34 years of March for Life

by Alan Roth, for the Upstate Conservatives Blog...



ABORTION: Hundreds of thousands of people came from Alabama, Seattle, Texas, Ohio, New York, Pennsylvania, Maine, Utah, Indiana, Brazil, and beyond.

They were men and women, young and old, healthy and infirm, religious and secular.

While people of all shapes and sizes marched on behalf of Life in our nation’s capital the most outstanding feature of the more than 100,000 strong was their youth. Multiple tens of thousands of young people – grade school, high school, college students, and recent graduates marched in defense of the most innocent victims of abortion.

Some prayed, some shouted their opposition to Roe v. Wade, some carried banners with names of their schools, churches, and organizations. Many spent countless hours on buses to spend a handful of hours expressing their right to speak their minds on behalf of the innocent victims of abortion.

While the mainstream media gave short shrift to this 34th March for Life the marchers will take home the experience of a lifetime. They will spread the word within their communities that human life is sacred and many Americans agree that abortion must be stopped.

As is custom, many of the marchers went to the Congressional office buildings to lobby their legislators in defense of life. Large numbers went to the Capital Hill Club to meet the most openly pro-life presidential candidate – Senator Sam Brownback.

Senator Brownback does not hide his pro-life, pro-family beliefs. He wears them on his sleeve. And from the looks of those who came to see him and those who carried his banners he probably is going to enjoy support from young people (as well as others). Young people are attracted to candidates who take on the establishment when the establishment is wrong. They are attracted to candidates who stand for something meaningful. Brownback certainly fits that profile.

This March for Life seemed to have an energy not witnessed in a while. An energy that is necessary to champion the pro-life cause with a pro-abort Congress and a rapidly approaching Presidential Election.

The break is over

Alan Roth sends this manifesto:

Conservatives in Disarray


In the Eyes of our friends, our liberal opponents, and the media the conservative movement is in disarray.

This year’s CPAC (Conservative Political Action Conference) should be a presidential showcase to show our relevance as a movement. I may be wrong but I don't get the impression that presidential candidates are lining up to participate in this event. It is also indicative of the challenge we face as a movement that there is no credible conservative candidate for President at this time.

After 8 years ofplaying inside the Beltway politics, my impression is that our grassroots conservative troops have lost confidence in our ability to win elections and to represent their beliefs in the political arena.

I believe that we, as conservatives, MUST promote some basic truths:

We are committed to protecting the people of the United States of America against its enemies. We should have a full debate about security and foreign polices. Engage someone such as John Bolton to outline his vision for dealing with Iran, with radical Islam that is sworn to destroy us, with a Russia that is causing havoc for us and the free world.
Living in a Post 9-11 world means that security will be an issue for decades to come. We need to lead the way by forming a consensus on solutions to these issues with experts such as Andrew McCarthy and Congressman Pete King.
Continue to be vocal and united on domestic issues such as nationalism, immigration, taxes, the rule of law, right to life, and gay marriage. We MUST align ourselves with credible leaders who articulate a conservative vision for America in the 21st Century.

If we do not present a united front, if we do not express confidence that our movement is politically potent, then no one else will. We collectively control our own destiny.

Comments from Allen Roth

Board of Directors – Member

American Conservative Union

Summarized by Greg Rigby

More Bruno Pork

Bruno got firm unconditional grant

from the Albany Times-Union click for full story

$500,000 to Troy company had no restrictions; another $525,000 went to business

By JAMES M. ODATO, Capitol bureau
First published: Saturday, December 9, 2006

ALBANY -- The Troy firm that received $500,000 through Sen. Majority Leader Joseph Bruno had no strings attached to the money, and got another $525,000 from the state authority overseeing the grants.

Evident Technologies Inc. not only received two $250,000 grants sponsored by Bruno, but also got $525,000 from Empire State Development Corp.'s venture capital fund, state officials said.

Bruno's member item grants to Evident were highly unusual because such legislative grants almost always go to nonprofit organizations.

The grants were also remarkable because friends of Bruno have been investors and directors of Evident. They also contributed to his Republican Senate Committee and one provided plane rides to Bruno and is under investigation for potentially exceeding lobbying gift limits.

Bruno Ethics Probe

from today's Syracuse Post-Standard

Bruno gave "pork" to firm connected to businessman in probe

12/6/2006, 11:45 p.m. ET
By MARK JOHNSON
The Associated Press
ALBANY, N.Y. (AP) — Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno directed $500,000 in state funding to a private company connected to a businessman being investigated for providing Bruno with free air travel, state records show.

