The latest poll results from the Washington Post prove that the ruling elite do not represent the views of the average American.  An overwhelming two thirds of voters decisively reject the notion that Ground Zero, the site of America’s greastest mass murder, is the appropriate site to build a Muslim monument.   In addition, half of all Americans have an unfavorable opinion of Islam.   Why do so many of the ruling elite miss the common sense element and vehemently support the Mosque?

Washington Post - Two-thirds of those polled object to the prospective Cordoba House complex near the site of the former twin towers, including a slim majority who express strongly negative views.

-49 percent of all Americans say they have generally unfavorable opinions of Islam

-Nearly a third of all Americans see mainstream Islam as encouraging violence

Americans recognize that it is simply not right to build a Muslim mosque next to a site that is still an open wound for many Americans.    If the builders of the proposed mosque possessed simple human decency or respect for 3,000 murder victims, the mosque project would have never been proposed.  The mosque project is an act of outrageous provocation and Americans should push back.

America’s outrage should be equally directed at both the mosque builders and the politicians who support the mosque under the banner of “religious freedom”.  A huge majority of Americans already believe that the government does not have the consent of the governed and this is a prime example for feeling that way. 

It’s a big country - pick another place!

More On This Topic:  Sacrilege at Ground Zero - Washington Post

Location matters. Especially this location. Ground Zero is the site of the greatest mass murder in American history — perpetrated by Muslims of a particular Islamist orthodoxy in whose cause they died and in whose name they killed.

America is a free country where you can build whatever you want — but not anywhere. That’s why we have zoning laws. No liquor store near a school, no strip malls where they offend local sensibilities, and, if your house doesn’t meet community architectural codes, you cannot build at all.

These restrictions are for reasons of aesthetics. Others are for more profound reasons of common decency and respect for the sacred. No commercial tower over Gettysburg, no convent at Auschwitz — and no mosque at Ground Zero.

Build it anywhere but there.

Rasmussen Reports, one of the most respected and accurate polling organizations in the country, now provides proof of what many of us have long known - the vast majority of Americans do not believe that the federal government has the consent of the governed.

The notion that governments derive their only just authority from the consent of the governed is a foundational principle of the American experiment.

However, a new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that just 23% of voters nationwide believe the federal government today has the consent of the governed. Sixty-two percent (62%) say it does not, and 15% are not sure.

In his new book, In Search of Self-Governance, Scott Rasmussen observes that the American people are “united in the belief that our political system is broken, that politicians are corrupt and that neither major political party has the answers.” He adds that “the gap between Americans who want to govern themselves and the politicians who want to rule over them may be as big today as the gap between the colonies and England during the 18th century.”

The book earned positive reviews from Larry Sabato, Pat Caddell, Bill Kristol, Joe Trippi and others. In Search of Self-Governance is available from Rasmussen Reports and at Amazon.com.

The growing disconnect between mainstream America and the ruling political elite has been discussed on this site numerous times and now we have the polling numbers to prove it.  Despite the polls, Washington carries on with business as usual, apparently oblivious to the concerns, beliefs and values of their constituents.  Additional polls reinforce the basic disconnect between mainstream voters and the ruling elite.

Data released yesterday finds that 68% of voters believe the Political Class doesn’t care what most Americans think.

Over the past couple of years, most Americans have opposed many initiatives of the Political Class including the bailouts of the financial and auto industries. Additionally, most voters still favor repeal of the national health care plan and overwhelmingly disagree with the Justice Department’s decision to challenge Arizona’s new immigration law in court.

Fifty-five percent (55%) don’t even think most members of Congress pay all the taxes they owe.

Voters are evenly divided over the notion that a group of people randomly selected from the phone book could do a better job than the current Congress.

One reason for skepticism about the Political Class is that 70% believe Big Government and Big Business are on the same team working together against the rest of us.

In a recent Wall Street Journal article, Scott Rasmussen, founder of Rasmussen Reports further expounded on the serious rift between the governed and the ruling elite.

“Americans don’t want to be governed from the left or the right,” Scott Rasmussen tells the American Legislative Exchange Council, a conference of 1,500 conservative and moderate legislators. “They want, like the Founding Fathers, to largely govern themselves with Washington in a supporting—but not dominant—role. The tea party movement is today’s updated expression of that sentiment.”

