Daniel Hannan: What Does It Mean to Be Conservative?

From The Telegraph

By Daniel Hannan

The cleverest living Englishman

Some years ago, while canvassing for his wife in a local election in Wiltshire, Roger Scruton was asked on the doorstep, “What is conservatism, anyway?” The voter had unwittingly put the question to the man who, more than any other, has defined what conservatism is; the man who has as good a claim as any to be the cleverest living Englishman.

If he were on the Left, Roger Scruton would be recognised as one of our towering public intellectuals; but it’s a peculiarity of our age that conservative thinkers occupy a space beyond the mental horizons of most commissioning editors. There will always be Rightist columnists of the Richard Littlejohn variety, I’m delighted to say; but a Rightist professor whose writings range from German philosophy to the oddities of common law, from religious art to country sports, is likely to be regarded as an eccentric class traitor.

Still, Roger will be read and remembered when many of the prominent literary figures of our day are footnotes – partly for the keenness of his intelligence and partly for the consistency of his vision, but mainly for the grandeur of his prose. He can ennoble almost any subject – economics, cooking, telephone boxes – by his gentle logic and his courteous insistence on treating readers as his intellectual equals.

Pope Francis Doesn't Really Understand This Economics Thing, Does He?

From Forbes

By Tim Worstall

Pope Francis has told us all that we’re really very naughty indeed to allow food to become a product like any other, a product in which people can speculate and profit. Which leads to a rather sad observation about Il Papa‘s understanding of basic economics: he doesn’t, essentially, he doesn’t understand basic economics. It is indeed an outrage that there are still 800 million or more of our fellow human beings who are malnourished. Appalling that while the world grows the calories to feed all not all get fed. But once we’ve noted those points, decided (as we damn well should) to do something about them, the interesting question becomes, well, what? At which point we might note that it’s the places with well functioning markets, subject to all that horrible speculation and profit making, that have the people who are not malnourished and not starving. Something Pope Francis might have considered before he said this: 

The Solemnity of Our Lord Jesus Christ, King of the Universe

Saint Mary's Cathederal Choir - "Hail Redeemer King Divine"

Wayne Allyn Root: Obama Appears to Hate Everyone

Pat Buchanan: Rogue President

By Patrick J. Buchanan

Asserting a legal and constitutional authority he himself said he did not have, President Obama is going rogue, issuing an executive amnesty to 4 to 5 million illegal aliens.

He will order the U.S. government not to enforce the law against these 5 million, and declare that they are to be exempt from deportation and granted green cards.

Where did Obama get his 4-5 million figure, not 2-4 million, or 5-7 million? Nowhere in law, but plucked out of his own mind, as to what he can get away with. Barack Obama just felt it was about right.

Thus does our constitutional law professor-president “faithfully execute” the laws of the United States he has twice swore to uphold?

Schlafly: Obama Could Launch Another Civil War

 “I think he lies about everything”

President Obama’s looming executive action on immigration reform represents a Fort Sumter-type moment, according to conservative icon Phyllis Schlafly.

Schlafly at first considered comparing the Obama amnesty to the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor but decided that Obama’s plan is much more subtle.

“With Pearl Harbor, the American people knew what was happening,” she said.

But Fort Sumter, where the opening shots of the Civil War were fired, represented the beginning of a ruinous conflict, and Schlafly, like fellow conservative luminary Richard Viguerie, speculates that an executive amnesty might touch off a sort of modern-day conflagration.

Read more at WND >>

Dear GOP, Do Your Damned Job

From Conservative Review

By Steve Deace 

November 17, 2014

Dear Republican Party,

On November 4^th the American people spoke with a resounding voice, and voted “no” to President Obama’s Marxist Progressive agenda/tactics. The numbers show the American people gave you a definitive mandate as well.

• Democrats are now at their lowest numbers in state legislatures nationwide in 86 years, and Republicans now control more than two-thirds of the state legislative chambers across the country. 
• Republicans have the most seats in the U.S. House of Representatives since before the Great Depression.
• Republicans posted one of the top five election year swings in the U.S. Senate in the past 70 years.
• For the first time in 58 years there will be Republican governors in Illinois, Maryland, and Massachusetts at the same time. 
• Over 80% of U.S. geography is now represented by Republicans.

The depth and extent of GOP gains were unforeseen by every pollster and pundit that correctly predicted the outcome of the 2014 election. That’s because they failed to see two things:

1)    The willingness of the conservative base you’ve been battling in recent years to still turn out and turn the tide in several key races.

2)    The American people were far angrier with Obama than they were with Republicans; disregarding the fact your 42% approval rating in the latest Gallup poll is the same as the president’s.

Despite claims from liberal media pundits on election night, 2014 was not an anti-incumbent election. Almost all of the Republican incumbents won. In fact, the only Republican governor who lost was the one who raised the gas tax.

However, defiant as ever, the president has reacted to the 2014 election results by threatening anti-constitutional executive amnesty for illegal aliens, appointing an Eric Holder clone to succeed him at his renegade Justice department, and to essentially create an Obamacare for the internet.

Even Obama’s chosen architect for his signature legislation has been caught on camera admitting Obamacare wouldn’t have passed without a lack of transparency from Democrats, and the stupidity of the American people. The Obama Regime is nothing if not shameless.

In spite of this president’s repeated efforts to thwart the rule of law, this is still a representative republic. On November 4^th the American people did all they can lawfully do to save themselves from Obamaism. They more then went out of their way to change the direction of the country, even electing Republicans to positions of prominence within deep blue states like the president’s own home. There is nothing more the American people can lawfully do that they haven’t already done.

Now it’s up to you to lead.

See, the American people weren’t just sending a message to Obama, they were also sending a message to you. And if you refuse to act upon that message, then you will be guilty of defying the will of the people every bit as much as the Marxist Progressive in the White House.

The message from the American people is clear – stop Obama.

Contrary to the cynical claims of the Obama Regime, the American people are not stupid. Therefore, you cannot run ads nationwide reminding voters Obamacare was on the ballot this year and then not do everything you can to save them from it. You cannot send Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) all over the country to rally a wary conservative base to use this election as a means to stop Obama’s illegal executive amnesty scheme, and then not do so.

Despite your lackluster record, we are trusting you again because the future of the country is at stake and you were our only viable alternative. Sometimes you have to fight wars with the soldiers you have.

It is your solemn duty to come up with the remedies that honor the faith the American people have placed in you, not to mention that upholds your sworn oaths of office to defend the Constitution against all enemies both foreign and domestic.

For Obama cannot unilaterally act lawlessly in our system of government. The separation of powers requires fecklessness on your part to permit it to happen.

Forget what your consultants tell you is politically possible. You’re up against an opponent who doesn’t care about possible, let alone legal. And if this is how this president operates when he had to pretend to care what the American people thought, imagine what boundaries he’ll push these final two years when he does not.

You will not be able to outmaneuver or outlast a Progressive who is hell-bent – literally – on winning a Marxist argument with history. You will have to face him and defeat him. This isn’t about the technocratic tactics you too often obsess over. This is about the only tactic that matters now—survival.

Your courage of conviction is required. History is calling on you to hold the line on American Exceptionalism, so there’s enough liberty left for the next president to hopefully start turning the country back to the vision of the Founding Fathers.

Do your damned job, or you may be the generation Ronald Reagan once warned us about. The one who will have to explain to their children and grandchildren what it was once like here when people were still free.

Steve Deace is a nationally-syndicated talk show host and also the author of the new book “Rules for Patriots: How Conservatives Can Win Again.” You can “like” him on Facebook or follow him on Twitter @SteveDeaceShow.)