To National Association for Gun Rights supporters only:
Gun-control organizations and Obama Administration political appointees in our federal bureaucracies have targeted the National Association of Gun Rights for harassment and legal intimidation.
In order to fight back with the most effective defense possible, Mr. Dudley Brown has been advised to request that National Association for Gun Rights supporters like you certify that they consider themselves members of the organization.
Mr. Brown has created a NAGR Member Ballot and is requesting that you fill it out, advising him of how best to proceed against assaults on our Second Amendment this year immediately.
But first, please read his important letter explaining the details of what he and NAGR face.
Rest assured, your completed ballot will not make you liable for any further action or put you in any danger of political retribution.
It will, however, assist Mr. Brown in fighting back against gun control groups and their allies in the federal government.
Please read his letter and fill out the enclosed Member Ballot today.
Sincerely,
David Warrington, Esquire
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The preceding email message may be confidential or protected by the attorney-client privilege. It is not intended for transmission to, or receipt by, any unauthorized persons. If you have received this message in error, please (i) do not read it, (ii) reply to the sender that you received the message in error, and (iii) erase or destroy the message.
Thursday, December 30, 2010
FROM TOWNHALL
Dear Londa,
Terrorism. Illegal immigration. Identity theft. Drugs. Fraud.
Call me cynical, but whenever I hear anti-gun politicians talk about these issues nowadays, I've come to expect a new thinly-veiled assault on our Second Amendment freedoms.
Either they want to ban our guns, track our guns . . .
. . . Or track us.
Well, after years of watching our illegal immigration problem grow steadily worse -- and watching our elected officials refuse to lift a finger in response -- the politicians' "fix" is finally in.
It's a new Federal Biometric ID card.
That's right. Instead of controlling our borders, the politicians want to control you and me. They want to give amnesty to illegal immigrants and make us prove we're not criminals!
And President Barack Obama, Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and Chuck Schumer (D-NY) are all working hand in glove to ram this new scheme into law as part of their new "comprehensive immigration reform" package.
That's why it's vital you sign the petition to your Congressman and Senators IMMEDIATELY.
If passed, the Federal Biometric ID card included in the new amnesty bill will:
Include a "unique biometric identifier" -- like fingerprints, retinal scans or even a scan of the veins on the back of your hand; and,
Allow bureaucrats to watch your every move, as the Federal Biometric ID card will almost certainly be produced with RFID tracking technology; and,
Include virtually unlimited amounts of personal information about you -- like what guns you own, for instance.
And this new Federal Biometric ID would be required for any person wishing to hold a job legally in the United States.
So I guess the welfare recipients don't have to get one.
I don't know about you, but I'm outraged.
It seems that whenever politicians are using terrorism, crime, illegal immigration or something else as their excuse, it's really you and me in their crosshairs.
Just remember those Department of Homeland Security memos listing pro-gun, pro-constitution activists as "domestic extremists."
How would you like to be told you can't board a plane because your new Federal Biometric ID Card told a TSA agent you supported some political candidate the new anti-gun regime thinks is too "pro-constitution?"
Even if you place complete 100% trust in the intentions of all federal government bureaucrats, what if there's some "accident?"
After all, you and I have heard the news stories of government officials "losing" laptops chockfull of hundreds of thousands of records including folks' names, social security numbers, addresses and birthdates.
And, of course, you and I cannot ignore the fact that since ID cards are required to purchase a firearm, the Federal Biometric ID scheme will likely create a de facto national gun registry.
That's why it's so important you click here to sign the petition IMMEDIATELY.
Unfortunately, this fight will not be easy -- just take a look at the makeup of Congress.
Anti-gun, anti-freedom Harry Reid still has a Senate majority.
Throwing party labels aside in the Senate and counting EVERY anti-gun Senator leaves you and me with a steep hill to climb.
And, of course, we can't forget about President Obama.
He's already come out publicly in favor of Senator Lindsey Graham's and Chuck Schumer's "bipartisan" bill -- so you and I must expect he'll do whatever it takes to enact the Federal Biometric ID scheme.
There's no doubt about it -- our backs are against the wall.
But there is good news.
Coming on the heels of the Healthcare fight -- and all the lies, smoky backroom deals and outright bribery employed to ram the bill into law -- there's not a real cozy feeling of "bipartisanship" right now in the U.S. Senate.
And the midterm elections have only cemented that feeling.
That's a HUGE plus.
It could be that with the exception of Senator Graham and perhaps a couple of others, you and I may not have as much difficulty in keeping even marginally pro-gun Republican U.S. Senators in our fold as we would normally.
Also, many key Democrat Senators come from states that have recently REFUSED to comply with the original DANGEROUS ID Bill.
That means we can win this fight, but it won't be easy.
The anti-gun politicians believe their best shot at passing the Federal Biometric ID scheme is to move FAST.
That's why your IMMEDIATE help is so vital.
So in addition to your signed petitions, I hope you'll consider making a generous contribution, as well.
You see, I've already prepared a massive targeted mail, phone and e-mail program that I'm ready to launch as soon as I can pay the up-front costs.
And then if I can raise the resources, I'd like to run hard-hitting radio, TV and newspaper ads, as well.
The goal is to start a grassroots fire against a new Federal Biometric ID scheme in the states represented by key Republican and Democrat Senators.
We'll point out that there's an overwhelming majority of citizens in their states who are opposed to a Federal Biometric ID card.
We'll also mention these voters are ALL watching these Senators' votes very carefully this election year.
Believe me, these Senators WILL get the message.
But I can't do any of this without your help.
That's why I hope you'll rush me your most generous contribution TODAY.
I know I'm asking a lot from you. But this could be it.
This could be the major, knock-down, drag-out fight we've been waiting for ever since President Obama was elected.
Until now, we've beaten the gun-control crowd to the punch -- publicizing and mobilizing a firestorm of grassroots opposition to the gun-grabbers radical schemes before they could even get them off the ground.
But unless you act now, we won't be so lucky this time.
That's why I hope, if at all possible, you will agree to a contribution of $25.
Of course, if that's simply too much, and you can't afford such a contribution at this time, I understand.
But will you agree to chip in at least $5 or $10?
I know you understand what's at stake.
So please rush me your most generous contribution of $25, $10 or at least $5 TODAY!
Sincerely,
Dudley Brown
Executive Director
P.S. The key provision in Senators Lindsey Graham's (R-SC) and Chuck Schumer's (D-NY) amnesty bill backed by President Obama is a new mandated Federal Biometric ID card that would be required for any person to hold a job in the United States legally.
This card would include untold amounts of personal information (like gun ownership) and biometric tracking technology that would allow government bureaucrats to track our every move.
That's why it's vital you sign our petitions to your Congressman and Senators IMMEDIATELY along with your most generous contribution of $25, $10 or $5 TODAY!
Terrorism. Illegal immigration. Identity theft. Drugs. Fraud.
Call me cynical, but whenever I hear anti-gun politicians talk about these issues nowadays, I've come to expect a new thinly-veiled assault on our Second Amendment freedoms.
Either they want to ban our guns, track our guns . . .
. . . Or track us.
Well, after years of watching our illegal immigration problem grow steadily worse -- and watching our elected officials refuse to lift a finger in response -- the politicians' "fix" is finally in.
It's a new Federal Biometric ID card.
That's right. Instead of controlling our borders, the politicians want to control you and me. They want to give amnesty to illegal immigrants and make us prove we're not criminals!
And President Barack Obama, Lindsey Graham (R-SC) and Chuck Schumer (D-NY) are all working hand in glove to ram this new scheme into law as part of their new "comprehensive immigration reform" package.
That's why it's vital you sign the petition to your Congressman and Senators IMMEDIATELY.
If passed, the Federal Biometric ID card included in the new amnesty bill will:
Include a "unique biometric identifier" -- like fingerprints, retinal scans or even a scan of the veins on the back of your hand; and,
Allow bureaucrats to watch your every move, as the Federal Biometric ID card will almost certainly be produced with RFID tracking technology; and,
Include virtually unlimited amounts of personal information about you -- like what guns you own, for instance.
And this new Federal Biometric ID would be required for any person wishing to hold a job legally in the United States.
So I guess the welfare recipients don't have to get one.
I don't know about you, but I'm outraged.
It seems that whenever politicians are using terrorism, crime, illegal immigration or something else as their excuse, it's really you and me in their crosshairs.
Just remember those Department of Homeland Security memos listing pro-gun, pro-constitution activists as "domestic extremists."
How would you like to be told you can't board a plane because your new Federal Biometric ID Card told a TSA agent you supported some political candidate the new anti-gun regime thinks is too "pro-constitution?"
Even if you place complete 100% trust in the intentions of all federal government bureaucrats, what if there's some "accident?"
After all, you and I have heard the news stories of government officials "losing" laptops chockfull of hundreds of thousands of records including folks' names, social security numbers, addresses and birthdates.
And, of course, you and I cannot ignore the fact that since ID cards are required to purchase a firearm, the Federal Biometric ID scheme will likely create a de facto national gun registry.
That's why it's so important you click here to sign the petition IMMEDIATELY.
Unfortunately, this fight will not be easy -- just take a look at the makeup of Congress.
Anti-gun, anti-freedom Harry Reid still has a Senate majority.
Throwing party labels aside in the Senate and counting EVERY anti-gun Senator leaves you and me with a steep hill to climb.
And, of course, we can't forget about President Obama.
He's already come out publicly in favor of Senator Lindsey Graham's and Chuck Schumer's "bipartisan" bill -- so you and I must expect he'll do whatever it takes to enact the Federal Biometric ID scheme.
There's no doubt about it -- our backs are against the wall.
But there is good news.
Coming on the heels of the Healthcare fight -- and all the lies, smoky backroom deals and outright bribery employed to ram the bill into law -- there's not a real cozy feeling of "bipartisanship" right now in the U.S. Senate.
And the midterm elections have only cemented that feeling.
That's a HUGE plus.
It could be that with the exception of Senator Graham and perhaps a couple of others, you and I may not have as much difficulty in keeping even marginally pro-gun Republican U.S. Senators in our fold as we would normally.
Also, many key Democrat Senators come from states that have recently REFUSED to comply with the original DANGEROUS ID Bill.
That means we can win this fight, but it won't be easy.
The anti-gun politicians believe their best shot at passing the Federal Biometric ID scheme is to move FAST.
That's why your IMMEDIATE help is so vital.
So in addition to your signed petitions, I hope you'll consider making a generous contribution, as well.
You see, I've already prepared a massive targeted mail, phone and e-mail program that I'm ready to launch as soon as I can pay the up-front costs.
And then if I can raise the resources, I'd like to run hard-hitting radio, TV and newspaper ads, as well.
The goal is to start a grassroots fire against a new Federal Biometric ID scheme in the states represented by key Republican and Democrat Senators.
We'll point out that there's an overwhelming majority of citizens in their states who are opposed to a Federal Biometric ID card.
We'll also mention these voters are ALL watching these Senators' votes very carefully this election year.
Believe me, these Senators WILL get the message.
But I can't do any of this without your help.
That's why I hope you'll rush me your most generous contribution TODAY.
I know I'm asking a lot from you. But this could be it.
This could be the major, knock-down, drag-out fight we've been waiting for ever since President Obama was elected.
Until now, we've beaten the gun-control crowd to the punch -- publicizing and mobilizing a firestorm of grassroots opposition to the gun-grabbers radical schemes before they could even get them off the ground.
But unless you act now, we won't be so lucky this time.
That's why I hope, if at all possible, you will agree to a contribution of $25.
Of course, if that's simply too much, and you can't afford such a contribution at this time, I understand.
But will you agree to chip in at least $5 or $10?
I know you understand what's at stake.
So please rush me your most generous contribution of $25, $10 or at least $5 TODAY!
Sincerely,
Dudley Brown
Executive Director
P.S. The key provision in Senators Lindsey Graham's (R-SC) and Chuck Schumer's (D-NY) amnesty bill backed by President Obama is a new mandated Federal Biometric ID card that would be required for any person to hold a job in the United States legally.
This card would include untold amounts of personal information (like gun ownership) and biometric tracking technology that would allow government bureaucrats to track our every move.
That's why it's vital you sign our petitions to your Congressman and Senators IMMEDIATELY along with your most generous contribution of $25, $10 or $5 TODAY!
Monday, December 27, 2010
From Patriot Post
Alexander's Essay – December 23, 2010
The Light and the Truth
"To the distinguished Character of Patriot, it should be our highest Glory to add the more distinguished Character of Christian. The signal Instances of providential Goodness which we have experienced and which have now almost crowned our labours with complete Success, demand from us in a peculiar manner the warmest returns of Gratitude and Piety to the Supreme Author of all Good." --George Washington
Publisher's Note: To our Patriot readers of faiths other than Christianity, we hope that this edition serves to deepen your understanding of our faith -- and the faith of so many of our Founders. Permission to forward or reprint is granted.
Gen. Washington in PrayerFive years ago, I sent a Christmas greeting from The Patriot Post team entitled, "Happy Christmahanakwamadan," mocking the Left's PC insistence on "inclusive" and "non-offensive" greetings. It was accompanied by a legal department disclaimer outlining the terms of acceptance for the greeting.
Since then, the Left has redoubled its efforts to reinforce the mythical "wall of separation between church and state," assuming, as is now common, that those words originally penned by Thomas Jefferson to some of his constituents in Connecticut, supersede the only language in our Constitution concerning such a constraint.
That errant assumption, however, lacks even a shred of validity, and it was certainly not Jefferson's intent.
Our Founders were rightly suspect of any encroachment by government upon religious freedom, and they codified a proscription against such in the First Amendment of our Bill of Rights. It reads, "Congress [emphasis added] shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof..."
And yet, through decades of liberal interpretation of the so-called "living constitution," the Left has adulterated the authentic document via judicial diktat to comport with whatever agenda it desires.
How is it that we've come to this place in our nation's history? How is it that the God who endowed us with "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness" has been expelled from the public square under the supposition that religion and politics are antithetical?
Even Barack Hussein Obama, while cynically citing our Declaration of Independence in five public speeches recently, omitted the words "endowed by our Creator" from its context. Indeed, our president even proclaimed during an international forum that our national motto is "E pluribus unum," when it is, of course, "In God We Trust."
Why?
As frequent readers of this column know, I have spent most of my adult life in defense of Liberty, and endeavoring to guarantee it for others.
For the first half of my post-graduate career, I was engaged in the identification of "enemies foreign" in service to my country and in accordance with my oath "to support and defend" our Constitution. I did my small part to protect our countrymen from those enemies.
In my second career, as publisher of The Patriot Post for the past 15 years, I've been more focused on identifying "enemies domestic," as also specified in the oath I have renewed seven times. As such, I now endeavor to protect my countrymen by way of enlightenment from the enemies within.
To that end, our mission is guided by our motto, "Veritas vos Liberabit," which translates, "the Truth will set you Free." The origin is John 8:31-32, where Jesus said, "If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free." I am utterly convicted, after some early years of living as an unrepentant sinner, that enduring Truth can be fully understood only in the Light of the teachings of Jesus.
Of course, The Patriot Post is an instrument not for religious proselytization, but for discerning and disseminating the truths as outlined by our Founders in the Declaration of Independence and enshrined in our Constitution. We do so in order to distinguish between Rule of Law, which they understood as "endowed by our Creator," versus postmodern rule of men, the refuge of despots and tyrants who seek to enslave us now.
The unavoidable Truth is that our nation is founded on the principle that rights of man are endowed by God and not subordinate to the will of other men. The exclusion of God from the public discourse, then, is the objective of those who believe they are the arbiters of the rights of others, and who thus use "separation of church and state" as a means to that end.
This battle -- between those who seek to conserve our endowment by God, so that God can rule through the hearts of men, and those who seek to separate us from God so that their chosen men can rule over all others -- reflects the fundamental spiritual battle between God's purpose for us and our desire to be our own God.
Thus, the battle between Liberty and tyranny is really the battle between Light and Dark, which brings me to this perspective about the origins of the celebration of the birth of Christ in December.
The early church did not observe the celebration of Christ's birth. Annual year-end celebrations in the first centuries AD were predominantly pagan festivals associated with the winter solstice on the ancient Roman calendar.
History does not confirm for us who instituted the tradition to also celebrate Christ's birth at that time of year, but they were a brilliant lot. Pagans celebrated the solstice because it was the longest day of winter darkness, and because it thus heralded the season's change and the promise of more light and longer days, the growing seasons upon which they depended for life.
On the front in AfghanistanIsn't that precisely what Christmas represents, the dawn of a new season of Light through the birth of Jesus?
For most of us, Christmas is a collage of our childhood memories and family traditions. However, to recognize it more fully as the dawn of the New Covenant reveals the true spirit of Christmas, which is the foundation of every great Patriot's character.
George Washington insisted, "To the distinguished Character of Patriot, it should be our highest Glory to add the more distinguished Character of Christian." Here, I would suggest that the impetus for the selfless sacrificial acts of generations of Patriots is rooted, both theologically and culturally, in the ultimate example of sacrifice recorded some 2,000 years ago, when Jesus gave His life for all that would follow Him through eternity.
In 1743, Benjamin Franklin, our Founding Sage, wrote in Poor Richard's Almanack, "How many observe Christ's birth-day! How few, his precepts! O! 'tis easier to keep Holidays than Commandments."
As it is and always shall be, human nature leads us to live according to our own truths rather than following the enduring Truth and Light of our Creator.
For those who have yet to turn toward the Truth and Light, it would be far too easy to simply wish you "Happy Christmahanakwamadan." At the risk of offense, then, I'll offer you the same wish I have for all fellow Patriots who walk in the Light: Merry Christmas!
