The Google logo has been blacked out today. Wikipedia, reddit, Mozilla and Twitpic are all blocking access to content.  Even Star Trek icon George Takei has blocked his site.  The moves are displays of cyber-protest against the heavy-handed and ill-conceived Stop Online Piracy Act (SOPA).

From a political and public relations standpoint, this has already been a complete and utter failure for Hollywood and their formerly formidable lobbying arm, the Motion Picture Association of America. Former Sen. Chris Dodd became the new CEO of the MPAA after he realized he would never be re-elected in his home state of Connecticut due to his personal scandals with Countrywide Mortgage and his involvement in the mortgage collapse at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. So naturally, Hollywood hired the failed Senator as their man in Washington. Dodd has been the chief architect of SOPA, which was written with about as much subtlety and constitutional protocol as his equally disastrous Dodd-Frank banking law.

The merits of SOPA and the overall issue of online piracy is a worthy topic, and it can be argued that the federal government should have some hand in policing and enforcing piracy on behalf of private industries and artists who rely on royalties as a major part of their profit structure. These details can and should be debated here and in Washington DC. What is striking about today’s Internet blackout and the over-the-top reaction to it from Dodd is that this arrogant, befuddled and inept former Senator has finally figured out a way to unite the left and the right to focus their passion against a common enemy:  Hollywood. 

When was the last time left-leaning companies like Google aligned themselves with the Heritage Foundation? When have you seen left-wing think tanks like Demand Progress taking the same stand on an issue as Tea Party organizations? How often do you see Huffington Post columnists parrot talking points from the CATO Institute? Yet, thanks to the arrogance and ineptitude of Chris Dodd and the MPAA, these disparate groups are all aiming their ire at the Hollywood industry and the politicians who gladly take their donations and then push through ill-conceived legislation with the subtlety of an elephant in a ballet.

No matter how the SOPA legislation ends up, this episode should send a clear message to Hollywood and the elite few who share the same big government nanny-state desires embodied in the SOPA bill. Annoyance and anger at the pompous industry transcends ideological lines, and when an industry chooses a buffoon like Chris Dodd to handle what should be a nuanced and introspective regulation that polices piracy without stifling free expression, they deserve the black eye they are getting.

Face it, Hollywood: America is telling you to take a leap, and take your failure of a lobbyist with you.

Remember, this was his solution for global warming: curb carbon emissions by hiking the price of electricity and gas, forcing us to use less.

Well, that’s deader than the nerves in Nancy Pelosi’s face.

Says Obama:

“Cap-and-trade was just one way of skinning the cat. It was a means, not an end. I`m going to be looking for other means to address this problem.”

And with that, we owe massive gratitude to the American people.

By going to the polls and yanking one house away from Obama’s control, they – in effect – blocked the largest tax increase in history.

That’s what cap and trade was: the higher prices it guaranteed would have showed up in our electricity bill, gas stations, and in everything we buy. According to the Heritage Foundation, it would have cost the economy 161 billion dollars in 2020 – or $1,870 per family of 4. By 2035, that number jumps to $6,800.

And get this: According to the Wall Street Journal, during the few days the bill was debated in the House Energy Committee, Republicans put forth amendments to suspend the program if gas hit $5 a gallon, if electricity prices rose 10%; and if unemployment hit 15%.

The Dems smacked that down.

Ah, the spirit of working together.

Which means: cap and trade would have passed – until, the American public made a stink over health care. Obama expended so much capital and good will on that fight, that it cost him the midterms, and the worst piece of legislation on earth.

With no opposition party in place, it was the sign-waving folks in those tri-corn hats who did the heavy lifting.

God bless ‘em.

And if you disagree with me, you’re a racist, homophobic tricornophobe.

GREAT SHOW TONIGHT:

Stephen Kruiser!

Anna Gilligan!

and Terry Shappert!

fun fun fun!

