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Trump’s Deregulation Project Thirteen Obama rules are gone so far, but there’s much more to do.

Posted By on April 18th, 2017

Health reform may be on life support and tax reform uncertain, but one part of the Donald Trump economic growth project is succeeding: deregulation. The question is whether the President will now rev up the effort.

President Trump last week signed the 13th bill repealing regulations through a potent tool called the Congressional Review Act (CRA), which allows Congress to reject rules in a majority vote within 60 legislative days of publication. The 1996 law had previously been used only once, when Congress and George W. Bush nixed an ergonomics directive from the Occupational Safety and Health Administration. Two other repeal resolutions have passed the House and are pending in the Senate.

The list of rejects includes the Interior Department’s Stream Protection Rule, which would have eliminated a third of coal-industry jobs and usurped state authority over mining, for little environmental improvement. Awaiting Senate repeal is the Bureau of Land Management’s venting and flaring rule for natural-gas fracking. That aimed to reduce methane emissions, though they have already dropped more than 15% since 1990 even as U.S. energy exploration has doubled in a decade.

Other worthy targets: A Federal Communications Commission regulation that would have forced Comcast to abide by consumer privacy standards that Amazon and Google could ignore. Sen. Ben Sasse (R., Neb.) moved a bill to deep-six a teacher training mandate that features incentives for teachers to avoid struggling schools that need talented instruction most. The left is spreading panic about potential sludge rivers or killer toys, but these reversals merely restore the status quo of six months ago.

Congressional Review actions do not include Mr. Trump’s executive orders, which have directed agencies to reconsider the trillion-dollar Clean Power Plan, the Labor Department’s financial advice diktat known as the fiduciary rule, among many others.

Then there are the rules that agencies have delayed and may eventually scrap, from micromanaging ceiling fan efficiency to organic farming standards. Sam Batkins at the American Action Forum estimates that 15 delayed rules alone would require 10 million hours of paperwork. That time could be devoted to activities that produce wealth and innovation, and the main losers would be compliance lawyers.

The White House and Senate Republicans have said the 60-day review period for Congressional Review Act measures will end next month. But our colleague Kimberley Strassel has explained how the law applies to past rules that agencies failed to report to Congress as required. The same is true for “guidance” letters, such as the Education Department’s sexual assault “Dear Colleague,” that were imposed with the force of law without having to go through a public comment period.

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A Month of Islam and Multiculturalism in France and Belgium: March 2017 by Soeren Kern

Posted By on April 18th, 2017

Yussuf K. said he carried out the January 2016 attack “in the name of Allah and the Islamic State.” He added that he chose his victim because “he was Jewish.”

A confidential police report revealed that more than 50 organizations in Molenbeek, a migrant-dominated neighborhood of Brussels, Belgium, are believed to have ties to jihadist terrorism.

An Ipsos poll for France Television and Radio France found that 61% of the French believe that Islam is incompatible with French society.

March 2. In a landmark trial at the Paris Children’s Court, a 17-year-old Turkish jihadist, identified only as Yussuf K., was sentenced to seven years in prison for attacking Benjamin Amsellem, a Jewish teacher in Marseille, with a machete. Yussuf K. said he carried out the January 2016 attack “in the name of Allah and the Islamic State.” He added that he chose his victim because “he was Jewish.” Yussuf K. was charged with “an individual terrorist attempt and attempted assassination in connection with a terrorist enterprise,” with the aggravating circumstance of anti-Semitism. He was tried as a minor because he was 15 when he carried out the attack. The criminal trial of a minor on terror charges was the first of its kind in France, where some fifty children are currently being investigated for jihadist offenses.

March 2. The European Parliament voted to lift the immunity from prosecution for National Front leader Marine Le Pen for tweeting images of Islamic State violence. Under French law, publishing violent images can be punished by up to three years in prison and a fine of €75,000 euros ($79,000). Le Pen, a leading candidate in this year’s French presidential election, posted the images in response to a journalist who compared her party’s anti-immigration stance to the Islamic State. Le Pen denounced the legal proceedings against her as political interference in the campaign and called for a moratorium on judicial investigations until the election period has passed.

