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« on: November 10, 2015, 06:54:14 PM » |
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The Patriot Post Digest 11-6-2015
From The Federalist Patriot
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Daily Digest
Nov. 6, 2015
THE FOUNDATION
“I think all the world would gain by setting commerce at perfect liberty.” —Thomas Jefferson, 1785
TOP RIGHT HOOKS
Economists Expected a Scare but Oct. Jobs Report Not Bad1
The U.S. economy added 271,000 jobs in October and the unemployment rate fell a tenth of a point to 5%. After the discouraging jobs reports2 for August and September, economists feared the worst for the Bureau of Labor Statistics' October jobs report3. For months, the economy has struggled to add enough jobs to keep pace with population growth, and economists thought the October report would say America gained only 185,000 jobs. Yet by some indicators in the report, the economy seems to be slowly turning around. Even the alternative measure of unemployment, the U-6 rate, dropped from September’s 10% to 9.8% for October. The BLS revised up its employment numbers for the late summer, reporting the economy added an additional 12,000 jobs. And while many of October’s hires were possibly in preparation for the holidays (44,000 jobs were added in the retail trade sector), the most notable areas of growth were in health care and professional and business services.
This encouraging report may precipitate Federal Reserve action on interest rates in December. The Washington Post reported4 ahead of BLS’s release that investors saw a 50% chance the Fed would raise interest rates next month. The report also means the economy could yet break free of Barack Obama’s economic quagmire. That’s good news, but it could prove politically challenging. As the American Enterprise Institute’s James Pethokoukis tweeted5, “GOP couldn’t beat Obama with 8% unemployment. Can they beat Hillary when it’s 4% next November?”
Zombie Ex-Im Bank Is Undead6
As Ronald Reagan once said, “The nearest thing to eternal life we will ever see on this earth is a government program.” He was all too right. “The House on Wednesday night rejected efforts to derail a renewal of the Export-Import Bank, virtually assuring a new life for the agency,” reports The Hill7. “Supporters of the 81-year-old bank highlighted the 313-118 House vote last week — 127 Republicans voted in support — in favor of reviving Ex-Im as proof of the strong support in Congress.”
As we noted8 before its temporary expiration, the bank is a little-known federal agency that gives loans to foreign customers to buy U.S. goods. In practice it’s little more than a mechanism for Big Government to choose Big Business winners and losers. The first warning that the bank would be a cronyism cesspool was when the father of modern Big Government, FDR, created it by executive order in 1934. The second warning is that Ex-Im’s biggest defenders are cronyists in Congress and in huge companies like GE and Boeing, the latter of which benefits from 30%9 of the bank’s financing — nearly $70 billion over the last seven years to foreign purchasers of its products.
Rep. Stephen Fincher (R-TN), who led the GOP charge to reinstate the bank, said Wednesday that “this is a Republican reform bill, [and] we should be happy when Democrats want to cross the aisle to support Republican ideas.” He added, “It’s sad when people put their political scorecards above their constituents.” No, it’s sad when Republicans abandon the Constitution and free-market principles in favor of cronyism. But that’s standard procedure in Washington.
If the Planet’s Warming, Why Is McCarthy Going After AC?10
The 27th Meeting of the Parties to the Montreal Protocol, which began on Sunday, came to a close Thursday in Dubai. The United States was represented by EPA Administrator Gina McCarthy, who urged an amendment to the Montreal Protocol that would require a global reduction in hydrofluorocarbons. In an op-ed11 for The Guardian, she wrote, “Our planet’s fragile ozone layer is on a path toward full restoration by about 2050. But there’s a hitch: the success has hinged largely on replacing ozone-depleting substances with hydrofluorocarbon (HFCs) — chemicals we now know are highly damaging to the environment.” Consequently, McCarthy now advocates a universal policy curbing HFCs in equipment and material like air conditioners, refrigerators and insulation. She continues:
“It was the 1987 Montreal Protocol, one of the most successful environmental treaties in history, which led to HFCs replacing ozone-destroying pollutants. On 1 November, at the international meeting of the Parties to the Montreal Protocol in Dubai, the United States will make a powerful case for better management of HFC pollution worldwide. Because of the importance of taking aggressive action on these chemicals to achieve global climate goals, I will be leading the United States delegation at that meeting. … Solutions are here, and it’s time to amend the Montreal Protocol to reflect that.”
Hot Air’s Jazz Shaw quips, “Maybe it’s just me, but the same moment you’re telling everyone how much warmer it’s getting might not be the best time to take away their air conditioner.” Besides, researchers just informed us that rising global temperatures are ruining Americans' sex lives12. Moreover, they hypothesize that the population is bigger today because of air conditioning. And now they want to take that away? Liberal logic — it’s why we can’t have nice things.
FEATURED RIGHT ANALYSIS
Democrats' Misplaced Faith13
By Kelly Bartlett
Kentucky House Speaker Greg Stumbo, a Democrat, tried to rally dispirited party members in an odd speech following Tuesday’s election losses. At times, Stumbo sounded more like a preacher speaking to his flock than a politician. The primary takeaway is that Democrats have no idea how to talk about faith, and they are particularly guilty of making Christianity into nothing more than a religion about Big Government.
Memo to Democrats: Jesus wasn’t a socialist14.
Perhaps Stumbo ditched his victory speech last minute for this impromptu sermon. After all, Democrats were floored that, once again, polls were so wrong. Conservatives Matt Bevin and Jenean Hampton handily won election15 as governor and lieutenant governor, respectively, despite being down in the polls.
Acknowledging a “bad night,” Stumbo promised a “new day” was coming. “Our message has to be reflected upon,” he exhorted. “We can’t let them miscommunicate what our core values are. We can’t let them make people believe that we are not godly people. We can’t make them believe that only Christians are Republicans and Republicans [are] therefore entitled to hold office.”
Stumbo’s sermon boiled down to this: We’re Democrats because “the Bible tells me so.”
But his ignorance and gross misinterpretation were on full display:
“I’m gonna admit I have not read the Holy Book from front to finish like some of you probably have, but my reading of our Bible shows that the word Republican or Democrat isn’t used. And people sometimes ask me … what would Jesus have been if he were alive? Would he be a Democrat or Republican? I don’t know. Nobody knows. The Bible doesn’t tell us that, does it?
"But I believe the Bible is a book of parables. God teaches us through lessons. We are children and this is the primer that he uses to teach us lessons. So, the lessons of our party are the lessons of the Bible.”
Here Stumbo makes a huge leap of faith and logic. His argument is essentially that God uses the Bible to teach us lessons, therefore Democrats are the Bible Party. This goes beyond clinging to religion16 — this is a blatant attempt to co-opt Scripture for political gain. To be fair, both parties are capable of doing that. Ohio governor and GOP presidential candidate John Kasich has used17 Matthew 25 to endorse expanding ObamaCare in his state. |
