Virginia Right!

Tonja Dausand, an awesome liberty and sovereignty activist, behind enemy lines in California, reported to me this:

Hi again,

I spoke with Robert Kappel in Soux Falls (605) 367-8277. He told me that they have not renewed their memebership with ICLEI at this year for financial reasons but it’s possible they might.

All the best,

Tonja Dausend

Thanks and a shout out to Tonja for all she does.

I did see the media reports about Ron Paul has suspended his campaign etc.  NOT TRUE!  Here’s what the email says:

Our campaign will continue to work in the state convention process.  We will continue to take leadership positions, win delegates, and carry a strong message to the Republican National Convention that Liberty is the way of the future.

Moving forward, however, we will no longer spend resources campaigning in primaries in states that have not yet voted.  Doing so with any hope of success would take many tens of millions of dollars we simply do not have.  I encourage all supporters of Liberty to make sure you get to the polls and make your voices heard, particularly in the local, state, and Congressional elections, where so many defenders of Freedom are fighting and need your support.

I hope all supporters of Liberty will remain deeply involved – become delegates, win office, and take leadership positions.  I will be right there with you.  In the coming days, my campaign leadership will lay out to you our delegate strategy and what you can do to help, so please stay tuned.

So, let’s keep fighting, especially in Virginia.  Ron Paul didn’t quit on us; let’s not quit on him.

While I am not completely happy with the Pirate Party movement, it is a step toward liberty.  It is good to read this blog from the Pirate’s one member of the European Parliament from Sweden:  Amelia Andersdotter:

A few highlights:

Prague declaration on Pirate Party Europe ratifiedAmong the internationally significant decisions of the weekend was PP-DE’s ratification of the Prague declaration authored by pirates from all over the Europe at the Pirate Parties International Conference two weeks earlier. The signatories agree to include a common election program in their platforms for the EP elections in 2014, to coordinate their campaigns, and to establish a Pirate Party of Europe. The ratification was welcomed by guests from international Pirate Parties that attended the assembly. Board member Julia Schramm has made it her goal to help facilitate broad transnational participation in writing the common election program.  (emphasis mine)

Led by Joachim PAUL, the Pirate Party, the somewhat libertarian German Pirate Party won 7.6% of the vote in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany’s California!

The Pirates were dancing in the streets in a graffiti-smeared neighborhood near the central station as hundreds of the party’s young, laptop-toting followers crowded into a local disco called Zakk to dance the night away.

Joachim Paul, captain of the crew and a biochemical engineer turned politician, took the stage and fired up the crowd, shouting into a sea of trademark orange Pirate flags: “The Pirates in North Rhine-Westphalia are in the state parliament! Tomorrow it’s on to the federal parliament!”

Watch out Tweedledee and Tweedledum, the people might have choices!  At least a decent victory party!

This report has exit polling showing that the German Pirate Party won 7.5% of the vote in the largest state of Germany, North Rhine Westphalia!

Unlike the City State of Berlin, and small states like the Saarland and Schweizig-Holstein, this is a major win for the new liberty party in Germany.

The reporter here has five reasons for the rise of the Pirate Party.  Here’s number four:

The fourth reason is the Piratenpartei‘s early broadening of the party platform. In Sweden, we learned the hard way in 2010 that not enough people will vote a party with a narrow platform to the general parliament. The European parliament was fine, but not the Swedish one. While we were busy running an election campaign, the German pirate party were busy discussing if – and if so, how – their program should be broadened. This was rewarded with 15 seats in the Berlin parliament, which leads me to…

I wish to add a sixth one:  The Pirates are not Tweedledee nor Tweedledum and they will have to at some point take on the EU, its elites and the empire.  When that happens, watch out!  Liberty is on the march.  Remember, “…where the Spirit of the Lord is there is liberty.”  (II Corinthians 3:17 [KJV])

I have found this from the Daily Paul about the five district conventions held today in the First, Second, Third, Seventh and Eighth Congressional Districts and the word is surprisingly encouraging:

Submitted by Virginian on Sat, 05/12/2012 – 18:26. Permalink

Looks like we got a good number so far.
Adding to the list below:
CD1: 2/3
CD2: 2/3? (Could be 3/3)
CD3: 3/3
CD7: 0/3
CD8: 1/3
Thats so far 10-11 out of 18 which is over half.

