Beto O’Rourke wants farmers to hand over their ‘fair share’ of crops to stop global warming By Monica Showalter

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2019/04/beto_orourke_wants_farmers_to_hand_over_their_fair_share_of_crops_to_stop_global_warming.html

Socialism with a boyish and syrupy face

Campaigning for president in Iowa, Robert Francis “Beto” O’Rourke thinks farmers need to do their “fair share” to combat global warming, handing over some of their crops to save the Earth.Kid you not.  According to Breitbart News:Democrat 2020 presidential candidate Robert “Beto” O’Rourke proposed Friday in Iowa that the U.S. “allow” farmers to give up their “fair share” of crops to fight climate change.O’Rourke stood aloft as he proclaimed his message at a rally in Marshalltown, Iowa Friday:If we allow farmers to earn a profit in what they grow, if we allow them to contribute their fair share in combatting Climate Change by growing cover crops, allowing the technologies that invest in precision tilling and farming, capturing more of that carbon out of the air is another way in which they can make a profit.  Keep those farms together, pass them on to the next generation, and allow them to provide us our food and national security, our independence from the rest of the world, our ability to provide for the rest of the world.Where does he get the idea that farmers’ land and crops are “his” land and crops, to be used by the state as he deems fit?  That’s called a tax hike in ordinary terms, and state expropriation if you look at it closely enough.  Hugo Chávez used to think Venezuelan farmers’ land and crops were “his” land and crops once upon a time, too, and we all know how well that worked out.

Dear Pope Francis: A Border Wall Is The Most Humanitarian Policy Francis’s statement disregards not only the sovereignty of the American nation-state, but also ignorance of how generous America has been to the poor and vulnerable of the world.By Kevin D. Roberts

https://thefederalist.com/2019/04/09/dear-pope-francis-border-wall-humanitarian-policy/

Pope Francis has intruded into American politics again, riffing critically on border walls and capitalism. Once again, serious Catholics, including me, are dismayed by the holy father’s ignorance on the issue.

Francis’ remarks— especially his comment that “those who build walls will become prisoners of the walls they put up”—reveals an incomplete understanding of the crisis. Were he to acknowledge the entirety of the current crisis at the border, including the egregious actions of human smugglers and human traffickers, his prodding might find better currency among American policymakers.

As it is, however, his statement displays an unfortunate disregard not only for the sovereignty of the American nation-state, but also a truly unfortunate ignorance of how generous America has been to the poor and vulnerable, especially those who appear on our borders and shores.

Francis has decried the building of a wall, and the free market, which he continues to conflate with the crony capitalism of Latin America. What an irony, considering that Central American migrants are leaving their homelands because those nations have neither the rule of law nor the economic opportunities that the pope rightly wishes everyone to have.

We Will Never Fix Campus Indoctrination Until We Cut College Subsidies Debt-financing by America’s youngest generation has made it possible for universities offer politicized, useless majors and administratively driven indoctrination. Dustin Steeve

https://thefederalist.com/2019/04/09/will-never-fix-campus-indoctrination-cut-college-subsidies/

Last month, President Trump signed an executive order titled “Improving Free Inquiry, Transparency, and Accountability at Colleges and Universities.” Some hailed the order as a much-needed response to rising illiberalism on college campuses, while others called it a solution in search of a problem.

Like many, when I first heard about the order, I focused on the goal. The first question that came to my head was: “Do we really want the government to be in the business of legislating ‘free inquiry?’”

That’s an interesting political philosophy question, but it avoids the fundamental problem of universities these days: debt-financing enables the administrative and academic departments targeting free speech on campus and silencing conservatives.
People Think College Is About Education, But It’s Often Not

Higher education is riding on its reputation as a gateway to a bright future. As of 2018, 82 percent of Americans believed a four-year degree was either “very” or “somewhat” good preparation for attaining a well-paying job. However, recent events have eroded that reputation, especially amongst conservatives.

Eric Swalwell, California Democrat, says he’s running for president By Camilo Montoya-Galvez

https://www.cbsnews.com/news/eric-swalwell-2020-california-congressman-tells-stephen-colbert-hes-running-for-president/

California Rep. Eric Swalwell, one of President Trump’s most outspoken critics in Congress, announced he is seeking the presidential nomination in what is shaping up to be the largest Democratic primary field in U.S. history.

The 38-year-old San Francisco area lawmaker announced his presidential campaign during an appearance on “The Late Night Show with Stephen Colbert” airing Monday night on CBS.

“I’ve already done a lot, but I can do more,” he said in a clip released by the show. “I’ve been in Congress for six years. I’ve defended our country from the Intelligence Committee while Democracy has been on the ropes.”

