Day155 Monday 01/31/11

ran 6.2 miles

Here’s something you may not know. In an article written by Anne E. Kornblut and Rachel Weiner, they reported that Jon Huntsman, the U.S. Ambassador to China has officially sent a letter of resignation to President Barack Obama. It is speculated that Huntsman intends to run against his boss for the position of President of the United States of America in 2012. If that’s not a shellacking to everything Barack Obama represents, I don’t know how much stronger of a message could be sent. He will step down from his post in April, leaving only three months to name and confirm a new ambassador, one of the most important postings in the world.

Appointed by Barack Obama in 2009, Huntsman is a Republican and once held the Governor’s seat of Utah. It will be a difficult task to replace him after the relationships and diplomacy he has successfully established. Huntsman is fluent in Mandarin, possesses extremely productive relations with China, and has been immensely instrumental in Obama’s efforts to make America more competitive and to build a business alliance with Beijing.

Yet another one of Obama’s appointees is jumping ship on his policies. Huntsman stands out uniquely, though, because in his case he did not fail, like his economic advisors and others who had resigned on behalf of the messes they had made. Jon Huntsman is resigning because he, the most knowledgeable man in America on U.S.-Chinese relations obviously disagrees with Obama’s direction and he apparently feels he can do a better job.

1,668.7 miles to go.

Day154 Sunday 01/30/11

ran 2.7 miles

• 21.9 miles run this week.

• Daily running average for the week was 3.13 miles per day.

• Total amount run in the past 154 days is 405.1 miles.

• Daily running average overall is 2.63 miles per day.

Today is the five-month mark of running against Barack Obama, protesting his radical ideas and legislation, and seeking solutions that will get him out of office on November 6, 2012. That date sits far off on a distant horizon that is hard to define, but as we get closer and visibility sharpens, our future will appear before us and we will either reelect Barack Hussein Obama or we will elect Someone Else. We don’t know too much about Someone Else at this point. What we do know is that Someone Else is a man or a woman who will largely oppose the direction Barack Obama has been steering this country. And, in the short-term scheme of things, that is enough for right now.

Having reached the five-month mark today and striding through 400 miles yesterday, I’ve reached a point in the growth of this campaign and protest against Barack Obama that I feel motivated to see how I can make this blog better. I am going to start including images and videos on daily posts, tweak the appearance of the blog, show some new t-shirt designs, and generally do whatever I can to give this blog as much potential as I can.

If you, the reader, have any ideas on what I can do to make this blog more concise, more navigable, or more effective, I welcome any ideas.

And with that being said, I also encourage anyone who feels the way so many of us do about the direction Barack Obama is leading our nation to get involved and to make a difference. In Lafayette, I have met a lot of people and organizations that are working to redefine the wasteful, over-bearing system of government America has had for so long, on federal, state and local levels.

1,674.9 miles to go.

Day153 Saturday 01/29/11

ran 3.1 miles
I hit my 400-mile mark today, and tomorrow will end the first five months of running against Obama. The running has been going smoothly and my distances are increasing. The blog has garnered a following that continues to increase and I’ve had the opportunity to meet some very passionate and involved political minds in Lafayette. The Tea party organizations are extremely friendly and motivating, and their meetings are filled with useful information and notable speakers.

Here is some commentary from www.teapartyoflafayette.com, following the State of the Union Address:

"Mr. Obama is a huge part of our problem, not part of any solution.

After he and his party immersed us all in massive debt and exploded the size of the Federal government, he now wants to arrest the size of that government at its present level.

In the face of this year's deficit of $1.5 trillion dollars and intractable unemployment-underemployment of 16%, he talks of fixing education, doing high-speed rail, and doubling our exports.

The Democrats have been "fixing" education for a long time. The teachers' unions have given that party hundreds of millions of dollars. That's part of the fix.

Doubling our exports will be achieved by continued devaluation of the dollar. That will make the products we still manufacture cheaper for the Chinese, but dollar devaluation will make all our Chinese imports more expensive.

As to the $100 trillion dollars of our unfunded Federal entitlements, Mr. Obama's Social Security solution is to encourage "both sides" to work something out; that's it, that's all he said. On Obamacare, he said he's not going back. Never mind that 26 states are litigating against this highjacking of individual choice, individual responsibility.

Mr. Obama ignores the obvious: the Nation cannot borrow itself out of debt.

Mr. Obama is another Hugo Chavez. As Rep. Ryan said in his response to Mr. Obama's speech, the Nation is at a tipping point. If not fixed now, we become a big Venezuela."

K. Thomas Noell, M.D.

1,677.6 miles to go.

Day152 Friday 01/28/11

ran 2.7 miles

• Maine was the twenty-third state to join the union on March 15, 1820, one year before Missouri and one year after Alabama.

• Population, as of 2009, is 1,318,301.

• Senators are Susan Collins (R) and Olympia Snowe (R).

• Representatives are Chellie Pingree (D) and Michael Michaud (D).

• Maine has four electoral votes. Historically, the state has voted red from the Civil War through the 1980s, only voting blue in 1912, 1964, and 1968. Maine has voted Democratic in the last four elections. Barack Obama won by 18% over John McCain in 2008. Maine and Nebraska are the only two states to not use the “All or nothing” approach to awarding electoral votes. Differing from the other forty-eight states, the winner of the popular vote gets two electoral votes, while one is assigned to the winner of each of Maine’s two congressional districts. This method was established in 1972, and is yet to result in a split electoral vote.

On to more pressing news, Egypt is currently in a complete state of chaos. The dictator they’ve had for the past thirty years has the entire nation at odds with him. Rubber bullets have been replaced with real bullets, curfews and authority are being ignored and overtaken, and earlier today the nation’s internet access was completely disabled by the government. At first glance, you don’t think to consider how much your daily life revolves around the Internet, and the idea that your government could simply pull a switch on its accessibility is even more preposterous.

The truth is, as coincidental as it may seem, that amidst all of the turmoil in our ally-nation of dictator-led Egypt, there is legislation being discussed in Congress right now, which would grant Barack Obama a “Kill Switch” for the internet in America. To even acknowledge this reality is absurd but it is true. Barack Obama wants the power to literally turn off the Internet if he deems it necessary.

Why? I can’t think of a logical reason but after seeing what is happening in Egypt one idea comes to mind. Our world is fomenting into a froth, spilling over the edges of the reality we’ve known for a long time, as a result of poorly led governments around the globe and it will probably get worse before it gets better. The next two years, not even considering the events that will happen in other countries, in America, alone, will be a time that will test your principles and strengths.

So, again, I ask why does Barack Obama want legislation that allows him to cut off 300 million Americans from access to the Internet? I can’t answer that question because it holds no American merit as far as freedom is concerned, but what is happening in Egypt right now is a good start to speculate towards a future that Barack Obama may foresee where he finds it necessary to silence certain Americans who don’t conform to his ideas.

1,680.7 miles to go.

