Fat Lester Formally Endorses Newt Gingrich

The campaign of former House Speaker and current GOP Presidential Candidate Newt Gingrich received a major boost today when internet / social media extraordinaire Fat Lester officially endorsed the former Congressman from Georgia.

Fat Lester, whose real name is Peter Egan, had not previously endorsed a candidate, citing favorable views of numerous candidates early on in the GOP nominating contest, along with the fact that he personally knows more than one of the candidates originally in the race as reasons for refraining from issuing an endorsement.

(Newt Gingrich consults with NOLA Tea Party leaders including Fat Lester)

However, when Herman Cain announced that he was suspending his campaign in light of a series of frivolous, racially-motivated attacks by several women on the left who were allegedly paid millions combined in exchange for levying the false and defamatory charges. Needless to say, these women were acting on behalf of the Obama Administration/Campaign (they're one-in-the-same), including at least one Obama Administration employee and the next-door neighbor of Obama's speech writer, it left Gingrich as the only candidate in the race with whom Lester has spoken with at length and in person regarding the challenges facing the country and the solutions required to get the nation back on the right track.

(GOP Presidential Candidate Newt Gingrich and Right-Wing Conspirator Fat Lester)

That said, personal affiliation with a candidate was not the sole criteria upon which Lester based the decision. Lester is also a strong supporter of former Pennsylvania Senator Rick Santorum, and identifies with Santorum's views on most issues, in particular the one nobody likes to talk about: the "A-word".

(Former House Speaker Newt Gingrich introduces himself to the VRWC)

This conflict made endorsing a candidate difficult even after Cain, whom Lester had helped raise funds via a Tea Party Rally with over two thousand attendees (back before he'd even announced he was running) at which Cain was the keynote speaker; announced that his campaign was effectively over and that he (Cain) would be endorsing Gingrich. However, after three states have held their nominating contests, with Santorum's victory in Iowa failing to translate into momentum going forward, Lester decided Gingrich is the candidate most likely to defeat Obama in a 1-on-1 match-up due to his unnaturally high IQ (he must have 50 IQ points over Obama and no less than 120 over former Speaker Nancy Pelosi) as well as his superior debate skills.

(Naturally, the media was not invited to the closed-door session)

While Fat Lester had speculated back in June that Gingrich may ultimately represent the Republican Party's best shot at victory in 2012, he had withheld making an endorsement so early on in the campaign for obvious reasons, some of which are stated above.

Lester is not going to merely informally endorse the former Speaker by issuing a public announcement on one of his blogs. Rather, he will be putting his money (something he has very little of) where his mouth is, and will be making a financial contribution to both Gingrich and Santorum's respective campaigns, with Gingrich receiving roughly twice the amount that will be given to Santorum. Should the latter win any more states or do anything else that results in his building of momentum with the majority of states yet to vote, he will likely receive additional funding from Lester proportionate to any progress he makes in terms of gaining ground on Mitt Romney and Ron Paul.

(Newt Gingrich thanks Fat Lester for his advice and endorsement)

Fat Lester would like to encourage anyone and everyone reading this who cares about the general welfare of the United States of America to do likewise and make a donation to the Gingrich campaign using the link below. He would like for you to do this regardless of who you are, what your party affiliation is or which candidate you're supporting. Anyone can donate, regardless of one's income.

DONATE TO NEWT'S CAMPAIGN

America's Next President Poses with Fat Lester's Sister

If Fat Lester can come up with $100 spread out over a few months, so can you. It's time we take our country back, and we're going to need everyone to chip in whatever they can in order to save the nation.

The most important people were seated closest to the candidate

Another four years of Obama holding the office of the Presidency, and the United States will look more like Cuba than the prosperous one-time superpower where anyone who was willing to work hard could achieve success not attainable in most places throughout the world.

Fat Lester believes Newt Gingrich is the candidate with the best chance to take in 57+% of the vote required to win after the millions of fraudulent votes that will be cast by democrats are accounted for. In swing states, the real number needed to win could reach as high as 63-64%. In order to win this election, we will need to get 100% of the eligible voters in this country who want to preserve the freedom, prosperity and opportunity for which America was founded and will always be remembered (in the event Obama wins and the nation is disassembled or integrated into a North American Union). In order to do that, we will need to contribute whatever we can without losing our homes or failing to put food on our respective tables.

