Duncan Hunter Interview Series- Taking Obama and Company to the Woodshed

This is the fifteenth in a series of conversations with former Congressman and conservative stalwart Duncan Hunter. He has agreed to these sessions as one way to keep his message of Reaganesque foreign policy and constitutional domestic policy on the front burner for the American people and his Republican colleagues. Hunter is currently spending much time and personal capital positioning a group of conservative candidates to take back congressional seats from liberal Democrats. With any luck, Mr. Hunter will choose to run for the presidency come 2012. But for right now, the 2010 midterm election is his mission. The interview takes place with Hunter from Washington DC.

AJM: How are you, Congressman?

DH: Good. We’re traveling to a funeral, but we got another 20 minutes before we get there so were good to go. How are you doing?

AJM: Good, good. Just wanted to let you know that this morning we had a great session on Free Republic with your friend Nick Popaditch. And he was very well received and gave some great answers. He sounded like a young Duncan Hunter. Heck, he sounded like even an old one.

DH: (laughs) That’s great. Nick’s a good guy.

AJM: One of the questions was who…or name some political figures that he admires. Of course, he started off with Reagan and then he mentioned one of his mentors – Duncan Hunter – how do you like that?

DH: Well that’s great. He’s a good man. And I think he has a really good chance of winning this thing too.

AJM: I think I told you yesterday that they do not have a primary opponent. That’s good news. He can concentrate on the real target.

DH: That’s wonderful. Really good.

AJM: He answered about 20 questions. Got a great response from the folks on the site. So he should be getting a few donations from the Free Republic crew. There are even some that are actually down in his district.

DH: That’s good. How many people tune in to that? How many people do you think heard or read the Gunny?

AJM: Well, he was only there for an hour. Remember when we did yours a couple years ago when you came onto the site?

DH: Yeah.

AJM: Well, by the end of it there were 700 hundred or so responses. But in addition to the responses a couple of thousand views – a couple of thousand that didn’t necessarily post anything but saw what you had to say. Within a few days, I imagine Gunny’s views will be well beyond 1000.

DH: That’s great.

AJM: Yeah, And in that short hour I think there was 140 responses and maybe 400 to 500 views.

In addition, I told them I’m ready to volunteer for his campaign and will try to get this stuff out to the blogosphere. See if we can’t find a home for if he wants to write up anything, to find a good place to post that too.

DH: That’s super. It’s neat that he doesn’t have a primary opponent. That will give him a lot of clear sailing.

AJM: Yeah. No money invested for trying to beat back someone for that seat. When I was talking to April yesterday I told her that with Filner they have a very target rich environment. Would you agree with that?

DH: Oh yeah. Absolutely. Absolutely.(laughing)

AJM: OK. Well I got just a couple of quick questions for you today.

In the news in the last week and a half or so, since Joe Biden was over in Israel and Israel announced 1600 additional homes to be built in Jerusalem – which has always been their plan – Obama and Hillary decided to publicly dress Israel down in the media. What is your take on that?

DH: Yeah. I think Israel has proven time and again that it’s one of the very few true friends that the United States has in that part of the world. And we are trying constantly to maintain that tiny postage stamp of a nation. I think the Obama Administration is a glaring example of the misguided American ‘leadership’ which comes to the forefront from time to time, which somehow feels that by giving away a few edges of land, that it is going to help Israel in the long run. And experience has shown us that that does not work.

AJM: I agree with that. And I don’t think Israel should be giving up any more land to.….

DH: Not an inch!

AJM: And Biden, in his remarks in Israel, mentioned that the Palestinians deserve a contiguous territory. That means connecting Gaza to the West Bank, and I just don’t see that happening.

DH: The answer to that is that the people – these islamic radicals - who make bombs, which they intend to utilize in on going terrorist activities against Israel, don’t even know what the word ‘contiguous’ means.

So you have this unusual situation which has endured for years in which artsy craftsy liberals in Washington DC, like Joe Biden – the famous author of the ‘split Iraq into three parts’ Plan – sit around cutting paper dolls up into different shapes hoping that one of them is going to provide the master plan for the survival of Israel and appease their enemies. And in the end, the only currency that they have to achieve the ends that they say they want to achieve, is giving away property, giving away land.

The Israelis gave away a lot of oil producing territory in years past. They’re being urged now, for example, to give portions away of the Golan Heights, which gives them a critical, tactical defense of a very important area, from which they’ve previously been attacked.

So the formula in the end for liberals in Washington with respect to Israel is always capitulation of some sort. These liberals in the Obama Administration still haven’t ‘broken the code’ that the people who would destroy Israel aren’t interested in concessions. They are interested in the elimination of Israel.

AJM: Exactly, exactly. Now jumping on to a domestic issue, Lindsey Graham, Senator from South Carolina, was out in the media earlier in the week and over the weekend, browbeating the Obama Administration for not moving fast enough on the new Amnesty Plan. So it’s obviously established that Graham and his RINO cohorts are planning the next McCain-Kennedy. I would like your response to Mr. Graham.

DH: Well, I think that the McCain-Kennedy amnesty bill is founded on the erroneous assumption that somehow an amnesty plan can precede any border enforcement and be meaningful. And it can’t. It’s akin to a state government debating whether the speed limit should be 55 miles per hour or 65 miles per hour; and all the while there is no highway patrol and everybody is doing 100 mph. You simply end up with a legalization which provides a magnet for millions more people to come to the United States illegally, and thinking they’ll catch the next amnesty. And at the same time, it’s never coupled with increased border enforcement.

So the answer is, Lindsey, enforce the law; build more border fence! But first take note of the fact that where the fence has been built, where the real Hunter double fence has been built, illegal immigration and the smuggling of narcotics has been reduced MASSIVELY. Now the fence we built in San Diego resulted in a reduction of illegal crossings in our sector by more than 90%. It also resulted in the crime rate in the county of San Diego dropping – according to the FBI – by more than 50%, after the fence was built. Meaning that there is an enormous population of criminals who cross the border regularly, not to work, but to hurt Americans and destroy American property. That fact is buttressed by the statistics that more than 25% of the inmates in our federal penitentiaries are criminal aliens, illegal aliens. People who snuck into the United States not for any benign purpose, but rather to hurt our people and destroy our property. You have to have border control!

AJM: It seems like such a simple concept. I just wonder how you, after all those years of promoting this and being blocked, mainly in the Senate, I mean you and a few of your House allies have been pushing this stuff for a very long time. How did you restrain yourself from marching over to the Senate and grabbing these chumps by the lapels and shaking them??

DH: Well actually, the House members went over and beat up on the Senate about 100 years ago with sticks and canes, so subsequently, that was forbidden. (laughs)

AJM: (Laughing)

DH: Unfortunately, the practice was outlawed. (laughing) So you can’t beat up on a Senator, even ones who deserve it.

We found out it was hard to distinguish between the Senators and the statues when we got over there. You had to hold a mirror up to the mouth of the figure. And if a little vapor formed, it was a statue.

AJM/DH: (laughing)

DH: The point is with respect to the border fence, we built some 600 miles of ‘fence’ or border structure, of the 854 that was authorized by the law that I authored, the Secure Fence Act. But what I specified was a double fence. And I specified, for example, over 300 miles of it to be constructed in Texas. And the Texas Senators watered that down drastically, to 60 miles of non-double fence, with their governor cheerleading on the sidelines. The Texas border is on fire right now with drug smuggling, criminal activity, kidnappings, and the smuggling of people.

So you’ve got to have a border fence that’s absolutely enforceable, Mr. Graham.

Now I also told the good Senators and Homeland Security that the “Virtual Fence” would be virtually worthless. And they’ve now….

AJM: ….come to recognize that!

DH: …killed the thing. Yeah, the virtual fence has now been abandoned. I told them further that they’d pay Boeing a fortune. Boeing had never come in under cost on any project they’ve ever done for the American taxpayer, whether its military aircraft or a virtual fence.

They must have got tired of looking at the field reports, where the Border Patrolmen had their laptops bouncing off the ceiling as they were vectoring left and right in the open deserts as bands of illegal aliens zigzagged on them in the dark of night.

The virtual fence was one of the dumbest acts in show business yet they were able to propose and pitch this thing - and pay for it – with a straight face.

But you’ll notice nobody is suggesting that they put a virtual fence around the Whitehouse. They decided to keep a real one.

AJM: Well a few of your opponents in the 2008 election, and one in particular, was all about the virtual fence. That was Rudy Giuliani, if you recall.

DH: Well, they should have put Rudy down there in one of those vehicles with a Dukakis helmet while the Border Patrolman was being told to “turn left, no, turn right. Oops, they zigzagged on you”. This thing was based upon these vehicles being able to zigzag around gulches and gullies and canyons in the Southern Arizona desert ….at night. It got to the point that they were running over the people that were crossing illegally on the rare occasion they were anywhere near locating them at all. That proved to be impossible.

AJM: Yeah. I guess last question here. It looks like according to, I believe, the Wall Street Journal, that China is actually helping Iran with their nuclear and missile programs. I know China has been a sore spot with you for decades. So I’d like you to address our current crop of leaders on what the hell to do about these guys?

DH: Well, I think the US State Department has discovered a less than profound fact: China likes money.

And China really does have a military-industrial complex. Many of their companies, like Romney’s friends at Huawei corporation, which helped to give the Taliban their communication system and helped to build an air defense system for Saddam Hussein to use against American aircraft, was formed by a former officer of the People’s Liberation Army. So they have a very tight wrap between their military and their so-called corporate industrial base.