March 4. The mayor of the French port of Calais, Natacha Bouchart, signed a decree prohibiting aid groups from distributing meals to migrants and refugees at the site of the former “Jungle” migrant camp. The decree said food distribution by charities had led to large numbers of people gathering at the site of the now-closed camp, with fights breaking out and risks posed to the safety of local residents.

March 6. President François Hollande vowed to “do everything in his power” to prevent Marine Le Pen from winning the upcoming presidential election in France. Polls have suggested that Le Pen, leader of the National Front party, may win the first round of France’s election on April 23. Le Pen, who has campaigned on an anti-immigration platform, has also vowed to hold a referendum on France’s membership of the European Union. Hollande, who decided not to run for a second term, said it was his “ultimate duty to do everything to ensure that France is not convinced by such a plan” to take France out of the EU.

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Facing The Budget By Herbert London President, London Center for Policy Research

Posted By on April 18th, 2017

Each year legislators sharpen their knives, consider key constituent needs and meet to pass a budget. This year isn’t very different except that when the Republicans could not unify to replace the Affordable Care Act, unexpected questions about the party emerged.

The Democrats are united in opposition and after tasting Republican blood in the DC waters are vehemently opposed to compromise. For the Republican leaders, the challenge in keeping the Freedom Caucus in tow. The party appears to be riven by the schism between pragmatists and idealists.

Some Republicans contend they are worried about repeating the experience of 2013 when the party drew most of the ire over a partial shutdown. However, a Republican Congress shutting down a Republican government would be the height of folly.

President Trump has requested new funding for the extension of the Wall with Mexico. He also wants to boost military spending to the tune of $54 billion. It is unlikely he gets all that he wants. The question is does he get enough to declare victory.

Apart from a need to pass the budget, Republicans have other big ticket items they seek to complete this year, including the tax code. This is no time to appear timorous, but the Republicans should not be overconfident either.

The budget will be the next big test on whether party unity can transcend the party’s divisions. Trump and Ryan have to demonstrate they can maintain party discipline. The public jury awaits an answer.

One matter is clear, the Trump agenda cannot be held hostage to the Freedom Caucus. This is the time for Trump to assert, he is president and cannot be intimidated by a minority in the party. At the same time Trump will need consensus to increase the defense budget. The revision of Obamacare is a more formidable task than budget approval. But it is no less important. With the failure to address Obamacare, Trump cannot abide another loss. The symbolism alone, with a press corps out to nail him, would be devastating.

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There’s a crisis in the air If a shooting war comes, the Air Force is not ready Jed Babbin

Posted By on April 18th, 2017

American armed forces consistently perform so well that their effectiveness is taken for granted. Complaints about military spending cuts during the Obama years are such a cliche that they have been yawned at by our political leaders and completely ignored by the media.

But those years have taken us from cliche to crisis. Three factors have combined to create an emergency in airpower. First is the wear and tear imposed by nearly 16 years of combat. Second are with the massive, reckless cuts in defense spending imposed by President Obama which, under the Budget Control Act of 2011, are scheduled to continue for at least four years. Third is the near-criminal neglect of our forces by Mr. Obama’s generals and admirals. As a result, so many of our combat aircraft are incapable of flying combat missions that the president is deprived of options that may be critical to any war, large or small.

Air power — the ability to clear the skies of enemy aircraft and destroy the enemy’s ground forces — has been a critical element of warfare for nearly a century. Offensively and defensively, air power is the sine qua non of military action.

Constant pilot training and American technological advantages have meant that every generation of American fighter pilots since World War II has inherited air supremacy — domination of the skies — as a birthright. That is no longer the case.

In February, the Navy confirmed that 74 percent of the Marines’ F/A-18s — 208 of 280 aircraft — are incapable of flying combat missions.

