Excerpted from Howard Phillips Issues and Strategy Bulletin of December 15, 1998

GOP SENATE SPED UP APPROVAL OF CLINTON JUDGES

Excerpted from Howard Phillips Issues and Strategy Bulletin of November 30, 1998

Excerpted from Howard Phillips Issues and Strategy Bulletin of October 31, 1998

THE TIMID, UNPRINCIPLED GOP ELEPHANT DANCES TO BILL CLINTON'S TUNE --- AND DOESN'T GET PEANUTS

The New York Times (10/17/98, p. A8) reports that Fred Greenstein, a historian at Princeton University said "the President had rallied once-panicked Democrats behind him by playing the budget game skillfully and maintaining his high public approval ratings. The reversal of political fortune, he said, was ‘full of anomalies and paradoxes – like who would imagine a President would be strengthened by being the third person to have impeachment hearings?’...

"If Mr. Clinton ‘gets any weaker,’ Paul A. Gigot, the political columnist, summarized today in The Wall Street Journal, ‘Republicans may pass Hillary's health-care plan.’"

Excerpted from Howard Phillips Issues and Strategy Bulletin of October 15, 1998

According to The New York Times (10/7/98, p. A18), "Republicans want to keep the spotlight on the impeachment investigation of President Clinton and are therefore eager to brush away any matters that might interfere. They indicated today that they intended to change their positions on matters ranging from less money for the International Monetary Fund to a weakened Federal Election Commission to a denial of political amnesty for 40,000 Haitians."

THE DEVIL MADE THEM DO IT

"‘We aren't going to leave here without it,’ said Representative David R. Obey of Wisconsin, the top Democrat on the Appropriations Committee."

Patrick Buchanan asks in The Washington Times (10/7/98, p. A17): "Can it be that a Republican Congress will wind up killing a nearly $18 billion tax cut this year for American families, only to hand $18 billion over to the International Monetary Fund to make the world safe for hedge funds?..."

"Brazil is bust, its currency over-valued. But if investors are fleeing Brazil's paper that offers 50 percent interest, why would the IMF dump $30 billion into Brazil, asking only 5 percent? Answer: The IMF is not bailing out the people of Brazil. They will get new taxes. The IMF is bailing out the politicians of Brazil and the Western banks...."

"‘Blackmail!’ screams the IMF. Actually, it is extortion, and the Russians are practicing it because they know the IMF is nothing but a front for the investor friends of Treasury Secretary Robert Rubin. If you don't give us the cash, they are saying, we won't pay them back."

IMF SHAKEDOWNS CONTINUE BECAUSE REPUBLICANS ARE AFRAID TO SAY "NO"

" Will the GOP House leadership approve the $18 billion IMF bailout, in which case it should stop proclaiming itself the party of free markets?"

Excerpted from Howard Phillips Issues and Strategy Bulletin of August 15, 1998

ELLEN SAUERBREY IS A REAL REPUBLICAN –– AND THAT'S THE PROBLEM

Jeremy Redmon writes in a cover story for The Washington Times Metropolitan section (8/4/98, p. C4) that although "proud of her conservative values, Mrs. [Ellen] Sauerbrey [the GOP candidate for Governor of Maryland] says she would not attempt drastic changes in current law if elected. Though she opposes abortion and gun control, for instance, she says she wouldn't try to ban either.

"She says she is realistic: In polls, most Maryland voters say they favor legalized abortion and gun-control laws. Besides that, Democrats control the state legislature and could make life difficult for her if she attempted wholesale changes."

GOP STRATEGY OF "PREEMPTIVE CONCESSION" IS THE BYPRODUCT OF PANDERING POLITICAL OPPORTUNISM

Mrs. Sauerbrey is not alone in her desire to seem inoffensive and non-threatening to the left-wing ideological adversaries of the conservative voters whose support she seeks. The basic message of the Republican Party seems to be "vote for us---we talk ‘conservative’ but we don't really mean it, and, even if we do mean it, you can be sure that we will do absolutely nothing to convert the opinions we proclaim into public policy."

PHONY CONSERVATIVE REPUBLICANS ARE MORE DANGEROUS THAN GENUINE LIBERAL DEMOCRATS

Frankly, that's a big reason why so-called "conservative Republicans" are more dangerous to the lives, liberties, and property of the American people than are determined liberal Democrats. Republicans such as Sauerbrey behave as if politics and government is merely a big game of "let's pretend", and that there are no real life consequences to a government which authorizes abortion and subsidizes its practitioners---a government which, at the Federal and state levels, grows ever more powerful, ever more intrusive, and ever more dangerous.

"THE LESSER OF TWO EVILS" IS MORE EVIL

People who vote for candidates such as Sauerbrey are guilty of far more than self-delusion, thinking that, somehow, people such as she are the "lesser of two evils". In fact, she is the greater evil. By promising to do nothing, she renders the cause whose banner she waves impotent and irrelevant. She makes certain that statist policies will continue. In office, incumbents such as she silence the critics of big government by pretending they are "doing the best they can". Worst of all, behavior such as hers renders the entire electoral process irrelevant to important governmental decisions, leaving power in the hands of judges, bureaucrats, lawyers, lobbyists, and special-interest activists, rather than electorally accountable legislators and executives.

AFTER "THE VICTORY", BECAUSE NOTHING CHANGES –– CONSERVATIVES CONCLUDE THAT NOTHING CAN CHANGE

Moreover, innocent unknowing people who simply read platforms and listen to speeches are convinced that there is nothing they can do to change the course of public policy through political participation.

It's time to reject "cures" which are worse than the disease. It's time for people to recognize the truth ...that to achieve victory, first you must seek it. A promise to not rock the boat will, at best, secure the status quo. To change policy in office, candidates must first advocate change during their campaigns.

GOP BREAKS ITS PROMISE TO END NEA FUNDING

The Washington Post reports in the Style section (7/22/98, p. D1) that "The usual rhetorical fireworks were muted yesterday as the National Endowment for the Arts got its first up-or-down vote in the House in four years. The agency, long the target of conservatives, received a near-guarantee of solid survival with approval of $98 million in funds for next year...."

