Standing at the Crossroads of History

By C. A. Bamford

Imagine a world without America. Imagine a world where there is no one to stand proudly and boldly in defense of liberty. To whom will those suffering under oppression or need turn for help? As Ronald Reagan so famously said, “If we lose freedom here, there is no place to escape to. This is the last stand on earth.”



Our nation is at a crucial crossroad. The presidential election of 2012 will be one of the most important in the history of our Republic. Our choice will determine our future, our children’s future, and that of the United States of America. Never have the stakes been so high. Never has the choice been so clearly defined. We face experience and accomplishment vs. empty rhetoric and unfulfilled promises; American exceptionalism vs. apologetic mediocrity. Will we remain the Greatest Nation on Earth, or will we become just one of many managed and regulated units in a homogenized, global community working for the good of a few and the freedom of none?

First, let us define what is meant by American Exceptionalism. It does not mean we think that we are better than everyone else. It is a statement that America is different than all other nations because of where we came from, who we are, and what we stand for. Our Founders believed that we were brought together on this continent by Providence. They believed that God had a hand in bringing together the people who made this nation. It is faith in the idea that in this nation, people of all races and creeds can unite around a universal belief in opportunity, shared values, and our natural rights and responsibilities under God.

As Alexander Hamilton, James Madison and the rest of our Founders knew, American exceptionalism is about human freedom and holding yourself to the highest standard of which you are capable. No other country on earth has ever tried such an experiment as this representative democracy governing the independent states according to the Constitution; the Constitution, which was openly and contentiously debated, and painstakingly crafted by the founders in order to protect our new country and to ensure the individual rights of all. America was indeed founded as, and has endured as an exceptional nation.

But if we mistakenly demand that the rewards of the sacrifice of blood, toil, and treasure that created this exceptional nation be given to all without regard; if we demand that shared wealth regardless of participation, not shared opportunity, is the right of all, then we will no longer be exceptional. If we cease to hold ourselves to the highest standards of which we are capable, then we will cease to be an exceptional nation and we will become no more than any other country, be it Greece, Venezuela or Iran.

Over the past two and a half years, the inept and incomprehensible policies of the current administration have brought us to the brink of disaster and have eroded and threatened to destroy those things we once held dear…self-reliance, honor, and freedom.

We know that Governor Sarah Palin believes we are an exceptional nation. President Obama has told us he believes that America is no more exceptional than Greece, Iran, or any other nation in the world. Governor Palin has proven that she is willing to sacrifice much of what she holds dear for this exceptional nation. President Obama has asked us to sacrifice for his vision of a fundamentally changed country; one that is no longer an exceptional nation. The difference in their vision for America is clear. Let us now compare their experience and leadership.


Experience and Accomplishments: Governor Palin

Private sector experience: Sarah Palin worked at local businesses, on fishing boats and canneries to pay her way through college. She and her husband, Todd Palin, own and operate an Alaskan commercial fishing business. Palin has written two books, both #1 NY Times Bestsellers which sold over 2 million copies. She is a political commentator for FOX News and hosted a highly rated TV series about Alaska on the Learning Channel. Palin is an in demand international speaker.

1992-1996 - Palin was elected by wide margins and served two terms on the City Council of Wasilla, Alaska

1996—2002 - Elected in 1996 with 75% of the vote in a 3-way race, Palin served two successful 3-year terms as Mayor of Wasilla. Under her stewardship, infrastructure was improved, property taxes cut.

Her policies to attract business into the area were so successful that the tiny town of Wasilla became the fasting growing city in the nation.Tens of thousands flock to Wasilla to shop in the stores Palin brought to town, thanks to her positive, pro growth policies.

1999-2002 - Mayor Palin was elected President of Alaska Conference of Mayors by her peers. She led dozens of other mayors in dealing with statewide issues, such as municipal revenue sharing, and advocating for local government control of important local issues.

2003-2004 - Appointed to and named Chair and Ethics Supervisor of the Alaska Oil and Gas Conservation Commission.

2003-2005 - Palin served as one of three Director of Senator Steven’s Excellence in Public Service group devoted to advancing women in conservative politics.