This added to these victories in the other districts:

Submitted by valleyforge on Sat, 05/12/2012 – 19:33. Permalink

April 28
CD4 1/3
CD9 3/3

May 5
CD6 3/3

I contacted the NEW THIRD District GOP CHAIRMAN, J. Christopher Stearns, who confirmed the following numbers (as well as his own election!):

CD 1:  2/3 national delegates, sweep of state central committee (3/3)

CD 2:  2/3 national delegates, another SWEEP of state central committee (3/3)

CD 3:  3/3 national delegates, STILL ANOTHER SWEEP of state central committee!  (3/3)

(Our national curling team could use sweepers like this!)

CD 7:  0/3 national delegates, 0/3 state central.

CD 8:   3/3 national delegates and 3/3 state central.

I have not confirmed the other districts as far as RP delegates or state central but just these numbers will reshape the future of the Grand Ol’ Party in the Old Dominion.  It means libertarians will have a seat at the table with the state party.  I am a delegate to that convention and I plan (Lord willing) to be there for that.  Maybe a live blog…

UPDATE:  The new RP members of state central might get to decide the biggest question of 2013:  How is the fight between Lt. Governor Bolling and Attorney General Cuccinelli (Note:  I have endorsed Cuccinelli) for Governor:  Primary or Convention?  Convention is cheaper but also favors Cuccinelli.  Here’s a Virginian-Pilot article on this question.

The groundwork for that possible shift, which could limit broader access to the nomination process, is being laid now even as a fight for party control builds ahead of a likely gubernatorial matchup between Lt. Gov. Bill Bolling and Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli.

Behind it is a roster of Ron Paul loyalists, Cuccinelli supporters, tea partyers and other factions – what one activist called a “perfect storm of odd alliances within the Republican Party.”

They’ve been quietly working to put like-minded people in seats on regional Republican panels that come with votes on the Virginia GOP’s governing body, the State Central Committee.

It is safe to say the staid, steeped in convention (pun intended) Virginia GOP is due for a big change.  I think it is a positive change.  Let’s invite and welcome liberty candidates into the GOP!

While the Greek Pirate Party only garnered about one half of one percent in the recent election, its counterpart in Germany is rolling right along, having won seats in a third state parliament:  The northern state of Schleswig-Holstein:

Voters in the North German state of Schleswig-Holstein have chosen a new parliament. The Pirate Party has won seats for the first time, while the embattled Free Democrats have fared better than expected.

After its success in Berlin and Saarland, the German Pirate Party – whose policies focus on freedom of information in the digital sphere – has managed to win seats in the northern state of Schleswig-Holstein. Following Sunday’s election, the Pirates walked away with over 8 percent of the votes.

The Pirates essentially tied with the Free Democrats, the somewhat libertarian but pro-EU party.

The next state to have an election is North Rhine-Westphalia, the California of Germany with nearly 18 million citizens.  And the Pirates are slated to do very well, maybe even double digits:

On Sunday, voters in Germany’s largest state, North Rhine-Westphalia, will elect a new state parliament. If recent opinion polls ring true, the Pirate Party will have its best election results to date.

Germany’s five leading polling research institutes agree on one thing: The Pirate Party will most certainly enter the North Rhine-Westphalia (NRW) state parliament after this weekend’s election. Three of the institutes said the party will receive up to 10 percent of the vote, which would put Germany’s up-and-coming political group on the same level as the Green party, which is currently part of the governing coalition with the center-left Social Democrats.

Their leader in NRW has a notable last name:  Joachin Paul.  Yes, that’s right, Herr PAUL.  He is either a distant relative of Ron Paul or the Pirates wanted some of the Paul electoral skill to rub off on them!  Here’s what chief candidate Paul says:

The Pirate Party’s top candidate in NRW, Joachim Paul, said his party is no longer just a party for younger Germans.

“More and more older people from all parts of society are coming to our party,” said Paul, who himself was chosen to head the state party in the place of a younger candidate.

But the Pirates aren’t there yet:

Since its early days when the Pirate Party had the reputation of being nothing more than a protest party, it has now come up with a comprehensive manifesto. One of the main areas they are looking to make changes is education. However, fewer kids per classroom – one of their main goals – would significantly increase public spending.