Please donate to Newt's campaign. If you support Ron Paul or Rick Santorum, donate to them as well. Fat Lester will be donating $120, $80 to the Gingrich campaign and $40 to the Santorum campaign. Please make one sacrifice on an item you can live without (as long as it's not something you're considering buying from Fat Lester or his affiliated businesses ;-), and instead use that money to help defeat the great American Saboteur-in-Chief.

---

On a totally separate note, it appears Mitt Romney's got some problems on the horizon:

Help Restore Louisiana's Wetlands & Coastal Ecosystem

I recently created a petition to the United States Congress (House and Senate) and the U.S. President, asking the respective bodies and the individuals in positions of leadership within those respective bodies to please commit to restoring Louisiana's wetlands and coastal ecosystem.

You can read (and sign) the petition here:  https://www.change.org/petitions/restore-louisianas-wetlands-and-coastal-ecosystem

I would very much appreciate it if anyone and everyone reading this would take just a moment to check out the petition, and if you agree with it, please also sign it. It's pretty hard to envision a scenario in which anyone would have any major objections to this goal.

Change.org|Start an Online Petition »

Wishful Thinking: The Anti-Soros

The Emergence of the Anti-Soros

As much as I'd like to say otherwise, I am not aware of anyone who appears to be maneuvering him or herself such that one day that person could serve as a counter-influence and check on George Soros' power. Not even myself :-( . Hey, a guy can have dreams though, right?

I'm going to divulge little bit about myself here for those of you readers visiting this blog for the first time, or who are simply unfamiliar with me in general, and thus are unaware of the context most readers of this blog know by way of past experiences with me.


I work about 80 hours a week on average, and sometimes more. Sure, I would like to one day be as wealthy as George Soros. While I have no doubt that should I achieve my financial goals or anything even close, I would thoroughly enjoy the money (a yacht with a harem of topless women feeding me grapes and strawberries in the Caribbean sun comes to mind), the primary reason I strive for such riches is so that I can become - for lack of a better term - the Anti-Soros.


Please do not mistake me for believing I am or ever could be Jesus Christ or his reincarnation (or ever be even 1/7777777 the man he was and is). That said, if I were to do as much good in the world as one would have to accomplish in order to earn even remote consideration for a title such as the "Anti-Soros", I'd feel much better about my chances for receiving forgiveness for my own worldly sins, which are many.


That said, I'm not an evil person, and I do have a good heart, flawed as I am. It would be nice though to be able to invest $10,000,000 into developing SmokersVote.org (a yet-to-be-established political PAC I intend to develop into an organization that at this point would best be described as the "NRA of and for Tobacco", as well as anyone else who believes in freedom-of-choice and personal responsibility.


It would also be nice to be able to take $500,000,000 and donate it to the campaign fund of GOP Presidential frontrunner Herman Cain using anonymous overseas donations of less than $200 (which is how Soros circumvented U.S. campaign finance law when he contributes roughly half of Obama's 2008 war chest).


I'd love to be able to contribute millions of dollars to Pro-Life candidates for the Unites States House of Representatives, U.S. Senate and state Governorships in hopes that someday, the right side will finally win large enough majorities in the federal lawmaking chambers and/or win the governorships of enough states to either have a law made outlawing abortion outright, have the U.S. Supreme Court overturn the unprecedented historical tragedy of Roe v. Wade, and/or accomplish the same end by way of a Constitutional amendment (which if my memory serves me correctly would require 37 states to sign on).


I'd thoroughly enjoy buying or founding my own nationwide and/or worldwide newspapers, cable networks and institutions for higher learning --- even if the investments yielded a perpetual negative return monetarily speaking which of course I would be easily able to sustain given my wealth --- for the sole purpose of attempting to revive the terminally ill profession of news and journalism, and bring it back to the fundamentals of Who, What, Where, When, Why and How, with the facts of the stories being covered actually being factual in nature, with personal and political opinions confined to the OP/ED page.


My schools would teach history (which has been absent from course curricula in America for generations across all levels of the education/propaganda system). For example, in Econ 101 at UFL (University of Fat Lester), students would be asked to write their final term paper on John Maynard Keynes and his theories regarding economics. Students who would fail to point out in said term paper the fact that "Keynesian Economics", while fundamentally-sound on its surface and in theory, and perhaps even altruistic in nature in terms of the motivation underlying Keynes' thinking (and that of the political figures throughout history who have applied Keynes' economic principles), has failed miserably in each and every single example of its actual application as a mechanism for economic planning and governance, would receive an "F" for the paper and no credit for the course.