A majority of Democrats, Republicans and independents all agree with the mainstream view on Mr. Rasmussen’s three questions. “The major division in this country is no longer between parties but between political elites and the people,” Mr. Rasmussen says. His recent polls show huge gaps between the two groups. While 67% of the political class believes the U.S. is moving in the right direction, a full 84% of mainstream voters believe the nation is moving in the wrong one.

The fact that 67% of the ruling political elite believe we are moving in the right direction despite the totally opposite belief by those they rule over should be a cause of great concern regarding the future political stability of the country.  The ruling elite will continue to enforce their “enlightened view” upon an unwilling populace until they are voted out of office.  Since Democrats and Republicans both seem to be largely woven out of the same cloth, the question of whether any fundamental change will occur remains open.

Baseball great, 48 year old Roger Clemens, faces the equivalent of a death sentence with the threat of a 30 year prison term after being indicted for making false statements, obstruction and felony perjury.   The indictment follows an inquiry into Mr. Clemen’s alleged use of steroids, during which Mr. Clemens flatly denied ever using steroids or human growth hormone.

Federal prosecutors, miffed by Mr. Clemens audacity to make allegedly “false statements under oath”, announced the indictment today and seem prepared to vigorously prosecute Mr. Clemens.  US Attorney Ronald Machen, said in a statement that “The Department of Justice takes referrals from congressional committees very seriously”.

Mr. Clemens continues to maintain his innocence, stating on Twitter that, “I never took HGH or steroids.  And I did not lie to Congress. I look forward to challenging the government’s accusations, and hope people will keep an open mind until trial. I appreciate all the support I have been getting. I am happy to finally have my day in court.”

The ironic part of this human tragedy is that Roger Clemens was man enough to state his innocence, forgoing his Fifth Amendment rights and agreeing to testify before Congress.  According to sports writer Jeff Passan,

Clemens wasn’t in trouble when baseball released George Mitchell’s report on steroid use. Sure, it disintegrated the purity of everything he spent 24 seasons building, but Clemens was no felon. Just a guy who chose the wrong drug dealer. Only when he went on the warpath to prove his innocence did Clemens tiptoe near a law that people in power are interested in prosecuting.

The indictment, 19 pages long and rich with information, highlights 15 utterances the government deemed false leading to an obstruction of justice charge. Testimony regarding steroids, HGH and vitamin B12 comprise three false statement charges and two more perjury charges, each of which could carry five years prison time.

On page 10 is the statement most horrifying to Clemens, the rubbing alcohol in his gaping wound: “The Committee did not issue CLEMENS a subpoena, and CLEMENS was under no obligation to testify. CLEMENS retained his right under the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution to refuse to answer any questions that might tend to incriminate him.”

He could’ve taken the Mark McGwire tack, treating the Fifth like his best friend. He could’ve done what so many other accused steroid users did: not say a thing and let the allegations fade into the ether, a black mark, sure, but not one that torpedoes a life. He could’ve done what his friend Andy Pettitte did: admit use, apologize for it and move on.

There remains the possibility, of course, that Clemens never did use steroids,…

Still, it’s harrowing to see another all-time great baseball player, steroids or not, paraded in front of the country as an example that thou best not trifle with the feds.

Does the country really want to see Roger Clemens put in jail, made an example of, by over zealous prosecutors seeking to exhibit the Federal Government’s stern authority over its citizens?  Readers of this column are already aware of the fact that the United States incarcerates more of its citizens than any country on earth -see How The US Justice System Turns Jaywalkers Into Violent Criminals.

The United States currently has in prison 762 people per 100,000.   The incarceration rate in France is 96 people per 100,000.   Is the United States a land full of criminals or do we have a justice system run amok??  People lie everyday, including those who lead our country.   Doesn’t the Justice Department have better things to do?

It should come as no surprise that the President strongly endorsed building a mosque on Ground Zero in Manhattan.  Nor should it come as a surprise that he later tried to backpedal and obfuscate his original defense of the mosque when various groups expressed outrage at his position.  Perhaps the President is merely trying to tell every side what they want to hear - perhaps worse, he simply lacks any real convictions on the matter due to the absence of a core set of values or beliefs.

