THE TYGRRRR EXPRESS

Tonight I will be guest hosting the Rick Amato show. The show airs in San Diego on KCBQ 1170 AM from 7pm to 8pm. Then it airs from 8pm to 9pm on KTIE 590 AM in the Inland Empire. It can also be heard over the internet.

http://amatotalk.com/

My guests in the first hour will be Larry Greenfield, Richard Baehr, and Evan Sayet.

Mr. Greenfield is the Executive Director of the Reagan Legacy Foundation and a fellow at the Claremont Institute.

http://www.claremont.org/scholars/scholarid.487/scholar.asp

Mr. Baehr is a health care consultant and writer for American Thinker.

http://www.americanthinker.com/richard_baehr/

Mr. Sayet is a conservative political satirist who runs the “Right to Laugh” comedy tour.

http://evansayet.com/

In the second hour I will continue with Mr. Sayet and then bring on Marc Rudov, Ellen Karis, and Katrina Rice.

Mr. Rudov is the No-Nonsense Man and a frequent Fox News guest.

http://thenononsenseman.com/

Ms. Karis is a conservative comedian living in liberal Manhattan.

http://www.ellenkaris.com/

Ms. Rice is active in Young Republicans and an expert in social media. Her book is “the internet is blue.”

http://www.linkedin.com/in/veribatim

I would like to thank my sponsor American Bullion.

http://www.americanbullion.com/

See you all tonight.

eric

Update: Here is the podcast.

http://amatotalk.com/blog/guest-host-eric-golub-www-tygrrrrexpress-com/

eric

The Republican Party is once again on the verge of falling into a liberal trap. They never learn.

Every time the GOP decides to be “open-minded” and “reach out,” they get snake-bitten.

At some point conservatives have to realize that the left hates our guts. They despise us. They have bad intentions, and wish to crush us by using our desperate human desire to be liked against us. Once the right realizes that the left does not see us as human, conservatism can finally advance.

The GOP is considering agreeing to a presidential debate sponsored by Politico. This is insane.

The GOP should immediately vow to boycott such debates.

Just because the Democratic Party is an entire collection of beggars does not mean we Republicans have to adopt their model.

It is not enough for Democrats to grovel in front of MSNBC. Liberal ethnic minorities know that MSNBC consists of upper class white bleeding heart liberals that empathize with minorities from afar but certainly would not be in the same room as they are.

This leads to Democrats doing debates on Black Entertainment Television, MTV, The View, the Gay and Lesbian groups, and PBS to satisfy the animal lovers.

Democrats in 2008 had debates about “black issues,” “Hispanic issues,” “gay issues,” and other nonsense.

The Republican party has a central set of core conservative principles. We lose when we stray from them and win when we stick to them. Since the ideas are the uniting factor, segregated Jim Crow debates are not necessary.

Herman Cain does not need to go on BET. Michele Bachmann does not need to go on The View. They are conservatives who can talk about cutting taxes and spending while killing terrorists to any conservative audience of any race or gender.

The Politico and MSNBC have zero interest with Republicans except to demonize and ridicule them. They are not real news organizations.

Democrats threatened to boycott Fox News, but the difference is that people actually watch Fox News. The ratings justify appearing. Democrats and independents do watch Fox News.

MSNBC and the Politico represent the hard left. Republicans have nothing to gain and everything to lose by taking questions from “unbiased moderators” like Chris Matthews. If we deny him, he will hate us. If we give in, he will hate us. Let him yell and scream, but not with my candidates in the room.

Some on the left will argue that boycotting the liberal media would be a threat to democracy.

This is totally wrong. Primaries are not general elections.

In the general election, liberals have a stake. It may be ever shrinking, but it is more than zero.

The Republican primary is for Republicans. In the same way liberals should have zero say in when Republicans schedule their primaries and caucuses, they should also have zero say in our primary fights.

The Republican National Committee should make sure that every “moderator” truly is just that. Republicans don’t need to take questions from Bob Herbert (formerly) of the Jayson Blair Times just because he claims to speak for all blacks. Conservatives do not need to take questions from Katie Couric or Joy Behar just because they are demented enough to think they represent any sane women.

Dr. Thomas Sowell and Dr. Walter Williams are brilliant economists. Let them moderate a debate on fiscal matters. They happen to be black, but that is irrelevant. They are the best and brightest. Charles Krauthammer is the finest foreign policy mind on Earth. He happens to be Jewish, but that takes a back seat to his being brilliant.