A WELL ORCHESTRATED GINGRICHIAN WRESTLING MATCH IN WHICH THE U.S. CONSTITUTION TAKES A FALL

"[C]onservative views did not prevail as a Republican-orchestrated plan opened the way for the 253-173 vote. The Interior appropriations bill came to the floor with $98 million for the NEA, a level that Rep. David Obey (D-Wis.) won in full committee after an initial vote in the subcommittee gave the agency nothing. Late Monday the Republicans came up with a plan to have the NEA funding removed on the floor in a procedural rule, then immediately have Rep. Nancy Johnson (R-Conn.) propose restoring it."

"RIGHT-WING" REPUBLICANS ARE INVITED TO PLAY "LET'S PRETEND"

"In this way, the Republicans showed they are very handy at tossing a favor to their right-wing constituency and giving a platform to the moderate Republicans they need on other issues. ‘The amendment should be supported even if the procedure is Mickey Mouse,’ said Obey...."

"The Senate has yet to finish its work on the NEA's 1999 funding but the appropriations committee has approved $100 million in funding. The slight difference in the two bills will be worked out in conference committee. William J. Ivey, who has headed the agency for two months, noted the change in mood in the House. ‘The old debate over the existence of the NEA finally has given way to a more thoughtful dialogue about the appropriate level of federal arts funding in America.’"

GOP THINKS $100 MILLION FOR NEA IS POLITICALLY BENEFICIAL

The New York Times (7/22/98, p. 1) observed that, "Today's vote for the popular arts subsidy reflects the moderating influence of a pending election. Republicans had also provided themselves political cover by approving changes last year that they said would reduce their concerns about the program. The changes include broadening the distribution of grants to more than just a few urban areas and building in safeguards against the financing of artistic works that many conservatives deemed obscene." Thanks to the GOP leadership, this anti-Christian, Soviet-style "Ministry of Culture" has a new lease on life.

Excerpted from Howard Phillips Issues & Strategy Bulletin of July 31, 1998

I must take issue with those of my conservative friends who say that the Republicans disappoint them. How can that be? The Republicans never disappoint me. They can always be relied upon to sell out the principles for which they profess to stand, and which they corruptly claim to embrace in order to yet again secure our support.

The latest example of "now you see it, now you don't" is Congress taxing you yet again to subsidize the International Monetary Fund, which collects the debts owed the big banks and financial institutions in consequence of loans which, at the time they are issued, are quite predictably nonrecoverable. And there is always an excuse to continue.

DICK ARMEY DEMONSTRATES AGAIN THAT HIS "WORD" IS NO GOOD

As reported in The New York Times (7/16/98, p. 1), "House Republicans took a crucial step today toward approving all of the added money requested for the International Monetary Fund, as party leaders indicated a willingness to reverse their opposition to the agency out of concern that the economic crises overseas might spread to the United States.

"A House panel voted $3.5 billion for the agency, and even though that was far below the $17.9 billion requested by the Clinton Administration, Representative Dick Armey of Texas, the majority leader and a harsh foe of the I.M.F., virtually conceded the fight.

"‘In the end, I suppose they will probably get about as much money as they're looking for,’ Mr. Armey said in a speech to the United States Chamber of Commerce....

"Speaker Newt Gingrich acknowledged the growing concerns last month when he noted, ‘A lot of members who were wavering last fall now realize that it's very important for us to pass this.’...

"Concerns about the I.M.F.'s programs were heightened this week when the agency was forced to dig deep into a little-used fund of last resort to provide up to $13.8 billion in new loans to Russia over the next two years to help stabilize the ruble. The agency has not dipped into this fund in two decades and doing so now severely limits its lending ability."

REPUBLICANS ALSO COLLAPSE ON PAYING PHONY DEBT TO U.N.

According to The Wall Street Journal (7/16/98, p. A6), the "House Appropriations Committee gave initial approval to a $16.2 billion foreign-aid budget that includes long-delayed financing for the International Monetary Fund.

"The measure provides nearly $3.4 billion upfront for a new IMF credit line. An additional $14.5 billion for the IMF's reserves is expected to be added as the bill moves through the House.

"To placate conservatives, the IMF would be required to charge higher, more market-determined interest rates on future loans and adopt a public-disclosure process modeled on the Federal Reserve's. Three months after an IMF executive-board meeting, for example, a written summary would be available for public inspection. Letters of intent, spelling out the conditions imposed by IMF on borrowing nations, would be similarly released.

"The Treasury's full $17.9 billion funding request for the IMF won Senate approval months ago. But the House GOP leadership has repeatedly balked, and even now has insisted on staggered IMF payments. ‘There's been a lot of controversy, and a lot of controversy is still scheduled,’ joked Rep. Sonny Callahan (R., Ala.), when Demcorats sought vainly to add the reserves funding. But as the bill's manager, Mr. Callahan expects the Treasury will get its full request."

Morton Kondracke suggests (Roll Call, 6/29/98, p. 6) that those "were laudable trade initiatives that House Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga) signed onto last week, although the timing of them was intensely political – and, in one case, probably perverse."

"Gingrich joined a bipartisan group of House Agriculture Committee members in supporting normal trade relations with China, replenishment of the International Monetary Fund and a new try at passing fast-track trade authority...."

GRASS ROOTS SUPPORT FOR NATIONAL INDEPENDENCE HAS NO VOICE IN BIPARTISAN COUNCILS OF POWER

"Gingrich remains an internationalist at a time when nationalism is a growing movement in the GOP."

GINGRICHIAN ANTI-CLINTON RHETORIC IS "BOOB FODDER" FOR GULLIBLE REPUBLICANS

"Moreover, each policy has been sought by President Clinton, indicating that cooperation is possible even though Gingrich has been denouncing Clinton in intensely personal terms....

"While welcoming Gingrich's announcements last week, a US Chamber of Commerce official remarked, ‘There's still a lot of catching-up they need to do.’

"When Congress returns from recess, it's a safe bet that it will approve ‘normal trade relations’ – the new designation replacing ‘most favored nation’ – for China. Business is spending millions promoting NTR, and the structure of the vote requires China foes to win impossible two-thirds votes in both the House and the Senate."

Here follow excerpts from the conclusion of my May 1 address to a meeting of the Council for National Policy held at the Ritz Carlton Hotel in Tysons Corner, Virginia:

"The Republican Party has become the proverbial ‘house divided against itself’.

"The Republican Party has lost its moral energy, and, indeed, its raison d'etre becomes ever less discernible with each new retreat from principle and betrayal of commitment.

