RUTHFULLY YOURS

Mr. Rotunda is professor of jurisprudence at Chapman University in Orange, Calif.
The federal judge denied anonymity for those deciding the fate of accused al Qaeda ally Mustafa Kamel Mustafa.

Statues of Lady Justice adorning courthouses often show her holding scales and wearing a blindfold, meant to show that she dispenses justice objectively, without regard to the identity of the parties. However, something else is going on in the New York trial of Mustafa Kamel Mustafa (also known as Abu Hamza al-Masri ). It appears that the presiding federal judge, Katherine B. Forrest, is lifting off the blindfold and putting her thumb on the scales to favor the defendant.

Mustafa is an Egyptian-born imam who preached Islamic fundamentalism and support for Osama bin Laden at the Finsbury FIF.LN 0.00% Park Mosque in London beginning in the 1990s. A British court convicted him in 2006 for encouraging his followers to murder non-Muslims.

After Mustafa served his sentence in Britain, he was extradited in 2012 to the U.S. Since April, he has been on trial in New York on charges of conspiring to aid al Qaeda, by assisting in the taking of 16 hostages in Yemen in 1998 (four of whom were killed), advocating violent jihad in Afghanistan in 2001 and helping others attend an al Qaeda training camp there; and attempting to establish a terrorist training camp in late 1999 and early 2000 near Bly, Ore.

During opening arguments last month, the prosecutor told the jury that they would hear a recording of an interview in which Mustafa admitted that he gave a satellite phone to the kidnappers and said the kidnapping “was justified.” Mustafa’s defense lawyer said that his client “needed to be outrageous” in his speeches so he could “reach the entire spectrum of his community.”

Judge Forrest denied the prosecution’s application to keep jurors’ names secret for their protection. That causes a real problem for jurors. Who will want to be a named, easily identified juror in a case like this one, when he worries that other fundamentalists will wreak revenge on those who convict? The jurors may recall that various translators of Salmon Rushdie’s “Satanic Verses” were murdered over the years, apparently because they translated a book insulting to Islam. The best way for the jurors to protect themselves from revenge seekers is to vote not guilty.

Poorly vetted outsiders have done a disservice to the grass-roots tea party movement.

Republican primary season is in full swing, and lucky for many prominent conservative groups, politics doesn’t track batting averages. They’d be hard pressed to hit the Mendoza Line.

The Senate Conservatives Fund, FreedomWorks, the Madison Project, the Club for Growth and some tea party groups roared into this primary season determined to claim more GOP scalps. The roar has faded to a whimper. In every race involving a Senate Republican incumbent, the outsider candidate is lagging—if not holding a 20-point deficit.

The challengers aren’t bombing because of a lack of money or the “establishment,” but mainly because of some mind-boggling embarrassments. Dr. Milton Wolf, challenging Pat Roberts in Kansas, was discovered to have a penchant for posting gruesome X-ray images of dead people on Facebook. FB +2.29% (Whoops.) Kentucky’s Matt Bevin, challenging Mitch McConnell, has been forced to explain his changed positions on the 2008 government bank bailout, and more recently his presence at a cockfighting rally. (Uh-oh.)

Chris McDaniel, a lawyer and state legislator challenging Mississippi’s Thad Cochran, spent April dealing with past comments as a radio host, including derogatory references to Mexico and “Mamacita.” He’s also fielding awkward questions about his past plaintiffs’ work, including his request that a judge blow up Mississippi’s tort reform. (Ummm.)

These episodes have turned off the very people these outside groups claim to represent: the grass roots. Many Republican voters—even those desperate for a party shake-up—simply aren’t comfortable supporting a doctor who publicly mocks gunshot victims. They expect (and deserve) something more serious. That’s to their credit, and it’s tempting to therefore write off all this as proof the system works. Bad candidates lose. No harm done.

Michelle’s Motto: ‘Sometimes the best time is to do nothing at all’
By Jeannie DeAngelis

There is a part of me that thought I was beyond being shocked by anything the high-living Obamas do. Somewhere deep down I believed that these people had to have a modicum of conscience at their core. To be honest, I secretly felt that at some point the gross excess would become a bit embarrassing and the Obamas’ orgy of self-indulgence would ease up a bit.