2007 Assumed Chairmanship of Interstate Oil and Gas Compact

2006-2009 - Palin was elected Governor of Alaska, the second most powerful gubernatorial office in the country. Governor Palin, the youngest person and first woman to be elected governor of Alaska, earned bipartisan approval ratings of over 90% making her the most popular governor in America.

She co-wrote and signed into law the Alaska Gasline Inducement Act (AGIA), negotiated with Canada on building a natural gas line from Alaska to the lower 48 states (an achievement that prior governors had attempted but failed to achieve for over 30 years), passed landmark bi-bipartisan ethics reform, cut billions in spending from the budget and put $5 billion into the state’s rainy day savings fund, and left her state with a $12 billion budget surplus.

She successfully fulfilled every one of her campaign promises, both as Mayor and as Governor. Her fiscally conservative policies earned Alaska a Aaa rating, the highest rating given.

As governor, she served as Commander in Chief of the Alaska National Guard, the only National Guard on 24-hour standby. Alaska's unique role as the first line of defense means as Governor, Sarah Palin has a top level national security clearance, and received regular briefings. Though never discussed, Palin's level of security is reportedly as high as ranking members of Congress' national security council membership, second only to the President.

She was also Commander-in-Chief of the Alaska Defense Force, a reserve military and police force that is a recognized militia by Homeland Security. It was the ADF that bravely defended Alaska during World War II, when the Japanese invaded the territory.

Governor Palin was a frugal budgeter as the Governor of Alaska. During her tenure, she cut spending 9.5% while also vetoing nearly half a billion dollars in spending, and she wisely did this during strong economic times.

Whitney Pitcher spells it all out here.


Governor Palin has nine years of Executive Experience, more than three times as much as President Obama. Twenty years of public service in total.


Experience and Accomplishments: President Obama

Private sector experience - Barack Obama’s education was funded by federal programs and unknown donors. He has published two best-selling books, and one unsuccessful children’s book. He has no other known private sector business experience other than a reported part time job at an ice cream shop during his teen years.

1992-96 - Lectured at the U of Chicago Law School.

From April-Oct 1992 Obama also directed ACORN's Illinois Project Vote, a voter registration drive that achieved its goal of 400,000 registered African Americans.
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He and Michelle spent several months in Bali in 1992 working in vain to finish a book, which was later published in 1995 with the help of domestic terrorist Bill Ayers, who reportedly ghost wrote much of it.

1993-96 - Obama joined a law firm specializing in civil rights litigation, as an associate.

1995-1999- Chairman of the Chicago Annenberg Challenge, a "foundation" created and guided by terrorist Bill Ayers.

1996-2004 - Obama was a senior lecturer at U of Chicago, teaching courses in due process and equal protection, voting rights, and racism and law. He published no legal scholarship, and turned down tenured positions

1995-2004 - Obama announced his candidacy for the Illinois Senate in 95, and served eight years (97-04) while continuing to work part time at the university, He proposed no major legislation and voted “Present” 130 times.

1996-2004 - Was counsel from 96-04, with his law license becoming inactive in 2002. During the four years Obama worked as a full time lawyer at the firm, he was involved in 30 cases. He also continued to work part time for the university and as a State Senator.

2004-2008 - Was elected as a Democrat to the U.S. Senate in 2004, and began his fulltime campaign for the presidency in 2006. Introduced no significant legislation.

2009 - Obama elected President of United States. He began his campaign for re-election shortly thereafter. Under his administration, debt has tripled, the deficit widened, unsustainable spending, record unemployment has crippled the US economy.

Our AAA credit rating has been downgraded for the first time in our history. Onerous regulations have hampered energy exploration and development and are destroying our jobs creators, small businesses throughout the country. Government has become a bloated, uncontrolled entity that no longer answers to the people, but seeks instead to control and use them. Under his administration we have become a nation divided.

At the end of the 1970s, after three years of Jimmy Carter, America could not wait to vote for someone else. That someone turned out to be the greatest president of the 20th century. Ronald Reagan knew what he believed, was passionate about expressing it, and once in office, carried through with the goals he had articulated during the 1980 campaign.

When the history of the 2012 presidential election is written, what will we remember? That a conservative Republican challenged a socialist nightmare for the leadership of the country — and won? Or that the Republican Party nominated another squish who allowed the worst president in our history to follow through on his promise to "fundamentally transform the United States of America."