"Some of its elected officials oppose abortion completely. Others are unwilling to do anything to challenge abortion.

"Newt Gingrich favors statehood for Puerto Rico, but many within the GOP oppose statehood as an unwise objective."

REPUBLICANS HAVE INCREASED FEDERAL ROLE IN EDUCATION

"Most grass-roots Republicans favor parental control of education, but the Republican Party in Congress has voted even more spending on education than Bill Clinton himself requested."

GOP'S FALSE FLAG IS MORE DANGEROUS TO OUR CAUSE THAN CLINTON

"The list is endless – NAFTA, the World Trade Organization, the Mexican bailout, NATO expansion, racial, ethnic, and gender quotas, Legal Services, Planned Parenthood subsidies, Gay Men's Health Crisis, National Endowment for the Arts, tax policy, spending policy, and so much more."

THE REPUBLICAN CONGRESS HAS VOTED RECORD HIGH TAXES AND SPENDING

"Since the election of 1994, Republicans have controlled the Congress. Under budget agreements for which they have voted, Federal spending is set to rise from one trillion, five hundred fifteen billion, seven hundred million dollars in Fiscal Year 1995 (the year when they came to office) to one trillion, eight hundred seventy-nine billion, seven hundred million dollars in Fiscal Year 2002 (which begins in 2001). Already, in Fiscal Year 1998, spending has increased by more than $200 billion annually since the GOP took power (or office)."

GINGRICH & CO. VOTED TO RAISE OUR INCOME TAXES BY A QUARTER TRILLION DOLLARS PER YEAR

"Similarly, Federal income taxes, collected annually, have increased from five hundred ninety billion dollars in 1995 to six hundred ninety-one billion dollars in the current Fiscal Year, and will further increase to eight hundred thirty-nine billion, eight hundred million dollars in Fiscal Year 2002.

"Other taxes have climbed as well since the 1994 election, including FICA, business taxes, excise taxes, and estate and gift taxes. Only one area of collection has dropped – customs, duties, and fees."

TARIFFS ON FOREIGNERS WOULD BE BETTER THAN TAXES ON AMERICANS

"That's right. Tariffs, which were, until 1894, the principal source of revenue to the Federal government, are currently yielding relatively little income, in consequence of trade agreements based on the false notion that it is better to place direct taxes on American workers and businesses than tariffs on foreign companies and foreign products."

OUR GOAL SHOULD BE CONTROL OF THE GOVERNMENT, NOT CONTROL OF THE PARTY

"This state of division in the Republican Party is an insuperable problem. No matter how many platforms conservatives write, the division will remain. To unite the Republican Party, Christians and conservatives would be obliged to surrender their agenda, even were they to control its leadership and choose its nominees."

REPUBLICANS ARE WRONG WHEN IT MATTERS--WITH US WHEN IT DOESN'T COUNT

"We are told by Newt Gingrich that significant changes cannot be made until there is a Republican President. Others say that more seats are needed in the House or the Senate."

PERMANENTLY DIVIDED GOP CAN'T BE REFORMED---IT MUST FIRST BE REJECTED AND THEN REPLACED

"But, even with a Republican President, and with two-thirds majorities in both Houses of Congress, fundamental divisions within the Republican Party on the most important issues, including abortion, taxes, sovereignty, and Constitutional accountability, combined with a lack of Constitutional discernment and fidelity, even among many of its strongest conservative and Christian leaders, will prevent the GOP from ever putting America back on the right track."

A CONSPIRACY TO HOLD OFFICE WHICH IS AN OBSTACLE TO REAL CHANGE

"The Republican Party is no longer a coalition to change policy, but rather a conspiracy to hold power. But the conspiracy no longer works because so many of those who have been gathered together under the banner of the elephant are at odds with one another."

THEY SEEK TO SEDUCE CONSTITUTIONAL CONSERVATIVES, BUT THEY'LL NEVER MARRY OUR PRINCIPLES

"However, it is argued that a Big Tent is needed to gain and hold office. It is true that status quo Republicans do in fact need Christian and conservative support to stay in office. But it is not true that Christians, conservatives, and Constitutionalists need to be unequally yoked with those by whom we and our principles are held in profound contempt."

"Indeed, it is the ‘lowest common denominator’ majority strategy of the Republican Party which is at the heart of many of its problems."

GINGRICH THINKS HE WILL LOSE HIS JOB IF HE PUSHES A CONSERVATIVE AGENDA

"For Newt Gingrich to remain as Speaker, he has to stay on good terms with 217 of his Congressional colleagues.

"The best way to stay on good terms simultaneously with pro-lifers and pro-aborts, with free traders and economic nationalists, is to do as little as possible. That will always be the case – however much he doth protest."

GOP'S "MAJORITY" STRATEGY CAN BE TRUMPED BY CONSTITUTIONAL PLURALISM

"The answer for us is to weld together those who are in agreement, to build a new coalition which could elect a plurality President who will govern by maintaining and building on his plurality strength and translating it into sufficient support in Congress to have his vetoes sustained."

CONSTITUTION FACILITATES VICTORY BY PLURALITY

"It is easier for us to prevail with a united plurality than a divided majority. The genius of our electoral college system under the Constitution is that, in the context of 51 separate electoral contests, a united plurality force, which brings together millions of pro-family voters committed to one nation under God, with liberty and justice for all, and the comprehensive defense of our God-given rights to life, liberty, and property, can win, state by state, 100 percent of each such state's presidential electors – even while commanding only a plurality of each such state's popular votes."

IT'S MORALLY OBLIGATORY TO CAST ASIDE DECEITFULLY CORRUPT GOP LEADERS

"My friends, it is long past time to reject the counsels of defeatism and despair.

"If our cause truly does merit a full investment of our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor, we are morally obliged not to be bought off by offers of crumbs from the Establishment table and to determine instead that we shall replace those now in charge of that table."

IT'S A LIE THAT NEAR-TERM VICTORY CANNOT BE ACHIEVED

"The biggest lie we have been told is that nothing can be done, that we can't achieve change until we have 67 Republican Senators or two-thirds of the votes of the House, combined with a Republican President, but this is nonsense.

"Our Constitutional system makes it possible to block unconstitutional expenditures and unwise policies with far less than a majority vote.