Nature's Law of Supply and Demand would be introduced in elementary school and would be a yearly recurring theme until high school, during which it would be taught in Physics class as well as in Biology, Civics and American History. The reason being that Supply and Demand is every bit as much of one of the few natural laws which govern the universe as are the Law of Gravity and the Law of Conservation of Mass and Energy. The only difference between the laws from the standpoint of a physicist is that the latter two require no life, while the former must have life present in order to be applied and recognized. It is a common misnomer that the Law of Supply and Demand is exclusive to human society. In fact, this is the law that governs all life on earth, from the tiniest single-cell organisms to the most complex beasts nature has to offer, and everything in between.


Evolution is fueled by Supply and Demand. As environmental conditions (including supplies of food and the demand thereof - i.e. "competition") change over time, life forms (including plants, animals, bacteria and so forth) either evolve so as to continue to survive in an ever-changing environment or become extinct. It is this, the most natural of all the laws which govern nature and the natural world, from which the economic system known as Capitalism is modeled. Obviously, Capitalism must be slightly modified to meet the needs of a civilized human society (you can't just kill your next-door neighbor and steal his potatoes because you're hungry). However, in terms of its viability as a system providing all of the necessary components for long-term success and prosperity for nearly all involved parties - including but not limited to its own built-in system of checks-and-balances - it is unparalleled. This is especially true when compared directly with the system envisioned by Keynes, which contradicts virtually every aspect of human nature, and --- dare I say --- nature itself.


Students attending the schools and universities controlled by my hypothetical future money would be taught facts like these beginning at an early age. A tremendous emphasis would be placed on teaching students how to think (for themselves) as opposed to what to think (as most schools and universities are oriented toward). However, students who reject indisputable fact and fail to substantiate their dissenting position(s) with a logical argument that exposes one or more flaws in the established thinking would be required to spend additional time learning the principles of logic, reason and critical thinking - perhaps the most glaring deficiency of all in today's American education system, which for the past 70 years or so has been unanimously dominated by the liberal establishment (with substantial influence and significant contributions by the Soviet KGB - * see video at bottom of page if you decide to click the link).

Newt May Be GOP's Best Matchup vs Obama

Newt a Sure-Thing Winner Over Obama in 2012

While Newt Gingrich's campaign staff may be in need of a makeover, he still remains an exceptional candidate. In a one-on-one matchup versus Barack Obama, Newt may well represent the GOP's best shot.

Newt Gingrich at the RLC in New Orleans

Where Newt elevates himself from the rest of the pack is in the specifics of his proposed policies and solutions. He is by far the best of the candidates in the current field at articulating the specific reasons why Obama's policies are destructive for the country, what he would do to correct the problems Obama has caused and why.

I had the privilege during last year's SRLC (Southern Republican Leadership Conference) in New Orleans of attending a private meeting with the former House Speaker in which he met with local Tea Party leaders to discuss the direction of the country. I was extremely impressed with Gingrich's depth and breadth of knowledge about the intricacies of the problems facing the country - both in a practical as well as a legislative sense. Newt would not only win the election should he get the nomination, he has the answers to actually fix the problems plaguing the country.

When I try to envision how each candidate in the GOP primary field would fare in a one-on-one election versus Obama, I see Newt being the least risky candidate. I just cannot see Obama defeating Gingrich in a mono-a-mono matchup. I can't say that about the rest of the candidates.

Newt is probably the most intelligent of the bunch --- the man is a certifiable genius. He is the most accomplished as a legislator, having balanced a budget and secured tax cuts in spite of the Clinton White House. Newt is also probably the best debater of the lot, especially when the debate is occurring between Obama and a Republican.

Make no mistake, Newt would absolutely obliterate Obama in a debate. It wouldn't even be close - not even remotely so. The extent of the shellacking would excite Republicans to cheer him like rabid LSU fans in Tiger Stadium in a home-game against Auburn, while sending Democrats running for cover.

Contrary to what the media would have you believe, the field for the 2012 Republican Presidential Primary features a number of very strong and extremely qualified candidates. Of those candidates, it is my belief at this point that Gingrich offers the best shot at defeating Obama.