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Britonistan, or Deconstructing Britain: Edward Cline

Posted By on April 18th, 2017

The indefatigable Soeren Kern, of the Gatestone Institute, itemizes the multculturalization of Britain, in March, or rather the continuing Islamization of Britain in just one month. For if multculturalization means anything in Britain (and elsewhere), it all seems to be a marked deck, or a rigged game, in favor of Islam. “Heads we win, tails we win.” However, I don’t see Muslims donning bells and learning the simple steps of the Morris dance, or any other British reel. Where does the “multi” enter the picture?It doesn’t.

Multiculturalism in Islam’s vocabulary means submission to Islam. It doesn’t mean “equality” or par with Western values or cultural traditions. It doesn’t mean that the hijab is equal to the miniskirt. In means a total substitution of Islam for whatever is Western. It means the negation of the West. It means not just the elevation of a barbaric “culture” to a level with the West’s. It means its burial. Paraphrasing one of Ayn Rand’s villains, it means “elevating the mediocre so that the shrines are razed.” That is all it has ever meant.

The month of London and Britain in March that Kern details does not include the likes of Indiscreet. That culture is gone.

Afraid of asserting the superiority of its values lest it be charge with hubris, the West has always shilly-shallied when it came to defending its values against the cultural and moral relativists, and against Islam. It did not want to be accused of cultural “imperialism.” Rand had another gem that applies across the board in all conflicts, most especially today, in the conflict between the West and Islam:

“In any compromise between food and poison, it is only death that can win. In any compromise between good and evil, it is only evil that can profit.”

That is, the most consistent party will come out on top.

Andrew Michta, in his essay on American Interest, “The Deconstruction of the West,” offers a number of salient observations on why the West has become so timorous when confronting Islam, among them:

The problem, rather, is the West’s growing inability to agree on how it should be defined as a civilization. At the core of the deepening dysfunction in the West is the self-induced deconstruction of Western culture and, with it, the glue that for two centuries kept Europe and the United States at the center of the international system….

Today, in the wake of decades of group identity politics and the attendant deconstruction of our heritage through academia, the media, and popular culture, this conviction in the uniqueness of the West is only a pale shadow of what it was a mere half century ago. It has been replaced by elite narratives substituting shame for pride and indifference to one’s own heritage for patriotism. [Italics mine]

Soeren Kern, in an earlier Gatestone article from May 2016, “Meet the First Muslim of London,” discusses the number of “troubling” actions and statements from Sadiq Khan’s past that belie his image as a mild-mannered Muslim and a harmless Pooh bear:

Conservative Party candidate Zac Goldsmith accused Khan of giving “platform, oxygen and cover” to Islamic extremists. He also accused Khan of “hiding behind Britain’s Muslims” by branding as “Islamophobes” those who shed light on his past…..

Khan also spent years campaigning to prevent Babar Ahmad from being extradited to the United States on charges of providing material support to terrorism. Ahmad, who admitted his guilt, later said that his support for the Taliban was “naïve.”

In 2002, Khan represented the leader of the Nation of Islam, Louis Farrakhan. Khan tried to reverse a decision by the Home Office, which had banned Farrakhan from entering the UK due to fears that his anti-Semitic views would stir up racial hatred. Farrakhan has called Jews “bloodsuckers” and referred to Judaism as “a gutter religion.”

At the time, Khan said: “Mr. Farrakhan is not anti-Semitic and does not preach a message of racial hatred and antagonism.” Khan added:

“Farrakhan is preaching a message of self-discipline, self-reliance, atonement and responsibility. He’s trying to address the issues and problems we have in the UK, black on black crime and problems in the black community. It’s outrageous and astonishing that the British Government is trying to exclude this man.”

Khan now says: “Even the worst people deserve a legal defense.,,,”

In 2004, Khan was the chief legal advisor to the Muslim Council of Britain, a group linked to the Muslim Brotherhood. Khan defended Yusuf al-Qaradawi, an Egyptian-born Islamist who has been banned from entering the UK. Al-Qaradawi has expressed support for Hamas suicide bombings against Israel: “It’s not suicide, it is martyrdom in the name of Allah.” According to Khan, however, “Quotes attributed to this man may or may not be true.”