So China likes money, and the Iranians have offered them money. I think that they also feel that they are achieving some foreign power leverage by aiding the Iranians - especially with what they perceive as a groveling adversary in the White House.

And I think America’s options are narrowing substantially now with respect to Iran.

AJM: With respect to China, if you were President and you found out this week that despite their lip service that they don’t support the Iranian nuclear program, that they actually are, at least on the delivery systems if nothing else, what do you do as president? I mean obviously Obama’s not going to do it.

DH: I think you undertake massive sanctions on trade. And if you don’t have the particular levers in place, you seek those levers from Congress, which I think you would get. So massive sanctions on trade.

I think this exposes one of the huge mistakes on the part of Republicans and Democrats over the last 20 years, which was to move a great deal of the American industrial base to communist China. It deprived us economically, strengthened them economically and gave them the hard cash that they’ve used to arm significantly. From the Sovremenny Class missile destroyers that they purchased from the Russians for close to a billion a piece, to the Kilo class submarines, to dozens of lesser systems. China is arming, largely, with American cash. And now it’s abundantly clear that they have no respect for America’s concerns with respect to the Middle East.

Another thing that is bothering me tremendously is the fact that after America has shed blood, sweat and tears to win the Iraq war, China briskly moved in, straightened their bowtie, and promptly snapped up one of the large petroleum concessions in Southern Iraq.

AJM: Well we let them do that.

DH: That’s right, we let them do that. A massive, massive mistake on the part of the Americans.

AJM: With all this trouble out there now, and much more on the horizon, it seems we need someone like a Duncan Hunter in the oval office, not an Obama.

DH: Now we’re talking.

AJM: I tell you, you are right about a lot of these things, including the fact that we don’t hear Republicans standing up to China any more than the democrats.

DH: No. Exactly. A lot of our folks have drunk the Kool Aid on ‘Free trade’, and allowed the industrial base of the country to be shipped overseas, based on the idea that somehow they’re gonna go to Heaven.

AJM: (laughs) They speak Chinese in heaven, apparently.

DH: The idea of ‘free trade’ is as stupid as the idea of ‘free love’. It’s something that does not work and does not exist in the real world.

AJM: And correct me if I’m wrong Congressman, if we really want to have or need to have low wage countries making our products, why not use allies? The Philippines for example, that…

DH: Absolutely. Absolutely. But on the other hand we’ve got a lot of them also. If you look at the dispersal of the American industrial base, we’ve generously ladled it out all over the world.

But I would say the most dangerous transfer has been that to China, because China, of all the countries that we moved our industrial base to, the greater part of it, as represented by this disadvantage in trade right now – our huge trade loss – we moved it to a country which is not only taking these American dollars, but is building a formidable military system with it. Including strategic systems, nuclear tipped systems, which are at least partially targeted at the United States of America.

AJM: It makes no sense.

DH: We’re helping them to pay for the very missiles that are becoming increasingly sophisticated and are pointed at us.

AJM: You’ve explained this to your colleagues over and over. What is the response you get from your Republican colleagues? The Yukon Stare?

DH: Well, listen. You understand the Republicans and the Democrats, and their adherence to the politics of free trade – like Al Gore sticks to the politics of global warming. I think it is clear now that they are simply wrong! And I think a lot of people that went along with it now understand the debilitating effect it has had on the United States economy.

AJM: Yeah. And that is only ONE of the major problems with it.

DH: That’s the primary reason for having a so-called ‘jobless recovery’. It’s tough to recover when your job is in Beijing. The whole idea that is spouted regularly on news shows is that consumers will get confidence, they’ll go to the stores, they’ll buy things, and the factories responding to those purchase orders hire back people and produce more products. Now that works, unless the factory is in Beijing.

Americans can race to Wal Mart, buy billions of dollars worth of products, and have it result in not a single factory hire in the United States, because all the products are made off shore. So you can jumpstart an industrial base; just not your own.

AJM: (laughs) Well it’s good for the Longshoremen, I guess.

DH: That’s it: A few people to handle the products and a few people to ring the cash registers.

AJM: Absolutely. Finally, on this whole idea of what the ‘health care’ reform is going through right now. The idea that they are going to “deem it” through, or use the Slaughter rule to deem the vote in the house and then use this reconciliation to get the Senate bill through. Do you want to comment on this mess?

DH: I would say simply this. If the Democrats try to trick the system into producing a legislative outcome, this socialist clap trap, that is against the will of more than 70% of the American people, they are going to pay a steep penalty at the polls. That’s what these nutty machinations amount to – attempting to trick or game the system.

AJM: They (dems) must obviously not think so, because they are willing to do it.

DH: Well you’ve got the debate right now between Democrats who say ‘this is our last hurrah – let’s get everything we can get while we have the numbers no matter how unpopular’ and others that say ‘I’d like to come back next year’. Mr. Obama is trying to convince a lot of people that they should win purple hearts for him.

AJM: (laughs) If they do somehow manage to get this turd through do you think that the Republican mantra, for all the people running like Gunny Pop and others, should be “we are going to overturn ObamaCare when we get in”?

DH: Oh absolutely! Yes. Overturn all of Obama’s socialist programs.

AJM: Well, very good. You’ve been gracious again with your time. When are you back home?

DH: Hey, it was good to talk to you. We’ll probably be back tonight, after the funeral here.

AJM: Now I talked to Sam briefly when I called you the other day, and he says the bun is about to pop out of the oven. Has that happened?

DH: No, they don’t have the new baby yet, but we are on pins and needles.

AJM: Well get back home for that!

DH: Well listen, the best to your family Jim.

AJM: Well thank you very much and we’ll talk soon.

