A personal comment or two

The far left has hijacked the Democrat party. Sadly, some of my common-sense Democrat friends have been blinded by the hatred generated to destroy Donald Trump.

While in Congress from 1985 to 1997, I realized that some welfare programs were used to influence votes, resembling a form of vote buying. It targeted a specific group with perceived needs in exchange for political support, a tactic that continues today.

It has become increasingly clear to me that the Democratic party has been hijacked as time has passed, and people have not been helped but instead enslaved. The sensible Democrats I grew up with were once leaders who used the government to assist people with real needs genuinely. It's difficult to argue with that.

In those days, our discussions mainly revolved around the different approaches to addressing a situation. More often than not, these debates led to the introduction of legislation. During this time, the Democrats consistently won the votes, holding control of Congress from Eisenhower to Gingrich.

Even though the debates could become heated, we were all Americans first; being Democrats and Republicans came second.

But then things began to change. Hatred started to replace legitimate political differences. Attacking a strong opponent personally became the norm. Being an American takes a back seat or even becomes irrelevant. Political consultants were making millions of dollars by promoting this tactic.

In 1996, during my race against Sen. Tom Harkin, most major polls showed me in the lead. At one of my fundraising events, David Yepsen, Political Editor for the Des Moines Register, approached me with a press release from the Harkin Campaign and asked, "Jim, is this true?"

Either my resounding “NO” or the strange look on my face convinced David to kill the press release. David is the most respected political reporter in Iowa. Had he published it, the race would have been over the next day.

Mr. Harkin had sent his goons to Corsicana, TX, to dig through the Navarro County Court House for some dirt they could use on me during the campaign. They found none.

However, they did come across Nancy and my marriage certificate. Then, the idea hit them: The Lightfoots were married in Texas, and their son was born in Iowa. Yes, they thought they could alter the dates on the marriage certificate to make it appear Jim Jr. was an illegitimate child. This would drive a massive wedge between me and my bloc of Christian voters—enough of a wedge to throw the election to Mr. Harkin.

The dates on our marriage certificate were altered, and the phony certificate was part of a press release distributed statewide by the Harkin campaign.

Ultimately, Mr. Harkin won primarily because President Clinton camped out in Iowa the weekend before the election. As President of the United States, he monopolized all the press outlets in the state. You could not turn on the TV or pick up a newspaper without a picture of President Clinton proclaiming what a great Senator Mr. Harkin was and that he should be re-elected.

It worked as Harkin won.

A few years later, I learned from a high-ranking Democratic Party official that the DNC had decided to select Senator Harkin as the one US Senator to send the President to save. My question today is: why did the DNC choose to save the most liberal, far-left Democratic Senator in the US? Hmm?

If you desire to fact-check this story, you may read in several legitimate, respected publications that I was leading or terribly close in the polls before Pres. Clinton’s visit to Iowa. This old Southwest Iowa farm boy gave Mr. Harkin the toughest, closest race in his 40-year lifelong political career. According to Wikipedia, "Ultimately, Harkin was successful in his bid and defeated Lightfoot, albeit by the narrowest margin of his career.”

The hate campaign to destroy me personally did not work, but the weekend presence of President Clinton did. That is fair, as it is the way politics works. We could not generate the votes we needed to overcome the influence of a sitting US President.

Looking back, the socialist-communist party had been slowly building its power in the US Government one brick at a time. Today, those bricks have become a wall.

We were warned this would happen back in 1959

We were warned this would happen back in 1959. Soviet Premier Nikita Khrushchev, according to former Secretary of Agriculture Ezra Taft Benson, told him during his first visit to the US, "‘You Americans are so gullible. No, you won’t accept communism outright, but we’ll keep feeding you small doses of socialism until you finally wake up and you find you already have communism. We won’t have to fight you. We’ll so weaken your economy until you fall like over-ripe fruit into our hands.’"

Please keep in mind these are the comments and opinions of an old man who grew up spending nearly 20 years as a broadcast journalist during a time when God was in charge, earrings were only worn by women, and tattoos were only found on men who mostly had been members of the military. Everyone worked for a living and helped those in legitimate need. It was a great time in America.

So much for my opinions; I encourage you to read this excellent article published in Canada Free Press. Mr. DiLorenzo hits the nail squarely on the head. Sadly, we have so many young people who have grown up indoctrinated by our colleges with liberal political propaganda and agendas, influenced by the mass media that America is evil, never learning our country’s factual history, both good and bad, and to stand up and salute the Stars and Stripes during the playing of our National Anthem. Patriotism is an abstract idea rejected by many.

Click here for Mr. DiLorenzo’s article.