“Freedom is never more than a generation away from extinction.”

Ronald Reagan warned “Freedom is never more than a generation away from extinction.”

Reagan’s warning is especially apt today – enemies of liberty never give up, whether abroad or in the United States. As past generations, pro-freedom Americans still have to battle against liberal control, America-bashers, left-wing defeatists, and their accomplices in the press. We don’t have Reagan to help us now so it’s up to us to stand up for America and freedom. We can begin doing that by our vote in the primaries this spring and in the national election in November; it is imperative to choose a nominee that has not already demonstrated a willingness to sacrifice conservative principles for popular liberal news media acclaim.

Not long ago, I wrote on my blog, www.vincentgioia.com, “Some things to consider in making a voting selection”. One important consideration is to see who is in favor or against a candidate or proposition. For example, in these primaries who is supporting the candidates? The New York Times supports McCain, Democrat strategist Susan Estrich supports McCain, Republican’s-in-name-only Schwarzenegger and Giuliani support McCain, and I’m sure you can find others. If you think the ‘grey lady’, the Dukakis campaign manager and social liberals support a conservative, think again. Whatever McCain may be, he’s not a conservative just because he sometimes votes for a few things we favor.

There is some evidence that pro-freedom efforts can succeed if there is sufficient effort and we must build on these achievements. Despite Pelosi and Co. and ‘Dirty’ Harry Reid and his party takeover of the House and Senate a year ago, there have been some successful efforts.

The best example of course is the successful effort to block the McCain and Bush attempts to provide amnesty to illegal aliens in our midst and partial success in authorization for a border wall to assist minimizing the invasion from Mexico. Unsuccessful, however, was providing sufficient funding to actually build the wall and the will to do so. In this success pro-freedom conservatives were aided by helpful conservative radio and a public outcry for border protection and no amnesty.

We must thwart all attempts to stifle conservative radio; the best way is to not elect a Democrat president. Unfortunately, I’m not convinced that McCain would protect this information outlet since he eschews conservatism; McCain is reported to have said of Justice Alito “he is too conservative”.

Although the ‘REAL I.D. Act’ was shamefully passed during a previous sleeping Republican Congress, its implementation has been delayed by failing to issue regulations and to allocate funds for this Soviet-style internal travel passport system based on federally-standardized, high-tech, information-collecting state-issued driver’s licenses, thanks to a few congressional conservatives.

Some exorbitant funding bills have been vetoed. Attempts by Democrats to micromanage the Iraq war failed. Efforts to ‘fix’ the Alternative Minimum Tax (AMT) by adding a huge tax increase on middle-class families were rebuffed by a relatively few steadfast conservatives in congress (leaving a saving of about $2,000 per family intact). Additionally, Congressional Democrats were foiled in their attempt to enact so-called ‘PAYGO’ that would require additional revenue via taxes to make up for the alleged revenue-shortfall.

For all the Democrats’ (and McCain’s) loud complaints and preaching against interrogation techniques (water boarding comes to mind), CIA documents were released to show Democrats have previously been informed about interrogation techniques used and offered no objection at the time. Clearly Pelosi, Reid and top Democrats switched sides for crass political gain, not out of principle.

Conservative lawmakers also frustrated passage of another hate crimes bill pushed by the Democrat majority and a Senate filibuster thwarted an attempt by unions to replace worker secret organizing ballots with the so-called ‘card check’ when deciding whether to unionize; as one union boss, Bruce Raynor, said about secret union member balloting “There’s no reason to subject workers to an election”.

I hope we all remember these things at voting time.