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Ruth King

Obama’s Judges Continue Thwarting Trump By Andrew C. McCarthy

https://www.nationalreview.com/2018/11/obama-appointed-lawyers-thwart-trump-policies-immigration-energy/

To the Lawyer Left, elections represent a policy choice only when Democrats win.

As I write on Friday, the restraining order hasn’t come down yet. But it’s just a matter of time. Some federal district judge, somewhere in the United States, will soon issue an injunction blocking enforcement of the Trump administration’s restrictions on asylum applications.

The restrictions come in the form of a rule promulgated jointly by the Departments of Justice and Homeland Security, and a proclamation issued by President Trump. In conjunction, they assert that an alien who wishes to apply for asylum in the United States must act lawfully: An alien who is physically present here and wishes to apply must be in the country legally; an alien outside the country who wishes to apply must present himself at a lawful port of entry — not attempt to smuggle his way in or force his way in as part of a horde (i.e., no invasions by caravan).

Of course, what used to be assumed is today deemed intolerable. It is no longer permitted to expect of non-Americans what is required of Americans — adherence to American law while on American soil.

Therefore, the fact that the administration’s action is entirely reasonable will not matter. No more will it matter that, contrary to numbing media repetition, the rule and proclamation derive from federal statutory law. Nor will it make any difference that, in part, the president is relying on the same sweeping congressional authorization based on which, just four months ago, the Supreme Court affirmed his authority to control the ingress of aliens based on his assessment of national-security needs.

Just two things will matter. The first is that the asylum restrictions represent a Trump policy that reverses Obama policies — specifically, policies of more lax border enforcement, and of ignoring congressionally authorized means of preventing illegal aliens from filing frivolous asylum petitions (with the result that many of them are released, evading further proceedings and deportation). The second is that, precisely to thwart the reversal of Obama policies, President Obama made certain that the vast majority of the 329 federal judges he appointed were progressive activists in the Obama mold.

The media-Democrat complex will tell you this is “the rule of law.” In reality, it is the rule of lawyers: the Lawyer Left on the front line of American decision-making, a line that runs through courtrooms, not Capitol Hill.

You can already hear the retort: Conservatives do the same thing — put conservative judges on the bench to dictate conservative results. Au contraire. Conservatives really do want the rule of law, as in the laws that Congress passes and the president signs. That is, we want the country run by accountable office holders who answer to us, whom we can remove if they make bad decisions. We are willing to live under laws we oppose, provided that we have a fair opportunity to repeal or amend them. To take an obvious constitutional-law example: Though we oppose abortion, we are not looking for robed right-wingers to “discover” a prohibition of abortion in, say, the due-process clause. We think it is a matter for legislation, primarily at the state level.

That is not what the Lawyer Left is doing. They talk a good game about “ground-up democracy,” but the actual goal is top-down control. Those judges — their judges — are in place to dictate policy outcomes, not to let democracy happen.

Norway’s Mosques Are Multiplying, and Taxpayers Foot the Bill By Bruce Bawer

https://pjmedia.com/trending/norways-mosques-are-multiplying-and-taxpayers-foot-the-bill/

Founded in 2001, Oslo-based Human Rights Service (HRS) has been instrumental in supplying useful and illuminating research about the scale, nature, and social and economic impact of immigration into Norway. Its recommendations have resulted in important policy changes, its website is very widely read by Norwegians who are skeptical about Islam, and the latest book by its information officer, Hege Storhaug (just out in English as Islam: Europe Invaded, America Warned), was a massive bestseller.

In the U.S., a think tank like HRS would be funded by corporate donors and philanthropists, but, in accordance with Scandinavian practice, it gets its money — which, given how much it accomplishes, doesn’t really come to all that big a sum — from the national government. Pretty much every year brings another fight over how much, if anything, HRS should get from the public till, with almost everyone on the left (and not a few on the right) complaining that its work contributes to negative images of Muslims. This year, the proposed national budget for 2019 left untouched the generous handouts to such far-left PC enforcers as the “Anti-Racist Center,” but cut by a half minute kroner ($60,000) the annual subsidy to HRS. The planned cut drew so much attention that a couple of leading members of the Progress Party (FrP) — which voters put into power largely so that it could implement the kind of reforms that HRS has called for — were actually roused to action and saw to it that the budget line was left untouched.

Meanwhile, the Norwegian state budget doles out far larger sums to other, far more dubious recipients — and HRS, as it happens, has been instrumental in digging out and publicizing the numbers. I’m referring to the huge annual payouts to mosques, which for some reason almost all of the members of the Norwegian parliament think they have the obligation to fund.

