Good Afternoon, my fellow patriotic American Citizens! I'm so happy to see all of you here today and it is a real honor and a privilege to be able to speak to you this afternoon. But...hold on...before I get started...I think there might be a reporter or two here, so I need to start over and say things in a way that the liberal media can understand. So..here we go...
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Good afternoon, my fellow right wing extremists! (laughs) Now...I'm joking here..I'm being a little facetious. But I wanted to address something that has really been bothering me, and that is the slanted, negative coverage of these Tea Party rallies by the liberal media. There are members of the media who have called our meetings "Astroturf", implying that these are "fake" grass roots. Some members of the media have accused us of being paid to attend these rallies. By the way...if there is anyone at this rally that is being paid to attend, could you please talk to me after I speak, because I clearly did not get that email! Other members of the media have been so childish and so juvenile as to call us "teabaggers" in a weak attempt to make some type of vague sexual joke out of the situation.
Well, I don't need to listen to that nonsense and neither do you. People who would insult the Tea Party concept are showing their lack of respect for our American history. The Boston Tea Party was the sparkplug that lit the American Revolution. Without it, we wouldn't even have a country that they could criticize and these media talking heads wouldn't have their bully pulpit from which they could point their fingers at us.
But this is typical hatred from the left. That is all it is...hatred. Their actions speak volumes about them. There is a hysterical, shrieking announcer on MSNBC, filled with phony rage, who routinely likes to point his finger at other people and call them "the worst people in the world". There is a washed-up actress who recently announced that people who attend Tea Party rallies are "racists" and said that our rallies are all about "hating a black man." Wait a minute! What?!!
These rallies are about one thing and one thing only.... oppressive government taxation. Race has nothing to do with it. I mean.. I'll be honest. I'm a Conservative and I did not vote for the current President. I tend to vote for the most Conservative candidate on the ballot. Doesn't matter what race the candidate is...doesn't matter what sex the candidate is (winks ala Sarah Palin). But Barack Obama is our President and will be for the next four years. However, I am a forgiving guy, and if I were ever to see a speech on TV where President Obama went on TV and said...
(doing Obama impersonation)
My fellow Americans, I am here tonight to announce a startling change. I have realized the error of my ways. I have chosen to disavow Socialism. From now on....I declare myself to be a Free Market Capitalist. Instead of raising your taxes, I intend to lower them. Instead of creating new and useless Government programs, I intend to eliminate them. (dropping impression)
Now, if I could only hear these magical words from President Obama, and see them followed up by actions, I would be running to the polls to vote for him. Hell...the people in front of me standing in line?...I'd be knocking them out of my way to get in their and vote for President Obama. But unfortunately this is not what we have here in America today. His politics are 180 degrees in the opposite direction of where I want this country to go.
So...to all the liberal media out there...let me repeat this, and I think I speak for many, many of the people who are gathered here today. The fact that President Barack Obama is black has absolutely nothing to do with why we are here today. The fact that he wants to raise our taxes and exert more government influence and control over our lives has everything to do with why we are here today.
Before I get to Prop 1A, the other subject I wanted to discuss was the hostile way that these protests, and people just like us, are being viewed by members of our own government. We are gathered here today under the protection of the First Amendment to the United States Constitution... which says that we can peacefully assemble and address our government over our grievances. It is a crucial part of American life. John F Kennedy once said "those who would make peaceful protest impossible, will eventually make violent protest inevitable." None of us want that... and in fact the recent Tea Party rallies were a rousing success. Over 260,000 Americans joined together nationwide to protest, and not a single item in the news about unrest or violence. Yet we are the ones being treated with suspicion and distrust by our own government. Sad, isn't it?
Some of you may have heard about a controversial event that happened recently when the Department of Homeland Security released some insider memos detailing the fact that people like us are being "profiled" as possible domestic terrorists. They even used the phrase "right wing extremist" in the memo.
Let's go down a checklist and compare... do these terms apply to you? Most of them apply to me. Attends Tea Party rallies? Check. Believes in God? Check. Loves country/feelings of patriotism? Check. Feared/predicted or anticipated the economic collapse? Check. Hates abortion? check. Unhappy with illegal immigration? Check. Gun owner? Check. Unhappy with the election results of November 2008. Check. If you meet all these criteria you might be labelled a "threat" to our country. But...here's the one that really bothers me... returning members of our US Military who have served in Iraq or Afghanistan. Are you kidding me? Can you believe this?
Next week is Memorial Day, and it always upsets me to think of the wonderful Americans who paid the ultimate price for their country. I have a soft spot for them because I served in the military. Now I'm not saying I was "Joe Super Veteran" or anything like that. I never saved anyones life. I never won any huge medals or honors. I never even saw combat. I was one of the lucky ones. When I was in the Army, there wasn't any active fighting going on around the world... a fact for which I thank our former President Ronald Reagan. I was one of the lucky ones. But right across the street from us right now, there are thousands and thousands of wonderful patriotic American citizens who served their country just like I did. But they weren't so lucky. They died in horrible places that most of us can barely pronounce. They died in places like Khe Sahn in Vietnam and in places like Nasiriyah in Iraq. Americans have shed blood in every corner of the globe. More often than not, it was to protect the freedom and liberty of others. There is a reason that you and I and millions of other Americans will probably never visit these places. Courageous members of our Armed Forces made sure that you will never have to.
I'm glad that some of you are recording this, because I have a special message for the Department of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano.
You are profiling the wrong people. These people are not threats to their country. In fact, it is quite the opposite. People like this are the last chance our country has! So...if you want to continue down this path...if you want to profile and put people on "watchlists'...then go ahead. Do as you wish. I only ask one thing from you, Secretary Napolitano. I want to be the first name on that list. I would consider it an honor...and I think I would be in pretty good company.