Please join our team in prayer for our uniformed Patriot Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines and Coast Guardsmen, and especially for the families enduring their absence, so that we might once again celebrate Christmas as a free people.
As always, on behalf of our staff and National Advisory Committee, I am humbled to stand with you among the ranks of our Patriot countrymen. We wish peace and God's blessing upon you and your family.
I sign every essay with this valediction: "Semper Vigilo, Fortis, Paratus, et Fidelis," which translates, "Always Vigilant, Brave, Prepared and Faithful." I believe that is what Christ has called us to be.
Semper Vigilo, Fortis, Paratus et Fidelis!
Mark Alexander
Publisher, The Patriot Post
P.S. As always, we take leave between Christmas and New Year's to be with our families. Our next edition will be on Jan. 3, 2011.
Also, as of this morning, we still need $83,242 to make budget. If you have not already done so, please take a moment to support our 2010 Year-End Campaign today by making a contribution -- however large or small. If you prefer to support us by mail, please use our printable donor form.
The Light and the Truth
"To the distinguished Character of Patriot, it should be our highest Glory to add the more distinguished Character of Christian. The signal Instances of providential Goodness which we have experienced and which have now almost crowned our labours with complete Success, demand from us in a peculiar manner the warmest returns of Gratitude and Piety to the Supreme Author of all Good." --George Washington
Publisher's Note: To our Patriot readers of faiths other than Christianity, we hope that this edition serves to deepen your understanding of our faith -- and the faith of so many of our Founders. Permission to forward or reprint is granted.
Gen. Washington in PrayerFive years ago, I sent a Christmas greeting from The Patriot Post team entitled, "Happy Christmahanakwamadan," mocking the Left's PC insistence on "inclusive" and "non-offensive" greetings. It was accompanied by a legal department disclaimer outlining the terms of acceptance for the greeting.
Since then, the Left has redoubled its efforts to reinforce the mythical "wall of separation between church and state," assuming, as is now common, that those words originally penned by Thomas Jefferson to some of his constituents in Connecticut, supersede the only language in our Constitution concerning such a constraint.
That errant assumption, however, lacks even a shred of validity, and it was certainly not Jefferson's intent.
Our Founders were rightly suspect of any encroachment by government upon religious freedom, and they codified a proscription against such in the First Amendment of our Bill of Rights. It reads, "Congress [emphasis added] shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof..."
And yet, through decades of liberal interpretation of the so-called "living constitution," the Left has adulterated the authentic document via judicial diktat to comport with whatever agenda it desires.
How is it that we've come to this place in our nation's history? How is it that the God who endowed us with "life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness" has been expelled from the public square under the supposition that religion and politics are antithetical?
Even Barack Hussein Obama, while cynically citing our Declaration of Independence in five public speeches recently, omitted the words "endowed by our Creator" from its context. Indeed, our president even proclaimed during an international forum that our national motto is "E pluribus unum," when it is, of course, "In God We Trust."
Why?
As frequent readers of this column know, I have spent most of my adult life in defense of Liberty, and endeavoring to guarantee it for others.
For the first half of my post-graduate career, I was engaged in the identification of "enemies foreign" in service to my country and in accordance with my oath "to support and defend" our Constitution. I did my small part to protect our countrymen from those enemies.
In my second career, as publisher of The Patriot Post for the past 15 years, I've been more focused on identifying "enemies domestic," as also specified in the oath I have renewed seven times. As such, I now endeavor to protect my countrymen by way of enlightenment from the enemies within.
To that end, our mission is guided by our motto, "Veritas vos Liberabit," which translates, "the Truth will set you Free." The origin is John 8:31-32, where Jesus said, "If you hold to my teaching, you are really my disciples. Then you will know the truth, and the truth will set you free." I am utterly convicted, after some early years of living as an unrepentant sinner, that enduring Truth can be fully understood only in the Light of the teachings of Jesus.
Of course, The Patriot Post is an instrument not for religious proselytization, but for discerning and disseminating the truths as outlined by our Founders in the Declaration of Independence and enshrined in our Constitution. We do so in order to distinguish between Rule of Law, which they understood as "endowed by our Creator," versus postmodern rule of men, the refuge of despots and tyrants who seek to enslave us now.
The unavoidable Truth is that our nation is founded on the principle that rights of man are endowed by God and not subordinate to the will of other men. The exclusion of God from the public discourse, then, is the objective of those who believe they are the arbiters of the rights of others, and who thus use "separation of church and state" as a means to that end.
This battle -- between those who seek to conserve our endowment by God, so that God can rule through the hearts of men, and those who seek to separate us from God so that their chosen men can rule over all others -- reflects the fundamental spiritual battle between God's purpose for us and our desire to be our own God.
Thus, the battle between Liberty and tyranny is really the battle between Light and Dark, which brings me to this perspective about the origins of the celebration of the birth of Christ in December.
The early church did not observe the celebration of Christ's birth. Annual year-end celebrations in the first centuries AD were predominantly pagan festivals associated with the winter solstice on the ancient Roman calendar.
History does not confirm for us who instituted the tradition to also celebrate Christ's birth at that time of year, but they were a brilliant lot. Pagans celebrated the solstice because it was the longest day of winter darkness, and because it thus heralded the season's change and the promise of more light and longer days, the growing seasons upon which they depended for life.
On the front in AfghanistanIsn't that precisely what Christmas represents, the dawn of a new season of Light through the birth of Jesus?
For most of us, Christmas is a collage of our childhood memories and family traditions. However, to recognize it more fully as the dawn of the New Covenant reveals the true spirit of Christmas, which is the foundation of every great Patriot's character.
George Washington insisted, "To the distinguished Character of Patriot, it should be our highest Glory to add the more distinguished Character of Christian." Here, I would suggest that the impetus for the selfless sacrificial acts of generations of Patriots is rooted, both theologically and culturally, in the ultimate example of sacrifice recorded some 2,000 years ago, when Jesus gave His life for all that would follow Him through eternity.
In 1743, Benjamin Franklin, our Founding Sage, wrote in Poor Richard's Almanack, "How many observe Christ's birth-day! How few, his precepts! O! 'tis easier to keep Holidays than Commandments."
As it is and always shall be, human nature leads us to live according to our own truths rather than following the enduring Truth and Light of our Creator.
For those who have yet to turn toward the Truth and Light, it would be far too easy to simply wish you "Happy Christmahanakwamadan." At the risk of offense, then, I'll offer you the same wish I have for all fellow Patriots who walk in the Light: Merry Christmas!
Please join our team in prayer for our uniformed Patriot Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines and Coast Guardsmen, and especially for the families enduring their absence, so that we might once again celebrate Christmas as a free people.
As always, on behalf of our staff and National Advisory Committee, I am humbled to stand with you among the ranks of our Patriot countrymen. We wish peace and God's blessing upon you and your family.
I sign every essay with this valediction: "Semper Vigilo, Fortis, Paratus, et Fidelis," which translates, "Always Vigilant, Brave, Prepared and Faithful." I believe that is what Christ has called us to be.
Semper Vigilo, Fortis, Paratus et Fidelis!
Mark Alexander
Publisher, The Patriot Post
P.S. As always, we take leave between Christmas and New Year's to be with our families. Our next edition will be on Jan. 3, 2011.
Also, as of this morning, we still need $83,242 to make budget. If you have not already done so, please take a moment to support our 2010 Year-End Campaign today by making a contribution -- however large or small. If you prefer to support us by mail, please use our printable donor form.
FROM ISREAL TODAY
This Christmas, remember, 'Jesus was a Palestinian'
Sunday, December 26, 2010
Ryan Jones
Print Version
Share
More than a billion Christians around the world have just celebrated Christmas, commemorating the birth of Jesus, the promised Messiah. There is one thing the Palestinian Arabs hope you all remembered while celebrating - that Jesus was, in fact, a Palestinian (Arab).
It is nothing new for the Palestinians to claim that Jesus was a Palestinian. The Palestinian leadership gets in on the action all the time. Yasser Arafat used to openly declare as much as he kicked off Christmas from Bethlehem every year.
Arafat is gone, and current Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas is a bit more subtle, but the media organs under his control are still being used to perpetuate this lie.
In a December 3 interview with Palestinian Authority TV, Samih Ghanadreh from Nazareth was asked about his new book “Christianity and its Connection to Islam.”
Ghanadreh tells the host that he remembers fondly how Arafat would label Jesus as “the first Palestinian Shahid (martyr).”
The host then matter-of-factly notes that “Jesus was a Palestinian; no one denies that.”
Palestinian Media Watch, which provided translation of the above interview, reports that earlier in the year, the Communications and Education Authority of the ruling Palestinian faction Fatah issued this statement on its official website:
“If we are proud of the holiness of our land, then we are proud and pride ourselves that the first and most important holy woman among the nations and peoples is from the holy land: The Virgin Mary - the woman of love and peace - is of the nation of Palestine…”
A year earlier, Abbas’ appointed Mufti of Jerusalem, Mohammed Hussein, preached on PA TV that “Jesus was born in this land; he took his first steps in this land and spread his teachings [of Islam] in this land. He and his mother [Mary], we may say, were Palestinians par excellence.”
These examples confirm that among average Palestinians, it is an ingrained belief that Jesus, the Messiah of Israel, was a Palestinian and even a pre-Islam Muslim. All historic or religious ties between Jesus and the Jews have been severed, just as they have severed all historic and religious ties between the Jews and this land.
Sunday, December 26, 2010
Ryan Jones
Print Version
Share
More than a billion Christians around the world have just celebrated Christmas, commemorating the birth of Jesus, the promised Messiah. There is one thing the Palestinian Arabs hope you all remembered while celebrating - that Jesus was, in fact, a Palestinian (Arab).
It is nothing new for the Palestinians to claim that Jesus was a Palestinian. The Palestinian leadership gets in on the action all the time. Yasser Arafat used to openly declare as much as he kicked off Christmas from Bethlehem every year.
Arafat is gone, and current Palestinian leader Mahmoud Abbas is a bit more subtle, but the media organs under his control are still being used to perpetuate this lie.
In a December 3 interview with Palestinian Authority TV, Samih Ghanadreh from Nazareth was asked about his new book “Christianity and its Connection to Islam.”
Ghanadreh tells the host that he remembers fondly how Arafat would label Jesus as “the first Palestinian Shahid (martyr).”
The host then matter-of-factly notes that “Jesus was a Palestinian; no one denies that.”
Palestinian Media Watch, which provided translation of the above interview, reports that earlier in the year, the Communications and Education Authority of the ruling Palestinian faction Fatah issued this statement on its official website:
“If we are proud of the holiness of our land, then we are proud and pride ourselves that the first and most important holy woman among the nations and peoples is from the holy land: The Virgin Mary - the woman of love and peace - is of the nation of Palestine…”
A year earlier, Abbas’ appointed Mufti of Jerusalem, Mohammed Hussein, preached on PA TV that “Jesus was born in this land; he took his first steps in this land and spread his teachings [of Islam] in this land. He and his mother [Mary], we may say, were Palestinians par excellence.”
These examples confirm that among average Palestinians, it is an ingrained belief that Jesus, the Messiah of Israel, was a Palestinian and even a pre-Islam Muslim. All historic or religious ties between Jesus and the Jews have been severed, just as they have severed all historic and religious ties between the Jews and this land.
FROM ISREAL TODAY
Israeli diplomat ambushed by NY Times staff
Sunday, December 26, 2010
Israel Today Staff
Print Version
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The New York Times, flagship of the liberal American media, has never been a friend of the Jewish state. But the newspaper’s aversion to Israel turned to open hostility this month when its top editors ambushed and tore into an unsuspecting senior official from the Israeli Consulate in New York City.
The Israeli official was invited by the Times editors, among them rabid columnist Thomas Friedman, to meet with them at their office. Being a veteran at dealing with the American media, the official assumed the invitation was for a friendly discussion and perhaps an interview regarding the peace process and other matters of importance to Israel.
The Israeli had no idea he was being invited for what he described as a lynch.
As the meeting started, the Times editors - most of them Jews, and one of them a former Israeli - began to attack the Israeli diplomat, and refused to give him even a moment to respond.
They blamed Israel for everything, the diplomat told Israel Today.
The Times editors insisted the breakdown of the peace process was Israel’s fault, that the lack of peace was Israel’s fault, and were adamant that Israel had given nothing to the Palestinians. They accused Israel of being an extremist and racist state, and blasted the diplomat for Israel’s “ill-treatment” of President Barack Obama.
In short, the Times staff informed the Israeli in no uncertain terms that they were sick of his country.
The diplomat told us he was shocked by the attack. He tried to respond, but the Times editors were not interested in hearing his arguments.
“I asked them,” said the diplomat, “We haven’t given the Palestinians anything? How can you say that? Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu broke with his party platform and implemented a 10-month Jewish building freeze, and what did we get in return? More Palestinian refusal to negotiate.”
According to the Israeli, the Times editors responded: “Yes, yes. Of course you are going to start telling us about how Israel’s security needs are not being met. You just don’t get it that we are sick of hearing about that.”
There is little doubt that this ambush was led by Friedman, whose hostility toward Israel in his recent columns has surprised even his liberal friends in the Jewish state.
In recent articles, Friedman has accused Israel of being a spoiled child, crazy and extremist. He insisted that the US stop being Israel’s “enabler,” and pointed out that the rest of the world is fully on the side of the Palestinians, so why not America?
Wrote Friedman in one of his columns: “Israel, when America - which has given you billions over the past 50 years and defended you in the international arena - asks you to stop building settlements for three months in order to jump start peace talks, there is only one correct answer, and that is ‘yes, whatever you say.’”
Sunday, December 26, 2010
Israel Today Staff
Print Version
Share
The New York Times, flagship of the liberal American media, has never been a friend of the Jewish state. But the newspaper’s aversion to Israel turned to open hostility this month when its top editors ambushed and tore into an unsuspecting senior official from the Israeli Consulate in New York City.
The Israeli official was invited by the Times editors, among them rabid columnist Thomas Friedman, to meet with them at their office. Being a veteran at dealing with the American media, the official assumed the invitation was for a friendly discussion and perhaps an interview regarding the peace process and other matters of importance to Israel.
The Israeli had no idea he was being invited for what he described as a lynch.
As the meeting started, the Times editors - most of them Jews, and one of them a former Israeli - began to attack the Israeli diplomat, and refused to give him even a moment to respond.
They blamed Israel for everything, the diplomat told Israel Today.
The Times editors insisted the breakdown of the peace process was Israel’s fault, that the lack of peace was Israel’s fault, and were adamant that Israel had given nothing to the Palestinians. They accused Israel of being an extremist and racist state, and blasted the diplomat for Israel’s “ill-treatment” of President Barack Obama.
In short, the Times staff informed the Israeli in no uncertain terms that they were sick of his country.
The diplomat told us he was shocked by the attack. He tried to respond, but the Times editors were not interested in hearing his arguments.
“I asked them,” said the diplomat, “We haven’t given the Palestinians anything? How can you say that? Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu broke with his party platform and implemented a 10-month Jewish building freeze, and what did we get in return? More Palestinian refusal to negotiate.”
According to the Israeli, the Times editors responded: “Yes, yes. Of course you are going to start telling us about how Israel’s security needs are not being met. You just don’t get it that we are sick of hearing about that.”
There is little doubt that this ambush was led by Friedman, whose hostility toward Israel in his recent columns has surprised even his liberal friends in the Jewish state.
In recent articles, Friedman has accused Israel of being a spoiled child, crazy and extremist. He insisted that the US stop being Israel’s “enabler,” and pointed out that the rest of the world is fully on the side of the Palestinians, so why not America?
Wrote Friedman in one of his columns: “Israel, when America - which has given you billions over the past 50 years and defended you in the international arena - asks you to stop building settlements for three months in order to jump start peace talks, there is only one correct answer, and that is ‘yes, whatever you say.’”
Wednesday, December 22, 2010
PROPHECY NEWS WATCH
Beam Me Up: 'Teleportation' Is Year's Biggest Breakthrough
http://www.foxnews.com/
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Thanks to physics, and the truly bizarre quirks of quarks, those Star Trek style teleporters may be more than fiction.
A strange discovery by quantum physicists at the University of California Santa Barbara means that an object you can see in front of you may exist simultaneously in a parallel universe -- a multi-state condition that has scientists theorizing that teleportation or even time travel may be much more than just the plaything of science fiction writers.
Until this year, all human-made objects have moved according to the laws of classical mechanics, the rules governing ordinary objects. Toss a ball in the air and it falls back to Earth. Drop a coin from your roof and it falls into your yard. But back in March, a group of researchers designed a gadget that moves in ways that can only be described by quantum mechanics -- the set of rules that governs the behavior of tiny things like molecules, atoms, and subatomic particles.
And the implication -- that teleportation and even time travel may someday, somehow be a reality -- is so groundbreaking that Science magazine has labelled it the most significant scientific advance of 2010.
Physicists Andrew Cleland and John Martinis from the University of California at Santa Barbara and their colleagues designed the machine -- a tiny metal paddle just barely visible to the naked eye -- and coaxed it into dancing with a quantum groove: First, they cooled the paddle until it reached its "ground state," or the lowest energy state permitted by the laws of quantum mechanics (a goal long-sought by physicists). Then they raised the widget's energy by a single quantum to produce a purely quantum-mechanical state of motion.
They even managed to put the gadget in both states at once, so that it literally vibrated a little and a lot at the same time -- a bizarre phenomenon allowed by the weird rules of quantum mechanics.
"When you observe something in one state, one theory is it split the universe into two parts," Cleland told FoxNews.com at the time, trying to explain how there can be multiple universes and we can see only one of them.
Crazy? Maybe. Insanely great science? Absolutely.
