THIS is what EVERY Democrat represents - no matter how "reasonable" a person they seem to be. Just look at the results of President Biden, Chuck Schumer, Nancy Pelosi, and virtually every Democrat in power - including every Congressperson. And don't forget about Democrats like Texas Governor candidate Beto O'Rourke and Harris County Judge Lina Hidalgo. In Arizona, Mark Kelly who ran as a moderate but votes 94% of the time with Democrats. Mark Kelly = Joe Biden. Beto and Lina Hidalgo = woke insanity.

This is a different America than we had 20, 10, or even 1 year ago. And the main reason is a Leftist "long march through the institutions," (Christopher Rufo) and a long strategy grounded in communism and socialism which has overtaken the Democrat party, big business, education, culture, law, and even medicine. Think about it. This is not the America we could have imagined even a few years ago.

Conrad Black sums up the RESULTS of Leftist Democrat policies:

"A disastrous and shaming flight from Afghanistan is described by President Joe Biden as 'a triumphant success,' while Dr. Anthony Fauci retires with dignity after doing terrible damage to the country with his nonsense about shutting schools, 'droplets,' the ups and downs of masking, the 'abolition of hand-shakes'-almost all of it now thoroughly discredited."

"Six years ago, no one could have imagined that these outrages would have occurred, much less that they would be accepted by a bedraggled, degraded, demoralized United States, its federal government in the hands of lawless and authoritarian myth-makers, applauded by the complicit national political media. Can this be America?"

What will your kids and grandkids experience if we keep putting Democrats in power?

It will only get worse.

That's why a return to Constitutional Americanism is the only way to restore sanity, dignity, productivity, and hope to America.

And the surest way there is to elect Republicans (no matter how flawed one may be) to replace the destructive RESULTS of Democrats (no matter how nice one may seem).

This article was published at AZ Free News, and is reproduced with permission.

TCR Comment: This comes from a sister publication the AZ Free News authored by Kim Miller.

Are you fed up? Are you worried that America is rapidly sliding into a neo-Marxist state by the radical left in control of Washington with historically narrow majorities in the U.S. House and Senate and an Executive controlled by unnamed far leftists in place of a clinically incompetent President Biden? They are desperate to keep power and complete their radical progressive agenda that will change America and our liberty forever.

Americans just witnessed the passage of the Inflation Reduction Act of 2022 without one Republican vote in the U.S. Senate and House (Just as Obamacare was passed in 2010). The IRS will be hiring 87,000 new agents, many armed, to terrorize American taxpayers.

Americans witnessed the FBI raid at the Trump Mar-A-Lago home and property of President Trump, truly a first in all of American history. We know what that is about.

It is undeniable that the Democrat Party and the administrative state (the executive branches of the DOJ, FBI, IRS, et al) are clear and present dangers to our Republic and our liberty as they increasingly veer further away from the rule of law and the Constitution. What is the solution? At this critical juncture, there is only one action we can all take.

The only viable and timely solution at this critical point is to vote - yes, vote correctly and smartly to retake the U.S. House and Senate on November 8th and to prepare the way to retake the White House in two years. Vote and help everyone you know to vote and get their friends to also vote or our crimewave will be getting worse. We must vote correctly and in great numbers to be sure our votes are counted to diminish the potential for the left to rig and steal the midterms and the 2024 elections as they are clearly intending to do after their success in 2020.

Flash: the SPR is now at a 37 year low, not because we had a natural disaster such as war, but because Joe Biden used it to drive down high prices for political reasons.

That was never the purpose of SPR. Biden's irresponsible anti-fossil fuel policies raised oil prices and his misguided efforts to reduce oil and gas production also raised prices.

Instead of siphoning off the SPR, with the proper pro-energy policies, we could produce a million more barrels a month, increase good paying American jobs and not be partially dependent on foreign oil.

Another reason Congress needs to be changed from anti-energy to pro-energy by voting Republican.

If you recall, a few weeks ago TCR revealed over $400 million in wasteful spending for new unneeded bureaucrats in Harris County (Houston) Texas. This report was picked up by Fox 26 in Houston.

So Cagle (on the ballot in November) and Ramsey asked their Democratic colleagues Hidalgo, Garcia and Ellis to work with them to fund priorities, limit tax increases and add critically needed police patrol officers. The response from Hidalgo, et al was no, we have the votes.