Other objectives the Pirates have emphasized include free public bus and train transportation and an unconditional welfare for all NRW citizens. The costs for such endeavors would balloon into the multi-billion-euro range.

The German Pirates need a consultant – a liberty consultant!  Here’s some free advice!  Germany needs to get out of the Euro, free Europe from EU bureaucrats, reform education by allowing home schooling and school choice and endorse national sovereignty.  Reform of copyright and trademarks will require MEPs and the Pirates need to get that motion going.  Ring the Bell of LIBERTY!  SAY NO to Tweedledee and Tweedledum!   Say YES to liberty and sovereignty.

Here is a very favorable article on Louisiana Governor Bobby Jindal.  A few highlights:

Members of the Louisiana press corps have learned over the years to ask the governor multiple questions at once, as the only way to avoid spending the better part of a press conference listening to his take on every nuance of a single topic.

Even the briefest conversation with Jindal leaves no doubt that he is deeply knowledgeable and passionate about policy, but less immediately clear is whether he has the right stuff to take the next step in a national political environment in which attention spans are short.

A state cabinet secretary at how old?

A Rhodes scholar who helmed the Louisiana Department of Health and Hospitals — the state’s largest agency — at the almost absurd age of 24, Piyush “Bobby” Jindal’s aptitude and credentials for the nation’s second-highest office would be difficult for anyone to question seriously.

Vice President Biden’s worst nightmare?

Jindal cited with palpable enthusiasm a slew of statistics about budget cuts, state payrolls, and the reversal in a decades-long brain drain from Louisiana, all under his administration. He also was eager to expand the parameters of his agenda in a manner that evoked a Romney stump speech.

“There’s one view that our primary focus should be all about redistributing wealth and that the reason people are suffering is because other people are doing well, and we need to manage the slow decline of this great country and become more like Europe,” Jindal said. “There’s a second view which says . . . your last name, your Zip code, your race, your gender, your income, should not determine your outcome as an adult in America — that if you’re willing to work hard and get a great education, you should be able to pursue the American dream.”

Biden might let Hillary have the job!  “You take VP, Hillary, I don’t want to debate that guy!”  Finally, there is no question Governor Jindal is ready to serve as President if the need called.

Though he is only 40, Jindal is already one of the more experienced Republican governors in the country, having been in office for 4 ½ years after serving three years as Louisiana’s 1st District representative in the U.S. House.

National debt?  Deficits?  Foreign policy (Jindal is probably more of a national security conservative than I am but I think he is open to ideas.)  Jindal is something like the Tesla of politics:  Big ideas come to him right away.

An early example of tackling a major, important subject came in his first government job:  Intern for Congressman Jim McCrery.  Jindal asked for an “assignment” and perhaps a bit annoyed, the Congressman assigned the young intern from Brown University to write a paper on Medicare.  Here’s what happened:

Jindal thanked the congressman and said that he would get right on it. Two weeks later, the eager intern plopped down a fat document on the lawmaker’s desk.“I read it, and it was excellent,” McCrery said. “For him to grasp as well as he did the Medicare program in such a short period of time was nothing short of amazing. It was an early indicator of how far this young man might go in life.”

OFFICIAL DISCLAIMER:  If Governor Romney picks either Governors Jindal or McDonnell, the 2012 ticket will be the first time Sandy has met BOTH the Presidential and VP candidates.  See this blog entry for the time I met Governor Jindal.

I blogged on the adventures of Special Rapporteur James Ayala, sent by the UN Human Rights Council (You mean the one with Saudi Arabia on it?  Yes, dear readers, that one!) to investigate US treatment of Original Americans.  Ayala called for reparations but thankfully Congress did not even meet with him.

Here’s the latest idea from Special Rapporteur Ayala:  Give Mount Rushmore back to the Original Americans.  No, you can’t make stuff like this up about the UN!

South Dakota’s Black Hills, home to the granite faces carved into Mt. Rushmore, should be restored as Native American tribal lands, a United Nations official recently said.

The United States has already offered reparations but the Original Americans said no:

The Black Hills, home to Mount Rushmore, are public land but are considered sacred by the Sioux tribes. The Sioux have refused to accept money awarded in a 1980 U.S. Supreme Court decision and have sought return of the land. The Black Hills and other lands were set aside for the Sioux in an 1868 treaty. But Congress passed a law in 1877 taking the land.

