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March 2016

Will the Obama Administration Recognize the Legal Evidence of Genocide? NR Interview by Kathryn Lopez

The U.S. State Department is facing a congressionally mandated deadline to make a choice: Will the U.S. follow in the footsteps of the European parliament and a growing global consensus on telling the truth about the genocide of Christians and other religious minorities in Iraq and Syria?

L. Martin Nussbaum is a religious-liberty attorney in Colorado Springs. He serves as legal counsel for the Knights of Columbus and In Defense of Christians, which Thursday released a report of the evidence that what is happening is, in fact, a genocide. The report entitled Genocide against Christians in the Mideast is available here. Nussbaum is one of the lawyers who worked on the report’s legal brief and talks about it here. – KJL

Kathryn Jean Lopez: How clear is the genocide case?

L. Martin Nussbaum: It’s clear. ISIS has systematically targeted Christian communities in Iraq and Syria, killing or abducting thousands of Christians in those countries. In Iraq alone, 200,000 Christians have been displaced from their historic homeland on the Nineveh Plain. ISIS and its affiliates have wiped out almost every trace of Christian civilization there, destroying hundreds of churches and other holy sites, some dating back to the earliest centuries of Christianity. And ISIS is explicit about its goal: the total annihilation or subjugation of Christian people. “We will conquer your Rome, break your crosses, and enslave your women,” they have said. In light of the atrocities they’ve committed in the Middle East, Africa, Europe, and elsewhere, we should take them at their word.

This ongoing genocide has been recognized by 28 European countries, the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights, the Iraqi and Kurdish governments, major world leaders (including Chancellor Angela Merkel and Pope Francis), and U.S. presidential candidates of both parties. The United States government stands virtually alone in refusing to acknowledge the genocide.

Lopez: Why is naming it as genocide so important, when the policy implications aren’t clear at all?

Nussbaum: First, it’s the truth. ISIS’s stated goal is the establishment of a “caliphate” and the eradication of all who refuse to submit to its warped vision, including Christians. Hence the genocidal atrocities we’ve seen in Iraq, Syria, and Libya. Second, the word “genocide” actually means something — morally, politically, and legally. The United States, like all signatories to the 1948 Genocide Convention, has an obligation to prevent and punish genocide. But, as our government’s own U.N. ambassador Samantha Power lays out in her groundbreaking book, “A Problem from Hell”: America and the Age of Genocide, the United States has historically dithered about genocide, refusing to acknowledge it even when it’s unfolding before our eyes. Why? Because to call it genocide means we have to do something about it. Critically, though, it doesn’t necessarily mean “boots on the ground.” As our report lays out, we’re asking for the State Department to recognize the ongoing genocide and to immediately take concrete — though at this point, relatively moderate — steps, including investigation and collection of evidence of genocide, referral to the U.S. Department of Justice and the United Nations Security Council for investigation and possible criminal indictments, and exploration of whether to set up a hybrid international criminal court to bring ISIS and other perpetrators to justice.

Feel Betrayed by the GOP? Vote for the One Candidate Who Walks the Walk By Andrew C. McCarthy

‘In the House and the Senate, we own the budget.” It was August 2014, the stretch run before the midterm elections, and Senate minority leader Mitch McConnell was making promises to voters about how he and his party would face down Barack Obama’s lawless presidency. Put us in charge, he explained, and a Republican Congress would defend Americans by using the main tool the Framers gave them, the power of the purse:

That means we can pass the spending bill. And I assure you that in the spending bill, we will be pushing back against this bureaucracy by doing what’s called placing riders in the bill. No money can be spent to do this or to do that. We’re going to go after them on health care, on financial services, on the Environmental Protection Agency, across the board. All across the federal government, we’re going to go after it.

But wait, couldn’t that lead to a government shutdown? Weren’t Republicans supposed to be the grown-ups in the room who would “restore regular order” and “make Washington work”? Locked in his own reelection battle, McConnell was having none of it. President Obama “needs to be challenged,” he thundered, “and the best way to do that is through the funding process.” Republicans would place scores of spending restrictions on the president — “that’s something [the president] won’t like,” he told Politico, “but that will be done. I guarantee it.” A GOP-controlled Congress would dare Obama to veto bills in order to preserve spending on his transformational agenda. If a shutdown happened, that would be the White House’s problem.

In other words, McConnell and his fellow Republican leaders talked the brave talk when courting voters who wanted the financing plug pulled on Obama policies that are crushing ordinary Americans — the impeachable non-enforcement of our immigration laws that costs Americans jobs, depresses American wages, and stresses American communities; the unfolding Obamacare debacle that deprives ordinary Americans of the doctors and insurance they had, corralling them into plans with premiums and deductibles so high that the “coverage” is illusory.