Science magazine has just recognized this first quantum machine as the 2010 Breakthrough of the Year. The magazine's editors have also compiled nine other important scientific accomplishments from this past year into a top ten list, appearing in a special feature in the journal's current issue.
"On a conceptual level that's cool because it extends quantum mechanics into a whole new realm," said Adrian Cho, a news writer for Science. "On a practical level, it opens up a variety of possibilities ranging from new experiments that meld quantum control over light, electrical currents and motion to, perhaps someday, tests of the bounds of quantum mechanics and our sense of reality."
Science's list of the nine other groundbreaking achievements from 2010 follows.
Synthetic Biology: In a defining moment for biology and biotechnology, researchers built a synthetic genome and used it to transform the identity of a bacterium. The genome replaced the bacterium's DNA so that it produced a new set of proteins—an achievement that prompted a Congressional hearing on synthetic biology. In the future, researchers envision synthetic genomes that are custom-built to generate biofuels, pharmaceuticals or other useful chemicals.
Neandertal Genome: Researchers sequenced the Neandertal genome from the bones of three female Neandertals who lived in Croatia sometime between 38,000 and 44,000 years ago. New methods of sequencing degraded fragments of DNA allowed scientists to make the first direct comparisons between the modern human genome and that of our Neandertal ancestors.
HIV Prophylaxis: Two HIV prevention trials of different, novel strategies reported unequivocal success: A vaginal gel that contains the anti-HIV drug tenofovir reduced HIV infections in women by 39 percent and an oral pre-exposure prophylaxis led to 43.8 fewer HIV infections in a group of men and transgender women who have sex with men.
Exome Sequencing/Rare Disease Genes: By sequencing just the exons of a genome, or the tiny portion that actually codes for proteins, researchers who study rare inherited diseases caused by a single, flawed gene were able to identify specific mutations underlying at least a dozen diseases.
Molecular Dynamics Simulations: Simulating the gyrations that proteins make as they fold has been a combinatorial nightmare. Now, researchers have harnessed the power of one of the world's most powerful computers to track the motions of atoms in a small, folding protein for a length of time 100 times longer than any previous efforts.
Quantum Simulator: To describe what they see in the lab, physicists cook up theories based on equations. Those equations can be fiendishly hard to solve. This year, though, researchers found a short-cut by making quantum simulators—artificial crystals in which spots of laser light play the role of ions and atoms trapped in the light stand in for electrons. The devices provide quick answers to theoretical problems in condensed matter physics and they might eventually help solve mysteries such as superconductivity.
Next-Generation Genomics: Faster and cheaper sequencing technologies are enabling very large-scale studies of both ancient and modern DNA. The 1,000 Genomes Project, for example, has already identified much of the genome variation that makes us uniquely human—and other projects in the works are set to reveal much more of the genome's function.
RNA Reprogramming: Reprogramming cells—turning back their developmental clocks to make them behave like unspecialized "stem cells" in an embryo—has become a standard lab technique for studying diseases and development. This year, researchers found a way to do it using synthetic RNA. Compared with previous methods, the new technique is twice as fast, 100 times as efficient and potentially safer for therapeutic use.
The Return of the Rat: Mice rule the world of laboratory animals, but for many purposes researchers would rather use rats. Rats are easier to work with and anatomically more similar to human beings; their big drawback is that methods used to make "knockout mice"—animals tailored for research by having specific genes precisely disabled—don't work for rats. A flurry of research this year, however, promises to bring "knockout rats" to labs in a big way.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
http://www.foxnews.com/
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Thanks to physics, and the truly bizarre quirks of quarks, those Star Trek style teleporters may be more than fiction.
A strange discovery by quantum physicists at the University of California Santa Barbara means that an object you can see in front of you may exist simultaneously in a parallel universe -- a multi-state condition that has scientists theorizing that teleportation or even time travel may be much more than just the plaything of science fiction writers.
Until this year, all human-made objects have moved according to the laws of classical mechanics, the rules governing ordinary objects. Toss a ball in the air and it falls back to Earth. Drop a coin from your roof and it falls into your yard. But back in March, a group of researchers designed a gadget that moves in ways that can only be described by quantum mechanics -- the set of rules that governs the behavior of tiny things like molecules, atoms, and subatomic particles.
And the implication -- that teleportation and even time travel may someday, somehow be a reality -- is so groundbreaking that Science magazine has labelled it the most significant scientific advance of 2010.
Physicists Andrew Cleland and John Martinis from the University of California at Santa Barbara and their colleagues designed the machine -- a tiny metal paddle just barely visible to the naked eye -- and coaxed it into dancing with a quantum groove: First, they cooled the paddle until it reached its "ground state," or the lowest energy state permitted by the laws of quantum mechanics (a goal long-sought by physicists). Then they raised the widget's energy by a single quantum to produce a purely quantum-mechanical state of motion.
They even managed to put the gadget in both states at once, so that it literally vibrated a little and a lot at the same time -- a bizarre phenomenon allowed by the weird rules of quantum mechanics.
"When you observe something in one state, one theory is it split the universe into two parts," Cleland told FoxNews.com at the time, trying to explain how there can be multiple universes and we can see only one of them.
Crazy? Maybe. Insanely great science? Absolutely.
Science magazine has just recognized this first quantum machine as the 2010 Breakthrough of the Year. The magazine's editors have also compiled nine other important scientific accomplishments from this past year into a top ten list, appearing in a special feature in the journal's current issue.
"On a conceptual level that's cool because it extends quantum mechanics into a whole new realm," said Adrian Cho, a news writer for Science. "On a practical level, it opens up a variety of possibilities ranging from new experiments that meld quantum control over light, electrical currents and motion to, perhaps someday, tests of the bounds of quantum mechanics and our sense of reality."
Science's list of the nine other groundbreaking achievements from 2010 follows.
Synthetic Biology: In a defining moment for biology and biotechnology, researchers built a synthetic genome and used it to transform the identity of a bacterium. The genome replaced the bacterium's DNA so that it produced a new set of proteins—an achievement that prompted a Congressional hearing on synthetic biology. In the future, researchers envision synthetic genomes that are custom-built to generate biofuels, pharmaceuticals or other useful chemicals.
Neandertal Genome: Researchers sequenced the Neandertal genome from the bones of three female Neandertals who lived in Croatia sometime between 38,000 and 44,000 years ago. New methods of sequencing degraded fragments of DNA allowed scientists to make the first direct comparisons between the modern human genome and that of our Neandertal ancestors.
HIV Prophylaxis: Two HIV prevention trials of different, novel strategies reported unequivocal success: A vaginal gel that contains the anti-HIV drug tenofovir reduced HIV infections in women by 39 percent and an oral pre-exposure prophylaxis led to 43.8 fewer HIV infections in a group of men and transgender women who have sex with men.
Exome Sequencing/Rare Disease Genes: By sequencing just the exons of a genome, or the tiny portion that actually codes for proteins, researchers who study rare inherited diseases caused by a single, flawed gene were able to identify specific mutations underlying at least a dozen diseases.
Molecular Dynamics Simulations: Simulating the gyrations that proteins make as they fold has been a combinatorial nightmare. Now, researchers have harnessed the power of one of the world's most powerful computers to track the motions of atoms in a small, folding protein for a length of time 100 times longer than any previous efforts.
Quantum Simulator: To describe what they see in the lab, physicists cook up theories based on equations. Those equations can be fiendishly hard to solve. This year, though, researchers found a short-cut by making quantum simulators—artificial crystals in which spots of laser light play the role of ions and atoms trapped in the light stand in for electrons. The devices provide quick answers to theoretical problems in condensed matter physics and they might eventually help solve mysteries such as superconductivity.
Next-Generation Genomics: Faster and cheaper sequencing technologies are enabling very large-scale studies of both ancient and modern DNA. The 1,000 Genomes Project, for example, has already identified much of the genome variation that makes us uniquely human—and other projects in the works are set to reveal much more of the genome's function.
RNA Reprogramming: Reprogramming cells—turning back their developmental clocks to make them behave like unspecialized "stem cells" in an embryo—has become a standard lab technique for studying diseases and development. This year, researchers found a way to do it using synthetic RNA. Compared with previous methods, the new technique is twice as fast, 100 times as efficient and potentially safer for therapeutic use.
The Return of the Rat: Mice rule the world of laboratory animals, but for many purposes researchers would rather use rats. Rats are easier to work with and anatomically more similar to human beings; their big drawback is that methods used to make "knockout mice"—animals tailored for research by having specific genes precisely disabled—don't work for rats. A flurry of research this year, however, promises to bring "knockout rats" to labs in a big way.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
PROPHECY NEWS WATCH
Tipping Point: 25 Signs That The Coming Financial Collapse Is Now Closer Then Ever
http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The financial collapse that so many of us have been anticipating is seemingly closer then ever. Over the past several weeks, there have been a host of ominous signs for the U.S. economy. Yields on U.S. Treasuries have moved up rapidly and Moody’s is publicly warning that it may have to cut the rating on U.S. government debt soon. Mortgage rates are also moving up aggressively. The euro and the U.S. dollar both look incredibly shaky. Jobs continue to be shipped out of the United States at a blistering pace as our politicians stand by and do nothing. Confidence in U.S. government debt around the globe continues to decline. State and local governments that are drowning in debt across the United States are savagely cutting back on even essential social services and are coming up with increasingly “creative” ways of getting more money out of all of us. Meanwhile, tremor after tremor continues to strike the world financial system. So does this mean that we have almost reached a tipping point? Is the world on the verge of a major financial collapse?
Let’s hope not, but with each passing week the financial news just seems to get eve worse. Not only is U.S. government debt spinning wildly toward a breaking point, but many U.S. states (such as California) are in such horrific financial condition that they are beginning to resemble banana republics.
But it is not just the United States that is in trouble. Nightmarish debt problems in Greece, Spain, Portugal, Ireland, Italy, Belgium and several other European nations threaten to crash the euro at any time. In fact, many economists are now openly debating which will collapse first – the euro or the U.S. dollar.
Sadly, this is the inevitable result of constructing a global financial system on debt. All debt bubbles eventually collapse. Currently we are living in the biggest debt bubble in the history of the world, and when this one bursts it is going to be a disaster of truly historic proportions.
So will we reach a tipping point soon? Well, the following are 25 signs that the financial collapse is rapidly getting closer….
#1 The official U.S. unemployment rate has not been beneath 9 percent since April 2009.
#2 According to the U.S. Census Bureau, there are currently 6.3 million vacant homes in the United States that are either for sale or for rent.
#3 It is being projected that the U.S. trade deficit with China could hit 270 billion dollars for the entire year of 2010.
#4 Back in 2000, 7.2 percent of blue collar workers were either unemployed or underemployed. Today that figure is up to 19.5 percent.
#5 The Chinese government has accumulated approximately $2.65 trillion in total foreign exchange reserves. They have drained this wealth from the economies of other nations (such as the United States) and instead of reinvesting all of it they are just sitting on much of it. This is creating tremendous imbalances in the global economy.
#6 Since the year 2000, we have lost 10% of our middle class jobs. In the year 2000 there were approximately 72 million middle class jobs in the United States but today there are only about 65 million middle class jobs.
#7 The United States now employs about the same number of people in manufacturing as it did back in 1940. Considering the fact that we had 132 million people living in this country in 1940 and that we have well over 300 million people living in this country today, that is a very sobering statistic.
#8 According to CoreLogic, U.S. housing prices have now declined for three months in a row.
#9 The average rate on a 30 year fixed rate mortgage soared 11 basis points just this past week. As mortgage rates continue to push higher it is going to make it even more difficult for American families to afford homes.
#10 22.5 percent of all residential mortgages in the United States were in negative equity as of the end of the third quarter of 2010.
#11 The U.S. monetary base has more than doubled since the beginning of the most recent recession.
#12 U.S. Treasury yields have been rising steadily during the 4th quarter of 2010 and recently hit a six-month high.
#13 Incoming governor Jerry Brown is scrambling to find $29 billion more to cut from the California state budget. The following quote from Brown about the desperate condition of California state finances is not going to do much to inspire confidence in California’s financial situation around the globe….
“We’ve been living in fantasy land. It is much worse than I thought. I’m shocked.”
#14 24.3 percent of the residents of El Centro, California are currently unemployed.
#15 The average home in Merced, California has declined in value by 63 percent over the past four years.
#16 Detroit Mayor Dave Bing has come up with a new way to save money. He wants to cut 20 percent of Detroit off from essential social services such as road repairs, police patrols, functioning street lights and garbage collection.
#17 The second most dangerous city in the United States – Camden, New Jersey – is about to lay off about half its police in a desperate attempt to save money.
#18 In 2010, 55 percent of Americans between the ages of 60 and 64 were in the labor market. Ten years ago, that number was just 47 percent. More older Americans than ever find that they have to keep working just to survive.
#19 Back in 1998, the United States had 25 percent of the world’s high-tech export market and China had just 10 percent. Ten years later, the United States had less than 15 percent and China’s share had soared to 20 percent.
#20 The U.S. government budget deficit increased to a whopping $150.4 billion last month, which represented the biggest November budget deficit on record.
#21 The U.S. government is somehow going to have to roll over existing debt and finance new debt that is equivalent to 27.8 percent of GDP in 2011.
#22 The United States had been the leading consumer of energy on the globe for about 100 years, but this past summer China took over the number one spot.
#23 According to an absolutely stunning new poll, 40 percent of all U.S. doctors plan to bail out of the profession over the next three years.
#24 As 2007 began, there were just over 1 million Americans that had been unemployed for half a year or longer. Today, there are over 6 million Americans that have been unemployed for half a year or longer.
#25 All over the United States, local governments have begun instituting “police response fees”. For example, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg has come up with a plan under which a fee of $365 would be charged if police are called to respond to an automobile accident where no injuries are involved. If there are injuries as a result of the crash that is going to cost extra.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
http://theeconomiccollapseblog.com/
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
The financial collapse that so many of us have been anticipating is seemingly closer then ever. Over the past several weeks, there have been a host of ominous signs for the U.S. economy. Yields on U.S. Treasuries have moved up rapidly and Moody’s is publicly warning that it may have to cut the rating on U.S. government debt soon. Mortgage rates are also moving up aggressively. The euro and the U.S. dollar both look incredibly shaky. Jobs continue to be shipped out of the United States at a blistering pace as our politicians stand by and do nothing. Confidence in U.S. government debt around the globe continues to decline. State and local governments that are drowning in debt across the United States are savagely cutting back on even essential social services and are coming up with increasingly “creative” ways of getting more money out of all of us. Meanwhile, tremor after tremor continues to strike the world financial system. So does this mean that we have almost reached a tipping point? Is the world on the verge of a major financial collapse?
Let’s hope not, but with each passing week the financial news just seems to get eve worse. Not only is U.S. government debt spinning wildly toward a breaking point, but many U.S. states (such as California) are in such horrific financial condition that they are beginning to resemble banana republics.
But it is not just the United States that is in trouble. Nightmarish debt problems in Greece, Spain, Portugal, Ireland, Italy, Belgium and several other European nations threaten to crash the euro at any time. In fact, many economists are now openly debating which will collapse first – the euro or the U.S. dollar.
Sadly, this is the inevitable result of constructing a global financial system on debt. All debt bubbles eventually collapse. Currently we are living in the biggest debt bubble in the history of the world, and when this one bursts it is going to be a disaster of truly historic proportions.
So will we reach a tipping point soon? Well, the following are 25 signs that the financial collapse is rapidly getting closer….
#1 The official U.S. unemployment rate has not been beneath 9 percent since April 2009.
#2 According to the U.S. Census Bureau, there are currently 6.3 million vacant homes in the United States that are either for sale or for rent.
#3 It is being projected that the U.S. trade deficit with China could hit 270 billion dollars for the entire year of 2010.
#4 Back in 2000, 7.2 percent of blue collar workers were either unemployed or underemployed. Today that figure is up to 19.5 percent.
#5 The Chinese government has accumulated approximately $2.65 trillion in total foreign exchange reserves. They have drained this wealth from the economies of other nations (such as the United States) and instead of reinvesting all of it they are just sitting on much of it. This is creating tremendous imbalances in the global economy.
#6 Since the year 2000, we have lost 10% of our middle class jobs. In the year 2000 there were approximately 72 million middle class jobs in the United States but today there are only about 65 million middle class jobs.
#7 The United States now employs about the same number of people in manufacturing as it did back in 1940. Considering the fact that we had 132 million people living in this country in 1940 and that we have well over 300 million people living in this country today, that is a very sobering statistic.
#8 According to CoreLogic, U.S. housing prices have now declined for three months in a row.
#9 The average rate on a 30 year fixed rate mortgage soared 11 basis points just this past week. As mortgage rates continue to push higher it is going to make it even more difficult for American families to afford homes.
#10 22.5 percent of all residential mortgages in the United States were in negative equity as of the end of the third quarter of 2010.
#11 The U.S. monetary base has more than doubled since the beginning of the most recent recession.
#12 U.S. Treasury yields have been rising steadily during the 4th quarter of 2010 and recently hit a six-month high.
#13 Incoming governor Jerry Brown is scrambling to find $29 billion more to cut from the California state budget. The following quote from Brown about the desperate condition of California state finances is not going to do much to inspire confidence in California’s financial situation around the globe….
“We’ve been living in fantasy land. It is much worse than I thought. I’m shocked.”
#14 24.3 percent of the residents of El Centro, California are currently unemployed.
#15 The average home in Merced, California has declined in value by 63 percent over the past four years.
#16 Detroit Mayor Dave Bing has come up with a new way to save money. He wants to cut 20 percent of Detroit off from essential social services such as road repairs, police patrols, functioning street lights and garbage collection.