Day151 Thursday 01/27/11

ran 3.4 miles
I attended a luncheon today with a group of dedicated and principled individuals who represent the ideal model of conservatism. We discussed the upcoming election for Parish Council candidates and what kind of men and women we would like to put in seats, based on ardent beliefs in lower taxes, lower spending, less government regulations, reducing the bonded indebtedness of the Parish, protecting the family, promoting limited government and supporting God-given rights. There was a man sitting next to me who I remember in particular because he completely understood my desire to simply do something, regardless of how little a difference it might make, and how important it was to simply be heard and to get involved…just to say “I’m trying to make a difference”. He had asked me a few questions including why I was at the meeting. I told him that I woke up one day and, out of sheer frustration with the direction America was heading, just wanted to scream. Instead, I started running and writing about it. I told him that if Barack Obama was reelected in 2012 that I simply wanted to earn the right to say that I did everything I could to prevent it from happening. That was when he looked at me, grinning, and said he knew exactly how I felt. I appreciated that. Turns out, this man who was sitting next to me had recently sat down and read the entire health care reform bill. His reaction was similar to mine. An urge to scream, an inability to understand why the bill was passed, and a driving force to do something about it, just to say he tried to make a difference, out of sheer frustration. He told me that he had once made a sign, which stated “Have you read H.R.3200?” and stood at a busy intersection of Lafayette during his lunch break one day, holding it up for thirty minutes. This is the sort of thing we need more of. Playing politician behind the closed doors of a comfortable home is much less effective than stepping outside and doing something about it, no matter how small the measure.

This blog began as a project with the sole intention of contributing to the effort of making Barack Obama a one-term president, regardless of how little its affects may influence the larger picture, but it has turned into much more over the past five months as I have gotten involved with others and gone to meetings for different political groups that include members from all over Lafayette and its surrounding cities. One thing I learned immediately was that getting Barack Obama out of the White House, which is extremely important, is only a short-term solution. Our president has awakened a giant among the American people and that giant, composed of millions across the American landscape, wants only one thing. We want our America back and in order to do that it starts at the grassroots level of local politics.

There are some amazing political minds and impressive things going on in Lafayette regarding our potential future state of political affairs. For a long-term solution one must start at the beginning; grassroots. As the Parish Council election draws closer I will keep the blog updated with information about the conservative candidates who adhere to the principles I stated above.

As an afterthought, if you are reading this then you are more than likely concerned with the direction our nation is heading under Barack Obama. If you have any interest in getting involved or getting informed, email me. There are a lot of facts on local, state and federal levels of government that you are probably unaware of and would find hard to believe.

1,683.4 miles to go.

Day150 Wednesday 01/26/11

ran 3.0 miles
Last night’s State of the Union Address reminded me of that Seinfeld episode where George relentlessly lied to his deceased fiancée’s parents about having a house in the Hampton’s even though he knew that they knew he was lying. But he persisted and persisted, going so far as to actually drive them out to the nonexistent house. Could Obama be a Costanza so bent on fulfilling a nonexistent agenda that he could drive America to a proverbial house in the Hamptons that does not exist?

If you haven’t seen that episode, I highly recommend it. Last night’s speech was filled with a bunch of fluff and talk about mid to long-term future goals in green energy and very little pertaining to the devastating crises we are currently experiencing or the inadequacies he has fallen short with, leading America further into debt.

George Bush did not create the economic problems we are currently storming, which Barack Obama excessively blames him for. To insinuate that one single man could possibly be to blame for our current state of affairs is absolutely ridiculous. This cup has been at its brim for a long, long time, enduring the volumes of many presidents and many congresses. What I find most interesting about Barack Obama is that we Americans, to a large degree, allowed so many politicians to waltz on our backs for so long with no public recourse. Obama, if any one man should be singled out, has single-handedly driven millions upon millions of Americans to speak out against their government in such overwhelming numbers for the first time in a very long time. In one breath he blames Bush for all of the problems under the American sun and in the next he spends billions of dollars on means that have shown no productive end. Yet there he stood last night before us all, asking that we work toward a future that has little to do with the next two years. He predictably took an escapist approach to the hole he has made for himself, filling it with puffery and utopian goals, which span the next two to three decades. What about right now, President Obama? What about the next two years?

1,686.8 miles to go.

Day149 Tuesday 01/25/11

ran 4.3 miles
One year ago, Barack Obama delivered a State of the Union Address and hopefully tonight’s will differ in the goals he verbalizes for our American future. As you view tonight’s speech and hear some of his featured quotes, keep these in mind from his speech in 2010.

"I have never been more hopeful about America's future than I am tonight. Despite our hardships, our union is strong. We do not give up. We do not quit. We do not allow fear or division to break our spirit."

This country is extremely divided due to legislation passed by Obama and the ideas of his fellow liberals.

"If there's one thing that has unified Democrats and Republicans -- and everybody in between -- it's that we all hated the bank bailout. I hated it. I hated it. I hated it. You hated it. It was about as popular as a root canal."

It was equally painful when other bailouts followed and stimulus packages amounted to nothing notable in terms of the unemployment rate.

"For every success story, there are other stories, of men and women who wake up with the anguish of not knowing where their next paycheck will come from, who send out resumes week after week and hear nothing in response. That is why jobs must be our number-one focus in 2010, and that's why I'm calling for a new jobs bill tonight."

How did that work out for you, America?

"I know that there are those who disagree with the overwhelming scientific evidence on climate change. But here's the thing. Even if you doubt the evidence, providing incentives for energy efficiency and clean energy are the right thing to do for our future, because the nation that leads the clean-energy economy will be the nation that leads the global economy, and America must be that nation."

While the Gulf States have been losing jobs and their economies have shrunk due to the drilling moratorium, our current Administration has made it clear that they have little interest in the wellbeing of these southern states or the epic boost in the economy and unemployment statistics, which drilling would bolster.

"This problem is not going away. By the time I'm finished speaking tonight, more Americans will have lost their health insurance. Millions will lose it this year. Our deficit will grow. Premiums will go up. Patients will be denied the care they need. Small-business owners will continue to drop coverage altogether. I will not walk away from these Americans, and neither should the people in this chamber."

The health care reform bill, which is now law, will continue to make our deficit grow, premiums will still go up, patients will be denied a competitive level of quality health care, and small businesses will have great difficulty affording the mandated health care. Only now that ObamaCare has actually passed these looming threats he noted in his 2010 speech will be tenfold. Socializing health care has been done before in many other countries and it simply does not work. It looks like a great utopian idea at first, just like any other communist idea, but it just doesn’t work.

"If the Republican leadership is going to insist that 60 votes in the Senate are required to do any business at all in this town, a supermajority, then the responsibility to govern is now yours, as well. Just saying no to everything may be good short-term politics, but it's not leadership."

Perhaps they are not just saying “No” to everything but that they coincidentally disagree with nearly every idea that comes out of Obama’s mouth. They are not bashful children crying over spilt milk, they are rational minds Americans elected who are fulfilling the wishes of their constituents.

"The spirit that has sustained this nation for more than two centuries lives on in you, its people. We have finished a difficult year. We have come through a difficult decade. But a new year has come. A new decade stretches before us. We don't quit. I don't quit. Let's seize this moment, to start anew, to carry the dream forward, and to strengthen our union once more."

The year 2010 and Barack Obama’s decisions and leadership has been deemed defunct beginning with the message American voters sent him as a result of the November Midterm Election and ending with a Lame Duck session, which crammed in more last minute legislation than facts a college student can cram into their mind the night before a test.

Stay tuned tonight for Paul Ryan’s Republican rebuttle after Obama’s speech!

1,689.8 miles to go.