In recent weeks, coincidentally, even as HRS was fighting to hang onto its own minuscule government appropriation, it was publishing bombshell reports on the stunning increase in the number of mosques in Norway — and on the corresponding rise in the amount of taxpayer funds transferred to their coffers. Norway, let it be remembered, has a tiny population of 5.25 million people — almost identical to that of Chicago — but at present it has 219 mosques, which represents a 65% upsurge since only eight years ago. This year, the mosques received a total of 187 million kroner ($22,359,347) from the government.

How does the government decide how much to give each mosque? I didn’t know the answer until the other day. It is rooted in the fact that, until January of last year, the Church of Norway (DNK) was the nation’s official state church. It used to be the case that unless your parents opted out of it, you were automatically registered as a member at birth. Naturally, the government covered the Church’s expenses, and each congregation’s annual endowment was based on its membership statistics. In Norway, as elsewhere in Western Europe, church attendance has radically declined over the past few years, but in Norway the amount of cash infused into those churches has remained relatively constant, meaning that the sum per worshiper has increased dramatically. In order to be fair, by its own lights, the Norwegian parliament supports mosques at the same rate per registered member as the DNK. Since official mosque membership has skyrocketed even as church attendance has dived (one in eight residents of Oslo now belong to a mosque), the amount of taxpayer money handed over to these houses of worship has, according to an FrP official, “escalated at an alarming tempo.” CONTINUE AT SITE

Trouble in Nigeria? Must be Trump’s Fault By Veronika Kyrylenko

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2018/11/trouble_in_nigeria_emmustem_be_trumps_fault.html

The leftists continue to demonstrate a severe Trump Derangement Syndrome. How else do you explain a manic obsession in finding connections between everything terrible that happens in the world and President Trump, or seeing a malicious intent in his every single action and word? Planet is heating up – Trump’s to blame (no, it “doesn’t matter” for the leftists that we are reducing carbon emissions.) Trump nominates a new Supreme Court Judge – let’s oppose him with “whatever means necessary”. Trump smiled at Putin at some formal gathering — Putin’s puppet, obviously (no, it “doesn’t matter” that the Trump Administration is constantly introducing anti-Russian sanctions.)

Now, in the end of October, the Nigerian Army killed 45 and wounded nearly 100 protesters from the radical Shia group called Islamic Movement of Nigeria (IMN) when they started throwing rocks at the soldiers. The leftist reaction? You guessed it – it was Trump’s fault. “Nigerian Army Uses Trump’s Words to Justify Fatal Shooting of Rock-Throwing Protesters,” runs the New York Times. “Nigerian Army defends killing protesters by quoting Trump. Trump’s caravan rhetoric affecting the whole world,” asserts CBS. That’s right, the whole world.

Trump Versus the Euro-Swamp By James Lewis

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2018/11/trump_versus_the_euroswamp.html

This guy Donald Trump has amazing physical staying power. Right after his end-sprint in the Midterms, which ended pretty well, and only pausing for a White House presser to deliver a kick to Jim Acosta, Donald Trump is in Europe, where the 100th anniversary of Armistice Day is being memorialized on Sunday.

In case you forgot, Armistice Day is the day the guns stopped firing in the trenches in World War I, after the United States sent in our first huge expeditionary force to tilt the balance against the Central Powers, including the German Empire, as Bismarck had rebranded Prussia in1848, and the other German Empire of the time, called the Austro-Hungarian Empire.

During that bloody trench war the German General Staff also sent Vladimir Lenin in a closed train across to Moscow, to stir up revolution against the Romanoff Czars.

Lenin and his Bolsheviks killed the Romanoffs, all of them — men, women and children, and after a civil war that the Bolsheviks won. The rest, as they say, is history. Lenin pulled Russia out of World War I, which was the German aim in smuggling Lenin over there.

So we have another German Empire to thank for the Soviet Union, though we should not blame living people for the sins of the past. But history has a crazy way of repeating, and today we have the makings of a new European Kaisertum, called the European Union.

UN Member States: Migration Is a Human Right by Judith Bergman

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/13263/un-migration-human-right

It cannot be stressed enough that this agreement is not about refugees fleeing persecution, or their rights to protection under international law. Instead, the agreement propagates the radical idea that migration — for any reason — is something that needs to be promoted, enabled and protected.

The UN has no interest in admitting that its agreement promotes migration as a human right; until recently, there has been little debate about it. More debate might risk jeopardizing the entire project.

UN member states are not only supposed to open their borders for the migrants of the world, but should also help them pick and choose their future country by providing them with comprehensive information about each country they may wish to settle in.

