Mr. Trump's two most trusted employees serving in perhaps the most critical positions in the Executive Branch intentionally reject any connection between Islamic doctrine and the conduct of Muslim terrorists. It is no wonder, then, that Mr. Trump's lengthy speech outlining his current Afghanistan war policy contained the word "terrorism" but no mention of Islam.
Since the global jihad thrust itself into our national consciousness on September 11, 2001, America's arbiters of political correctness have over and again rejected every honest inquiry into Islam. This willful refusal to explore the ideological roots of those who routinely claim allegiance to Muhammad's religion while engaging in terrorism has led our nation to choose costly and inconclusive responses to such violence. With the "lone wolf" phenomenon, having sprung up on our shores over the past decade, one wonders whether our nation is any safer today from Islamic terrorism than during our pre-9/11 salad days. More @ American Thinker
Chuck Schumer is in a spirited mood. "This is going to be one of the
biggest fights of the next three, four months," the Senate minority
leader said recently of the coming debate over tax cuts. "And Democrats
are ready for it."
No doubt they are. But the relevant question is: Does their readiness
even matter? Last month Mitch McConnell said he planned to bring taxes
to the Senate floor under the budget reconciliation procedure. That
would bypass the filibuster. The bill could pass by majority vote. No
Democrats required.
And Republicans are unlikely to experience the defections over taxes
that doomed them on health care. The health bill was a mess, a product
of Republican confusion and infighting. There is no such uncertainty
toward cutting taxes.
This is not to say that a cut is a done deal. Congressional
Republicans may find a way to screw up. Fumbling the ball at the
one-yard line is a specialty of theirs. But the prospect that GOP
incompetence may rob the Trump administration of another legislative
victory only underscores the fundamental point: Chuck Schumer's big
words to the contrary notwithstanding, the Democrats are irrelevant to
the power equation in Donald Trump's Washington.
That equation consists of five variables. None is called (D).
This is the gravestone of my
great-great-great grandfather, Benjamin Parks Middleton, located in the
Bethel Baptist Church cemetery between the towns of Hazelhurst and
Georgetown in Copiah County, Mississippi. He was a farmer from that area
and, to my knowledge, was not a slave-owner.
Benjamin served as a private in the 6th Mississippi infantry unit of
the Confederate States Army during the War Between the States. Eighty or
so years earlier, his grandfather, Holland Middleton, served as a
captain from Richmond County, Georgia in the Continental Army during the
Revolutionary War. At the time of Benjamin’s death in 1891, he could
not have known that his two-year-old grandson, Troy, would log more days
in combat than any general officer in the United States Army fighting
real, flesh-and-blood Nazis (not the modern Hitler fanboy variety)
during World War Two. Hundreds of thousands – nay, millions – of
Americans alive today can trace similar lineages and share similar
stories.
I cannot say for certain, but my guess is that none of these men
shared the Current Year’s enlightened views on race relations in our
Vibrant, Diverse, Multicultural Society. Does that make them History’s
Greatest Monsters whose sacrifices and accomplishments are not worth
publicly remembering? For the crime of failure to conform to modern
sensibilities, must we disavow our ancestors, the men who built America?
Sadly, among a small but increasingly vocal and violent segment of
America, the answer to these questions is a resounding “yes.” What began
as a call to remove from the public square monuments to the service and
sacrifice of those who – rightly or wrongly – reasonably believed they
were following in their grandfathers’ footsteps in fighting the Second
War for American Independence now has mushroomed, predictably, into a
call for removal, by any means necessary, of public monuments to anyone
so thoughtless as to be caught Wrongthinking While Dead.
This exceedingly myopic view of history and human nature will, if
left unchecked, leave a trail of destruction in its wake before
eventually burning itself out on its own incoherence and hatred. Before
that time comes, however, we who disagree must resist by all peaceable
means available. We who wish to live in an honest America, a truthful
America, a warts-and-all America – an America open to real diversity of
thought – must resist these totalitarian efforts to shoehorn American
history into a political ideology.
If you think so, say so. Pay no mind to the names
you will be called, for they are mere words designed to shame you into
silence, but which have no meaning.
In the end, the cultural Marxists running amok in America during the
Current Year will be defeated in their efforts to retcon American
history, if for no other reason than that their worldview betrays a
fundamental misunderstanding of human nature. Humans seek to honor their
ancestors, not cast them aside as so much garbage. Humans seek truth
and understanding, not political claptrap masquerading as history.
Humans seek the real diversity of thought, not the fake Diversity of
totalitarians.
A Salt Lake City nurse has released police body camera and
hospital surveillance footage which she claims shows her being illegally
arrested back in late July after refusing police orders to draw blood
from an unconscious patient.