Otherwise, we can be like the left. We can have a bunch of while male hatemongers like E.J. Dionne babble about diversity while attacking the candidates for being born with a y chromosome and light melanin content.

It is bad enough the left weasels their way into the general election debates. Gwen Ifill and George Stephanopolous get to ask questions. For some reason, conservative reporters do not.

This cannot happen in the primaries. Let the Politico froth like the rabid leftist dogs they are. They cannot and must not get into our primaries.

If they do, Republicans should blame themselves for being “tolerant.”

It is time to hunt for the leftist infiltrators and verbally take care of them like the little rats they are.

Only then can Republicans have real conservative debates free from liberal bias and ideological bigotry.

eric

Herman Cain is a fiery orator who brings crowds to their feet. Now the former CEO of Godfather’s Pizza is trying to rouse Americans out of their slumber and propel him to the White House.

Stranger things have happened, as recently as 2008.

There is a temptation by many to compare and contrast Cain with Barack Obama since both men are black. This completely misses the entire point on what Herman Cain is about.

While Mr. Obama did hold an Illinois Senate seat for a few weeks before being propelled into the 2008 presidential race, his actual resume was non-existent. He had never run a state, a city, or a business. He was a community organizer, and has now tried to run America as a social worker would handle their case load.

Herman Cain has run a successful business. He is a self made man. He was the head of the National Restaurant Association, also known as the “nice NRA.” He was the man who challenged then President Bill Clinton over tax increases that Cain insisted were bad for small businesses. Cain was right and Clinton was wrong.

If Cain were right, he would still be a great orator. Yet to deny his race is a plus for him would be naive. If he were Caucasian, there would be no difference between his rationale for running and that of nominal frontrunner Mitt Romney.

Yet Mr. Cain does not want people to support him because he is black. Barack Obama was an affirmative action hire. People wanted to feel good about themselves, so they overlooked qualifications and gave a man a chance based on his race. For those doubting this, look at how people voting for anybody else were treated. They were called racists.

Herman Cain does not want to be an affirmative action hire. He wants to be hired because he is qualified for the job. He wants the job on merit. The color of his skin matters much less than the content of his character.

Some would argue that being a successful businessman is not enough. Ross Perot and Steve Forbes were not given the job, and Donald Trump still has failed to convince enough people that his flirtation with running is anything other than another brilliant publicity stunt.

Yet one thing Ross Perot said that was totally correct was when he said regarding his experience that “I don’t have experience running up a four trillion dollar debt.”

Now the number is fourteen trillion, and the politicians with “experience” have not reined in spending.

We need to know more about Herman Cain. Barack Obama got elected without people knowing much about him. He spoke well. Yet Americans are paying the price for completely ignoring large gaps in his very existence.

(This is not about his birth certificate. There are simply years in his adult life where he fell off of the grid of life. The media was too lazy to even bother finding out what he did with his young adult life. If he did nothing but lay on a beach and get stoned, we have a right to know this. It is called “vetting.”)

Herman Cain needs to be vetted. We need to know about his foreign policy views. The consequences are now obvious what happens when somebody with no foreign policy experience is allowed to send soldiers into kinetic conflicts.

What we do know about Herman Cain is that he does not appear to have anything to hide. He is comfortable being vetted and being in the public eye.

What we also know about Mr. Cain is that he is smart, successful and accomplished. He is willing to slog through a two year process to take a job that will bring him more hassles and pay him less money than he would make staying in the  restaurant industry. He has given up his privacy.

He spent his adult life serving Americans. He sees the families who came into his pizza shops. They were every day Americans.

Now he wants to serve Americans again at the highest possible level.

Unlike some of his political opponents on the left, he is actually willing to do the real work that the job requires. We know this because he has not coasted through life. He has made a life for himself honestly and with spectacular results. Some people blather insincerely about the American dream. Herman Cain is the very embodiment of that dream.

His entry into the 2012 presidential race is good for all Americans. He should be welcomed into the discussion and judged not by his look, but by his words and deeds. If we get to this level of colorblindness, we might just find a fantastic candidate to be our the next leader of the free world.

eric

While the GOP is normally a hierarchical party that ignores dark horses, Rick Santorum is prepared to run as the socially conservative candidate in the race.

This label is partially misleading and perhaps unfair. Most of the candidates are socially conservative. Senator Santorum has views on economic policy and foreign policy that fit well within the mainstream of the Republican Party.