#17 The second most dangerous city in the United States – Camden, New Jersey – is about to lay off about half its police in a desperate attempt to save money.
#18 In 2010, 55 percent of Americans between the ages of 60 and 64 were in the labor market. Ten years ago, that number was just 47 percent. More older Americans than ever find that they have to keep working just to survive.
#19 Back in 1998, the United States had 25 percent of the world’s high-tech export market and China had just 10 percent. Ten years later, the United States had less than 15 percent and China’s share had soared to 20 percent.
#20 The U.S. government budget deficit increased to a whopping $150.4 billion last month, which represented the biggest November budget deficit on record.
#21 The U.S. government is somehow going to have to roll over existing debt and finance new debt that is equivalent to 27.8 percent of GDP in 2011.
#22 The United States had been the leading consumer of energy on the globe for about 100 years, but this past summer China took over the number one spot.
#23 According to an absolutely stunning new poll, 40 percent of all U.S. doctors plan to bail out of the profession over the next three years.
#24 As 2007 began, there were just over 1 million Americans that had been unemployed for half a year or longer. Today, there are over 6 million Americans that have been unemployed for half a year or longer.
#25 All over the United States, local governments have begun instituting “police response fees”. For example, New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg has come up with a plan under which a fee of $365 would be charged if police are called to respond to an automobile accident where no injuries are involved. If there are injuries as a result of the crash that is going to cost extra.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
FROM TOWNHALL
Will Mrs. Obama Downsize Your Kid?
Email Mona Charen
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Sign-Up The first lady got a bit of a bum rap last week when some on the right wrenched her comment on the new school lunch program out of context. Justifying an expanded federal program to feed kids healthy breakfasts and lunches at school, Michelle Obama said, "We can't just leave it up to the parents." Some radio shouters let fly at her for that. But immediately before that statement, Mrs. Obama had said, "I meet parents who are working very hard to make sure that their kids are healthy ... They're trying to teach their kids the kind of healthy habits that will stay with them for a lifetime. But ... it's clear that we as a nation have a responsibility to meet as well. We can't just leave it up to the parents." This is not to suggest that Mrs. Obama's initiative, which will cost an additional $4.5 billion over the $13 billion we're already spending, is a good idea. The thrust of the new federal law is to bring the wisdom of the federal government to the task of helping kids become healthier. The terms "wisdom" and "federal government" make uncomfortable sentence mates. Certainly, there is a problem to be addressed. Some 31 percent of children and teens, reports the CDC, are overweight or obese, triple the rate of 30 years ago. It isn't even crazy to suggest, as Mrs. Obama has, that when "one in four young people are unqualified for military service because of their weight, childhood obesity isn't just a public health threat, it's not just an economic threat, it's a national security threat as well." And yet, it requires a certain kind of stubborn obtuseness to ride into battle carrying the flag of subsidized school lunches when the problem was partly created by ... subsidized school lunches!
Mrs. Obama is correct that school meals are loaded with saturated fat, salt, and sugar. She notes that children receive half of their daily calories from school lunches. Most kids don't eat breakfast at school, which means that school lunches are larded up with calories.
How did this happen? Was it just that before the Obamas came to town, the feds were misguided about what was good for kids? Or was it something about the way government operates?
Is it an accident that school lunches are so heavy on cheese and meat? No. The National School Lunch program, enacted in 1946, was devised with two goals in mind. The first was to subsidize farmers by purchasing huge blocs of "excess" commodities in order to keep prices up. Only secondarily did the government intend to help feed hungry children. Subsidies are, to paraphrase Ronald Reagan, the closest thing to immortal life in this world. So while America's children were getting heavier and heavier, particularly low-income children, federal programs continued to heap pizza, French fries, and cheeseburgers onto their plates.
There have been episodic and quixotic efforts to kill the subsidies. In 2007, Rep. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz.; and Ron Kind, D-Wis., offered an amendment to the farm bill that would have reduced subsidies for unhealthy commodities like meat and cheese, cut subsidies to millionaire farmers, and increased funding for nutritional services to poor children. But Speaker Pelosi, fearing that her farm state members would pay a political price, urged a "no" vote.
Some 30 million American children (about 83 percent of the total) eat subsidized school lunches in America's schools, though only 17.4 million are low income. Mrs. Obama's reform will increase spending on the grounds that healthy foods are more expensive than unhealthy ones. But $2.2 billion of the $4.5 cost of the new program is to be offset by reductions in the Food Stamp program. Bad idea.
The amount of all of this food that winds up uneaten in the trash can only be guessed at (though anecdotal evidence abounds). Wouldn't it make more sense, economically, nutritionally, and (importantly) socially to eliminate school lunches altogether? Parents can pack a highly nutritious turkey, tuna, or peanut butter sandwich with an apple or an orange. Poor parents can afford to do this with help from the Food Stamp program. The older kids can pack their own lunches. (A child who repeatedly showed up at school without lunch would receive attention from child protective services.) Most of the parent-supervised lunches would be superior in nutrition and taste to anything the government could serve (some kids might even find an affectionate note from mom or dad in their lunch boxes). But more importantly, the principle that parents are responsible for their children would be ratified.
Mona Charen
Mona Charen is a syndicated columnist, political analyst and author of Do-Gooders: How Liberals Hurt Those They Claim to Help .
TOWNHALL DAILY: Be the first to read Mona Charen's column. Sign up today and receive Townhall.com daily lineup delivered each morning to your inbox.
©Creators Syndicate
Email Mona Charen
Columnist's Archive Share Buzz 0diggsdigg
Sign-Up The first lady got a bit of a bum rap last week when some on the right wrenched her comment on the new school lunch program out of context. Justifying an expanded federal program to feed kids healthy breakfasts and lunches at school, Michelle Obama said, "We can't just leave it up to the parents." Some radio shouters let fly at her for that. But immediately before that statement, Mrs. Obama had said, "I meet parents who are working very hard to make sure that their kids are healthy ... They're trying to teach their kids the kind of healthy habits that will stay with them for a lifetime. But ... it's clear that we as a nation have a responsibility to meet as well. We can't just leave it up to the parents." This is not to suggest that Mrs. Obama's initiative, which will cost an additional $4.5 billion over the $13 billion we're already spending, is a good idea. The thrust of the new federal law is to bring the wisdom of the federal government to the task of helping kids become healthier. The terms "wisdom" and "federal government" make uncomfortable sentence mates. Certainly, there is a problem to be addressed. Some 31 percent of children and teens, reports the CDC, are overweight or obese, triple the rate of 30 years ago. It isn't even crazy to suggest, as Mrs. Obama has, that when "one in four young people are unqualified for military service because of their weight, childhood obesity isn't just a public health threat, it's not just an economic threat, it's a national security threat as well." And yet, it requires a certain kind of stubborn obtuseness to ride into battle carrying the flag of subsidized school lunches when the problem was partly created by ... subsidized school lunches!
Mrs. Obama is correct that school meals are loaded with saturated fat, salt, and sugar. She notes that children receive half of their daily calories from school lunches. Most kids don't eat breakfast at school, which means that school lunches are larded up with calories.
How did this happen? Was it just that before the Obamas came to town, the feds were misguided about what was good for kids? Or was it something about the way government operates?
Is it an accident that school lunches are so heavy on cheese and meat? No. The National School Lunch program, enacted in 1946, was devised with two goals in mind. The first was to subsidize farmers by purchasing huge blocs of "excess" commodities in order to keep prices up. Only secondarily did the government intend to help feed hungry children. Subsidies are, to paraphrase Ronald Reagan, the closest thing to immortal life in this world. So while America's children were getting heavier and heavier, particularly low-income children, federal programs continued to heap pizza, French fries, and cheeseburgers onto their plates.
There have been episodic and quixotic efforts to kill the subsidies. In 2007, Rep. Jeff Flake, R-Ariz.; and Ron Kind, D-Wis., offered an amendment to the farm bill that would have reduced subsidies for unhealthy commodities like meat and cheese, cut subsidies to millionaire farmers, and increased funding for nutritional services to poor children. But Speaker Pelosi, fearing that her farm state members would pay a political price, urged a "no" vote.
Some 30 million American children (about 83 percent of the total) eat subsidized school lunches in America's schools, though only 17.4 million are low income. Mrs. Obama's reform will increase spending on the grounds that healthy foods are more expensive than unhealthy ones. But $2.2 billion of the $4.5 cost of the new program is to be offset by reductions in the Food Stamp program. Bad idea.
The amount of all of this food that winds up uneaten in the trash can only be guessed at (though anecdotal evidence abounds). Wouldn't it make more sense, economically, nutritionally, and (importantly) socially to eliminate school lunches altogether? Parents can pack a highly nutritious turkey, tuna, or peanut butter sandwich with an apple or an orange. Poor parents can afford to do this with help from the Food Stamp program. The older kids can pack their own lunches. (A child who repeatedly showed up at school without lunch would receive attention from child protective services.) Most of the parent-supervised lunches would be superior in nutrition and taste to anything the government could serve (some kids might even find an affectionate note from mom or dad in their lunch boxes). But more importantly, the principle that parents are responsible for their children would be ratified.
Mona Charen
Mona Charen is a syndicated columnist, political analyst and author of Do-Gooders: How Liberals Hurt Those They Claim to Help .
TOWNHALL DAILY: Be the first to read Mona Charen's column. Sign up today and receive Townhall.com daily lineup delivered each morning to your inbox.
©Creators Syndicate
FROM TOWNHALL
Last year, the National Association for Gun Rights first broke this incredible tale out of Shreveport, Louisiana.
At the time, no other gun rights organization had touched the story. But when we tracked down the victim for an interview, we couldn't believe what we heard, and we immediately sent out a nationwide alert.
The story went viral overnight.
If this tale of government abuse moves you, send it to a friend or family member to get the word out.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Welcome to Shreveport: Your rights are now suspended.According to Cedric Glover, mayor of Shreveport, Louisiana, his cops "have a power that [. . .] the President of these Unites States does not have": His cops can take away your rights.
And would you like to guess which rights he has in mind?
Just ask Shreveport resident Robert Baillio, who got pulled over for having two pro-gun bumper stickers on the back of his truck -- and had his gun confiscated.
While the officer who pulled him over says Baillio failed to use his turn signal, the only questions he had for Baillio concerned guns: Whether he had a gun, where the gun was, and if he was a member of a pro-gun organization.
No requests for a driver's licence, proof of insurance, or vehicle registration -- and no discussion of a turn signal.
Accordingly, Baillio told the officer the truth, which led the police officer to search his car without permission and confiscate his gun.
However, not only does Louisiana law allow residents to drive with loaded weapons in their vehicles, but Mr. Baillio possessed a concealed carry license!
What does such behavior demonstrate, other than transparent political profiling -- going so far as to use the infamous Department of Homeland Security report on "Americans of a rightwing persuasion" as a how-to guidebook, no less?
Mr. Baillio made no secret of his political affiliations: An American flag centers a wide flourish of pro-freedom stickers and decals on his back windshield.
In fact, when Baillio asked the officer if everyone he pulls over gets the same treatment, the officer said no and pointed to the back of his truck.
Baillio phoned Mayor Glover to complain about this "suspension of rights" only to find that his city's morbidly obese "commander in chief" was elated at the story: According to Glover, Baillio got "served well, protected well, and even got a consideration that maybe [he] should not have gotten."
Thankfully, Mr. Baillio recorded a good bit of that phone call. You can watch a video with the transcriptions here. I've reproduced a chunk of the call below:
Baillio: (in the context of being asked about the presence of a gun) Well, I answered that question honestly, and he disarmed me.
Glover: Which would be an appropriate and proper action, sir. The fact that you gave the correct answer -- it simply means that you did what it is you were supposed to have done, and that is to give that weapon to the police officer so he could appropriately place it in a place where it would not be a threat to you, to him, or to anyone in the general public.
[. . .]
Glover: My direction to you is that, had you chosen not to properly identify the fact that you had a weapon and directed that officer to where that weapon was located; had you been taken from the vehicle, and the officer, in the interest of his safety, chose to secure you in a safe position, and then looked, found, and determined that you did, in fact, have a weapon...then, sir, you would have faced additional, [inaudible], and more severe criminal sanctions.
Baillio: So what you're saying is: I give up all my rights to keep and bear arms if I'm stopped by the police: Is that correct?
Glover: Sir, you have no right, when you have been pulled over by a police officer for a potential criminal offense [which would be what?! - DB] to stand there with your weapon at your side in your hand [Baillio's weapon was nowhere near his side or his hand, and Glover knew that. - DB] because of your second amendment rights, sir. That does not mean at that point your second amendment right has been taken away; it means at that particular point in time, it has been suspended.
Will Grigg from ProLibertate, an excellent freedom blog, has this to say:
According to Glover, a police officer may properly disarm any civilian at any time, and the civilian's duty is to surrender his gun -- willingly, readily, cheerfully, without cavil or question.
From Glover's perspective, it is only when firearms are in the hands of people other than the state's uniformed enforcers/oppressors that they constitute a threat, not only to the public and those in charge of exercising official violence but also to the private gun owner himself.
NAGR spoke with Mr. Baillio, and he told us that he's in the process of securing the official procedures and codes for firearm handling and private property confiscation for the Shreveport police department.
So far, the city has been half-heartedly cooperating with him.
"I felt sick," Baillio told NAGR. "My uncles didn't die for this country so I could surrender my rights like a wimp. I felt terrible. I was just thinking of all that my family has done for freedom in this nation -- including dying -- and here they are disarming me at a traffic stop."
What to do?
Read Luke's commentary here, and participate in the discussion by leaving a comment.
Send this around. This kind of behavior cannot go unchecked.
Call Mayor Glover's office to complain: (318) 673-5050.
I'll leave you with one last consideration. As a licensed firearms instructor in charge of a hundred different students every month, I'm often asked if citizens should voluntarily inform police officers of the presence of a firearm during a routine traffic stop.
While different states have different laws, my answer for Colorado citizens is an emphatic "No": Colorado law doesn't require you to volunteer that kind of information, and this case in Louisiana proves why, if at all possible, you should never invite trouble by doing so.
For Liberty,
Dudley Brown
Executive Director
National Association for Gun Rights
P.S. NAGR maintains a gun rights blog that our members use to keep abreast of current gun rights developments.
Whether the news is coming down from Congress, the states, the ATF, Michael Bloomberg, Eric Holder, or even this particular autocratic city official, Luke will keep you ahead of the game and up to speed on the battle for your gun rights.
To visit the blog, click here or point your browser to www.NationalGunRights.org/Blog.
At the time, no other gun rights organization had touched the story. But when we tracked down the victim for an interview, we couldn't believe what we heard, and we immediately sent out a nationwide alert.
The story went viral overnight.
If this tale of government abuse moves you, send it to a friend or family member to get the word out.
--------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Welcome to Shreveport: Your rights are now suspended.According to Cedric Glover, mayor of Shreveport, Louisiana, his cops "have a power that [. . .] the President of these Unites States does not have": His cops can take away your rights.
And would you like to guess which rights he has in mind?
Just ask Shreveport resident Robert Baillio, who got pulled over for having two pro-gun bumper stickers on the back of his truck -- and had his gun confiscated.
While the officer who pulled him over says Baillio failed to use his turn signal, the only questions he had for Baillio concerned guns: Whether he had a gun, where the gun was, and if he was a member of a pro-gun organization.
No requests for a driver's licence, proof of insurance, or vehicle registration -- and no discussion of a turn signal.
Accordingly, Baillio told the officer the truth, which led the police officer to search his car without permission and confiscate his gun.
However, not only does Louisiana law allow residents to drive with loaded weapons in their vehicles, but Mr. Baillio possessed a concealed carry license!
What does such behavior demonstrate, other than transparent political profiling -- going so far as to use the infamous Department of Homeland Security report on "Americans of a rightwing persuasion" as a how-to guidebook, no less?
Mr. Baillio made no secret of his political affiliations: An American flag centers a wide flourish of pro-freedom stickers and decals on his back windshield.
In fact, when Baillio asked the officer if everyone he pulls over gets the same treatment, the officer said no and pointed to the back of his truck.
Baillio phoned Mayor Glover to complain about this "suspension of rights" only to find that his city's morbidly obese "commander in chief" was elated at the story: According to Glover, Baillio got "served well, protected well, and even got a consideration that maybe [he] should not have gotten."
Thankfully, Mr. Baillio recorded a good bit of that phone call. You can watch a video with the transcriptions here. I've reproduced a chunk of the call below:
Baillio: (in the context of being asked about the presence of a gun) Well, I answered that question honestly, and he disarmed me.
Glover: Which would be an appropriate and proper action, sir. The fact that you gave the correct answer -- it simply means that you did what it is you were supposed to have done, and that is to give that weapon to the police officer so he could appropriately place it in a place where it would not be a threat to you, to him, or to anyone in the general public.
[. . .]
Glover: My direction to you is that, had you chosen not to properly identify the fact that you had a weapon and directed that officer to where that weapon was located; had you been taken from the vehicle, and the officer, in the interest of his safety, chose to secure you in a safe position, and then looked, found, and determined that you did, in fact, have a weapon...then, sir, you would have faced additional, [inaudible], and more severe criminal sanctions.
Baillio: So what you're saying is: I give up all my rights to keep and bear arms if I'm stopped by the police: Is that correct?
Glover: Sir, you have no right, when you have been pulled over by a police officer for a potential criminal offense [which would be what?! - DB] to stand there with your weapon at your side in your hand [Baillio's weapon was nowhere near his side or his hand, and Glover knew that. - DB] because of your second amendment rights, sir. That does not mean at that point your second amendment right has been taken away; it means at that particular point in time, it has been suspended.