Day148 Monday 01/24/11

ran 2.7 miles
Barack Obama’s State of the Union Address will air tomorrow night and it is hard to predict how he will approach it. Many of his liberal counterparts are frustrated with the possibility of him positioning himself in the center of the aisle, a complete contradiction to where he was positioned during last year’s speech. If he placates to the right, it may be what conservatives want to hear, but it will also make him look like a man with no backbone in his beliefs. After passing his health care law, after the stimulus packages, after his intention to give all illegal aliens health care, obviously accepting them as American citizens, which our tax money would pay for, after all the actions he’s made and the ideas he entertains, how can he stand in the middle of the aisle after being so radical and destructive on the left only one year ago, up until the moment Americans voted and expressed to him in a united scream that we are not interested in what he is selling. In fact, if he does not stand behind that podium and promote how important his health care law is, how important the money he wastes is, and how brilliant every action he has taken so far is, then I would venture to say that any productive ideas submitted by the right, which he chooses to employ would be an admission of how wrong his direction has been for two years. One example we must never forget of how pliable and adaptive his beliefs are is the decision he had made to extend the Bush tax cuts across the entire board. I think it is great that he did it, but not extending them was one of his biggest campaign promises leading up to his presidency. The Barack Obama we may see tomorrow night, if he does happen to tread in the middle of the aisle and acknowledge some conservative ideas, is not the Barack Obama that the majority of Americans had elected in 2008.

“I don’t think he should have this tone that if he rolls on his back the new Congress is going to rub his belly. A lot of these guys coming to town campaigned against everything this president wants to achieve. The president needs to take an aggressive approach to make clear he’s not going to roll over.”

Rep. Anthony Weiner

Following the State of the Union Address, Rep. Paul Ryan will be delivering the Republican response. GOP leaders tout him as a leading Conservative thinker on federal spending. He is currently the chairman of the House Budget Committee, but the House is expected to vote to grant him an unprecedented amount of power to force spending cuts for the rest of this fiscal year. This power will allow Ryan a unilateral ability to set an overall spending level for the rest of the year, usually handled by a full panel.

1,694.1 miles to go.

Day147 Sunday 01/23/11

ran 2.7 miles

• 24.2 miles run this week.

• Daily running average for the week was 3.46 miles per day.

• Total amount run in the past 147 days is 383.2 miles.

• Daily running average overall is 2.61 miles per day.

Today ends week twenty-one of running against Obama. I’m on the brink of 400 miles and I’m about to break 5 months.

Looking back on the conception of the health care nightmare we now face, here is a look back on the days before it was passed. This is an opening statement from Congressman Dave Camp (R-MI), ranking member of Ways and Means Committee, from March 20, 2010, pertaining to the consideration of H.R. 4872, the “Reconciliation Act of 2010” and Senate Amendments to H.R. 3590, the “Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act”.

“Madam Chairwoman, Ranking Member Dreier, and members of the Committee, thank you for the opportunity to testify today on this legislation.

The American people have spoken: they do not want the federal government involved in their personal health care and they do not want a bill that spends over a $1 trillion, raises more than one-half trillion dollars in new taxes, cuts Medicare by more than one-half trillion dollars and increases Americans’ health insurance premiums. Yet, that is exactly what will happen if the House passes the Senate Democrats’ health care bill and the Reconciliation bill tomorrow.

The American people have rejected this bill precisely because it taxes too much, spends too much and increases premiums too much. With a total of $569.2 billion in new taxes, these bills represent the single largest tax increase in American history. Just what are those taxes?”

If you have the stomach for it, here it is:

1,696.8 miles to go.

Day146 Saturday 01/22/11

ran 2.7 miles
“Now, Congress will have to pay for what it spends, just like everybody else.”

This quote came from President Barack Obama on February 13, 2010, before the Federal government once more spent over a trillion dollars more than it collected from Americans in taxes. That is an extra $8,000 of debt per household in America. Thank you.

“Trust in government rarely gets this low.”

From Associated Press, April19, 2010, Andrew Kohut, Director of the Pew Research Center, released his latest survey findings, indicating that nearly 8 out of 10 Americans have little trust in the Federal government and they share little faith that it can reconcile our problems. Trust in America’s government has only been this low in the past 60 years.

“Do you know how many political and economic decisions are made in this world by people who don’t know what in the living daylights they are talking about?”

This one came from former President Bill Clinton, Associated Press, September 21, 2010. It is simple to sum up the circus Washington is once stating the obvious can no longer hurt your chances for reelection.

1,699.5 miles to go.

Day145 Friday 01/21/11

ran 3.3 miles

• Louisiana, my home state, was the eighteenth state to join the union on April 30, 1812, four years before Indiana and nine years after Ohio.

• Population, as of 2009, is 4,492,076.

• Senators are Mary Landrieu (D) and David Vitter (R).

• Representatives are Steve Scalise (R), Cedric Richmond (D), Jeff Landry (R), John Fleming (R), Rodney Alexander (R), Bill Cassidy (R), and Charles Boustany (R).

• Louisiana has eight electoral votes. Historically, like many southern states that had seceded from the union during the Civil War, Louisiana voted Democratic from Reconstruction through World War II. Although Louisiana is viewed as solidly Republican today, the state has voted blue five times and twice for third-party candidates since 1948. Louisiana has been a red state since the 2000 presidential election. In 2008 McCain beat Obama by a margin of 59% to 40%.

Louisiana Representative Jeff Landry (R) deserves much recognition. A couple days ago he signed documentation to refuse the government subsidized elite medical benefits all Congressional members receive from the wallets of taxpayers. Expressing that he did not want to be a hypocrite and deserved nothing more than his constituents, he turned down his free elite health care and purchased his own. We need more men and women like this in Washington.

Cedric Richmond (D) was the only one of our seven Louisiana Representative to vote against the repeal of ObamaCare just a few days ago. Senator Mary Landrieu also ardently advocates ObamaCare.

1,702.2 miles to go.

Day144 Thursday 01/20/11

ran 3.3 miles

• Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Index rating shows that 29% of American voters strongly approve of Obama’s performance as president while 36% strongly disapprove, giving Barack Obama a Presidential Approval Index rating of –7, compared to –11 on this day last week, and –16 on this day two weeks ago. His popularity has spiked in approval over the last few weeks.

• Overall, 49% of voters say they at least somewhat approve of Obama’s performance and 50% disapprove.

• Just 27% of American voters say the country is generally heading in the right direction.

• Only 31% believe the bailouts were good for the nation.

Health Care is the hot topic of the week and it is worth mentioning that many Republican officials in Washington have actually gone the distance and refused to participate in the congressional benefit health insurance subsidized by the government, which they are entitled to, and sought out their own like the rest of us. In my opinion, any Congressman or woman who does accept the elite health care that we pay their premiums for is definitively a hypocrite if they voted for ObamaCare. Yet, House Democrats released a letter to Republican congressional leaders demanding to know which of their members would be foregoing their congressional benefit health insurance, given their party’s opposition to the reform overhaul legislation.

Really?

I would like to know why exactly democrats feel so entitled to taxpayer-funded, elite benefits when they voted for and so passionately believe in Obama’s health care reform. If you believe so ardently in its merit than you should be the first person in line to sign up for it and nothing more. Democrats have the audacity to request those in Washington who oppose Obamacare to give up their government benefits if they do truly believe it is wrong? No! If you believe it is so right than join our hundreds of millions in the struggles you will never know. If any party should be encouraged to join the ranks of the millions it should be democrats.