Yet while on the surface there is very to differentiate Mr. Santorum from most of the candidates, he is the only one making social issues the heart of his campaign. His attitude is that other candidates pay lip service to social issues but do not do any of them.

The 2008 election was about the economy, and the 2004 election was clearly about foreign policy and the War on Terror. Social issues inspire a burning passion among people on both sides, but many people who decide the elections do not have such litmus tests.

While gun control, gay rights, and even illegal immigration can be considered social or “cultural” issues, an honest conversation about social issues means abortion.

I am not a culture warrior. I have voted for pro-life and pro-choice candidates. I have never publicly revealed my position on abortion.

Mr. Santorum has. He is ardently pro-life. Whether one agrees or disagrees with his  stand, he has taken a clear unambiguous position. Like many Pennsylvania Catholics, his faith teaches him that abortion is murder and life begins at conception.

Again, most of the candidates agree with Mr. Santorum. Yet none of them will make this the heart of their campaign. One reason Mr. Santorum has to do this is because without such a focus, his rationale for even being in the race becomes very limited.

To his credit, he is a true believer. This is not to imply that he would be lost on foreign policy issues or economic matters. He has spoken intelligently on everything from fiscal sanity to world conflicts ranging from Israel to Iran.

Yet his niche the provides him a foothold in the race is the socially conservative constituency. For Americans who pay more attention to Phyllis Schlafly and the Eagle Forum than the Wall Street Journal editorial pages or Foreign Policy Magazine, Santorum is the one to watch.

The strike against Santorum is that there is a large plurality of Americans who simply have a hostile bigotry toward anybody deemed “religious.” The left hates all conservatives, but they despise social conservatives with an extra dose of venom. Social conservatives are made out to be intolerant zealots when the truth is most of them just want to love their neighbor.

Santorum would benefit if he were the only candidate in the race focusing on social issues. In 2008 Sam Brownback was hurt by Mike Huckabee. Brownback was serious, but was made out to be dour. Huckabee was folksy and funny. Brownback was much better suited for the job he easily won, Governor of Kansas.

Social conservatives have to prove they are non-threatening. Huckabee did not scare people. If Huckabee gets in this race, Santorum may have too big an obstacle to overcome. Yet while Santorum does not have Huckabee’s humor, he is less dry than Brownback. He also does not come across as the stereotypical angry social conservative as depicted by enraged televangelists.

Santorum is not bombastic. He does not use words like “infanticide.” He treats political opponents with dignity and respect. He is kind and thoughtful. He does not demonize people the way the left would do to him. He is also not a hypocrite. He practices what he preaches, and is a good family man with no known scandals.

He is definitely a legitimate candidate for Vice President. Pensylvania is a key state, and the constant mention of former Governor Tom Ridge seems to have faded. Ridge is pro-choice.

With Rick Santorum, what you see is what you get. Given his emphasis on social issues, some people will not vote for him. Yet if he can show people the intelligent, decent, and honorable family man he is, he could make some gains early on. Iowa rarely predicts the rest of the race, but Iowa voters focus on social issues. An early win never hurts.

Santorum’s dark horse status gives him the freedom to run an honest campaign free from hemming, hawing, and triangulating early on. If he becomes a serious contender, it will be interesting to see if this strong approach still holds up.

It would be good for the country if Rick Santorum is allowed to discuss social issues without being personally attacked. I personally focus more on taxes and terrorism, but I absolutely respect Mr. Santorum’s desire to want Americans to have a serious and principled conversation about social issues.

It was former New York Post columnist Ben Wattenberg who wrote the book “Values Matter Most.” If he is right, Rick Santorum will be the one to passionately and successfully carry that mantle to the values voters in the Republican Party.

eric

Donald Trump is absolutely not running for President. Push all your chips to the center of the table and bank on it. There is no way under any circumstances that he is running.

Yet before he bows out, I will give him one day of coverage only because virtually none of his opponents have announced anything either. Some of them may drop out as well.

I happen to like Trump. I have always admired his creativity. He builds beautiful buildings that are a beacon to the world.

Even in the world of television, he provided quality in a genre that featured very little of it. Reality television has brought nonsense such as the Jersey Shore and Real Housewives, but “The Apprentice” was different. I personally improved my boardroom skills observing the conflicts when it counted most. “Celebrity Apprentice” has raised tons of money for charity and given exposure to various afflictions most people do not think about. Bret Michaels of Poison educated us about juvenile diabetes while Trace Adkins spoke about child food allergies.