Newt at the RLC in New Orleans



Newt Announces 2012 GOP Candidacy



Newt in the New Hampshire GOP Primary Debate

Crowded Conservative GOP Field Bodes Well for Moderates

For the record, I do still fear that my two favorite candidates for the 2012 GOP Presidential Nomination (Herman Cain and Ron Paul) may hurt each other's candidacies by splitting the Tea Party vote and thus diluting each of their chances to capture statewide races, which in turn could potentially result in another moderate winning the nomination - not because he or she is the most popular candidate, but because the other cluster of candidates were too similar on the issues for any one of them to distinguish themselves enough to outshine the rest.

For example, if four in every five of Republican voters want a strong conservative to win the nomination, and there are eight strong conservatives and one moderate in the race, the moderate could end up winning the party nod by virtue of the other candidates destroying each other's chances by splitting up the conservative and Tea Party votes such that a moderate with 20% of the vote would defeat eight candidates who average 10% each, with none of them eclipsing the 20% held by the moderate.

We all saw how well the moderate Republican fared against Obama in 2008. I hope the the candidates do not allow their personal ambitions to work counterproductive to each of their stated goals by dividing up the conservative vote in such a way that the least desirable candidate gets in thanks to the crowded field of hard-right candidates.

War on Drugs May Work to Ron Paul's Advantage in 2012

The U.S. government's insane bipartisan position on the "need" for the War on Drugs may well be the issue that converts me into a Ron Paul supporter before all is said and done.

I've already stated my support for Government outsider Herman Cain in the 2012 Republican Primaries. However, with so many good candidates in the race, my vote will factor in performance of the respective candidates in the primary elections leading up to the Louisiana GOP Primary. Specifically, I am not going to vote for a candidate who hasn't won a primary by the time Louisiana's nominating contest rolls around, and I reserve the right to vote for a candidate who may not necessarily be my first choice based on among other things, a candidates respective standings in the race to be the party's 2012 Presidential nominee.

So while Herman Cain may be my first choice, and while I would ideally like to see him win the party nomination (and ask Ron Paul to be his running mate), should Cain fail to make a splash in the states leading up to Louisiana's primary, I may well cast my vote for someone whose campaign is in play for the nomination. My first choice among the other candidates Cain excluded is Ron Paul, who is almost neck-and-neck with Cain in the race to win over my vote. Newt Gingrich and Rick Santorum are in a virtual tie for third, and I could feasibly see myself voting for any of these candidates should the others fall out of contention early on.

Of the four names mentioned, the one who has gained the most traction with me as a voter and Tea Party activist in the time since the 2008 elections is Ron Paul. Many of my readers may remember my cold reception to Ron Paul's candidacy in 2008, even as he took the digital world by storm with his staunch libertarian beliefs and apparent disdain for the government.

I did not consider Congressman Paul to be a serious candidate in 2008. My how things have changed. I not only would consider voting for Paul in the GOP Primary this go-round, I have an unprecedented level of optimism for both he and Cain --- two candidates who in other election cycles would have been quickly relegated to the realm of "fringe candidates" who are quickly dismissed by the media and voters alike. Typically, these candidates might get a few percentage points in each of their party's primary elections, but never come close to actually winning one.

I believe the political dynamics this go-round are markedly different from any other election cycle in my lifetime, and I think the very same positions on the very same issues and dynamics that in years past would all but disqualify men like Ron Paul and Herman Cain may not only work to their advantage this time around, but may even be significant enough to put both men into real contention.

There are just so many things wrong with the so-called war on drugs. First and foremost, the very premise of such prohibitions are un-American and unconstitutional. America's war on drugs has created a real war in Mexico pitting the nation, its government and its law enforcement agencies against drug-gang militias that have killed tens of thousands of people in the last few years alone.

How many lives must be lost before the U.S. government decides to start behaving like adults with regard to the issue? How many non-violent Americans whose only crime was pursuing happiness in a manner the U.S. government deems illegitimate must be locked up, taken away from their families, losing their jobs and any prospect of a normal remainder of their lives in the process before Americans say "enough is enough".

For all the Democrats' nefarious behavior in terms of their rewarding campaign contributors with big government contracts, bailouts and other corporate welfare, the Republicans are on-par in their support of the "Big Law Enforcement" industry, whose lobby is hell-bent on seeing to it that drugs remain illegal for the foreseeable future.

Ron Paul is the only candidate in the race who I am confident would do everything within his capability to end this expensive and ultimately counter-productive war. In the end, that may go an awfully long way to securing my vote in Louisiana.

