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« on: April 30, 2015, 06:43:20 PM » |
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The Patriot Post Digest 4-30-2015
From The Federalist Patriot
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Daily Digest
Apr. 30, 2015
THE FOUNDATION
“Only a virtuous people are capable of freedom.” —Benjamin Franklin, Letter to the Abbes Chalut and Arnoux, 1787
TOP RIGHT HOOKS
First Quarter GDP Is a Harsh Reality Check1
Other than the first quarter, last year was a better year for the economy. After contracting 2.1% to start off 2014, GDP jumped to 4.6% in the second quarter and 5% in the third quarter before slipping to 2.2% to round out the year. So, how’s 2015 looking so far? Well, chilly — literally, according to Democrats. The Commerce Department2 released initial numbers for the first quarter of 2015, and, at a sluggish 0.2%, GDP once again tempered America’s level of economic enthusiasm. And the “worse-than-expected3” downtrend is inevitably being blamed on winter weather woes. Jason Furman, Chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers, said4 this latest estimate “was likely affected by notably harsh winter weather” — interesting considering we’re supposedly coming off the warmest year on record and had a record warm start to 2015. It’s also the same recycled excuse they used last year.
Moreover, as Nick Timiraos of The Wall Street Journal reminds us, revisions knocked last year’s initial first quarter growth down by a staggering two percentage points — from 0.1% to -2.1%. Is a repeat in the offing? Yesterday’s report continues a familiar trend under the Obama recovery — a roller coaster ride that features some signs of life along with harsh reality checks. Stability and sustainability are still lacking in the economy, which will continue through at least 2017.
Bernie Sanders Challenges Clinton for Democrat Nomination5
At least the Democrat presidential primary got interesting. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT), the politician who described himself as a “democratic socialist” and who was described by the New York Times6 as an adherent to “that old-time religion” of populism, announced he is campaigning to win the Democrat Party’s nomination as its presidential candidate. The politician that was once too far to the Left for the Democrat Party told the Associated Press7, “People should not underestimate me. I’ve run outside of the two-party system, defeating Democrats and Republicans, taking on big-money candidates and, you know, I think the message that has resonated in Vermont is a message that can resonate all over this country.” Right out of the gate, Sanders challenged Hillary Clinton’s succession to the throne by bringing the progressive rhetoric that splits rich versus poor and capitalizes on income inequality. “What we have seen is that while the average person is working longer hours for lower wages,” Sanders said, “we have seen a huge increase in income and wealth inequality, which is now reaching obscene levels.” Between the two candidates, Clinton still seems the greater threat. Sanders appears more harmless than calculating, and a Sanders nomination will pull the Democrat Party further from middle America.
Did Freddie Gray Try to Injure Himself in the Police Van?8
If true, the death of Freddie Gray may not have anything to do with police brutality and more to do with an irrational man bent on self-harm. This in from The Washington Post9: “A prisoner sharing a police transport van with Freddie Gray told investigators that he could hear Gray ‘banging against the walls’ of the vehicle and believed that he ‘was intentionally trying to injure himself,’ according to a police document obtained by The Washington Post.” This story has the ring of truthiness about it, but is it really? Jazz Shaw10 writes at Hot Air that the prisoner could be an unreliable witness — similar to the witnesses that said Michael Brown had his hands up. Furthermore, Investigative Reporter at Baltimore’s NBC affiliate TV station Jayne Miller11 said the Post’s account contradicts what the Baltimore Police Commissioner said a week ago. At the time, he said the prisoner described Gray as “mostly quiet.” The timeline is still being reconstructed. When we do get the complete and truthful story, what will happen if the rioters, who already destroyed much of Baltimore, do not get the conclusion for which they demanded?
Don’t Miss Alexander’s Column
Read 2016 Presidential Field on Guns and Liberty12, on the remarks made by candidates for the Republican presidential nomination at the 2015 NRA Leadership Forum.
If you’d like to receive Alexander’s Column by email, update your subscription here13.
FEATURED RIGHT ANALYSIS
No, Riots Are Not a ‘Legitimate Political Strategy’14
By Allyne Caan
Reading the liberal media, you’d think the Baltimore rioters are the reincarnation of Lexington and Concord’s minutemen, bravely facing tyrants to defend their freedom. Well, Paul Revere might disagree. Somehow, ruining businesses and running off with condoms15 doesn’t quite equate to Patrick Henry’s speech “Give me Liberty or give me death.”
But the Left wants America to think it does.
A particularly absurd Salon headline16 this week reads, “Baltimore’s violent protesters are right: Smashing police cars is a legitimate political strategy.” The author’s argument is that non-violence is “a tactic, not a philosophy” and that black communities are struggling against “premeditated economic exploitation.” Riots are simply “reasonable responses to generations of extreme state violence, and logical decisions about what kind of actions yield the desired political results.”
According to Fordham University sociology professor Heather Gautney17, “Riots like the ones we are seeing in Baltimore … should be viewed as rational responses to injustice. Riots highlight the injustice and violence that’s prevalent in impoverished neighborhoods in this country.”
And BuzzFeed’s Adam Serwer writes18, “Violence — as harmful and self-destructive as it is — sometimes works.” Serwer claims that, for 80 years, the “recipe for urban riots” has been largely the same: “(a)n impoverished and politically disempowered black population refused full American citizenship, a heavy-handed and overwhelmingly white police force, a generous amount of neglect, and frequently, the loss of black life at the hands of the police.”
But is portraying lawless violence as a justified and effective quest for justice accurate?
A closer look at the facts says, “No.”
For starters, as Acton Institute Senior Editor Joe Carter points out19, far from empowering black communities, urban riots leave lingering damage. In 2004, The National Bureau of Economic Research published research on riots that took place in the 1960s and 1970s, and Carter notes the research found not only a decline in the median black family income in riot-impacted cities but also declines in male employment rates and in the median value of black-owned property.
And as for “premeditated economic exploitation” and political disempowerment justifying violence, Rev. Jesse Lee Peterson notes20 that even during the era of Jim Crow laws, when institutionalized racism was both legal and praised, black crime was “relatively low” — no riots as a “legitimate political strategy ” then. And since Johnson’s infamous War on Poverty21 was launched, Peterson adds, there has been a “massive wealth transfer to black Americans in the form of welfare and other handouts.” Certainly, a case can be made for economic exploitation, but the indictment would be against those intent on keeping black voters dependent on the government for handouts.
Is violence, then, justified, or is it simply being used as an escape from tackling problems with resolution — not simply retribution — in mind? Just as profanity is often the discourse of those unwilling to develop a compelling vocabulary, so violence is often the discourse of those unwilling to develop compelling arguments.
And there is inarguably a need for compelling arguments. While America has made exceptional strides toward Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s goal of judging others based not on the color of their skin but on the content of their character, racism has sadly not yet breathed its last in America. |
