ConservativeChristianRepublican-Report - 20081212

"Daily Motivations"

Never forget that getting big things done all year long isn't about magic. It's about leadership. -- Santa Claus


Welcome to a special edition of Leadership Lessons - straight from the desk of Santa Claus.

Dear Santa:
Having everyone understand and support the need for change is important to our success. But building that understanding and support is no easy task. Any ideas on what I might do?
Curious in California

Dear Curious:
You’re right-on. Building understanding, support, and acceptance for any endeavor is critical to its success. And that’s especially true when change is involved. In addressing your inquiry, I went to one of my trusted leadership resources. Here are two proven ideas from The Manager’s Communication Handbook that should help:

Give The Reasons.
Providing information is a key to building understanding. The more information managers share about the “why” behind the “what” they are trying to accomplish, the more employees will see the overall organizational vision – and the more they will accept and support plans and strategies necessary to achieve that vision.

Teach The Business of The Business.
Although they may not specifically ask, employees really DO want to know what all the reports and numbers [that you track] mean. So explain them. Managers who invest the time it takes to teach employees how the business works will reap the rewards of greater understanding ... and increased productivity.
Need to build support for change in non-business settings (e.g. at home)? Try similar strategies … with a little tweaking.



"The Patriot Post"

"Were we directed from Washington when to sow, and when to reap, we should soon want bread." -- Thomas Jefferson

"All socialism involves slavery.... That which fundamentally distinguishes the slave is that he labors under coercion to satisfy another's desires. The relation admits of many gradations. Oppressive taxation is a form of slavery of the individual to the community as a whole. The essential question is -- How much is he compelled to labor for other benefit than his own, and how much can he labor for his own benefit?" -- Herbert Spencer

"[O]ne kind of economic distortion ... will come from the political directives issued by newly empowered politicians. First, bank presidents are gravely warned by one senator after another about 'hoarding' their bailout money. But hoarding is another word for recapitalizing to shore up your balance sheet to ensure solvency. Is that not the fiduciary responsibility of bank directors? And isn't pushing money out the window with too little capital precisely the lending laxity that produced this crisis in the first place? Never mind. The banks will knuckle under to the commissars of Capitol Hill. They control the purse. Prudence will yield to politics.. Even more egregious will be the directives to a nationalized Detroit. Sen.. Charles Schumer, the noted automotive engineer, declared 'unacceptable' last week 'a business model based on gas.' Instead, 'We need a business model based on cars of the future, and we already know what that future is: the plug-in hybrid electric car.' The Chevy Volt, for example? It has huge remaining technological hurdles, gets 40 miles on a charge and will sell for about $40,000, necessitating a $7,500 outright government subsidy. Who but the rich and politically correct will choose that over a $12,000 gas-powered Hyundai? The new Detroit churning out Schumer-mobiles will make the steel mills of the Soviet Union look the model of efficiency. The ruling Democrats have a choice: Rescue this economy to return it to market control. Or use this crisis to seize the commanding heights of the economy for the greater social good. Note: The latter has already been tried. The results are filed under 'History, ash heap of.' " -- columnist Charles Krauthammer

"Can the liberties of a nation be thought secure when we have removed their only firm basis, a conviction in the minds of the people that these liberties are the gift of God? That they are not to be violated but with his wrath? Indeed I tremble for my country when I reflect that God is just: that his justice cannot sleep for ever." -- Thomas Jefferson



"The Web"

"The greatness of a leader is measured by the achievements of the led. This is the ultimate test of his effectiveness." -- Gen. Omar Bradley

"When things go wrong in your command, start searching for the reason in increasingly large circles around your own desk." -- Gen. Bruce Clarke




"Human Events"

Bankruptcy Now or Later?
by Ted Nugent

http://www.humanevents.com/article.php?id=29850
There are two key things to remember when considering bailing out the automobile industry.

First, never reward destructive behavior unless you want more of it. Second, never throw good money after bad.