Obama at Bat video

Obama at Bat

Why Duncan Hunter - Part 2

Why Duncan Hunter is the Man for POTUS, Part 2
Alexander J. Madison - March 3, 2010
The 2010 elections are right around the corner. Once again, I urge all conservatives to work tirelessly to nominate and elect candidates who will not only stop Obama’s socialist agenda, but who will also reverse course on the Republican ‘slow drift’ socialism it has embarked upon.
Though it seems too early to expend effort lobbying for the right 2012 Presidential candidates, one glance through the headlines will demonstrate that a gaggle of Republican politicians are already lining their coffers and elbowing for a place in the primary.
And we see another phenomena repeating, as predictable as the swallows returning to Capistrano: RINOs pretending to be conservatives when they are challenged in their primaries. Just the other day, we found out from John McCain that he was apparently bamboozled by former Treasury Secretary Paulson into supporting the “crap sandwich”, the rich-guy & foreign banker bailout known as TARP. Perhaps Hank, that old romantic, got down on bended knee and stroked McCain’s hand, much like he did to Speaker Pelosi. With pressure on his right flank from conservative stalwart JD Hayworth, Mr. McCain has resorted to ridiculous statements, unbelievable statements, to get the folks who are angry at Washington to re-elect His Maverickness. McCain isn’t the only one. His good pals in Florida and Texas, Charlie “bailout” Crist and Rick “vaccine” Perry, are suddenly claiming to be Reagan Republicans. Huh?
So what is the solution to this smoke and mirrors nonsense? The nonsense that has a lifelong liberal limp-wrist like Mitt Romney – who still believes that semi-automatic rifles with a bayonet mount are too scary for American citizens to possess, and that socialized medicine is desirable as long as his name is attached to it - being touted as the 2012 “frontrunner” by the same folks who sold us John McCain in 2008. The nonsense that has global warming alarmist, treehugger, and anti-smoke nazi Tim Pawlenty being feted as presidential timber. The nonsense of Newt Gingrich – who was leftwinger Dede Scozzafava’s biggest cheerleader - arrogantly thinking he can waltz into the nomination based on his schizophrenic ideas of his American Solutions racket. The nonsense that nanny-stater extraordinaire Mike Huckabee – who despite his apparent return to gobbling down Twinkies and fried gizzards is fawning over Michelle Obama’s new anti-fatso campaign – is remotely suitable for the task at hand. And the nonsense that McCain’s VP, Sarah Palin, by virtue of a pleasant personality and vague conservative credentials, is the only person who can beat back the pack of RINOs.
The Tea Party did not form based upon the Republicanism that these folks represent. The Tea Party was the direct reaction to these people, working hand in glove with the democrats, saddling America with debt, bureaucracy, nanny-statism, illegal aliens, and Political Correctness. Its genesis was a combination of Rick Santelli’s famous rant, the GOP and Democrats force feeding TARP to an angry public, the 2007 push for amnesty, and, more recently, the Obama Administration’s blatant attempts to consolidate government power and control. But these are just the straws that broke the camel’s back!
Real Americans do not want governors and bureaucrats telling them they can’t smoke here, or there, while taxing their tobacco and alcohol products sky high to further feed the nanny state. They do not want the government to spend one thin dime of their money telling them what and how the hell to eat. They loathe the notion of the government, be it state or federal, sticking their noses into healthcare - ObamaCare, RomneyCare, ArKids, Special Needs kids - it does not matter; unleash the free market then stay OUT of it, period.
Americans reject the entire notion of Amnesty, whether it is La Raza’s call for complete open borders or McCain’s and the GOP establishment’s “pathway to citizenship”. You sneak in, we catch you, goodbye!
Patriotic Americans overwhelmingly reject the whole notion of Algore’s phony, sovereignty usurping, wealth redistributing scheme called global warming. Yet, there the Republicans were in a 2008 primary debate, raising their hands like eager, brown-nosing schoolkids when the debate moderator asked who believed that “global warming was a serious problem”. And there was Governor Pawlenty on the sidelines telling the world to ignore those awful skeptics, and later VP candidate Palin telling us “we must do something about it.” When you have politicians vowing to fix the weather, you know that the shark has not only been jumped, but they used Evil Knievel’s rocket-bike to jump it.
And Political Correctness? If the current 2012 media-selected frontrunners became anymore politically correct, they could get jobs in the Chicago Public Schools as diversity coaches teaching tolerance and anti-bullying.
After Ann Coulter, one of the genuinely funny lights of unapologetic conservative punditry, cleverly skewered John “faggot” Edwards and Political Correctness in one brilliant sentence at the 2007 CPAC gathering, Romney, Rudy and McCain could not find microphones fast enough to reject her “insensitivity” and “divisiveness”. They also, however, proved her point. It was Pavlovian.
When presidential nominee John McCain was presented with glaring opportunities to take Barack Obama to the woodshed for his radicalism, he instead wilted like a PC wallflower. McCain actually said, regarding Obama’s 20 year relationship with anti-Semitic, anti-American preacher Jeremiah Wright: “Look, I do know Senator Obama and he does not share those (Wright’s) views.” Why on earth would he say such a thing?? (Hint: Obama’s half black).
After all the hard work that conservative journalists, bloggers, and talk radio did to illuminate Obama’s radical Marxist, anti-capitalist history, McCain responded by saying “He is a decent person, and a person that you do not have be scared of as President of the United States.”!!! Top that off with his pandering to the Hispanic community by promoting amnesty – stupidly thinking that most Hispanic-Americans want our laws violated – and you get the picture. He has no problem sliming his current 2010 primary opponent, a conservative, as if he were a menace to the Republic, but treat a black liberation theology radical as the anti-American he is? Never!
The problem is this: The other guys who are gearing up for a 2012 are as bad or worse. Either they are as politically correct as McCain, share his views on amnesty and global warming, and/or they have liberal streaks a mile wide in their records as politicians. This goes for T-Paw, Newt, Mitt, Huck as well as the ‘Charlie Crist in cowboy boots’ who just won re-election in Texas. Not a Reaganite amongst them.
Sarah Palin is a special case. With two years as Alaska’s governor under her belt before being plucked onto the national ticket by McCain, she has not had a chance to fully demonstrate what she believes. She may be supporting RINO McCain’s re-election out of a sense of duty, but she sure gushes on about him every time someone brings him up; including last night on Jay Leno’s program. And she may have been following the ‘company line’ during the 2008 campaign – despite her repeated statement that she was never asked “to check her views at the door” - but that just means she needs to enlighten us now with her ‘real’ thinking on critical issues such government bailouts, amnesty, and global warming, which she flunked miserably during the campaign.
The solution is Duncan Hunter. Hunter was non-committal about his future plans in politics when interviewed last March. He did specifically say he was not “closing any doors”. But since then, he has mostly focused on getting a batch of rock ribbed conservative candidates – mostly Iraq and Afghanistan veterans – to run in congressional seats in districts currently held by democrats for the 2010 elections. Hunter understands that America is in grave peril, and that more CONSERVATIVES in congress is the only way to stop the bleeding.
The guys that Hunter is busy campaigning for include ‘Gunny Pop’ Nick Popaditch (http://www.popaditchforcongress.com/) in California, Jesse Kelly (http://www.votejessekelly.com/) in Tucson, Arizona, and Vaughn Ward (http://www.vaughnward.com/home) up in Idaho. Look at the platforms of these three warriors and you will see they all stand for slashing (not slowing) the federal government, stopping the illegal alien invasion, genuine job spurring tax cuts, and a stronger military – just like the man who helped recruit them. Hunter also has several other candidates he will be helping as well.
But once these and other conservatives are elected and we take back at least one house in the Congress (if not both), the party MUST select the right man at the right time to lead us in 2012. As Hunter succinctly stated, “I think a party is largely defined by it's president.” That was true during Nixon’s time, Reagan’s time, as well as during GWB’s tenure. So the choice is clear. We can select a presidential nominee who is a slick political animal without clear constitutional convictions similar to Nixon, a “big government” social ‘conservative’ like Bush turned out to be, or a principled constitutionalist and genuine Reaganite – like Duncan Hunter.
With Hunter, we will not get answers that cater to the crowd he happens to be speaking to. So there will be no democratic advertisements that can skewer him as a liar or a flip flopper. Hunter gives the exact same message on building the border fence and deporting illegal aliens to Hispanics as he does to every other group of Americans. And it just so happened that he received tremendous Hispanic support throughout his 28 years in Congress. Hard to imagine, but these Americans of Hispanic descent do not like being bullshitted anymore than other folks do. Maybe they appreciated the 90% drop in crime and border smuggling once the ‘Hunter Fence’ was erected in their communities; the same ‘Hunter Fence’ that was called “ridiculous” and “nonsense” by Rick Perry – doing his best Janet Napolitano impression.
And just as Hunter refrained from jumping on the politically correct, politically popular, anti-tobacco legislation bandwagon that Republicans and Democrats alike were championing not so long ago, so too will he veto any misguided future nanny-state garbage, such as John McCain’s idiotic attempt to put nutritional supplements under FDA control, Huckabee’s anti-fat crusade, Romney’s leftwing ‘gay tolerance’ infestation in America’s schoolrooms, Palin’s welfare spending on “special needs” kids, or Newt’s inexplicable ‘bi-partisan’ – with Nancy Pelosi on the couch no less – “we agree our country must take action to address climate change” nonsense.
When the going gets tough, we won’t find Hunter ducking for cover and parroting liberal talking points to get better media coverage. No squawking on about stopping fictional “torture” a la McCain, or repealing Don’t Ask Don’t Tell like the Flipper Romney, or pimping for automobile “mileage taxes” to curb those mysterious green house gasses like T-Paw, or offering up tuition breaks for illegal aliens like the Amnesty Princess in Texas.
What you will find with Duncan Hunter is a hard nosed realism based on sound conservative and traditional American principles.
The hard nosed realism that says the federal government must be REDUCED in size and scope if we are to continue to exist as the country handed to us by our founders. Everything is on the table, including across the board, non-defense spending CUTS, the elimination of entire departments like Education, Arts, Energy, and Interior, and gutting the scope of the regulatory agencies such as the EPA, OSHA, and the FDA. Hunter is one of the very few men in congress to propose such genuine, “radical” reductions over his career.
The realism that says the tax system is in drastic need of an overhaul. As an original sponsor of the FairTax, Hunter wants to eliminate the IRS, by and large, and the billions it costs each year to run that bloated bureaucracy. He also is the only one to propose eliminating all taxes on US manufacturers, which would go a long, long way to restoring America’s high paying industrial jobs, and becoming competitive once again in the manufacturing sector.
The realism that says that enemies are to be treated as enemies, adversaries as adversaries, and allies as allies. Hunter’s no holds barred attitude towards Iran, and Islamic jihadists in general, will have Ahmadinejad handing over his nukes immediately. When Hunter declared in the debates and interviews that he has every intention of taking them out if they are not surrendered, he actually means it. Iran knows it too.
Hunter is also one of the few anti-communists left from the Reagan Revolution and he has always treated and will continue to treat Red China as an adversary, not a “partner” (do you hear that Mitt?). Hunter vows to bring our trade with China back into balance, and prohibit any more American “dual use” technology from leaving our shores for theirs. He will harshly punish their continued malfeasance on software and intellectual piracy, devaluation of currency and dumping. And they know it. And unlike the other guys, Hunter will command the respect and solidarity with our traditional allies – as well as our newer allies in the former Soviet Bloc – by doing exactly what he says he will do without hidden agendas or triangulating to please Arab, Russian, or Chicom sensibilities. And the fact that Hunter will restore defense spending to Reagan era levels, as a percent of GDP, means no nation on the planet will contemplate the term “paper tiger” in relationship with the USA. Hunter’s vow to put America ahead to stay in space based weapons, Naval power, missile defenses, fighter and bomber capabilities, and defense technology will not be an unfulfilled campaign pledge.
Hunter’s American principles say we live in a country founded on certain ideals, ideals that were codified in our Declaration of Independence and the Constitution, and that we cannot have a federal government that does not abide by the constraints of that Constitution. Hunter – a critic of McCain Feingold – is a champion of the 1st Amendment, stalwart on the 2nd and 10th Amendments, a ferocious defender of property rights, and a champion of US Sovereignty. He does not abide by the notion that supra-national or international entities can trump the God given sovereignty of the American people – whether it’s the UN, the WTO, the World Bank or any other boondoggle organization.
As for the poison of political correctness, Hunter’s record speaks for itself. Last year, when the Senate Armed Services Committee released its “bipartisan” report on ‘war crimes’ in the Iraq and Afghan theatres, implicating Don Rumsfeld and other officials, most Republicans went into hiding and avoided talking about it. Hunter went on national television and called it “leftwing rubbish”. When McCain and his sidekick Lindsey Graham joined the democrats in calling for Gitmo to be shuttered due to reports of “abuse”, Hunter went on to CSPAN and not only defended the facility and the soldiers who ran it, but even showed off the delicious meals and prayer rugs these dirtbags were being given. When the GOP was beginning to fold like a house of cards on global warming, Hunter was right there along with Jim Inhofe to callout Algore’s phony “alarmism”– long before the recent revelations that the global warming science wasn’t science at all. Now that it’s safe to deride the Algorian fantasy, Pawlenty, Huckabee, and Romney have emerged as critics. Imagine that.
Hunter has never budged from his position that illegal aliens must not only be prevented from entering the country, but that they all must be deported; the exact opposite of the “pathway to citizenship” crap being pushed by Democrats and Republicans alike.
When the Democrat party, the media, President Bush, the Federal Reserve, the Treasury Department, and the entire GOP leadership signed on to the TARP bailout as absolutely critical to the well being of the nation, Hunter did not just say no, he said “hell no”, and offered up a free market alternative that was utterly ignored by his own party bosses. Now we know that TARP was not only unnecessary, but was the beginning of a massive campaign of government interference in the free market, just as Hunter predicted.
When General Peter Pace was taking media and democratic fire for his beliefs that open homosexuality was incompatible with military service, George Bush and Robert Gates decided to not re-nominate the warrior for his Joint Chief’s position. Hunter, on the other hand, published a scathing piece in USA Today defending not only Peter Pace, but calling the whole idea a leftwing “social experiment” that had no place in our fighting forces.
When Romney, Guiliani, and McCain were talking up their “ability” to work in a bipartisan fashion, Hunter labeled them as members of “the Kennedy Wing of the Republican Party”; a label that remains to this day. And when Wolf Blitzer asked Hunter if “reaching across the aisle” as demonstrated by the moderate and popular (at the time) governor Schwarzenegger was the future of the GOP, Hunter’s unhesitatingly fast answer was an emphatic “NO!”
And though the entire GOP establishment has rushed out to Arizona to re-elect John McCain to his Senate seat, Hunter declined to endorse him – despite a 30 year friendship with the man.
In closing, there are those who will say that Hunter had his chance, and couldn’t even get to the front tier of candidates in 2008. But is America the same country that voted for Mr. Obama in 2008? Are Americans in the mood to tolerate another “centrist” republican like McCain who could barely articulate the differences between conservative and liberal; who was afraid to label Obama for what he truly is? Are conservative Americans ready to be fed a stream of lies and flip flops again and put their faith in a politician whose tough talking, newly discovered rhetoric does not match his squishy record in office? Are we going to let the media dictate who should be frontrunners once more and who needs to be ignored?
I contend that America is experiencing a conservative re-awakening; a yearning for the years when the sure hand of Ronald Wilson Reagan was steering the ship. And this time, in 2012, the phonies and pretenders, those who helped run the ship off its proper and constitutional course, will be upended by a Reaganite. And that is the way it must be if we are to save this sacred Republic.