Ayala continued his scold of the US:

According to Anaya, handing over these lands would be a key step toward repairing relations with the indigenous people who once controlled them. It would also further the nation’s compliance with the U.N. Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples, a measure that President Barack Obama endorsed in 2010, reversing a previous vote.

I knew there was a UN document sneaking around somewhere!  Here it is!  It’s not a treaty but it has all sorts of “rights” for indigenous peoples around the world.  Of course President Obama is all for it! I say, NO on new vague UN rights!

BUT GUESS WHO ELSE supports the “rights” of indigenous peoples?  If you said ICLEI, you are right!  Here’s the pertinent clause from ICLEI’s Charter:

Charter 1.7 – Principles
The Association shall promote, and ask its individual members to adopt, the following Earth
Charter Principles to guide local action:

****

(12) Uphold the right of all, without discrimination, to a natural and social environment
supportive of human dignity, bodily health, and spiritual well-being, with special attention to the
rights of indigenous peoples and minorities.

Here‘s the charter text!  ICLEI is indeed a Fifth Column, supporting in part of taxpayer dollars who will probably seek to take our property and give it back to the Original Americans!  Time to show this guy the door and take ICLEI with him!  (Defunding these cynical errands might be a good alternative idea!)

I found this video amusing when I first looked at it(for the record, I have hazel eyes).  Here’s the summary:

If you have blue eyes, be wary of falling in love with another blue-eyed beauty. According to a study from USA Today, there’s a possibility everyone with blue eyes may be related. Researchers in Denmark say every person with blue eyes descends from one ancestor whose genes mutated 6 to 10,000 years ago.

Of course all blue-eyed people have a common ancestor!  Adam and Eve!  The Bible says we have a common ancestor.  So surprisingly does science!  Try this first:

“It’s a mathematical certainty that that person existed,” said science journalist Steve Olson, whose 2002 book “Mapping Human History” traces the history of the species since its origins in Africa more than 100,000 years ago.

If you don’t take your science from Fox News, try this:

In January 1987, Rebecca Cann, Mark Stoneking, and Allan Wilson published a paper in Nature that dropped a bombshell of our understanding of human evolution. Until then, the prevailing theory held that different groups of humans had evolved separately in different regions, beginning about two million years ago. Their groundbreaking work revealed all humans carried mitochondrial DNA in their cells that dated back to a single woman who had lived just 200,000 years ago. This woman was dubbed Mitochondrial Eve.

They even called her “Eve”; where do you think they got it from?

“So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them. * * * “And Adam called his wife’s name Eve; because she was the mother of all living.”  Genesis 1:27, 2:20 (KJV)

Science even suggests that the gene pool of mankind had a bottleneck after creation (They say evolution of course but I won’t) at least three times:  One million years ago!  70,000 years ago!  A supervolcano did it!

This was because of a so-called bottleneck effect. The rapid decrease, in our ancestors’ populations, in turn, brought about the rapid differentiation – or genetic divergence – of the surviving populations.

The idea is being advocated by Professor Stanley Ambrose of the University of Illinois.

He believes that the eruption of Mount Toba in Sumatra caused the bottleneck.

“Modern human races may have diverged abruptly, only 70,000 years ago,” he writes in the Journal of Human Evolution.

Geneticists have thought for some time that humans passed through a recent evolutionary bottleneck but they had little idea what may have caused it.

I know what caused that bottleneck, too!  The Flood that reduced the Earth’s population to eight persons.

The Bible is utterly reliable.  I know what some say:  That volcano was 74,000 years ago and the Flood was mere 4-6 thousand years ago!  The 74,000 years are as the scientists count time.  The facts are undisputed, it is the DATE that is in dispute.

The Bible is utterly reliable.  It also says we all are in sin, need a Savior to avoid eternal punishment, and Jesus is that Savior!

²² Even the righteousness of God which is by faith of Jesus Christ unto all and upon all them that believe: for there is no difference:

²³ For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God;

²⁴ Being justified freely by his grace through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus:

²⁵ Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God;

(Romans 3:22-25 [KJV])  Time to reconsider that refusal to study and/or investigate the claims of Jesus Christ.  If you want to know more about eternal life in Jesus Christ, go here!

I am surprised I still have blood left in my veins as opposed to it boiling away between the attack on Serbia and this:

A United Nations investigator probing discrimination against Native Americans has called on the US government to return some of the land stolen from Indian tribes as a step toward combatting continuing and systemic racial discrimination.