Taxpayers should not be held accountable to bailout the automobile industry or any other industry for that matter. There is constitutional authority for the decades of poor management decisions, forecasting and labor deals that have put GM, the U.S.'s largest automobile maker, perilously close to going belly up.

That constitutional authority is the basic freedom everyone in America has: to succeed or fail on your own, and accept the consequences or the benefits.

The $700 billion bailout Troubled Asset Relief Program (TARP) was to be used only for bailing out financial institutions, not automobile companies skating on thin financial ice. If he is a good and honest steward of taxpayer dollars, Treasury Secretary Paulson will deny the
Big Three's request to be included in TARP.

Congress created a $25 billion loan program through the Department of Energy to help the Big Three. This loan program should be utilized by the Big Three instead of wanting to be included in TARP.

GM, Ford and Chrysler are sinking ships. With cash reserves dwindling, their only viable option is to try and stay afloat in these turbulent economic seas is bankruptcy.

Truth be told, it is not a question of if GM will file for bankruptcy protection, but rather when. Bankruptcy will provide GM the necessary protection and some time to possibly turn a dying automotive dinosaur into a smaller, lithe, profitable company that is sized for its shrunken market share. "Possibly" being the operative word.

Filing Chapter 11 protection protects GM from itself. Bankruptcy could free GM from costly labor contracts, provide them the opportunity to restructure hugely expensive pension programs, and renegotiate health benefits. Other unprofitable assets could also be amputated. Bankruptcy puts all options on the operating table to try and stop the massive bleeding of cash.

Should GM emerge from the bankruptcy operating table with a heart beat, odds are GM is never going to be the global automotive giant it once was. The automotive world is much more competitive than, say, forty years ago when GM, Chrysler and Ford ruled the automotive world from my beloved Motor City.

While the UAW may believe GM, Ford and Chrysler are in business to provide automotive workers a salary and other costly benefits, the reality is that car companies are in business to make a profit. Period. Write that down.

The UAW's costly benefit demands over the years coupled with weak automotive management who historically caved into the UAW's demands put the automotive bolts, so to speak, to the shareholders and, to a certain degree, has put the Big Three on the path to possible extinction.

Contrary to Michael Moore's disingenuous and anti-free market automotive movie (Roger and Me), profit must drive all business decisions. Even a goofy guitar player knows that a business that fails to focus on profits and does not constantly look to the future to open up new markets, develop new products and upgrade services for a changing world, cutting costs, etc., is a business that is ultimately going out of business.

Those of us who have lived and worked in and around the Motor City have watched it slowly rust into oblivion over the last twenty-five years. The decline of the Motor City should be used as a case study in every business school in America on how not to sink an industry and destroy a city in the process with denial driven feelgood liberal suicide policies.

Bailing out GM with billions of taxpayer dollars is the wrong approach. GM is not too big to fail. What GM may be is too unprofitable to stay in business.



"Simple Truths"

"The hardest arithmetic to master is that which enables us to count our blessings." -- Eric Hoffer

"Gratitude unlocks the fullness of life. It turns what we have into enough, and more. It turns denial into acceptance, chaos to order, confusion to clarity. It can turn a meal into a feast, a house into a home, a stranger into a friend. Gratitude makes sense of our past, brings peace for today, and creates a vision for tomorrow." -- Melody Beattie



"Find Law"

Remains Found Near Home of Missing Florida Girl

FLORIDA V. ANTHONY

http://news.findlaw.com/hdocs/docs/crim/flcma101408ind.html

(Cir. Ct., 9th Jud. Dist., Orange County, Fla., Dec. 11, 2008) – Authorities found unidentified skeletal remains of a small child near the home of missing Florida 3 year old Caylee Anthony. Anthony's mother has been charged with the missing girl's murder. Here is the indictment. Read more...