Will Grigg from ProLibertate, an excellent freedom blog, has this to say:
According to Glover, a police officer may properly disarm any civilian at any time, and the civilian's duty is to surrender his gun -- willingly, readily, cheerfully, without cavil or question.
From Glover's perspective, it is only when firearms are in the hands of people other than the state's uniformed enforcers/oppressors that they constitute a threat, not only to the public and those in charge of exercising official violence but also to the private gun owner himself.
NAGR spoke with Mr. Baillio, and he told us that he's in the process of securing the official procedures and codes for firearm handling and private property confiscation for the Shreveport police department.
So far, the city has been half-heartedly cooperating with him.
"I felt sick," Baillio told NAGR. "My uncles didn't die for this country so I could surrender my rights like a wimp. I felt terrible. I was just thinking of all that my family has done for freedom in this nation -- including dying -- and here they are disarming me at a traffic stop."
What to do?
Read Luke's commentary here, and participate in the discussion by leaving a comment.
Send this around. This kind of behavior cannot go unchecked.
Call Mayor Glover's office to complain: (318) 673-5050.
I'll leave you with one last consideration. As a licensed firearms instructor in charge of a hundred different students every month, I'm often asked if citizens should voluntarily inform police officers of the presence of a firearm during a routine traffic stop.
While different states have different laws, my answer for Colorado citizens is an emphatic "No": Colorado law doesn't require you to volunteer that kind of information, and this case in Louisiana proves why, if at all possible, you should never invite trouble by doing so.
For Liberty,
Dudley Brown
Executive Director
National Association for Gun Rights
P.S. NAGR maintains a gun rights blog that our members use to keep abreast of current gun rights developments.
Whether the news is coming down from Congress, the states, the ATF, Michael Bloomberg, Eric Holder, or even this particular autocratic city official, Luke will keep you ahead of the game and up to speed on the battle for your gun rights.
To visit the blog, click here or point your browser to www.NationalGunRights.org/Blog.
FROM TOWNHALL
The Year of Right-Wing Terrorists?
Email Brent Bozell
Columnist's Archive Share Buzz 0diggsdigg
Sign-Up There is some very dangerous -- as in red-hot incendiary -- hatred going on, and it's being advanced by the national news media directly.
The panel of judges for the Media Research Center's Best Notable Quotables of 2010 found that theme time and time again while selecting the year's worst reporting and punditry.
PBS talk-show host Tavis Smiley won "The Poison Tea Pot Award for Smearing the Anti-Obama Rabble." On May 25, he was interviewing author Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a bold critic of radical Muslims -- at the risk of a fatwa against her own life since 2004. Ali said jihadists "got into their minds that to kill other people is a great thing to do and that they would be rewarded in the hereafter."
Smiley shot back: "But Christians do that every single day in this country."
Jaws dropped. Ali couldn't believe her ears: "Do they blow people up every day?"
Read very carefully Smiley's response: "Yes. Oh, Christians, every day, people walk into post offices, they walk into schools. That's what Columbine is -- I could do this all day long."
Smiley wasn't done. Next, he smeared the tea party movement, repeating falsehoods as fact: "Here are folk in the tea party, for example, every day who are being recently arrested for making threats against elected officials, for calling people 'nigger' as they walk into Capitol Hill, for spitting on people."
What, oh, what is the U.S. Congress doing underwriting this radical leftist dishonesty with taxpayer money?
Liberals like Smiley cravenly plead that Islam is no more violent than any other faith. Then they blame Christians for violently persecuting Muslims. When controversy erupted this fall over a mega-mosque proposal at ground zero, Christian conservatives were put in the cross hairs. The dreadful ABC host Christiane Amanpour won "The Ground Zeroes Award for Impugning Americans as Islamophobic."
In an Oct. 3 "This Week" special on Islam, Amanpour opened fire on Gary Bauer in that snooty British accent of hers: "As you know, a series of politicians have used the Islamic center, have used sort of Islamophobia and scare tactics in their campaigns. ... My question is: Do you take any -- after some of the loaded things that have been said, and we can play you any number of tapes, Mr. Bauer -- do you take any responsibility at all for, for instance, what happened in Murfreesboro (Tenn., where a mosque site was vandalized)?"
Bauer, like Ali, was stunned. "Are you serious? Absolutely not. I have never encouraged violence. I condemn violence."
But Amanpour would have none of it. "You don't think the rhetoric lays the groundwork for others?"
When conservatives warn America of the potential threat of Islamic radicalism, they're "rhetorically laying the groundwork" for violence. When Islamic radicals actually plot -- and undertake -- violence, America is to be blamed for its failure to be open-minded enough. Such is the worldview of our increasingly radicalized "news" media.
If conservatives are going to be called terrorists, the megaphone-in-chief for that clarion call must be the rabid Keith Olbermann of MSNBC. He won the "Obama's Orderlies Award for Prepping America for ObamaCare" with a Jan. 5 screed about our allegedly murderous private health care system: "What would you do, sir, if terrorists were killing 45,000 people every year in this country? Well, the current health care system, the insurance companies and those who support them are doing just that. ... Because they die individually of disease and not disaster, (radio host) Neal Boortz and those who ape him in office and out approve their deaths, all 45,000 of them -- a year -- in America. Remind me again, who are the terrorists?"
Boortz wasn't alone as some kind of talk-radio terrorist in Olbermann's cockeyed view. Olbermann also took the "Crush Rush Award for Loathing Limbaugh" for his rant on the 15th anniversary of the Oklahoma City bombing. He wouldn't blame the actual (executed) bomber, Timothy McVeigh. He was still painting with liberal smears from the Clinton years: "What was the more likely cause of the Oklahoma City bombing: talk radio or Bill Clinton and Janet Reno's hands-on management of Waco? ... Obviously, the answer is talk radio. Specifically Rush Limbaugh's hate radio. ... Frankly, Rush, you have that blood on your hands now, and you have had it for 15 years."
You can dismiss these as the ludicrous utterances of Smiley, Amanpour and Olbermann. But what does it say that they are headliners for PBS, ABC and NBC? It is those networks, not just their reporters, that are advancing a very dangerous form of hatred on the airwaves.
Brent Bozell
Founder and President of the Media Research Center, Brent Bozell runs the largest media watchdog organization in America.
TOWNHALL DAILY: Be the first to read Brent Bozell's column. Sign up today and receive Townhall.com daily lineup delivered each morning to your inbox.
©Creators Syndicate
Email Brent Bozell
Columnist's Archive Share Buzz 0diggsdigg
Sign-Up There is some very dangerous -- as in red-hot incendiary -- hatred going on, and it's being advanced by the national news media directly.
The panel of judges for the Media Research Center's Best Notable Quotables of 2010 found that theme time and time again while selecting the year's worst reporting and punditry.
PBS talk-show host Tavis Smiley won "The Poison Tea Pot Award for Smearing the Anti-Obama Rabble." On May 25, he was interviewing author Ayaan Hirsi Ali, a bold critic of radical Muslims -- at the risk of a fatwa against her own life since 2004. Ali said jihadists "got into their minds that to kill other people is a great thing to do and that they would be rewarded in the hereafter."
Smiley shot back: "But Christians do that every single day in this country."
Jaws dropped. Ali couldn't believe her ears: "Do they blow people up every day?"
Read very carefully Smiley's response: "Yes. Oh, Christians, every day, people walk into post offices, they walk into schools. That's what Columbine is -- I could do this all day long."
Smiley wasn't done. Next, he smeared the tea party movement, repeating falsehoods as fact: "Here are folk in the tea party, for example, every day who are being recently arrested for making threats against elected officials, for calling people 'nigger' as they walk into Capitol Hill, for spitting on people."
What, oh, what is the U.S. Congress doing underwriting this radical leftist dishonesty with taxpayer money?
Liberals like Smiley cravenly plead that Islam is no more violent than any other faith. Then they blame Christians for violently persecuting Muslims. When controversy erupted this fall over a mega-mosque proposal at ground zero, Christian conservatives were put in the cross hairs. The dreadful ABC host Christiane Amanpour won "The Ground Zeroes Award for Impugning Americans as Islamophobic."
In an Oct. 3 "This Week" special on Islam, Amanpour opened fire on Gary Bauer in that snooty British accent of hers: "As you know, a series of politicians have used the Islamic center, have used sort of Islamophobia and scare tactics in their campaigns. ... My question is: Do you take any -- after some of the loaded things that have been said, and we can play you any number of tapes, Mr. Bauer -- do you take any responsibility at all for, for instance, what happened in Murfreesboro (Tenn., where a mosque site was vandalized)?"
Bauer, like Ali, was stunned. "Are you serious? Absolutely not. I have never encouraged violence. I condemn violence."
But Amanpour would have none of it. "You don't think the rhetoric lays the groundwork for others?"
When conservatives warn America of the potential threat of Islamic radicalism, they're "rhetorically laying the groundwork" for violence. When Islamic radicals actually plot -- and undertake -- violence, America is to be blamed for its failure to be open-minded enough. Such is the worldview of our increasingly radicalized "news" media.
If conservatives are going to be called terrorists, the megaphone-in-chief for that clarion call must be the rabid Keith Olbermann of MSNBC. He won the "Obama's Orderlies Award for Prepping America for ObamaCare" with a Jan. 5 screed about our allegedly murderous private health care system: "What would you do, sir, if terrorists were killing 45,000 people every year in this country? Well, the current health care system, the insurance companies and those who support them are doing just that. ... Because they die individually of disease and not disaster, (radio host) Neal Boortz and those who ape him in office and out approve their deaths, all 45,000 of them -- a year -- in America. Remind me again, who are the terrorists?"
Boortz wasn't alone as some kind of talk-radio terrorist in Olbermann's cockeyed view. Olbermann also took the "Crush Rush Award for Loathing Limbaugh" for his rant on the 15th anniversary of the Oklahoma City bombing. He wouldn't blame the actual (executed) bomber, Timothy McVeigh. He was still painting with liberal smears from the Clinton years: "What was the more likely cause of the Oklahoma City bombing: talk radio or Bill Clinton and Janet Reno's hands-on management of Waco? ... Obviously, the answer is talk radio. Specifically Rush Limbaugh's hate radio. ... Frankly, Rush, you have that blood on your hands now, and you have had it for 15 years."
You can dismiss these as the ludicrous utterances of Smiley, Amanpour and Olbermann. But what does it say that they are headliners for PBS, ABC and NBC? It is those networks, not just their reporters, that are advancing a very dangerous form of hatred on the airwaves.
Brent Bozell
Founder and President of the Media Research Center, Brent Bozell runs the largest media watchdog organization in America.
TOWNHALL DAILY: Be the first to read Brent Bozell's column. Sign up today and receive Townhall.com daily lineup delivered each morning to your inbox.
©Creators Syndicate
FROM TOWNHALL
Uncle Sam Will Help Buy You an Alpaca
Email John Stossel
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Sign-Up I often bash government. I say it can't do anything better than people in a free market.
But the government is unequalled in producing one thing: negative unintended consequences. Show me a government activity, and I will show you bad results that even the program's advocates probably don't like. Here's one example.
Congressmen say our government should "support and strengthen family-based agriculture."
Abstractly, supporting family-based agriculture sounds good. Government policies often harm small farms by favoring corporate agribusinesses. Government could help family farms by ending the subsidies that mostly go to the big guys. But that doesn't interest the politicians. They prefer to do things like creating tax breaks to encourage livestock breeding.
The tax breaks have led to a boom in alpaca breeding. Twenty-five years ago, there were 150 alpacas in America. Now, there are 150,000.
One website even advertises: "Have Uncle Sam Help You Buy Your Alpacas."
Rose Mogerman raises alpacas in New Jersey, the most densely populated state. "I fell in love with them," she said.
But she fell in love with the tax break first.
"Yes. I have to be honest," she said. "I might have had two. I wouldn't have had 100. ... I was looking for a tax shelter."
The Alpaca Breeders Association asked its members, on a scale of 1 to 10, what motivated them to get into alpaca breeding. More than half rated "tax benefits" a 10.
Yes, alpacas are cute. They are also valued for the fiber made from their fleece. But selling the fleece doesn't explain the growth in alpaca raising. At auctions, prices have gotten absurdly high. Half-ownership of one male alpaca sold for $750,000.
This is not necessarily a good thing. Economists at the University of California, Davis warn that the industry is in a speculative bubble. "Alpacas sold today as breeding stock have values wildly in excess of even the most optimistic scenarios based upon current fiber prices and production costs," Tina L. Saitone and Richard J. Sexton write.
"(C)urrent prices are not supportable by economic fundamentals and, thus, are not sustainable," the UC Davis economists write. Their paper was originally published in the Review of Agricultural Economics in 2007 with the great title "Alpaca Lies? Speculative Bubbles in Agriculture."
In other words, people have overinvested, bid up input prices and produced too many animals given expected future demand for their fleece. As a result, I bet lots of people will lose money. Tax policy is surely a big reason for the overinvestment, and an unintended consequence will be bankruptcy for some alpaca breeders.
I'm using "bubble" in a nontechnical sense because, strictly speaking, a bubble is an unsustainable inflation of asset prices inconsistent with economic reality. However, even a wrongheaded tax preference is real and sustainable. So if the tax break is the reason for the alpaca boom, there's really no bubble.
The Alpaca Owners and Breeders Association says the UC Davis study is "seriously flawed (and) full of misinformation," but offered no evidence for that bald assertion. The authors stand by their study, saying that no conflicting studies have been published and that their research is confirmed by a recent price decline.
Government is good at inflating bubbles. The housing bubble was fueled by low interest rates, tax breaks and subsidies.
Last year, I reported how Congress' ridiculous tax credits stimulated demand for electric golf-carts. Electric vehicles are touted these days as "green" technology and so were given special tax treatment. Unfortunately, the plug-in carts are ultimately connected to coal-fired plants. The National Research Council says electric cars may be worse for the environment than gas-powered cars. That didn't matter to the policy-makers.
As a result of the tax benefit, golf-cart dealers had a field day. One advertised that his $6,000 carts were "free" because of the $6,000 tax credit. Gov. Mike Huckabee got one. His friend got seven. I got one, too.
The deal sure helped the golf-cart industry. My dealer sold 10,000 of them.
At least the golf-cart credit expired. Most government giveaways never go away.
Get ready for the bust of the alpaca bubble. Sadly, Congress will then probably bail out bankrupt alpaca farmers.
John Stossel
John Stossel is host of "Stossel" on the Fox Business Network. He's the author of "Give Me a Break" and of "Myth, Lies, and Downright Stupidity." To find out more about John Stossel, visit his site at johnstossel.com.
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Sign-Up I often bash government. I say it can't do anything better than people in a free market.
But the government is unequalled in producing one thing: negative unintended consequences. Show me a government activity, and I will show you bad results that even the program's advocates probably don't like. Here's one example.
Congressmen say our government should "support and strengthen family-based agriculture."
Abstractly, supporting family-based agriculture sounds good. Government policies often harm small farms by favoring corporate agribusinesses. Government could help family farms by ending the subsidies that mostly go to the big guys. But that doesn't interest the politicians. They prefer to do things like creating tax breaks to encourage livestock breeding.
The tax breaks have led to a boom in alpaca breeding. Twenty-five years ago, there were 150 alpacas in America. Now, there are 150,000.
One website even advertises: "Have Uncle Sam Help You Buy Your Alpacas."
Rose Mogerman raises alpacas in New Jersey, the most densely populated state. "I fell in love with them," she said.
But she fell in love with the tax break first.
"Yes. I have to be honest," she said. "I might have had two. I wouldn't have had 100. ... I was looking for a tax shelter."
The Alpaca Breeders Association asked its members, on a scale of 1 to 10, what motivated them to get into alpaca breeding. More than half rated "tax benefits" a 10.
Yes, alpacas are cute. They are also valued for the fiber made from their fleece. But selling the fleece doesn't explain the growth in alpaca raising. At auctions, prices have gotten absurdly high. Half-ownership of one male alpaca sold for $750,000.
This is not necessarily a good thing. Economists at the University of California, Davis warn that the industry is in a speculative bubble. "Alpacas sold today as breeding stock have values wildly in excess of even the most optimistic scenarios based upon current fiber prices and production costs," Tina L. Saitone and Richard J. Sexton write.
"(C)urrent prices are not supportable by economic fundamentals and, thus, are not sustainable," the UC Davis economists write. Their paper was originally published in the Review of Agricultural Economics in 2007 with the great title "Alpaca Lies? Speculative Bubbles in Agriculture."
In other words, people have overinvested, bid up input prices and produced too many animals given expected future demand for their fleece. As a result, I bet lots of people will lose money. Tax policy is surely a big reason for the overinvestment, and an unintended consequence will be bankruptcy for some alpaca breeders.
I'm using "bubble" in a nontechnical sense because, strictly speaking, a bubble is an unsustainable inflation of asset prices inconsistent with economic reality. However, even a wrongheaded tax preference is real and sustainable. So if the tax break is the reason for the alpaca boom, there's really no bubble.
The Alpaca Owners and Breeders Association says the UC Davis study is "seriously flawed (and) full of misinformation," but offered no evidence for that bald assertion. The authors stand by their study, saying that no conflicting studies have been published and that their research is confirmed by a recent price decline.
Government is good at inflating bubbles. The housing bubble was fueled by low interest rates, tax breaks and subsidies.
Last year, I reported how Congress' ridiculous tax credits stimulated demand for electric golf-carts. Electric vehicles are touted these days as "green" technology and so were given special tax treatment. Unfortunately, the plug-in carts are ultimately connected to coal-fired plants. The National Research Council says electric cars may be worse for the environment than gas-powered cars. That didn't matter to the policy-makers.
