The Patriot Post Digest 7-20-2016

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The Patriot Post Digest 7-20-2016
From The Federalist Patriot
Free Email Subscription
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Mid-Day Digest

Jul. 20, 2016

THE FOUNDATION

“I expect that a just, dispassionate and steady conduct, will at length rally to a proper system the great body of our country. Unequivocal in principle, reasonable in manner, we shall be able I hope to do a great deal of good to the cause of freedom & harmony.” —Thomas Jefferson (1801)

TOP RIGHT HOOKS

Now That Trump Is the Nominee…1

“It’s my honor to throw Donald Trump over the top tonight with 89 delegates,” said Donald Trump Jr., speaking for the state of New York’s 89 delegates that officially granted the nomination to his father Donald Trump. The primary contest has been unofficially over for months now since Trump’s final two rivals, Ted Cruz and John Kasich, dropped out of the race in April. Though unconventional and uncouth, we’ve written extensively that Trump was able to energize support with his simple populist message of “making America great again.” That appealed to many who have become wearied by the unfulfilled promises (both real and perceived) of the establishment2.

There are still conservatives who are not on board the Trump Train. While there are certainly legitimate concerns that we have highlighted, his choosing of Mike Pence as a running mate3 should be an encouraging sign. At least it’s a good start, sending the message that Trump can work with other Republicans.

Given the fact that either Trump or Hillary Clinton4 will be elected president in November, the focus now must turn to defeating the very real threat of another Clinton presidency. Conservatives know that Hillary Clinton would continue the current leftist policies that are actively destroying the very foundations of this great nation. The prospects are truly frightening of where the country will be with four more years of socialist leadership. However, if Republicans continue to stubbornly bicker and maintain their fractured boundaries, refusing to unite together to face the greater foe, then we face four more years of continuing down this dangerous road of increasing government overreach and loss of Liberty.

GOP Convention Highlights, Day 25

Excerpts from Day 2 of the Republican National Convention:

House Speaker Paul Ryan: “This year of surprises and dramatic turns can end in the finest possible way — when America elects a conservative governing majority. We can do this, we can earn that mandate, if we don’t hold anything back, if we never lose sight of the stakes, if we never lose sight of what’s on the table. … Have we had our arguments this year? Sure we have. You know what I call those? Signs of life. Signs of a party that’s not just going through the motions. Not just mouthing new words for the same old stuff. Meanwhile, what choice has the other party made? … They are offering a third Obama term, brought to you by another Clinton.”

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell: “I’m here to tell you that Hillary Clinton will say anything, do anything and be anything to get elected president and we cannot allow it. … The American people are tired of hearing about the bounty of government while the cost of just caring for a family or meeting daily expenses grows out of reach. Over the past few years, they’ve seen government officials abuse their office and get rewarded for it. They’ve seen the middle class shrink. And in the midst of all this they have raised a simple complaint. Who is looking out for us? At a moment when so many feel betrayed by their government, why in the world would Democrats put forward such a candidate?”

New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie: “Since the Justice Department refuses to allow you to render a verdict, let’s present the case now, on the facts, against Hillary Clinton. She was America’s chief diplomat. Look around at the violence and danger in our world today every region of the world has been infected with her flawed judgment. … Hillary Clinton, putting herself ahead of America — guilty or not guilty? Hillary Clinton, lying to the American people about her selfish, awful judgment — guilty or not guilty? Time after time, the facts, and just the facts, lead you to the same verdict both around the world and at home. … We cannot make the Chief Law Enforcement Officer of the United States someone who has risked America’s secrets and lied about this to Congress and the American people.”

Former Attorney General Michael Mukasey: “Over the years, Hillary Clinton has done a lot and said a lot to show why she should not be president. But how she treated government secrets as secretary of state, and what she said before and after she was caught, sums up the case against her. She sent and received secret and top-secret and beyond-top-secret emails on an unsecure private email system instead of on the secure government system — and she did it without authorization.”

Sen. Ron Johnson: “What difference, at this point, does it make? I am the guy who provoked that infamous response from Hillary Clinton by asking a simple question: ‘Why didn’t you just pick up the phone and call the survivors?’ It makes a difference to the young Yazidi woman I met who was captured and brutalized by ISIS barbarians, the joy of life hauntingly absent in her eyes. It makes a difference to the travelers, passing through airports in Brussels and Istanbul, who just wanted to get home to their family and friends. It makes a difference to the ordinary Americans sharing holiday cheer at a Christmas party in San Bernardino. It makes a difference to the young men and women dancing on a summer night at a club in Orlando. And it makes a difference to the families watching fireworks at a celebration of freedom in Nice. … It doesn’t have to be like this — we shouldn’t have to live in fear. This is a fight for freedom. It’s not someone else’s fight, this is our fight. And it is a fight we absolutely must win.”