So the overall contributions of “The Donald” have been very positive. Besides, I would rather have the Celebrity Apprentice than our current American Idol leader.

Yet since running for President is a political audition, Mr. Trump should be subjected to the same analysis and scrutiny as every other candidate.

Trump is associated with fiscal issues. His detractors point out that he started out with money from his father. This does not diminish that he far surpassed what his father accomplished, and his father did well. Donald Trump was a visionary, and his visions paid off.

Trump also gets criticized for having had financial problems in the early 1990s.  This is an unfair criticism. He correctly has pointed out that the recession of 1990-1991 was actually a real estate depression. He did what the federal government refuses to do. He tightened his belt, sold assets, and worked his way back on top. He also freely admits in his book “The Art of the Comeback” that he stopped working hard and it came back to bite him. This is a very candid and refreshingly self-critical attitude.

Trump has many sensible economic ideas. He is totally correct on tax cuts. He would be fine with supply side economics. He would favor lowering the taxes on dividends and capital gains as well. As a Wall Street guy, his policies would help Wall Street. He would not roil the stock market or the bond market. Real estate markets would certainly be fine with him.

However, he is totally wrong on trying to take a hard line with China in the form of tariffs. The last thing America needs is a trade war. We need to get spending under control and stop borrowing. Yet protectionism is not the answer. This is a philosophical disagreement worth having during the Republican primary.

On foreign policy issues Trump is an interesting contradiction. He was against the war in Iraq. Again, on this one he is wrong. The war was the right thing to do. Conversely, he wants to get “tough” with Iran. Unlike China, Iran is a nation America should get tough with. Yet getting tough is a slogan. More elaboration needs to be fleshed out.  He says America should just keep the Iranian oil. This would be music to Neocon ears. If he means it, fantastic.

Social issues is where things get very confusing with Mr. Trump. He prides himself on straight, blunt language. Yet on social issues he seems to be like any other typical politician.

At CPAC he stated that he was pro-life, and against gay-marriage. He made himself out to be a conservative Republican. Trump has always been the standard for New York Country Club Republicans. He is a moderate Republican who was fiscally conservative, socially liberal, and totally willing to work with and contribute to Democrats.

This week he stated that he used to be pro-choice, but has had his views change. Cynics would call this an election conversion, but many politicians have had their epiphanies at convenient times. Bill, Clinton, Al Gore, and Jesse Jackson were pro-life until running for President. George Herbert Walker Bush ran as the pro-choice candidate in 1980 before swearing allegiance to the pro-life movement eight years later. Steve Forbes changed his position, and so did Mitt Romney. All of these men could have done so out of sincerity, but political expediency is more like it.

As for being against gay marriage, I find it hard to believe that Trump even cares. On an episode of “Celebrity Apprentice,” he asked Cyndi Lauper if she liked President Obama. She said she did, and he replied “I like him too.” Lauper had just come back from a signing ceremony with Lady Gaga on a gay rights bill.

This does not make Trump a phony. It just means he needs to explain these discrepancies. This is part of the vetting process.

Initially it seemed that Trump had most of the policy positions of Ron Paul but without the lunacy. He accurately pointed out that Paul cannot win the nomination. Yet Trump is not  a Paul clone on social issues, unless the tack rightward by Trump is insincere.

One other area where Trump seems to be wading that no GOP candidate should go near is that of President Obama’s birth certificate. I am not convinced Trump really cares about that either. Talking about it is controversial, and Trump loves controversy.

Yet this is a bad controversy. Mr. Obama is a Christian who was born in Hawaii. The birthers must remain marginalized if for no other reason than it distracts from the many policy issues where criticism of Mr. Obama is totally fair game.

Trump wonders what President Obama is hiding, but it is highly likely that he is hiding nothing. He likes the issue because it makes Republicans look like dolts. As for Mr. Trump, he claims to have been born in New York. I pray this is true, and that he is not secretly a child of New Jersey.

The end result with Trump is that while I would support him if he won the nomination, it would be with much nervousness. Again, I like him very much. Yet I am a Neocon and he is not. This is a legitimate policy disagreement, which is what primaries are for to begin with.

With Donald Trump, there is plenty of political meat to chew on. Whether one agrees or disagrees, he does provide much to talk about. This is exactly how he wants it. He is definitely not running, but the fact that so many people are talking about him anyway proves how brilliant a marketer he is. Time will tell if that is enough to move him from Celebrity Apprentice to Commander in Chief.

eric

On this April 15th, Barack Obama has decided to rob productive Americans blind and give the money to a bunch of liberal deadbeats who will then deliver him votes in 2012 by any means necessary.