"Our founding fathers gave us a brilliant Constitutional system, which permits us to block unconstitutional activities with one President and one-third plus one of one House of Congress."

IF WE STOP UNCONSTITUTIONAL FEDERAL SPENDING, WE CLOSE DOWN THE ENEMY

"For us to succeed, it is not necessary that we pass legislation, but it is imperative we stop spending.

"Under the Constitution, funds may be disbursed from the Federal treasury only in the context of either a Presidentially signed Congressional appropriation or the Congressional override of a Presidential veto."

ALL IT TAKES IS A HOUSE SPEAKER OR SENATE LEADER WHO HAS THE COURAGE TO SAY "NO"

"In fact, if the Republicans truly wish to terminate any particular department or program, all they need to do is refuse to appropriate funds for it. The President cannot veto a zero. He is stuck with it.

"But, alas, the Republican Congress has sent Bill Clinton no zeroes to ponder."

INCREMENTALISM IS A LIBERAL TRICK

"They tell us that you can only reverse the policies of the Left incrementally.

"That is incorrect and unwise advice.

"Incrementalism works for the liberals because their philosophical premises guide the course of present policy."

WHEN YOU ARE ABLE TO DO IT, YOU HAVE A DUTY TO ACT SWIFTLY

"We must challenge their premises and, given the chance, immediately change their policies, abolishing unconstitutional programs in whole and at once.

"If you have cancer, you don't eliminate it incrementally. If you desire to survive and conquer the cancer, you must try to get rid of it at once before it can regroup and kill you."

IN A FOUR-YEAR TERM, WE CAN ROLL THE CLOCK BACK TO LIBERTY

"In the space of a single Presidential term, we can win back several generations of liberties lost, reversing the regulatory, prosecutorial, and police functions which have been unconstitutionally usurped and nurtured by those in both parties who have set policy for the Federal government.

"In the space of a single Presidential term, we can reverse the tide of the cultural war in our great nation and throughout the world by depriving the enemies of western civilization of the Federal treasury resources which have fed their armies and fueled their agenda.

"We are already 35 years late in ‘Defunding the Left’. And it has been 25 years since my effort as Director of the U.S. Office of Economic Opportunity to close down the ‘Great Society’ was betrayed by a Republican administration which feared a bad day in the media more than it reviled its own complicity in subsidizing the neo-Marxist war against God, family, and country."

LET'S LET FAMILIES KEEP EVERYTHING THEY EARN AND OWN

"In the space of a single Presidential term, we can strengthen the American family by cutting the Federal government down to Constitutional size, abolishing the income tax, and ending the pressure on both husbands and wives to work outside the home with one parent trying to generate enough income to pay taxes to the government, while the other parent works to provide for the needs of the family."

TERMINATE ANTI-CHRISTIAN INDOCTRINATION OF AMERICA'S YOUTH

"In the space of a single Presidential term, we can eliminate the use of our tax dollars for the miseducation of America's children by government-funded indoctrination academies which train them to be sexually proficient and promiscuous, even as they lead them astray concerning the facts of history and the nature of truth."

ZERO ABORTION MUST BE OUR GOAL

"In the space of a single Presidential term, we can save the lives of 6 million children whose abortions will be stopped by an executive branch which honors that Constitutional mandate that no person, indeed, even a person recently conceived, may be deprived of life without due process of law."

"GRADUALISM" BY CONSERVATIVES WORKS FOR THE LIBERALS

"My friends, with God all things are possible, but to achieve victory, first we must seek it."

WILSON, FDR, AND LBJ DID NOT ACT "GRADUALLY"

"We are told that the ship of state is a big boat, and that we cannot reverse direction too quickly. Indeed, defenders of the status quo say we must do so gradually."

OUR TIME IS RUNNING OUT

"I am here to say that the ship of state is on the wrong course, and the time is running out on the opportunity to change direction.

"There are icebergs ahead for America. We don't know what form those icebergs will take. They could come as acts of terrorism, as natural disasters, in the form of a nuclear explosion, via chemical biological warfare, or an Euro-inspired crash of the dollar, or an economic paralysis and nationwide loss of confidence resulting from the failure of Congress and the President to fully anticipate and deal with the ‘millennium bug’."

WE MUST HAVE THE COURAGE TO TELL WHAT WE KNOW

"Only God knows the details. But we can clearly discern the prospect of calamity."

–– AND PROCLAIM WHAT WE BELIEVE

"Our job is to warn of the crisis to come, and to prepare to deal with it, so that our cause will have not merely survivors, but victors.

"Unless America changes direction, we shall at best merely delay the inevitable catastrophe, which is not inevitable, rather than avert it.

"My friends, it is time to leave the ‘political Titanic’ on which the conservative movement has for too long booked passage.

"Instead, it is our task to build an ark so that we will be ready to renew and restore our nation and our culture when God brings the tide to flood.

"Let us act now to prepare and plan for the renewal of America's role as the leading force for Godly leadership in the restoration of Western Christian civilization."

THOSE WHO WON'T ENDORSE OUR GOALS DO NOT SHARE THEM

"We can and must cut the Federal government down to Constitutional size – abolish the income tax – withdraw from the institutions of the New World Order – and end the government-approved destruction of our posterity, the innocent unborn children, each of whom is truly a gift from God."

"...our first and our greatest President, George Washington, who, at a critical moment in that 1787 convention which gave us our Constitution, asserted that: ‘If, to please the people, we offer what we ourselves disapprove, how can we afterward defend our work? Let us raise a standard to which the wise and honest can repair. The event is in the hands of God.’"

GOD'S WILL SHALL BE DONE

"Ladies and gentlemen, I urge you to join with me in rejecting the politics of retreat, defeat, sellout, and surrender – as we raise once again the banner of truth, demanding justice, expecting victory, and marching forward as members of Gideon's Army, faithful to our duty, knowing that God's will shall be done on Earth as it is in Heaven. Thank you."

Excerpted from Howard Phillips Issues & Strategy Bulletin of May 15, 1998

GOP'S NATIONAL DATABASE UNCONSTITUTIONALLY INVADES YOUR PRIVACY

Doug Bandow points out (Investor's Business Daily, 4/20/98, p. A36) that the Republicans are heading in the wrong direction on important issues of personal privacy and confidentiality.

"In a well-meaning effort to catch ‘deadbeat dads,’ Republicans added a measure to the '96 Welfare Reform Act to set up a national database that will catch everyone – even those who aren't deadbeats or dads....