Also in 2004, Khan shared a platform with a half-dozen Islamic extremists in London at a political meeting where women were told to use a separate entrance. One of the speakers was Azzam Tamimi, who has said he wants Israel destroyed and replaced with an Islamic state. Another speaker was Daud Abdullah, who has led boycotts of Holocaust Memorial Day. Yet another speaker was Ibrahim Hewitt, a Muslim hardliner who believes that adulterers should be “stoned to death….”in 2009, when Khan was the Minister for Community Cohesion in charge of government efforts to eradicate extremism, he gave an interview to the Iran-backed Press TV. He described moderate Muslims as “Uncle Toms,” a racial slur used against blacks to imply that they are too eager to please whites.

Meanwhile, today, Kern reveals that:

March 3. The Amateur Swimming Association changed its swimsuit regulations to allow Muslim women to wear full body outfits, after a request from the Muslim Women’s Sport Foundation. The rule was changed to encourage more Muslim women to take part in the sport. Rimla Akhtar, from the Muslim Women’s Sport Foundation, said:

“Participation in sport amongst Muslim women is increasing at a rapid pace. It is imperative that governing bodies adapt and tailor their offerings to suit the changing landscape of sport, including those who access their sport.”

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“The Paris Accords Amidst Legions of Canute’s Knights” by Sydney Williams

Posted By on April 17th, 2017

The apocryphal King Canute placed his throne on the beach to demonstrate the fact that the power of kings was subservient to that of God. This is a message yet to be learned by those who believe that man can control the temperatures of earth – that man is more powerful than nature.

“Denier” is what “climate change absolutists” call those who, like me, acknowledge the fact of climate change and that man has played a significant part, but are skeptical that the precise magnitude of man’s effect is determinable, let alone dominant. “Denier” is the term used by those who profess moral and intellectual superiority to those they condemn as being in the pay of fossil-fuel lobbyists, or as being too stupid to understand what they claim is undeniable. “Denier” is what we are called, we who believe in evolution – that adaptability is key to survival – by those who, like Canute’s entourage, believe that man can compel the tide not to rise.

No reasonable person doubts man’s impact on the environment. He has dammed rivers, so that lands might be cultivated. He has developed energy sources, so that we might be comfortable in winter and summer. He has broken laws of gravity, so that we might travel through air and through space. He has built cities where marshes and virginal forests once stood, so that we might enrich our lives, form societies, educate our youth, finance our businesses, create employment, and erect museums and symphonies to exhibit the art we have created. We know we have had an impact. We also know all living things are interdependent. When one species becomes extinct, others must adapt or die; for change is a permanent feature of life.

Nations, like species, develop unevenly. With species, the ability to adjust to change is crucial. Among nations, survival is tied to liberty. Free men, living under the rule of law and with the prospect of private profit, are more willing to take risks, thus more likely to enjoy the fruits of creativity, ingenuity, perseverance and hard work. A victim and a beneficiary of the wealth created has been the natural world. We have exploited our resources, but we have allowed people to live with clean water and air.

Environmental extremists attack those who extract resources that help all, but they rarely acknowledge the benefits that industry and wealth have brought. When oil was first discovered in Pennsylvania in 1859, the woods of New England towns (like the one in New Hampshire where I grew up) were largely denuded, with trees used for heat, cooking and construction. Wood charcoal was used to make steel, before coal was first used around 1875. New York apartments ceased being heated by coal before the EPA was created. It has hard to imagine how we would live had fossil fuels not been discovered. We may rue the damage they have caused, but without them our lives would be absent comforts we take for granted; nor would we have the moneys they have generated, which have helped conserve our rivers, forests, mountains and beaches.

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The Least Diverse Place in America The tragic state of American campuses. Prager University VIDEO

Posted By on April 17th, 2017

http://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/266432/least-diverse-place-america-prager-university

What is the least diverse place in America? It’s the institution that most actively seeks racial, ethnic, gender, and cultural diversity: the college campus! Colleges want students to look different, but think the same. Charlie Kirk, founder of Turning Point USA, explains.