As a result of the tax benefit, golf-cart dealers had a field day. One advertised that his $6,000 carts were "free" because of the $6,000 tax credit. Gov. Mike Huckabee got one. His friend got seven. I got one, too.
The deal sure helped the golf-cart industry. My dealer sold 10,000 of them.
At least the golf-cart credit expired. Most government giveaways never go away.
Get ready for the bust of the alpaca bubble. Sadly, Congress will then probably bail out bankrupt alpaca farmers.
John Stossel
John Stossel is host of "Stossel" on the Fox Business Network. He's the author of "Give Me a Break" and of "Myth, Lies, and Downright Stupidity." To find out more about John Stossel, visit his site at johnstossel.com.
FROM TOWNHALL
Internet Access Is Not a 'Civil Right'
Email Michelle Malkin
Columnist's Archive Share Buzz 1diggdigg
Sign-Up When bureaucrats talk about increasing our "access" to x, y or z, what they're really talking about is increasing exponentially their control over our lives. As it is with the government health care takeover, so it is with the newly approved government plan to "increase" Internet "access." Call it Webcare.
By a vote of 3-2, the Federal Communications Commission on Tuesday adopted a controversial scheme to ensure "net neutrality" by turning unaccountable Democratic appointees into meddling online traffic cops. The panel will devise convoluted rules governing Internet service providers, bandwidth use, content, prices and even disclosure details on Internet speeds. The "neutrality" is brazenly undermined by preferential treatment toward wireless broadband networks. Moreover, the FCC's scheme is widely opposed by Congress -- and has already been rejected once in the courts. Demonized industry critics have warned that the regulations will stifle innovation and result in less access, not more.
Sound familiar? The parallels with health care are striking. The architects of Obamacare promised to provide Americans more access to health insurance -- and cast their agenda as a fundamental universal entitlement.
In fact, it was a pretext for creating a gargantuan federal bureaucracy with the power to tax, redistribute and regulate the private health insurance market to death -- and replace it with a centrally planned government system overseen by politically driven code enforcers dictating everything from annual coverage limits to administrative expenditures to the makeup of the medical workforce. The costly, onerous and selectively applied law has resulted in less access, not more.
Undaunted promoters of Obama FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski's "open Internet" plan to expand regulatory authority over the Internet have couched their online power grab in the rhetoric of civil rights. On Monday, FCC Commissioner Michael Copps proclaimed: "Universal access to broadband needs to be seen as a civil right ... (though) not many people have talked about it that way." Opposing the government Internet takeover blueprint, in other words, is tantamount to supporting segregation. Cunning propaganda, that.
"Broadband is becoming a basic necessity," civil rights activist Benjamin Hooks added. And earlier this month, fellow FCC panelist Mignon Clyburn, daughter of Congressional Black Caucus leader and Number Three House Democrat James Clyburn of South Carolina, declared that free (read: taxpayer-subsidized) access to the Internet is not only a civil right for every "nappy-headed child" in America, but is essential to their self-esteem. Every minority child, she said, "deserves to be not only connected, but to be proud of who he or she is."
Calling them "nappy-headed" is a rather questionable way of boosting their pride, but never mind that.
Face it: A high-speed connection is no more an essential civil right than 3G cell phone service or a Netflix account. Increasing competition and restoring academic excellence in abysmal public schools is far more of an imperative to minority children than handing them iPads. Once again, Democrats are using children as human shields to provide useful cover for not so noble political goals.
The "net neutrality" mob -- funded by billionaire George Soros and other left-wing think tanks and nonprofits -- has openly advertised its radical, speech-squelching agenda in its crusade for "media justice." Social justice is the redistribution of wealth and economic "rights." Media justice is the redistribution of free speech and other First Amendment rights.
The meetings of the universal broadband set are littered with Marxist-tinged rants about "disenfranchisement" and "empowerment." They've targeted conservative opponents on talk radio, cable TV and the Internet as purveyors of "hate" who need to be managed or censored. Democratic FCC panelists have dutifully echoed their concerns about concentration of corporate media power.
As the Ford Foundation-funded Media Justice Fund, which lobbied for universal broadband, put it: This is a movement "grounded in the belief that social and economic justice will not be realized without the equitable redistribution and control of media and communication technologies."
For progressives who cloak their ambitions in the mantle of "fairness," it's all about control. It's always about control.
Michelle Malkin
Michelle Malkin is the author of "Culture of Corruption: Obama and his Team of Tax Cheats, Crooks & Cronies" (Regnery 2010).
Email Michelle Malkin
Columnist's Archive Share Buzz 1diggdigg
Sign-Up When bureaucrats talk about increasing our "access" to x, y or z, what they're really talking about is increasing exponentially their control over our lives. As it is with the government health care takeover, so it is with the newly approved government plan to "increase" Internet "access." Call it Webcare.
By a vote of 3-2, the Federal Communications Commission on Tuesday adopted a controversial scheme to ensure "net neutrality" by turning unaccountable Democratic appointees into meddling online traffic cops. The panel will devise convoluted rules governing Internet service providers, bandwidth use, content, prices and even disclosure details on Internet speeds. The "neutrality" is brazenly undermined by preferential treatment toward wireless broadband networks. Moreover, the FCC's scheme is widely opposed by Congress -- and has already been rejected once in the courts. Demonized industry critics have warned that the regulations will stifle innovation and result in less access, not more.
Sound familiar? The parallels with health care are striking. The architects of Obamacare promised to provide Americans more access to health insurance -- and cast their agenda as a fundamental universal entitlement.
In fact, it was a pretext for creating a gargantuan federal bureaucracy with the power to tax, redistribute and regulate the private health insurance market to death -- and replace it with a centrally planned government system overseen by politically driven code enforcers dictating everything from annual coverage limits to administrative expenditures to the makeup of the medical workforce. The costly, onerous and selectively applied law has resulted in less access, not more.
Undaunted promoters of Obama FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski's "open Internet" plan to expand regulatory authority over the Internet have couched their online power grab in the rhetoric of civil rights. On Monday, FCC Commissioner Michael Copps proclaimed: "Universal access to broadband needs to be seen as a civil right ... (though) not many people have talked about it that way." Opposing the government Internet takeover blueprint, in other words, is tantamount to supporting segregation. Cunning propaganda, that.
"Broadband is becoming a basic necessity," civil rights activist Benjamin Hooks added. And earlier this month, fellow FCC panelist Mignon Clyburn, daughter of Congressional Black Caucus leader and Number Three House Democrat James Clyburn of South Carolina, declared that free (read: taxpayer-subsidized) access to the Internet is not only a civil right for every "nappy-headed child" in America, but is essential to their self-esteem. Every minority child, she said, "deserves to be not only connected, but to be proud of who he or she is."
Calling them "nappy-headed" is a rather questionable way of boosting their pride, but never mind that.
Face it: A high-speed connection is no more an essential civil right than 3G cell phone service or a Netflix account. Increasing competition and restoring academic excellence in abysmal public schools is far more of an imperative to minority children than handing them iPads. Once again, Democrats are using children as human shields to provide useful cover for not so noble political goals.
The "net neutrality" mob -- funded by billionaire George Soros and other left-wing think tanks and nonprofits -- has openly advertised its radical, speech-squelching agenda in its crusade for "media justice." Social justice is the redistribution of wealth and economic "rights." Media justice is the redistribution of free speech and other First Amendment rights.
The meetings of the universal broadband set are littered with Marxist-tinged rants about "disenfranchisement" and "empowerment." They've targeted conservative opponents on talk radio, cable TV and the Internet as purveyors of "hate" who need to be managed or censored. Democratic FCC panelists have dutifully echoed their concerns about concentration of corporate media power.
As the Ford Foundation-funded Media Justice Fund, which lobbied for universal broadband, put it: This is a movement "grounded in the belief that social and economic justice will not be realized without the equitable redistribution and control of media and communication technologies."
For progressives who cloak their ambitions in the mantle of "fairness," it's all about control. It's always about control.
Michelle Malkin
Michelle Malkin is the author of "Culture of Corruption: Obama and his Team of Tax Cheats, Crooks & Cronies" (Regnery 2010).
FROM THE PATRIOT CHRONICLE
Chronicle · December 22, 2010
The Foundation
"[R]eligion and virtue are the only foundations, not of republicanism and of all free government, but of social felicity under all government and in all the combinations of human society." --John Adams
Editorial Exegesis
New Unit Service Patch"The U.S. military, already strained by wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, faces transformation from the world's most powerful fighting machine into an organization where political correctness is more important than victory. Saturday's Senate vote cleared the final hurdle for the repeal of President Clinton's 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' policy designed to prevent homosexual conduct in the ranks. Battle lines will now form over how the homosexual advocacy policies will be implemented. Though the repudiated lawmakers who rammed the repeal through this weekend's session pretend they are simply latter-day Rosa Parkses seeking to end discrimination, there is no comparison. Since 2005, a mere 1 percent of Army discharges involved homosexual conduct. This issue isn't about retaining or recruiting qualified personnel for the military. This is part of the Left's larger societal goal of using government to force others to embrace unorthodox personal lifestyle choices. The implications are clear from a look at how the federal government treats issues of homosexuality. ... Troops can look forward to so-called pride parades on military bases and awareness days for the transgendered. Everyone knows the sort of thing that might work in Greenwich Village or a San Francisco neighborhood doesn't go over well in a fighting force drawn largely from red state America -- an area whose residents Mr. Obama once derisively referred to as the type who 'cling to guns or religion.' That's why implementing the New Gay Army means forcing soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines to endure 'diversity' training. Those who don't like it will be told to get out, as several senior military leaders have suggested already. Chaplains in particular will face the dilemma that preaching their faith will violate the new pro-homosexual code of conduct. As a result, far more are likely to leave or be thrown out of the military as a result of Mr. Obama's policy than were ever affected by Mr. Clinton's. It's hard to see how that will do anything to strengthen the nation's defenses." --The Washington Times
The Foundation
"[R]eligion and virtue are the only foundations, not of republicanism and of all free government, but of social felicity under all government and in all the combinations of human society." --John Adams
Editorial Exegesis
New Unit Service Patch"The U.S. military, already strained by wars in Afghanistan and Iraq, faces transformation from the world's most powerful fighting machine into an organization where political correctness is more important than victory. Saturday's Senate vote cleared the final hurdle for the repeal of President Clinton's 'Don't Ask, Don't Tell' policy designed to prevent homosexual conduct in the ranks. Battle lines will now form over how the homosexual advocacy policies will be implemented. Though the repudiated lawmakers who rammed the repeal through this weekend's session pretend they are simply latter-day Rosa Parkses seeking to end discrimination, there is no comparison. Since 2005, a mere 1 percent of Army discharges involved homosexual conduct. This issue isn't about retaining or recruiting qualified personnel for the military. This is part of the Left's larger societal goal of using government to force others to embrace unorthodox personal lifestyle choices. The implications are clear from a look at how the federal government treats issues of homosexuality. ... Troops can look forward to so-called pride parades on military bases and awareness days for the transgendered. Everyone knows the sort of thing that might work in Greenwich Village or a San Francisco neighborhood doesn't go over well in a fighting force drawn largely from red state America -- an area whose residents Mr. Obama once derisively referred to as the type who 'cling to guns or religion.' That's why implementing the New Gay Army means forcing soldiers, sailors, airmen and Marines to endure 'diversity' training. Those who don't like it will be told to get out, as several senior military leaders have suggested already. Chaplains in particular will face the dilemma that preaching their faith will violate the new pro-homosexual code of conduct. As a result, far more are likely to leave or be thrown out of the military as a result of Mr. Obama's policy than were ever affected by Mr. Clinton's. It's hard to see how that will do anything to strengthen the nation's defenses." --The Washington Times
Thursday, December 16, 2010
FROM TOWNHALL
Dear fellow American,
Did you know that Barack Obama has already banned nearly a million American made rifles?
Nearly a million rifles.
Banned by Barack Obama and his anti-gun cronies.
In a bureaucratic block the Obama Administration secretly banned the re-importation of American made M-1 Garand and Carbine rifles being stored in South Korea.
These rifles were used by the US military during the Korean War and left there after the war was over.
With one stroke of his pen, Barack Obama bypassed the Constitution and single-handedly banned nearly a million American made rifles by executive fiat.
In response, I instructed my staff to prepare a petition for you to sign to voice opposition Obama's Historic Rifle Ban.
Please click here to watch the video they created in which NAGR Director of Operations Luke O'Dell discusses this latest gun ban with M-1 Garand expert Rory Edwards.
Make no mistake, these rifles were made in America, by Americans for Americans to defend freedom on foreign shores and are greatly sought after by American shooters and collectors.
Now State Department officials claim these antique, collector rifles could be used to commit crimes.
While the radical anti-gun crowd is giddy with praise for Obama’s latest back-door gun ban, law-abiding citizens across the United States are crying foul.
These outrageous claims are a thinly veiled attempt to distract from Obama’s special interest payback to the radical anti-gun crowd. This desperate pandering must not be allowed to continue.
That’s why we’ve prepared a petition and video against Obama’s Historic Rifle Ban.
Click here to watch the video and sign the petition.
It has been common practice since the end of World War II to re-import these American made rifles from the foreign allies they were lent to after the war.
During the Reagan Administration a similar import request for 200,000 Garand rifles was approved.
State Department officials say they are working with South Korea to “dispose” of these American made rifles.
You and I both know that is bureaucratic code for the melting down and destruction of these iconic American made rifles.
On top of banning American citizens from owning these rifles, Obama’s State Department is arranging for the destruction of nearly one million historic, American rifles.
To help dispel some of the myths surrounding this iconic American rifle, Director of Operations Luke O’Dell interviewed M-1 Garand expert Rory Edwards.
Click the link below to view the video.
Let me be clear: at no time in U.S. history has the ownership of any part of this gun been restricted or banned.
These firearms -- truly pieces of American history -- rightly belong in the hands of U.S. citizens, and Obama has banned nearly one million of them without cause.
Please click here to learn more about the M-1 Garand and Barack Obama’s ban on the re-import of nearly one million American made rifles.
Once you’ve watched the video, please sign the petition against Obama’s Historic Rifle Ban.
The National Association for Gun Rights’ staff will compile your petitions and forward them to President Barack Obama and Congressional leaders Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid.
Also, please chip in $10 or $20 to help the National Association for Gun Rights continue to fight the Obama Historic Rifle Ban.
Thank you, in advance for joining me in standing up against this outrageous anti-gun action.
For liberty,
Dudley Brown
Executive Director
National Association for Gun Rights
P.S. In a bureaucratic block, President Barack Obama has blocked the re-import of nearly a million American made rifles.
That’s nearly a million historic rifles that Obama doesn’t want in the hands of American citizens like you and me.
Did you know that Barack Obama has already banned nearly a million American made rifles?
Nearly a million rifles.
Banned by Barack Obama and his anti-gun cronies.
In a bureaucratic block the Obama Administration secretly banned the re-importation of American made M-1 Garand and Carbine rifles being stored in South Korea.
These rifles were used by the US military during the Korean War and left there after the war was over.
With one stroke of his pen, Barack Obama bypassed the Constitution and single-handedly banned nearly a million American made rifles by executive fiat.
In response, I instructed my staff to prepare a petition for you to sign to voice opposition Obama's Historic Rifle Ban.
Please click here to watch the video they created in which NAGR Director of Operations Luke O'Dell discusses this latest gun ban with M-1 Garand expert Rory Edwards.
Make no mistake, these rifles were made in America, by Americans for Americans to defend freedom on foreign shores and are greatly sought after by American shooters and collectors.
Now State Department officials claim these antique, collector rifles could be used to commit crimes.
While the radical anti-gun crowd is giddy with praise for Obama’s latest back-door gun ban, law-abiding citizens across the United States are crying foul.
These outrageous claims are a thinly veiled attempt to distract from Obama’s special interest payback to the radical anti-gun crowd. This desperate pandering must not be allowed to continue.
That’s why we’ve prepared a petition and video against Obama’s Historic Rifle Ban.
Click here to watch the video and sign the petition.
It has been common practice since the end of World War II to re-import these American made rifles from the foreign allies they were lent to after the war.
During the Reagan Administration a similar import request for 200,000 Garand rifles was approved.
State Department officials say they are working with South Korea to “dispose” of these American made rifles.
You and I both know that is bureaucratic code for the melting down and destruction of these iconic American made rifles.
On top of banning American citizens from owning these rifles, Obama’s State Department is arranging for the destruction of nearly one million historic, American rifles.
To help dispel some of the myths surrounding this iconic American rifle, Director of Operations Luke O’Dell interviewed M-1 Garand expert Rory Edwards.
Click the link below to view the video.
Let me be clear: at no time in U.S. history has the ownership of any part of this gun been restricted or banned.
These firearms -- truly pieces of American history -- rightly belong in the hands of U.S. citizens, and Obama has banned nearly one million of them without cause.
Please click here to learn more about the M-1 Garand and Barack Obama’s ban on the re-import of nearly one million American made rifles.
Once you’ve watched the video, please sign the petition against Obama’s Historic Rifle Ban.
The National Association for Gun Rights’ staff will compile your petitions and forward them to President Barack Obama and Congressional leaders Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid.
Also, please chip in $10 or $20 to help the National Association for Gun Rights continue to fight the Obama Historic Rifle Ban.
Thank you, in advance for joining me in standing up against this outrageous anti-gun action.
For liberty,
Dudley Brown
Executive Director
National Association for Gun Rights
P.S. In a bureaucratic block, President Barack Obama has blocked the re-import of nearly a million American made rifles.
That’s nearly a million historic rifles that Obama doesn’t want in the hands of American citizens like you and me.
