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July 2023

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Poking the Snoring Conservative Dragon. Part Two Victor Davis Hanson

By on July 1st, 2023

https://victorhanson.com/poking-the-snoring-conservative-dragon-part-two/

In 2024, the Left will spend $4-5 billion on the presidential and congressional races, with another $4-5 billion in free advertising in propaganda from network news, PBS, NPR, and the Silicon Valley mob. The latter again will do their leftist best, from rigging the order of Google searches, to banning supposed “misinformation” and “disinformation” from non-Twitter social media, to blacklisting traffickers in “hate speech” who might critique Democratic candidates.

The only remedy would be millions of poll watchers to turn out on Election Day 2024. The Right must draft legions of lawyers right now to ensure balloting laws are not massaged by leftist activist lawyers and judges.

There must be a rare conservative mass get-out-the-vote effort (i.e., mail-in and early balloting), targeted at rest homes and retirement communities. Republicans, until they restore integrity to balloting, must bring Barack Obama’s proverbial “gun to a knife fight” (a phrase Obama stole from David Mamet’s screenplay of The Untouchables) determination not to keep losing, and master third-party vote harvesting and ballot curing.

The Left does not have the numbers (look at the poor poll numbers on every of Joe Biden’s current policies), but neither do conservatives—unless they organize and trump the tactics of the Left. (No, I am not suggesting protestors mass outside Hunter Biden’s house in the fashion leftists swarm with impunity the homes of Supreme Court justices in felonious, but exempt, efforts to intimidate them into rendering more favorable opinions.)

But there are things the Right can do, if it wishes to stop losing the popular vote in seven of the last eight presidential elections (George W. Bush’s razor-thin 2004 being the outlier)—and finally for the first time in 36 years win 51% of the popular vote, as George H.W. Bush last managed in 1988 against a weak Mike Dukakis.

So what would an aroused dragon do?

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NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Supreme Court Moves Us Closer to A Colorblind Society by Alan M. Dershowitz

By on July 1st, 2023

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/19759/colorblind-society

Although this decision was split along current conservative-liberal lines, with the court’s three liberals dissenting, it actually reflects traditional liberalism. Justice William Douglas, perhaps the most liberal justice in Supreme Court history, advocated precisely this race neutral approach when affirmative action was first introduced. He was right then, and his liberal, colorblind approach, has now been vindicated.

A simple example demonstrates why employing race as a criteria is both unconstitutional and immoral. As the Supreme Court correctly pointed out, admission to elite universities is a zero-sum game: for every student or group that is given preference, another is disadvantaged. So consider this zero-sum choice:….

After decades of vacillation, the Supreme Court of the United States has finally and firmly declared that the Constitution does not permit publicly funded universities to consider race, as such, in its admission processes. This is a decision that many, including this author, have been advocating since the 1970s, when my first law review article appeared, calling for affirmative action to be based on non-racial criteria and individual accomplishments.

The Supreme Court has been moving in this direction for some time now, but it has until now allowed loopholes the size of university football stadiums. These loopholes were exploited by universities to enforce quota systems whereby approximately the same percentage of minority applicants would be admitted every year. The results of these quotas impacted most heavily on one of the most discriminated against groups in American history – Asian Americans. The plaintiffs in the Harvard case were such Americans. It will be interesting to see how their numbers are affected by the decision.

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FOREIGN POLICY Comments turned off

The Biden Administration’s Dangerous Nuclear Deal: Congressional Approval Required by Majid Rafizadeh

By on July 1st, 2023

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/19758/dangerous-nuclear-deal

“I urge the Administration to remember that U.S. law requires that any agreement, arrangement, or understanding with Iran needs to be submitted to Congress.” — Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas), Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, in a letter to US President Joe Biden, June 15, 2023.

“INARA [the Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act of 2015] was enacted with strong bipartisan support to ensure Congressional oversight of U.S. policy regarding Iran’s nuclear program…. This definition makes clear that any arrangement or understanding with Iran, even informal, requires submission to Congress.” — Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas), Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, in a letter to US President Joe Biden, June 15, 2023 [Emphasis added].

[T]he return to the nuclear deal means that the current sanctions against Tehran will be lifted and the regime would reportedly receive $100 billion a year “to Destabilise [the] Region,” as well as legitimately to rejoin the global financial system. Through the nuclear deal, the Iranian regime will again buy itself a blank check to advance its aggressive and fundamentalist policies across the Middle East, just as it did after the 2015 nuclear deal, but this time with the potential of threatening other countries with its nuclear breakout capability.

“To give them another windfall of cash like we did as a result of the 2015 nuclear deal, which led to an expansion of their proxy wars in the Middle East, it doesn’t make any sense. It’s not in our national interest…. They’re gonna fuel their proxy wars and they’re seeking domination and control in the Middle East…. No, it’s not a good deal. It wasn’t a good deal in 2015. It’s not a good deal now.” — Retired U.S. Army General Jack Keane, The Hill, June 18, 2023.https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/19758/dangerous-nuclear-deal

“I urge the Administration to remember that U.S. law requires that any agreement, arrangement, or understanding with Iran needs to be submitted to Congress.” — Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas), Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, in a letter to US President Joe Biden, June 15, 2023.

“INARA [the Iran Nuclear Agreement Review Act of 2015] was enacted with strong bipartisan support to ensure Congressional oversight of U.S. policy regarding Iran’s nuclear program…. This definition makes clear that any arrangement or understanding with Iran, even informal, requires submission to Congress.” — Rep. Michael McCaul (R-Texas), Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, in a letter to US President Joe Biden, June 15, 2023 [Emphasis added].

[T]he return to the nuclear deal means that the current sanctions against Tehran will be lifted and the regime would reportedly receive $100 billion a year “to Destabilise [the] Region,” as well as legitimately to rejoin the global financial system. Through the nuclear deal, the Iranian regime will again buy itself a blank check to advance its aggressive and fundamentalist policies across the Middle East, just as it did after the 2015 nuclear deal, but this time with the potential of threatening other countries with its nuclear breakout capability.

“To give them another windfall of cash like we did as a result of the 2015 nuclear deal, which led to an expansion of their proxy wars in the Middle East, it doesn’t make any sense. It’s not in our national interest…. They’re gonna fuel their proxy wars and they’re seeking domination and control in the Middle East…. No, it’s not a good deal. It wasn’t a good deal in 2015. It’s not a good deal now.” — Retired U.S. Army General Jack Keane, The Hill, June 18, 2023.

The Biden Administration, in an attempt to revive the Iran nuclear deal, has been quietly negotiating with the theocratic regime of President Ebrahim Raisi, known — for his crimes against humanity and his involvement in a massacre of nearly 30,000 political prisoners — as “the Butcher of Tehran.”

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