Alas, when voters trusted them to follow through, when it came time to walk the walk . . . the GOP went AWOL.

In the blink of an eye after the historic Republican victory — solid control of the Senate with McConnell safely ensconced as leader, a hammerlock on the House — they gave away the store: fully funding Obama’s final years in office, including Obamacare, including the unconstitutional executive decrees that eviscerate immigration law; forfeiting the considerable leverage they had to “challenge” Obama “through the funding process” as McConnell had committed to do.

Hillary IT Specialist Singing Like a Bird to the FBI By Rick Moran

A source close to the FBI investigation into the use of Hillary Clinton’s private email server says that the IT specialist who worked for Clinton and who has been granted immunity by the Justice Department is revealing key details about how and when Clinton and her aides accessed the server.

The source characterized Bryan Pagliano as a “devastating witness.”

Fox News:

“Bryan Pagliano is a devastating witness and, as the webmaster, knows exactly who had access to [Clinton’s] computer and devices at specific times. His importance to this case cannot be over-emphasized,” the intelligence source said.

The source, who is not authorized to speak on the record due to the sensitivity of the ongoing investigation, said Pagliano has provided information allowing investigators to knit together the emails with other evidence, including images of Clinton on the road as secretary of state.

The cross-referencing of evidence could help investigators pinpoint potential gaps in the email record. “Don’t forget all those photos with her using various devices and it is easy to track the whereabouts of her phone,” the source said. “It is still boils down to a paper case. Did you email at this time from your home or elsewhere using this device? And here is a picture of you and your aides holding the devices.”

Barack Goes Ballistic By Jeannie DeAngelis

In whatever form it takes, authoritarianism is often identified by the unrelenting desire on the part of a leader to eliminate his or her adversaries. And while Iran and Obama purport to have two very different worldviews, both are religious in fervor when dealing with those who deviate from the faith.

In Iran there are mullahs who safeguard Islam’s sacred law, in America there is a president who thinks he is a law unto himself. Iran wants to nuke Israel and the U.S., and Obama is nuking the Constitution.

That’s why the news that Attorney General Loretta Lynch reviewed the possibility of pursuing civil action against climate change skeptics (“deniers”) was as disturbing as the report that Iran recently tested two ballistic missiles.

Most would agree that it is easy to identify what motivates the theocratic Islamic Republic of Iran.

For starters, Iran is zealous in its hatred for America, the country led by a Muslim-sympathizing president that agreed to help the genocidal terrorist state acquire an atomic bomb. The $150 billion check Obama dropped in the mail to Tehran ensures that, in the future, our mortal enemy will possess the means to repay our generosity by turning a third of the earth’s water into Wormwood.

In the meantime, because of the Islamic belief that, on the delicate wings of a mushroom cloud, chaos will usher in the 12th Imām, Mohamed al- Mahdī, Iranian leaders remain primarily fixated on how to annihilate their ancient enemy Israel.

Until that great and terrible day arrives, the Islamic theocracy continues to deal harshly with capital offenders who Iran’s leaders believe “spread corruption.”

The type of depravity that the Iranian government views as a threat to social and political wellbeing include criticism of the regime, offending the Prophet and defying Islamic standards with speech or printed material.

Funny, some of those violations sound similar to the American sin of critiquing prescient Obama, and exercising the right to free speech.

Sometimes, at first, Iranian government goon squads called “religious police” monitor suspected blasphemers. Other times, offenders immediately endure persecution and/or spend extended time in a jail cell. But, more often than not, those who “spread corruption” are tortured and executed.

Put simply, if a citizen dares to disagree with the theocratic ruler of Iran, the punishment that follows is severe and unforgiving.

The Little Fascist That Could By Frank Salvato

Tonight, as I watch protesters in the streets of Chicago squash the free speech rights of those they do not agree with I exist ashamed of my hometown. I have understood for years that Chicago had arrived at being the epicenter of Progressive intolerance, even more so than the grounds of UC Berkeley or Columbia University. But listening to one of the “protesters” being interviewed after the announcement that they had succeeded in effecting the cancellation of a political rally featuring Donald Trump (of whom I am not necessarily a huge supporter), I have come to the conclusion that the brown shirt-jackboots of fascist regimes past have been resurrected; inhabiting the liberal bastions and college classrooms of the Windy City.

One giggling female protester said, “We are protesting inequality, we’re protesting everything.” And a self-anointed community activist (where does one go to get certified as a community activist anyway?), Quo Vadis, said the goal of the protesters – numbering in the high-hundreds, if not thousands – was for, “Donald to take the stage and to completely interrupt him. The plan is to shut Donald Trump all the way down.” In other words, the protesters who consider themselves champions of “equality for all” executed a plan to affect the total censorship of a political figure. By any consideration, these “protesters” annihilated Donald Trump’s First Amendment right to free speech. Correct me if I am wrong, but censorship is antithetical to equality for all. But maybe these protester’s civics instructors haven’t covered the Bill of Rights yet.

