In June 2011, 11-year-old Skylar Capo saved a baby woodpecker from her family’s cat. “I’ve just always loved animals,” the aspiring veterinarian told her local news station. “I couldn’t stand to watch it be eaten.” Little did she know her act of compassion violated a federal statute against the “possession” or “transport” of a migratory bird — or that a Virginia game warden would be on her family’s doorstep days later demanding payment of a $535 fine.

“If you kick your core voters hard enough, Mr. Cameron, they might kick back.” That was former Conservative Party chairman and Margaret Thatcher cabinet minister Norman Tebbit’s take on the very poor showing by the Tories in a Feb. 28 special election for the Eastleigh of Hampshire seat in the British House of Commons, behind the UK Independence Party and Liberal Democrat candidates.

Time for a little history lesson. Sequestration may in fact have been Obama’s idea, but it was brought to the floor in the House of Representatives not once, but twice by Republican leaders. There, it was approved not once, but twice. In the Senate it passed easily with bipartisan support. Republicans let it pass the House and Senate, and Obama signed it.

The only things propping us up right now are a printing press, the good will of China and Saudi Arabia buying treasuries and trading in dollars, low interest rates, and yes, a weak economy keeping inflation at bay. Minus that, we face certain insolvency in the time it takes a baby to grow up and graduate college — if not sooner.

All the hysteria about sequestration sounds frightening — but is it true? Of course not. According to The Wall Street Journal ”federal domestic discretionary spending soared by 84 percent with some agencies doubling and tripling their budgets” during Barack Obama’s first two years in office. In fact the sequester would scale back just one of every six dollars in discretionary spending increases since 2008.

Everything we will ever need to know about the Obama Administration may come down to a single decision. And that is whether Obama, along with newly sworn in Secretary of State John Kerry, approve the Keystone XL pipeline from the Alberta tar sands to the U.S. For, contained in that decision is not just the future energy independence of North America — the U.S. currently depends on foreign sources for 45 percent of our fuel — but perhaps the future prosperity of the American economy.

President Obama’s proposal to expand Head Start harkens back Plato’s Republic, which advocated children be mandatorily placed in the care of the state guardians at very young ages. Yet findings from the Department of Education found the program was ineffective at best. At least Obama can pretend he “cares” about the children.

So, the White House has shown its hand. Without a doubt, it views it has authority to target U.S. citizens if they are deemed to be a part of the enemy, regardless of any due process claims the target might have raised had he been captured about his status as an enemy combatant. Where this ends is anyone’s guess.

The Budget Control Act, which reduced budgeting authority by $1 trillion over ten years will only yield $115.3 billion of actual, real cuts over a two-year period, after which spending increases. To balance the budget with our annual trillion dollar deficits, budgeting authority would likely need to be slashed by anywhere from $5 trillion to $10 trillion over ten years.

Future military officers at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point are being taught to view freedom-loving Americans as violent, racist terrorists-in-waiting It’s important to remember that taking a firm stand against unlimited government and assaults on freedom doesn’t make one a radical, a right-winger or a racist — just an American exercising your right to free speech.