ENVIRONMENT AND JUNK SCIENCE, NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Can Nuclear Power Be Saved? By Jonathan Lesser

Posted By on August 14th, 2019

https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/08/nuclear-power-clean-reliable-energy-us-should-embrace/

It’s a clean, reliable source of energy that the U.S. would do well to embrace.

Whither nuclear power? That question has become more important as energy policies evolve to emphasize emissions-free “green” energy and an increased electrification of the U.S. economy. Some environmentalists consider nuclear power to be crucial to reducing carbon emissions; others continue to vehemently oppose nuclear power and believe that our energy must come solely from renewable sources.  The public, encouraged into hysteria by dramatizations of nuclear-plant accidents such as the film The China Syndrome and HBO’s Chernobyl, is split.

Meanwhile, the nuclear-power industry itself is in a parlous state for a variety of tangled reasons. In a recent Manhattan Institute report, I broke them down into four categories: (i) decades of construction cost overruns and plant delays because of poor designs, lack of manufacturing expertise, and changing regulations; (ii) political squabbling over spent-nuclear-fuel disposal; (iii) energy policies, including renewable-energy subsidies and mandates, that have distorted electric-power markets and made it harder for nuclear plants to compete; and (iv) lower natural-gas prices and more efficient gas-fired generators. In the past few years, threatened plant closures have led state policymakers to award subsidies to eleven existing plants. More such subsidies are likely forthcoming, if for no other reason than some nuclear-plant owners wanting their share of the subsidy pie. “Nice plant you got there,” they seem to be saying to local economic stakeholders. “Be a shame if something happened to it.”

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Hillary Ruins the Plan By Andrew C. McCarthy

Posted By on August 14th, 2019

https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/08/ball-of-collusion-book-excerpt-hillary-clinton-ruins-the-plan/

Plan A was to exonerate her and get her elected. Plan B, the failsafe, was an ‘insurance policy’ meant to destroy Trump.

Editor’s note: Andrew C. McCarthy’s new book is Ball of Collusion: The Plot to Rig an Election and Destroy a Presidency. This is the first in a series of excerpts.

 There really was a collusion plot. It really did target our election system. It absolutely sought to usurp our capacity for self-determination. It was just not the collusion you’ve been told about for nearly three years. It was not “Donald Trump’s collusion with Russia.”

Here is the real collusion scheme: In 2016, the incumbent Democratic administration of President Barack Obama put the awesome powers of the United States government’s law-enforcement and intelligence apparatus in the service of the Hillary Rodham Clinton presidential campaign, the Democratic party, and the progressive Beltway establishment. This scheme had two parts: Plan A, the objective; and Plan B, a fail-safe strategy in case Plan A imploded — which all the smartest people were supremely confident would never, ever happen . . . which is why you could bet the ranch that it would.

Plan A was to get Mrs. Clinton elected president of the United States. This required exonerating her, at least ostensibly, from well-founded allegations of her felonious and politically disqualifying actions.

Plan B was the insurance policy: an investigation that Donald Trump, in the highly unlikely event he was elected, would be powerless to shut down. An investigation that would simultaneously monitor and taint him. An investigation that internalized Clinton-campaign-generated opposition research, limning Trump and his campaign as complicit in Russian espionage. An investigation that would hunt for a crime under the guise of counterintelligence, build an impeachment case under the guise of hunting for a crime, and seek to make Trump un-reelectable under the guise of building an impeachment case.

MEDIA, POLITICS Comments turned off

Max Boot’s Dishonesty By Charles C. W. Cooke

Posted By on August 14th, 2019

https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/08/max-boots-dishonesty/

Max Boot is a narcissistic, dishonest, calculating, manipulative writer who engages in the same willfully dishonorable conduct he claims to disdain in others.He intentionally misconstrues what others write and then lies about it, knowing that no one will bother to uncover his distortion.

Before yesterday, my primary criticism of the Washington Post’s Max Boot was political in nature. As I wrote in a recent book review, I found it regrettable that Boot’s opposition to the president had not prevented him from “succumbing reactively to Trump’s cult of personality, or from making Trump the origin of every graph onto which he plots himself.” As of yesterday, my primary criticism of the Washington Post’s Max Boot is that he is a narcissistic, dishonest, calculating, manipulative writer who is prone to engaging in precisely the sort of willfully dishonorable conduct that he claims to disdain in others.