Author's Note:  For the record, my position regarding the war on drugs is in no way an endorsement of use and/or abuse of illicit substances. I do believe addiction in America is a serious problem, but one that is not solved by incarcerating Americans who develop addictions to mood-altering chemicals. A propensity to abuse alcohol and drugs is passed down genetically from addicts to their children. Technically, addictive disorders are a medical illness, and putting people in jail for suffering from a genetic illness seems as un-American to me as anything with which I am familiar.

Atlas Shrugged the Movie (Part 1) Now Playing in Theaters

Part one of the Atlas Shrugged movie is now playing in theaters across the country.  I've been waiting a decade (since I first picked up the book) for this movie to debut.  And what do you know, but the timing of this movie's release couldn't have been any better.  Atlas Shrugged is the closest thing to an official Tea Party charter as exists, and with a looter government in Washington rapidly confiscating wealth by way of inflation (and taxes), but especially inflation, it almost seems as if this movie was more than a half century in the making by design.

In any case, I this will be the first movie I've gone to see at a theater since April of 2005.

The official movie trailer can be seen below.

Hermain Cain Meets Fat Lester

I had the honor and privilege of meeting 2012 GOP Presidential Candidate Herman Cain at a Tea Party event in Mandeville, LA a few weeks back. Mr. Cain was the keynote speaker at the event, which also featured contributions from New Orleans radio personality John Osterlind, St. Tammany Parish radio personality Jeff Crouere and distinguished gentleman and businessman John d'Hemecourt of Abita Springs.

[Photo: GOP Presidential Nominee Herman Cain visits with right-wing conspirator Peter Egan Jr., aka: "Fat Lester"]

Mr. Cain delivered an inspiring speech in which he laid out his philosophy as a candidate for the United States Republican Presidential Nomination in 2012. He spoke of the government's reckless and ever-growing irresponsibility, and promised that if chosen to represent the Republican Party in the 2012 Presidential Election, that he would be the candidate who finally reversed course in hopes of righting the ship. The question implicit in the words "in hopes of" is not whether or not Herman Cain possesses the ability to lead the country back to greatness, but whether or not the unprecedented spending and borrowing that has taken place since the Democrats seized the House in the 2006 mid-term elections in the face of an already massive debt (present BEFORE they took office - they've increased it by an average of $4.07 billion per day SINCE they gained control of Congress). Each year that Nancy Pelosi was Speaker of the House of Representatives the Congress set a new record for national debt. That rise has increased dramatically since the election of Barack Obama as President.

Mr. Cain's speech was not particularly heavy on policy or specific issues per se, as can be expected for what ultimately wound up being something of a quasi-announcement that he would seek the GOP nomination for the Presidency. While technically at the time of the event his now-campaign was simply announcing the formation of a "Presidential Exploratory Committee", he left little doubt that he planned to enter the Republican contest as something of a "dark horse" candidate (no pun intended).

[Photo: GOP Presidential Candidate Herman Cain addresses the crowd at a Tea Party event in Mandeville, Louisiana]

The fact is that Herman Cain is not a politician, and has none of the baggage that all career politicians who have been in Washington for any significant period of time bring with them. Perhaps most significantly, the reluctance to implement the "radical" changes (as Chuck U. Shumer and Dingy Harry like to say) necessary to ensure the long-term economic and financial viability of the United States, the Federal Reserve Bank id its currency. The reality is that the last President in recent memory to positively impact the state of the government had a successful career in the private sector before seeking the governorship of the only state where Hollywood icons have repeatedly contested for (and won) multiple terms as chief executive. Those that have followed (and those that preceded) him have been career public sector elected representatives whose idea of running a business involves laundering taxpayer money to campaign donors who then reinvest it in that Congressman or Senator's "business" ventures, and look where they've taken the country.

Of all the names mentioned so far as possible Republican Presidential contenders, with the exception of Donald Trump who is only putting on a show for the sake of publicity and who is a RINO (Republican In Name Only) at best, none can boast the kind of private sector or executive-level success and experience in general that Herman Cain has achieved. Cain, the son of working-class parents in Georgia, grabbed the American dream by the (fill-in your choice of body part). He knows what working people go through in life, knowledge foreign to far too many in the Washington establishment in both parties.

Finally, in Herman Cain Americans have an opportunity to vote for a black man for President of the United States, not because he's black and it's long-past time the country elected a person of color if for no other reason than to break the taboo, but because if his resume, his mammoth intellect and his charisma are any indication, there's a very strong probability that Herman Cain may very well be the best and most qualified man for the job.