"[T]he law, however effective, is a dangerous extension of federal power that will ultimately be misused. Congress shot a blunderbuss, with every working American a target...."

STATES MANDATED TO DO THE DIRTY WORK

"The database idea has precedent. California passed a law in '92 requiring companies with five or more employees in 17 different industries to report all new hires within 30 days who are older than 18 and earn more than $300 a month. Firms had to include the workers' names and Social Security numbers. (So much for the old promise never to use Social Security numbers for anything other than Social Security).

"Congress voted in '96 to take the California program national...states must create comparable systems. All companies must report the names and Social Security numbers of all new hires, along with the date that they started work, within 20 calendar days. Come May 1, states will also have to compare Social Security numbers of new hires and reported deadbeats....where in the Constitution does Washington get the power to order states to create employment databases?"

REPUBLICAN PROMISES ARE LIES

"Congress is run by Republicans who regularly proclaim states' rights and inveigh against unfunded mandates. Yet here they've passed a serious intrusion into states' rights and an enormous expansion of unfunded mandates...."

SOVIETIZATION OF THE U.S. ECONOMY MUST BE REVERSED

"A federally mandated employment database is inconsistent with a free society. Government should not know where everyone in America works. Nor should government be able to track people as they change jobs. A truly limited national government of enumerated powers has no authority to force every company across the nation to turn in a list of its new employees.

"Knowledge of everyone's employment could be a powerful tool for social control. Once such a list exists, politicians will be tempted to expand its uses. Indeed, Congress ordered that the hiring data also be used to verify eligibility for other welfare programs, as well as for managing state employment security and workers' compensation programs."

YOU ARE ON THEIR LISTS

"And lawmakers will be tempted to create other lists – perhaps of people who purchase guns, contract serious diseases, attend particular schools, lose court judgments, run up bad debts and so on. All of them could serve one useful purpose or another. But all would pose a serious threat to freedom....

"Congress should rescind the State Directory of New Hires. Repealing this law may cost the government some money. But our liberty is too precious to sell for a few pieces of silver."

REPUBLICANS AND DEMOCRATS CONSPIRE TO PREVENT SDI DEPLOYMENT

National security expert Angelo Codevilla writes (The Washington Times, 5/11/98, p. A19) that "[t]his year, like most other years for the past generation, the U.S. government will spend more than $3 billion in the name of defense against ballistic missiles. Since 1983, we have spent some $46 billion. And this year, exactly like every other year, this money will buy not a single solitary piece of equipment that might possibly be used to keep even one foreign missile from landing on the American people."

BILLIONS FOR RESEARCH, NOT ONE CENT FOR DEPLOYMENT

"Some of the money will buy technology that could (but will not) be used for missile defense. Most of the $3 billion, however, will go into equipment painstakingly designed not to be useful for defending America. This is not incompetence. Since the 1972 U.S.-Soviet Anti-Ballistic Missile (ABM) Treaty, it has been the policy of the U.S. government that the American people should remain 100 percent without protection against missiles."

THEY FAVOR THE "ARMS CONTROL" LOBBY MORE THAN THEY FAVOR DEFENDING AMERICA

"Since nearly all Americans believe such protection is the necessary and proper business of the U.S. government, politicians have a problem. Most Democratic politicians and officials want no missile defense, but fear the label ‘anti-defense.’ Most Republicans want a missile defense, just to be labelled ‘pro-defense,’ but fear the dominant anti-defense culture within the bureaucracy. So, Republicans and Democrats have tacitly agreed to spend lots of money, ostensibly for missile defense, on condition that not one penny of it will buy any defense."

Globalist influence in the GOP is reflected in the front page Washington Post (4/21/98) story concerning a key Republican member of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. "When Sen. Chuck Hagel (R-Neb.) visited the T-L Irrigation Co. here last Tuesday, the big topic was an impending shopping trip by a delegation from China....

"‘We are living in a global village, undergirded by a global economy,’ he told students at the University of Nebraska campus in Kearney, using words not normally associated with a midwestern Republican conservative. No one seemed surprised, and no one disagreed....

"Now it is a hotbed of trade-based internationalism, and Hagel, for one, is ready to help lead a fight to ensure that the GOP's presidential nominee in 2000 shares that thinking...."

GOP "CONSERVATIVES" GRAMS, HAGEL, AND ROBERTS HELPED LEAD THE FIGHT FOR $18 BILLION TO IMF

"[T]he region's world outlook extends beyond trade to varying degrees of support for the United Nations and other instruments of internationalism, with inevitable repercussions for Congress, the GOP and even presidential politics.

"Little more than a year after coming to the Senate, Hagel, with help from midwestern GOP first-termers Pat Roberts (Kan.) and Rod Grams (Minn.), led the successful fight in the Senate for $18 billion to replenish IMF reserves depleted by the Asian rescue operations."

FOR REPUBLICANS, ADVOCATES OF CONSTITUTIONAL CONSERVATISM ARE THE ENEMY

"For him, it was the opening shot in a broader struggle over the direction of the Republican Party and its choice of a presidential nominee. ‘A lot of us don't want an isolationist leading us into the 21st century and into defeat in the process,’ he says, refusing to name names at this point but vowing to do so as the need arises.

"Hagel is not alone as a ‘global villager’ on the Great Plains. Even as Hagel was readying his puddle-jumping tour of south-central Nebraska during Congress's two-week spring break, Roberts was unleashing an anti-isolationist broadside before the Kansas Press Association...."

IS "AMERICA LAST" THEIR MOTTO?

"Roberts took an additional whack at lawmakers, including House Republicans, who want to hold the IMF bill hostage for action on issues such as abortion. Not that these issues are not important, but ‘we will not build successful foreign or trade policy by making the rest of the world conform to our way of life and our views of how we want things to be,’ he said."

Excerpted from Howard Phillips Issues & Strategy Bulletin of March 31, 1998

GARY BAUER JOINS IN CRITIQUE OF PRO-BIG GOVERNMENT GOP CONGRESS

Gary Bauer and Stephen Moore observe (Wall Street Journal, 3/20/98, p. A14) that after "just three years in the majority the GOP is now in danger of becoming what the voters saw and rejected in the Democrats in 1994: a party devoid of ideas that simply preserves and defends the status quo in Washington...."

