President Barack Obama told a White House gathering of 85 of the nation’s mayors on February 20  that if they don’t spend the “taxpayers’ money” wisely, “I will call them out on it.” Of course, the money Obama is referring to is not money the cities will be collecting in taxes, but money Washington will provide them as part of the recently enacted $787 billion “stimulus” legislation.

Senator John Ensign (R-Nev.) wonders how the government could successfully run the Big Three automakers when it cannot even run itself. On December 11, before the $14 billion bailout bill died in the Senate, Ensign rose on the Senate floor and asked his colleagues:

During the presidential campaign, as well as on election night, the major media generally ignored the third-party candidates who threw their hats into the presidential ring. These largely ignored candidates, none of whom attained one percent of the vote, included: Independent Ralph Nader (667,000 votes; 0.5 percent), the Libertarian Party's Bob Barr (494,000 votes; 0.4 percent), the Constitution Party's Chuck Baldwin (178,000 votes; 0.1 percent), and the Green Party's Cynthia McKinney (144,000 votes; 0.1 percent).*

During the Republican presidential debate in Durham, New Hampshire, in September 2007, Congressman Ron Paul warned that "we've dug a hole for ourselves and we've dug a hole for our party. We're losing elections and we're going down next year if we don't change it."

Recently on the campaign trail, John McCain and Barack Obama have accused each other of offering tax proposals that would hurt the middle class. John McCain, in a paid radio address on October 18, compared Obama to European socialists, saying: "At least in Europe, the socialist leaders who so admire my opponent are upfront about their objectives. They use real numbers and honest language. And we should demand equal candor from Sen. Obama. Raising taxes on some in order to give checks to others is not a tax cut; it's just another government giveaway."

The major media have widely hyped Colin Powell's October 19 endorsement of Barack Obama for president. On that day's edition of the ABC News program This Week With George Stephanopoulos, former presidential adviser David Gergen carlled Powell's announcement "the most important endorsement of the campaign so far." And on the same program, former Republican Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich said that Powell's endorsement "eliminated the experience argument. How are you going to say the former chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, former secretary of state, former national security adviser, was taken in?"

Appearing on the CBS interview program Face the Nation on September 7, Senator John McCain said he would have Democrats in his cabinet if elected president.

A number of former GOP presidential candidates — Sam Brownback, Rudy Giuliani, Mike Huckabee, Mitt Romney, and Fred Thompson — are scheduled to speak at the Republican National Convention, where they will be expected to display party unity and support John McCain, the GOP’s presumptive standard-bearer. Ron Paul will not be among them.

Every four years, the two major political parties choose their nominees for President of the United States. The Republican and Democrat standard-bearers, like the political parties themselves, then represent the opposing sides of the political divide between conservatism and liberalism — or so we are told. In truth, though the major-party standard-bearers certainly appeal to different constituencies, the substance of what they would do as President is much more similar than their rhetoric suggests.

The New American has published its first “Freedom Index” for the new (112th) Congress. The index, published four times each two-year congressional term, rates all members of the House and Senate based on their adherence to constitutional principles of limited government, fiscal responsibility, national sovereignty, and a traditional foreign policy of avoiding foreign entanglements.