I've now met three four of the top six or seven names being mentioned in association with the GOP Presidential nominating contest, albeit one has been mentioned only as a potential candidate for Vice President as he has repeatedly proclaimed that he planned to seek reelection to his state's governorship and would not seek the Presidency - at least not before his 42nd birthday. This Southern Governor only became eligible to run for the Presidency since the summer of 2006. Anyone not know to whom I am referring?

I know this has gotten a little bit off topic since this is a post about Herman Cain. However, this latter candidate whom I have refused to name (in this post - c'mon, you should know this one) presents a couple of very interesting dynamics as a potential VP consideration. First off, in the ostensibly unlikely event he should team up with Herman Cain, they would represent the first major-party non-white Presidential ticket in the nation's history. Second, should this person join up with another candidate such as say Newt Gingrich, whom I have also met during the SRLC last year (2010 for those of you in Rio Linda) when he consulted with myself and about two-dozen other Tea Party leaders in New Orleans about the prospect of a potential Presidential bid, it MIGHT present a scenario in which I could potentially vote for a different ticket IF the Herman Cain campaign had not won any primary contests before Louisiana's, MAY feel compelled to vote for a ticket other than Herman Cain's. Unless and until that happens, at this point, he's definitely got my vote in the Louisiana GOP Presidential Primary.

[PHOTO: (from left) Peter and Pamela Egan, Herman Cain and Fat Lester]

About Herman Cain (Source: Wikipedia)

Herman Cain (born December 13, 1945) is an American newspaper columnist, businessman, political activist, and radio talk-show host from Georgia. He is best known as the former chairman and CEO of Godfather's Pizza. He is a former deputy chairman (1992–94) and chairman (1995–96) of the Federal Reserve Bank of Kansas City. Cain's newspaper column is distributed by North Star Writers Group. He currently lives in the Atlanta suburbs.

Cain was born and raised in Georgia by working class parents. He earned a bachelor's degree in Mathematics at Morehouse College in 1967, and while working for the U.S. Department of the Navy, a master's degree in computer science from Purdue University.

After completing his master's degree, Cain left the Department of the Navy and began working for Coca-Cola as a business analyst. In 1977, he joined Pillsbury where he rose to the position of vice president by the early 1980s. He left his executive post to work for Burger King – a Pillsbury subsidiary at the time – managing 400 stores in the Philadelphia area. Under Cain's leadership, his region went from the least profitable for Burger King to the most profitable in three years. This prompted Pillsbury to appoint him president and CEO of Godfather's Pizza, another of their then-subsidiaries. Within 14 months, Cain had returned Godfather's to profitability. In 1988, Cain and a group of investors bought Godfather's from Pillsbury. Cain continued as CEO until 1996, when he resigned to become CEO of the National Restaurant Association – a trade group and lobby organization for the restaurant industry – where he had previously been chairman concurrently with his role at Godfather's.

Cain hosted The Herman Cain Show on Atlanta talk radio station News Talk 750 WSB, a CNN radio affiliate until February 2011 and serves as a commentator for Fox News Business and a syndicated columnist distributed by the North Star Writers Group. In 2009, Cain founded "Hermanator's Intelligent Thinkers Movement" (HITM), aimed at organizing 100,000 activists in every congressional district in the United States in support of a strong national defense, the FairTax, tax cuts, energy independence, capping and cutting government spending, restructuring Social Security, and defending the U.S. Constitution. Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Herman_Cain

FLASHBACK: GOP Will Repeal Obamacare if House Changes Hands

This post was originally published in March of 2010 on another site that is no longer online. It has been slightly modified from its original version.

March 20, 2010

Whatever House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Democrats in the House and Senate eventually either do or don't do regarding President Obama's healthcare reform proposal (commonly referred to as "Obamacare") is immaterial as to whether or not the bill (assuming one is passed) is ever actually implemented. The only real vote on Obamacare will take place this coming November, and it will be voted on by the American people themselves.

Consider the following:

In November of 1994 the U.S. House of Representatives saw an 82 seat majority for the Democrats become a 24 seat Republican majority overnight.  The Senate remained at 56-44, but with the respective parties swapping numbers (and control of the Senate).

Even if Obamacare passes, Republicans can kill it at any point upon regaining control of the House by merely refusing to fund it.  All budgetary legislation must originate in the House and the majority party (and/or coalition) must vote to spend everything contained within the Federal budget.