POTUS: Why Duncan Hunter is the Right Man - Part 1

Why Duncan Hunter is the Man for POTUS, Part 1

Guest Post By Alexander J. Madison - February 08, 2010

The 2010 elections are right around the corner. All conservatives must work tirelessly to nominate and elect candidates who will not only stop Obama’s socialist agenda dead in it’s tracks, but who will also reverse course on the Republican ‘slow drift’ socialism it has embarked upon since Reagan departed.

Though it may now appear too early to spend much effort lobbying for the right 2012 Presidential candidate, all one needs to do is glance through the headlines to understand that a gaggle of Republican politicians are already lining their coffers and elbowing for a place in the primary.

Examples? Sure.

Tim Pawlenty, governor of Minnesota, has set up his Freedom First PAC and has hired some of President Bush’s old campaign hands to steer him to victory. Yes, the same Tiny Tim who has spent much of his governorship tongue kissing the wacko environmentalists and who stated: “We should not spend time on voices that say climate change is not real” and “We should have listened to President Carter” (about energy policy). Zoinks!!

How about the old Newster? Gingrich is well positioned financially to make a run for the Presidency. He has hinted strongly he will do just that, even proclaiming himself to be considered a “frontrunner”, naturally. If his global warming couch-pimping with Nancy Pelosi wasn’t enough to compel a little bile into the back of conservatives’ throats, then his cross country treks with Education Secretary Arne Duncan and Al Sharpton singing the praises of Obama’s education policy should do the trick.

Mitt Romney has been busy as well, and will no doubt be running. He’s already the favorite of the GOP elite and the “it’s his turn” crowd. Of course, his flip flops are so numerous and spectacular, that he will be made into a Mitt sausage all over again, just like McCain did to him. It would be a miracle if the Obama camp isn’t already secretly shuffling donations his way.

Sarah Palin pretty much erased all doubt about her intention to run during her interview with Fox’s Chris Wallace. With a good percentage of the tea partiers solidly behind her, she could be a formidable force. Unfortunately, her inexperience regarding foreign policy is an Achilles heel, just as it is for Mitt Hucklenty. And she will certainly have to answer for some of the weak tea responses she gave the media as McCain’s VP selection.

Mike Huckabee, former governor of Arkansas, also is making lots of noise and has a Fox TV gig to promote himself. However, his inexplicable record of criminal pardons and commutations as governor once again reared its ugly head in 2009 – this time with 4 dead police officers – and he should seriously rethink his candidacy.

Others that are “maybes” to run include Rick “Vaccine” Perry of Texas (assuming he wins re-election), Lou Dobbs of CNN fame, Haley “Eminent Domain” Barbour, and Libertarians such as former NM governor Gary Johnson and Ron Paul.

With this in mind, it is incumbent upon conservatives to promote a rock-ribbed Reaganite instead. A rock-ribber without a PC bone in his body, who doesn’t moisten his finger or ‘focus group’ to help him determine his views, whose arm does not twist when the Party bosses come calling, and who has a certifiable, undeniable record of domestic and foreign policy conservatism. That man is Duncan Lee Hunter.

While it is true that Hunter, like several others mentioned above, ran for the 2008 nomination, it is also true that the rank and file GOP and independent voters largely wanted nothing to do with a return to conservative principles in 2007 and 2008. The absolute proof of this is that the 2008 frontrunners were named Giuliani, Romney and McCain throughout the entire campaign (with a late surge of panic for Huckabee).

Today is a different day. The guy Glenn Beck and Mike Reagan and Ann Coulter and Michelle Malkin “really liked”, but “couldn’t win” is poised to reap the benefit of Americans finally waking up from their slumber and demanding a return to Constitutional governance and Reaganesque foreign policy. Duncan Hunter is the only likely candidate that comes close to satisfying this demand. But it is up to him and those that know this to get out in front of the train early and spread the word – that America can finish the revolution Reagan started if they support the right man for the job.

Hunter throughout his Congressional career advocated wholesale deletions of Federal departments and agencies such as the Department of Energy, the Department of Education and the NEA. He has an unvarnished record of opposing the drivel coming out of regulatory agencies such as the EPA and OSHA, and has pushed to slash their scope and funding. When asked this past January whether he still advocated getting rid of these dead weights, his response was “Oh absolutely!”

And Mr. Hunter delivered perhaps the finest defense of free market healthcare in the Congressional Record, dating back to the days when Clinton and Co. were pushing their version of socialized medicine. It can be found in it’s entirety at this link:

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-bloggers/2363325/posts

When it comes to amnesty and illegal aliens, even old Tom Tancredo didn’t promote the kind of toughness that Duncan Hunter advocated. That toughness not only included building a double fence separated by a Border Patrol road across all the smuggling corridors on the Mexican border, but insisted on the deportations of all illegal aliens as they are apprehended. A 2007 interview with PBS’s Judy Woodruff sheds light on Mr. Hunter’s unwillingness to bend on illegal Aliens:

JUDY WOODRUFF: You also have been adamant in saying that you think that the illegals, known illegals in this country should be deported. How do you go about finding them?

REP. DUNCAN HUNTER: Well, I think, to some degree, we're like a boat that's got a big hole in it, and we're bailing water furiously. You have to plug the hole in the boat, which means you have to secure the border.

Once you secure the border, we have a deportation system, in fact, for people that say, "You can't deport people by the thousands," we deport thousands of people from this country every month! And if we don't, if we don't adhere to the law, the many people who are here right now, the millions of people who are here right now, who came in illegally after the amnesty of the 1980s, came in after the U.S. Senate, the U.S. House held up a big sign and we said, "This time we really mean it," 1986, I believe. We said, "We really mean it. Nobody else can come in illegally." And folks came in illegally and left tire tracks on those signs.

Regarding foreign policy, Ronald Reagan restored America’s confidence and superpower status after years of drift during the previous RINO and democrat administrations. George W. Bush provided a stop gap after Clinton and the supposed post Soviet Union “peace dividend”, but our nation is in dire need of increasing defense spending once more. Duncan Hunter vows to follow the Reagan model of “Peace through Strength”. Indeed, you can find no stauncher supporter for beefing up our Naval strength, increasing the size of our Army and Marine Corps, and perfecting our missile defense systems. Hunter is also adamant about America leading the world. Especially our adversaries, in space based weaponry, something that President Obama foolishly has vowed not to pursue.

You can be sure of one thing. If Hunter had been nominated last time, he would have wiped the floor with Mr. Obama in the debates, unlike a very stiff and uncertain John McCain. You can be sure of another thing. If Duncan Hunter were president right now, Iran would have already halted its pursuit of nuclear weapons, one way or another. When Hunter stated in an interview last October that “the West must move quickly. I think the United States needs to destroy those facilities”, he meant it. And if Mr. Hunter were now president, the ever bellicose China would be far less bellicose, knowing they had an adversary who would never blink. As Hunter said in the same interview, “the storm on the horizon is clearly China”. This too, he meant.