Given the manipulative nature of the Democratic House members request, Republican House members have actually taken them up and denied their government health care entitlements and sought out their own plans. This is a really big deal and something to admire as a quality in some of our leaders we have not seen in a very long time. Bobby Schilling (R-IL) and Mike Kelly (R-PA) are two of many who have turned down Barack Obama’s socializing of the American health care system and turned down their own congressional health care plan to show they are equal to their constituents and that they deserve the same treatment.

Here is a quote from the letter issued by democrats to republicans. It is one of the most ridiculous points a pen has ever contradicted the surface of paper with.

1,705.5 miles to go.

Day143 Wednesday 01/19/11

ran 4.2 miles
The House of Representatives approved the repeal of Barack Obama’s health-care reform law today. This gesture was a campaign promise for the mid-term election by Republican candidates but, unfortunately it is only that, a gesture of coming through on a promise. It is better than nothing but it arrives at the Democratic majority-led Senate essentially dead on arrival.

The repeal passed 245-189. Every single Republican member of the House voted for the repeal including three Democrats; Dan Boren of Oklahoma, Mike Ross of Arkansas and Mike McIntyre of North Carolina.

House Majority Leader Eric Cantor told reporters that “The American people deserve to see a vote in the Senate.” Although the vote will fail, and if it wouldn’t Barack Obama would certainly veto the repeal, Cantor makes a great point. We do deserve to see this convoluted bill put to a revote. I want to see what Republicans and Democrats are going to vote for the repeal and which ones will not. That way, we can make a revised list of exactly which of our politicians are in Washington to rebuild and which ones are there to continue devastating the foundations of our nation. The health-care reform law is encompassing enough of an issue that, in its present form, any Senator or Representative who approves of ObamaCare defines with that one single vote a lot more about themselves than they want their constituents to know. It is a very risky move in either direction, as far as reelection is concerned. I am pretty sure I don’t stand alone when I say that any Senator or Representative who votes to continue ObamaCare without drastic revisions will instantly lose any chance of earning my vote. This health-care reform law is that big of a deal.

Check out Day141 for some unbelievable facts about Obama’s health bill.

1,708.8 miles to go.

Day142 Tuesday 01/18/11

ran 3.9 miles
You may not know this, but the American dollar has been the world’s reserve currency since World War II. Whatever nation possesses the power to hold the claim to the world’s reserve currency is obviously the biggest economic batter at the plate. In fact, these are some of the entitlements that come with owning the accolade of being the world reserve currency holder:

• No one else on the face of the Earth can print money (monopoly money) at such a slow rate of consequence. But if you print enough monopoly money, eventually it devalues that nation’s economy and, ultimately, its strength as a country. And it is extremely insulting to the rest of the world and their many adversities when America is viewed as a nation who passes “Go” and collects two hundred dollars (hundreds of millions of times) more frequently than every other nation.

• As the current world reserve currency holder, every commodity and resource is obviously priced with the value of the American dollar as a basis. Advantageously, the nation who holds the right to world reserve currency does not have to adjust their prices for goods on the values of other national dollars. For example, gas for your vehicle in America is the cheapest you will find compared to any other country. Gas prices all over the world in any direction from the American center range from just above our low $3 mark all the way up to $14 for a gallon of gas. And these are not third-world countries; these are powerful countries with leaner, more ordered economies.

• Bread, milk, medicine---it’s all relative; when your nation possesses the power of being the world’s reserve currency holder, everything is naturally cheaper and more prosperous than everywhere else in the world. What American statistics would mark as a low-class family in America is easily a middle-class family in many other prosperous countries, and in even more countries low-class America would be considered upper-class elsewhere.

So, with all that has been said, what nation, with leaders who obviously want the best for their country and naturally feel America has perhaps had their run for too long and has maybe been too irresponsible, would not salivate over the possibility of becoming the next world reserve currency holder, with all of the benefits it entails that Americans have been enjoying for so long? Who wouldn’t?

This has happened in other nations before, namely England. They were the primary currency for over one hundred and fifty years until they did exactly what America is doing now. All of these bailouts and all of the spending to come is a last ditch effort to salvage something that is nearly too far-gone. Barack Obama, I would like to think, has good intentions of making things continue to seem as American as he can for as long as he can, but, if that is the case then he is in total denial of the larger picture of America and his efforts are only facades of an opposite reality.

As a closing note, there is no law in America that prohibits any kind of retailer from accepting foreign currency for purchases in America. Our retailers don’t accept foreign currency only because we have the most valuable dollar. But, should power shift, which is quite possible, we could possibly pay retailers Chinese dollars (Yuan), or some other currency one day soon, because we suffocated our own economy and made the American dollar second or even fourth-grade.

1,713.0 miles to go.

Day141 Monday 01/17/11

ran 4.1 miles
You may not know this, but someone of political stature has finally stepped forward and broken down ObamaCare, highlighting important facts by page number. Thank you, Judge Kithil of Marbles Fall, Texas, for putting your name and your merit out in front of every one of your fellow citizens and taking the time to point out to all how shady and unproductive this monumental mistake of a bill is.

This is straight off of Patriots For America:

• Page 50/section 152: The bill will provide insurance to all non-U.S. residents, even if they are here illegally.

• Page 58 and 59: The government will have real-time access to an individual's bank account and will have the authority to make electronic fund transfers from those accounts.

• Page 65/section 164: The plan will be subsidized (by the government) for all union members, union retirees and for community organizations (such as the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now - ACORN).

• Page 203/line 14-15: The tax imposed under this section will not be treated as a tax. (How could anybody in their right mind come up with that?)

• Page 241 and 253: Doctors will all be paid the same regardless of specialty, and the government will set all doctors' fees.

• Page 272/section 1145: Cancer hospital will ration care according to the patient's age.

• Page 317 and 321: The government will impose a prohibition on hospital expansion; however, communities may petition for an exception.

• Page 425, line 4-12: The government mandates advance-care planning consultations. Those on Social Security will be required to attend an "end-of-life planning" seminar every five years. (Death counseling...)

• Page 429, line 13-25: The government will specify which doctors can write an end-of-life order.

"Finally, it is specifically stated that this bill will not apply to members of Congress. Members of Congress are already exempt from the Social Security system, and have a well-funded private plan that covers their retirement needs. If they were on our Social Security plan, I believe they would find a very quick 'fix' to make the plan financially sound for their future."
Honorable David Kithil
Marble Falls, Texas

The outline above is a false representation of the health care bill and should not be taken seriously. I discovered this fact on 03/06/11 and want to point out that it should not have been used as a news source.

With facts like these it is a mind-numbing exercise to attempt to rationalize how so many of our political leaders could possibly suggest a concept of health care with such a crushing gravity on our economy and our principles as a nation. To apply logic to what this bill entails in any capacity seems to be impossible. Is it fair to say anyone who signed this thing needs to be voted out of Washington as soon as possible?

In the spirit of people trying to create real change, which does not abolish our American principles but strengthens them, and in the spirit of speaking out and making yourself heard for the greater benefit of this nation, remember Martin Luther King today and the extraordinary accomplishes and sacrifices he made for this country.

1,716.9 miles to go.

Day140 Sunday 01/16/11

ran 1.4 miles

• 21.9 miles run this week

• Daily running average for the week was 3.13 miles per day

• Total amount run in the past 140 days is 359.0 miles

• Daily running average overall is 2.56 miles per day

Today ends week twenty of running against Obama. I have never been so driven in my entire life, as I am right now to make a difference for the wellbeing of our country. I am merely days away from completing one-third of a year of protesting the actions and ideas of our president, and this blog has been leaving a rippling wake reaching out to thousands of readers. Readers in twenty-five states follow this blog and I aim to have twenty-five more states following it as soon as possible.

