Monday – November 8, 2010

When I was Speaker:

This week, we will hear about the President’s successful trade trip to India and Asia. He will spend two hundred million dollars a day on this junket. He said on Friday that there would be 56,000 jobs created from the trade deal in India alone. You do the math. Why spend two hundred million a day for a hand full of jobs that won’t be created for at least another three years?

This trade mission will posture the president as the Free Trader in Chief. He left town amidst the most humiliating political loss in over six decades to re-create himself. He said in front young people in India, that there would be “mid course corrections and adjustments”. He went to say, “We will see how they play out in the coming months.”

I have to pose one question. Whenever this president gets himself into trouble politically, he addresses the young. Could it be the young are still impressionable and still wants to see the magic that has disappeared in the eyes of the mature? Alex Sink, a Democrat and former candidate for the governor’s office in Florida, said she did not get the backing of the White House because she was critical of the Presidents liberal positions. She lost to a Republican. Could it be that there are more who have matured politically than those who are mature and still idealistic? What ever the case, we are still feeling the repercussions of the vote last Tuesday.

Congressman Boehner of Ohio, the next Speaker of the House, has been humbled by the win. He has met his destiny and that is the history he will make when the Republicans challenge the spending initiatives, challenge the healthcare bill and finally question the improprieties that will require investigations.

The next Speaker is mature enough to lead. He is experienced enough to lead and he has the courage to lead and, better yet, the courage to ask the tough questions when he leads. On the other hand, Nancy Pelosi, the outgoing Speaker who made history herself, will ask her fellow democrats to support her for the minority leadership position in the House. She will then be able to push every one down a peg so she can retain power. James Clyburn, the Chairman of the Congressional Black caucus, will also be forced to step down a peg in leadership to accommodate Pelosi’s wish.

Ms. Pelosi’s only purpose in doing this is to remind everyone that she was once Speaker. She will say: “ When I was Speaker”, at every point in the tenure of Mr. Boehner. She will steel the stage and reserve the clout that she will require when the inevitable mismanagement of her office is discovered. She will stay in power to reserve her power. This is not only selfish, but it becomes dangerous to our system and to our freedoms.

When Ms. Pelosi reminds us that “when she was Speaker”, we will be reminded of the back room deals and the gross abuse of power that she, Harry Reid, the President and every House member and Senate member of the Democratic Party were part and parcel to. When Ms. Pelosi reminds us of “when she was Speaker”, Mr. Boehner must also remind us of what occurred when she was Speaker.

Thomas Jefferson wrote to Richard Price in 1785: “The happiness of governments like ours wherein the people are truly the mainspring is that they are never to be despaired of. When an evil becomes so glaring as to strike them generally, they arouse themselves, and it is redressed. He only is then the popular man and can get into office who shows the best dispositions to reform the evil. This truth was obvious on several occasions during the [Revolutionary] war, and this character in our government saved us. Calamity [is] our best physician."

On today’s date, in 1725, The New York Gazette newspaper began publication. It was edited by William Bradford and it would chronicle events of the day until 1744. It was the colonies first newspaper.

Bradford has numerous "firsts" to his credit in the history of American printing. From 1725 to 1744 he published the New York Gazette, the colony's first newspaper. After 1733 it had a rival, the Weekly Journal, published by Bradford's former apprentice and partner, John Peter Zenger. Bradford, as public printer, supported the government. Zenger was sponsored by a faction opposed to the government. When attempts were made to suppress Zenger, Bradford took a new side, against the government, in the famous freedom-of-press controversy.

Since the inception of Bradford’s newspaper, we have had a tradition of excellence in this country. Part of that excellence is made possible through the freedom of the press. In recent years, the freedom of the press has been bought and paid for by big corporate concerns. Journalists have been able to offer their opinions, regardless of fact or falsity and have been given support by accommodating an agenda, instead of writing and speaking about the differences of the agenda.

Keith Olbermann was suspended indefinitely by NBC for contributing to Democratic political campaigns. It is the policy of NBC news that any donation to a political campaign be given prior approval by the president of the news organization. Olbermann obviously violated the rules when he donated $2,400.00 to each of three Democratic political campaigns. They were: Kentucky’s Senate candidate Jack Conway and Arizona’s Reps, Paul Grijalva and Gabrielle Giffords. Why these three, one can only speculate. But when Olbermann was over the top in his criticism of Rand Paul and the other Republican candidates how can you become impartial and deliver the news regardless of preference, to an audience who must have the facts to vote their conscience. I am sure that many of NBC’s and MSNBC’S viewers do have a conscience. It is Olbermann that didn’t and still doesn’t.

Jefferson also wrote about the freedom of the Press – In a letter to John Tyler in 1804, he wrote: "No experiment can be more interesting than that we are now trying, and which we trust will end in establishing the fact, that man may be governed by reason and truth. Our first object should therefore be, to leave open to him all the avenues to truth. The most effectual hitherto found, is the freedom of the press. It is, therefore, the first shut up by those who fear the investigation of their actions."

Mr. Olbermann, Ms. Pelosi and Mr. Reid and the others who drive an agenda that is despised and that is fraught with threats to liberty and freedom, should review the writings of the men that came before them. There are lessons and more importantly fact that was preserved, because of a free press. It is the opinion that becomes a fact by agenda that remains the threat. When Pelosi reminds of “when she was Speaker” remember the opinion vs. the fact by agenda scenario of the past four years.

I hope that when Mr. Boehner faces the end of his tenure he can say, without a doubt, “When I was Speaker, it was out of a fondness of serving and not out of a fondness of power.” I believe he will, because he started with a humble acceptance of preserving liberty and freedom and not wanting it destroyed. I believe he has read the words of Jefferson and I believe that he believes them.

Gregory C. Dildilian
Founder and Executive Director
Pinecone Conservatives

A footnote: Remember fact is far easier to report on when opinions are taken out of the scenario. Fact is far easier to absorb when opinions are taken out of the news cycle. Truth in the press is what guarantees our liberties and freedoms.