Swalwell enters a crowded race for president with more than a dozen candidates seeking to capture the Democratic nomination and thwart Mr. Trump’s reelection bid next year. To date, 17 other Democrats have declared their candidacy for president or launched presidential exploratory committees, including Sens. Bernie Sanders, Kirsten Gillibrand, Kamala Harris, Cory Booker and Elizabeth Warren; Ohio Rep. Tim Ryan; Hawaii Rep. Tulsi Gabbard; Texas Rep. Beto O’Rourke; and South Bend, Indiana, Mayor Pete Buttigieg.

Evaluating the 2020 Democratic Primary Field By Sean Trende

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2019/04/09/evaluating_the_2020_democratic_primary_field_139997.html

Assessing the Democratic presidential primary at this point is a nearly impossible task. With around 15 serious candidates who have declared or formed an exploratory committee, and with another handful seriously looking at joining the race, the slate is very much in flux. Like the Republican primary in 2016, small changes in the polling position of candidates can translate to a large change in their position relative to one another, which in turn incentivizes rising candidates to stay in. So rather than, say, power-ranking the candidates – how does one really decide how to rank John Hickenlooper versus Jay Inslee? – I will look at them through the lens of “buy” versus “sell,” based upon the RCP Poll Average.

Palestinians Target Students by Khaled Abu Toameh

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/14041/palestinians-target-students

The Palestinian students are being targeted because of their political affiliations and not because of any crime they committed.

While the Palestinian Authority and Hamas are busy beating up each other’s supporters, “pro-Palestinian” activists on US and Canadian university campuses are busy blaming Israel for Palestinian woes.

For these alleged activists — who are remarkably passive when it comes to truly assisting Palestinians — their protests seem more about hating Israel than anything else. If they really cared about the Palestinians, they might stop abusing Israel long enough to notice the abuse that the Palestinian “leaders” inflict on the people under them.

“Pro-Palestinian” activists at university campuses in the US and other Western countries have long been waging various campaigns to denounce Israel and hold it fully responsible for the continued “suffering” of Palestinians.

These activists, however, seem to care little about violations committed against the Palestinians by the Palestinian Authority (PA) in the West Bank or Hamas in the Gaza Strip — even when fellow students in the West Bank and Gaza are being targeted.

Qatar: ‘A Wolf in Sheep’s Clothing’ Bankrolling Islamism in Europe by Giulio Meotti

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/14042/qatar-europe-islamism-finance

“We have been reporting Doha’s ideological and religious penetration for years. In the form of investments and financial operations, Qatar extends its proselytizing network every day, with serious damage to European societies…” — Souad Sbai, the Moroccan-born president of Italy’s Averroes Studies Center.

Qatar has been funding mega-mosques across Europe. Qatar’s goal is apparently to Islamicize the European diaspora.

“[Qatar’s] English-language stations produce slick propaganda against Qatar’s enemies, dressed up in Western liberal rhetoric. Al Jazeera’s latest venture – its social media channel, AJ+ – is aimed at young, progressive Americans. Its documentaries on the evils of Israel, Saudi Arabia, and the Trump administration are sandwiched between glowing coverage of transgender rights campaigns and emotional appeals for the plight of asylum seekers on America’s southern border – seemingly incongruous topics for a broadcaster controlled by a Wahhabi regime… Qatar is now the largest foreign donor to American universities.” — Daniel Pipes, president of the Middle East Forum.

In October, Italian Interior Minister Matteo Salvini visited Qatar, the “energy giant”, where he praised the emirate for “not sponsoring extremism anymore”. Unfortunately, the opposite is true. Qatar, “the other Wahhabi state”, apparently is interested not only in its economic relationship with Europe, but also in exporting its brand of political Islam.

According to a new book, Qatar Papers: How the Emirate Finances Islam in France and Europe, by two French journalists, Christian Chesnot and Georges Malbrunot, Qatar has distributed 22 million euros to Islamic projects in Italy alone. This funding has had virtually a single beneficiary: the Union of Islamic Communities and Organizations in Italy (UCOII), accused of closeness to Qatar’s pet organization, the Muslim Brotherhood, the mouthpiece of which is Qatar’s media outlet, Al Jazeera, located in the capital city of Doha.

Who Commits Most of the World’s Extremist Violence? Evil as they are, white supremacists aren’t even close to the top of the list. Seth Barron

https://www.city-journal.org/global-extremist-violence

Last week, the New York Times featured an illustrated timeline of “white extremist” killings over the last nine years, with lines demonstrating citation and affiliation among the killers. According to the Times, the record shows “an informal global network of white extremists whose violent attacks are occurring with greater frequency in the West.”