Having purposively libeled one of our Buckley Fellows after he had the temerity to argue that one does not fight racism by making lazy racial generalizations, Boot has now moved on to libeling Dan McLaughlin, one of the most thoughtful writers in America, and to making peculiar charges about National Review as a whole. As Oscar Wilde might have said: To lie about one writer may be regarded as a misfortune; to lie about two looks like carelessness.

Or worse.

WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

The Coming Migration out of Sub-Saharan Africa By Christopher Caldwell

Posted By on August 14th, 2019

https://www.nationalreview.com/magazine/2019/08/26/the-coming-migration-out-of-sub-saharan-africa/

It could send millions to Europe

Almost the entire population of Italy, it seems, spent the last week of June watching a boat arrive from across the Mediterranean. It was the Sea-Watch 3, a Netherlands-registered ship funded by progressive philanthropists and captained by Carola Rackete, a 31-year-old German climate-change activist. Rackete radioed that she was carrying 42 African refugees rescued at sea who were in desperate health. Italian interior minister Matteo Salvini holds that such ships rendezvous with traffickers just off the Libyan coast, and are really less interested in rescuing sailors than in transporting illegal immigrants to Europe en masse. “Taxis,” he has called them. And indeed, Rackete had been doodling about at the edge of Italy’s territorial waters for several days, charting a course less consistent with any health emergency than with a wish to land her human cargo in the European Union, where it is easy to apply for political asylum and where even those whose applications are rejected are almost never deported. Since his Lega party began sharing power in a populist coalition a year ago, Salvini’s decision to close Italy’s ports to such ships has made him the country’s most popular politician by a mile — and arguably, though he is still only a cabinet minister, the leader of the Western European political Right.

This time Salvini failed. Rackete broke through a line of Coast Guard ships in the pre-dawn hours of June 29 and made port on the island of Lampedusa, allegedly ramming a customs ship in the process, a maneuver for which she was arrested. Italians were riveted to their smartphones and TV sets. A good number of Lampedusans even lined the docks in the middle of the night to holler their wish that she be prosecuted — and worse. But when “Carola,” as she was increasingly known to the public, was released in early July, a crowd of supporters waved signs with handmade hearts. She still faces criminal charges. In Germany, Chancellor Angela Merkel’s foreign minister, the Social Democrat Heiko Maas, backed Rackete against the Italian authorities. “Saving human lives is no crime,” he said. 

IMMIGRATION Comments turned off

It’s not racist to screen out migrants who’ll be a burden Jonathan Tobin

Posted By on August 14th, 2019

https://nypost.com/2019/08/12/sorry-but-its-not-racist-to-screen-out-migrants-wholl-be-a-burden/

Last week’s mass shooting in El Paso, Texas, has sent public discourse about immigration off the rails.

It has allowed radicals to frame as racist normal law enforcement activities and immigration rules. We saw this in New York recently, with anti-ICE protesters stopping traffic on the West Side Highway and holding sit-ins at an Amazon store to protest the company’s compliance with immigration rules.

In the left’s telling — and it’s increasingly hard to distinguish the hard left from the soft — the administration and those who support it are no better than the insane white nationalist who committed the El Paso atrocity.

Similar hysteria has greeted a new Trump administration regulation governing legal immigrants’ access to public welfare. The New York Times depicted the new rule as part of an effort by the president and his hard-line immigration adviser, Stephen Miller, to “shift” the demographic makeup of newcomers to the country.

Under the new rule, those who are in the country legally will have a more difficult time obtaining green cards or gaining citizenship if they received food stamps, housing assistance, Medicare or other public benefits.

POLITICS Comments turned off

POLITICS ARIZONA : CURT SCHILLING MULLING A RUN FOR CONGRESS

Posted By on August 14th, 2019

http://www.rollcall.com/news/campaigns/trump-endorses-curt-schilling-bid-congress-arizona-terrific

Former Arizona Diamondbacks and Boston Red Sox pitcher Curt Schilling can count on the endorsement of President Donald Trump if he decides to run for Congress in Arizona.