Boy, was I wrong.

Much to my astonishment, after chronicling all the travels and the affluent way of life enjoyed by the spoilt first lady, it turns out that while her husband was in Asia screwing up and eating $300 endangered blue fin tuna sushi, Michelle actually indulged in a secret spa weekend in Middleburg, Virginia.

If the second leg of her Hawaii vacation is counted as a separate trip, there would be Hawaii I and Hawaii II, Aspen, Key Largo, and China, with the Middleburg spa weekend being Michelle’s sixth getaway since the first of the year.

After 27 days in Hawaii (17 with family and an additional 10 at Oprah’s Maui Estate), a star-studded birthday bash, a State Dinner in a heated tent on the South lawn dressed in a $12K Carolina Herrera gown, skiing in Aspen for President’s Day weekend, bunking in an $8,400 per-night Presidential Suite in China for eight days, and Key Largo lodging at the Ocean Reef Resort ($35 million net-worth members only), Michelle apparently felt entitled to sneak away for some well-earned downtime at Salamander Resort in Middleburg, Virginia.

The resort’s website reminds guests: “Sometimes the best time is to do nothing at all,” a motto both Michelle and her do nothing husband have apparently taken to heart.

A new report by Rick Folbaum of CBS’s Miami affiliate shines light upon a pressing issue all too often ignored: women flocking to the U.S. in order to take advantage of the country’s notoriously generous birthright-citizenship policy. If a woman is here on vacation, or just passing through, and gives birth to a child on American soil: Boom! Automatic citizen! It may be that neither the child nor his parents have any ties whatsoever to the United States, yet the child is now an American citizen just as if his parents had worked, paid taxes, and been part of American society for years.

These children not only reap the incalculable advantages of U.S. citizenship but, when they turn 21, can sponsor their families’ U.S. residency — hence the term “anchor babies.”

We might better call this “unconditional citizenship.” All that is required is that the child be on American soil at the time of his birth — it generally matters not who the parents are, how they arrived here, why and how long they have been here, or whether they will even remain. Never paid a single dollar of tax in the United States or worked a day here? We will confer citizenship on your child nevertheless.

To be clear, there are two instances referred to as “birthright citizenship,” one of which is fair and one of which is ridiculous.The first is citizenship obtained at birth because at least one of the parents was a citizen at the time; this is referred to as jus sanguinis (Latin for “right of blood”), and it makes sense. The other is jus soli (Latin for “right of the soil”), citizenship granted simply by virtue of the child’s being born on that territory. For good reason, most nations, including every European nation, shun the soil-based “right” and instead grant citizenship only on the jus sanguinis principle. Out of the world’s advanced countries, only two grant automatic citizenship to those born on their soil: Canada and the United States.

So how did this happen? It’s thanks to the 14th Amendment, which reads: “All persons born or naturalized in the United States, and subject to the jurisdiction thereof, are citizens of the United States and of the State wherein they reside.” (The language was originally intended to rightly confer citizenship on freed slaves and their children.) However, the champions of jus soli conveniently ignore consideration of the phrase “subject to the jurisdiction thereof,” as a myriad of legal scholars have questioned whether this language does, in fact, support our jus soli approach. While a tourist or undocumented immigrant is technically subject to our laws while visiting (e.g., if he commits a crime, he will be arrested), is that the same type of “subject to American jurisdiction” the 14th Amendment’s authors had in mind? Is a tourist truly subjecting himself to American jurisdiction the same way an American is, simply by vacationing here? It is hard to argue that the amendment’s authors intended the automatic jus soli, if only because they could not and did not imagine the ramifications of their confusing wording as (a) illegal immigration was not a large concern in mid-19th-century America, during a time when the nation was looking to grow and particularly seeking additional hands to cultivate lands out West; and (b) American citizenship was not so coveted back then as to warrant a trip here specifically for one’s child to obtain it. At the time of its drafting, in fact, as explained by the Heritage Foundation’s Hans A. von Spakovsky, “subject to [American] jurisdiction” meant not owing allegiance to any other country. Tourists certainly do still owe allegiance to their home country.