The Empire State Development Corp. grant to Evident Technologies Inc., a private nanotechnology company based in Bruno's district, received the "pork-barrel" spending at Bruno's request. Initial funding for Evident came from an investment firm run by Jared Abbruzzese, according to a news report posted on the company's Web site.

Abbruzzese is currently under investigation by the state Lobbying Commission into whether he provided Bruno with an illegal gift when he flew him between New York City and Albany. The businessman was formerly part of Empire Racing Associates, one of several groups seeking the lucrative state franchise to operate thoroughbred racing in New York. Hugh Carey took over for Abbruzzese in October.

Guest Commentary by Herb London

Commentary
Herbert London: The coming crisis in American citizenship
Herbert London, The Examiner
Dec 1, 2006 3:00 AM (5 days ago)

WASHINGTON - The Intercollegiate Studies Institute recently completed a study on American civic literacy that should serve as a wake-up call for every educator in the country. Since America’s founding, leaders have argued that our nation cannot be free and ignorant at the same time. Yet, if this study can be relied on, that is precisely the predicament we find ourselves in.

Charles Eliot, former president at Harvard, once said, “The reason there is so much intelligence at the college is freshman bring so much in and seniors take so little out.” Eliot’s glib assertion was actually prescient.

According to the study, “There is a trivial difference between college seniors and their freshman counterparts regarding knowledge of America’s heritage.” Overall, college seniors failed the civic literacy exam. More than half could not identify the century when the first American colony was established in Jamestown. And a majority did not recognize Yorktown as the battle that brought the American Revolution to an end.

In addition, more than half of the college seniors did not know the Bill of Rights prohibits the establishment of an official religion and, remarkably, nearly half did not know that The Federalist Papers were written in support of the Constitution’s ratification.

What is going on here? The most highly educated generation, if one is reliant on college attendance, seems to know very little and, more significantly, does not learn very much while in the academy. Thorstein Veblen’s comment that students “are trained in incapacity” takes on new and poignant meaning.

Some might argue that these results apply to marginal colleges and universities, but they would be wrong. An Ivy League education contributes nothing to a student’s civic knowledge. Of the 50 schools in the survey, including Brown and Yale, 16 showed “negative learning,” to wit: The seniors in these colleges scored lower than freshman, “suggesting that they will graduate with even less civic knowledge than what little they had as freshmen.”

What is self-evident is that colleges that require a course in American history and institutions outperform those schools that do not. In fact, civic learning appears to be related to a traditional core curriculum. A lesser-known college such as Calvin College achieved a high ranking partly because its students took an average of 1.5 philosophy courses compared to 0.8 philosophy courses taken by seniors at Yale, Berkeley and Johns Hopkins.

Similarly, the study suggests that civic learning is related to active citizenship. Students with knowledge of American history tend to be more engaged in voting, community service and political campaigns. Clearly, family discussion helps to compensate for deficiencies at colleges. But whether it can compensate fully for curriculum omissions is unclear.

It should be obvious — but often isn’t — that our democratic republic needs to be nourished by citizens well versed in our traditions and unique institutions.

Unfortunately as this extraordinary study reveals, America’s colleges and universities are failing in this mission, leaving many college seniors bereft of the fundamental knowledge good citizenship demands.

Where will this ignorance of American life lead? It is hard to predict. But on one matter there cannot be any doubt: A people unfamiliar with their traditions will not be ardent about defending them.

America needs citizens well-versed in how exceptional this nation is.

If our colleges cannot produce these people, our enemies will know how to exploit this vulnerability.

Some might contend that is already happening. That is why we should all be indebted to ISI for this study and why it is time for our colleges and universities to address this fundamental need.

Herbert London is president of Hudson Institute and professor emeritus of New York University. He is the author of Decade of Denial (Lanham, Maryland: Lexington Books, 2001).

Brown outspent Valesky by 50%

from today's Syracuse Post-Standard

Dollar lead failed Brown
He took in more than 50 percent more but didn't unseat state Sen. Valesky.
By Alaina Potrikus


State Sen. Dave Valesky and Assemblyman Jeff Brown sank more than $2.5 million into the race for the 49th District Senate seat this fall, according to reports filed with the state Board of Elections Monday.

In the end, Brown, R-Manlius, continued his fundraising lead over Valesky, with total contributions topping $1.6 million, according to Monday's filing. Valesky, D-Oneida, who raised $927,000, won the seat Nov. 7.

New Citizenship Test

I was reading about the new citizenship test and of course the headlines say things like "Can you pass the new test?" I think it's pretty disgraceful that papers all across the country write this headline in a joking way. Lack of knowledge about American History and Government is not funny. It's sad.

