By Christina Sun
Obama’s policy in the Middle East has been based more heavily upon the perseverance of his political image than on pragmatism.
On Aug. 2, 2010, Obama said that he is on the way to fulfilling his campaign promise of ending the war in Iraq. Under his plan, the United States will have removed all combat troops by Aug. 31, 2010 and 50,000 troops will remain to train Iraqi security forces, conduct counterterrorism operations and provide security for ongoing U.S. civilian efforts. Obama, however, seems more intent on being precisely …

By Trent Serwetz
This just in:
BJ Lawson has won the Republican Party’s nomination for NC’s fourth congressional district, earning  46 percent of the 23,000 votes cast (2010 North Carolina Primary Election Results, WRAL.com (link)).
Lawson, who also won the 2008 GOP nomination, won tonight’s primary election running on a platform of limited government and fiscal responsibility. The Lawson campaign especially highlighted the importance of constitutional government and opposed the Federal Reserve.
“I think the primary message of the campaign has been about getting our economic freedom back, the freedom to create our …

By Christina Sun
You know there is a problem with the tax system when the U.S. Secretary of the Treasury fails to file his taxes correctly.
Whether or not Timothy Geithner knowingly evaded his taxes, the discrepancy shows how complex our current tax system really is.
If you’ve ever filed taxes, images of inscrutable tax policies and forms are probably ingrained in your recent memory – studies agree.  A Tax Foundation survey in April 2007 found that 83 percent of people surveyed said the federal income tax is “very complex” or somewhat “complex.” The …

By Lingfeng Li
As we look forward to the 2010 elections, The Gothic Guardian sat down with BJ Lawson, a Republican candidate for the United States Congress representing North Carolina, for an interview.Our interview with Frank Roche, Lawson’s opponent in the Republican primary, can be found here.

“I’m not trying to fit into anyone’s box, in terms of labels,” William “BJ” Lawson says.
At age 36, Lawson, a Republican Congressional candidate for North Carolina’s fourth district, has already fit and outgrown many labels. He has been an engineer, a doctor, an …

By Sabrina McCutchan
When American President Woodrow Wilson initiated the League of Nations in 1919, his aim was to create an organization that would unite national governments in the pursuit of a global agenda: peace. Criticism of the move, however, flowed thick and fast, with perhaps the most lasting objection being that America should not serve as the “world’s policeman.”
There is little doubt that the United States could fill such a role, especially after the end of the Cold War and the political decline of the only major contender for international …

By Christina Sun
Bribery, corruption, cronyism, you name it. Obama’s new appointees have participated in them all.
These policy “czars,” as they are often called by the media and the Obama administration, are high level White House officials appointed sans Senate confirmation. Historically, presidential administrations have used czars to rise above the usual Washington fray and help various bureaucracies work together. However, the Obama administration has run amok with the appointments.
According to the White House Report to Congress on White House Staff, the czars are among the highest paid staffers in the …

By Justin Robinette
We have heard a lot recently about a return to core conservatism being, necessarily, a return to social conservatism.  Many within the party have reacted to the failed 2008 Republican Party and have adopted the view that the failure of the McCain-Palin ticket was a combination both of the continuation of George W. Bush’s “compassionate conservatism,” and the moderation taken to social issues by Senator McCain, and by extension his family and his campaign staff, publicly.
The general view of the Republican Party as the party of white, religious …

By Lingfeng Li
Not content to merely spend money it doesn’t have, our government wants you to join in the spending too.
The health care reform bill, recently passed in both the House and Senate, will require all Americans to buy insurance, even if they would rather spend their money on other ventures.  The bill is especially pertinent to young adults, who have the highest uninsured rates of any age group.
Based on Census Bureau data covering 2006-2007, there are roughly 19 million young adults adults (aged 18-34) without insurance number, about 41 …

By Lingfeng Li and Trent Serwetz
As we look forward to the 2010 elections, The Gothic Guardian sat down with Frank Roche, a Republican candidate for the United States Congress representing North Carolina, for an interview.Our interview with BJ Lawson, Roche’s opponent in the Republican primary, can be found here.

The Candidate
Frank Roche values courage – he uses the word directly no less than five times during the course of an hour-long interview, and alludes to it in countless other instances.
Courage may explain his choice to run for U.S. Congress in …

By Trent Serwetz
Everyone knows what a political conservative sounds like; as soon as a person starts going off about tax cuts or defensive spending, it becomes an ostensible fact that they are conservative. But where did conservatism come from, and why do certain views resonate with us as conservative, while others don’t?
Edmund Burke, one of the philosophical founders of modern conservatism, sympathized with the colonists during the American Revolution because he felt that the English taxation was an arbitrary and oppressive use of government power1.
Adam Smith, the other grandfather of …