In summary, the reawakening of the American people to finish the Reagan revolution, to return to the federal government back to its constitutional duties, to restore the confidence of our nation, to checkmate our adversaries, and to jealously protect our sovereignty calls out for a leader of exceptional fortitude and love of country. Duncan Hunter is that man.

(Part 2 will focus on economics and the poison of political correctness – stay tuned)

Duncan Hunter Bonus Interview: Slams Obama Admin over Push for Gays in the Military

Bonus interview, posted by pissant at Free Republic-

AJM: Hello Mr. Hunter. I’m sure you’ve seen the news. Your son, Duncan D., has been getting hammered in the left-wing media and blogs for defending the Military’s Don’t Ask Don’t Tell policy.

DH: Yeah, I’ve noticed that. He must be doing something right (laughs). He’s doing a great job, as evidenced by the frothing attacks from the homosexual lobby, the media and their democrat allies. I talked to Duncan, called him up. Gave him some encouragement and a few ideas. But he’s doing great.

AJM: Have you had a chance to write anything up on this?

DH: No, I’ve been so busy. I haven’t had a chance to write anything on this yet. But I think I may get on the TV out in Texas. I’m going to see my cousin out there, who is real sick. Probably leave tomorrow. But I might be able to do a television interview out there on this.

AJM: Can you briefly summarize what your thoughts on this are?

DH: Well, I think that it’s disgraceful! It’s insulting that after nine years of our guys in uniform being deployed in inconvenient and dangerous places fighting for this country, for the Obama Administration to be prying this back open now. Especially from a President who has very limited knowledge of military life and who looks to socialist countries for ideas.

Now with Colin Powell on their side, they are going to really try to push this thing. The military leaders supporting the Administration seemed to have forgotten what the mission is. It isn’t social experiments to please the liberal democrats. I think it’s a real tragedy for these leaders to go along with this nutty idea.

No one talks about the absolute invasion of privacy. For these young men and women to have to be in extremely close quarters, shower with, live with essentially, people that will have a sexual attraction to them. That is unacceptable.

Most kids that join the military make a decision in conjunction with their families. And they do so, often times, because of its wholesome reputation and support of the traditional, conservative values that these young men and women and their families hold. It would be very detrimental to let a group of leftwing activists destroy that.

They are pushing this without thinking through its effects on National security. And affecting a National Security issue with a political decision is generally damaging. And this attempt by the Obama Administration to re-open this question and re-force this question is in that category.

I know that we did a lot of work, a lot of research when Bill Clinton tried to pay off his campaign contributors in the homosexual community in 1992 by opening up the military to their ranks. I know the enormous amount of research we did, the enormous amount of testimony we elicited in the Republican Research Committee during the hearings we held on it.

AJM: The big argument they are making that I’ve seen time and again, including from Mr. Kerry, who attacked your son, Senator Kerry that is, is that “times have changed” and it’s time now has finally come. How do you respond to that argument, that times have changed?

DH: His answers may change, but values haven’t!

But listen, I’ve got to walk in the door and meet some guys. That ought to give you plenty of ammo for now.

AJM: Absolutely. Thanks again and have a great rest of the day.

Duncan Hunter Interview 1-28-2010 On Obama's "Socialism With A Smile" Speech and More

DH: Hey, Jim, go ahead there friend.

AJM: Sounds like you were doing a little banking.

DH: Yeah, I‘m here on good old North Island. I’m getting a little money for my seed here.

AJM: Do you need my address?

DH: (laughs) Like I said it’s seed money, not feed money.

AJM: (laughs) OK. Well I guess since this is still relatively fresh in your mind, do you want to give your two cents on Obama’s speech?

DH: Yeah, I think the speech last night was classic Obama; and that is socialism with a smile. Apparently, he is not going to listen to the American people, including many people who voted for him in the last election, who don’t want to turn healthcare over to the Post Office. And he’s going to continue to try to socialize, basically, one sixth of the economy.

He also spent an inordinate amount of time blaming the previous administration for his problems. He spoke of inheriting the storm and how he’s gotten us through it. But almost every area he went into he compared himself to the previous administration. And I’m reminded of the fact that probably George Washington was the only American president that didn’t blame all of his problems on the previous administration. But this guy went overboard!!

He was fixated on the Bush Administration. And you can tell that the staff folks who wrote his speech for this thing had a few gaps in their research. For example, he said that they’ve killed, America killed, more Al Qaeda in 2009 than we did in 2008, before he came in. He made that point. Well, that’s true, and the reason is that we won the Iraq War that he attempted to retreat from. We won it in 2008, and the attacks on Americans and civilians in Iraq went down over 90%. The Iraq government matured, their military matured, the war is over and we won it! In 2007, we killed an enormous number of Al Qaeda and destroyed their ability there to attack in force. So obviously the number of Al Qaeda went down because there was no longer a center of gravity in the Al Qaeda organization left to confront the Americans in on the battlefield for much of 2008. And now, in 2009, the Al Qaeda in Afghanistan have flared up, and there is more confrontation and there is more fighting. And as a result we are killing more of them.

But the fact that the Al Qaeda numbers, their casualties, went down in 2008 is a direct result of a successful policy, that is the surge, that Obama foolishly opposed. In other words, not something he should brag about!

AJM: It was spin city in that chamber last night.

DH: He’s like a new sheriff in town claiming he’s gunning down more cowboys now than “Bat” Masterson did in his days. Bat Masterson had cleaned out the entire town.

AJM: (laughs)

DH: That’s what we did with Iraq.

Another thing Obama did which I thought really disserved everybody that has worn the uniform for the United States in Iraq, he said: “Make no mistake, we’re coming home”. He refuses to acknowledge that we’ve won, because he was against the war.

That’s a slap in the face to everybody that’s served over there, because we’ve clearly won in Iraq, by any metric. We stood up a government which is a representative form of government. It’s held. The 1st Iraqi Division has not taken a backwards step since before 2008. They went into Basra and soundly defeated Al Sadr’s guys. They then moved into surrounding areas in southern Iraq like Amarah, cleaned him out there. Then they marched on Sadr City, 4 battalions abreast, cleaned out the Mahdi Army that Al Sadr was leading. The Marines in Anbar province, in the big difficult, dangerous western province, cleaned out Al Qaeda and made a partnership with the Sunni community, which turned on Al Qaeda and helped the Americans in cleaning out Al Qaeda in western Iraq.

So the Iraqi military is stood up, the government is stood up. It’s legislating. It’s casting votes and solving their problems with ballots, not bullets. The Americans are packing up and leaving. I’ve got a son in Iraq right now, they are mopping up, they are packing up. US casualties are extremely low. In fact, I’d wager there were more Americans killed in Obama’s hometown in December than were killed in Iraq.

So we’ve won in Iraq, and Obama refused to acknowledge it, because it’s not politically expedient for him to acknowledge that these great young Americans carried the battle to the enemy and produced a victory for the United States! And it is probably, arguably, the most important victory for our country since Korea. And he won’t acknowledge it.

So I thought that that was something that should disturb the entire community of American veterans and their families.

AJM: And he had the gall to preface his remarks on Defense by saying how all Americans should “honor” the troops, not only when they go out to war but when they come home.

DH: Yeah, he used what I call the “Victim Strategy”. That is, all liberals are happy to announce that people who served their country in uniform are “victims”, and that they are going to take care of them.

Alan Cranston, former Senator Alan Cranston - now the late Alan Cranston - who represented California, was a conscientious objector in World War II. And he became, by his leftist notions, the greatest advocate for the veterans. Treating the veterans like victims is the answer for anti-war liberals.

The best thing you could do for veterans is to acknowledge that they’ve won, that they accomplished something, that their lives and sacrifices have value, and what they gave to the United States has great value!

AJM: Yeah, it’s amazing. Did you catch his slap at the Supreme Court over McCain Feingold?

DH: Yeah, I didn’t see it, so I didn’t pay too much attention to that. I thought the other big thing was his announcement that he was going to continue to try to socialize healthcare.

But one other thing on the security front. He gave an extremely weak statement on Iran. Iran is now committed to developing nuclear weapons. And they are refining uranium at the Qoms, at the 2nd site. When they get the uranium refined approximately to the 5 percent level, even though that is far below the 90% that you are supposed to need to make a nuclear weapon, that actually manifests an accomplishment that represents most of the work that goes into refining uranium. You’ve now made it much more difficult for somebody who wants to knock your program out, to eliminate the program, because the large facilities which are big targets, like Natanz, aren’t needed to take the uranium from 5% to 70, 80, or 90%. So the big targets are going by right now. It’s going to be much more difficult in the shooting gallery to find and destroy the small targets, especially if they are deeply buried.

So the President squawked about increasing consequences for Iran, but Iran is not suffering any consequences right now to the degree that they will be deterred from producing a nuclear weapon. So on the Security front, Obama was very, very weak on Iran.

And lastly, he failed to take on China. It’s been a mistake for both Democrat and Republican Administrations. China is still cheating on trade. They are taking the life blood out of the industrial base of this country, which is taking the good wages and good jobs of the middle class that underpins the housing industry in this country, a major segment of our economy.

AJM: One of the reasons he’s not going to be particularly or even mildly bellicose to the Chinese is that he has to fund all of his trillion dollar spending sprees, he needs them to keep buying the securities.

