THE FOUNDATION

“His integrity was most pure, his justice the most inflexible I have ever known, no motives of interest or consanguinity, of friendship or hatred, being able to bias his decision. He was indeed, in every sense of the words, a wise, a good, and a great man.” — Thomas Jefferson about George Washington

WASHINGTON’S BIRTHDAY

In some circles, today is observed as “Presidents’ Day,” jointly recognizing Presidents George Washington and Abraham Lincoln, but it is still officially recognized as the anniversary of “Washington’s Birthday” —and that is how we mark the date in our shop.

As friend of The Patriot, Matthew Spaulding, a Heritage Foundation scholar, reminds: “Although it was celebrated as early as 1778, and by the early 19th Century was second only to the Fourth of July as a patriotic holiday, Congress did not officially recognize Washington’s Birthday as a national holiday until 1870. The Monday Holiday Law in 1968—applied to executive branch departments and agencies by Richard Nixon’s Executive Order 11582 in 1971—moved the holiday from February 22 to the third Monday in February. Section 6103 of Title 5, United States Code, currently designates that legal federal holiday as ‘Washington’s Birthday.’ Contrary to popular opinion, no action by Congress or order by any President has changed ‘Washington’s Birthday’ to ‘Presidents’ Day’.”

In honor of and due respect for our first and (we believe) greatest President, arguably, our history’s most outstanding Patriot, we include two quotes from George Washington which best embody his dedication to liberty and God. The first from his First Inaugural Address, 30 April 1789, and the second from his Farewell Address, 19 September 1796.

“The preservation of the sacred fire of liberty, and the destiny of the republican model of government, are justly considered as deeply, perhaps as finally, staked on the experiment entrusted to the hands of the American People.”

“Of all the dispositions and habits which lead to political prosperity, Religion and morality are indispensable supports. In vain would that man claim the tribute of Patriotism, who should labor to subvert these great Pillars of human happiness—these firmest props of the duties of Men and citizens.”

These quotes aptly sum up The Patriot Post’s mission and purpose.

INSIGHT

“At this hour the animosities of political strife, the bitterness of partisan defeat, and the exultation of partisan triumph should be supplanted by an ungrudging acquiescence in the popular will and a sober, conscientious concern for the general weal.” —Grover Cleveland

ICHTHUS IMPRIMIS

“Then Jesus cried out and said, ‘He who believes in me, believes not in me but in Him who sent me. And he who sees me sees Him who sent me. I have come as a light into the world, that whoever believes in me should not abide in darkness’.” —John 12:44-46

FAMILY

“The Reagan coalition is dying, in the way great governing coalitions do: not through its failures, but through its successes. Think of the issues that held us together in the 1980s and 1990s: slash income taxes, spur economic growth, monetary reform, welfare reform, crime, communism and the decline of the family. Hardly any of these issues has the same political weight today because Reaganism’s ideas transformed the U.S. economy, killed off communism, cut crime, stabilized inflation, and transformed welfare into workfare. Indeed, the irony is that the pro-family conservatives are the only part of the Reagan coalition whose problems are worse after 30 years of political effort. U.S. culture is coarser, families are weaker, schools now teach not only condoms, but gay marriage, porn is everywhere, abortion on demand is still the law, and almost 40 percent of our children are now born out of wedlock. What is the next great governing coalition? Somewhere, the next Reagan is thinking hard.” —Maggie Gallagher

CULTURE

“Sure, it would be nice to have more family-friendly films, but Hollywood is a business, and like any business, it’s designed to make money. If PG-13- and R-rated films rule at the multiplex, it’s because they’re the most profitable, right? Guess again. PG-13- and R-rated films don’t make the most money—not by a long shot. Ironically, it’s G- and PG-rated films that prove to be the most lucrative. [The Dove Foundation] examined the average profits per film between 1989 and 2003, and it found that G-rated films produced 11 times more profit than R-rated films. Yet Hollywood produced 12 times more R-rated films than G-rated films during the same time period! What sense does that make?… So why are [family-friendly movies] few and far between? Maybe it’s a question of culture. In blue-state Hollywood, what better way to establish your liberal credentials—and thumb your nose at red-state, middle America—than to trash traditional values at every opportunity? Whatever the reason, we can’t change things simply by complaining—or remaining silent. Our best defense is to support good films.” —Rebecca Hagelin