With the news of Iran’s nuclear research being more widespread than previously thought, as well as the Obama administration’s retreat on the missile defense system; a documentary like “33 minutes” is more timely than ever.  Too often, Americans think of nuclear threats in the abstract, and this film does much to move the hard truths of the current state of our defense into the concrete.  Featuring interviews with numerous political luminaries such as Ronald Reagan’s Attorney General from 1985-1988, Ed Meese III, and the Iron Lady herself, Margaret Thatcher, the film will leave you understanding why missile defense is arguably the most important issue facing our nation today.

Check out more information about the film on Heritage’s website, and be sure to look for a screening near you.  For those of you in the Los Angeles area, Heritage will be having a screening at the Arclight Theater in Hollywood on October 27, followed by panel discussion including Senator Jim Talent and Kim Holmes, VP of Foreign and Defense Policy Studies at the Heritage Foundation.  Be sure to RSVP for this important event.

I’ve always heard that misery loves company.  If true, misery in America has more company these days than it knows what do with. 

I realize that conservatives have felt this way ever since the Democrats nominated the Chicago crony of Bill Ayers, Jeremiah Wright, Tony Rezko, Rod Blagojevich and the assorted felons at ACORN, to be our president, but why aren’t millions of honest, decent, hard-working Democrats up in arms?  I can guarantee that if a Republican president had done half the things that Obama has pulled off in his first half year, most of us on the right would be calling for his head.  At the very least, none of us would be kissing his heinie. 

Even before grabbing up car companies and banks, he got the ball rolling with a trillion dollar, 1100-page pork-filled stimulus package that had to be passed, he insisted, within a few short hours or America was going to be turned into a pumpkin.  Well, without anyone having had time to read anything but the price tag, it was passed into law.  Obama then took his own sweet time signing it.  In the months since its passage, the unemployment rate has soared, entire states are going belly up and, apparently, nobody seems to know what happened to the money. 

Then there’s the Waxman-Markey cap and trade bill, which started out in life at a thousand pages, and then had a 300-page amendment tacked on to it in the dead of night.  It was as if Dr. Frankenstein, after carefully inspecting his nightmarish creation, decided that what the monster really needed was a second head and a hunchback.  Again, nobody had time to read the bill, but that didn’t prevent 219 congressmen, including eight Republicans who scurried out from under a rock just long enough to make certain that Christmas, or perhaps I mean Ramadan, would come early for the President. 

As I recall, when he was a candidate, Obama assured us that taxes would be decreased for 95% of all Americans.  Inasmuch as the Heritage Foundation estimates that the cap and trade bill will wind up costing the average middle class taxpayer nearly $3,000 in additional energy costs, I guess a tax isn’t a tax if you don’t call it one.  Of course Obama and Al Gore and their liberal lackeys don’t mention the jobs that people in the oil and coal industries will lose while we’re busily building windmills.  Perhaps those folks who were formerly occupied supplying the wherewithal so that America could continue to be a major industrial nation can be hired to stand around and generate energy by blowing at the windmills.

Maybe what Obama meant when he claimed we’d be paying less in taxes was that we’d all be on the dole before the next election rolled around.  

During the campaign, when Obama vowed that, if elected, he would create or save four million jobs, I speculated that he meant that if at some point there were four million Americans who were still working, he could say he’d kept his campaign promise.  I swear I meant it as a joke. 

Inasmuch as Obama seems to be doing all he can to turn America into a left-wing third world nation, it stands to reason that he was far more perturbed by a military coup in Honduras than by innocent blood being spilled in the streets after a rigged election in Iran. 

It’s amazing, if you stop and think about it, that George H.W. Bush lost his bid for re-election because he was goofy enough to say, “Read my lips…no new taxes,” but Obama does his level best to bankrupt America and destroy the middle class, and yet continues to ride nearly as high in the popularity polls as Michael Jackson.  Imagine if the man could moonwalk. 

But, I guess a lot of us who find ourselves going down the financial drain don’t really mind so long as we can watch Prince Obama and his princess holding hands on their $250,000 date night in New York City. 

It’s almost enough to make a person pity Bernard Madoff.  That poor shmuck got a 150-year prison sentence, and he only screwed Americans out of about 65 billion dollars.