Elizabeth Warren to Airbnb: No Sleep for You!6

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-MA) and two other Democrat senators sent a letter to the Federal Trade Commission asking that it “study and quantify” popular short-term lodging companies, specifically Airbnb. Democrats' claim their purpose for sending this request is that they are “concerned that short-term rentals may be exacerbating housing shortages and driving up the cost of housing in our communities.” The letter continues by citing concerns over potential safety and health violations and mentions reports of — what else? — “widespread discrimination against African-American guests.”

This may sound similar to all the wrangling the past couple of years over the driver network program Uber and other similar ride-share companies. And in many ways it is. As with the complaints about Uber, all the huffing and puffing about safety violations, discrimination and “exacerbation of the housing market” are merely a smoke screen for the real agenda — government revenue and the union racket. Commercial enterprises such as the large hotel industry provide a higher tax revenue to both local and federal coffers than does little Aunt Margaret who rents out her spare bedroom a few times a year. And wouldn’t you know, the hotel industry has also jumped on board the anti-Airbnb bandwagon. Competition is leading to loss of revenue, so the unions are calling in the big dogs to sit on the scales.

Warren and her fellow leftist travelers believe that the only good government is a big controlling one, and statists' primary means to accomplish this aim is through onerous regulations and taxes. Free market capitalism rests on greater individual freedom leading toward greater innovation and individual wealth and a robust economy, as has been proven time and time again. Socialism on the other hand tends toward suppression of individual freedoms, resulting in lack of innovation and growth and large governments whose control and over-regulation leads to a deflated economy. Just ask Venezuela.

BEST OF RIGHT OPINION

Ben Shapiro: When Do Values Trump Democracy?7
Tony Perkins: No Coup for Christians in Turkey8
Walter Williams: Challenges for Black People: Part II9

For more, visit Right Opinion10.

TOP HEADLINES

Iran’s Huge Role in 9/11 Also Covered Up11
EPA Scores Major Victory Over Coal Mining12
DOJ to Fight Mega Health Insurer Mergers13

For more, visit Patriot Headline Report14.

FEATURED RIGHT ANALYSIS
America’s Biggest Scandal15

By Arnold Ahlert

On Monday night, Hillary Clinton attacked GOP vice presidential candidate Mike Pence, calling him “one of the most hostile politicians in America when it comes to public education.” Give Clinton credit for one thing: She clearly recognizes the single greatest threat to progressive hegemony is well-educated Americans. That’s exactly why the Democrat-educrat alliance will attack anything that threatens their de facto monopoly control of public schools.

The alliance is unquestionable. So far in the 2016 election cycle — just as it has been in every election cycle — the American Federation of Teachers (AFT) and the National Education Association (NEA) have directed16 millions of dollars in campaign contributions almost solely to Democrats, at 100% and 98%, respectively.

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The Patriot Post Digest 7-20-2016
From The Federalist Patriot
Free Email Subscription
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The results of the Democrat-run education industrial complex have been nothing short of catastrophic. “Twelve million poor children, mainly black and Hispanic, are trapped in failing government schools that are teaching them nothing,” David Horowitz explained17 in 2014. “As a result, they will never get a chance at a middle-class life. Virtually every school board and every administration in inner city districts is controlled by Democrats, and has been for over fifty years. Everything that is wrong with inner city schools that policy can fix, Democrats are responsible for.”

Even worse, the “fix” as they say is in, and even the reliably leftist New York Times was capable of smelling the stench. In December 2015, the paper revealed18 that while “the number of students earning high school diplomas has risen to historic peaks … academic readiness for college or jobs are much lower.” How much lower? “The most recent evaluation of 12th graders on a national test of reading and math found that fewer than 40 percent were ready for college level work,” the Times revealed. “College remediation and dropout rates remain stubbornly high, particularly at two-year institutions, where fewer than a third who enroll complete a degree even within three years.”

How is this possible? “Grade inflation is rampant in New York City’s (NYC) public schools, reports a new study by StudentsFirstNY,” columnist Heather Kays reveals19, further noting that in schools “where fewer than 10 percent of students pass state tests, 85 percent of students were passing their school’s coursework.”

New York is hardly an outlier. Public schools all over the nation have been steadily20 inflating grades since 1990. The 2007 National Household Education Survey revealed an astounding 81% of students got mostly As and Bs in high school.

Moreover, many school districts are abandoning anything resembling real standards to facilitate the process. California, South Carolina and Tennessee recently eliminated a requirement that students pass exit exams to qualify for a diploma, and Alaska, California, Wisconsin and Wyoming lowered the number of credit requirements needed to graduate. In Connecticut, social promotion is all that matters. “Promotion and graduation require no actual learning,” writes21 Chris Powell, managing editor of the Journal Inquirer. “Rather, only simple attendance is required. Promotion and graduation are left to the discretion of local school boards, which have lost the nerve to enforce standards that measure learning.”

Other school districts are making22 50 out of 100 the lowest grade a teacher can give a student, provided the student a makes a “reasonable attempt” or “good faith effort” to do the work. Many are also embracing “standards-based grading,” a term designed to obscure the reality such “standards” allow students to turn in work late, retake exams, and limit the percentage homework can count in the calculation of one’s overall grade.

