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« on: May 15, 2015, 06:11:07 PM » |
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The Patriot Post Digest 5-15-2015
From The Federalist Patriot
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Daily Digest
May 15, 2015
THE FOUNDATION
“The executive and legislative branches of the national government depend upon, and emanate from the states. Every where the state sovereignties are represented; and the national sovereignty, as such, has no representation.” —Joseph Story, Commentaries on the Constitution, 1833
ARMED FORCES DAY
Tomorrow is Armed Forces Day. We remain the land of the free because these Patriots — American Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines and Coastguardsmen — have stood bravely in harm’s way and remain on post today. For this, we, the American people, offer our heartfelt thanks and prayers for you and your families.
The Patriot Post is proud to be one of the nation’s leading advocates for our Armed Forces and their mission. We do this by providing countless Americans with the right perspective on that mission and the demanding tasks our military personnel have carried out with unfailing courage and professionalism. In addition, we support our warriors through efforts such as Operation Shield of Strength1 — from which we have now distributed more than one million dog tags — our Support and Defend2 pages, and The Patriot Post Shop3, which carries an extensive collection of products bearing official military insignia, the proceeds of which support our mission of service to our Armed Forces.
TOP RIGHT HOOKS
Obama’s Nuke Deal Gets Loads of Skepticism4
Once Barack Obama signs his deal with Iran, that’s it. Re-imposing sanctions or striking down the nuclear deal will become very hard — even if Iran does weaponize its nuclear program. On Thursday, Congress passed its resolution5 watering down its role in treaty negotiation by requiring a 30-day review of Obama’s treaty before voting on it. Essentially, Obama’s deal can be struck down only by veto-proof majorities in Congress. Meanwhile, Russia announced6 it will not allow an automatic snapback of sanctions if Iran is found stuffing fissile material into missiles, and it can use its position as one of the veto votes on the UN Security Council to prevent such a diplomatic move. By doing so, Russia is currying favor with Iran.
Finally, Obama hosted leaders of countries in the Persian Gulf7 at Camp David Thursday, trying to assure them that this nuclear deal is in their best interest. But after reading the joint statement released after the meeting, Charles Krauthammer8 said, “That was a prepared statement for a summit that is meant to assure the Gulf Arabs that we’re not selling them out. That was a sellout announcement. … They should be terrified.” Another win for Obama.
The DOJ Is on a Mission to Stop Racist Pollution9
Under the current administration, we’ve come to expect an ideologically activist Department of Justice that seeks out instances of pollution and racism and acts accordingly. But when the DOJ looks for instances where pollution itself is racist, the department veers into injustice. National Review’s Roger Clegg pointed out a DOJ publication that touted this approach in its spring edition10. According to a memorandum issued by Bill Clinton during his administration: “In accordance with Title VI of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, each Federal agency shall ensure that all programs or activities receiving Federal financial assistance that affect human health or the environment do not directly, or through contractual or other arrangements, use criteria, methods, or practices that discriminate on the basis of race, color, or national origin.” That means if an organization receiving federal funds — like a city government — needs to somehow affect the environment, it needs to justify that it’s not racist to boot. Justice thus assumes that creating a landfill or creating a facility that deals with harmful chemicals in a certain location may have racist intent when in fact the intent may be purely economic. Furthermore, labeling neighborhoods “black” or “white” fails to take into account their evolution, as when they undergo white flight or gentrification. But never mind all this when social justice – rather than colorblind justice – is the DOJ’s ultimate goal. More…11
No, Antarctica Is Not Experiencing Rapid Ice Melt12
Antarctic sea ice is so expansive that researchers are exploring ways to avoid more embarrassing mishaps13. Writing in The Daily Caller, Michael Bastasch says, “50 scientists have gathered in Tasmania to discuss more accurate ways to predict Antarctic sea ice levels so researchers don’t get stuck in ice pack when traveling southward.” So it was richly ironic when CBS News reported this week that “Antarctica is melting from above and below14.” The article, which documents a new alarming study on how global warming is supposedly eating away at the giant ice cap, begins with an outrageous claim — “It’s no secret that ice shelves in Antarctica are thinning” — and warns that “warming air temperatures and warmer ocean currents together could explain why the Antarctic Peninsula’s floating ice shelves are losing volume and becoming more vulnerable to collapse.” The truth? As of Wednesday, sea ice extent was breaking the previous record high set just last year, according to data from the National Snow & Ice Data Center, and the trend for decades now has been a steady increase in areal ice coverage. In fairness, the exception is the western portion of the continent, where ice is lagging behind the 1981-2010 average. But averages are based on the whole, not cherry-picked portions of the data. This is nothing more than selective outrage.
FEATURED RIGHT ANALYSIS
The Woulda, Shoulda, Coulda Approach to Foreign Policy15
By Michael Swartz
As a leading GOP presidential candidate and brother of the former president, Jeb Bush had to know he was going to be asked about Iraq sometime during the campaign. That “sometime” came this week as Megyn Kelly of Fox News asked him whether, “knowing what we know now,” he would have authorized the invasion of Iraq16. Jeb used the answer to both speculate that Hillary Clinton would have done (in fact, did) the same thing and declare that, “if they’re trying to find places where there’s big space between me and my brother, this might not be one of those.”
The blowback was predictable, and he quickly walked back his answer, insisting he’d misheard the question. He did seem to answer the “knowing what we knew then” version. Now he says flatly, “I would not have gone into Iraq.”
Needless to say, there’s been a lot of debate about the fitness of the younger Bush’s initial answer. Conservatives ponder whether he needed a better one17, made “a rookie mistake18,” or was exactly right19. There are also those who thought the question itself was “completely stupid20.”
Stupid or not, the question was bound to come up as a result of the ongoing mess we’re dealing with in the Middle East, and we now have over a decade of hindsight at our disposal. There weren’t the quantities of weapons of mass destruction everyone — even those who quickly pretended otherwise — originally believed were in Iraq.
Intelligence estimates at the time were all George W. Bush had to go on, not “what we know now.” There was also Saddam Hussein’s established record of atrocities, belligerence and threats to U.S. interests. So, we eliminated a bloody dictator, the byproduct of which convinced Libyan strongman Moammar Gadhafi that he should abandon his own efforts at a WMD program.
Obviously, the “knowing what we know now” question is valid only as a hypothetical, since we cannot turn back the hands of time. But if we’re playing the hindsight game, we should also consider what the consequences of inaction might have been. Might Saddam Hussein now be a nuclear-powered menace? And might the region have already experienced its first nuclear calamity? We can only deal with the here and now, and the window of opportunity for taking action isn’t generally unlimited.
Indeed, as former Secretary of State Henry Kissinger observed, “The analyst can allot whatever time is necessary to come to a clear conclusion; the overwhelming challenge to the statesman is the pressure of time. The analyst runs no risk. If his conclusions prove wrong, he can write another treatise. The statesman is permitted only one guess; his mistakes are irretrievable. The analyst has available to him all the facts; he will be judged on his intellectual power. The statesman must act on assessments that cannot be proved at the time that he is making them; he will be judged by history on the basis of how wisely he managed the inevitable change and, above all, by how well he preserves the peace.” |