While Mr. Rove has been defined by the media and Hollywood elite as a partisan attack dog and nicknamed forebodingly as “The Architect,” he came off as anything but and emphasized that conservatives should be careful to work with our current president in a respectful manner.  When he mentioned President Obama’s name, a few overzealous members of the audience shouted out their less than positive feelings about the man; and Mr. Rove quickly and gently reminded them that our president has made some decisions that conservatives should applaud. From the surge in Afghanistan to military tribunals, Mr. Rove explained that President Obama has taken the right steps in regards to some very important issues that face our nation.  

As Mr. Rove stated, “We have to love our country enough that when [President Obama] is right, we are his best and strongest defenders.”  After eight years of BDS, conservatives should know better than to reflexively disagree with our current President on every issues just because he has a (D) in front of his name.  This does not mean that we must ignore the President when he is wrong, which is his tendency, but rather that we must also, as Rove explained, “disagree with him thoughtfully and carefully.”

The point is that whether or not we agree with those on the other side of the aisle, we must respect our nation enough to treat every issue that we face with careful reasoning, and intelligent discourse.  Too often, we forget that these debates are not about political victories but instead, are about finding the best way forward for our nation.  As Mr. Rove said, “our country exists and prospers because of values…that have meaning.”  By tearing a man down solely because of his political affiliations, win or lose the battle, we are degrading these values and thus our nation. We should honor our past and the fact that the United States was founded by men who put “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness” before ego and power.  

Americans are exhausted by the continual battles between Republicans and Democrats; as these two parties continue to sling mud back and forth.  This is not to say that Americans are looking for bi-partisanship, which usually results in wishy-washy legislation that only panders to voters’ short term happiness.  Instead, I believe, that Americans are desperately seeking leaders who will remind them of what makes our country great: the audacity of the human spirit to accomplish great things when released from the grip of oppressive government; the need to sacrifice in order to protect our great tradition of liberty, and the duty we have to help our neighbor instead of relying on our government to do so.  If we, as conservatives, base our message on these values, we will give Americans a true message of hope that is based in the values of our past, but that will also lead us to our future.

As I recall, the words to Jim Croce’s song from the early seventies went something like this: 

You don’t tug on Superman’s cape
You don’t spit into the wind
You don’t pass counterfeit currency in old Las Vegas
And you don’t mess around with Jim 

Maybe I’m wrong about the third line, but two weeks ago Chen Chiang Liu of San Marino, California learned the hard way from U.S. District Court Judge James Mahan you don’t tug on Superman’s cape and you don’t pass counterfeit currency in Las Vegas. 

Liu was initially snared in the Los Angeles FBI undercover investigation code-named OPERATION SMOKING DRAGON. While out on bail, he was caught passing counterfeit bills in Las Vegas casinos and arrested by the Secret Service. On March 5th, Liu was sentenced to 151 months in federal prison. But this case was much more than merely another federal conviction. Liu was passing the Supernote, a counterfeit $100 bill manufactured by the North Koreans. What made this case even more interesting was the lack of news coverage the trial received. I know because I was the undercover agent. 

Liu was a major player in a criminal conspiracy in which I purchased $2 million of the counterfeit bills. I was told by a co-conspirator with whom I negotiated that I was soon to be the exclusive distributor of the bills in the United States. I would be limited to a mere $40 million annually, purchasing the bills for about 30 cents on the dollar. The trial took place in Las Vegas at the same time OJ Simpson was being prosecuted. Each day I walked from the hotel past the local courthouse to the federal building. Camp OJ was staffed by dozens of reporters from all over the nation following the antics of a former football player charged with stealing back his own memorabilia. Helicopters actually hovered overhead. Yet two blocks away, Liu was on trial in a matter involving an act of war…it is an act of aggression under international law for any country to counterfeit the currency of another nation. 