The GOP could just draw up a budget that doesn't include any reference to Obamacare, and the Senate can either pass it and the President sign it; or even better, have it rejected by either the Senate and/or President and stall for as long as necessary before authorizing the government to spend ANY money. The GOP could refuse to pass a budget bill until certain budgetary items have been removed completely from the federal bankroll.

This means that before any bill could be passed, any and all federal funds alloctated to anything even remotely related to Obamacare, ACORN, Planned Parenthood, and other rogue legislation and non-governmental organizations would have to first be stripped from the budget.

Therein lies the beauty of a system of checks-and-balances. Even if the ruling party passes Obamacare against the will of an overwhelming majority of Americans, the electoral punishment will open the door for the Republicans to undo the damage and actually serve the people that elected them rather than subjugate them. That is, assuming they can pick up enough seats to retake control of Congress.

Eventually, the President and the Senate (if the Democrats keep their majority there --- and that's a big "if") would have no choice but to compromise with Congressional Republicans in order to fund any government program.

It will be quite interesting to see how things would unfold with House Speaker Boehner calling the shots instead of Nancy Pelosi. The Republicans must pick up a minimum of 39 seats currently occupied by Democrats and successfully defend their own incumbents as well in order for that (the GOP gaining a House majority) to happen.

The Democrats presently hold a 77 seat advantage in the House and a 16 seat advantage in the Senate, although the two independents both caucus with the Democrats, so it's really more like an 18 seat Democrat edge.

In 1994, the Democrats held an 82 seat edge in the House and a 12 seat advantage in the Senate. While it is feasible that the GOP could recapture both legislative chambers in this November's elections, doing so would require a repeat of the '94 landslide, which was and still is an unprecedented rebellion against incumbents, in this case Democrats.

The Republicans winning enough seats in this year's mid-term election to acquire a majority within the Senate is extremely improbable given the circumstances. It's not an impossible scenario, but realistically the party should not be disappointed if it manages to make a serious dent in the Democrats' advantage, positioning the party so as to be able to make a serious bid at retaking control in 2012, when the dynamics are more in the GOP's favor with more so-called "vulnerable" Democrats such as Mary Landrieu of Louisiana will be up for reelection.

As stated previously, if the GOP can just manage to retake the House it can stop Obamacare from ever being implemented in spite of objections from the President and Senate Democrats.

The question is not will the Democrats lose seats in this year's mid-term elections, but will they hang on to enough of them to be able to fund Obamacare (assuming they eventually get a bill passed)? 

On a side-note, even if no bill is passed, it may be too late to undo the damage Obamacare (and the Stimulus bill, the GM takeover and everything else Obama has done while in office) has done to the Democrats chances for reelection across the board, and they should still stand to lose a considerable number of seats regardless of what happens with the healthcare reform bill from this point forward.

Fat Lester Meets Karl Rove

This post was originally published in April of 2010 on another site that is no longer online. It has been slightly modified from its original version.

March 31, 2010

COVINGTON, LA - Fat Lester, the primary author of this weblog (not to mention its namesake) was recently blessed with the opportunity to meet Karl Rove, the brain behind George W. Bush’s two successful Presidential campaigns as well as his Presidency.

Mr. Rove is one of Fat Lester’s foremost role models, and a man whose work he admires tremendously. Not only has did he rise to the top of his profession - an extremely competitive and cut-throat one at that - he did so without ever graduating from college, a common theme among Fat Lester's role models (other examples include Rush Limbaugh, Bill Gates and Steve Jobs).

The meeting took place at a once-in-a-lifetime dinner featuring Dr. Rove and GOP political strategist Mary Matalin following a public book signing in Covington, Louisiana. Dr. Rove has been touring America promoting his new book: Courage and Consequence: My Life as a Conservative in the Fight. 

The event was held at a private residence just a few miles from Fat Lester’s home off of Three Rivers Road in Covington, Louisiana. At least 150-200 people were in attendance at the event, at which both Matalin and Rove spoke, with the former introducing the latter.

The party was great fun, as was getting to meet Karl Rove and Mary Matalin. It was certainly a night I won't soon forget.

GOP Strategist Karl Rove and Fat Lester perform the secret handshake

Sheriff Clarence Dupnik: The Name Says It All

Clarence Dupnik, the embattled Sheriff from Tucson, Arizona whose hateful and incendiary comments following the shooting of Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords served as the spark that ignited the ensuing firestorm of attacks from both right and left (mostly from the left) that have now led to the politically-expedient calls for unity and for toning down of the political rhetoric that we are now hearing from President Barack Obama and others, is aptly named.