~Doug Patton

History will record whether we had to courage and wisdom to choose a leader who is passionate about America, and who has proven herself to be a fearless and effective fiscal reformer and advocate for the people she serves, or if we choose to continue to blindly follow those who are destroying our nation. America is indeed a blessed and exceptional nation.

It is now up to us to ensure that it remains so. One may again quote one of our greatest presidents:

You and I have a rendezvous with destiny. We'll preserve for our children this, the last best hope of man on earth, or we'll sentence them to take the last step into a thousand years of darkness.

~ Ronald Reagan

Sarah Palin On Sputnik vs. Spudnut, And A Look Forward To The Future

Above: Governor Sarah Palin meets with Russia's Ambassador To The United States, Sergy Kislyak

If our readers checked out coverage of Sarah Palin's interview with Greta Van Susteren and her follow up posting on Facebook, you know that (A) she has been ripping Obama's pep rally for even MORE Big Government boondoggles [otherwise known as the SOTU speech] to shreds, and (B) she likes potato flour donuts!

We find it delightful that Sarah was able to use a donut shop with a cool name [and an excellent play on Obama's Sputnik reference] to illustrate the difference between the American Spirit, American Exceptionalism, and the ability to make one's dreams become reality in a free society vs the crippling effect of Big Government intervention, and central planning.

Sarah elaborates on Sputnik and Spudnut further:

Please read this article by the Hoover Institution’s Research Fellow Peter Schweizer. Schweizer, who has written extensively on the subject of the decline and fall of the Soviet Union, offers a Washington Post writer an important refresher on the real history of Sputnik, since many critics are engaged in misreporting:

Palin’s other point is that Sputnik was the sort of government bureaucratic program that got the Soviet Union in trouble; it’s an example of what eventually did them in. Citing Wikipedia (what journalistic ingenuity!), Stromberg argues that actually the Soviet Union didn’t have a debt problem until some "thirty years after" Sputnik. Perhaps instead of relying on Wikipedia, Stromberg might have consulted Robert Gates’ book From the Shadows which chronicles, in part, his career as a Soviet analyst at the CIA. (Just in case they are unaware at the Post, this is the same Robert Gates who is now the Secretary of Defense.) On page 173, he accurately points out that the CIA knew early on of the "Soviet economic crisis. From the late 1950s, CIA had clearly described the chronic weaknesses as well as the formidable military power of the Soviet Union."

Read the whole thing here.

Now, in a recent interview I mentioned analogies that could relate to solutions to our economic challenges, including the difference between a communist government’s "Sputnik" and the private sector’s "Spudnut." The analogies I mentioned obviously aren’t comparable in size, but highlight a clear difference in economic focus: big government command and control economies vs. America’s small businesses.

If you’re near Richland, WA, you should stop by The Spudnut Shop, where you’ll find an all-American success story of a family owned small business that for over 60 years has been serving up a product that people want to buy. Businesses like this coffee shop don’t receive big government bailouts. They produce something with their own ingenuity and hard work. And here we see the former communist Soviet Union’s advancement (before its government debt-ridden demise) vs. America’s small businesses that are the backbone of our economy.

We’d be well off if we had a greater appreciation for the free market ingenuity of ordinary American entrepreneurs, both great and small – whether they make high-tech gadgets or potato donuts. And this goes for all our small business owners – whether they run a family farm, a commercial salmon fishing business, an auto shop, a print shop, a consulting firm, a restaurant, you name it. Our government should show them more respect by not punishing their success and limiting their ability to hire more people by over-taxing and over-reaching into their businesses. Don’t stifle their growth with burdensome regulations like Obamacare and cap-and-tax. Government should be on their side, not in their way.

I believe and trust in the strength of America’s private sector. But I sometimes fear that the current administration in Washington distrusts or discounts the individuals who have built this country; hence their belief that only a distant bureaucratic elite in D.C. can make decisions for our small businesses that will provide American opportunity. This administration’s thinking is wrong. We don’t need a command and control economy that "invests" our money in their half-baked ideas. We need freedom, reward for hard work, and a re-invigorated sense of personal responsibility and work ethic, especially among our young people.