The former Major League Baseball player turned conservative talk show host is weighing a congressional run in the Copper State, he told the Arizona Republic this week.

Trump took to Twitter on Tuesday to support that potential development, writing that Schilling was a “great pitcher and patriot” and that it is “terrific!” he is considering running in Arizona.

Schilling, who is listed as a Massachusetts resident, has long been one of Major League Baseball’s most politically active former players. In 2016 and 2017, he expressed interest in running to unseat Democratic Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts before ultimately backing out of the race. He actively campaigned for Republican presidential nominee John McCain in 2008 and supported President George W. Bush’s reelection campaign in 2004.

He endorsed Trump in 2016 and has vehemently defended the Trump administration as a commentator for the conservative media outlet Blaze TV.

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

5 Biggest Misconceptions About The Trump Administration’s Record On LGBTQ Issues Matthew Craffey

Posted By on August 14th, 2019

https://thefederalist.com/2019/08/14/5-big-misconceptions-trump-lgbtq-record/

If you cut through the lies and the false narratives peddled by the media, you’ll find Trump has been one of the greatest presidents for LGBTQ Americans in history.

Recently Ric Grenell, the openly gay U.S. ambassador to Germany, hosted a discussion in Berlin with international LGBTQ activists as part of the Trump administration’s efforts to decriminalize homosexuality around the world. More than 70 countries have laws against LGBTQ activities. Through economic influence, increasing education, and advocating policy changes, this important new global campaign hopes to change that.

Activists from countries such as Lebanon, Georgia, and Botswana shared their experiences and discussed the harrowing conditions LGBTQ individuals face in their nations. Grenell gave activists from the most affected countries a forum to develop better strategies to fight for LGBTQ policies and made it clear the United States would help in their struggle however it could.

The Trump administration also announced the appointment of another openly gay man, Robert Gilchrist, as the U.S. ambassador to Lithuania. If confirmed by the U.S. Senate, Gilchrist could play a pivotal role in LGBTQ policy. His challenge will be to do this in a culturally conservative country that lags other nations in affirming LGBTQ desires.

There is a large potential political and cultural impact to our top diplomat in a country like Lithuania being a gay man. It sends a high-profile message that to have a good political and economic relationship with the United States, nations will need to accept LGBTQ individuals and improve treatment of their own LGBTQ citizens. It’s one more example of how the Trump administration is using soft-power and influence to carry out this important global initiative.

However, the dominant narrative weaved by the media and Democrats incorrectly paints the administration’s record on LGBTQ issues. The very same Advocate article on Gilchrist’s appointment still claims that overall, “the Trump administration has taken many anti-LGBTQ actions.” But has it?

As a gay man myself, it’s important to me to know how the facts measure up to these accusations. Below are the most notable allegations of anti-LGBTQ actions supposedly taken by the Trump administration, and whether the media and leftist politicians reported them accurately.

IMMIGRATION Comments turned off

If You’re Not Grateful To The United States, Why Are You Here?By Casey Chalk

Posted By on August 14th, 2019

https://thefederalist.com/2019/08/14/youre-not-grateful-united-states/

Rather than ridicule America’s past, as if the travesties of U.S. history nullify its soaring glories, immigrants and longtime Americans should be grateful for America and its political and cultural traditions.

Earlier this month, the Washington Post featured an op-ed entitled “I am an uppity immigrant. Don’t expect me to be ‘grateful,’” by New York University professor Suketu Mehta, an author who recently published a book arguing that “immigration is a form of reparations” for past American crimes.

In the article, Mehta accuses America of stealing “the futures of the people who are now arriving at its borders,” of causing many immigrants “to move in the first place,” and of “despoil[ing] their homelands and mak[ing] them unsafe and unlivable.” He censures the West for “despoil[ing] country after country through colonialism, illegal wars, rapacious corporations and unchecked carbon emissions.”