The idea that white supremacist violence is a growing global threat has gained more currency recently, notably in the wake of the ghastly Christchurch mosque massacre, when an avowed white nationalist murdered 50 Muslims. New York congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, for instance, asserted that “White supremacists committed the largest # of extremist killings in 2017.” No one will deny that racial hatred is an evil ideology, and that people who kill in the name of white supremacy commit evil—but is it true that white extremists are sowing a growing amount of worldwide mayhem?

The evidence suggests otherwise. Even a superficial glance at the record indicates that of the nearly 20,000 people killed in thousands of extremist killings in 2017, white supremacists were responsible for very few. The worst terrorist event of 2017, according to the State Department, was the explosion of a truck bomb outside the Safari Hotel in Mogadishu, Somalia, which killed more than 580 people. This violent act is believed to have been the work of Al-Shabaab, which was responsible for 97 percent of the 370 instances of extremist killings in Somalia in 2017, accounting for about 1,400 deaths—mostly civilian. The remaining violent acts were carried out by Jabha East Africa (ISIS-Somalia), a dissident Al-Shabaab splinter group.

Same People Behind Iraq War Lies Pushed Russian Collusion By Julie Kelly

https://amgreatness.com/2019/04/08/same-people-behind-iraq-war-lies-pu

For more than two years they misled us.

Exploiting fear and confusion after a shocking event, they warned that our country was in imminent danger at the hands of a mad man. They insisted that legitimate intelligence, including a CIA report issued a month before a national election and a dossier produced by reliable sources in the United Kingdom, proved the threat was real. The subject monopolized discussions on Capitol Hill, in the White House, and in the press.

They argued that the situation was so dire that it was straining our relationship with strategic allies. Any evidence to the contrary was readily dismissed. And anyone who questioned their agenda was ridiculed as a coward, a dupe, or a conspiracy theorist. The news media dedicated endless air time and column inches to anyone who wanted to repeat the falsehood.

But an investigative report released two years after the propaganda campaign began found no evidence to support their central claim. The CIA report was highly flawed. The official dossier, some concluded, was deceptive and “sexed-up.”

No, I’m not referring here to the Trump-Russia collusion hoax, although the similarities are nearly identical. I’m talking about the period between 2002 and 2004 when many of the very same people who recently peddled collusion fiction also insisted that Saddam Hussein possessed weapons of mass destruction—including material to produce nuclear bombs. On the heels of the horrors of 9/11, the United States and our allies waged war against Iraq in 2003 based primarily on that assurance.

But in 2004, a special advisor to the CIA concluded Iraq had no weapons of mass destruction. There were no stockpiles of biological or chemical agents; no plans to develop a nuclear bomb. The main argument for the war had been wholly discredited. But it was too late: The conflict officially raged on for another seven years, including a “surge” of 20,000 more U.S. troops in 2007 at the behest of the late Senator John McCain (R-Ariz.). We still have a troop presence in Iraq to this day.

Why Are 2020 Democrats Embracing Slavery Reparations? By Matt Margolis

https://pjmedia.com/trending/why-are-2020-democrats-embracing-slavery-reparations/
Today, Senator Cory Booker, one of the many Democrats running for president, announced legislation that would “form a commission to recommend reparations for slavery.” According to Booker, “This bill is a way of addressing head-on the persistence of racism, white supremacy, and implicit racial bias in our country. It will bring together the best minds to study the issue and propose solutions that will finally begin to right the economic scales of past harms and make sure we are a country where all dignity and humanity is affirmed.”

Spoiler alert, Senator Booker: It won’t solve any problems. It won’t satisfy anyone. What exactly do proponents of slavery reparations believe that they will do that affirmative action policies in education, employment, awarding of government contracts, etc., etc. couldn’t? If the election of Barack Obama to the highest office in the land (despite his radicalism and lack of qualifications) wasn’t proof that we, as a nation, have moved far beyond the days of slavery, then what will? A check? For how much? Will we finally be able to put an end to affirmative action policies? Of course not, that’s not the point.

Ben Shapiro has previously noted that just the question of how reparations would be implemented is in itself something proponents of reparations can’t answer with unity. So, it’s safe to say that reparations would not be a cure-all to right the wrongs of the past and put slavery behind us once and for all, but just another wealth redistribution program that would precede another, and another, and another to solve something that, in the eyes of those pushing for it, will never actually be fixed to satisfaction.

Of course, my real question is not what Booker thinks reparations will accomplish (since we all know they won’t accomplish anything) but why this is becoming a litmus test for 2020 Democrats. Most of the 2020 Democrats who attended Al Sharpton’s National Action Network convention in New York City last week expressed support for the commission Booker’s legislation aims to create. This kind of thing may play well to African-American Democrats, but opposition to slavery reparations has been strong and consistent over the years, with roughly 7 in 10 Americans opposing them. With such strong opposition to reparations, supporting them is clearly not a winning message in the 2020 general election.