Of course, you are familiar with the traditional big spenders lament, "oh we all let people die for lack of free medical services." The short answer is prioritize.

County Judge candidate and financial wiz Alexandra del Moral Mealer has already revealed the budget and after eliminating non-core spending, can fund the priorities and give a needed pay adjustment to police and detention officers.

Now prioritizing means no more unneeded bureaucratic programs, no more free lawyers for illegals and many other items if the average citizen in Harris County knew about, would be sick to their stomach.

This is why who you vote for locally matters this year.

In the Houston Chronicle editorial on September 25, the editors unintentionally let the cat out of the bag.

They said "Commissioner Adrian Garcia, who has publicly questioned the usefulness of County Constables..."

Next time you hear Garcia claim he is pro-law enforcement, you know the truth. Garcia can't be trusted on public safety, but his opponent Jack Morman can.

John Kass, former columnist of the Chicago Tribune, now an independent columnist, is a brilliant journalist.

In a recent column Kass (johnkassnews.com) blew up the open border and what it has wrought, with an eye-opening and scary account of our crisis and you know who is to blame. That would be the open border advocates led by Biden, Harris, O'Rourke and our own Lina Hidalgo. They are all part of the problem.

Here are the highlights:

"If the president and the others who avoid it ever stood on that border, they'd be confronted by their abdication of responsibility to the American people. And so they stand clear and away."

"More than 100,000 young Americans died from drug overdoses last year, more than have ever been killed by terrorists, with almost 70 percent of the American dead coming from fentanyl, that cheap, deadly synthetic opioid shipped from smiling China, spruced up by the drug lords of Mexico, and delivered as poison across Biden's wide-open border to kill American young people of all races and creeds, of all backgrounds.

"Yet with all the urgent sounds competing for attention and eyeballs, there is nothing so quiet as America's fentanyl dead. They don't excite TV news. They're quite still and cold. And worse, their parents have cried themselves dry.

"What they don't need to hear now are more Biden border lies telling them the border is secure. Because it is not.

"Do you remember the border lie about former President Donald Trump building those cages for children of illegal immigrants? That generated more media anger than recent fentanyl overdose deaths. Do you remember? I remember.

"You couldn't walk through a newsroom then without smelling the self-righteous fury that came through their pores about Trump and those kids in those cages. It triggered woke journalists the way papercuts trigger a vampire. They were all over it, writing and tweeting and Trump who built the cages, but his predecessor, former President Barack Obama who had those kid cages built.

"And the? Ooops they forgot and the-kids-in-cages outrage faded completely away, like media credibility. And Obama? The guy from Chicago who lives in Martha's Vineyard with other rich elites who didn't want to share their island with poor illegal immigrants - and shipped them away to a military base in a matter of hours - certainly knows one thing. He knows narrative, since all he accomplished in eight years in the White House was arriving with a blank slate only to become the hero of David Axelrod's fairy tale.

“But he does not know how to play the race card. He condemned Americans who support legal immigration and denounced them as racists for the sin of expecting that the president and his Democrats follow U.S. Immigration law.

" ... and Vice President Kamala Harris, the president's point person on the border who never goes to the border, reassuring America that despite reports to the contrary, and video of untold millions of people just walking over the border, and small border towns overwhelmed with illegal immigrants, that the border was secure.

"And then White House Press Secretary Karine Jean-Pierre doubled down on behalf of the president, insisting the amazing claim of Kamala Harris was true and the border was secure.

"'What we stand by is that we are doing everything that we can to make sure that we follow the process that's been put forth,' Jean-Pierre said. 'That's why we have historic funding to do just that, to make sure that the folks that we encounter at the border be removed or expelled.'

"Millions have come across illegally. There are good, decent people among them who are desperate for a chance. America doesn't need only chemical engineers. They need immigrant families full of hunger and resolve to succeed. But they break the law.

"And what we don't know is how many 'got aways' are living here, some of them criminals released from Venezuelan prisons. This is reminiscent of another weakling Democrat president, Jimmy Carter, who was overwhelmed by Fidel Castro's release of Cuban prisoners sent to Florida as part of the chaotic Mariel Boatlift.