The United Nations, in a non-binding agreement that almost all UN member states will sign at a ceremony in Morocco in early December, is making migration a human right.

The finalized text of the agreement, the Global Compact for Safe, Orderly and Regular Migration, although officially non-binding, “puts migration firmly on the global agenda. It will be a point of reference for years to come and induce real change on the ground…” according to Jürg Lauber, the representative of Switzerland to the UN — who led the work on the agreement together with the representative of Mexico.

One immediate irony, of course, is that few countries have entry requirements as restrictive as Switzerland’s. If one wishes to stay more than three months, not only is a “residence permit” required, but, “In an effort to limit immigration from non-EU/EFTA countries, Swiss authorities impose strict annual limitations on the number of residence and work permits granted to foreigners.”

Augusto Zimmermann: Why Did We Do This to Australia?

http://quadrant.org.au/opinion/qed/2018/11/australia/

Sir Harry Gibbs’ advice was succinct: ‘…a state is entitled to prevent the immigration of persons whose culture is such that they are unlikely readily to integrate…’ That counsel was ignored and, once again, Allah’s will has been inflicted on a society whose misguided generosity opened the gates.

At least one person has been killed and another two injured after a Muslim terrorist went on a stabbing frenzy in Bourke Street, Melbourne, on Friday afternoon. The past four successful terrorist attacks on Australia’s soil have all been carried out by Muslim terrorists, some of whom had successfully applied for refugee status before the Australian authorities. For instance, Islamic State’s most influential recruiter in Australia, Muhammad Ali Baryalei, is a Muslim refugee that the government allowed to stay in the country.

Australia has a population of approximately 24 million and around 500,000 of its people are Muslims. The number of Muslims has risen dramatically over the last thirty years. Over 300,000 of them use Arabic at home. Needless to say, most Muslims are not terrorists but, unfortunately, all terrorists consider themselves to be faithful Muslims. While security measures are not specifically directed against the broader Muslim community, terrorists are, of course, drawn exclusively from this specific religious group.

The problem is that we simply do not know who to trust amongst a religious group that largely despises our democracy, culture and laws, and that do not even accept the principle of religious tolerance and separation of powers.

Although jihadists are not drawn exclusively from the first-generation Muslim immigrants, a large Muslim immigration to Australia invariably provides a larger recruiting ground for terrorists and other Islamist militants. Both the influx of asylum seekers from dysfunctional majority-Muslim countries and the constant influx of Muslim immigrants to Australia naturally exacerbate the threat of Islamic terrorism on our soil.

Melbourne terror attack: Knifeman Hassain Khalif Shire Ali, 30, had ‘inspiration’ links to Isis, police say Somali-born attacker’s brother was arrested on terror charges last year

A man who stabbed one person to death in a terrorist attack in Melbourne was known to police and was the brother of a man arrested on terror charges last year, Australian authorities say.

Somali-born Hassain Khalif Shire Ali, 30, set fire to a pickup truck laden with gas cylinders in a busy shopping area of the city on Friday, stabbing three people, one fatally, before he was shot dead by police.

Police said that “there are links” between Ali and Isis in the form of inspiration, rather than direct contact with the terror group. Counter-terrorism investigators were searching two properties in suburban Melbourne on Saturday morning as part of their investigation.

Victoria Police commissioner Graham Ashton said the man’s brother was arrested last year on charges of planning an attack in Melbourne and currently being held in prison awaiting trial.

“He is certainly someone who is known to both us and the federal authorities in relation to counter-terrorism and terrorism-related matters,” he told Channel 7’s Sunrise program.

“He is the brother of an offender or a suspect that we arrested late last year in relation to the preparation of a terrorist event.”
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Plane crashes into residential street in Melbourne leaving one dead

Police were first called to reports of a car on fire but when they arrived, were attacked by the man, who was armed with a knife.

Videos taken by bystanders show a lengthy confrontation between the police and the attacker, as bewildered shoppers pass by.

The man lunges repeatedly at the two officers with his knife, while they attempt to incapacitate him with pepper spray and a taser.

Britain Struggles With Rise in Knife Attacks Government, social workers target problem London mayor says will take a generation to solve By Will Horner

https://www.wsj.com/articles/britain-struggles-with-rise-in-knife-attacks-1541759400

LONDON—Daniel Frederick, a 34-year-old father of three, was returning to his home on a London public-housing estate shortly after New Year’s when a group of teenagers stabbed him in the back seven times, yards from his flat near a children’s playground.