A UN investigator in the US?  There is about 100 nations that commit REAL human rights violations and the Human Rights Council sends a special rapporteur to investigate US?  (You mean the one with China and Libya on it?  Yes, that one!)  Really?

James Anaya, the UN special rapporteur on the rights of indigenous peoples, said no member of the US Congress would meet him as he investigated the part played by the government in the considerable difficulties faced by Indian tribes.

Well, one time for everything:  Congress did something right.  They ignored the interloper from the UN.

The special rapporteur wants reparations, too:

“I’m talking about restoring to indigenous peoples what obviously they’re entitled to and they have a legitimate claim to in a way that is not devisive but restorative. That’s the idea behind reconciliation,” he said.

I sure am glad the UN can’t attack us like we did Serbia!  Besides, it’s the socialistic and paternalistic policies of the Federal Government toward the reservations that is a leading cause of Original American poverty.  (I use the term “Original American” because it is more accurate than “Native American”; I for example an born in America and thus a native American but I am certainly not an original American.)

Of course the Obama administration supported this envoy coming here:

Anaya said he had received “exemplary cooperation” from the Obama administration but he declined to speculate on why no members of Congress would meet him.

I guess the President made him welcome.  Had I been the Chief Executive (Lord help us!), he and all the other UN envoys investigating our prisons and jails etc. would be unwelcome in the USA.  Go find REAL human rights issues to investigate!  I think the comment by ReaganiteGOPer to the blog at the Humble Libertarian is amusing and says my attitude well:

How bout we give the Indians the UN building in Manhattan and kill two birds with one stone?

This article about Serbia got my blood boiling so I decided to finally say it:  President Obama, make an apology that I will heartily support!  To Serbia for our attack on their nation for no reason!  The USA never did something like that before (unless you count the Civil War and that is problematic due to Fort Sumter) to any nation.  Our army was used to defend the homeland or to help stop proven aggression (Korea, Vietnam, the First Gulf War) started by another nation.  But the Kosovo War was started by the NATO sock puppet of the USA so do-gooders like former President Clinton and Sec. of State Madeleine Albright could feel good about themselves.  Of course they had the support of Senator John McCain who wanted to send ground troops into Serbia and march to Belgrade!

Although I can speak only for myself, I believe the sponsors of this resolution offered it to encourage the President to do what almost every experienced statesmen has said he should do – prepare for the use of ground troops in Kosovo if they are necessary to achieve victory.

Victory?  What sort of victory did he want?  We attacked Serbia for no reason and took part of their land.  Here is the official reason in the New York Times as to why we attacked Serbia:

“Thirteen years after NATO bombed Belgrade to halt the killing of ethnic Albanians in Kosovo,…”

Not to protect a vital national interest or or prevent imminent attack, we went to war on a nation that did not attack us first.  It would be like if a nation attacked us for keeping African-American people in poverty-ridden inner cities.  How would we react?  Would we fight?  Watch this video and ask yourself that question:

This is what we did in Serbia and thank the Lord they surrendered before Americans had to die so Madeleine Albright could feel good.  Here’s her brilliant analysis of Iraqi sanctions:

In 1996 then-UN Ambassador Madeleine Albright was asked by 60 Minutes correspondent Lesley Stahl, in reference to years of U.S.-led economic sanctions against Iraq, “We have heard that half a million children have died. I mean, that is more children than died in Hiroshima. And, you know, is the price worth it?”

To which Ambassador Albright responded, “I think that is a very hard choice, but the price, we think, the price is worth it.”

***

I must have been crazy; I should have answered the question by reframing it and pointing out the inherent flaws in the premise behind it. Saddam Hussein could have prevented any child from suffering simply by meeting his obligations…. As soon as I had spoken, I wished for the power to freeze time and take back those words. My reply had been a terrible mistake, hasty, clumsy and wrong. Nothing matters more than the lives of innocent people. I had fallen into the trap and said something I simply did not mean. That was no one’s fault but my own. (p. 275)

I am sure she did not want to see innocent children die; I am sure of it.  But if we had followed the sage advice of a great man (“We just plain don’t mind our own business!”) we would not be involved at all in this moral issue.  The Kosovo War was unnecessary and aggressive; just because we did not change their government or their wealth, that does not make it any less an attack for no reason.  President Obama ought to go to Belgrade and apologize to the Serbian people for attacking their nation for no reason and taking part of their territory away from them.  If I were President (God help us all!) I would put the apology in the First Inaugural and immediately go to Belgrade and repeat it there to the Serbian Parliament.