It is interesting how everyday conservative minds tend to take action and make a difference while everyday liberal minds tend to sit idly by and protest little. It is interesting how conservative talk radio inspires so many Americans while liberal talk radio accomplishes few listeners at all. It is interesting that our president makes decisions and passes bills that no majority of America wants decided or passed.

Yet, here we are.

1,721.0 miles to go.

Day139 Saturday 01/15/11

ran 2.7 miles
Rethinking Obama’s political performance in Tucson

Byron York delves into the options Barack Obama had for scripting his speech and the undertones his final draft implicated. A tormenting and emotional four days had passed, which was plenty of time for some of the most volatile voices in the media to pass judgment and blame Republicans for this tragedy and everything else under the sun, before he finally addressed the nation and offered his sentiments. During those four days Obama made no effort to take the heated and accusatory opinions off of the media burner. When the military tragedy at Fort Hood, Texas occurred in 2009, he had immediately taken the initiative to urge everyone to avoid assumption and blame. It was only upon determining that there was no feasible way to deny that Loughner was simply an extraordinarily disturbed registered democrat that Obama could make his speech and announce that politics were not to blame for the shooting.

Three reactions by lawmakers to the Arizona shootings

1. Encase the entire House and Senate floor with plexiglass to prevent visitors from throwing objects at members of Congress. Indiana Republican Representative Dan Burton can be thanked for re-introducing this bright idea. Perhaps he and his fellow leaders should not give Americans so many reasons to want to throw things at them.

2. Make punishable by law the illustrating of pictures of elected officials with crosshairs on their images and ban people from saying things that could be considered threatening to lawmakers. Democrat Representative Robert Brady of Pennsylvania wants Big Brother to monitor your Photoshop skills.

3. Stoke the fire under the FCC to bring back the Fairness Doctrine, which has nothing to do with fairness, to muzzle Rush Limbaugh and all the other conservative radio and television personalities for being so critical of liberal ideology and all of its inadequacies. Thank you, Democrat Representative James Clyburn of South Carolina, for nothing.

Record $14 trillion-plus debt

America has reached an unprecedented depth in debt. Our $14 trillion debt divided by the population of America averages out to each and every American owing $45,300 to pay it off. Take into consideration that nearly half of the citizens in this country don’t even pay taxes and, therefore, hardly contribute to society and that number doubles. Yet, we keep the doors on our borders unlocked, we discuss granting amnesty to millions upon millions of illegal aliens, we continue to pay so many of our citizens to stay home and watch television all day, giving them no encouragement to live their lives with dignity or any hunger for achievement or pride, and we scratch our heads wondering how our current deficit came to be. It is very simple. The America we currently live in is not real. It is like a family with a joint income of $30,000 who has two BMWs in the garage of their 2,700 square foot home with an RV in the driveway and a pool in the backyard. It is not real. We all see it but it is an illusion that is crippling us more and more day after day. As indescribably irresponsible as so many of our government leaders, so many of our banks, and so many of our CEOs have been, we need to come to terms with the fact that we are at fault, too. Look at the rest of the world around you. Can you honestly tell yourself that this would last forever? Our national debt is terrifying and the only thing scarier than our debt is the fact that we owe so much of it to China.

These next two years will be a time that tests what is really important to every American. It will question our resolve and our patience. It will question our ability to sacrifice and continue to stand proudly in the company of adversity.

If the possibilities of November 6, 2012 leave you with a feeling of indifference then you may be living in an unfortunate dream world, which persists only to utterly shock you once you do finally wake up.

1,722.4 miles to go.

Day138 Friday 01/14/11

ran 4.6 miles

• Kentucky was the fifteenth state to join the union on June 1, 1792, four years before Tennessee and one year after Vermont.

• Population, as of 2009, is 4,314,113.

• Senators are Senate Republican Leader Mitch McConnell and newly sworn in Tea party-backed Rand Paul.

• Representatives are Edward Whitfield (R), Brett Guthrie (R), John Yarmuth (D), Geoff Davis (R), Harold Rogers (R), and Ben Chandler (D).

• Kentucky has eight electoral votes. Historically, the state has voted almost exclusively blue since remaining with the union during the Civil War through World War II. Since the 1950s Kentucky has been a reliable red state barring Jimmy Carter in 1976 and Bill Clinton in 1992 and 1996. In 2008, McCain defeated Obama 57% to 41%.

Two weeks into 2011 and a sense of normalcy is finally beginning to resonate for the new year. The first week of 2011 was the most bizarre seven days in current events and news reporting we had seen in a long time. I say normalcy, but by that I only mean that news is once again a futile exercise in spinning facts.

There are so many things Americans need to know about their government at local, state and federal levels that they just don’t because it is simply not discussed in the media for some odd reason, yet if a travesty grabs the nation’s attention reporters will give critical updates and state unequivocal facts every two minutes, often repeating themselves with the same interesting and highly descriptive details over and over. Why can’t every day’s current events be reported in an interesting and highly descriptive manner, filled with indisputable facts?

Many of the actions Barack Obama has taken to form his legacy over the past two years are the most debatable actions that have been taken since Jimmy Carter was president and facts and statistics lay collecting dust in a reality we are obviously out of touch with. When did America change from a boot camp for success into a naptime you never awake from?

1,725.1 miles to go.

Day137 Thursday 01/13/11

ran 2.7 miles

• Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Index rating shows that 25% of American voters strongly approve of Barack Obama’s performance as president while 36% strongly disapprove, giving Obama a Presidential Approval Index rating of –11, compared to –16 on this day last week. This is the lowest level of strong disapproval recorded in the last fifteen months.

• Overall, 49% of voters say they at least somewhat approve of Obama’s performance and 50% disapprove.

• Only 26% of voters believe that the country is generally heading in the right direction.

• Just 29% of voters believe that repeal of the health care law will increase the federal budget deficit, and 75% believe implementing the new health care law will cost more than projected.

Tonight I attended the first Acadiana Patriots meeting of 2011 in Lafayette, Louisiana. It was very exciting and the members were extremely welcoming. I did not expect to gain so much knowledge in only an hour and a half concerning politics on the local, state, and federal level. It was an interactive experience with guest speakers and plenty of questions and explanations. An enlisted and long-term member of the United States military who has been serving in Iraq described his experience and his thoughts on a number of issues, a representative of the Pelican Institute described some incredible things they are doing with charter schools and offered some eye opening facts about school systems across the state that demand some attention and change, and the final guest speaker was a State Senator, Elbert Guillory of district 24, who highlighted some critical points about district rezoning in Louisiana, which will be determined in April of 2011. He had a fair and logical proposal, which would correct how lopsided the current spread of Senator distribution among the state of Louisiana is, and it has been submitted to Governor Jindal, awaiting people like you and me to encourage him to pursue it. Here is the website that details Senator Elbert Guillory’s district plan.

The meeting far surpassed my expectations, which were already pretty high, and I encourage anyone who wants to become more informed or to make a difference to attend one of the Acadiana Patriots monthly meetings.

1,729.7 miles to go.