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California Sanctuary Surge Governor Jerry Brown pardons criminal deportees. Lloyd Billingsley

Posted By on April 17th, 2017

California governor Jerry Brown has pardoned “three veterans deported to Mexico,” as the Sacramento Bee reported. Hector Barajas Varela, who came to the United States “without authorization,” served more than year in prison for shooting at an occupied home. Brown also pardoned Erasmo Apodaca, who served 10 months in prison for burglary, and Marco Chavez, who spent 15 months in prison for reasons the report did not specify.

Brown issued the pardons as Easter approached, and shortly after President Donald Trump authorized more than $500 million in emergency relief for California, including $274 million for the damaged spillway on Oroville Dam. That federal largesse, after Brown’s tsumani of anti-Trump rhetoric, did not alter the governor’s determination to reinforce California as a sanctuary state for violent criminals. His pardon of criminal foreign nationals, after they had been deported, is merely the latest wave in the surge.

Major California cities and counties have long defied federal efforts to arrest and deport illegals, even violent criminals. Now San Francisco is appealing to a federal judge to block the Trump administration from withholding federal funds from such cities.

When repeatedly deported felon Juan Francisco Lopez-Sanchez gunned down Kate Steinle on a San Francisco pier in July, 2015, that deadly act of gun violence had no discernable effect on Tani Cantil-Sakauye, Chief Justice of the California Supreme Court, headquartered in San Francisco. The state’s Chief Justice, who like Brown has sworn to uphold the law, reserves her wrath for “meanspirited” ICE agents, whom she accused of “stalking” illegals in courthouses. As attorney general Jeff Sessions, explained, it is entirely legal and proper for federal agents to make arrests in public places.

Had Mexican national Luis Bracamontes been arrested, deported and not allowed to return, he might not have gunned down Sacramento County sheriff’s deputy Danny Oliver and detective Michael Davis in 2014. Even so, illegals in the region claimed to fear ICE agents, so this year Sacramento County sheriff Scott Jones invited ICE director Thomas Homan to explain how the federal agency aims to enforce the law.

Hermandad Mexicana, founded by the late Stalinist Bert Corona, organized a demonstration proclaiming “resiste.” Local Democrats denounced, “discriminatory efforts to divide families” and “hate-filled attacks against immigrants.”

After the election of Donald Trump, California attorney general Xavier Becerra proclaimed: “If you want to take on a forward-leaning state that is prepared to defend its rights and interests, then come at us.” For the task of defending “unauthorized immigrants,” Becerra is well qualified.

At Stanford, where he earned his bachelor and law degrees, Becerra was a member of MEChA, the Movimiento Estudiantil Chicano De Aztlan. A belch from the sixties’ left, MEChA calls the southwest portion of the United States “Aztlan” and seeks to regain the territory for Mexico.

In Congress, the MEChA veteran faithfully supported amnesty for those in the country illegally. Though turned down as a running mate for Hillary Clinton, Becerra is the ideal choice for Jerry Brown’s attorney general, and he remains uncritical of sanctuary cities that shelter violent criminals.

For his part, Brown began harboring violent criminals back in the 1970s. American Indian Movement co-founder Dennis Banks, convicted of riot and assault for a courthouse gun battle in South Dakota, fled to California and governor Jerry Brown refused to extradite him. That set the tone for Brown’s second go-round as governor.

In late 2015, after radical Islamic terrorists Syeed Farook and Tashfeen Malik gunned down 14 people in San Bernardino, Brown said “we have to be on guard and we have to do whatever we can do.” Brown also said he would spend time “making sure that our federal-state collaboration really is working.” The governor did just the opposite, actively opposing federal enforcement of U.S. immigration laws and his motives are stronger than Xavier Becerra’s.

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More Anti-Trump Rioting at Berkeley If you want to beat up Trump supporters with impunity, Berkeley is the college for you. Matthew Vadum

Posted By on April 17th, 2017

Left-wingers violently attacked Trump supporters at a UC Berkeley rally for at least the third time in recent months, according to media reports.

The riot at Berkeley on Saturday occurred as “Tax Marches” took place in cities across the nation aimed at pressing President Donald Trump to release his personal income tax returns, something the law does not require.