FROM THE PATRIOT POST
Chronicle · December 15, 2010
The Foundation
"The freedom and happiness of man ... [are] the sole objects of all legitimate government." --Thomas Jefferson
Hope 'n' Change: ObamaCare Mandate Ruled UnconstitutionalOn Monday, U.S. District Judge Henry E. Hudson, appointed by George W. Bush, ruled that one of the core provisions of ObamaCare -- the one mandating that individuals buy health insurance -- is unconstitutional. "The unchecked expansion of congressional power to the limits suggested by the Minimum Essential Coverage Provision [the individual mandate] would invite unbridled exercise of federal police powers," wrote Hudson. "At its core, this dispute is not simply about regulating the business of insurance -- or crafting a scheme of universal health insurance coverage -- it's about an individual's right to choose to participate."
Read more here.
Editorial Exegesis
"U.S. District Court Judge Henry E. Hudson's ... court is the first in the country to invalidate any piece of [ObamaCare], a significant setback for those who have been clamoring for decades for a government takeover of health care. And it might not be the last court to rule against the legislation, given the number of other legal challenges out there. One such lawsuit in Florida was filed by 20 state attorneys general and governors and has been joined by incoming House Speaker John Boehner. It's scheduled to be heard this week by a judge who has indicated he too has problems with the individual mandate. Perhaps most importantly, Hudson's ruling puts the legislation's supporters on the defensive, both in the courts of law and in the court of public opinion, where it's not popular. Monday's decision is a strong momentum boost for the repeal movement, which at one time seemed like little more than wishful thinking. The ruling will, of course, be appealed. A Congress and White House that were so willing to trod on American liberty with their health care reform aren't going to let a federal court ruling stop their campaign to take over as much of the private sector as possible. ... As so many others have said, ObamaCare and the legal challenges surrounding it are not about the country's health care but about America's future and our legacy of constitutional freedom. The justices will be deciding if we are a nation of laws or of legislative whim. They need to get it right." --Investor's Business Daily
Upright
"According to Obama, the federal government can make you do something if your failure to do it, combined with similar inaction by others, has a 'substantial effect' on interstate commerce. By rejecting that premise on Monday, U.S. District Judge Henry E. Hudson took a stand for the principle that Congress may exercise only those powers that are specifically enumerated in the Constitution." --columnist Jacob Sullum
"If the federal government can get away with ordering individuals to buy health insurance based on interstate commerce laws, it could order us to submit to any other practice it deems for our good based on similar misinterpretations of the Constitution. Such a course would further erode our liberties and move us closer to dictatorship and away from principles the Constitution was written to protect." --columnist Cal Thomas
"The Supreme Court, as currently constituted, seems unlikely to overturn Judge Hudson's holding on the individual mandate and the tax penalty. Yes, the highest court has gone very far in extending the Commerce Clause over the past seven decades. But even the Supremes have never gone as far as the Obama Justice Department desperately wants it to go. For the court to go that far, it will have to fundamentally break the Constitution, tearing out its strictures on a limited government. Such a ruling would mean the literal end of any limits on the power of Congress, posing the most dangerous political threat to our liberty since our nation's founding." --Hans von Spakovsky of the Heritage Foundation
"Regarding the estate tax, or what has come to be known as the death tax, it is probably, of all the ways in which our government takes revenue, the most immoral. ... The death tax punishes the very behavior that defines the economic heart and soul of American prosperity. But perhaps worse, it attacks our most important social institution -- the American family. ... If we want to get back to prosperity, then it should be axiomatic that protecting freedom, entrepreneurship and family is the answer. Not the politics of power and envy." --columnist Star Parker
"Most people have no clue what military life is like, least of all the opinion makers in New York, Los Angeles and the nation's capital. The military is not representative of the country at large. It is disproportionately rural, small-town, Southern and Hispanic. We ask our troops to do a lot for very little money. Sometimes they die for us. The least Democrats could do is not pass grandstanding bills while self-righteously denouncing our servicemen as homophobes." --columnist Ann Coulter
Support The Patriot Post Today
Our team works tirelessly to consolidate a week's worth of the best insightful conservative analysis and the most outrageous comments made by assorted leftists in the media, politics and culture. Indeed, The Patriot Post's Chronicle is a one-of-a-kind information buffet that you won't find anywhere else.
We depend on your support to keep this priceless resource coming to your inbox every Wednesday. Help us by making a secure online donation to our 2010 Year-End Campaign. If you prefer to support us by mail, please use our printable donor form.
Thank you and God bless!
Nate Jackson
Managing Editor
The Foundation
"The freedom and happiness of man ... [are] the sole objects of all legitimate government." --Thomas Jefferson
Hope 'n' Change: ObamaCare Mandate Ruled UnconstitutionalOn Monday, U.S. District Judge Henry E. Hudson, appointed by George W. Bush, ruled that one of the core provisions of ObamaCare -- the one mandating that individuals buy health insurance -- is unconstitutional. "The unchecked expansion of congressional power to the limits suggested by the Minimum Essential Coverage Provision [the individual mandate] would invite unbridled exercise of federal police powers," wrote Hudson. "At its core, this dispute is not simply about regulating the business of insurance -- or crafting a scheme of universal health insurance coverage -- it's about an individual's right to choose to participate."
Read more here.
Editorial Exegesis
"U.S. District Court Judge Henry E. Hudson's ... court is the first in the country to invalidate any piece of [ObamaCare], a significant setback for those who have been clamoring for decades for a government takeover of health care. And it might not be the last court to rule against the legislation, given the number of other legal challenges out there. One such lawsuit in Florida was filed by 20 state attorneys general and governors and has been joined by incoming House Speaker John Boehner. It's scheduled to be heard this week by a judge who has indicated he too has problems with the individual mandate. Perhaps most importantly, Hudson's ruling puts the legislation's supporters on the defensive, both in the courts of law and in the court of public opinion, where it's not popular. Monday's decision is a strong momentum boost for the repeal movement, which at one time seemed like little more than wishful thinking. The ruling will, of course, be appealed. A Congress and White House that were so willing to trod on American liberty with their health care reform aren't going to let a federal court ruling stop their campaign to take over as much of the private sector as possible. ... As so many others have said, ObamaCare and the legal challenges surrounding it are not about the country's health care but about America's future and our legacy of constitutional freedom. The justices will be deciding if we are a nation of laws or of legislative whim. They need to get it right." --Investor's Business Daily
Upright
"According to Obama, the federal government can make you do something if your failure to do it, combined with similar inaction by others, has a 'substantial effect' on interstate commerce. By rejecting that premise on Monday, U.S. District Judge Henry E. Hudson took a stand for the principle that Congress may exercise only those powers that are specifically enumerated in the Constitution." --columnist Jacob Sullum
"If the federal government can get away with ordering individuals to buy health insurance based on interstate commerce laws, it could order us to submit to any other practice it deems for our good based on similar misinterpretations of the Constitution. Such a course would further erode our liberties and move us closer to dictatorship and away from principles the Constitution was written to protect." --columnist Cal Thomas
"The Supreme Court, as currently constituted, seems unlikely to overturn Judge Hudson's holding on the individual mandate and the tax penalty. Yes, the highest court has gone very far in extending the Commerce Clause over the past seven decades. But even the Supremes have never gone as far as the Obama Justice Department desperately wants it to go. For the court to go that far, it will have to fundamentally break the Constitution, tearing out its strictures on a limited government. Such a ruling would mean the literal end of any limits on the power of Congress, posing the most dangerous political threat to our liberty since our nation's founding." --Hans von Spakovsky of the Heritage Foundation
"Regarding the estate tax, or what has come to be known as the death tax, it is probably, of all the ways in which our government takes revenue, the most immoral. ... The death tax punishes the very behavior that defines the economic heart and soul of American prosperity. But perhaps worse, it attacks our most important social institution -- the American family. ... If we want to get back to prosperity, then it should be axiomatic that protecting freedom, entrepreneurship and family is the answer. Not the politics of power and envy." --columnist Star Parker
"Most people have no clue what military life is like, least of all the opinion makers in New York, Los Angeles and the nation's capital. The military is not representative of the country at large. It is disproportionately rural, small-town, Southern and Hispanic. We ask our troops to do a lot for very little money. Sometimes they die for us. The least Democrats could do is not pass grandstanding bills while self-righteously denouncing our servicemen as homophobes." --columnist Ann Coulter
Support The Patriot Post Today
Our team works tirelessly to consolidate a week's worth of the best insightful conservative analysis and the most outrageous comments made by assorted leftists in the media, politics and culture. Indeed, The Patriot Post's Chronicle is a one-of-a-kind information buffet that you won't find anywhere else.
We depend on your support to keep this priceless resource coming to your inbox every Wednesday. Help us by making a secure online donation to our 2010 Year-End Campaign. If you prefer to support us by mail, please use our printable donor form.
Thank you and God bless!
Nate Jackson
Managing Editor
FROM TOWNHALL
Changing America
Email Walter E. Williams
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Sign-Up Dr. Thomas Sowell, in "Dismantling America," said in reference to President Obama, "That such an administration could be elected in the first place, headed by a man whose only qualifications to be president of the United States at a dangerous time in the history of the world were rhetoric, style and symbolism -- and whose animus against the values and institutions of America had been demonstrated repeatedly over a period of decades beforehand -- speaks volumes about the inadequacies of our educational system and the degeneration of our culture." Obama is by no means unique; his characteristics are shared by other Americans, but what is unique is that no other time in our history would such a person been elected president. That says a lot about the degeneration of our culture, values, thinking abilities and acceptance of what's no less than tyranny. As Sowell says, "Barack Obama is unlike any other President of the United States in having come from a background of decades of associations and alliances with people who resent this country and its people." In 2008, Americans voted for Obama's change. Let's look at some of it.
Obama's Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius threatened that there would be "zero tolerance" for "misinformation" in response to an insurance company executive who said that ObamaCare would create costs that force up health insurance premiums. That's not only an attack on our constitutionally guaranteed free speech rights but an official threat against people who express views damaging to the administration.
Not to be outdone by his HHS secretary's attack on free speech, Obama wants full disclosure of the names of people who were backers of campaign commercials critical of his administration, saying that there has been a "flood of deceptive attack ads sponsored by special interests, using front groups with misleading names." Disclosure would leave administration critics open to government and mob retaliation.
Obama and his congressional and union allies have lectured us that socialized medicine is the cure for the nation's ills, but I have a question. If socialized medicine, Obamacare, is so great for the nation, why permit anyone to be exempted from it? It turns out that as of the end of November, Obama's Health and Human Services secretary has issued over 200 waivers to major labor unions such as the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Union and Transport Workers Union of America and major companies such as McDonald's and Darden Restaurants, which operates Red Lobster and Olive Garden. Keep in mind that the power to grant waivers is also the power not to grant waivers. Such power can be used to reward administration friends and punish administration critics by saddling them with millions of dollars of health care costs.
Obama's heath care legislation contains deviousness that has become all too common in Washington. What was sold to the American people as health care reform legislation includes a provision that would more heavily regulate and tax gold coin and bullion transactions. Whether gold and bullion transactions should or should not be more heavily regulated and taxed is not the issue. The administration's devious inclusion of it as a part of health care reform is.
Fighting government intrusion into our lives is becoming increasingly difficult for at least two reasons. The first reason is that educators at the primary, secondary and university levels have been successful in teaching our youngsters to despise the values of our Constitution and the founders of our nation -- "those dead, old, racist white men." Their success in that arena might explain why educators have been unable to get our youngsters to read, write and compute on a level comparable with other developed nations; they are too busy proselytizing students.
The second reason is we've become a nation of thieves, accustomed to living at the expense of one another and to accommodate that we're obliged to support tyrannical and overreaching government.
Adolf Hitler had it right when he said, "How fortunate for governments that the people they administer don't think."
Walter E. Williams
Dr. Williams serves on the faculty of George Mason University as John M. Olin Distinguished Professor of Economics and is the author of More Liberty Means Less Government: Our Founders Knew This Well.
Email Walter E. Williams
Columnist's Archive Share Buzz 0diggsdigg
Sign-Up Dr. Thomas Sowell, in "Dismantling America," said in reference to President Obama, "That such an administration could be elected in the first place, headed by a man whose only qualifications to be president of the United States at a dangerous time in the history of the world were rhetoric, style and symbolism -- and whose animus against the values and institutions of America had been demonstrated repeatedly over a period of decades beforehand -- speaks volumes about the inadequacies of our educational system and the degeneration of our culture." Obama is by no means unique; his characteristics are shared by other Americans, but what is unique is that no other time in our history would such a person been elected president. That says a lot about the degeneration of our culture, values, thinking abilities and acceptance of what's no less than tyranny. As Sowell says, "Barack Obama is unlike any other President of the United States in having come from a background of decades of associations and alliances with people who resent this country and its people." In 2008, Americans voted for Obama's change. Let's look at some of it.
Obama's Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius threatened that there would be "zero tolerance" for "misinformation" in response to an insurance company executive who said that ObamaCare would create costs that force up health insurance premiums. That's not only an attack on our constitutionally guaranteed free speech rights but an official threat against people who express views damaging to the administration.
Not to be outdone by his HHS secretary's attack on free speech, Obama wants full disclosure of the names of people who were backers of campaign commercials critical of his administration, saying that there has been a "flood of deceptive attack ads sponsored by special interests, using front groups with misleading names." Disclosure would leave administration critics open to government and mob retaliation.
Obama and his congressional and union allies have lectured us that socialized medicine is the cure for the nation's ills, but I have a question. If socialized medicine, Obamacare, is so great for the nation, why permit anyone to be exempted from it? It turns out that as of the end of November, Obama's Health and Human Services secretary has issued over 200 waivers to major labor unions such as the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers Union and Transport Workers Union of America and major companies such as McDonald's and Darden Restaurants, which operates Red Lobster and Olive Garden. Keep in mind that the power to grant waivers is also the power not to grant waivers. Such power can be used to reward administration friends and punish administration critics by saddling them with millions of dollars of health care costs.
Obama's heath care legislation contains deviousness that has become all too common in Washington. What was sold to the American people as health care reform legislation includes a provision that would more heavily regulate and tax gold coin and bullion transactions. Whether gold and bullion transactions should or should not be more heavily regulated and taxed is not the issue. The administration's devious inclusion of it as a part of health care reform is.
Fighting government intrusion into our lives is becoming increasingly difficult for at least two reasons. The first reason is that educators at the primary, secondary and university levels have been successful in teaching our youngsters to despise the values of our Constitution and the founders of our nation -- "those dead, old, racist white men." Their success in that arena might explain why educators have been unable to get our youngsters to read, write and compute on a level comparable with other developed nations; they are too busy proselytizing students.
The second reason is we've become a nation of thieves, accustomed to living at the expense of one another and to accommodate that we're obliged to support tyrannical and overreaching government.
Adolf Hitler had it right when he said, "How fortunate for governments that the people they administer don't think."
Walter E. Williams
Dr. Williams serves on the faculty of George Mason University as John M. Olin Distinguished Professor of Economics and is the author of More Liberty Means Less Government: Our Founders Knew This Well.
FROM TOWNHALL
Memo to Conservatives: Quit Apologizing for Capitalism
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Sign-Up Everywhere we turn these days, it seems, leftists are undermining and attacking capitalism on moral grounds. Their criticisms are directed not at merely certain corrupt corporations or individuals who abuse the system, but at the system itself.
Sadly, few conservatives, even conservative Christians, are willing or prepared to defend capitalism's virtues. Rather than tout it in terms of liberty, they sheepishly apologize for its allegedly inherent greed.
It's a testament to the power of propaganda and the appeal of emotion over reason that a system that has produced the greatest prosperity in world history is castigated on moral grounds, while those systems that have proliferated abject misery, poverty, tyranny and subjugation are hailed as morally superior.
Granted, most leftists don't openly confess their hostility to capitalism, but they come close, especially in their endless waging of class warfare.
Surely you've heard Obama say, preposterously, "A free market was never meant to be a free license to take whatever you can get, however you can get it." No one actually supports this straw man argument. American capitalism has always been subject to the rule of law. Even the fiercest free market proponents don't defend the license to steal or economic anarchy.
Hidden in Obama's statement (and more apparent in some of his other statements) are unmistakable implications that those who thrive in our system are immoral and don't deserve it and that the less successful have been cheated out of their just desserts. This doubtlessly proceeds from his leftist view of the relationship between government and the people.
The left doesn't seem to comprehend the indispensability of private property to liberty or the necessity of liberty to achieve prosperity. To them, it is not individuals operating in a climate of liberty who produce prosperity. Government produces (or magnanimously permits) the creation of wealth and is the most appropriate vehicle for distributing that wealth and delivering the greatest good to the greatest number of people.
America's gross national product first belongs to the government, and only that portion the government allows you, in its beneficence, to keep after taxes is your money. But even then, it is not wholly your money, for you are not free to transfer it by gift (lifetime or death) to whomever you'd like without penalty. And interest you earn on it will also be taxed.
Leftists pay lip service to America's founding ideal of equality of opportunity but honor instead the un-American idea of equality of outcomes. They fully intend to use the power of government to rectify America's inequitable distribution of resources. Don't forget that at one time, at the hands of the left, the top income tax rate was higher than 90 percent or that it was 70 percent before the Reagan cuts.
Indeed, it's ironic that leftists depict conservatives as hyperbolic and extreme for sometimes using the terms "socialist" and "Marxist" to describe Obama. They don't offer a substantive defense against the claim, but use the same argument they offer against all charges about Obama's radical behavior, namely that an elected American president couldn't possibly be a radical or a socialist and certainly couldn't be a Marxist. That's the stuff of spy novels.