LIBERTY

“Did you know that Americans, like Cubans, suffer from a ‘lack of freedom’? So says actress Charlize Theron. Born in South Africa under apartheid, the Oscar winner recently made a documentary about Cuban rappers. Theron: ‘I would argue that there’s a lack of freedom in America…’ CNN: ‘Yes, but you don’t have Democrats being arrested and thrown in jail…’ Theron: ‘No, but I do remember not too long ago some people getting fired from their jobs in television because they spoke up on how they felt about the war.’ CNN: ‘Do you think the lack of freedoms in Cuba are parallel to the lack of freedoms in the United States?’ Theron: ‘Well, I would, I would compare those two, yes, definitely.’…Ms. Theron is onto something. Maybe she meant the threat to the freedom of those who put together and aired the docudrama ‘The Path to 9/11.’… Or maybe Ms. Theron meant the government’s attack on ‘global warming deniers.’… Or maybe Ms. Theron meant the intentions of Rep. Dennis Kucinich, D-Ohio. Kucinich wants to reinstate the so-called ‘fairness doctrine’ to tell broadcasters how to program their stations under the guise of ‘fairness and balance.’… Or maybe…” —Larry Elder

THE GIPPER

“Freedom is the right to question and change the established way of doing things. It is the continuing revolution of the marketplace. It is the understanding that allows us to recognize shortcomings and seek solutions. It is the right to put forth an idea, scoffed at by the experts, and watch it catch fire among the people. It is the right to dream—to follow your dream or stick to your conscience, even if you’re the only one in a sea of doubters.” —Ronald Reagan

OPINION IN BRIEF

“With the House debating this week how much ‘non-binding’ grief to lay on President Bush about Iraq, I e-mailed a soldier friend of mine for his impressions of the increasingly amplified protests. Army Sgt. Daniel Dobson, 22, of Grand Rapids, Mich., is on his second tour in Iraq. I asked him what he thinks of the growing opposition to the war. Writing from Mosul, he says he appreciates the freedom Americans have to protest, but adds: ‘The American military has shown a stone-cold professional veneer throughout the seething debate raging over Iraq. Beneath that veneer, however, is a fuming, visceral hatred. We feel as though we have been betrayed by Congress.’ Sgt. Dobson believes the military is being hamstrung against an enemy with no reservations or restrictions: ‘It is our overwhelming opinion that we have not been allowed to conduct the war to the fullest of our capability; neither do we feel that we should pull out because of a lack of ‘results.’ War is not a chemistry set with predetermined outcomes or complications. With a great army matched with an equally cunning enemy, we find ourselves in a difficult, but winnable fight. We do not seek results; rather, we seek total and unequivocal victory…[T]here is no honor in what the Democrats have proposed. It stings me to the core to think that Americans would rather sell their honor than fight for a cause’.” —Cal Thomas

GOVERNMENT

“Problems with our health care system are leading some to fall prey to proposals calling for a nationalized single-payer health care system like Canada’s or Britain’s… Some of our politicians hold up the Canadian and British nationalized health care systems as models for us. You can bet that should we ever have such a system, they would exempt themselves from what the rest of us would have to endure. There’s a cure for our health care problems. That cure is not to demand more government but less government. I challenge anyone to identify a problem with health care in America that is not caused or aggravated by federal, state and local governments.” —Walter Williams

RE: THE LEFT

“Destroying a president is not much of a strategy to win a war, but it’s all the Democrats have. The churls of the left don’t seem to care whether their country wins the war, the important thing is to ‘keep hate alive.’ If hate worked in ‘06, maybe it will work again in ‘08, when the stakes will be considerably higher. Sometimes it’s not only hate, but a bit of schadenfreude, too, taking pleasure in the woes of the enemy. ‘Partisan pleasure in George Bush’s pain dates to the anguish of the contested 2000 election loss,’ observes Daniel Henninger in the Wall Street Journal. ‘The Democrats have run against something called ‘Bush’ for so long this sentiment is now bound up in any act or policy remotely attached to the president. Iraq’s troubles, or Iran or North Korea, are merely an artifact of crushing this one guy.’ The president’s tormentors in Congress, some old and some new, insist they don’t have anything against the fine young Americans with their lives on the line in Iraq, but the troops are dispensable to the larger partisan goal of destroying George W. and abdicating the responsibility that comes with being the world’s only superpower. If the troops are hurt, too, well, that’s just a risk the critics will have to endure.” —Wesley Pruden