UPDATE:  Here’s a Guardian (UK) article citing a UN “special rapporteur” saying we should give lands back to the Original Americans.  Suppose somebody went to war with us over that?  That’s what we did in Serbia.  Where’s the apology?

When we think of great efforts in a national competition, we think of:

The Atlanta Braves – in the playoffs every year from 1991 through 2005 (No playoffs in 1994)

UCLA basketball – Eleven national titles and seven in a row (1967-1973)

USA Olympic basketball before the debasement – no real losses from 1936 through 1984 (USA boycotted the 1980 Olympics).

But here’s a program that has won national honors for 33 straight years!  That’s THIRTY-THREE!  Who is it? Butler Bulldogs?  NO.  It’s the Wright State University Model United Nations team.  Here’s the report from the website of the university:

For the 33rd year in a row, Wright State University’s Model United Nations team achieved the highest recognition possible at the national conference in New York City.

Competing against 255 teams from universities around the world, Wright State was one of 17 schools to be recognized as having an Outstanding Delegation.

The WSU team, representing the United Kingdom, also collected several outstanding delegate and outstanding committee position papers, too.

The National Model UN is the leading College Model UN in the country.  The Model UN program at WSU was irregular until 1980 when Dr. Jim Jacob restarted the program as the Ivory Coast.  That team (it is now time for a disclosure:  A certain right wing blogger was the Ivorian representative to the Human Rights Commission [now Human Rights Council] maybe  that is why we did not win an award!) did not win but from 1981 through 2012, the WSU team did win one of the Outstandings every year.

My hat is off to our wonderful Model UN team!  Even though the best thing is US out of UN and the UN out of US, the next best thing is Wright State continuing to keep the Model UN streak alive in NY every Holy Week.  GO RAIDERS!

Baroness Warsi caused a minor row when she suggested that UKIP was trying to attract the same kind of voter as the racist British National Party:

Lady Warsi, on the BBC last night, pointed out that Ukip are fielding 14 per cent more candidates at this election than at the last one, while the BNP are fielding the same percentage fewer. She called this “interesting” and asked if there was a “link or an overlap” between the two. Nick Robinson, the BBC’s political editor, asked if she meant that there has been some sort of deal between the two. Here’s her quote in full:

What’s interesting about Ukip this year is that they are actually fielding something like 14 per cent more candidates this year than they did last time. But interestingly the British National Party are fielding exactly 14 per cent less candidates this time than they did last time. So whether there is some sort of link, an overlap, there.

This produced an unworthy, but thankfully quickly retracted and apologized for, tweet from a UKIP official (he called her a name the rhymed with “rich”).

This blog says that Lady Warsi’s statistical conclusions are not accurate!

• UPDATE and embarrassing climbdown: I’ve spoken to the Conservative Party press office, and it sounds like the worst that Baroness Warsi can be accused of is not knowing the difference between percentages and percentage points. In 2008, the BNP ran in 19.3 per cent of seats; in 2012, they ran in only 5.3, a drop of 14.0 percentage points (but 73 per cent). By contrast, Ukip ran in 14.4 per cent of seats in 2008, and in 28.7 per cent of seats in 2012, an increase of 14.3 percentage points (but 99 per cent). Obviously that doesn’t mean there is a link between the two parties, but the correlation she described is there.

But my observations are this:  UKIP has done the British nation a great service by running the BNP out of politics.  Now British voters have a libertarian, euroskeptic and non-racist alternative to the BNP.  Lady Warsi was trying the guilt by association tactic; that was not classy.  (Nor was it classy to tweet her that name that rhymes with “which” either!)  So, UKIP leaders, keep it classy!  But keep fighting!

But the very first comment at this blog I saw was this one by soysauce:

I actually find it rather endearing that a party spokesman just blurted out the truth, it’s not anything that the majority of us wouldn’t want to say to our politicians anyway, we all swear from time to time. in my opinion it’s exactly what we need, independent minded people telling it how it is, time to take all the focus groups, spin doctors and pr people outside and mow them down, start with a clean slate and build a parliament of decent, honest people with no party affiliations, just the common good at the centre of their hearts.
Right, I’m off to sign up to UKIP.