Never mind Obama's actual background, his associations, his statements, his radical appointments and his unprecedented policies. Those who describe him in terms that accurately capture his extremism and divisiveness are the ones written off as extremists or divisive.
This irony is compounded by the fact that it is leftists who are guilty of hyperbole -- even paranoia -- in their attack on conservatives, their patriotism and their free market advocacy. Consider the bizarre rant of Obama's spiritual adviser, Jim Wallis, in trashing America's "conservative media" to a group of Britons.
Wallis said: "We now are controlled by the right-wing media, Fox News and all the rest, and this is the media that has an ideological point of view that America is best and the rest of you don't even count, that the rich are our salvation. ... When I say the 1 percent of the country has more wealth than the bottom 90 percent, they say that's a good thing. ... You just keep feeding the rich and the poor with their little tin cups hoping the rich are good tippers; that's a good thing for the economy."
Talk about the stuff of fiction. Conservatives don't believe foreign countries "don't count." Nor do they believe that the rich are anyone's salvation or that they are glorified benefactors of the economically less fortunate.
It is yet another irony that liberals accuse Christian conservatives of subordinating their theology to their politics, when it is their "social justice" brethren who are guiltier of conflating their politics with their ideology, idolizing redistributionism and, in my humble opinion, distorting the Gospel to conform to their political predispositions.
David Limbaugh
David Limbaugh, brother of radio talk-show host Rush Limbaugh, is an expert in law and politics and author of new book Crimes Against Liberty, the definitive chronicle of Barack Obama's devastating term in office so far.
Email David Limbaugh
Columnist's Archive Share Buzz 0diggsdigg
Sign-Up Everywhere we turn these days, it seems, leftists are undermining and attacking capitalism on moral grounds. Their criticisms are directed not at merely certain corrupt corporations or individuals who abuse the system, but at the system itself.
Sadly, few conservatives, even conservative Christians, are willing or prepared to defend capitalism's virtues. Rather than tout it in terms of liberty, they sheepishly apologize for its allegedly inherent greed.
It's a testament to the power of propaganda and the appeal of emotion over reason that a system that has produced the greatest prosperity in world history is castigated on moral grounds, while those systems that have proliferated abject misery, poverty, tyranny and subjugation are hailed as morally superior.
Granted, most leftists don't openly confess their hostility to capitalism, but they come close, especially in their endless waging of class warfare.
Surely you've heard Obama say, preposterously, "A free market was never meant to be a free license to take whatever you can get, however you can get it." No one actually supports this straw man argument. American capitalism has always been subject to the rule of law. Even the fiercest free market proponents don't defend the license to steal or economic anarchy.
Hidden in Obama's statement (and more apparent in some of his other statements) are unmistakable implications that those who thrive in our system are immoral and don't deserve it and that the less successful have been cheated out of their just desserts. This doubtlessly proceeds from his leftist view of the relationship between government and the people.
The left doesn't seem to comprehend the indispensability of private property to liberty or the necessity of liberty to achieve prosperity. To them, it is not individuals operating in a climate of liberty who produce prosperity. Government produces (or magnanimously permits) the creation of wealth and is the most appropriate vehicle for distributing that wealth and delivering the greatest good to the greatest number of people.
America's gross national product first belongs to the government, and only that portion the government allows you, in its beneficence, to keep after taxes is your money. But even then, it is not wholly your money, for you are not free to transfer it by gift (lifetime or death) to whomever you'd like without penalty. And interest you earn on it will also be taxed.
Leftists pay lip service to America's founding ideal of equality of opportunity but honor instead the un-American idea of equality of outcomes. They fully intend to use the power of government to rectify America's inequitable distribution of resources. Don't forget that at one time, at the hands of the left, the top income tax rate was higher than 90 percent or that it was 70 percent before the Reagan cuts.
Indeed, it's ironic that leftists depict conservatives as hyperbolic and extreme for sometimes using the terms "socialist" and "Marxist" to describe Obama. They don't offer a substantive defense against the claim, but use the same argument they offer against all charges about Obama's radical behavior, namely that an elected American president couldn't possibly be a radical or a socialist and certainly couldn't be a Marxist. That's the stuff of spy novels.
Never mind Obama's actual background, his associations, his statements, his radical appointments and his unprecedented policies. Those who describe him in terms that accurately capture his extremism and divisiveness are the ones written off as extremists or divisive.
This irony is compounded by the fact that it is leftists who are guilty of hyperbole -- even paranoia -- in their attack on conservatives, their patriotism and their free market advocacy. Consider the bizarre rant of Obama's spiritual adviser, Jim Wallis, in trashing America's "conservative media" to a group of Britons.
Wallis said: "We now are controlled by the right-wing media, Fox News and all the rest, and this is the media that has an ideological point of view that America is best and the rest of you don't even count, that the rich are our salvation. ... When I say the 1 percent of the country has more wealth than the bottom 90 percent, they say that's a good thing. ... You just keep feeding the rich and the poor with their little tin cups hoping the rich are good tippers; that's a good thing for the economy."
Talk about the stuff of fiction. Conservatives don't believe foreign countries "don't count." Nor do they believe that the rich are anyone's salvation or that they are glorified benefactors of the economically less fortunate.
It is yet another irony that liberals accuse Christian conservatives of subordinating their theology to their politics, when it is their "social justice" brethren who are guiltier of conflating their politics with their ideology, idolizing redistributionism and, in my humble opinion, distorting the Gospel to conform to their political predispositions.
David Limbaugh
David Limbaugh, brother of radio talk-show host Rush Limbaugh, is an expert in law and politics and author of new book Crimes Against Liberty, the definitive chronicle of Barack Obama's devastating term in office so far.
FROM TOWNHALL
Obama's Lies About His Broken Promises
Email Chuck Norris
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Sign-Up Last week, President Barack Obama was backpedaling like a circus unicycle rider, after his compromise on extending Bush-era tax cuts for the country's top 2 percent of income earners. Because he had pledged repeatedly during his presidential campaign to raise those earners' taxes, he instantly was slammed by his political base. Even pro-Obama comedic commentators Jon Stewart and Bill Maher were left humor-speechless.
Feeling defensive and maybe even a bit insecure, Obama fired back in anger against people across the political spectrum. Wielding his verbal sword, the president poked and prodded: "Take a tally. Look at what I promised during the campaign. There's not a single thing that I've said that I would do that I have not either done or tried to do. And if I haven't gotten it done yet, I'm still trying to do it."
"Not a single thing"?
Well, as a fighting champion who takes taunting seriously, I thought I'd take the president up on his challenge for us to take a tally.
What I discovered is that of the more than 500 promises Obama made during his candidacy, even according to the pro-Obama website PolitiFact's "Obameter," his scorecard reads: 123 promises kept, 39 compromised, 24 broken, 82 stalled, 232 in the works and three not yet rated. What that coddled language boils down to is this: Even according to those on the political left, Obama has fulfilled 123 promises and left 380 pledges dangling farther than participles.
What PolitiFact overlooks is that what really matters isn't the count of broken promises; it's the caliber of those broken promises. If I fail to fulfill a promise to take my dog for a walk, that's one thing. But it's quite a different deal if I fail to take my wife on a promised date. The difference is a night in the doghouse!
Let me spare you a long list of substantial pledges and promises. Here's a short list, a few golden nuggets, or, should I say, fool's gold flakes. I'll set to the side presidential promises of transparency, C-SPAN coverage of health care debates and even Guantanamo Bay's closing. Instead, I'll go straight for the promise jugular. And so that no one thinks I'm overreaching my punch, here are the vows right out of the president's mouth:
--"We've got a philosophical difference, which we've debated repeatedly, and that is that Sen. (Hillary) Clinton believes the only way to achieve universal health care is to force everybody to purchase it." (Spoken during the Democratic presidential debate on Feb. 21, 2008.)
--"We need tougher border security and a renewed focus on busting up gangs and traffickers crossing our border. ... That begins at home, with comprehensive immigration reform. That means securing our border and passing tough employer enforcement laws." (Spoken in Miami on May 23, 2008.)
--"Based on the conversations we've had internally, as well as external reports, we believe that you can get one to two brigades out a month. At that pace, the forces would be out in approximately 16 months from the time that we began. That would be the time frame that I would be setting up." (Spoken to The New York Times on Oct. 31, 2007, about the withdrawal from Iraq.)
--"We will launch a sweeping effort to root out waste, inefficiency and unnecessary spending in our government, and every American will be able to see how and where we spend taxpayer dollars by going to a new website called Recovery.gov." (Spoken in a speech on Jan. 28, 2009.)
--"There is no doubt that we've been living beyond our means and we're going to have to make some adjustments. Now, what I've done throughout this campaign is to propose a net spending cut." (Spoken during the presidential debate on Oct. 15, 2008.)
--"We are going to ban all earmarks." (Spoken at a news conference on Jan. 6, 2009.)
--"Under my plan, no family making less than $250,000 a year will see any form of tax increase -- not your income tax, not your payroll tax, not your capital gains taxes, not any of your taxes." (Spoken at a town hall meeting on Sept. 12, 2008.)
--And oh, yes, then there's that substantial promise repeated dozens of times in one way, shape or form on the campaign trail: "It's true that I want to roll back the Bush tax cuts on the wealthiest Americans." (Spoken in Chester, Pa., on Oct. 28, 2008.)
Now, what were those words the president used last week? "Not a single thing"?
I know some will accuse me of kicking the president while he's down. But he's actually roundhouse kicked himself (again), by not only lying about his broken promises but also dissing everyone inside and outside his own political camp.
Up against the political wall last week, Obama compared Republicans to hostage takers willing to harm Americans. Then he compared Democrats to unyielding stalemate causers who hold up political and American progress.
Seems to me the only politician President Obama hasn't demeaned is himself.
Is that because Obama is so far ahead of the American pack in wisdom or because he finally is walking alone with no one following? Have his arrogance, defiance, charismatic charade and inability to lead in conflict (proved last week by his need of former President Bill Clinton's presence) finally caught up with him, isolating him from even his most avid followers?
Maybe it's a good time this Christmas season for President Obama to contemplate a bit of wisdom from the Good Book: Pride comes before the fall.
Chuck Norris
Chuck Norris is a columnist and impossible to kill.
TOWNHALL DAILY: Sign up today and receive Chuck Norris and Townhall.com's daily lineup delivered each morning to your inbox.
Email Chuck Norris
Columnist's Archive Share Buzz 0diggsdigg
Sign-Up Last week, President Barack Obama was backpedaling like a circus unicycle rider, after his compromise on extending Bush-era tax cuts for the country's top 2 percent of income earners. Because he had pledged repeatedly during his presidential campaign to raise those earners' taxes, he instantly was slammed by his political base. Even pro-Obama comedic commentators Jon Stewart and Bill Maher were left humor-speechless.
Feeling defensive and maybe even a bit insecure, Obama fired back in anger against people across the political spectrum. Wielding his verbal sword, the president poked and prodded: "Take a tally. Look at what I promised during the campaign. There's not a single thing that I've said that I would do that I have not either done or tried to do. And if I haven't gotten it done yet, I'm still trying to do it."
"Not a single thing"?
Well, as a fighting champion who takes taunting seriously, I thought I'd take the president up on his challenge for us to take a tally.
What I discovered is that of the more than 500 promises Obama made during his candidacy, even according to the pro-Obama website PolitiFact's "Obameter," his scorecard reads: 123 promises kept, 39 compromised, 24 broken, 82 stalled, 232 in the works and three not yet rated. What that coddled language boils down to is this: Even according to those on the political left, Obama has fulfilled 123 promises and left 380 pledges dangling farther than participles.
What PolitiFact overlooks is that what really matters isn't the count of broken promises; it's the caliber of those broken promises. If I fail to fulfill a promise to take my dog for a walk, that's one thing. But it's quite a different deal if I fail to take my wife on a promised date. The difference is a night in the doghouse!
Let me spare you a long list of substantial pledges and promises. Here's a short list, a few golden nuggets, or, should I say, fool's gold flakes. I'll set to the side presidential promises of transparency, C-SPAN coverage of health care debates and even Guantanamo Bay's closing. Instead, I'll go straight for the promise jugular. And so that no one thinks I'm overreaching my punch, here are the vows right out of the president's mouth:
--"We've got a philosophical difference, which we've debated repeatedly, and that is that Sen. (Hillary) Clinton believes the only way to achieve universal health care is to force everybody to purchase it." (Spoken during the Democratic presidential debate on Feb. 21, 2008.)
--"We need tougher border security and a renewed focus on busting up gangs and traffickers crossing our border. ... That begins at home, with comprehensive immigration reform. That means securing our border and passing tough employer enforcement laws." (Spoken in Miami on May 23, 2008.)
--"Based on the conversations we've had internally, as well as external reports, we believe that you can get one to two brigades out a month. At that pace, the forces would be out in approximately 16 months from the time that we began. That would be the time frame that I would be setting up." (Spoken to The New York Times on Oct. 31, 2007, about the withdrawal from Iraq.)
--"We will launch a sweeping effort to root out waste, inefficiency and unnecessary spending in our government, and every American will be able to see how and where we spend taxpayer dollars by going to a new website called Recovery.gov." (Spoken in a speech on Jan. 28, 2009.)
--"There is no doubt that we've been living beyond our means and we're going to have to make some adjustments. Now, what I've done throughout this campaign is to propose a net spending cut." (Spoken during the presidential debate on Oct. 15, 2008.)
--"We are going to ban all earmarks." (Spoken at a news conference on Jan. 6, 2009.)
--"Under my plan, no family making less than $250,000 a year will see any form of tax increase -- not your income tax, not your payroll tax, not your capital gains taxes, not any of your taxes." (Spoken at a town hall meeting on Sept. 12, 2008.)
--And oh, yes, then there's that substantial promise repeated dozens of times in one way, shape or form on the campaign trail: "It's true that I want to roll back the Bush tax cuts on the wealthiest Americans." (Spoken in Chester, Pa., on Oct. 28, 2008.)
Now, what were those words the president used last week? "Not a single thing"?
I know some will accuse me of kicking the president while he's down. But he's actually roundhouse kicked himself (again), by not only lying about his broken promises but also dissing everyone inside and outside his own political camp.
Up against the political wall last week, Obama compared Republicans to hostage takers willing to harm Americans. Then he compared Democrats to unyielding stalemate causers who hold up political and American progress.
Seems to me the only politician President Obama hasn't demeaned is himself.
Is that because Obama is so far ahead of the American pack in wisdom or because he finally is walking alone with no one following? Have his arrogance, defiance, charismatic charade and inability to lead in conflict (proved last week by his need of former President Bill Clinton's presence) finally caught up with him, isolating him from even his most avid followers?
Maybe it's a good time this Christmas season for President Obama to contemplate a bit of wisdom from the Good Book: Pride comes before the fall.
Chuck Norris
Chuck Norris is a columnist and impossible to kill.
TOWNHALL DAILY: Sign up today and receive Chuck Norris and Townhall.com's daily lineup delivered each morning to your inbox.
FROM TOWNHALL
Obama's Tax Deal is a Raw Deal for Americans
Dear Londa,
When President Obama first announced his tax deal, we told Washington to slow down and not rubber stamp the package.
In November, the American people spoke out against typical Washington deal-making and in favor of politicians who will cast votes on principle. This deal reeked of Washington.
Now President Obama’s tax deal is an actual bill. And Harry Reid included even more spending in order to buy off votes to support it. To prevent a massive income tax increase, Members of Congress now are being asked to vote for ethanol subsidies, mass transit tax deductions, energy efficient appliance subsidies, and cash subsidies for alternative electricity generating corporations. All this in addition to tens of billions plus in unemployment compensation and a return of the death tax.
And what would conservatives get in return for this business-as-usual, spending binge? Two years of continued tax rates.
According to the conventional wisdom in Washington this is ‘the best deal we can get.’ We reject that.
November 2nd was supposed to signal an end to business as usual in Washington. It was supposed to be the beginning of a principle-driven Congress in which members fought for what they believe in, not what was politically palatable inside the Beltway.
This kind of insider deal is not what we sent people to Congress to do. It’s time to tell Washington: enough is enough.
Members of Congress who want to save the American people from increased taxes should fight hard for a clean extension of the Bush tax cuts. When they do, you and I will stand proudly on their side.
Sincerely,
Michael A. Neeham
Chief Executive Office
Heritage Action for America
Dear Londa,
When President Obama first announced his tax deal, we told Washington to slow down and not rubber stamp the package.
In November, the American people spoke out against typical Washington deal-making and in favor of politicians who will cast votes on principle. This deal reeked of Washington.
Now President Obama’s tax deal is an actual bill. And Harry Reid included even more spending in order to buy off votes to support it. To prevent a massive income tax increase, Members of Congress now are being asked to vote for ethanol subsidies, mass transit tax deductions, energy efficient appliance subsidies, and cash subsidies for alternative electricity generating corporations. All this in addition to tens of billions plus in unemployment compensation and a return of the death tax.
And what would conservatives get in return for this business-as-usual, spending binge? Two years of continued tax rates.
According to the conventional wisdom in Washington this is ‘the best deal we can get.’ We reject that.
November 2nd was supposed to signal an end to business as usual in Washington. It was supposed to be the beginning of a principle-driven Congress in which members fought for what they believe in, not what was politically palatable inside the Beltway.
This kind of insider deal is not what we sent people to Congress to do. It’s time to tell Washington: enough is enough.
Members of Congress who want to save the American people from increased taxes should fight hard for a clean extension of the Bush tax cuts. When they do, you and I will stand proudly on their side.
Sincerely,
Michael A. Neeham
Chief Executive Office
Heritage Action for America
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