Related Resources • Child's body found near missing Fla. girl's home



"American Civil Rights Union" (ACRU) - Be aware, this is the ACRU, not the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU). Also, as you know by their radical, left-wing, and liberal issues, the ACLU should be the American Un-American Liberal Union. Support the ACRU. - oyh

http://www.theacru.org/acru/aclu_supports_terrorist_against_americans/

Merry Christmas from the American Civil Rights Union

All of us at the American Civil Rights Union wish you and your family a safe, happy and blessed Christmas season.

ACLU Supports Terrorist Against Americans
As usual, the ACLU misreads the Constitution, and sides with those who would attack America and murder Americans, instead of following the Constitution and protecting Americans and America. The latest example is the ACLU promotion of the interests of an Al Qaeda representative in the US.

The facts for this article, but not all of the legal conclusions, come from an article in the Los Angeles Times on 5 December, 2008. It concerns an apparent representative of Al Qaeda in the US, who is an alien, but a legal resident in the US. On 5 December, the Supreme Court agreed to hear his case.

The ACLU is heavily involved in the case, since it represents the individual in question, Ali Saleh Kahlah Marri. The ACLU, and the Times article, both pose the question as whether the President of the United States can "order the military to arrest and hold a civilian based on suspected terrorist ties."

The article says that President Bush did this by defining Marri as an "enemy combatant." This is the first of many errors in the article. The correct phrase is "illegal enemy combatant." The Geneva Conventions, like the Hague Conventions before them, defined illegal combatants as those who were not in organized units, did not wear uniforms, did not carry weapons openly, and hid among the civilian populations.

Illegal enemy combatants were excluded from the protections of those Conventions, and under the Law of War could be summarily tried before military tribunals, and executed. Witness the trials and executions of the American Colonel Nathan Hale by the British, and of the British Major John Andre by the Americans.

This is not a trivial distinction. An "enemy combatant" is an ordinary soldier in the enemy’s army. When captured, they are held for the duration, and released when the war is over. None are charged with crimes (excepting war crimes). None are entitled to lawyers, nor subject to civil or criminal trials, like the captured German soldiers held in Arkansas during WW II.

The overwhelming error in the article, and in the ACLU position, is the failure to recognize the Quirin case from 1942. In it, a unanimous Supreme

Court ruled that it was proper, under the Law of War, for the US to arrest, try by military tribunal, and if convicted, to execute, illegal enemy combatants. Eight German saboteurs entered the US in civilian clothes with money, maps, and plans to blow up various war-related facilities.

All eight were tried and convicted in military tribunals. Six were sentenced to death. One was apparently an American citizen, born in Chicago. The Court unanimously held that their trials and convictions were proper. That under the Law of War, they were not entitled to the protections of the Bill of Rights, nor trial in courts under Article III of the Constitution.

As recently as the Hamdan case a few years ago, the Court still recognizes the Quirin case as good law. And, so it should. The nation is at war, and the Constitution is not a suicide pact. The Court cannot rule in favor of Marri, unless it is willing to reverse the Quirin case from WW II.

Apparently, Marri was operating in the US with information on cyanide and other poisons, and was in the pay of Al Qaeda. It is nearly impossible to draw a factual distinction between hin and the German saboteurs who were tried and executed under the Quirin decision. Based on the facts in this article, Marri can and should be treated as an illegal enemy combatant.

The reporter, and other reporters and editors around the country who prepare stories on the Marri case in the Supreme Court may be ignorant of the Quirin case from WW II. But any competent lawyer, if they consulted one, could fill them in. And it provides an entirely different understanding than writing the story from an ACLU press release, as the Times writer apparently did.

Source of this story on the Net:

http://articles.latimes.com/2008/dec/06/nation/na-scotus-terror6

Mission About the ACRU In the Courts ACLU Outrages In the Press Other Resources Contact Us Home



"The email Bag"

A different Christmas Poem...WOW!!!