DEFENSE SLASHED BUT NO DOMESTIC PROGRAMS ABOLISHED

Paul Craig Roberts observes in The Washington Times (3/10/98, p. A16), "Do Republicans have what it takes to protect the country and the rule of law from those in high places? What is being tested is not Mr. Clinton's or Mr. Starr's character, but Republican resolve. Ruby Ridge, Waco, Travelgate, Filegate, and scandals ad nauseam, have shown the public time and again that Republicans turn a blind eye to wrongful deeds by federal officials.

"While Republicans dream of retaining control of Congress and gaining the presidency, the public is watching a political party that has refused to hold accountable a single federal official, whether a lowly law enforcement officer, the attorney general, or President Clinton. Slowly, the Republicans are establishing the precedent that federal government officials are above the law."

GOP STRENGTHENS U.S. REGULATORY GESTAPO

Excerpted from Howard Phillips Issues & Strategy Bulletin of March 15, 1998

GINGRICH OUT OF STEP WITH CONSERVATIVES AGAIN

"‘We should not pick a specific replacement until we have a Republican president,’ Gingrich told supporters Saturday."

GINGRICH BACKS CLINTON ON RECORD BUDGET HIKE FOR EEOC

As reported in The Washington Post (3/5/98, p. A1), "The U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, which enforces anti-discrimination laws in the workplace, is hearing something it hasn't heard for a while: support from the Republican leadership.

BIGGEST BOOST IN 20 YEARS FOR UNCONSTITUTIONAL AGENCY

15 REPUBLICANS RESCUE FEDERAL CONSTRUCTION QUOTAS BY RACE AND GENDER

James Glassman asks in The Washington Post (3/10/98, p. A17), "[w]hat's wrong with the Republicans? They're now entering their fourth year in control of Congress – the first time that's happened since 1930. The economy is booming, the deficit has vanished and the president may be indicted or impeached. You would think this state of affairs would give them a little self-confidence, but GOP voices are confused, whimpering or downright inaudible. Bill Clinton, despite all his troubles, is setting the agenda."

"PLAY IT SAFE" POLITICS IS RISKY

"So what are the invisible Republicans up to? Last week House members, in a pathetic effort to endear themselves to Hispanic voters, brought up legislation to advance Puerto Rican statehood – hardly one of the great issues of our time. Meanwhile, senators passed a bill setting blood alcohol levels for drunk driving at 0.08 percent. Just a reminder: Back when the Constitution meant something, states were responsible for such matters."

"STATUS QUO" IS GOP'S DEFINITION OF CONSERVATISM

As reported by The Washington Post (3/7/98, p. 1), despite "arguments by many conservatives that public opinion is turning against such programs championed by advocates of affirmative action, 15 Republicans joined nearly all Democrats in a 58 to 37 vote against an amendment by Sen. Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) to drop the Disadvantaged Business Enterprise (DBE) program from a bill reauthorizing transportation projects for the next six years.

The 15 GOP quota voters were Bond (Mo.), Campbell (Colo.), Chafee (R.I.), Collins (Maine), D'Amato (N.Y.), Domenici (N.M.), Jeffords (Vt.), Kempthorne (Idaho), McCain (Ariz.), Murkowski (Alaska), Roth (Del.), Snowe (Maine), Specter (Pa.), Stevens (Alaska), and Warner (Va.). Five Senators did not vote: Glenn (D-Ohio), Coats (R-Ind.), Helms (R-N.C.), Hutchison (R-Tex.), and Bennett (R-Utah).

GINGRICH DEFENDS QUOTAS IN THE HOUSE

"Mr. Gingrich also blocked that bill, prompting Mr. Franks to call him a liar. Mr. Franks said Mr. Gingrich promised to allow his measure to come to the floor, and then reneged."

Excerpted from Howard Phillips Issues & Strategy Bulletin of February 15, 1998

GOP IS NOW FULLY SUPPORTIVE OF FEDERAL EDUCATION INTERVENTION

EVEN $3.5 BILLION MORE TO THE IMF IS AN UNCONSTITUTIONAL OUTRAGE

"The United States is the world's biggest donor to the IMF and its most influential member. Because the U.S. contribution accounts for 18 percent of the fund, the United States holds 18 percent of the fund's vote – more than the 15 percent needed to veto IMF proposals...."

TRENT LOTT WANTS TO GIVE IMF $18 BILLION OF YOUR TAXES

"In the Senate, Majority Leader Trent Lott said he wants to bring part of the IMF funding up for a quick vote – the $3.5 billion loan that appears to have widespread support in Congress.

"The remaining $14.5 billion would have to wait until later in the session."

TRENT LOTT'S NEW WORLD ORDER AGENDA: NATO, BOSNIA, IMF, AND FAST TRACK

National Journal's Congress Daily (1/23/98) reports that Senate GOP Leader Trent Lott's 1998 foreign policy objectives include "fast track trade negotiating authority, the Carribean Basin Initiative, NATO enlargement and supplemental funding for the Bosnia mission and the International Monetary Fund. Lott suggested the administration not request the entire $18 billion in IMF funds it wants in the FY98 supplemental, but divide it into ‘two or three parts;’ he also emphasized a need for reform in recipient countries."

ACTION: Let Senate Republican Leader Trent Lott (Fax: 202-224-2262) know what you think of his plan to help Bill Clinton bail out the IMF.

Excerpted from Howard Phillips Issues & Strategy Bulletin of January 31, 1998

I watched part of the spectacle on C-SPAN, perhaps you did too, as the Republicans voted by a 114 to 43 margin to continue subsidizing candidates for public office who favor "partial-birth abortions" (the hacking to death of unborn boys and girls just three inches away from childhood).

NO TERMINATION LIMITS SEEM PRAGMATIC

Is there any line which Republicans would draw? Is there any issue so significant that would cause them to withhold their votes and their dollars (actually the dollars of their donors) from a supplicant for public office who claims identification with the Republican Party?

Is sodomy too much? Gun confiscation? The surrender of national independence to the United Nations? The increase of Federal regulatory and funding authority? The emasculation of our national defense? The expansion of government control over the education of our children? The stripping away of religious liberty?

