and for us to come together as one united people.”
Our Editorial Board believes that three main themes played out during the November elections. First and foremost, our country’s citizens made a definitive statement that a top priority is to eliminate corruption and cronyism in our nation’s capital. It was time to bring in an outsider, because in the eyes of many, the Washington cartel’s career politicians had established an elite political class that is at odds with our country’s “regular” citizens, who said “Enough is enough”. One of the most important planks in President-elect Trump’s “Contract With the American Voter” is a pledge to move forward with a Constitutional Amendment to impose term limits on all members of Congress. By passing and implementing such an amendment, our elected representatives will be free to make decisions that are the right ones for our country as a whole, rather than worry about how an extremely difficult decision might affect their long-term political career.
The election was also an initial step in the right direction of restoring the Founders’ concept of Limited Government. We need to have our elected officials respect the Constitution they are sworn to preserve, protect and defend. Over the past eight years, there has been a growing sense that our citizens’ rights were slowly being dwindled away. There was also a sense that maybe the government’s “experts” weren’t always right. Maybe we shouldn’t have been trying to “fundamentally transform” the country or “socially engineer” the country’s citizens, or show favoritism to this or that special interest group. Maybe the country’s Commander in Chief shouldn’t have been legislating using a phone and a pen. Maybe the Supreme Court shouldn’t have been legislating either. Maybe the executive branch should have been enforcing the laws that are on the books, rather than picking and choosing which laws should be enforced. Maybe we were being taxed too much and weren’t seeing an adequate return on our investment in the federal government and its many new programs and regulations. Maybe we didn’t want to pay for “free” college for everyone. Maybe the federal government was just getting too big, intrusive, and out of touch.
And one of the most important outcomes of the election is that the long and steady march of the Left’s “progressive” agenda has been momentarily halted. Unfortunately, the Left’s agenda remains intact. All you need to do is re-read the excerpts of The 2016 Democratic Party Platform (on our Foundation’s website) for a listing of the Left’s priorities. One of the most alarming aspects of the 2016 election cycle was the emergence of the “Democratic Socialism” ideology advocated by Senator Bernie Sanders. Keep in mind that the “progressive” agenda dates back to early 1900’s. It has had its many (failed) successes over the years, starting with the various Socialism programs put forward by FDR. The size of the federal government then took another giant leap forward during the 1960’s with LBJ’s “Great Society” programs. And most recently, Bernie Sanders and Hillary Clinton attempted to move our country further to the Left. Although Senator Sanders was successful in moving the Democratic Party further to the Left, We The People were successful in blocking the further advance of Socialism in America.
Having said all that… The bulk of the hard work still remains. We need to have our federal government re-focus on its core responsibilities that are laid out in the US Constitution, and we need to fundamentally transform (and shrink) the federal government, and follow the wisdom of the Tenth Amendment in the Bill of Rights – The powers not delegated to the United States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are reserved to the States respectively, or to the people. Entitlement programs need to be reformed. We need to stop stealing from our children and grandkids. We need to eliminate deficit spending and start re-paying the country’s cumulative debt. Obamacare needs to be repealed and replaced. We need to get the federal government out of the welfare business, and instead support Not For Profit organizations (The People’s solutions) that will be much more effective in eliminating poverty in America. We need to re-affirm the concepts of self-reliance and personal responsibility, and that All Lives Matter. And our federal government needs to re-focus its efforts on advancing the following agenda – Opportunity for All, Favoritism to None.
US Debt Clock – – November 1st – $60,976 per citizen / December 1st – $61,262