When the Washington Post–ABC News poll at the end of March showed a very slim plurality supporting Obamacare, Democrats hoped the health-care law had finally turned the proverbial corner.

Then came the Post–ABC poll in April. It had the law underwater again, with 44 percent supporting it and 49 percent opposed, right back to where it was in January.

This is consistent with a new Wall Street Journal–NBC News poll that has 36 percent of people considering the health-care law a good idea and 46 percent a bad idea, and consistent with the Kaiser poll that has had support for the law at 38 percent to 46 percent the past two months.

The more Obamacare’s standing with the public changes, the more it stays the same. Democrats always want to insist that the debate over the health-care law is over. If so, they have lost it — at least the debate over whether the law is worthy of support.

The March Obamacare enrollment surge hasn’t brought springtime for President Barack Obama, just the soggy reality that he stands to be about as much of a drag on his party in November as anyone would have expected a few months ago. He ticked up to a 44 percent job-approval rating in the Wall Street Journal–NBC News poll, while he is at 41 percent, his lowest showing ever, in the Post–ABC News survey.

According to every indicator, the public is sour, the economy lackluster, and Republicans much more motivated to vote than Democrats. The general environment looks to be November 2010 all over again, except it hasn’t been preceded by an interlude of historic Democratic accomplishments.

SOME DEMS GIVE OBAMACARE FAINT PRAISE BUT IN ALMOST EVERY SINGLE CONGRESSIONAL RACE HEALTHCARE IS A MAJOR ISSUE AND THE GOP IS NOT TAKING ADVANTAGE OF IT BY GIVING ALTERNATIVES….OTHER THAN CRITICISM ….RSK

Our latest congressional polling suggests the issue is pressing.
As Republicans discuss the policy alternative to replace Obamacare, the political benefits are clear and decisive.

Our April national poll of 1,000 likely voters showed the same majority job disapproval for the president, 47 percent approval to 52 percent disapproval, similar to the findings of many other polls.

The same is true for the Affordable Care Act, known as Obamacare, with 45 percent approving to 51 percent disapproving. (For PowerPoint slides of the poll numbers, see here.)

However, despite the majority disapproval for the president and Obamacare, the Democrats hold a thin lead in the generic ballot for Congress, 43 percent to 41 percent, with 16 percent undecided:

After 9/11, the Left worried about Americans’ free-speech rights. After the Benghazi attack, not so much.

After the 9/11 terror attacks in 2001, members of the American Left found one thing they could all agree on: Our First Amendment rights were in peril.

The American Prospect insisted on September 12, when the rubble was still burning and the dead had not yet been retrieved, that “a number of government agencies and their cheerleaders would be clearly tempted to lock the Bill of Rights away in some basement dustbin of the National Archives.” Two weeks later, novelist Barbara Kingsolver warned, “Patriotism threatens free speech with death.” She bravely attacked the claim that “free speech is un-American.” Author Richard Reeves penned an op-ed for the New York Times under the headline “Patriotism Calls Out the Censor.” Conferences were rapidly convened; vows to fight the crackdown on free speech were issued.

The fact that this response was elicited by no actual crackdown on free speech seemed irrelevant. It was a classic example of “Fire, ready, aim!”

Later, when there was at least some theoretical basis to be concerned about lost liberties, the reaction from prominent liberals was nonetheless unhinged. White House press secretary Ari Fleischer, goaded by the press to respond to a bigoted comment from a Republican congressman and a typically stupid comment from “comedian” Bill Maher, said such statements are “reminders to all Americans that they need to watch what they say, watch what they do. This is not a time for remarks like that; there never is.”

Then–New York Times columnist Frank Rich spent much of the next five years treating this comment as the end of liberty in America. He even said Fleischer’s comment was as significant as the terror attack itself. “Even as we’re constantly told we’re in a war for ‘freedom’ abroad,” Rich wrote, “freedom in our culture at home has been under attack ever since.”

A couple of weeks ago, the prime minister of South Korea resigned over a tragic ferry accident in his country for which he had no personal responsibility whatsoever.

