A Time for Truth and Courage
June 12-13 – A Time for Truth and Courage
Last week’s news headlines reinforced our need for leaders who embrace and speak the truth with courage, even when it is painful to do so. From the BP oil disaster to the implementation of ObamaCare, President Obama has not been honest with the American people regarding the details of his "progressive" agenda. Click here to listen to this past weekend’s radio program
Last week’s news headlines reinforced our need for leaders who embrace and speak the truth with courage, even when it is painful to do so. From the BP oil disaster to the implementation of ObamaCare, President Obama has not been honest with the American people regarding the details of his "progressive" agenda.
BP Oil Gusher
I do not know what President Obama’s agenda is concerning the ongoing oil gusher in the Gulf of Mexico. His handling of the situation so far suggests that he is either incompetent or that he is hoping for an extremely destructive result in order to justify advancing the left-wing "green" agenda of eliminating future oil drilling. Why else would the President have turned down assistance from 17 other countries and neglected to waive the Jones Act which restricts inter-coastal U.S. shipping to American flag vessels with American crews? Virtually all of the large vessels in the world equipped for oil skimming do not fly the U.S. flag. Waiving the Jones Act and accepting assistance from other countries for this crisis would allow large scale oil skimming operations in the Gulf. Instead of making these leadership decisions, our President blames BP and makes television appearances while the oil rolls onto the beaches. Don’t forget Rahm Emanuel’s now famous quip that you should "never let a crisis go to waste."
Last week, the President ordered a six-month moratorium on all new deep water drilling in the Gulf of Mexico, including an immediate cessation of work on 33 new wells that are currently under construction. Perhaps he did this in order to make it seem like he is doing something, but this moratorium is really dangerous. In addition to causing the immediate loss of 50,000 jobs, this moratorium will increase our dependence on foreign oil and most importantly increases our risk of future oil leaks by leaving these new wells unfinished. That’s right; unfinished oil wells are more dangerous to the environment than ones that are operational. In order to justify this foolish decision, President Obama’s Interior Department Secretary Ken Salazar manipulated a report issued in late May by a panel of oil experts to suggest that they recommended the moratorium when in reality they did not. According to the group of experts, the two paragraphs that call for the moratorium in the report were added only AFTER the group had signed off on the report. Could the Obama Administration be more opaque, manipulative, and dishonest?
Storm Clouds Forming on the Economy
Over the past two weeks we learned that the U.S. debt will top $13.6 trillion or 93% of GDP by the end of this year, and increase to $19.6 trillion or 102% of GDP by 2015. Under the leadership of President Obama and the Democrat Party Congress, our national debt will reach $20 trillion five years sooner than was forecast just a few months ago! We have an out of control oil gusher in the Gulf of Mexico and an out of control red ink gusher in Democrat controlled Washington, DC! Adding more urgency to our economic woes, prominent Keynesian economist and director of the Earth Institute at Columbia University Jeffrey Sachs, admitted on MSNBC that Obama’s $1 trillion stimulus has failed. The May jobs report issued by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics showed no significant increase in the number of permanent, private sector jobs, and equity markets have experienced a correction. As a result, economists are increasingly worried about a double dip recession.
Brian Kapp, Co-founder, Portfolio Manager, and Chartered Financial Analyst at Kapp/Scanlon Financial shares this concern. Five weeks ago, Brian appeared on this program and predicted the recent correction in equity markets. This past weekend, Brian reaffirmed his belief that the economy will again be in decline by the end of 2010. And one of the reasons for this decline is the uncertainly of the business climate in America created by the irrational policies coming out of Washington D.C. President Obama’s inability to analyze and embrace economic truth is hurting all Americans. If you wish to learn more about Brian’s point of view, please visit kappscanlon.com or call him at 412-428-9545.
Growing Anti-Zionism and Anti-Semitism on the Left
This past week, veteran liberal White House correspondent Helen Thomas suddenly resigned from her post after she was caught on video saying that the Jews should "get the hell out of Palestine." When asked where they should go, she suggested that they return home to Poland or Germany. Unfortunately, such absurd, callous, insensitive, and ill-informed remarks are increasingly common among the hard left in this country. Just last week, while speaking to the congregation of East Liberty Presbyterian Church in Pittsburgh, Benjamin Jealous (CEO of the NAACP) stated that Tea Partiers are pushing hate, and that "the current level of hate in this country reminds (him) of Kristallnacht." You will remember that Kristallnacht, the "Night of Broken Glass," was the point in November 1938 when the Nazis in Germany released their full fury on the Jewish Community and launched the Holocaust. On that terrible night, Nazi government sponsored Brown and Black shirted paramilitary troops (the "SA" and the "SS") burned thousand of Synagogues to the ground, destroyed tens of thousands of Jewish homes and businesses, murdered over 100 Jews in cold blood and arrested and shipped tens of thousands of other Jews off to concentration camps where they were murdered.