The unrest came days after Berkeley campus Republicans withdrew an April 12 speaking invitation for David Horowitz, saying that the college administration had gone out of its way to make the planned event untenable by placing burdensome, Kafkaesque restrictions on it.

While UC Berkeley and “universities like it discourage conservatives, they open their arms to racist organizations like Black Lives Matter and terrorist support groups like Students for Justice in Palestine, [along with] a range of radical organizations,” Horowitz wrote last week.

But on this past April 15 (Saturday), Trump supporters chose Berkeley to express their support for the president, dubbing that date, traditionally when federal taxes are due, “Patriots Day.” The Berkeley rally was sponsored by pro-Trump group Liberty Revival Alliance.

“I got hit in the back of the head with some sticks,” a bloodied Ben Bergquam of Fresno, Calif., a “Patriots Day” rallier, told reporters as he clung to a crumpled sign reading, “Stop Liberal Intolerance.”

“I don’t agree with everything Trump says, but I don’t agree with violence,” Berquam said.

Not all the rallies Saturday descended into violence.

“I don’t respect this president,” Rep. Maxine Waters (D-Calif.) told the crowd at a considerably calmer march far away in Washington, D.C. “I don’t trust this president. He’s not working in the best interests of the American people.”

“I will fight every day until he is impeached,” she said.

Waters led marchers in a chant of “impeach 45” against the nation’s 45th president. “No more secrets, no more lies” emerged as another popular chant. “Show the people your taxes. Stop stonewalling, stop hiding,” Waters said.

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Calexit Craziness The ‘Yes California’ independence campaign, led by a Russian-backed eccentric, deserves a firm ‘no’ vote. By Kevin D. Williamson

Posted By on April 17th, 2017

The Irish Republican Socialist party and Sinn Fein still dream of a unified Irish republic. The Catalan Solidarity for Independence coalition would see the Estelada flag raised over an independent Estat Català, and there are independence-minded movements as far-flung as the western Sahara. The Uhuru Movement is a kind of separatist movement standing on its head, looking to transcend national borders (with their colonial histories) and unite African people in a single African identity. The United States has the Texas Nationalist Movement hoping to restore the Republic of Texas, and somewhere out there is a very committed fellow who believes himself to be the rightful king of Hawaii. There is a more plausible movement for an independent Puerto Rico and a much less plausible movement for an independent California. All of these have something in common.

Russians.

Weird, right?

The movement for Californian independence expects to have an initiative on the 2018 ballot, which would in turn lead to a 2019 referendum. The organizers of the “Yes California” campaign say that winning the referendum would be only the first step in the long and complex process of establishing a free and independent California, finally liberated from the grasp of Washington and, especially, of the military-industrial complex. “Peace and Security” is, in fact, Exhibit A in the case for Calexit, and the organizers complain that the U.S. government “spends more on its military than the next several countries combined. Not only is California forced to subsidize this massive military budget with our taxes, but Californians are sent off to fight in wars that often do more to perpetuate terrorism than to abate it. The only reason terrorists might want to attack us is because we are part of the United States and are guilty by association.”

If that sounds like it could have been written by Ron Paul or some lonely disciple of Murray Rothbard, that is no accident: The leadership of the California-independence movement has a distinctly paleo smell about it.

“When I talk to people about California independence, they always say: ‘Well, what would you do if China invades?’” says Yes California president Louis Marinelli from his home in . . . Yekaterinburg, formerly Sverdlovsk (city motto: Don’t call us Siberia), an industrial center on the edge of the Ural Mountains in Russia. “Seriously,” he asks, “when’s the last time China invaded another country?” I mention the obvious ones: Tibet, India, and the Soviet Union. There’s Vietnam and Korea. Marinelli is a young man; perhaps much of this seems like ancient history to him. It does not to the Indians, or the Russians, or the Vietnamese, or many others. “No, I mean: When’s the last time China crossed an ocean to invade another country?” he clarifies. “Only the United States does that.”

Only?

The American war machine must surely be of some intense concern to California’s would-be Jefferson Davis, inasmuch as there is no legal or constitutional process for a state’s separating from the Union, a question that was settled definitively if not in court then just outside the courthouse at Appomattox.