If I were a British citizen, I’d “sign up to UKIP”, too and be ready to go for every General Election, bag packed, purple ribbon and laptop in place, ready to go to wherever UKIP called me to run for MP.  I hope my efforts small as they are are helpful to the cause.  This is a fight for liberty and it’s throughout the world.  Ron Paul is one important part of it.  The Pirate Parties are also, slowly, hesitatingly but firmly heading toward liberty.  Wait until there’s a liberty party in Red China!  Men are created by God to be free, under His authority!  “…where the Spirit of the Lord is there is liberty”  [II Corinthians 3:17 (KJV)]

There is a super tiny glimmer of hope that USA Basketball might open the process to non-NBA players:  Kentucky outgoing star Anthony Davis has been named a finalist:

As such, after various reports had linked talented young players from across the N.B.A. to Team U.S.A. (including Sacramento’s DeMarcus Cousins, Detroit’s Greg Monroe, Washington’s John Wall, and Cleveland’s Kyrie Irving), program director Jerry Colangelo announced on Friday that Oklahoma City’s James Harden and outgoing Kentucky Wildcat wunderkind Anthony Davis will be officially added to the full roster of Olympic team finalists.

I do not think it is enough.  The method still is unrepresentative and the choice of Davis was only forced by several unfortunate injuries to NBA stars.  Without a serious shakeup, my policy is still the same:  No rooting or financial support foe USA men’s basketball.  I would suggest if my readers agree, email or contact US Olympics and let them know:  No money for basketball and this year, my team is Puerto Rico (or maybe Lithuania)!

As speculated right here at Virginia Right, Butler Bulldogs are joining the Atlantic 10:

Butler will officially join the Atlantic 10 for the 2013-14 season on Wednesday, a source with direct knowledge of the negotiation process told ESPN.com on Tuesday night.

The Bulldogs will leave the Horizon League in all sports and join the A-10 after it formally seeks admission to the league. The A-10 will then accept the Bulldogs’ application to make it official.

I think the Bulldogs will do well.  Stevens is a coaches’ coach, he gets super results from his recruits and recent recruits are reputed to be higher quality.

Brad Stevens did some good work with his three-man recruiting class, getting one of the state’s most prolific scorers in Kellen Dunham from Pendleton Heights. Dunham rates as the No. 78 player nationally according to ESPN, higher than any of Purdue’s for signees. He should fit well into Butler’s system as a pure jump shooter who can also use his 6’5″ size to get to the basket.

Butler should be in Richmond every other year and if VCU joins the A-10, maybe every year!  I plan to be there!  Go Bulldogs!

Mark Holmberg of TV 6 news in Richmond (WTVR) did a nice video report on the National Day of Prayer:

HANOVER, Va. (WTVR) The National Day of Prayer was celebrated, again, at the historic Polegreen Presbyterian Church site in Hanover County, considered the cradle of religious freedom and civil liberty.

It was here that religious rebels fomented a bloodless revolution against the Anglican Church, which was the controlling religion of the Brits.

Here‘s the video!  I am especially impressed with the conclusion of this video.

I can report (I was there and had the honor of leading in the Pledge and you can bet it was NOT a pledge to the Earth!) that it was a wonderful Christ-centered service.

For more on how to know Jesus as Savior and Lord, go here!

UKIP had a great day in Thursday’s local elections.  The Guardian’s headline is:  “Local Elections:  UKIP and Respect gain ground”

Rusthall

Piers Wauchope (UKIP) 533 (38 per cent) ELECTED

Robert Atwood (Con) 487 (35 per cent)

Alex Britcher (Lab) 263 (19 per cent)

Vic Bethell (Lib Dems) 103 (seven percent)

I am not entirely sold on the Greek Pirate Party.  But it is not hard left, hard left, neo-Nazi, or communist!  The Tweedledee Tweedledum parties:  Furgetaboutit!  No way!

Greece brought democracy to the world!  Now Greece can again bring democracy to Europe – the Pirate Party is a great choice.  So, the answer is:  The Pirate Party.  They only need three percent to enter Parliament.  Don’t waste your vote on totalitarian/statist parties.