James Taranto of Wall Street Journal gives a great critical summation of the back and forth retractions issued by the White House after Mr. Obama’s original endorsement of the mosque, and concludes that Mr. Obama “is a stubborn man without conviction”.  Mr. Taranto’s analysis is definitely worth the read - excerpts from his article follow:

So why did nearly everybody construe the Friday remarks as a strong endorsement of the Ground Zero mosque? Blame the professional left, which, in its characteristic neo-McCarthyite style, has sought to portray all criticism of the mosque project as, to quote Sargent, “un-American” and the critics as an undifferentiated lunatic fringe that rejects the First Amendment, at least as it applies to Islam.

Obama is a man of the left, so when he deployed the left’s rhetoric about the First Amendment, allies and adversaries alike assumed that he also intended to level this accusation at the mosque’s critics. They might well have been right about this, but if so, the president quickly made clear he does not have the courage of his convictions.

In doing so, and despite himself, he managed to make an important point. It is not a “clever little dodge” but a principled position to say that while the mosque’s developers have a right to build it near Ground Zero, doing so is not the right thing to do. Freedom of religion does not mean freedom from criticism.

Obama, however, made this point in a way that showed him to be small and weak, offering it not as a defense of the mosque’s critics but of himself against them. Imagine if on Friday he had not only pandered to his guests by defending their constitutional rights but also challenged them by saying forthrightly what he acknowledged evasively on Saturday: that building a mosque near Ground Zero may be unwise even though the law clearly allows it. That would have been presidential.

Instead we got what sounded like a strong endorsement, followed by a backpedaling denial that it was any such thing, followed in turn by a denial that the earlier denial was backpedaling. The president stands behind everything he said but denies that he said much of anything.

Barack Obama is a stubborn man without conviction.

Once again the President has shown a mindset that is alien to the common sense values of the average American.  Even worse, our accidental President was not shown the capacity to listen or learn even as his poll number plummet.

More On This Topic:  Sacrilege at Ground Zero - Washington Post

Location matters. Especially this location. Ground Zero is the site of the greatest mass murder in American history — perpetrated by Muslims of a particular Islamist orthodoxy in whose cause they died and in whose name they killed.

America is a free country where you can build whatever you want — but not anywhere. That’s why we have zoning laws. No liquor store near a school, no strip malls where they offend local sensibilities, and, if your house doesn’t meet community architectural codes, you cannot build at all.

These restrictions are for reasons of aesthetics. Others are for more profound reasons of common decency and respect for the sacred. No commercial tower over Gettysburg, no convent at Auschwitz — and no mosque at Ground Zero.

Build it anywhere but there.

Recent Census Bureau data is certain to ignite further debate over the issue of illegal immigration.   According to The Wall Street Journal, although illegal immigrants make up 4% of the US population, they are reproducing at twice that rate, accounting for 8% of all US births.

“Unauthorized immigrants are younger than the rest of the population, are more likely to be married and have higher fertility rates than the rest of the population,” said Jeffrey Passel, a senior demographer at Pew in Washington, D.C.

The report, based on Census Bureau data and analysis of demographic characteristics of the undocumented population, also found that the lion’s share, or 79%, of the 5.1 million children of illegal immigrants residing in the U.S. in 2009 were born in the U.S. and therefore citizens.

Amid a heated national debate over illegal immigration, some Republican politicians have been calling for changes to the Constitution’s 14th Amendment, which grants citizenship to “all persons born or naturalized in the United States and subject to the jurisdiction thereof,” in order to deny citizenship to children born in the U.S. to unlawful residents.

Late last month, South Carolina Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham announced his support for reconsidering automatic U.S. citizenship for babies born to undocumented immigrants. He said the status quo enticed people to enter the country illegally and have children to qualify for U.S. benefits.

As the debt of the United States grows to levels that are clearly becoming unsustainable (see US Is Bankrupt And We Don’t Even Know It), the huge cost of providing free education to children of illegal immigrants needs to be reevaluated.

According to WikiAnswers, the national average cost per student in public schools is $9,666.   The cost of educating 5.1 million children of illegal immigrants is costing the nation over $49 billion per year.  The issue is complex since illegal immigrants also produce numerous economic benefits to the nation, which must be taken into account when evaluating the situation.   Nonetheless, with many State governments on the verge of bankruptcy and legal US Citizens suffering economically, the country is no longer financially able to provide free education to an unlimited number of children born of illegal immigrants.

More On This Topic: Cost of Illegal Immigration In California Estimated At Nearly $9 Billion