"But illegal crossings aside, there is something else coming now over the border besides terrorists from Syria and Iran:

"Fentanyl.

"And there is no functioning on fentanyl. It is deadly. Just a speck can kill.

"Americans who want to get high have been seized on the Arizona border alone. It comes over by the ton, in backpacks carried by human mules, in trucks, trains, cargo ships; in those boxes of lettuce sold at your local American grocery store. And few produce workers tell the police, because the cartel head cutters know where they and their families live and there is no appeal.

"Last year alone, a record 107,375 young Americans died of drug overdoses, most involving synthetic opiates like fentanyl. And kids are given the drug, slipped into other narcotics, so powerful that just a pinch on a finger can kill dozens.

"We are witnessing mass suicide. And the Biden White House, which knows first-hand of drug addiction, is silent about the poison flowing up from the South at our children.

"China smiles as American leadership thrashes about. Mexican drug lords fill entire houses near big-city airports with American cash on quiet streets. They fill container ships with cash, with so much treasure they can't spend it. China buys political influence in cartels buy American politicians the way the Chicago Outfit and the five families of New York bought politicians during Prohibition.

"And President Biden and his enablers turn their eyes away from the open border, pretend it isn't happening and stare open-mouthed at the storm."

Federal Reserve Chairman Powell and all its governors need to be replaced immediately. They are looking at old-way solutions to the current financial crisis. Raising interest rates, increasing the unemployment rate to slow down our economy to get inflation under control is the wrong approach. This action by the Federal Reserve will cause a major recession and could even lead to a depression as happened in 1929. Today's economy is totally different than it was in the 1929 depression, the 1979 gas crisis, the 1986 savings and loan crisis, and the financial institution bad debts crisis in 2007 and 2008. Our major U.S. industries have changed due to high technology and green energy policies, including changes to the manufacturing and agricultural sectors and Biden's globalization policy. Instead of putting our country's interest first these policies need to stop by raising interest rates, printing more money and most importantly government spending on programs that do nothing but cause inflation. We need to lower government regulations on our private business sector.

These are steps that need to be done as the largest borrower is the U.S. Federal Government so we need an immediate cut across the board of all federal agencies of 25% of their budgets and if it means terminating federal employees as they are non-productive anyway. Some are still working from home like the EPA. The Departments of Defense and Homeland Security should be re-evaluated on their budget cuts. The Department of Defense needs to look at every defense contract and it needs to be discounted down by at least 15%. All the Federal Agencies' grants and contracts need to be looked at and cut by 20% except DOD and Homeland Security. Do not hire any IRS agents and in fact cut their budget as they are not qualified and when they audit the wealthiest individuals or businesses they lose because these people and entities can afford the best lawyers and accountants. It is the middle class and poor that get audited and stuck with tax bills. Put a hiring freeze on hiring federal government employees. The Federal Reserve has no clue that by raising interest rates and the federal government being the largest borrowers it costs us more money and creates more national debt.

The above solutions would cause interest rates and inflation to immediately go down, not Chairman Powell's way for a long term soft landing. The time has passed so unless you do what I suggest the plane has already crashed. The Washington establishment and media do not have a clue. These economists are incompetent and continue to promote the same old solutions that will not work This group in Washington and the defense industry is encouraging a proxy war through Ukraine with Russia. Keep spending billions of dollars and Ukrainians getting killed will bankrupt our country and future generations will live at a lower standard of living than our current standards.

We should be spending our government funds on making our cities safe, a first rate education for our students, closing our borders and requiring an identification system to know who is in our country. Cease forcing radical green energy changes off of fossil fuels, having the SEC and financial institutions set policies on diversity not best qualified for a job and forcing this on the private sector and not providing capital loans to energy companies is ridiculous. The current system with open borders, crime and a failed education system is costing us more each and every day. The only positive thing is our U.S. dollar is the strongest currency and if it loses its edge then our economy will be done. A strong dollar does hurt our manufacturing sector so this needs to be monitored carefully but not sure if this Federal reserve leadership can do it. Massive government cuts in spending will decrease the national debt and the inflation rate will come down.