POLITICAL FUTURES

“With all these Republican candidates for president—you have Giuliani, Romney, McCain—there’s a distinct effort… to redefine conservatism in a way that fits the candidacy of one or the other of these candidates. They are conflating electability with a serious discussion of conservatism. Much of it’s coming from the New York and DC elite. It reached its zenith with a column from George Will that I saw Sunday, in which there’s a big swipe taken at Reaganism and that conservatives’ view of Reaganism is a waste of time, that Reagan was one man at one time and never will be again. It’s a stunning, stunning piece—and all these things together amused me, because have you ever seen liberalism wring its hands and try to redefine itself to fit one particular candidate?… If conservatives are serious about a conservative candidate, then the candidate ought to have to be conservative, not the other way around.” —Rush Limbaugh

FOR THE RECORD

“Here’s some perspective you won’t find anywhere else: Mr. Bush has better approval ratings four years after the quick overthrow of Saddam Hussein than Woodrow Wilson, Harry Truman or LBJ did at this point in the wars they launched. Mr. Bush led his nation into a war and was reelected—a feat equaled by only one president in the past hundred years, FDR. Even Mr. Bush’s own father lost a bid for a second term despite leading the country into a war that seemed much more conclusive and successful to public opinion at the time.” —Holman W. Jenkins Jr.

SELECT READER COMMENTS

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“Thank you for your excellent Patriot Perspective in the 07-07 Digest, ’On Sunnis and Shi’ites. Our failure to Know our Enemy is truly appalling. Another fascinating influence in the Islamic world are Wahabi fanatics that are the central cause of our current problems. It is their sect that is evangelizing so energetically in our prisons. If we are not to ‘profile’ to identify enemies of foreign origin, what hope will we have to defend civilization against domestic recruits? Keep up the good work.” —Fairfax, Virginia

“Your outstanding Shi’a-Sunni essay reminded me of this quote by former Israeli PM Menachem Begin, in response to a journalist’s question about the official stand of his government regarding the Iran-Iraq war: ‘We wish both sides great success’.” —Ypsilanti, Michigan

“With regard to the ridiculous case against Scooter Libby, which is absent a protagonist, an antagonist, and any real crime—just memories and their faulty applications—we have, juxtaposed, a very real crime committed by Clintonista Sandy Berger. Berger, having actually broken a myriad of serious laws regarding National Security, managed to plea down to a fine he can pay with proceeds from one speech, and community service (which, almost two years later, he has not fulfilled). Is this Alice in Wonderland?” —GySgt, USMC, Vanceboro, North Carolina

THE LAST WORD

“Well let me try some irony on you: As I write, freezing rain and wind-whipped snow are pelting my roof, rendering me miserable, yet highly civilized human beings are trying to kill me. They actually oppose global warming. Despite the inclement weather, they remonstrate that global warming is an environmental evil, and from universities and media outlets they endeavor to silence anyone who departs from their orthodoxy. Scientists who remain calm are intimidated, and those extreme skeptics who doubt the global warming orthodoxy are abominated. A distinguished American think tank that sought an open debate on climate change, the American Enterprise Institute, was slandered in the media as a tool of Big Oil… Meanwhile, I am sitting here in our nation’s capital freezing. In California, the citrus crop is near ruin. The plains states look like Antarctica, and from the Midwest to the Atlantic coast snow and ice are everywhere. The logical conclusion is that rather than debate the possibility of global warming we should be applauding it and doing everything we can to usher it in… It is about time Americans acknowledge that global warming is our friend. It cannot come fast enough. No sensible person looks forward to what the weather reports call a ‘wintry mix’.” —Emmett Tyrrell

Veritas vos Liberabit—Semper Vigilo, Fortis, Paratus, et Fidelis! Mark Alexander, Publisher, for The Patriot’s editors and staff. (Please pray for our Patriot Armed Forces standing in harm’s way around the world, and for their families—especially families of those fallen Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines and Coast Guardsmen, who have died in defense of American liberty, while prosecuting the war with Jihadistan.)