Mr. Frederick, a security guard, was targeted in a case of mistaken identity, police believe, but the assault was part of a crime trend that London’s mayor said this week would take a generation to solve: a surge in knife attacks in a country with relatively low levels of violent crime.

Mayor Sadiq Khan was speaking on Monday after a spate of four unrelated knife homicides in London in five days—the youngest victims were 15 and 17—put renewed focus on the national trend. A fifth knife killing followed that night.

With strict British laws making guns hard to obtain, knives have become the weapon of choice for members of London gangs, who youth workers say fight over territory and are prepared to kill over trivial slights. As stabbings become more frequent, more young people feel compelled to carry knives for their own protection, fueling a cycle of violence.

Mr. Frederick’s sister, Louise Samuel, was at the hospital with her brother when he died in January. The five assailants, all 16 to 18 years old, were sentenced last month to a total of 64 years in prison.

Ms. Samuel, a former youth worker, said she can understand the peer pressure that drove them. She has already forgiven the boys, she said, and would like to meet them, “Just to know why they are so angry.” CONTINUE AT SITE

A Broward County Senate Steal? Florida’s Democratic stronghold makes a mess of vote-counting.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/a-broward-county-senate-steal-1541809807

Democrats have a hard time accepting electoral defeat. They’ve spent two years claiming with little evidence that Vladimir Putin elected Donald Trump. And now comes a vote-counting debacle in southern Florida that is at best gross incompetence, though don’t rule out an attempt to steal GOP wins for Senate and Governor.

Florida Gov. Rick Scott is about 15,000 votes ahead of Democratic incumbent Bill Nelson for a seat in the Senate. That puts the race in range of an automatic recount under state law. But at 11:30 p.m. on election night, Mr. Scott led by 57,000 votes. The same trend is happening in the gubernatorial race that went for Republican Ron DeSantis over progressive Andrew Gillum, though neither race appeared to be heading for a recount on election night.

The spread has narrowed in the past couple days by what can only be described as a suspect process in notorious Broward County. Three days after Election Day the county wasn’t finished reporting results from early voting, which ended on Sunday.

Florida Senator Marco Rubio was among the first to note the irregularities. Broward won’t disclose how many ballots are left, and “isn’t reporting hourly or regularly, but rather releasing thousands of additional votes, often in the overnight hours, that are chipping away at GOP leads,” as Senator Rubio put it.

On Thursday a teacher in Broward found a container labeled “Provisional Ballot Box” in a storage area of an elementary school that had been a polling station. The Sun-Sentinel reported Friday that a Broward County election official said there were no ballots in the box, which would be more reassuring if country officials were more transparent.

Burying the Other Russia Story Adam Schiff will shut down the probe that found FBI abuses.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/burying-the-other-russia-story-1541810056

Arguably the most important power at stake in Tuesday’s election was Congressional oversight, and the most important change may be Adam Schiff at the House Intelligence Committee. The Democrat says his top priority is re-opening the Trump-Russia collusion probe, but more important may be his intention to stop investigating how the FBI and Justice Department abused their power in 2016. So let’s walk through what we’ve learned to date.

Credit for knowing anything at all goes to Intel Chairman Devin Nunes and more recently a joint investigation by Reps. Bob Goodlatte (Judiciary) and Trey Gowdy (Oversight). Over 18 months of reviewing tens of thousands of documents and interviewing every relevant witness, no Senate or House Committee has unearthed evidence that the Trump campaign colluded with Russia to win the presidential election. If Special Counsel Robert Mueller has found more, he hasn’t made it public.

But House investigators have uncovered details of a Democratic scheme to prod the FBI to investigate the Trump campaign. We now know that the Hillary Clinton campaign and the Democratic National Committee hired Fusion GPS, which hired an intelligence-gun-for-hire, Christopher Steele, to write a “dossier” on Donald Trump’s supposed links to Russia.

Mr. Steele fed that document to the FBI, even as he secretly alerted the media to the FBI probe that Team Clinton had helped to initiate. Fusion, the oppo-research firm, was also supplying its dossier info to senior Justice Department official Bruce Ohr, whose wife, Nellie, worked for Fusion.

House investigators have also documented the FBI’s lack of judgment in using the dossier to obtain a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) warrant against former Trump aide Carter Page. The four FISA warrants against Mr. Page show that the FBI relied almost exclusively on the unproven Clinton-financed accusations, as well as a news story that was also ginned up by Mr. Steele.

The FBI told the FISA court that Mr. Steele was “credible,” despite Mr. Steele having admitted to Mr. Ohr that he passionately opposed a Trump Presidency. The FBI also failed to tell the FISA court about the Clinton campaign’s tie to the dossier.