Theresa Mitchell Dudley, president of the Prince George’s County Educators' Association, explains the transparent flaws: “You can’t go to an employer and say, ‘Here’s my work, it’s two weeks late,’ and expect that your boss is not going to fire you.”

Perhaps not. But you can certainly cultivate a sense of utterly misplaced indignation in millions of weak-thinking students who will be subsequently drawn to a Democrat Party that assures them they are victims of an inherently unfair society that only the ministrations of benevolent government — controlled by those same Democrats — can ameliorate.

None of this is remotely possible absent a virtual monopolistic system that requires children to attend schools in assigned districts, even if those schools are failing, or pay tuition many Americans can’t afford to attend private alternatives. Clinton attacked Pence because he favors school choice, charter schools23, career and technical education, and merit-based raises for teachers — every one of which are wholly anathema to Democrats and their union allies who want absolute control, absent a shred of accountability24.

Make no mistake: Education is the primary arena in the battle for the nation’s soul. Every problem we currently endure, from cultural pollution to endemic political corruption, and all things in between, can be traced back to the decline in standards and the ongoing indoctrination afflicting America’s schools and colleges. “Give me four years to teach the children and the seed I have sown will never be uprooted,” promised Marxist champion Vladimir Lenin.

Four years has become 12-16 years of institutionally sanctioned dumbing-down, courtesy of a Democrat-educrat alliance that is arguably the biggest scandal in the history of the nation.

And it’s about time Americans deeply concerned about the future of our country started treating it that way.

MORE ANALYSIS FROM THE PATRIOT POST

Clinton Searches for Partner in Crime25
Screening TSA’s Bad Behavior26

OPINION IN BRIEF

Ben Shapiro: “For well over a century, the left has mistaken the means of democracy for democratic values. That confusion has converted republics into tyrannies. Just because people elect their dictators doesn’t make the dictators legitimate. This is the whole point of the Constitution of the United States. There are certain rights that are inviolable, even by a majority. … Morality doesn’t follow the majority. Democracy and classical liberalism should go hand in hand, but they don’t always; a people trained in classical liberalism will vote for it, but a people trained in tyranny will vote for tyranny. That’s what’s been happening in Turkey. Increasingly, it’s what’s happening everywhere. Values must trump democracy if the two come into conflict. They don’t have to. But it’s our job to educate our children and, indeed, populations around the world about the meaning of classical liberal values. If we don’t, people will choose their own chains. And just because you choose your chains doesn’t mean those chains are somehow any less oppressive.”

SHORT CUTS

Insight: “If the only motive was to help people who could not afford education, advocates of government involvement would have simply proposed tuition subsidies.” —Milton Friedman (1912-2006)

Observations: “Mitch McConnell and Paul Ryan gave speeches that were necessarily abstracted from Trump and Trumpism, although both were quite forthright in making the case for supporting him as the best chance to enact important elements of the traditional Republican agenda.” —Rich Lowry

Non Compos Mentis: “How many more disaffected black men have to self-radicalize before we take their claims seriously?” —Tavis Smiley in a USA Today column, “Listen to the Baton Rouge police killer”

Village Idiots: “America is going through a paroxysm of rage based on a lot of build-up and distrust of our government; based on, basically, a Congress that’s done nothing, that’s been … stuck by the conservatives and not been able to really do anything to progress us forward. But I think that everything will turn out. I think there’s going to be a happy ending in November!” —Steven Spielberg

Demo-gogues: “As we bind up our wounds, we must come together to ensure that those who try to divide us do not succeed. … Thank you for your courageous service. We have your backs.” —a letter to America’s police force from Barack Obama, who has fostered division and failed to have the backs of our men and women in blue

Dezinformatsia: “To hear this grieving mother [Patricia Smith] … lay the blame directly at Hillary Clinton, saying that Hillary was responsible for her son’s death, personally responsible, doesn’t correspond with the facts as I know them and as I’ve read them in subsequent investigations, and it does seem to be a manipulation of someone’s grief and go into a very dark place.” —NBC’s Richard Engel

Food for thought: “If you’re one of those folks who found Pat Smith’s remarks shamelessly exploitative, I wonder if you’ll see the same grumbling about the speakers at the upcoming Democratic National Convention: Also scheduled Tuesday are Mothers of the Movement members Gwen Carr, Mother of Eric Garner; Sybrina Fulton, Mother of Trayvon Martin; Maria Hamilton, Mother of Dontré Hamilton; Lucia McBath, Mother of Jordan Davis; Lezley McSpadden, Mother of Michael Brown; Cleopatra Pendleton-Cowley, Mother of Hadiya Pendleton; Geneva Reed-Veal, Mother of Sandra Bland.” —Jim Geraghty

And last… “With all the media attention, you’d think Melania [Trump] violated national security, had a federal probe and was criticized by the head of the FBI.” —Twitter satirist @hale_razor

Semper Vigilans Fortis Paratus et Fidelis!
Managing Editor Nate Jackson

Join us in daily prayer for our Patriots in uniform — Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines and Coast Guardsmen — standing in harm’s way in defense of Liberty, and for their families.