One of the most annoying aspects of our modern political discussions is how Democrats or their media mouthpieces are constantly pointing out that our Democracy is in danger. This came on the heels of The Washington Post's immensely stupid new slogan "Democracy Dies in Darkness." Once again Democrats in California are actively attempting to take voters' rights away. This time they are asking voters to do it themselves.

California's overwhelming Democrat Legislature in 2017 passed the The Taxpayer Transparency and Fairness Act. Jerry Brown, then Governor and the great protector people's rights, signed it into law. This had as much to do with transparency and fairness as The Inflation Reduction Act has to do with inflation. The bill stole rights away from Californians.

The Board of Equalization (BOE) has five elected members. This bill emasculated their responsibilities and gave them to career bureaucrats. The BOE previously handled reviews of any sales tax and income tax appeals. The Office of Tax Appeals (OTA) now hears all those appeals. Of the twenty-four appointed judges, just five were not government employees prior to setting up this new structure. Instead of being responsible to the people of California as the elected officials are, these people are responsible to the governmental structure of the state. Since so many factors are subjective, it seems clear your rights were emasculated unless you think that career government workers are ruling more in the favor of the residents of the state.

A new taking of the right of voters is on the ballot in November. Los Angeles County - which by population would be the seventh largest state in the union - has five elected county supervisors that control the county. The residents have been able to elect the County Sheriff. The current county sheriff is Alex Villanueva, and the Board of Supervisors has been in a constant battle with him. This is even though Mr. Villanueva is a Democrat. Though the Board of Supervisors is a nonpartisan position, four of the five are Left-wing Democrats. Only one is not.

Currently, the county residents have the right of recall of the Sheriff if they do not like the job he (or she) is doing. That is not good enough for the County Supervisors. They initiated a motion that directs County Counsel to draft an ordinance for a special election that will allow voters to decide on an amendment to the County Charter that would grant the Board of Supervisors the authority to remove a Sheriff who violates the law or abuses power by a four-fifths vote.

Notice that four-fifths vote. If you did not have any idea of what goes on with the LA County Board of Supervisors, you might say that is a tall hurdle. I dare you to find a meaningful vote by the Board in the last eight years that did not have at least four (the upset left-wing Democrats) voting for it. These people vote in lockstep with each other. As expected, the vote to put this taking of voters' rights was passed by 4-1 with Supervisor Kathryn Barger dissenting.

If Mr. Villanueva were to win his reelection, how long do you think it would take for the Board of Supervisors to yank him from office? They will find any excuse since they have frequently battled the last few years and especially since the woke movement castrated L.A. law enforcement.

You can easily see a dispute happening between the Supervisors and the reelected sheriff. They drum up a phony process to exorcise Villanueva. Then they would have to replace him with someone. Who would that be? Since all of them endorsed Villanueva's opponent, Robert Luna, lo and behold who would they pick to be the new sheriff?

This is not just for this election and this dispute; this initiative is forever. In twelve years when there would be two completely different sheriff candidates, who would they be more beholden to - the residents of the county or the members of the Board of Supervisors? My money is on the supervisors.

We would have to be out of our minds to approve this initiative and give our rights away. Talk about being undemocratic. Where are all those Dems now talking about the "danger to our democracy"? They are not around because they are the danger.

Gary Polland is now a regular on "What's Your Point?" hosted by Greg Groogan on Fox 26 Houston, appearing every other week. Tune in or set your recorder for 7:00 am Sundays.

Gary Polland is a long-time conservative and Republican spokesman, fund-raiser, and leader who completed three terms as the Harris County Republican Chairman. During his three terms, Gary was described as the most successful county Chairman in America by Human Events - The National Conservative Weekly. He is in his twenty-sixth year of editing a newsletter dealing with key conservative and Republican issues. The last twenty-one years he has edited Texas Conservative Review. As a public service for the last 18 years, Gary has published election guides for the GOP primary, general elections and city elections, all with the purpose of assisting conservative candidates. Gary also for 20 years cohosted Red, White and Blue on Houston Public Media TV 8 PBS Houston, longest running political talk show in Texas history. Gary serves on the Board of Directors of American Values, a national pro-family, pro-faith, conservative organization supporting the unity of the American people around the vision of our founding fathers and dedicated to reminding the public of the conservative principles fundamental to the survival of our nation. Gary is a practicing attorney and strategic consultant. He can be reached at (713) 621-6335.