DH: Well, I think that’s the argument made to almost every president. The point is, if you really believe in that argument, and you believe that the red Chinese have an enormous amount of leverage over the United States right now, then by allowing them to continue this drag on the American industrial base you are agreeing to them INCREASING leverage over the United States in the coming decades! Meaning it is going to get much worse, and that China will continue to become an industrial powerhouse, that they will continue to accumulate American assets. And they’ll spend a great deal of those assets on a war machine, which they are building right now!

The Department of Defense’s publication on China’s military power reflects every year increasing military capability that will make it more and more difficult for the United States to carry out what it considers to be the proper foreign policy options in that part of the world.

So by saying “they’ve have a hold on us, they’ve got us by the shorthairs, they’ve got leverage on us, therefore we’re going to allow them to continue to extract America’s industrial base, and build up theirs while weakening ours” is essentially conceding the future to communist China. That’s what Obama is doing. I reject that. I think that’s a huge mistake.

AJM: I do too. And Congressman this is one of the main reasons, one of many I would say, that you have my support. Because you were the only one, the only one in a long time – I think Henry Hyde was a congressman that sided with you on this issue in terms of the future with China – but you’ve been harping on this for a good fifteen, twenty years. And you were the only one to run on that platform in the 2008 race. What you warned about in the early nineties and mid nineties has come to pass. And you’re right, it’s a situation that we need to extract ourselves from, not exacerbate.

DH: Yeah.

Anyway, that’s my take on the speech. So don’t put me down as “undecided” (laughs)

AJM: (laughing) I certainly won’t. Speaking of China, the Obama administration has agreed to sell Taiwan the package of armaments that the Bush Administration agreed on, with the exception of the advanced F-16 fighters. In the article that I read it said we didn’t want to sell them the advanced F-16 fighters because China said “no”. What is your take on the Taiwan situation, and how would you advise, how would you recommend that we treat Taiwan? It seems like a bastard child right now, and I think that is extremely unwise.

DH: Well I don’t think you need me for that discussion. (laughs)

AJM: (laughing) Well, I want your ideas, that’s my 2 cents on it but I ….

DH: I agree with you! (laughs)

But here’s what I’d say. To effectively blunt a Chinese assault on Taiwan, the Taiwanese department of defense needs what I would call ‘distributive fire’. That means they need to have ability on a sustained basis to take out platforms that are crossing the Taiwan Straights. That is naval platforms. And at the same time to handle incoming medium range ballistic missiles and ship fired missiles.

Now the reason they need to have distributive fires is because China is putting together a fairly effective air force. They’ve been watching the United States ‘knock down the door’ in theatres like Iraq and Afghanistan, but especially Iraq, where you go in and take out the anti-air capabilities of the country you are hitting. Then you can go in and work your will with superior air power. So the Taiwanese need to have survivable, distributive fires, meaning they can handle wave after wave of attacking aircraft coming over from mainland China.

I haven’t looked at the package proposed, to see whether or not that can happen, if they can handle that. They can’t do it simply with fighter aircraft. And China has an anti-air missile capability which is becoming increasingly sophisticated, which will be effective against a lot of the tactical aircraft the world has and the United States has. So without looking at that package, it’s hard to tell whether or not it is essentially symbolism involved. But I would say anything the Taiwanese do to build up their defenses is good. Whether or not it is sufficient to handle growing capability of China to cross the straights of Taiwan is questionable, at best.

AJM: What about this notion of not selling them particular items because of China’s protests?

DH: If we really want to defend Taiwan, obviously we should deliver to them what it takes to defend them. I don’t know what other systems we can give, but we don’t give our most advanced F-16s to anybody. There are some American components of F-16s that we hold back from everybody. There’s some high end equipment that we don’t want anybody to get their hands on. So you have plain vanilla F-16s, you’ve got some that are somewhat sophisticated, and then you’ve got some that are extremely ‘high end’. Without looking at the particular equipment package, I can’t give you a real good answer on whether or not we are giving Taiwan the right thing. Obviously, we need to give to Taiwan what it takes – or we need to sell to Taiwan, they need to pay for it. They haven’t been spending much of their Gross National Product on defense, which doesn’t make a lot of sense to me, because they are an industrial powerhouse.

But they need to build the ability to maintain distributive fires that are survivable and effective against aircraft, missiles and naval vessels.

AJM: And are we not, with the Taiwan Relations Act, committed to helping defend them, not only with weapons sales but with our miltary?

DH: Well, certainly. Obviously, the Obama administration is parsing the term ‘defense’. They are giving them something, while trying not to upset the Chinese.

And I simply haven’t looked at the package to be able to tell you that even if they gave them the more sophisticated F-16s, that’s going to do the trick. Because I’ve looked at Taiwan’s armaments and their military force structure, and China is advancing so rapidly. Chins is building roughly 100 medium range ballistic missiles a year, many which are being staged in the Taiwan area. Now whether they get early on, to what I would call the point of being able to overwhelm Taiwan’s defensive systems, that’s a question that requires more analysis.

AJM: But the Hunter Doctrine is: We give them what it takes to beat back the chicoms?

DH: Yes. If we really want to defend Taiwan, and I believe we need to help Taiwan defend itself, they should have the equipment that is necessary to defend against a burgeoning defense capability in communist china.

Listen, I’m just about ready to go into a canyon. So I’ll have to sign off.

And in answer to your question, I think Obama gave a great ‘Socialism with a Smile’ speech. (laughs)

AJM: Good enough. Have a great day.

DH: Same here, Jim. How’s your weather up there, you guys getting any rain?

AJM: It looks like it’s coming in now. We should get some more snow pack in the mountains. We need it.

DH: OK. Looking good. Thanks for calling.

America Rising Video

Duncan Hunter Interview – 1/21/2010: Mass. Miracle, Obama, Cheney, Jobs, McCain-Feingold & More!

This is part 10 of an ongoing series of conversations with former Congressman and conservative icon Duncan Hunter. Hunter has agreed to do a series of free wheeling interviews to ensure that the conservative point of view is given voice as we try to move the Republican Party and the country in a pro-American, pro-constitutional direction; a return to our roots, if you will. In addition to being involved in recruiting and fundraising for a number of hawkish, conservative congressional candidates, Hunter is attempting to re-invigorate the GOP and re-establish the Reagan, pro-military, small government ideals.

DH: Hello, Jim you there?

AJM: Yes sir, this is Jim.

DH: OK. Duncan Here. How’s it going?

AJM: Good, Good. We have Gloria from Ohio here on the line.

DH: Good. Hi Gloria.

GW: Hi, how are you?

DH: I’m doing good. I’ve got my two little granddaughters here, they have now got the fire ready to go. They built a little house in the fire place. Now we’re going to light it.

{To his granddaughters: Ok, grab my hand dear. Ok c’mon. No, you light it right there sweetie. Put your hand over here. Grab Grandpa’s hand. Grab grandpa’s hand right there. Ok now we’re going to light it. That’s good}.

OK guys, well listen, what’s new?

AJM: Well, I missed you last week. Of course we are on no particular schedule. But unfortunately I was skiing in Sun Valley, Idaho.

DH: Well that’s not bad. I’m going to do an event up there in Couer d’Alane at the end {throw that in sissy} at the end of February for the Republican Party for Vaughn Ward. He’s the Marine company commander now running for that congressional seat. I think it’s against Minnick.

AJM: Yes, that’s correct.

DH: You might want to run on up there, Jim.

AJM: Couer d’Alene is not that far either, right on the other side of the Washington border. Do you know when that’s going to be?

DH: It’s right at the end of February. You need to talk to the Republicans in Couer d’Alene, they’ll know the date.

AJM: OK. Is your brother involved in this too?

DH: Well, I just called him and told him to try and get up there too. I think he’ll try to get up and make it.

AJM: Well I have no qualms with that whatsoever. I might have to hit a ski area or two on the way back.

DH: Well, we’re thinking about catching some steelhead, so we’re of the same mindset. {drop that sissy, just drop it. You can’t just hold on to it}

AJM: Who joined the call? Is that Lynn?

LD: Yes. Hi Congressman Hunter

DH: Hi, how are you doing?

LD: Good. You?

DH: Doing great. I’ve got two little granddaughters here and they helped grandpa make a fire.

LD: How awesome.

DH: We’re working away {put it right there at the edge there, sis}

So anything new happen?

AJM: Well, we always got to report the news to you, you know that (laughs). I’d like to start off with what your take is on the victory in Massachusetts for Ted Kennedy’s former seat….

DH: It shows that God has a sense of humor!

All: (laughs)

DH: When He was thinking “now which Senate seat shall I give to the Republicans? I think I’ll give them Teddy Kennedy’s seat”.

All: (laughing)

AJM: Were you surprised? What do you think it portends for the upcoming elections?

DH: Well, I think the rule of thumb for politics is that truth is always stranger than fiction. So you have to always expect the unexpected. They have a 3 to 1 democrat versus republican registration, but a ton of independents, which was the key dynamic here.

But I think it shows that even folks from Massachusetts don’t like the idea of socialism! I think they harken back to lots of grim faced old WWII soldiers, Navy personnel, and Marines who fought in some of those horrendous battles, followed by lots of ongoing generations who fought in other tough places around the world to keep this country free. And the idea of giving away that freedom through Obama’s socialistic agenda was repugnant to most Americans, and I think, to a lot of liberals. I think there are a lot of liberals who in their hearts don’t believe in socialism. And they’ve watched the miracle of freedom and capitalism and I think that Americans don’t want to give that up. Even in Massachusetts they don’t want to give that up.

