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« on: January 04, 2016, 05:19:33 PM » |
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The Patriot Post Digest 1-4-2016
From The Federalist Patriot
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Daily Digest
Jan. 4, 2016
THE FOUNDATION
“Giving a distinct and independent power to do any act they please which may be good for the Union, would render all the preceding and subsequent enumerations of power completely useless.” —Thomas Jefferson, 1791
PUBLISHER’S NOTE
If you are among many who could not access our Website over the past few days, let me assure you, we’ve not laid down our arms! For the last week, data centers across the nation have been subject to endless “denial of service” attacks. While such targeted attacks are not unusual and often pass unnoticed, the recent attacks were unusual in their size and severity. Of course, none of our Website software or data was compromised. We’re pleased to report that we are back online today, full steam ahead. If you attempted to support to our 2015 Year-End Campaign1 and were unable to do so because of the interruption, please do so today!
TOP RIGHT HOOKS
Obama’s New Year Resolution: Targets Guns2
Entering the New Year, Barack Obama is scheduled to meet with Attorney General Loretta Lynch to discuss how his administration can take executive action to create more gun control. In his weekly address3 Jan. 2, Obama pulled out all the rhetorical stops, evoking the Sandy Hook massacre and the shooting of former Rep. Gabby Giffords to say that he would make it a priority to use his phone and pen to enact more gun control regulation against the American people because Congress wouldn’t. “We know that we can’t stop every act of violence,” Obama said. “But what if we tried to stop even one? What if Congress did something — anything — to protect our kids from gun violence? A few months ago, I directed my team at the White House to look into any new actions I can take to help reduce gun violence.”
While Obama’s cronies guesstimate out how far he can go, the office of House Speaker Paul Ryan said4 the executive branch hasn’t communicated its specific gun control aspirations to Congress. Seems like that would have been a prerequisite before Obama declared that the legislative body refused to act. Such a move from Obama guarantees that he will push Americans to continue purchasing firearms in record numbers5 before the feds descend with their regulations. Obama opined that he received letters from “responsible gun owners” (as if the only gun owners that are responsible are the ones who agree with Obama) asking him to take action on gun violence. But the person acting irresponsibly is Obama. The federal government has all the tools necessary6 to curb gun violence, all the laws already on the books to crack down on straw purchases, but Obama’s administration refuses to act. And because of that, criminals are allowed to walk free while gun-toting lovers of Liberty are viewed with deep suspicion. But Obama cares nothing of the law; he only has his ideology to push.
Marine Vet Stands Up to DMV Red Tape7
If “Pastafarians,” people who satirize religion by claiming to be worshipers of the Flying Spaghetti Monster, can get their department of motor vehicles to let them wear colanders on their heads8 while getting their driver’s license photo taken, then government can at least accommodate a veteran wanting to display his service to his homeland. Last month, Marine Corps vet Alex Morales went to his local DMV in California to get a new license while he was wearing a baseball cap with “USMC” emblazoned across it in red. Ahead of him, the DMV was photographing a group of men, probably Sikhs, who were wearing turbans. Here’s how Morales' wife, Henrietta, described what happened next in a Facebook post9:
“Alex was asked to take his hat off to have his picture taken. He said ‘no’, and ‘no’ again when asked the second time. When he was asked why he would not remove his hat he said, ‘those men didn’t remove their head wear, I shouldn’t either’. It was explained that this was their attire and their religion. Alex told the DMV person that what he had on was his attire and when he entered the Marines he declared an oath to the USA, and one nation under God, so that his oath was under God so just as good as his religion.”
Eventually, the DMV allowed Morales to stand for his photo, USMC hat and all. Afterwards, Henrietta Morales said some of the DMV staff quietly applauded Morales' stand. Marine vet: 1. Bureaucratic tangle at the DMV: 0.
Ranchers Take on the Feds in Oregon10
A group of armed activists took over the closed and unoccupied headquarters building at the Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in Oregon, part of an escalating conflict over land use out West. Rancher Ammon Bundy is leading the group, and if his name sounds familiar it’s because he’s the son of Nevada rancher Cliven Bundy, who had a similar standoff with the feds in 2014. We wrote at the time to choose your mascot carefully11, and we’d advise the same now. Essentially, this dispute arises from two things: First, the truly unjust treatment and sentencing of Dwight Hammond and his son Steven, ranchers punished for arson after they managed controlled burns on their property a decade ago; second, the use of the federal land at the wildlife refuge — Bundy and the other ranchers claim the feds have unlawfully taken it, and the ranchers should be able to continue using it.
Many leftists are demanding12 that the ranchers' actions in recent days be considered terrorism. After all, Barack Obama and his cadres have been stoking fears of right-wing extremism13 since taking office; this is just “proof.” But no one has been held hostage or hurt, much less killed, and the ranchers are so far peaceably assembled. There’s no question the federal government possesses far too much land14 in the West, but what is the appropriate response? Clearly, many ranchers have had enough, and they’re willing to take up arms to stop the abuse — even, apparently, if it provokes a violent government response.
FEATURED RIGHT ANALYSIS
The GOP Brand Is Becoming Toxic15
By Arnold Ahlert
For the last few years, many people have been calling for the formation of a third political party. The latest budget deal16 demonstrated the error of that thinking: What America really needs is the formation of a second one.
After the deal was announced, the nation was forced to endure yet another round of media-trumpeted “bipartisanship.” Collusion is more like it, and the ones getting colluded against are average Americans who will be underwriting this 2,000-page paean to special interests. One that keeps upping an already unaffordable national debt, and makes a complete mockery of the notion we have at least one party dedicated to smaller, more responsible government. In fact the cheerleaders of this monstrosity ought to be required to answer a simple question:
What’s the compromise position between fiscal solvency and national bankruptcy?
Of course no one will ask such a question because it would force the surrenderist faction of the GOP to explain why they completely ignored the “stop Obama” mandate handed to them by voters in the 2014 mid-term elections. Economics aside, much of that mandate centered on public frustration with the de facto invasion occurring at our southern border. This bill just funded every progressive agenda item that aids and abets that invasion, including illegal alien resettlement programs, and Barack Obama’s constitutionally suspect executive amnesty agenda17.
“There is a reason that GOP voters are in open rebellion,” explains18 Sen. Jeff Sessions (R-AL). “They have come to believe that their party’s elites are not only uninterested in defending their interests but — as with this legislation, and fast-tracking the president’s international trade pact — openly hostile to them.”
That’s because they are. And while those elites and their media allies ring their collective hands over the success of Donald Trump, it apparently hasn’t occurred to them that they are the primary architects of Trump’s success.
A political party is two things: a conglomeration of people with a similar ideological agenda, and a brand. The Establishment GOP is on the verge of discovering a very uncomfortable truth: when you water down your ideology, you destroy your brand.
When the GOP had complete control of the federal government during the first six years of the Bush administration, they embarked on an unconscionable spending spree that remained the gold standard for fiscal irresponsibility until the Obama administration topped it. Even worse, they expected their base to be gulled into believing that “compassionate conservatism” was a different animal than “tax-and-spend liberalism.” |