Day136 Wednesday 01/12/11

ran 3.4 miles
In yesterday’s post I reflected on Ronal Reagan’s farewell address to America at the end of his presidency. He had highlighted a legacy of fighting Communism and warned those in 1989, as well as, future generations of how threatening Communism is to the strengths of a free nation.

Today, through mere coincidence, I came across an interesting and clear analogy for the relationship between Communism and Free Enterprise in a book I was reading, which falls along the same lines of what Ronald Reagan was expressing in his farewell address. It was the last thing I would have expected to find in Stephen Jay Gould’s “The Panda’s Thumb”, a comparative analysis on the theory of evolution, which is very well-written in words anyone can understand---but, here it is, all of a sudden Gould began pointing out how important it was for men and women of varying industries and sciences to have the ability to “Construct fruitful analogies between varying fields”.

Gould posited that Darwin’s theory of natural selection (survival of the fittest) could easily be compared to Adam Smith’s laissez faire economics, which theorizes that, “If you want an ordered economy providing maximal benefits to all, then let individuals compete and struggle for their own advantages. The result, after appropriate sorting and elimination of the inefficient, will be a stable and harmonious polity.” Just like the theory of natural selection, order surfaces naturally from the struggle among individuals, not from predetermined principles or unrealistic economic planning.

Scottish philosopher Dugald Stewart encapsulated this idea when he said, “The most effective plan for advancing a people…is by allowing every man, as long as he observes the rules of justice, to pursue his own interest in his own way, and to bring both his industry and his capital into the freest competition with those of his fellow citizens. Every system of policy which endeavors…to draw towards a particular species of industry a greater share of the capital of the society than would naturally go to it…is, in reality, subversive of the great purpose which it means to promote.”

Regardless of where you stand on the theory of evolution, I find it hard to believe anyone can deny the God-given process of natural selection or the concept of the survival of the fittest. In the Animal Kingdom the price of not surviving is far more severe, but in America the price of failure is only to stand back up on your feet and to try again, making individuals stronger. This comparison between two completely different fields of study is very impressive. I’d venture to say that through Free Enterprise America’s fundamental policies and beliefs were designed to mimic the nature of the world we live in and that anything with the slightest undertone of Communism is definitively unnatural (Obamacare).

1,732.4 miles to go.

Day135 Tuesday 01/11/11

ran 3.8 miles
On this day in 1989, Ronald Reagan delivered his farewell address to America. After eight years as president of the United States, he spoke with proud enthusiasm about the foreign policy achievements of his administration.

Reagan declared that America rediscovered its commitment to world freedom during his presidency. He proclaimed the United States was “Respected again in the world and looked to for leadership.” Through a return to “Common sense”, which “Told us that to preserve the peace, we’d have to become strong again after years of weakness.”

Reagan forced Soviets to begin withdrawal from Afghanistan, pulled the Vietnamese out of Cambodia, and ordered Cuban forces out of Angola. All of these endeavors were acts against Communism, an ideology that Reagan firmly believed was the single most threat to freedom.

“Nothing,” Reagan stated, “Is less free than pure Communism.”

Ronald Reagan emerged as an American hero having defeated incumbent Jimmy Carter in the 1980 presidential election. Jimmy Carter is the most similar liberal president with radical and devastating agendas comparable to Barack Obama’s ideas to surface in Washington over the past thirty-five years. Ideally, perhaps history will repeat itself, the way it tends to do, and bestow upon Americans a new hero that Obama’s administration will force to rise up as a product of unrealistic legislating and sheer voter discontentment.

It is quite possible that Barack Obama’s genuine beliefs and motives in the political arena, the ideologies he bases all of his decisions on, which effect so many, might just lead to the biggest awakening and positive change America has experienced in a long, long time. Reagan emerged as a hero after Carter and Someone Else now has an opportunity in their grasps in 2012 to remind us all of what America is, once more.

1,735.8 miles to go.

Day134 Monday 01/10/11

ran 3.3 miles
Today begins the twentieth week of running against Obama. I’d like to reiterate on why exactly I am running all of these miles and typing all of these words. And as I work my way to the end of my fourth month I’d also like to tell a little bit about myself.

I am 32-years-old. I have been married to an amazing woman, who I cannot imagine life without, for four years. My favorite sport is soccer and my favorite color is green. I am an avid reader and I love writing. And I do not enjoy running nearly as much as you might expect, especially when it is freezing and raining outside. Aside from these few details, there is not much more worth mentioning.

One other thing I would like to point out is that I have never voted for anything or anybody one single time until Barack Obama ran for president. I had never been registered to vote and had hoped I never would be for the rest of my life because I had always found politics to be an unscrupulous affair of nonsense that had no place in what I believed was once a noble arena, which now seems more and more to no longer exist the way it was intended to be. Then I realized one day how naïve of a judgment that was to make and I registered to vote. I also came to realize that thousands upon thousands of Americans have died fighting for our freedom and all of the rights we currently have, one of which is obviously voting.

This brings me to why I am pursuing this two year-plus peaceful protest of our current president, Barack Obama. The last thing I want to be deemed as by readers is an obnoxious rebel with no cause who is incapable of substantiating his arguments with warranted reason.

Health care reform. This is an extremely important matter on so many different levels. For me, aside from the outrageous cost and how it will damage our economy as a whole, it is the Communism that fills the thousand-plus page bill that really disappoints me. We have been fighting Communism for as long as we can remember. Europe has even employed its methods and they are now rioting and protesting the results of it. Communism is great, even utopian, at face value but it is just simply too good to be true and what is happening in Europe right now is the ugly tail end of what Communism does to a country. As Communistic ideas pertain to America, if this health care reform bill bares its poisonous fruits across the American landscape, this act will stand as a source of precedent to nationalize other private sector industries and businesses. This is what Communism does; when one thing fails, governments go on to some other facet of industry and drain it dry until eventually there is nothing left. And it happens so fast that by the time everyone starts saying it was a bad idea to begin with, it is far too late to correct.

Steady unemployment numbers and stimulus packages. Obama has pumped incomprehensible amounts of monopoly money into our economy and little change has been made in proportion to the endless zeroes to the right of the dollar sign. We cannot continue to pump nonexistent money into our economy when so much money is wasted elsewhere and could be used so much more resourcefully. The November 2 election figuratively picked Barack Obama up into the air, sat him down on a chair in a timeout corner, and told him the way things needed to be. And he listened to the voice of the people. Otherwise, he would not have continued the Bush tax cuts across the board. The people were heard and he had to obey. That’s a beautiful thing that few other countries have the ability to embrace. The media spun this story as more debt piled onto our deficit but, the fact is, allowing Americans to keep their own money and to spend it as they see fit is the surest way to keep an economy afloat. It is not monopoly money, and if it had gone to the government it more than likely would have been spent in ways that would have reached unknown depths of waste, achieving little if nothing. Extending the tax cuts was not more weight on our debt, it was a good decision Barack Obama had to be demanded to do by millions of Americans.

Immigration. I think the best way to analyze this issue is to take a reverse approach. Rather than argue why we should not grant amnesty to millions of illegal immigrants and not leave our borders open as a book with no plot or any idea of a good ending, let’s look at it from a different approach. Here we go. Let everybody in. Let’s legalize everyone. Whatever ineffective approach we’ve been taking pertaining to immigration, let’s make it even more ineffective. This is a very touchy issue and I don’t want to come across one way or another, but do the math, literally. These are the options. Grant amnesty, continue to do nothing, or create some legislation that simply ensures citizens speak English, arrive in this nation with documented intentions, and know who George Washington was.