I know the curriculum for US History is a solid one, but what we lack is mandatory Civics class. A lot of the problems we are trying to tackle with the Upstate Conservatives group stem from the absence of qualified candidates for office- whether the local town offices or statewide. If more people understood the system and the importance of being involved, we'd have fewer "big bosses" running the show. I don't think it's realistic to have every office filled with someone who agrees politically- we don't need a one-party dictatorship- but there is certainly room for reasonable, sensible-minded individuals who want to govern in a way to benefit citizens.

I have had students whose parents went through untold hardships to move to America for a better life and I know that passing a test like the Citizenship test is almost silly in comparison. If you move your family from war-torn Sarajevo or Ethiopia or want to escape Communist China so your kids can be better off, isn't that a test in itself? I want immigrants who are motivated to come here and better themselves, learn English, teach their children democracy. Can a citizenship test prove actual worthiness?

Becoming a citizen is not like becoming a licensed driver. To be an American citizen is in the heart, not in the head.

Michael Brewster


from the Arizona Republic:

New test

1. There are four amendments to the Constitution about who can vote. Describe one.
Answer: Any citizen over 18 can vote. A citizen of any race can vote. Any male or female citizen can vote. You don't have to pay to vote.

2. What does it mean that the U.S. Constitution is a constitution of limited powers?
A: The federal government has only the powers that the Constitution states that it has. States have all the powers the federal government does not.

3. Name two of the natural, or inalienable, rights in the Declaration of Independence.
A: Life. Liberty. The pursuit of happiness.

4. Why did the colonists fight the British?
A: They had to pay high taxes but did not have any say about it. Taxation without representation. The British army stayed in their houses. The British denied the colonists self-government.

5. Where is the Grand Canyon?
A: Arizona. The Southwest. Along the Colorado River.


Current test

1.What do the stars on the flag mean?
A: One for each state.

2.What is the Constitution?
A: The supreme law of the land.

3. What is the executive of a state government called?
A: The governor.

4.Name some countries that were our enemies during World War II.
A: Germany, Italy and Japan.

5. Who meets in the U.S. Capitol building?
A: Congress.

The Truth on Minimum Wage

submitted by Dr. Paul Bertan

Below is an excerpt of an article by Richard Daughty titled "Have you got your $87?" (click on title for full article)

...the angriest guy in economics" [The Mogambo Guru] on the results of raising the minimum wage at the federal level or elsewhere... it truly explains the results of raising the wages, and on and on...

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Richard Daughty is general partner and C.O.O. for Smith Consultant Group, serving the financial and medical communities, and the writer/publisher of the Mogambo Guru economic newsletter, an avocational exercise the better to heap disrespect on those who desperately deserve it. The Mogambo Guru is quoted frequently in Barron's, The Daily Reckoning and other fine publications...

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--In part:

"The bad news is that, thanks to the last election, half the states in the USA now have legally-mandated higher minimum wages, most of them usually about 40% higher than the federal minimum wage of $5.15.

This is unalloyed bad news. If you don't believe me, then listen to Gerard Jackson, the Economic Editor of Brookes News, who cited economists Richard Vedder and Lowell Gallaway of the Employment Policies Institute, who found that there "was a correlation between minimum wage increases and poverty among 'the poorest of the poor.' In short, [effective] minimum wage increases raised the level of poverty. This is precisely what economics predicts."

And it is exactly what we will get more of, regardless of the glut of "economists", including some laughably lame-brained Nobel Prize crackpots, who have secured their place in the Mogambo Big Book Of Economic Infamy (MBBOEI) when they advocated, in writing, another raise in the minimum wage.

It boggles the mind that they would advocate such a thing when all of the other dozen or so raises in the minimum wage for the last 50 years have done absolutely nothing good for anybody, and have only left us with predictably more tragically poor people, a bigger government to take care of them, and higher prices for everybody, necessitating subsequent hikes in the minimum wage, raising prices, and continuing the spiral down, down, down to the Stygian depths of stinking economic hell and utter ruination.

And note that not one of these lowlife "economists" recommended that the damnable Federal Reserve stop creating excess money and credit, which is the cause of the price inflation that is bedeviling the low-wage worker in the first place! Idiots! First-class idiots!"

One of the worst exploits in the past election was perpetrated by Democrats. Their anti-Republican ads showed that the candidate "voted against raising the minimum wage while voting in favor of raising his own (legislative) salary."

Raising the minimum wage simply raises costs for employers, thereby raising cost of living for everyone. We should look at attracting businesses to Upstate NY which pay HIGHER than minimum wages. A pro-business climate will do this.