Mehta asserts, for such reasons, that he’s “entitled” to live in the United States. Yet a few brief historical reflections will demonstrate that immigration as reparations is a bit more complicated than Mehta lets on. Moreover, no one, whether first-generation immigrants or direct descendants of voyagers on the Mayflower, deserves to be here. Being American is a gift for which every citizen should be inordinately grateful.

MEDIA Comments turned off

A Week in the Life of ABC ‘News’ Trump-bashing, race-baiting, and fear-mongering. Or as they call it at the network, Tuesday. Edward Ring

Posted By on August 14th, 2019

https://amgreatness.com/2019/08/13/a-week-in-the-life-of-abc-news/

ABC Nightly News,” televised daily across the nation at 5:30 p.m., offers what is perhaps the lowest common denominator of the mainstream media’s liberal, anti-Trump bias. But even if you compare what ABC has to say to what actually constitutes balanced reporting, as well as to what qualifies as newsworthy reporting, ABC falls short.

By these standards—by what used to be the basic editorial criteria for good journalism—ABC “news” is a dangerous fraud. They spew propaganda, calibrated at an almost infantile level, calculated to reinforce carefully nurtured biases within their television audience.

ABC News is anchored by the dashing metrosexual, David Muir, an actor of extraordinary skill. Muir, along with a laudably diverse collection of equally telegenic thespians masquerading as “journalists,” manages to exude convincing gravitas despite delivering, night after night, an embarrassing infotainment sham, mixing in equal parts pablum and agenda-driven propaganda. Forget about the Walter Cronkite Award for Excellence in Television Political Journalism, or the Edward R. Murrow Award. Give David Muir an Oscar.

ABC’s nightly “news” is easily dissected. Their 30-minute formula, which all three legacy networks follow, consists of a prolonged opening segment, about 15 minutes in length, in which the  top national and international stories are presented (or so they tell us). An examination of what they reported on last week, during the five days from August 5 through August 9, provides ample evidence of just how far removed they are from genuine journalism.

POLITICS Comments turned off

The Rise of Cultural and Economic Jihadism in American Civilization Selling us cultural suicide as a moral virtue. Jason D. Hill

Posted By on August 14th, 2019

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/274618/rise-cultural-and-economic-jihadism-american-jason-d-hill

Two Democratic presidential candidates, Bernie Sanders and Julian Castro, have agreed to speak before the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA). The candidates will address the forum during its convention in Houston on August 31, 2019.

The ISNA is listed by the United States Justice department as an entity of the Muslim Brotherhood which is a terrorist organization linked to several Islamist and Jihadist global political movements. These movements have as their goal the establishment of a global caliphate. This means that their goals are to subject all human beings to Sharia law. In fact, the president of ISNA was quoted in a 2006 film as saying that the organization’s mission was to change the Constitution of America. The organization has as its goals, by means of a jihad campaign, the destruction of western civilization from within.

There are several reasonable people who believe that both Sanders and Castro are either ignorant of the ISNA’s real goal, or are simply trying to turn a blind eye to an organization’s radical agenda with the hopes that they can modify the nihilistic and jihadist agenda of the movement.

Nothing could be further from the truth. I submit that both Castro and Sanders, given their virulent demonstrations of Americaphobia are directly complicit with the goals of ISNA. They are joining forces with an enemy organization to delegitimize our great republic under the current form of its constitutional configuration. Before analyzing the real motives behind these America-hating politicians, let us briefly examine their stated political visions for America.

Bernie Sanders is an avowed democratic socialist. He intends to transform our system of free market enterprise that has lifted millions out of poverty and raised the standard of living for all persons. What does he intend to transform our socio-economic American civilization into? A totalitarian, expropriative government of theft by legalization. Socialism advocates vesting ownership and control of the means of production, capital and land in the community as a whole. Socialism is not a morally neutral system. Any system of governance presupposes an answer to the questions: Are you a sovereign entity who owns your life, work and mind? Is your mind something that can be nationalized and its material contents distributed by the state? Socialists think the answer is yes. They believe the products of one’s efforts belong to the community; that the state and society have a moral and financial responsibility to care for other people’s children; that is, the procreative choices made by those who are strangers to us, and that the most successful and productive people should be the most penalized.