Can you believe that NAACP CEO Benjamin Jealous actually compared Tea Party protests to Kristallnacht? Perhaps he does not know his history? Perhaps he is mean spirited and overly partisan? Perhaps he is just a peddler of division and hate? Whatever the case, using such hateful rhetoric is not only a tremendous insult to the freedom loving, patriotic Americans who are exercising their First Amendment rights by protesting at Tea Party rallies, but this kind of rhetoric is an insult to the millions of real victims of the Holocaust. These sorts of cheap, absurd comparisons to the Holocaust also make Anti-Semitism much more digestible in today’s world. If people knew what actually happened during the Holocaust, or if people were truly concerned about never letting such genocide happen again, then they would not make such ill informed, casual references.
In this context, we all have to really wonder about Barack Obama’s treatment of Israel. Why did he mistreat and humiliate Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu when he visited the White House two months ago? Why did Barack Obama refuse to have his photo taken with the Prime Minister? Why was the Obama Administration so willing to criticize Israel two weeks ago when the Israeli Defense forces stopped an illegal and violent "flotilla" from breaking the arms blockade against the Hamas led Gaza Strip? Whether delivered by Barack Obama, Helen Thomas, Benjamin Jealous or other left wing leaders and commentators, anti-Israel and anti-Semitic rhetoric and actions build up over time making anti-Semitic and anti-Israel attitudes more and more acceptable. This needs to stop right now.
More Incomprehensible Decisions on the Left
Dr. Paul Kengor, director of The Center for Vision and Values and a Professor of political science at Grove City College returned to the program this past weekend to discuss his article, "Commemorating Mao but Not Mother." Empire State Building Officials recently denied a request from the Catholic League to commemorate the centennial birth of Mother Theresa on August 26. But these same officials commemorated Mao and the 60th anniversary of the Communist revolution in China by lighting the building with red and yellow lights last year. For whatever reason, these officials felt it was appropriate to honor the most murderous, communist dictator in history, a man who killed 60 million of his own people, but felt it was inappropriate to honor a catholic nun who devoted her entire life to helping the diseased, afflicted, and rejected of Calcutta. What kind of left-wing political correctness could possibly justify this decision?
Despite all of the bad news and bad decisions in America under Democrat Party rule, have faith in America’s future. All around us, left-wing ideology is being defeated by its own absurdity. We need public leaders who will stand up for truth and who will courageously defend our values, our liberty, our history, and our allies. The liberal leaders currently in control of our government have failed us. It is time to replace them with a new generation of conservatives, individuals who understand that our government cannot spend its way to prosperity, that low tax rates are good for the American people, and that borrowing from future generations of Americans is immoral. We are winning this political discussion. Please keep up the fight.
Sincerely,
Glen Meakem
Glen Meakem is a successful technology entrepreneur, venture capitalist, and conservative talk radio show host, who offers information and insights on how individuals and our nation can be more successful. Glen’s unique perspective has been shaped by his experiences as founder, chairman and CEO of the B2B internet success Freemarkets Inc – which he founded in 1995, took public in 1999, and sold to Ariba in 2004. In 2005, Glen co-founded Meakem Becker Venture Capital, a firm that invests in early stage start up companies. Concerned about the liberal political agenda that has gripped the United States and his home state of Pennsylvania, Glen launched the Glen Meakem Program in 2008. Glen served as an officer in the United States Army Reserve and is a veteran of the First Gulf War. He also earned his undergraduate degree from Harvard and his MBA from Harvard Business School. For more information about Glen and the Glen Meakem Radio Program, or to read his blog, please visit http://glenmeakem.com.
Proudly sponsored by
________________________________________
Tune in each Saturday or Sunday (Click here for stations and times), or listen any time at GlenMeakem.com. And if you enjoy the show and these updates, reply and let us know, and please forward them to your friends!
Unsubscribe: http://www.mailermailer.com/x?u=82673202L-1b611464
