is weeks old, Gary Bauer’s January 12th e-mail, forwarded by Clark Coleman, contains four items each of which is highly interesting. They concern: James O’Keefe secret filming of the issuance of ballots to dead people in the New Hampshire primary; David Axelrod defending Rev. Wright; Ron Paul’s liberal supporters; and the Supreme Court’s unanimous rejection of an Obama administration-backed suit against a church for firing a minister.
Thursday, January 12, 2012
To: Friends & Supporters
From: Gary L. Bauer
COUNTDOWN TO VICTORY: 299 DAYS TO THE 2012 ELECTIONS
The Voting Dead
Yesterday The Daily Caller broke the disturbing news that ballots were issued for dead people during Tuesday’s New Hampshire primary. Undercover video captured poll workers issuing ballots for individuals who were recently deceased.
This “sting operation” was conducted by James O’Keefe, the same man who caught many ACORN workers on video violating tax laws and turning a blind eye to under-age prostitution. No laws were violated by O’Keefe, but his videos make it all too clear just how easy it is to commit voter fraud.
Undoubtedly, you may be wondering how this is possible. Well, New Hampshire, like many states, does not have a voter ID law. In fact, when one of O’Keefe’s undercover voters offered to show an ID, the response he received was, “The state says we’re not allowed to ask for identification.”
You may recall that a few weeks ago I blasted the Obama Justice Department for waging a jihad against state voter ID laws. We have to produce an ID to buy alcohol and other products. We have to produce an ID to drive and to board an airplane. We have to produce an ID to cash checks.
Yet Democrats insist that it is an onerous burden to ask citizens to produce an ID when they cast their ballots. The American public overwhelmingly disagrees. A recent Rasmussen poll found that 70% of likely voters support voter ID laws, including 64% of independent voters and even 54% of Democrats.
Axelrod Defends Wright
I have been saying for months now that this election is going to be brutal. Obama can’t run on “hope and change” again. It’s going to be fear and smear in 2012. This week we got another indication of where the Obama campaign is headed.
In California this week, Obama’s chief political strategist David Axelrod defended Barack Obama’s former pastor, Jeremiah Wright. According to the report, Axelrod dismissed the 2008 Wright controversy by saying it was nothing more than “ninety seconds of vitriol plucked from thirty years of sermons by some enterprising opposition researcher.”
Really? Why then did Barack Obama feel it was necessary to throw Wright under the bus and repudiate his outrageous statements and blatant racism? David Axelrod is not a dumb man, so why on earth is he opening up this can of worms now? [LA replies: This is not precisely correct. Obama initially responded to the Wright controversy by mildly criticizing his pastor while also defending him and saying that he would not abandon him, because abandoning him would be like abandoning black America itself. This was in Obama’s March 18, 2008 race speech in Philadelphia. Then, when Wright made some further intemperate remarks partly aimed at Obama himself, Obama disowned him. Thus Obama did not disown Wright over his 20 year career of anti-white and anti-American statements; he disowned him over one statement Wright made in 2008.]
I truly hope I am wrong, but I fear this is a signal by the Obama campaign to their media allies that they are prepared to make a candidate’s faith an issue in this year’s campaign. They know going down this road will invite questions about Wright. That is why Axelrod may have pre-emptively signaled it was really “much ado about nothing” and that the Obama campaign is prepared to refight that battle.
Why? Because no matter the faith of the GOP nominee, radical secularists will portray our candidate as an extremist, and left-wing activists are prepared to exploit religious bigotry in an attempt to get Obama reelected. In fact, the polling data already indicates that for all the hype about religious intolerance on the right, there is more bigotry on the left!
Ron Paul’s Liberal Base
In yesterday’s report I noted that, according to the exit polls, Ron Paul attracted a lot of support from self-identified liberals and independents who cast ballots in New Hampshire’s GOP primary. But there’s more.
The left-wing Nation reports that nearly 20% of voters who cast ballots in Tuesday’s Democrat primary voted against Barack Obama. Many in fact went so far as to write in another candidate’s name. So who came in second to Barack Obama in the New Hampshire Democrat primary? Ron Paul.
And why would so many Democrats write in Paul’s name? Because he is to Obama’s left on foreign policy and national defense. In fact, Paul is so extreme, he even opposed the SEAL raid that killed Osama bin Laden! For the record, only 5% of Americans agree with Ron Paul that it was wrong to take out bin Laden.
Supremes Stop Obama Power Grab
Many conservatives have been rightly concerned about Barack Obama’s recent power grabs. I am pleased to report that one of them was just slapped down by the Supreme Court.
At issue was a discrimination lawsuit filed against a religiously affiliated school after it had dismissed one of its teachers. The Obama Administration intervened against the school and argued before the high court that long-recognized “ministerial exemptions” should no longer apply to religious institutions. This was an incredibly hostile and unprecedented opinion, not to mention a potentially unprecedented expansion of federal influence over religious institutions.
The New York Times described the case as likely the “most significant religious liberty decision in two decades.” Bishop William E. Lori, chairman of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops’ ad hoc committee for religious liberty, praised the ruling, saying, “This decision makes resoundingly clear the historical and constitutional importance of keeping internal church affairs off limits to the government—because whoever chooses the minister chooses the message.”
In its opinion, written by Chief Justice John Roberts, the court’s majority flatly rejected the Obama Administration’s argument, stating that it is “hard to square with the text of the First Amendment itself … We cannot accept the remarkable view that the Religion Clauses have nothing to say about a religious organization’s freedom to select its own ministers.”
And here’s just how radical the Obama Administration’s positions was: The Supreme Court rejected its position UNANIMOUSLY—9-to-0. Not one of the court’s four left-wing justices, not even the two Obama appointed, sided with the administration. In fact, Justice Elena Kagan even wrote a concurring opinion with Justice Samuel Alito!