A new Republican Revolution is coming...

Never did I think the day would come that I'd be missing Newt Gingrich. But that day has indeed come. Back in the days of the "Contract with America", I may have scoffed at the idealism and pandering nature of its content, but at least the underlying ideas were sound.

Here's what Republicans in the 90's were about.

Reducing the size and scope of Federal Government.
Eliminating unfunded mandates.
Eliminating the budget deficit.
Returning rights to the States.
A policy that moved us away from overt nation building.

How in the heck did we get to where we are today???

2.3 trillion dollar budget presented to Congress compared to 1.8 trillion in the final full year of the Clinton administration.
412 billion dollar deficit compared to 86 billion dollar surplus in the final full year of the Clinton administration.
Enormous budget deficits.
BIGGER Federal Government.

And these numbers don't even include the cost of the wars we are involved in. They are off budget items that don't get included in the proposed figures and new spending for war efforts will come along as supplemental spending bills that will further balloon the deficit.

Huge cuts are being proposed in many domestic programs to allow President Bush to make good on a promise he should never have made to reduce the deficit by half by 2009. These cuts will likely be rebuked by members of Congress to protect their constituents' local interests, thereby keeping the budget huge and the deficit reductions unrealized.


Here's the good news. Rep. Mike Pence (R-Ind) is leading the charge to restore the party to its vision and goals of restoring the balances of federalism with the states, limiting the scope and influence of the Federal government and bringing spending back under control. A recent meeting in Baltimore of 50 influential Republicans discussed these and other key issues to restore our country to a fiscally sane path.

Now don't get me wrong. I'm still fairly liberal on social issues, but have always been in favor of fiscal conservatism. You don't spend what you don't have and if you need more money you find ways to make us more productive and increase revenues by means other than raising taxes.

It's not necessarily a bad thing to need more money than you have. In fact, its this very predicament that drives many people to come up with new and innovative methods of increasing productivity, enhanacing cash flow and increasing overall revenues.

I still strongly feel that George Bush is one of the worst Presidents we've seen in the last 25 years, but I also believe that we can work to effect change in spite of him through our representatives in Washington. Many of us may never have thought we'd be seeking help from the right-wing side of the aisle, but the time has come to align our priorities with many on the right who share our fiscally conservative values and believe that the Federal government should have less influence in our lives, not more!

This great country is far to diverse too allow Washington to force the wishes and beliefs of a true minority of close minded individuals on the whole of the nation. STAND UP PEOPLE. Stand up and be heard. Dont let groups like the Parents Television Council dictate the policy that comes out of Washington to affect all of us! http://www.parentstv.org/

This is one scary group. A recent Freedom of Information Act request revealed that 99.8% of all complaints received by the FCC come from this lone group! Complaints are up from 14,000 in 2002, to nearly 240,000 in 2003. There were only 350 complaints during 2000 and 2001. So, one group of very vocal people are influencing national policy in a very frightening way.

What is wrong with these people that they are so terrified by the sight of a breast or Mickey Rooney's butt! Other civilized nations, many of whom are our allies, don't freak out like this over nudity. They also don't have near the content of violent programming on television and movies that we have. You want to talk about inappropriate content, how about some of the movie promos shown during the Super Bowl. I was diving for the remote to stave off potential nightmares for my 5 year old. There is a ridiculous double standard in this country and it's being supported by this administration and its appointees to "protect" our children from nudity, but that allows incredibly violent programming with nary a peep of objection.

I don't know about you, but I'd much rather my children see a naked body in relevant programming or even humorous commercials than the absurd levels of violent content in today's programs and advertisements.

Nudity is OK people. Our children won't go blind, start having sex too soon or become deviant because they see images of naked people.

They WILL rebel against the type of repressive censorship that is being forced upon them and when they hit teen years... well, you'd better look out because all that repressive BS you've been crushing them with is gonna blow up in your face!

Now I'll take a deeeeep breath and try to wrap this up. I know this has been a long one and may seem to be a senseless rant. If so, I'd kindly ask you to read it through once more and think a bit about some of the points I've tried to raise.

Get Active. Contact your politicians and even those you didn't think you agreed with.

Relax. Spend a little more time with those you love, be that family friends or complete strangers you enjoy meeting on a park bench while feeding pigeons!

And never take a vacation you can afford. This may seem to deviate from the fiscal sanity portion of this blog, but its important to remember that life does indeed move pretty fast and as Ferris Bueller told us, if you don't dtop and look around once in a while, you could miss it! Truer words were never spoken.

Be nice.

Peace