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2016

James C. Bennett Preferring the Pirate

A Trump administration may well see needed reforms left undone and unneeded populist measures promoted. As this most unlikely of candidates draws closer to the GOP’s nomination, one thing is certain: Whatever the mogul’s flaws, and they are many, he is less dangerous than Hillary

ships riggedBeing a great aficionado of Patrick O’Brien’s tales of the Georgian Royal Navy, I beg the reader’s indulgence of my using a metaphor from that era. Imagine the American Right to be in the position of a Royal Navy captain of the Napoleonic Wars era, who has found himself trapped in a narrow strait of water blocked at one end by a strong French fleet, and at the other by a large ship which he recognizes as belonging to an infamous and eccentric buccaneer. Escape might still be possible by skirting past the pirate, but is growing more improbable by the moment. The crew, so loyal and steadfast in the past, is becoming spooked. Some are even jumping overboard and swimming toward the pirate vessel, hoping to join him, and the corpulent purser has absconded with a ship’s boat, rowing in the pirate’s direction.

The choices are grim. To surrender to the French is an appalling prospect, meaning four or even eight years in a prison hulk. However, the pirate is so eccentric and unpredictable that he might just kill you for surrendering to him. You call a council of war with your remaining officers and hear their opinions. One counsels that you take to the remaining boats and set the ship on fire, rather than surrender her to either. That would deny the ship to your enemies but leave you adrift and helpless. You might indeed make your way to shore and slowly, painfully use salvaged supplies to build a new ship, but that is uncertain, and would certainly leave you stranded for a long time.

Michael Copeman Over the Hillary

Pity those poor Americans in this presidential election year. In one corner, the bizarre figure of Donald Trump. In the other, the woman who excused her husband’s sexual predations, achieved nothing in the Senate and made cowardice her guide as Secretary of State. Some choice, eh?

Listening to one of Hillary Clinton’s stump speeches as she pursues the Democrats’ presidential nomination, you could be forgiven for suspecting that, taken at her word, she has been personally responsible for the liberation of women. In truth, her vapid and dismissive response to Bill Clinton’s history of abusive affairs likely set the women’s movement back many years. Hillary’s citing of a fabled “vast right-wing conspiracy” somehow, according to a compliant press corps, made Bill’s appalling history seem a mere side issue, all the allegations presented as no more than mere excuses to bring him down. Lies under oath, innovative uses for cigars and interns — even rape if you accept the word of at least two alleged victims and the late Christopher Hitchens, who wrote of having spoken at length to a third.

But none of this bothered Mrs Clinton, who has continued to present herself as the essence and hope of womanhood’s advancement. What she ignores are the key advances that have made life better for women and enabled them to take up opportunities previously un-achievable or forbidden. Legislation for compulsory school education for all children in the late 19th Century arguably opened the way. Those educated women would grow up to demand the vote, more control of money, and less back-breaking domestic drudgery.

The Political Stupidity of the Jews Revisited Why do so many of my fellow Jews stay in the Democratic Party’s pocket? By Joseph Epstein

The story has it that during the George H.W. Bush administration, James Baker proposes to his boss an idea that would go against Israeli interests. “The Jews aren’t going to like it,” President Bush says. Mr. Baker replies: “They don’t vote for us anyway—screw ’em!” Fast forward 15 years, when Rahm Emanuel proposes a different idea to his boss that would also go against Israeli interests. “The Jews aren’t going to like it,” President Obama says. Mr. Emanuel replies: “They vote for us anyway—screw ’em!”

Such, one might say, are the advantages of bloc voting for ethnic groups. Just as Democratic politicians assume the support of black voters, the Jews have been in the pocket of the Democratic Party at least as far back as Franklin Delano Roosevelt, and though there are few Jews alive today who were old enough to have voted for FDR, they, the Jews, are still in that pocket. This despite the fact that we now know that FDR was not such a grand friend to the Jews, for he did nothing to stop or even slow the Nazi genocide of Jews during World War II, and instead, when told by Rabbi Stephen Wise of the death camps, counseled silence on the subject. CONTINUE AT SITE

An Average Terror Sunday Few days go by without attacks on innocents somewhere in the world.

Welcome to what is becoming the new global terrorist normal.

Few days go by now without at least one mass-casualty terrorist attack somewhere in the world. Two such attacks on Sunday, in the Ivory Coast and Turkey, killed 39 people combined.

On Sunday afternoon gunmen raided Grand Bassam, a resort town in the Ivory Coast popular with wealthy locals and Westerners. The assault followed the template of other recent Islamist attacks in the region, with gunmen spraying fire at vacationers on the beach.

At least 12 people were murdered in Grand Bassam, at least one a French citizen, before security forces killed six terrorists and stopped the attack, according to the Ivorian government. Al Qaeda in the Islamic Maghreb claimed responsibility for the attack.

Left unchecked in the Middle East, al Qaeda and Islamic State (ISIS) have expanded into Africa. An Islamist crescent stretches from the Horn of Africa to West Africa, and to compete for recruits Africa’s al Qaeda and ISIS affiliates are racing to out-do each other in savagery. CONTINUE AT SITE

The U.S. Is Botching the Zika Fight A genetically tweaked mosquito could stop the illness, but regulators won’t test it. Why would that be? By John J. Cohrssen and Henry I. Miller

Almost every day seems to bring more bad news about the Zika virus: babies born with malformed brains; adults suffering the progressive paralysis of Guillain-Barré syndrome; Americans diagnosed after traveling to the tropics; active transmission of the disease in U.S. territories. Several companies are working on a vaccine, but primarily because of regulatory requirements none is likely to become commercially available before the end of the decade.

Last month President Obama announced that he will ask Congress for $1.8 billion to fight the mosquito-borne disease. But the president seems unaware that the bumbling of his Food and Drug Administration is blocking progress on a vital tool to control the Aedes aegypti mosquitoes that carry and transmit Zika and the viruses that cause dengue fever, chikungunya and yellow fever.

Using genetic engineering techniques, the British company Oxitec (a subsidiary of American-owned Intrexon) has created male Aedes aegypti mosquitoes with a specific mutation that causes them to need a certain chemical (the antibiotic tetracycline) to survive. Without it, they die—and their offspring die before reaching maturity. Releasing the males over several months causes a marked reduction in the mosquito population. Because male mosquitoes don’t bite, they present no health risk, and, because their progeny die, no genetically engineered mosquitoes persist in the environment.

This approach has already been widely and successfully tested abroad. Brazil has approved it, and Oxitec is helping to control mosquitoes in the city of Piracicaba. But in the U.S. the FDA has been paralyzed, unwilling to permit even small-scale testing. How did the feds go wrong? CONTINUE AT SITE

RACHEL EHRENFELD:IRAN THUMBS ITS NOSE AT OBAMA

Iran’s firing long-range ballistic missiles that could reach Israel last week was the result of the Obama administration’s unwavering refusal to hold the regime accountable.

Last week Iran flaunted its violation of U.N. Resolution 2231, which bans Tehran from “any activity related to ballistic missiles capable of delivering nuclear weapons, including launches using ballistic missile technology.”

But Iran feels reassured. After all, the regime was not held responsible for three fire previous testing of ballistic missiles, even after the Iran Deal was agreed upon. Instead of punishing the Islamic Republic, the U.S. added a few Iranian individuals and companies to its designation list, as if these were engaging in a private missiles development program.

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.