OK..on to the reason we are all here. Proposition 1A and oppressive taxation.
Let me start by asking a question. People always say that America is a "free country". Well...is it?
Is it really? We have social freedom about how to live our lives, but the big ticket items.... massive legislation, bailouts...things like that. We don't get to vote on those, do we? We were not the ones who put Proposition 1A on the ballot. But we are here to defeat it. But I ask you, could the common citizen ever get a measure on the ballot that was the opposite of 1A? A measure that said we wanted to lower our State income tax, that we wanted to lower our sales tax and our car tax fees?? I think the idea is highly unlikely. Voters here in California did it once, with Prop 13 many years ago, but even that was just a limit to the property tax.
No, most of the time our political problems are because of bad election choices. The wrong ideas are on the ballot, or sometimes the wrong candidates are on the ballot. Sometimes we are presented with a choice between two career politicians, neither of whom is interested in actually changing anything. And that is actually no choice at all. As an example, two months ago, when I ran for Mayor of Los Angeles, two of the City Council Members ran unopposed for re-election. And this was for a job that paid 178K a year! How were voters in their districts ever supposed to achieve any changes, when the very concept of change in that election, was not on the ballot? This is not healthy for our political system. I will tell you what else is not healthy... the very strange concept or belief that the government needs to be all things to all people. This is a core philosophy of liberalism. And it is a lie.
The entire reason we have to face Prop 1A on Tuesday is because the government here in California is out of money. Why are they out of money? Because they have bought into the lie that government needs to be all things to all people. The State has followed the Federal government into the trap of believing in Altruism. That the people in our society need to make their primary concern the well being of others. It is a ridiculous philosophy that most often shows up in nations that have either a Socialist or Communist government. It has never worked in any society on earth, because it goes against human nature. But, they keep on trying.
There are many evils to Socialism, some of the main ones being that it invites tyranny and totalitarianism. One of my opponents in the Mayoral election was a Socialist...and no...I'm not talking about Villaraigosa...I'm talking about the pure, unadulterated Socialist. The one who said that everyone has a "right" to housing. That everyone has a "right" to a job that pays at least $15/hr. That everyone has a "right" to free medical care and to free schooling through college. And exactly how do these Socialists achieve these rights? You guessed it...by taking away the rights of others. Best selling author Mark Levin describes things this way... "This is tyranny in disguise. These are not rights. These are the Statists false promises of utopianism, which the Statist uses to justify all trespasses on another individuals private property." He is right, because Socialism and Communism try to make the imperfect perfect. They try to control the uncontrollable. It can never work.
This type of behavior might sound familiar to all of you, because we are seeing this behavior in our current resident of 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. He says if we will just give him more and more control over private industry, he can fix everything. But I have bad news for all of you...he is wrong. Government intervention in this crisis is not going to work. Chrysler and GM? I'm sorry, but those companies are dead. They were dead the very first minute the government got its hands on them. It still remains beyond my comprehension how anyone who works for Chrysler or owns stock in them can have any faith in government leadership whatsoever. The same government that severely bungled the US housing market... remember Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac?... yeah those two names will go down in history, but not in a good way..... so, this same government who just destroyed the housing market with their meddling is suddenly the same group of geniuses who are now going to save the auto industry?? I think even the most fervent supporters of the current President understand this instinctively and know that it won't work.
All the union members in the world, no matter how hard they stamp their feet or how loud they howl in protest, they cannot save these companies. Nobody can. We live in a free market society. Consumers voted with their checkbooks and said "No, Thank you" to Chrysler and GM products. Unfortunately, failure is part of the process of healthy capitalism. Bad companies fail to make way for good ones. It is not the end of the world. Any country can manufacture an automobile... just like any country can make a television set or a bicycle. The big trick is coming up with the ideas and the products in the first place. And that is where America shows that it is exceptional in todays world. Dell computers, Apple computers, Microsoft, Oracle, Sun, Java, Cisco... none of these companies existed 30 years ago, but they exist today because of American ingenuity. Some of you are here today because of two very new companies, Twitter and Facebook... these companies didn't even exist five years ago, but now have millions of users.
Capitalism, and the power of entrepreneurship is what makes us so special as Americans. Capitalism is not perfect, but it is clearly better than the other choices. Capitalism is about an individual being free to succeed or fail. It is all about risk, innovation and free thought. When I was running for Mayor, I was in a debate at UCLA...just a few steps from here. I was listening to the two Socialist candidates badmouth Capitalism and talk about how it had "oppressed" and "enslaved" the working class. By the time I got the microphone I was furious. I spent several minutes destroying their arguments. I finished my speech by saying that their comments were nonsense. I finished my speech by saying... "Capitalism doesn't oppress you...Capitalism makes your life possible!!"
No, we have nothing to fear from healthy Capitalism. We have everything to fear from heavy-handed and overbearing government intervention in our lives.
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Who is John Galt...?? CUT FOR LENGTH
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We are at a moment of crisis in this country right now. Some of the speakers at other Tea Parties have said that it is the largest crisis in American history. I disagree. We have faced worse times. The American Revolution, The Civil War... World War 2... Cuban Missile Crisis.. no, we have faced worse times. This is merely a financial and economic crisis that was brought about by a meddling government and a crisis that can be solved by getting the government out of the way of the free market.
We face some tough choices right now. But best selling author Mark Levin would say that we only face one choice...Liberty or Tyranny. We need to rediscover our American principles. The idea that a small government gives you big freedoms, and that a Big Government gives you very little freedom. The idea that the government, in annexing large parts of the economy, is actually annexing large parts of your personal freedom.
56 men - edited out for time
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