His press conference the other day contained lies bordering on slander. He bashed the very tax cuts that he extended four months ago. Then he will go out on the trail and brag that he cut taxes.

It is time to cut through the fog. Mr. Obama has never cared about deficit reduction. He wants to increase spending on his domestic priorities. His ideal budget plans are basically to cut the defense budget by as close to 100% as possible while raising taxes on the “wealthy” to a bracket also nearing 100%.

Make no mistake about it. His billionaire liberal friends will still continue to get special breaks. Friends of Barry will be fine. So basically, Mr. Obama is trying to cripple conservative Republicans financially and give the money to liberal Democrats. This is the Chicago way.

So rather than allow President Obama to commit financial malpractice just to win a second term, it is time for a simplified tax day plan.  Every politician from President Obama to Congress should follow five steps.

1.) Shut up. Every politician except Congressman Paul Ryan should have their mouths ductaped. They should be banned from television in the same way sports broadcasters no longer cover drunken fans who strip naked and run onto the field. Mr. Ryan is now the leader of the free world. As an adult, he should speak. The other 534 kids and the First Toddler in Chief should be quiet since political children should be seen and not heard.

2.) Cut taxes. America needs drastic tax cuts that would make the Bush tax cuts seem minor by comparison. Slash taxes drastically. Reduce the capital gains tax to zero for anybody with less than $100,000 in stock. The Reagan tax cuts and the Bush tax cuts worked perfectly. Supply side economics works. Slash corporate and personal income tax rates. Slash harder than Freddie Krueger. Slash like a Guns n Roses guitar god. Slash like former quarterback Kordell Stewart. Slash Baby Slash.

3.) Cut spending. Forget Mr. Obama and his scalpel. It is time for the mother of all machetes. Freezing spending at already obscene levels is criminal. Roll back all programs to 2000 levels. That’s right. Democrats want to erase the very memory of George W. Bush. Let’s go back to the halcyon Clinton days. Every domestic program can start at 2000 levels. It is still the same century. Think of the Democrats as the candidates on “The Biggest Loser.” They are bloated two ton slobs. Dropping to 1995 pounds will not avoid death. 200 pounds on the scale is comparatively healthy. This budget is beyond fat free dressing. It is time for budgetary stomach stapling.

Defense can be on the table, but not before every single entitlement program is rolled back. People 55 and over will be exempt because promises to them must be kept. People under 55 have a decade to prepare for reality. End all luxury items. Kill NPR and PBS. Shoot Elmo and serve him as school lunch meat. All luxuries must either be financed by private citizens are eliminated forever. Only necessities should survive. A good start would be saving $400,000 by making Mr. Obama’s salary based on merit.

Call all of this extremist. Call it draconian. Just don’t call it mean-spirited. Mean-spirited is liberals lying to the American people. Liberals truly believe we can spend on diamonds while earning minimum wage. Extreme draconian measures are needed to combat this spending lunacy. Welcome to austerity.

4.) Sit down. This completes the “sandwich of silence” started in step one. The bread of silence in steps one and four covers the meat of steps two and three. Politicians have done nothing to slow rates of growth, much less cut anything. People who accomplish nothing should say even less. No more speeches. Let the deeds be the words.

5.) Resign. People who have never spent a day of their lives in the private sector are trying to run it. They are running it into the ground, celebrating the road to ruin. In 2006 the Democrats seized Congress and wrecked the brilliant Bush economy. One by one, sanctimonious liberals tried to pass miserable policies while exempting themselves from the very catastrophic and completely intended consequences. They praised higher taxation while not paying taxes themselves. If these failed people really care about America, they should get jobs in corporate America to give them an understanding of what real workers actually do.

Shut up. Cut taxes. Cut spending. Sit down. Resign.

Yet if this is not enough, one more point can and should be done in the name of compromise. It is the reversal of Obamanomics. Rather than tax people based on wealth, it should be based on ideology. Mr. Obama already does this. Now it is time to shift the money back.

Liberals favor higher taxes. Conservatives favor lower taxes. Since liberals love socialism and wealth redistribution, it is time to just take the money from the liberals and give it to the conservatives. Even the honest liberals know they will not do anything valuable with it anyway.

Rather than call this seizing assets, conservatives can just call this “investment.”