LUST FOR OFFICE IS THE CORE PRINCIPLE WHICH UNITES THE PACHYDERMS

No, surely, if they can give money to candidates who openly proclaim their intention to support an act, which in a civilized country would warrant the death penalty, there is no principle important enough to stand between the Republicans and their lust for power.

With notable exceptions, the GOP is led by a bunch of craven, unprincipled, self-deluded charlatans who lack the moral energy and ethical sincerity to take a forthright stand for a position, which even many Democrats fear to oppose.

NICHOLSON "GREW IN OFFICE" BY SETTING ASIDE HIS PERSONAL CONVICTIONS

Jim Nicholson proved himself "reliable" to the powers that be which run the Republican Party and which, more significantly, will control any administration which the Republicans may succeed in electing. For the sake of their approval, he energetically surrendered his professed religious beliefs and political principles.

GOP FEARS TO OFFEND ADVOCATES AND PRACTITIONERS OF INFANTICIDE

They say that it is necessary to fund the Christy Todd Whitmans of the world in order to get a Republican majority, as if having a Republican majority in Congress these past three years has done anything but reinforce the misdirection of the Federal government.

THEIR WORDS ARE EMPTY, THEIR PROMISES HOLLOW

Today, as we move into the third Congressional election cycle (1994-1996-1998) in which Republicans expect to triumph, there is more Federal money than ever before for Planned Parenthood, the homosexual movement, "education", foreign aid, socialized medicine, and all the rest.

ARE GOP DONORS "ACCESSORIES AFTER THE FACT", PERMITTING THEIR DONATIONS TO AID PRO-ABORT POLITICIANS?

It is on the altar of this Republican success that more of God's infants will be sacrificed. When will those who really want to do something to end abortion in America, wake up and smell the coffee?

GOP leaders who spoke out against the resolution to ban the use of GOP donor contributions to aid advocates of partial-birth abortion included: House Judiciary Committee Chairman Henry Hyde, California Attorney General Dan Lundgren, Texas Senator Phil Gramm, former Congressman Jack Kemp, Texas Governor George W. Bush, former Education Secretary Lamar Alexander, House Budget Committee Chairman John R. Kasich, Arizona Senator John McCain, California Governor Pete Wilson, and former Vice President Dan Quayle, among all too many others.

NATIONAL RIGHT TO LIFE COMMITTEE TAKES A DIVE

According to The Washington Post (1/16/98, p. A8), "The Christian Coalition supports the resolution...but the National Right to Life Committee has tried to stay out of the internal party battle." According to published reports, the NRTLC has received more than $650,000 from the Republican National Committee. I guess they had to "bite their tongue" lest they "bite the hand which feeds them".

GINGRICH HAS A SINGLE STANDARD: HELP FOR PRO-ABORT REPUBLICANS

It should be noted that in California Speaker Gingrich intervened to endorse and support a Republican Congressional candidate who took a "pro-choice stance on abortion". Indeed, Brooks Firestone was so pro-choice that he could accept partial-birth abortion. This seems to be a double standard. It is okay for the National Republican Party to intervene against pro-life candidates such as Tom Bordonaro, Firestone's successful primary foe, even as it intervenes in favor of pro-partial-birth Republicans such as Christy Todd Whitman.

According to The Weekly Standard (1/19/98, p.10), former Minnesota GOP Congressman Vin "Weber, who was a founder of the House pro-life caucus, says there's fear among pro-lifers that ‘they'll lose what they have, which is control of the party.’ But instead, he argues, the resolution might drive away big GOP donors, who tend to be pro-choice."

Excerpted from Howard Phillips Issues & Strategy Bulletin of January 15, 1998

Stephen Moore observes faithfully in The Washington Times (1/11/98, p. B3) that the "latest press release from the White House Budget Office proclaims that total federal expenditures will rise by ‘only’ $70 billion in 1998....

"The total federal budget now exceeds the combined family budgets of every household in America living west of Colorado...."

REPUBLICANS SUPPORT 100% OF CLINTON'S SPENDING---PLUS $4 BILLION

"Last February, Mr. Clinton asked Congress for $1.688 trillion to operate the government – a truly audacious sum that was ridiculed by fiscal conservatives. Yet the final budget approved by Congress somehow managed to exceed the Clinton request by $4 billion. Can a president politically blackmail Congress into spending more money than he himself asked for?..."

HOW DOES A "GREAT SOCIETY" LIBERAL PERSUADE "CONSERVATIVE REPUBLICANS" TO FUND THE LEFT-WING AGENDA EVEN MORE THAN HE DARES ASK?

"[T]here were dozens of programs for which the budget approved by Congress was more than the White House had sought (see table)."

"For example, the $7.6 billion bilateral foreign aid bill, the most expensive in history, contains $200 million more for ineffectual Agency for International Development (AID) assistance funds and $100 million more for the State Department than the White House sought...."

EX-IM WAS ONCE A TARGET FOR ABOLITION---NOW GOP SEEKS MORE CORPORATE WELFARE

"One of the largest dispensers of corporate welfare in the budget is the Export-Import Bank. Rather than end that aid to K Street corporate welfare queens, Congress appropriated $680 million for the bank, $50 million more than the Clinton budget demanded."

GOP IS GREENER THAN GORE

"The 105th Congress seems intent on proving it's as green as the Sierra Club by outspending Bill Clinton and Al Gore on environmental programs. Hence, even though the government already owns more than one-third of the land area of the United States, GOP appropriators approved $206 million for Interior Department land acquisitions – almost twice what Mr. Clinton and Mr. Gore wanted. The GOP was also more generous than the Clinton White House to the Park Service, the Fish and Wildlife Service and selected farm programs.

"The labor, health and education bill was the fiscal equivalent of the Alamo for conservatives. Home heating assistance, a program that Ronald Reagan and his budget director David Stockman tried to exterminate 16 years ago when the energy crisis ended, gets $100 million more than the Clinton budget request.

"Something called the School Improvement Program (who could be against that?) was slated for termination in 1995 but now gets $200 million more than our education president wanted."

Excerpted from Howard Phillips Issues & Strategy Bulletin of November 15, 1997

HAVING SURRENDERED THE PRINCIPLE, EACH YEAR GOP RETREATS FURTHER, SUPPORTING MASSIVE INCREASES IN FEDERAL EDUCATION SPENDING

As reported in The Washington Post (11/12/97, p. A11), "Last year, GOP leaders spoke seriously of abolishing the Education Department....They also threatened to make deep cuts in Goals 2000, a prominent Clinton program to give states grants for school reforms. But now they provide precisely the amount of money he had requested."