AJM: I think you might be right. Do you watch Glenn Beck’s show much, Congressman?

DH: Not much. Every now and again. But I don’t watch too much TV.

AJM: I don’t blame you.

DH: I like Glenn Beck. He was great to me in the presidential race. I like him. He gave me an hour on his show.

LD: I saw that!

DH: I appreciate Glenn Beck.

AJM: One of the things he likes to mention is the difference between your typical liberal democrats and the ‘progressives’ – the true believers in socialism and Marxism – and he likes to differentiate between those two. What camp do you believe that the Obama folks are in? Are they just typical liberal democrats or are they…..

DH: The latter. I think Obama, because of his background….everything Obama has ever had in life came from government. And I think his experience in life has revolved around radicals and government. And that’s what he believes in. And in the end, people tend to revolve back, to go back to their roots.

And I think Obama is a machine politician. And I think that’s why he had no problems in getting tough with Ben Nelson, and threatening to take things away from him. I think the American people were upset when Nelson, as I understand, it was threatened that the Obama Administration would take away the Strategic Operations Center from Nebraska, which is a national security issue. And that was treated by the Democrat leadership and Obama as a piece of cheese. I think that, to some degree, reflected the character, or lack thereof, of the Administration.

AJM: Yeah. And Nelson, if I’m not mistaken, is one of the more ‘moderate’ Democrats. They had to do some arm twisting somehow, I guess.

DH: My point is, if you really believe in machine politics and machine government, in a leftwing government-heavy administration, that is a classic approach. To simply threaten or cajole people until you get what you want.

AJM: That’s the Chicago way.

DH: There it is.

ALL: (laughs)

DH: I was in congress for 28 years. I never once called up the Whitehouse and told them I wanted something for a vote. Or that I would change my mind if I got something. You need to do what you think is right and let the chips fall where they may. If you are trying to work for a project in your district, you try to work for it on the merits. But the Chicago way is to bully and to intimidate and entreaty until you get your way. And I think that took a little bit of the shine off the Obama Administration’s claim to this “new direction” in American politics.

AJM: Post-partisanship!

DH: In the end, they reverted back to what you do with a ward precinct captain if he doesn’t go along with you. Beat him up. (laughs) They treated Ben Nelson like an expanded version of a recalcitrant Chicago precinct captain.

AJM: That’s great. When you mentioned your record of not bending to the chicanery of whatever administration…

DH: Not necessarily chicanery, but you go to DC to vote for what you think is right for your country, and if you really believe in exercising democracy in its proper way, you vote for things on their merits.

AJM: I agree. But I remember back in 2004, I believe Newsweek wrote an article about you entitled: Duncan Hunter’s Arm Does Not Twist. And it was an article talking about Cheney trying to cajole you into voting for something or another – I can’t even remember what the subject matter was right now….

DH: I think that was the Intel Bill, that tried to take away the assets of Defense related intelligence and move it over into this new intelligence reform package where Department of Defense would be responsible for a lot of our intel apparatus, but wouldn’t have the budget that funds that apparatus. And would not be in control of all of our intelligence assets in a war theatre.

What that means is if you had a rivet joint aircraft or an intelligence aircraft working in the Iraq theatre and the combatant commander said “we need that piece of equipment over Falluja right now because the Marines are in a heavy firefight”, one of our intelligence agencies might control that equipment and they’d have to get the OK from Washington before they could use it to support American soldiers in battle. You can’t do that in a war.

So what I think we did there, I insisted on maintaining the chain of control of our assets in theatre. And I think that accrues to the benefit of our soldiers, not only in Iraq, but in Afghanistan as well.

Obviously, there are a lot of intelligence assets that are key to our war fighting in particular battles. {OK kids that’s enough. No, we have to save the rest of it for the next fire. You’ve got plenty.}

ALL: (Laughing)

DH: They are using up all my fire starting material. They are not that good of Boy Scouts (laughs).

AJM: In that Newsweek piece, I think the author was amazed that you, at the height of Bush and Cheney’s popularity, that you were able to back them down.

DH: Well, I didn’t back them down. I simply refused to do what the Administration wanted. That was signing off on the intelligence bill. General Myers, former chairmen of the Joint Chiefs, has an excerpt about that in his book, Eyes on the Horizon. I just saw it last night, that incident.

AJM: Coincidence. Interesting. I’m kind of going off on a tangent here, but since we brought up Cheney, and he was the one trying to do some of the arm twisting…

DH: Except he wasn’t twisting arms in this sense: Cheney didn’t say “we are going to do this for you if you go along with it”. Cheney argued it on its merits.

AJM: No, but he still obviously didn’t convince you. (laughs)

DH: Yeah.

AJM: But I just wanted to know what your relationship with Dick Cheney is. You’ve known him a long time. What do you think about him, and what do you think about his recent, pretty candid remarks against some of the Obama Administration’s policies?

DH: Yeah. I like Dick Cheney. I think he viewed his role as Vice President as focusing primarily on security issues, which I think is a key thing, especially when you are in an administration which is involved in two wars. So I think Cheney was the right man at the right time. And he’s a good friend, and I think a guy with a realistic and pragmatic view of the world.

And I think the Obama people are beginning to understand the real world to some degree now. Mr. Obama was very popular with the Europeans, but you noticed they haven’t sent a single additional soldier into the battle zones. The Germans still won’t leave the fort at night under their rules in Afghanistan and the French refuse to go where there is any fighting. Outside of that, they are prepared to be with us all the way.

ALL: (Laughing)

LD: Right behind us.

DH: They are right behind us…..about 450 kilometers. (laughs)

AJM: Regarding Cheney’s recent criticisms of Obama…

DH: I think those were very appropriate. In fact, I think it actually helps the country and it may help the Obama Administration to some degree for this reason: The Obama Administration doesn’t have a weather vane, or a compass with respect to national security. Maybe Jim Jones, a former Marine, is going to provide some leadership there. But generally speaking, across the board they have very few people capable of focusing on security, with a background in that important area. So Cheney’s remarks on security issues are a little bit of a compass for the Obama Administration. They are forced to respond to his statements. That makes them think. That makes them consult with each other. It forces an analysis, and I think that’s good.

AJM: Yeah. One of the interesting things that I read about that Massachusetts victory for Mr. Brown, Scott Brown, was that one of the things he focused on quite heavily during his stump speeches was the fact that our tax dollars need to be going to fighting the terrorists as opposed to paying for their lawyers. And that resonated even in Massachusetts.

DH: Yeah. I think that makes some sense. You know, if anything, the fact that we had a number of the people from Guantanamo that we released, the military released, go back to the battleground and take up arms against us is evidence that we have been too lenient.

AJM: It was not just one or two either. It’s been a handful.

DH: Yeah, I think it’s been more than a dozen. A couple of them have been killed. Some have been captured.

AJM: And then what do you do with them again?

LD: For God sakes, don’t give them a bloody nose.

DH: Obviously, they need a new trial according to the liberals.

ALL: (laughing)

AJM: OK, I’m going to switch gears on you. On some other breaking news of the day. That is the Supreme Court today, at least I think it was today, or last night, finally overturned the majority of McCain Feingold, the campaign finance reform. It was a 5-4 vote, nonetheless they gutted the whole idea that corporations and other groups couldn’t spend their money the way they saw fit for elections. I know you opposed it when it came out, and I wonder if you’d like to comment on it now?

DH: I haven’t seen the opinion. And McCain Feingold was pretty complicated. So I’d have to take a look at the written opinion by the Supreme Court. I haven’t had a chance to look at it yet. I at least have to have a chance to look at the summary of their opinion.

AJM: Ok. We’ll get you on that one next time. Regardless, it is at least being reported – and I haven’t read the opinion yet either – as having substantially overturned McCain Feingold. You did oppose it back in its day, I do know that.

DH: One of the many problems with McCain Feingold, aside from its legality, was using 527s, the leftwingers could absolutely inundate conservative candidates. During one election cycle, they spent in excess of 100 million against conservative candidates, and the Republican 527s were something like 20 million. It became a huge funnel for leftwing money to go after Republicans who themselves were somewhat hamstrung by spending limits to individuals. So you ended up with massively financed negative campaigns. And I’m thinking of Richard Pombo’s district that Pombo lost, was one in which I believe the lefty 527s went well over a million bucks against him. You’d have to look up the exact numbers to ascertain that.

AJM: Yeah. Aside from the practical aspects of kind of a unilateral disarmament on the right, it apparently is deemed now at least partially unconstitutional. I think it is always a good thing to review laws such as that, that deal with speech.

DH: Yeah, I think so. But anyway, I’d have to look at the written opinion by the Supreme Court to really have a good take on exactly what they’ve done with McCain-Feingold.

LD: It was bad enough for Pelosi to put out a statement.

DH: (laughs) That’s a good indicator!

LD: Yes it is!

DH: They are coming our way!

ALL: (laughing)

DH: The Democrats fought ferociously to keep 527s at full steam. Anything attempting to reform the 527s, which were literally allowing foreign entities to come in and pump lots of money into the US system.

AJM: And George Soros financed about a dozen of them.

DH: Yeah, and any attempt to reform that was beaten back by the Democrats. In fact those were the days of a Republican majority, the filibuster was threatened in the Senate if we even thought about attaching that to a major bill that was going through.