In the USA, he exact opposite has been happening. Going on two years now, our administration has done nothing but attempt to lie, obfuscate and shift the blame concerning the events in Benghazi, Libya, on September 11, 2012, during which four Americans were murdered.

But as information dribbles out — most recently the long-hidden email from Ben Rhodes — the extent of this prevarication is reaching a tipping point with even a few representatives of the mainstream media (notably Jonathan Karl of ABC [1]) stepping forward to challenge the administration.

What seems clear at this point is that the administration blamed the Benghazi attacks on a video no one saw in order to distract public attention from the growing militance of al-Qaeda and related groups. That militance would have been of great embarrassment to a president during an election when his vice president was running around bragging bin Laden was dead and General Motors alive.

We still do not know why no attempt was made to rescue our people during the attacks since no one knew how long they would go on and why no one has been apprehended for these attacks. Those are only two of the ongoing mysteries about Benghazi. Where was the president that night [2]? What did he and Secretary of State Hillary Clinton talk about in their telephone conversation? We have heard rumors of gun running, MANPADs [3] and on and on.

But what remains is something tragically simple. The Obama administration and related entities (State, intelligence, etc.) were willing to lie about the murder of truly heroic American citizens in order to protect their behinds and, more importantly and scandalously, win an election. And people like Candy Crowley of CNN were all too willing to help them.

http://palwatch.org/main.aspx?fi=157&doc_id=11322

by Itamar Marcus and Nan Jacques Zilbedik

Official PA TV recently broadcast a young child reciting a poem that calls to join a “war that will smash the oppression and destroy the Zionist’s soul.” Palestinian Media Watch has documented that at least three other children have been featured on PA TV reciting this same poem. This video shows a very young girl wearing a Palestinian traditional dress and a pendant shaped like the map of “Palestine” that includes all of Israel. She is seen reciting the poem in different locations – in a field, on the beach and in a market. One part shows her behind barbed wire with pictures of Palestinian prisoners in the background.

The end of the Cold War 25 years ago essentially ended public discussion of nuclear weapons until the advent of the Obama presidency.

Obama has declared his intention to eliminate nuclear weapons, has entered into a treaty with Russia to reduce the number of nuclear weapons in each nation’s arsenal to 1,550 (which counts missiles and aircraft as warheads) and has called for a further reduction by one-third in the allowable number of weapons.
Last Sunday, CBS’ “60 Minutes” program started building a case for Obama’s cuts by raising doubts about the age, effectiveness and safety of our land-based missile force. According to the “expert” they interviewed, there wouldn’t be any harm in eliminating that force altogether. How they reach that conclusion without reference to the threats we face or the systems that make up our offensive and defensive systems is a mystery.

America dealt with the threat of Soviet nuclear forces through deterrence achieved by building a massive nuclear force of missiles and aircraft. Both sides knew that a nuclear strike by one would result in a nation-destroying counterstrike by the other. From 1961 to 2003, we had the “Single Integrated Operational Plan,” a strategy by which American nuclear weapons could be used only by direct presidential order. It defined how and when nuclear weapons could be used and aimed several missiles and aircraft at each target. It wasn’t designed as overkill but to reflect the realities that cause different weapons to fail to reach their targets.

The Soviet’s operational plans allowed military commanders far below their senior civilian leaders to order the use of nuclear weapons. That may still be their doctrine under the Putin government. But even in the worst of crises — such as the Cuban missile crisis of 1962 — the U.S. and the Soviet Union didn’t resort to using nuclear weapons. Deterrence worked.

The dangers we faced then haven’t disappeared, though they are not mentioned in polite company. The Russian nuclear missiles are gradually being modernized. China, North Korea and Pakistan all have nuclear weapons and the means to deliver them. Soon Iran will as well. The value of all of our adversaries’ forces is diminished by the other side of deterrence, our ballistic missile defense systems which are still being developed and deployed. (Loose language in Obama’s deal with Russia apparently counts missile defenses in the offensive weapons number.) Those defenses now are comprised of only 30 interceptor missiles stationed in Alaska and California. (The 30 Navy ships which have anti-missile capabilities are mostly tasked to defend the fleet, not our homeland, though four are detailed to NATO missile defense in Europe.)