During my three years undercover targeting members of an Asian criminal syndicate consisting of various loosely connected criminal conspiracies, I was tasked by FBI headquarters to obtain the Supernote. Our subjects brought me various versions of the counterfeit $100 bill, but members of two separate conspiracies brought me the Supernote. How good were these bills? Almost perfect. The bills were printed with the same color-shifting ink as in our genuine bills and printed on cotton-fiber paper using the intaglio printing process. The bills contained the security fibers as well as the watermarks. They were so good that a top analyst at Secret Service initially opined the bills were real. It wasn’t until the bills were examined under a microscope the flaws were detected. In fact, when I saw enlarged photo comparisons of the bills, the imposter looked better than the real thing. 

According to my Secret Service case agent, this was the first time anyone accused of possessing the Supernote went to trial. In the past, those caught entered guilty pleas. Liu, a Taiwanese national, decided to take his chances with the federal judicial system. With a twelve year sentence, he may now be re-thinking his decision to roll the dice in the Las Vegas federal courtroom. In one exhibit we played a video recording of an undercover meeting I had with one of Liu’s co-conspirators, Chao Tung Wu. Wu, believing me to be a criminal confederate, said on camera the money was manufactured in North Korea and distributed through the Russian embassy in Beijing. Expressing fears this might be some kind of “rip,” Wu suggested I travel with him to China and sit outside the embassy as he made the purchase. But even that tape failed to garner national media interest. 

Balbina Hwang of the Heritage Foundation believes the North Koreans produce about $250 million of the Supernotes per year. Various other investigations claim anywhere from $45 million to $1 billion in Supernotes are in circulation. Your guess is as good as mine. Since the flaws are invisible to the naked eye we have no idea what we may be holding in our wallets. 

The world knows North Korea is a nation that relies upon criminal ventures such as counterfeiting, kidnapping, and drug distribution to maintain its solvency. Some believe the North Koreans are producing the Supernote to undermine our economy. One look at our current economic situation seems to show we don’t need outside help… maybe counterfeiting is no big deal.

Having had very little experience with the Internet, I had no idea that the talk would go much further than that half-empty room of eggheads.  Instead, it soon went viral and became the talk of the conservative community.  To date, the speech, which I called, “Regurgitating the Apple: How The Modern Liberal ‘Thinks’” has been viewed by almost a half-million people on YouTube alone.  As far as YouTube hits go, that’s perhaps not the biggest number, but remember, I wasn’t wearing a bikini and singing about my love for Obama. This was a forty-seven minute, rather wonkish talk, by a previously unknown (at least in Washington and political circles) television writer with a bad haircut.

Striking to me was not just the number of people who watched the talk, but the calibre of thinkers who were sending it to each other, discussing it amongst themselves and going out of their way to contact me just to say “hi” and “thanks.”  These were people who thought, wrote and read about this stuff every day and surely didn’t need to take an hour out of their busy schedules to listen to just another talk.  This speech resonated with what I consider the best minds and most important thinkers and activists in the Republican Party and the conservative movement.

Since then, I have had a great deal of time to devote to the thesis of “Regurgitating the Apple,” as the success of the original talk saw me become an even more in-demand speaker, appear on radio and television programs and do the research for my someday to be finished (I promise) book now called, “Hating What’s Right: How The Modern Liberal Winds Up On The Wrong Side of EVERY Issue.”  As I have devoted more and more time to what has been called the “unified field theory of Liberalism,” my conviction that it is a cult of indiscriminateness, intentionally promoted by those who see a utopia to be found in the elimination of all efforts to be right, has only deepened.

Also striking was the utter failure of those who took exception to my thesis and made arguments that didn’t actually work and only further proved my points.  Name calling, ad hominen attacks, strawman arguments, vulgarity and anger were the vehicles of “debate” from the left.

As the number of viewers of my talk began to approach the half-million mark, I decided it was time to return to the Heritage Foundation for a “follow-up” lecture on the “thinking” of the Modern Liberal in order to revisit and expound upon some of the most important points from the first talk and to introduce some further consequences of the mindset I call “Modern Liberalism” and the rejection of rational and moral thought that now dominates the Democrat party in America.

Please enjoy the talk and, if you think it worthy, pass it on to others and link it to your sites.  I can be reached for questions and comments at www.evansayet.com.