AJM: Yeah. I believe the first challenge to its constitutionality, before the court was reformed by George W Bush, with Alito and um – what’s his name ---

ALL: Roberts

AJM: Yeah, Roberts – was a 5-4 decision the other way to sustain McCain Feingold. And Mr. Fred Thompson who was very involved in that legislation for many years, actually argued in front of the Supreme Court to keep it, to argue that it was good law. I don’t know if you remember that?

DH: No, I don’t.

AJM: Well he did. I’m glad to see it gone. But we’ll let you get up to speed on the actual verbiage.

DH: Well you ought to also (laughs). It’s probably a 500 page opinion. So get ready, and get your reading glasses on!

AJM: (laughs) Yeah. All I know is that when I read McCain Feingold it was bad law. And anything that goes to the point of overturning it is fine with me.

DH: Yeah.

AJM: OK. Another thing that happened in the news today, the jobless claims rose, quote-unquote,“unexpectedly”, to the highest level in several months. New jobless claims. Indicating even to the liberal press that this so-called recovery is a lot less than meets the eye.

What would you do, what would you recommend to the Republicans to campaign upon, or even to the Obama Administration to push, to actually turn this economy around? Right now it does not look like it is turning very fast, if at all.

DH: Retrieve at least a small part of the production lines that served this country’s consumers to our own country. Make a few things in America. We’ve moved our assembly lines off shore. The base of this economy is a middle class guy who can make enough money - and manufacturing has always been a high wage industry – who can make enough money to make that mortgage payment, to buy that car, and to do the other things that are part of the American Dream. We’ve allowed China to cheat on trade, along with a lot of other countries, with their Value Added Tax, which for practical purposes is a de facto tariff on American products and an illegal subsidy to foreign made products.

And we’ve allowed that dynamic to maintain in such a way that a large part of the American manufacturing base has gone off shore.

So the American that drives his Toyota to his house, watches his Sony television, puts on his Malaysian made clothes, then wonders why his kid doesn’t have a job, doesn’t have to look to far. And that’s’ why the housing was the last – you know ‘housing’ is manufacturing, writ large. In fact a house is referred to by national homebuilders – they call their houses “products”, they don’t call them homes. They are a big manufactured product which is still made mostly in this country and that’s why the housing boom carried the economy, the US economy, for as long as it did. It’s big manufacturing. One of the last segments of manufacturing that other countries haven’t learned to exploit. China hasn’t learned yet how to make a home in such a way that they can ship it over to the US and crane it onto a lot.

But the ripples, the economic ripples, that a healthy manufacturing, a healthy homebuilding industry sends to the economy of the community that it is sited in is evidence of how important manufacturing is to this country. And how much of it we let slip away. So until we make our own products, and retrieve some of that manufacturing base, the jobs that millions of Americans have depended on in the past to be able to afford that mortgage and afford those other things we provide for them, it’s a grim picture.

AJM: Yeah, and during the campaign…

DH: And it’s been an Achilles heel for the Republican Party. But it seems the Democrats have drunk the ‘free trade’ kool-aid also. The Hunter-Ryan bill was a bill that would have punished China or at least given the President the ability to punish China for illegal devaluation of its currency. It was promised by the Democrat leadership to be front and center when they took control. After a couple of Wall Street fundraisers, it seems to have faded into oblivion.

It’s because there are a lot of companies, which are American companies, whose manufacturing is now sited in China, who appreciate the benefit of the subsidies that China’s currency devaluation and their VAT rebate gives to them.

AJM: And during the campaign, if I’m not mistaken – obviously it’s tough to browbeat other countries into doing something – you had solutions for what we could do on our side. One of them as I recall was the elimination of taxes on US manufacturers. You still believe in that? And what other things can we do internally to stimulate….

DH: Eliminating taxes on manufacturing would actually create substantially more tax receipts, more revenue for the American government because workers would be making more wages and pay withholding tax, and economies would be stimulated and jobs and communities would be roaring back.

What we ought to have with respect to trade, one thing I offered is what I call “mirror trade”. For example, China has a 17% Value Added Tax. That means if the telephone you’re holding right now and talking into cost $100 to make and its made in China, that company in China, instead of paying corporate taxes and income taxes and other business taxes, pays the government of China 17% Value Added Tax. A hundred dollar cost of that phone you are talking into includes $17 paid to the Chinese government. When that phone is taken down to the docks to be shipped to Washington State, to be sold in one of your stores, the Chinese government rebates $17. That is they give the tax money back to the exporter, because they are sending it to America. So they subsidize it to the tune of 17 bucks. So they now have only $83 in that 100 dollar phone. And if you make that same phone in Washington State, and export it to China, when that phone hits their docks, the Chinese government charges you a penalty of $17, 17 percent. The Washington State manufactured phone is now $117, while the one made in China and sent to you has now gone down to $83. So you’ve got a 34 point spread and the opening kickoff hasn’t even taken place yet in this international competition.

That Value Added Tax rebate was a loophole. It was described by one Senate Staff report, back in the old days when we agreed to the General Agreement on Tariffs and Trade, as one of the biggest blunders in American negotiating history! There was only a few countries in the world at that time that had VAT taxes. Now, 132 of them have VAT taxes and they are upwards of 12 to 20 percent. And that amounts to an illegal subsidy for foreign based manufacturing, and a penalty, a de facto tariff on every product the United States manufactures and sells abroad. That’s why even countries that have higher labor rates than the United States, like Germany, have a trade surplus over the US.

AJM. Yeah. And for a country like China, which has a much, much lower labor rate, that’s even more poison in the well.

DH: You’d think the country with the highest labor rate, ie the US vis a vis China, would have the tax advantage. But interestingly, China has the lower labor rate, but they also scratched out this tax advantage, the VAT, and they manipulate their currency. So they have a triple play going in their direction.

Along with that you have US governments which do not understand that it is important to be friendly to business! In some of these States, the policy seems to be the ‘the beatings will continue until moral improves’.

ALL: (laughing)

DH: So you have…I remember when one of our big companies left San Diego and went to Arizona and the Democrat Mayor of San Diego told them that she was going to sue them if they left. And they said “you’ve now just explained why we are leaving”, and they left.

ALL: (laughing)

DH: And so being friendly to business, having low taxes, and doing everything you can to allow business to come in and operate, not overlaying the business structure with a punitive legal and regulatory system that is predicated on a massive extraction of dollars; those things are important in maintaining an economy where the average guy, without a PHD, can get a job that allows him to make mortgage payments, send his kids to college, buy a car, and do the things that constitute the American Dream.

And we are pushing manufacturing offshore. With that we are pushing off the dreams of the next generation.

AJM: I hear you. Obviously, it would take some time to adjust the WTO or get out of the WTO, don’t you think just in taxes and regulations, as you just described, we can make a big dent in the exodus of manufacturing?

DH: Absolutely. And it’s been proiven over and over and over. As I recall, but you’d have to check the facts on this, Ireland at one point decided to attract manufacturing, and eased up on their tax code and did things that made them much more business friendly, and was able to attract and revitalize their manufacturing industries.

This in not a secret. But it is something that the nature of government is to extend its power through its programs and bureaucracies, with its deliverance of so-called benefits to people. And by extracting money from the producers to finance those benefits. And it is very difficult to make some of these salmon swim upstream. Because the current of big government is always to accumulate power and that is manifested in its attempts to increase revenues.

LD: Up to a point. There comes a point where it all collapses, I would think.

DH: Listen, at one time – this is legendary – but legend has it that at one time Great Britain had a 95% tax bracket for some people. And the key is that those people simply left the country. And legend further says that they never actually collected a single dime under the 95% tax bracket. So you can pluck the golden goose til there’s no feathers left.

And that was the whole point of the Laffer Curve; it was the idea that if you continue to beat the prisoner – business – at some point they are going to stop producing.

GW: Yes, yes.

AJM: And you see that in the United States, where the low regulation – some of the southern states that have much lower regulation or regulatory burden compared to some of the more “enlightened” states.

DH: Yeah. That’s right. Well now listen, my little granddaughters – we’ve now built a fire. One of them has a shield and a sword, and the other one wants me to make Indian moccasins. I’m going to have to sign off here. (laughs)

ALL: (laughing)

AJM: OK, can I ask you one last quick question?

DH: Absolutely. Here we go.

AJM: This one’s quick. You have a Senate race, a Senate primary out there in California with Chuck DeVore versus Carly Fiorina. And I’m wondering, have you made an endorsement, and are you planning on making an endorsement??

DH: No. I haven’t made any endorsement. I haven’t even looked at the race. But we’ll do that and try to get up to speed on it. But, I haven’t yet, no. We got a long time before the California primary. {no, don’t draw on that}. I’ve got a granddaughter who is drawing on the wrong side of this leather.

LD: They’ll burn the house down while they are at it too. (laughs)

DH: (laughing) He, this is great time. I’m in my elk room right now. We’ve got these big elk heads on the wall. And they’ve represented a lot of meat, let me tell you.

AJM: Hey, when you went up to Idaho, or was it Colorado, where you got your elk, did you bring that home?

DH: Oh yeah. Yeah. We brought home the meat and we brought home the horns. So the Hunters will continue to eat well this winter.

ALL: (laughing)

AJM: OK. We’ll let you go. Take care of those kids. Are you doing duty by yourself or is Lynne home too?

DH: OK, great. Right now I think I’m isolated with a couple of wild Indians.

ALL: (Laughing)

AJM: OK, thank you very much.

DH: Great talking to you guys. Hope you are all doing well. Hope your families are doing well.

ALL: Thank you!

DH: OK. And God Bless Massachussetts!!

ALL: (Laughing) Amen!