Liberals should be banned from investing anything. Real investing means taking risks with one’s own earned money. Buying stocks and real property are investments. Oil companies and drug companies doing research and technology are actually investing. Crippling businesses is not investment. Phony environmental crackpot theories is not investment. Supporting the further decay of already failed public schools is not investment. Wrecking health care is not investment.

Liberals cannot invest because they do not believe in real investments in people. They loathe the investor class. They are the union beggar class, where stealing is investing and producing is greed.

It is time to put the adults back in charge on April 15th. Paul Ryan has offered a plan with some major positives. Barring that, just enact my five point plan.

Otherwise, let the children today know that liberal baby boomers were selfish spoiled brats until the very end of the country they inherited but killed off before it could be bequeathed.

eric

The conventional wisdom would have one believe that there is way Michele Bachmann would run for President in 2012. It seems that the conventional wisdom, which I bought into, is being proven wrong.

Initially it seems that there was simply no room for her in the crowded field. She did not have a special niche. There is no room for her and Sarah Palin, and supporters of both would choose Palin.

All of this is now wrong. Michele Bachmann has clearly established herself as the GOP candidate best representing the Tea Party movement. With Sarah Palin now looking increasingly like she is not running, Bachmann is getting closer to formally declaring.

With other candidates already possessing large war chests (or the appearance of), Bachmann would not seem like the type to raise money. This is false as well. She recently raised $2 million in a weekend. Many people give her very small donations. Her support is grassroots, but very devoted.

(Full disclosure: I have given her $35 in the last two years for her congressional reelection. I have not given any money to any presidential campaign.)

The one major downside against Congresswoman Bachmann is that while she has people who love her, there are Americans who do not know her who absolutely hate her guts. Of all the candidates most likely to run, she is the one the left would like to destroy the most. She is a minority conservative, and the left despises minority conservatives. She is ardently pro-life, and liberal women froth at the mouth at the very existence of a pro-life woman. It is considered traitorous to the gender.

The proof that Bachmann is hated beyond rational reasoning is that while liberals make every conservative out to be evil or stupid, the precious few most hated are seen as both. The two forms of attack are contradictory, but both were leveled at George W. Bush. Sarah Palin was mostly attacked as stupid, while Dick Cheney was labeled evil. Michele Bachmann gets both labels slandered about.

With regards to her intelligence, Congresswoman Bachmann is a professional tax attorney. She knows tax law better than virtually everybody in congress. So when she points out the billions of dollars in corruption and waste in the Obama healthcare law, she knows what she is talking about. No amount of liberal hyperventilating will change the fact that on budgetary matters, she is every bit as hard working and analytical as Paul Ryan. His being a male who avoids talking about social issues is why she gets the grenades that are not lobbed at him.

Liberals will try to destroy her from an intelligence standpoint by pointing out to her gaffe about confusing Massachusetts with New Hampshire on a matter of American history. So what? She made a mistake. Barack Obama said that there were 57 states. It does not make him a dolt. Joe Biden gets a free pass from liberals for his many gaffes because he is liberal and from liberal women because he is pro-choice. Michele Bachmann is just fine in the brains department.

As for her human nature, she is one of the kindest people on Earth. Liberals claim that everything they do, from destroying education to wrecking businesses, is “for the children.” Congresswoman Bachmann actually has benefited real children in a tangible way. She and her husband have raised five children of their own. They have also taken in 23…yes 23…foster children. That is compassion. That is Michele Bachmann.

The feminists also hate her because like Palin, Congresswoman Bachmann is a physically beautiful woman who married a handsome man and raised happy children. Ms. Bachmann refuses to be an angry bra-burner. She is happy, and that drives her critics nuts. An entire political network dedicated their election night coverage across the nation to attacking her. She rates higher than they do on every category, from beauty to disposition to kindness to toughness to effectiveness.

So while she has been a very effective congresswoman, this usually does not make for a good spring board to 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue. Usually governors get the job. Occasionally a senator gets it, and people regret it.

Yet the Tea Party movement is a powerful force, and Ms. Bachmann is the most visible politician associated with this leaderless movement. Like the people in the movement, she is ready to take a meat cleaver to the budget. She understands that spending is out of control and must be reined in fast and hard. Cuts must be wide and deep.

Republicans who throw her under the bus do so out of gutlessness, and liberals who attack her do so out of fear and jealousy.

There is nothing conventional about what is happening in America today. For this reason, an unconventional candidate like Michele Bachmann absolutely can and has become a serious force. The 2012 race would be better off for her entry.

eric