We need to be as motivated and optimistic as our parents, grandparents, and great-grandparents, many of whom started out with nothing but a dream as they built a life for themselves by the sweat of their brow. They didn’t ask for bailouts. They didn’t expect anything from anyone. They wanted the freedom and opportunity to work hard and prosper by their own merits. If at first they failed, they took their lumps, dusted themselves off, got back up, and tried again until they succeeded. They didn’t retreat. They built this country and they passed on to us more prosperity and opportunity than has ever been bestowed on any generation in human history. We must not squander that inheritance. Let’s get back to their common sense values.

~ Sarah Palin

This is spot on advice. America does need to look back at how our parents and grand-parents handled tough times. Not only making it through them, but coming out stronger, tougher, and more successful, as well.

I feel blessed in many ways. My parents were born in the early 1900s, as WWI was just getting cranked up, and I wasn't born until much later, when they were in their mid-40s. I had the benefit of parents who lived through two world wars and the Great Depression. They both had a strong work ethic, and a no-nonsense approach to things. I didn't get to spend as much time with them as most of my peers did their parents, as both passed on early in my life, but the couple of decades I did get to spend with them were essential.

America is in as tough a spot as it has ever been in, but common sense, AND history teach us that government is NOT the answer to our many problems. As Ronald Reagan often said: "Government is not the answer to our problems, government IS the problem." He was right. Almost every problem we have can be traced back to something government did. Some well meant but misguided program, draconian regulation, or just plain old stupidity.

We need to do everything we can to get government out of our way, off our backs, and helping, not hurting.

We need to get back to First Principles, and our Founding Fathers' vision for the Republic. One where the cities and states control their destinies, and the federal government stays out of the way, doing what it should do, protecting the nation from it's enemies, foreign and domestic, while the engine of democracy does it's thing.

Capitalism works, and works well, but only when government doesn't meddle. Doesn't try and pick winners and losers.

Not every business will succeed. Even Spudnuts, which was once a nationwide franchise, fell on hard times, but they survive today as a smaller group of independent owners, and carry on a brand that has been around since 1946. They did this by learning from mistakes, doing what had to be done to survive, and good old fashioned hard work. And, making a good product, as well. Not by government handouts.

Democrats introduced the concept of "too big to fail." This is a dangerous idea. Also a strange idea coming from people who believe in the THEORY of evolution as fact.

Part of evolution in business, as in the animal kingdom, is survival of the fittest. Just like some species of animals, plants, and what have you, fail, so do some businesses. It's a natural thing. A healthy thing. We learn more from failure than success. Also getting struggling businesses, that can't be turned around, liquidated, helps strengthen the market as a whole. Works the same way in the plant and animal world as well.

Government "investment" in failing businesses and "concepts" only continues to prop up the walking dead, and wastes billion, if not trillions of dollars on things that will never be.

The entire "green economy" would collapse tomorrow if the hundreds of billions of tax payer dollars stopped propping them up. But the "wise men" in Washington [and some "good old boys" on the take] have decided they are smarter than the markets, and have thrown common sense to the wind, literally, pushing an agenda few want, and one that cannot survive in the free market.

The "green economy" has failed the "survival of the fittest" test. It's failed to "evolve" into a viable business. We've been funding "green" for almost a century. Time to let it sink or swim on it's own, and stop throwing good money [that we don't have] after bad.

The same goes for other failed ideas. Time to just let go. 

We must be smarter. We must tell the federal government to cease and desist. It's well past time to stop the Soviet style central planning of our economy, and our lives. It has been a miserable failure. It has put us over $14 trillion in debt. That's basically 100 percent of the nation's yearly gross domestic product! [GDP] It's beyond simply unsustainable, it's a serious national security risk. The very nation could collapse under the weight of the debt. Simply cease to exist.

Washington wants to GROW the debt more and control even MORE of our lives from the central office in D.C.

This is unacceptable. The great American Experiment has always thrived when government was held at bay, and hard working American were left alone to do their thing. It's time to DEMAND this be the case once again, and take solid steps to make sure it is ALWAYS the case moving forward.

Sarah Palin is the nation's only top leader who is making this case for the American people. She gets it. This is why we must get behind her efforts to bring REAL CHANGE to America.

BTW, Sarah has visited The Spudnut Shop in Richland, WA and the Tri-City Herald reports on local reactions on this story and has a photo gallery of her visit. You can check that out here.