Utah University Hospital nurse Alex Wubbels was in charge on July
26th when law enforcement officials arrived and ordered her to extract
the blood of an unconscious truck driver who had been injured in a
hit-and-run accident earlier that day.
Wubbels says she was just doing her job and was protecting her
patient’s privacy when she was arrested and dragged out of the hospital
by a Salt Lake City police detective, who the nurse says illegally
arrested and assaulted her.
Kevin “KC” Massey filed a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request back
in October 2016. He just received a response (FOIA Response). Though
only two and a little bit of a third page, it is rather interesting. You
can read the whole Response, though I will give some highlights. “xxx”
indicates redactions, mostly names.
It begins with a Summary of Events, “On
September 2, 2014, Cameron County Sheriff’s Office (CCSO) Investigator
and Task Force Officer (TFO) for the FBI Brownsville Field Office xxx
called ATF SA xxx for assistance on the ‘BP Militia’ case.” So, the
government had already set up an investigation on the “BP Militia”. So,
well, it wasn’t just a coincidence that the events of August 29, 2014
occurred as they did. (ATF=Alcohol, Tobacco, & Firearms; SA=Special
Agent; BP=Border Patrol; NFA=National Firearms Act)
Now, when we see the background, well:
“On September 2, 2014, CCSO Investigator xxx had called ATF SA xxx for assistance with the firearms from an arrest of a militia member that had been shot at by an United States Border Patrol Agent
over the weekend of August 29. 2014. xxx advised SA xxx that the BP
agent was following a group of illegals through the brush when he encountered a militia member pointing a firearm at him.
CCSO Investigator xxx also informed SA xxx that this militia member is a
previously convicted felon who was possibly in possession of NFA
weapons.”
Americans continue to get fatter and it's delivering a huge blow to
the country, both in higher health care costs and undercutting military
recruiting, according to a huge new study.
The 14th annual State of Obesity:
Better Policies for a Healthier America report from the Trust for
America's Health and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation bluntly reported
that 70 percent of the nation is obese or overweight.
And while the rate
of obesity growth is leveling off, the costs aren't. The report, for
example, said additional health care for obese adults and children is
$150 billion a year and billions of dollars more in lost worker
productivity.
Fresh allegations that former FBI director James
Comey began drafting an “exoneration statement” for Hillary Clinton well
before interviewing her and other key witnesses have called into
question his Senate testimony about why he decided to go public with his
findings in the email case last summer.
In a June hearing before the Senate
Intelligence Committee, Comey was asked whether his decision to
announce the results of the investigation was influenced by
then-Attorney General Loretta Lynch’s infamous meeting days earlier on
an Arizona tarmac with former President Bill Clinton.
Violence is coming from antifa group on campus. Now they control
administrators and shut out competing ideas they disagree with or don’t
like.
“When they look to what college to pick, parents and students are
thinking of the largest investment their family is likely to make beyond
the purchase of a home,” Pfeffer Merrill said. “Across the political
spectrum, one of the most essential assets is [the opportunity] to be
exposed to a wide range of views.
Both the University of Missouri and Evergreen State College have been rocked by left-wing demonstrations, some of which administrators in both schools allowed. Now both have had to deal with falling enrollment and a decline in funds - and there are fears the situation could spread to other schools.
The defining issue is whether parents and donors see administrators as capable of containing clashes and responding firmly when protests get out of control, experts say.
Jacqueline Pfeffer Merrill of the American Council of Trustees and Alumni, a nonprofit that advocates for a variety of higher education issues, told Fox News that how a college handles freedom of expression matters greatly to prospective students, their parents and donors.
The DACA program was never intended to provide a pathway to citizenship, the committee said.
The Obama administration allowed
thousands of young illegal immigrants to ‘exploit an immigration law
loophole’ to obtain green cards, the Republicans on the Senate Judiciary
Committee said Friday.
The committee, chaired by Iowa Sen.
Chuck Grassley, said in a statement that data provided by U.S.
Citizenship and Immigration Services indicates thousands of recipients
of Obama’s Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals, or DACA, program have
applied for green cards and U.S. citizenship since the program went
into effect.
The Survey/Monkey poll shows that 30% of those surveyed view Pelosi
favorably, a statistical tie with Paul Ryan’s 31%. The two are also tied
up in the unfavorable department, with 64% holding an unfavorable view
of Pelosi, compared to 63% for Ryan.
Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell is in even worse shape. A Harvard-Harris poll released last week
showed the Kentucky Republican with a dismal approval rating of just
19%, the lowest of any politician in the country. In this same poll,
Ryan’s favorable rating is 33%, which is in line with the NBC poll.
Meanwhile, President Trump’s approval rating sits at 39%, which is
not great but is still better than his congressional counterparts, who
are not the focus of a 24/7 hate campaign from our national media.