Sheriff Clarence Dupnik

Dupnik's rhetoric singularly turned a national tragedy into a massive feeding-frenzy of blame and finger-pointing.  Not long after Dupnik first opened his mouth and began spouting vitriol, his accomplices on the left were working tirelessly to try to link the shooter to Sarah Palin, Rush Limbaugh, Mark Levin, Sean Hannity, George W. Bush, the Tea Party and others.

We were told to believe that it was hateful rhetoric coming from the likes of the people listed above that drove the shooter to insanity.  If Sarah Palin hadn't used a "bullseye" metaphor on her U.S. campaign district map, the shooter may never have gotten the idea.

It was Sheriff Dupnik himself that informed us of the link between the shooter and Rush Limbaugh.  Granted, he couldn't tell us how Limbaugh set him off (other than to lament that Limbaugh is on the air for three hours every day), and couldn't recall what Limbaugh said specifically that might have driven the shooter, we were nonetheless supposed to accept as Gospel that Rush is going around saying nasty things that can turn a deranged person homicidal.

Already, there have been increased calls for gun control on the left in the wake of the tragedy.  Democrats in Congress and the Senate are beginning to bring up the "Fairness" Doctrine in a favorable context once again.  The House of Representatives shut down this past week, postponing a plan to bring an Obamacare-Repeal bill to the floor and open it up for debate.

The opportunistic exploitation of the tragedy is in no way limited to the media name-calling and finger-pointing.  As the examples in the previous paragraph illustrate, elected representatives in the United States government were also quick to jump on the tragedy-exploitation bandwagon and saddle it with their own legislative initiatives (some more unconstitutional than others).

In response to this, conservatives have tried fruitlessly to point out that it was Obama who said "if they bring a knife to the fight, we'll bring a gun".  The have replayed incendiary remarks by Obama in hopes of illustrating the hypocrisy of the suddenly holier-than-thou President.  They have reminded everyone of all the left's vitriol. All of this has created the appearance that they're as guilty of politicizing the tragedy as is the left.

It might have been more productive to drive home the point that according to his friends, Jared Loughner was a radical left-wing liberal who didn't like the news, didn't listen to talk radio and had been obsessed with Congresswoman Giffords since before the inception of the Tea Party and Sarah Palin's rise to prominence.  I'd like to see a poll on how many people are aware of this fact versus how many believe that heated rhetoric played a role in the shooting.

In any case, all of this was in response to Sheriff Clarence Dupnik's hate-filled, partisan rhetoric in the immediate aftermath of the shooting.  Dupnik's words are what spawned all of that which is mentioned above --- from both sides of the political aisle.  Granted, the question of 'would it have happened had the Sheriff not incited it?' is very much a matter for debate.  I personally don't think it would have been anywhere near as bad had the initial reaction been more respectful of the families of the deceased and less intent on scoring political points.

What's in a Name?

In light of Dupnik's role in the post-shooting chaos that has gripped the nation, I couldn't help but observe that the sheriff appears to have been aptly named for the type of "work" he's currently engaged in (spawning heated, two-way rhetorical attacks in the wake of a tragedy).

You see, Dupnik's name draws from two different words, "dupe" and "nik".

Dupe

Dupe (French), according to The Free Dictionary, is defined as:

1. An easily deceived person.

2. A person who functions as the tool of another person or power.

Nik

Nik (Russian), according to The Free Dictionary, has two definitions as well:

1. One associated with or characterized by

2. Denoting a person associated with a specified state, belief, or quality

I'm going to refrain from explaining the significance of the definitions as they related to the man whose name they make up.  I like to think that you, my readers, are well able to figure that much out on your own.  If anyone really doesn't get it, please request an explanation in the comments and I will provide one.

In any case, everyone be double-sure to obey the laws out there.  There may be a sheriff lurking the streets who is associated with and characterized by his extreme left-wing beliefs, who is very easily deceived, and who functions as a tool of George Soros and the political left.

When Sheriff Dupnik asks for your license and registration, it's your voter registration he's really after.  If you just admit you were speeding, and tell him that it's Rush Limbaugh's fault you were speeding for getting your blood pressure up with his fiery rhetoric, he'll probably just let you go with a warning...