Fascism, by definition, means:

“…a political movement that employs the principles and methods of Fascism, the philosophy, principles, or methods of a governmental system that forcibly suppresses opposition and criticism, and emphasizing an aggressive Nationalism and often racism.”

Censorship is a tool of Fascism, serving to suppress opposition and criticism. This is exactly what we witnessed in the streets of Chicago tonight: censorship at the hand of the “enlightened” Progressive movement. So it is that it is fair to characterize these “enlightened” people – young and old, male and female, Black, White, Latino and otherwise – as modern day fascists; individuals intolerant of opinions that exist in opposition to their own; individuals that exist delusional to who they have become; “useful idiots” denying others the right to political free speech in defiance of the Bill of Rights.

A legacy of failure-No more, Mr. President: Obama has done enough damage to Israel already

With the clock ticking on two terms that incalculably damaged the cause of peace in the Middle East, President Obama is reportedly planning to dictate terms of an Israeli-Palestinian settlement through the United Nations. He must not go further down this path of ego, hubris and vengeance. He will not validate the Nobel Peace Prize awarded to him in 2009 and never earned. Undercutting the Jewish state, he will only make negotiations more impossible than they already are.Plainly, the President blames Israel in the person of Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu for the failure of Obama’s attempts to broker a peace deal.

While Netanyahu can be tough to get along with, Obama persistently failed to accept that the Palestinians lack leaders with the courage to end a state of war by accepting Israel’s right to exist.

Obama hit a wall largely because he placed demands on Israel without requiring the West Bank’s Fatah-led government, much less the Hamas rulers of Gaza, even to respect basic Israeli security needs.

The President’s destructive asymmetry dismembered decades of American policy in the Middle East.

#ChicagoThugs, #PatheticInChicago, #ChicagoFailure By Joan Swirsky

Who can forget the clueless thugs protesting last May in the streets of Ferguson, Missouri, holding up their brand new shiny placards––mmmm, where did those pricey things come from?––and expressing rage at….what?

Not at the lack of esteem they believed white America owed to the black-lives-matter movement.
Not at the shooting a year earlier of Michael Brown (for which police officer Darren Wilson was exonerated by a Grand Jury) or the phony “hands-up/don’t shoot” mantra.
Not at the devastating fact that under Barack Obama the unemployment figures for African-Americans were––and remain––at record sky-high levels. According to Larry Elder at Townhall.com, “By every key economic measurement, blacks are worse off under Obama…in some cases, far worse off.”
Not at the tragic fact that black-on-black crime was––and remains––the single biggest killer in the black community (other than abortion).
Oh no. They were protesting because the anarchic, hate-America moneybags who bribed or rather enticed them to show up and act out didn’t pay them! Reportedly, some of the protesters “who looted, rioted, burned buildings and overturned police cars….were promised up to $5,000 per month to join the protests.”

That’s right, according to Newsmax.com, “Missourians Organizing for Reform and Empowerment (MORE), the successor group to the now-bankrupt St. Louis branch of ACORN (Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now), stiffed the protesters.”

So much for the high-minded ideology that drove these unemployed know-nothings into the streets!

OLD BOTTLE, SAME WINE
This is exactly what we just witnessed in Chicago on Friday night, March 11th, as a bunch of protestors––both black and white––were convinced for a pittance or for a pile of dough to act like hyperactive children off their Ritalin in order to disrupt a massive rally, anticipated to be attended by over 25,000, for presidential-frontrunner Donald J. Trump. It was hilarious to see the protestors, when asked by reporters why they were there, robotically announce, “I’d rather not give my reasons.” Translation: I have no clue why I’m here, but I’m making a few bucks, so what the heck!

The venue was perfect, wasn’t it?––the home of the arch community organizer Barack Obama, who before his ignominious, race-baiting, hate-whitey, loathe-the-opposition tenure in the White House, specialized in fomenting the same kind of protests, almost all of them to bring down “the man.” The goal, of course, has always been to extort money from individuals or corporations perceived to be “racist,” to create or reinforce in the protestors the notion that they are perpetual victims, and to convince them to vote for Democrats who promise to address their grievances––but never do. The net result: The cities in America with the highest crime rates share one thing in common––each one has a Democrat mayor!