THEY NO LONGER OPPOSE EDUCATION "PROSTITUTION", BUT THEY LOUDLY QUIBBLE ABOUT THE PRICE

"As Congress wraps up its work this year, Clinton is continuing to prevail....‘Republicans are on the defensive — they're still confused over how to be for education without supporting new programs from Washington,’ said Chester Finn, a senior fellow at the Hudson Institute and assistant secretary of education during the Bush Administration. ‘Clinton's political instincts have been very shrewd.’...

"On some education issues, Republican leaders and Clinton have reached consensus. Both want to develop new charter public schools...Both sides also have agreed to spend more federal money to help children improve their reading skills and to help needy students pay for college...."

GOP COMPROMISES ON NATIONAL EDUCATION TESTING OF FEDERALLY SUBSIDIZED EDUCATION

"Another feud still exists on Clinton's plan to give national tests in reading and math, which would be an unprecedented step for schools. The compromise forged last week may preserve the tests....GOP lawmakers have deep differences on the subject. Last month, Senate Republicans strongly backed a modified form of Clinton's tests even as the House voted to ban them."

REPUBLICANS REREGULATE AMERICA

Bruce Bartlett of the National Center for Policy Analysis points out (Human Events, 10/3/97, p. 17) that "Among the many areas where the Republican Congress's actions have fallen short of its promises is deregulation. In the Contract With America, Republicans promised to rein in government regulators and lift the regulatory burden on American businesses....

1015 NEW REGULATIONS --- 9.2% MORE MONEY

"The study, from the Center for the Study of American Business (CSAB), at Washington University in St. Louis, carefully examines the federal government's regulatory spending. It reports that federal regulatory agencies saw one of their biggest increases ever in fiscal year 1997. Real, inflation-adjusted spending by all federal regulatory agencies rose 9.2%, and the number of employees went up by 1,015...."

"The biggest increase was received by the EPA, which now gets nearly one-third of all federal regulatory outlays. In 1997, it got an increase in its budget of $1.3 billion, a rise of 32% after inflation. This increase allowed the EPA to hire an additional 665 regulators, raising the total to 17,693. It is expected to add a further 330 regulatory staff in 1998."

FREE CITIZENS ARE AN INCREASINGLY ENDANGERED SPECIES

"Another regulatory agency seeing a healthy increase is the Interior Department's Fish and Wildlife Service, which enforces the Endangered Species Act. In real terms, the Fish and Wildlife Service saw its budget rise by more than 11% in 1997, and it added 162 regulators to its staff. It will add another 139 in 1998.

"According to the CSAB study, businesses spend $20 to comply with federal regulations for every $1 the government spends. And the burden on small businesses tends to be greater than for large businesses, which have a large output over which to spread the cost...."

"George Bush, who hired more than 21,000 additional regulators in just four years...increased real spending on regulatory activities by more than 21%. Apparently, the Republican Party is no longer the party of deregulation."

GOP GUBERNATORIAL CANDIDATES IN ILLINIOIS AND FLORIDA PROPOSE PRO-ABORTION RUNNING-MATES

Life Advocacy Briefing (#4-46, 11/17/97) reports that "(i)nexplicably, two of the G.O.P.'s leading gubernatorial prospects, Jeb Bush in Florida and George Ryan in Illinois have designated female abortion advocates as their favored candidates for lieutenant governor in their respective states, risking a sense of betrayal in their respective pro-life political bases."

BUSH AND RYAN ALIGN WITH FEMALE ABORTION ADVOCATES

"Florida frontrunner Mr. Bush gave the nod last week to Florida Secretary of State Sandra Mortham to join him in his second quest for governor, Illinois Secretary of State George Ryan tapped a little-known first-term State Representative, Corinne Wood, to join him on the state ticket."

WHY DID THEY FEAR A VETO? --- WHAT STAKE DOES THE GOP HAVE IN GUARANTEEING A CLINTON SIGNATURE FOR $13 BILLION OF FOREIGN AID?

As reported in The New York Times (11/14/97, p. A1), "By a voice vote, the Senate approved a foreign operations spending bill of nearly $13 billion for 1998 — without providing for United Nations and I.M.F. payments. The House had passed similar legislation 333 to 76 shortly after midnight....

THE IRS HAS NO POWER, EXCEPT THAT WHICH CONGRESS ASSIGNS

James Glassman correctly observes (Washington Post, 9/30/97, p. A21) that the real problem is not the IRS; it's the Congress which votes the IRS its authority and funding: "Senators heard outrageous testimony last week about IRS abuse of taxpayers. The acting commissioner apologized, but the real blame lies squarely with the politicians who professed to be so horrified at what they heard.

GOP's DEEDS BELIE THEIR WORDS

"Republicans talked grandly about simplification but this year passed legislation that added 285 new sections and 824 amendments to the tax law, making the code 9,451 pages long. Even expensive tax lawyers can't understand it. That leaves IRS agents free to make their own Talmudic interpretations — and then take away your house.

Excerpted from Howard Phillips Issues & Strategy Bulletin of August 15, 1997

House Speaker Newt Gingrich and the Republican leadership have sent another clear message to pro-lifers: "No matter what we do, you'll still vote Republican."

As reported in The Washington Times (8/12/97, p. A4), "Rep. James C. Greenwood, a pro-choice Pennsylvania Republican, will replace Rep. Bill Paxon, New York Republican, who resigned as chairman of the GOP leadership in the wake of a bungled coup attempt on the speaker....

"Mr. Greenwood was recruited by Mr. Paxon earlier this year to help develop a four-year agenda for the party that would help Republicans win the White House in 2000....Mr. Greenwood has been active in fighting pro-life legislation and belongs to the Tuesday Group, a collection of House GOP centrists who meet at least once a week to formulate strategy."

WHEN WILL PRO-LIFERS SAY "ENOUGH IS ENOUGH"?

Along with the two other most recent additions to the House Republican leadership, Jennifer Dunn and Deborah Pryce, Mr. Greenwood takes an unequivocating pro-abortion position, even to the extent of supporting abortions at U.S. defense installations. Greenwood was one of eight House GOP congressmen to vote with Bill Clinton in support of partial birth abortions.

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