The embers glowed softly, and in their dim light,
I gazed round the room and I cherished the sight.
My wife was asleep, her head on my chest,
My daughter beside me, angelic in rest.
Outside the snow fell, a blanket of white,
Transforming the yard to a winter delight.

The sparkling lights in the tree I believe,
Completed the magic that was Christmas Eve.
My eyelids were heavy, my breathing was deep,
Secure and surrounded by love I would sleep.
In perfect contentment, or so it would seem,
So I slumbered, perhaps I started to dream.

The sound wasn't loud, and it wasn't too near,
But I opened my eyes when it tickled my ear.
Perhaps just a cough, I didn't quite know, Then the
sure sound of footsteps outside in the snow.
My soul gave a tremble, I struggled to hear,
And I crept to the door just to see who was near.

Standing out in the cold and the dark of the night,
A lone figure stood, his face weary and tight.
A soldier, I puzzled, some twenty years old,
Perhaps a Marine, huddled here in the cold.
Alone in the dark, he looked up and smiled,
Standing watch over me, and my wife and my child.

"What are you doing?" I asked without fear,
"Come in this moment, it's freezing out here!
Put down your pack, brush the snow from your sleeve,
You should be at home on a cold Christmas Eve!"
For barely a moment I saw his eyes shift,
Away from the cold and the snow blown in drifts..

To the window that danced with a warm fire's light
Then he sighed and he said "Its really all right,
I'm out here by choice. I'm here every night."
"It's my duty to stand at the front of the line,
That separates you from the darkest of times.

No one had to ask or beg or implore me,
I'm proud to stand here like my fathers before me.
My Gramps died at ' Pearl on a day in December,"
Then he sighed, "That's a Christmas 'Gram always remembers."
My dad stood his watch in the jungles of ' Nam ',
And now it is my turn and so, here I am.

I've not seen my own son in more than a while,
But my wife sends me pictures, he's sure got her smile.
Then he bent and he carefully pulled from his bag,
The red, white, and blue... an American flag.
I can live through the cold and the being alone,
Away from my family, my house and my home.

I can stand at my post through the rain and the sleet,
I can sleep in a foxhole with little to eat.
I can carry the weight of killing another,
Or lay down my life with my sister and brother..
Who stand at the front against any and all,
To ensure for all time that this flag will not fall."

" So go back inside," he said, "harbor no fright,
Your family is waiting and I'll be all right."
"But isn't there something I can do, at the least,
"Give you money," I asked, "or prepare you a feast?
It seems all too little for all that you've done,
For being away from your wife and your son."

Then his eye welled a tear that held no regret,
"Just tell us you love us, and never forget.
To fight for our rights back at home while we're gone,
To stand your own watch, no matter how long.
For when we come home, either standing or dead,
To know you remember we fought and we bled.
Is payment enough, and with that we will trust,
That we mattered to you as you mattered to us."

PLEASE, would you do me the kind favor of sending this to as many
people as you can? Christmas will be coming soon and some credit is due to our
U.S service men and women for our being able to celebrate these
festivities. Let's try in this small way to pay a tiny bit of what we owe. Make people
stop and think of our heroes, living and dead, who sacrificed themselves for us.

LCDR Jeff Giles, SC, USN
30th Naval Construction Regiment
OIC, Logistics Cell One
Al Taqqadum, Iraq



GOD WANTED ME TO TELL YOU

Everything that is going wrong in your life today shall be well with you this year. No matter how much your enemies try this year, "they will not" succeed. You have been destined to make it and you shall surely achieve all your goals this year. For the remaining months of this year (2008), all your agonies will be diverted and victory and prosperity will be incoming in abundance. Today God has confirmed the end of your sufferings sorrows and pains because HE that sits on the throne has remembered you. He has taken away the hardships and given you JOY. He will never let you down.

I knocked at heaven's door this morning, God asked me... My child! What can I do for you? And I said, "Father, please protect and bless the person reading this message"... God smiled and answered... Request granted.