Islamic State Closing in on Germany Stabbing Is First ISIS-Inspired Attack on German Soil by Soeren Kern

Hans-Georg Maaßen, the head of Germany’s domestic intelligence agency (BfV), warned that the Islamic State was deliberately planting jihadists among the refugees flowing into Europe, and reported that the number of Salafists in Germany has now risen to 7,900. This is up from 7,000 in 2014 and 5,500 in 2013.

“Salafists want to establish an Islamic state in Germany.” — Hans-Georg Maaßen, director, BfV, German intelligence.

More than 800 German residents — 60% of whom are German passport holders — have joined the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq. Of these, roughly one-third have returned to Germany. — Federal Criminal Police Office.

Up to 5,000 European jihadists have returned to the continent after obtaining combat experience on the battlefields of the Middle East. — Rob Wainwright, head of Europol.

A 15-year-old German girl of Moroccan descent stabbed and seriously wounded a police officer in Hanover. The stabbing appears to be the first lone-wolf terrorist attack in Germany inspired by the Islamic State.

The incident occurred at the main train station in Hanover on the afternoon of February 26, when two police officers noticed that the girl — identified only as Safia S. — was observing and following them.

The officers approached the girl, who was wearing an Islamic headscarf, and asked her to present her identification papers. After handing over her ID, she stabbed one of the officers in the neck with a six-centimeter kitchen knife.

Turkey: Normalizing Hate World Champion Violator of Right to Freedom of Speech by Uzay Bulut

“[T]hey have launched an investigation against me in accordance with article 301 because I mentioned ‘peace, brotherhood, and human rights’ in my statement to the press. Hundreds of lawsuits have been brought against lawyers and members of opposition in Turkey because they talked about peace and brotherhood.” — Ilhan Ongor, Co-President of the Adana branch of the Human Rights Association.

Starving or murdering civilians does not, apparently, constitute a crime in Turkey, but speaking out about them does.

Insulting non-Turkish and non-Muslim people has almost become a social tradition in Turkey. Prejudice and hate speech have become normalized.

What makes this hate speech even more disturbing is that these people — Armenians, Greeks, Assyrians, and Jews, among others — are the indigenous peoples of Anatolia, Mesopotamia and Thrace, where they have lived for millennia. Today, as a result of Turkey’s massacres, pogroms and deportations, they have been turned into tiny communities.

According to the 2015 statistics of the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR), Turkey, 28 lawsuits were opened by applicants against member states regarding their violations of freedom of expression. 10 of those applications (complaints) were made against Turkey’s violations of freedom of expression. So Turkey ranked first in that category.

Turkish law professor Ayse Isil Karakas, both a judge and elected Deputy Head of the ECHR, said that among all member states, Turkey has ranked number one in the field of violations of free speech.

“619 lawsuits of freedom of expression were brought at the ECHR between 1959 and 2015,” she said. ” 258 of them — almost half of them — came from Turkey and most were convicted as violations of freedom of expression.”

Sharia Law or One Law for All? by Denis MacEoin

Here is the fulcrum around which so much of the problem turns: the belief that Islamic law has every right to be put into practice in non-Muslim countries, and the insistence that a parallel, if unequal, legal system can function alongside civil and criminal law codes adhered to by a majority of a country’s citizens.

Salafism is a form of Islam that insists on the application of whatever was said or done by Muhammad or his companions, brooking no adaptation to changing times, no recognition of democracy or man-made laws.

The greatest expression of this failure to integrate, indeed a determined refusal to do so, may be found in the roughly 750 Muslim-dominated no-go zones in France, which the police, fire brigades, and other representatives of the social order dare not visit for fear of sparking off riots and attacks. Similar zones now exist in other European countries, notably Sweden and Germany. According to the 2011 British census there are over 100 Muslim enclaves in the country.

As millions of Muslims flow into Europe, some from Syria, others from as far away as Afghanistan or sub-Saharan Africa, several countries are already experiencing high levels of social breakdown. Several articles have chronicled the challenges posed in countries such as Sweden and Germany. Such challenges are socio-economic in nature: how to accommodate such a large influx of migrants; the rising costs of providing then with housing, food, and benefits, and the expenses incurred by increased levels of policing in the face of growing lawlessness in some areas. If migrants continue to enter European Union countries at the current rate, these costs are likely to rise steeply; some countries, such as Hungary, have already seen how greatly counterproductive and self-destructive Europe’s reception of almost anyone who reaches its borders has been.

The immediate impact, however, of these new arrivals is not likely to be a simple challenge, something that may be remedied by increasing restrictions on numbers, deportations of illegal migrants, or building fences. During the past several decades, some European countries ­– notably Britain, France, Germany, Sweden, and Denmark — have received large numbers of Muslim immigrants, most of them through legal channels. According to a Pew report in 2010, there were over 44 million Muslims in Europe overall, a figure expected to rise to over 58 million by 2030.