These are my three hot topics that inspired me to run, write, and to register to vote. As I said before, I’m just a regular guy and I’ll be the first to tell you there is much about this world, this country, and the politics that define this country, which I do not know or understand. But, it is a valuable testament any time another one of us, among millions of others who feel the same, wakes up and says, “This is enough.”

1,739.6 miles to go.

Day133 Sunday 01/09/11

ran 2.6 miles
Congresswoman Gabrielle Giffords survived the night and remains in critical condition this morning. She was reported to be responsive to commands at 10 a.m. today and Dr. Michael Lemole, chief of neurosurgery, says he is “Cautiously optimistic” regarding her recovery.

All together, thirteen people were wounded and six were killed. Among the wounded Giffords is the only victim who still remains in critical condition. Those killed included a nine-year-old girl, an aide for the Democratic lawmaker, Arizona’s chief federal judge, and three others.

Today ends an eerie and tragic week nineteen of running against Obama. I ran 23.9 miles this week. Total miles run in the past 133 days are 337.1. My daily average is 2.54 miles per day.

1,742.9 miles to go.

Day132 Saturday 01/08/11

ran 2.6 miles
United States Representative Gabrielle Giffords of Arizona was shot in the head outside a grocery store in Tuscon today while holding a public event. The scene was filled with hundreds of bystanders attending an event called “Congress on Your Corner.” A man ran into the crowd of people and fired his gun, reportedly fifteen or more times. The man was tackled and subdued by people at the scene and was apprehended and is said to be in custody.

As I type these words, it is unconfirmed, but the news is saying there were fifteen or more shots and multiple fatalities. So tragic! This isn’t supposed to happen in America!

I set out this morning to look at some articles and post about some current events and this story is what I stumbled across. There is not much to say after coming across such a tragic event. Facts and numbers are still unconfirmed and the last thing I can say about this tragedy is that thoughts and prayers are with the Giffords family and others who’s loved ones may have been injured or killed.

1,745.5 miles to go.

Day131 Friday 01/07/11

ran 3.3 miles

• Kansas was the thirty-fourth state to join the union on January 29, 1861, two years before West Virginia and two years after Oregon.

• Population, as of 2010, is 2,818,747.

• Senators are Jerry Moran (R) and Pat Roberts (R).

• Representatives are Tim Huelskamp (R), Lynn Jenkins (R), Kevin Yoder (R), and Mike Pompeo (R).

• Kansas has six electoral votes. Historically, the state has voted Republican for the majority of its statehood. It has not voted for a Democrat since 1964, when Kansas voted for Lyndon Johnson. In 2008, John McCain won 57% of Kansas’ popular vote.

Moving away from Kansas’ interesting facts, Michael Moore uttered yet another absurd opinion today that was probably meant to escape through his anus but somehow crept up to his vocal cords.

“White America does not like having a black president.”

Moore said this during an interview with Bill Maher. Maher adamantly agreed by saying, “That is the truth…the statistics don’t lie…I'm not talking about polls. I'm talking about that the young people in '08 was the only – do you know this? – it's the only demographic – white demographic – that Obama won, 18- to 29-year-olds. Every other demographic, over 29, Obama lost the white vote. Every single one.”

Larry Elder, an incredible journalist who should be a household name, wrote a notable article pointing out how offensive, ignorant and utterly diarrheic Michael Moore’s mouth was. For one thing, Elders points out that no Democratic presidential candidate has won the “White vote” since 1964. He goes on to deliver his point by noting that Obama received more of the “White vote” than John Kerry did in 2004. Barack Obama surpassed Kerry’s “White vote” in every age demographic.

This is the article and it is overflowing with wisdom and indisputable facts.

I find it very hard to understand or to figuratively live a day in the life of people who passionately support Barack Obama’s ideas, those who are fans of Michael Moore, or those who have a desire to watch “Real Time with Bill Maher”. What is the end game?

It seems like some of the really important issues in America, such as the ugly face of racism, are only augmented when radical liberals open their mouths.

1,748.1 miles to go.

Day130 Thursday 01/06/11

ran 2.9 miles

• Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Approval rating shows that 24% of American voters strongly approve of Barack Obama’s performance as president while 40% strongly disapprove, giving Barack Obama a Presidential Approval Index rating of –16, compared to –13 on this day last week.

• Overall, 46% of voters say they at least somewhat approve of Obama’s performance and 53% disapprove.

• Only 27% of voters believe that the country is generally heading in the right direction.

So what is going on with all of the odd events in the past week? Birds falling from the sky, fish floating belly-up, crabs washing ashore lifeless, and a neon green river? If you have any theories, by all means please comment. It is very eerie.

On a lighter note, I was extremely excited to see that Bill O’Reilly will be interviewing Barack Obama on February 6, preceding the Super Bowl. That ought to be very interesting and well worth viewing. You can bet your right to vote that that interview would not have been scheduled were it not for the voter turnout and results of the November 2 election. Obama is squirming and to accept an interview with his biggest critic is an extremely desperate measure for his dwindling and extremely desperate time.

1,751.4 miles to go.

Day129 Wednesday 01/05/11

ran 3.7 miles
The 112th Congress was sworn in today. This ceremony was a historic victory for not only millions of conservative minds but, also, a staggering number of Independents and Liberals who Barack Obama let down with his change and direction over the last two years. Leading up to the Mid-term Election the Tea Party established a name for itself as a prevailing threat to Obama and his administration. Newly sworn in Congressman like Tea Party-backed Marco Rubio and Rand Paul, among many others, have some serious expectations to meet from a vehement and eager nation of citizens who elected them.

The Lame Duck Zombie Congress is finally over and the House of Representatives has acquired a healthy majority of Republicans while the Democratic numbers shrunk in the Senate. What the American people achieved on November 2 is a sign of how unbelievably amazing this country truly is. We, the people, vocalized our passion for America and the way we want freedom and our lives to be defined and our president and our government were forced to adapt and change course. There is no other country on Earth whose people possess more power and whose government is forced to such an extent to obey the will of its people. You can thank our founding fathers and the hundreds of thousands of soldiers who have fought and died for this country for nearly 250 years since the beginning of our Revolutionary War for that.

Here are some quotes from today’s Conservative victory:

“The American people have humbled us…they have reminded us that everything here is on loan from them…they seek a government that is honest, accountable and responsible to their needs.”

John Boehner

“The big changes today are of course happening across the dome…and I’d like to welcome the many new Republican members of Congress who’ve come to Washington to change the way things are done around here.”

Mitch McConnell

“The message from November’s election is that the American people have had enough and they want Congress to focus on creating jobs and cutting spending, and I look forward to working with Speaker Boehner and my colleagues in the House to address these and other important issues facing our country ... Representing Western New Yorkers in Congress is a job I do not take lightly, and I look forward to continuing to serve the needs of Western New Yorkers in the 112th Congress.”

Chris Lee

The road to November 6, 2012 has officially begun.

1,754.3 miles to go.

Day128 Tuesday 01/04/11

ran 2.6 miles
Today was a bizarre day of news. Birds are falling out of the sky and fish or floating to the surface of bodies of water, en masse, in Arkansas and Louisiana, mysteriously dead, Harold Camping of Family Radio, broadcasting out of Oakland, is declaring the end of the world to be May 21, 2011, the Mayan Calendar ends on December 21, 2012, and Barack Obama is once again letting go of key members of his administration. Those he lets go of will more than likely simply go under the radar of Washington to head his reelection campaign and the new faces he brings in will no doubt appease the masses who have disagreed with the majority of the decisions he has made up to this point.

Of all these odd goings-on, which have occurred very recently, I hesitate to admit that the birds and the fish suddenly dying in immense flocks and schools intrigue me the most.

Someone somewhere, no doubt, is going to proclaim any given day the last one and Barack Obama’s posturing and strategy is extremely unexciting and completely predictable. Politics are politics and they always will be. But birds falling out of the sky and fish floating on the surface of bodies of water---that is a very odd occurrence I can hardly wait to have explained!

Don’t drink the Kool-Aid and do not, for one second, think that Barack Obama regrets one single decision he has made regardless of how he politically postures himself otherwise over the next two years. Don’t mean to tell you how to think…just saying. America is two roads diverging and 2012 is where the fork in the road lies.

And definitely don’t drink the Kool-Aid.

1,758.0 miles to go.

Day127 Monday 01/03/11

ran 6.2 miles
A Congressman from California, Darrell Issa, soon to commandeer the Oversight and Government Reform Committee in the House of Representatives, intends to investigate, with the new Congress that convenes this week, numerous cases of fraud and government waste among the Obama administration. Among other hot topics, Darrell Issa and fellow Republicans vow to repeal health care reform, at least to some degree, considering their House majority is up against a dwindling Democratic Senate majority and a president who will likely veto any such idea, even if the legislation did somehow mange to wrangle the consent of the Senate.

This is old news, March of 2010, but Virginia Congressman, Tom Perriello, was quoted as saying, “If you don’t tie our hands we will keep stealing.” Addressing a faction of Tea Party supporters, this was his full comment, “If there’s one thing I’ve learned up here (in Washington) and I didn’t really need to come up here to learn it, is the only way to get Congress to balance the budget is to give them no choice, and the only way to keep them out of the cookie jar is to give them no choice, which is why – whether it’s balanced budget acts or pay as you go legislation or any of that – is the only thing. If you don’t tie our hands, we will keep stealing” Aside from a lethal dose of political suicide, Perriello has demonstrated an honesty, or a level of stupidity, that is not fit for the current state of our disappointment in Washington. (He was not reelected on November 2, 2010, but his quote, whether it was a weak moment that he allowed the truth to be told or if he was actually trying to pander to Tea Party backers that he should be their Representative, it goes to show how much of a circus Washington has become and how thick the wall is, which exists between our lawmakers and the people.

On an entirely different note, moving away from Washington, something that received a lot of publicity today was a prediction that the world is going to end on May 21, 2011. So, preceding the Mayan calendar prediction of the world ending on December 21, 2012, now we have another Doomsday theory. There is actually a billboard on Interstate 10 in Vidor, Texas, among many other locations, warning of the impending doom. I don’t mean to step on any fanatical toes but, according to Harold Camping, 88-year-old founder of Oakland-based Family Radio, which reaches millions of viewers all over the world, May 21, 2011 will begin the end of the world. He asserts that 7,000 years from the date of the great Biblical flood and May 21, 2010 both fall on the seventeenth day of the second month of the Biblical calendar, of course 7,000 years apart. It should be noted that Harold Camping has previously predicted the end of the world to occur in September of 1994, as well. He and a congregation awaited rapture with bibles pointed up and opened toward heaven. But nothing happened. Concerning the Mayan calendar, in a nutshell, on December 21, 2012, the Milky Way, the sun, and Earth are going to align in an extremely rare position, which many speculate would possibly alter the magnetic and gravitational nature that has kept this planet spinning on an axis tilted at 23.5 degrees for a very, very long time. If this tilt were suddenly changed, it could set off a catastrophic succession of natural disasters the likes of which have never been documented in the history of human civilization.

That being said, people have been predicting the end of this world for thousands of years and yet we are still here. I am not judging, mocking or supporting any one particular religious or nonreligious faction of belief or disbelief, in case any reader may get that impression. My doubtful assessment of these predictions are as much my right to express as it is incumbent upon others to believe in them. All we can do is wait and see.

May 21, 2011 will certainly be an interesting day, as will December 21, 2012, when one and/or the other finally arrive.

Sorry to jump aboard such a tangent in midcourse, which has nothing to do with running against Barack Obama, but I felt this story was very interesting and I am curious to see how other people feel about the audacity some mortal, fallible men possess to proclaim that they have figured out God’s big plan and that we should be so lucky to have them as prophets so we can prepare for rapture.

Anyhow, just a few bits of random news filling the air waves and inking the papers recently.

1,760.6 miles to go.

Day126 Sunday 01/02/11

ran 2.6 miles
I hate to admit it but each year, as the holidays pass and a new year begins, a huge sigh of relief sweeps over every fiber of my being. I certainly enjoy the holidays, but on a level I cannot even fully understand I seem to hold a real appreciation for new beginnings as opposed to the outcomes of any given endings. A new year is free and full of potential, whereas the end of a year is spent, known, and no longer holds any allure or mystery. So, as soon as Thanksgiving begins and rolls into December’s Christmas theme, culminating with New Year’s Eve, I have little patience left to not just simply move on and start anew. Especially when so much is at stake in the governing of this great nation leading up to the presidential election of 2012.

2010 was a year in which Barack Obama implemented his agenda and enacted his ideas, leading to a mid-term election with an outcome that rejected his previous decisions and his ideas in general. Barack Obama went on to sign more critical legislation during the Lame Duck session of Zombie Congress than he had in the remainder of the two years he was in office. Cramming in as many of his legislative priorities as he could before the new Congress is sworn in, which will happen this week, his agenda has already began to yield to the voice of the people and their November votes. But it’s too little and too late. Had American voters not shown up in defying numbers on November 2, 2010, this country’s immediate future would have been pointed in a much more radically different direction during the Lame Duck session we just endured. That being said, the new Senators and Representatives who eagerly await swearing in have a tremendously lofty bar of expectation to reach and it will be a challenge to make a notable difference between now and 2012.

Today ends week eighteen of running against Barack Obama and I wish everyone a prosperous and healthy 2011. Thank you for reading this blog and hopefully we can all make a difference leading up to the outcome of the presidential election on November 6, 2012. I ran 20.4 miles this week. Total miles run in the past 126 days are 313.2. My daily average is 2.49 miles per day.

1,766.8 miles to go.

Day125 Saturday 01/01/11

ran 2.6 miles
Welcome to 2011. It’s a clean slate full of potential. Those who find mediocrity as an ultimate goal and seek sustenance from the teat of the government, file to the left. For those of you who believe in opportunity with no ceiling for the price of working hard, form a line on the right.

If being proud to be a pebble of the American landscape is elitism then label me a pebble-sized elitist. I think America is the greatest country this planet has ever lifted above the surface of its oceans. And the citizens, not the government, that color its varying elevations red, white and blue have always been the spine of everything that makes this nation great.

Politics have always been politics and, by that, I mean to say just because yellow and blue make green does not mean that blue and green make yellow. There is a huge void in translation that exists between Americans and their lawmakers. There is no instant solution to breaking down the walls of understanding, which separate our nation’s leaders from our nation’s people, but the first step to the solution of keeping America the country we grew up in and love starts with electing Someone Else in 2012.

1,769.4 miles to go.