The Patriot Post Digest 4-11-2016

[nChrist]

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The Patriot Post Digest 4-11-2016
From The Federalist Patriot
Free Email Subscription
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Mid-Day Digest

Apr. 11, 2016

THE FOUNDATION

“If individuals be not influenced by moral principles; it is in vain to look for public virtue; it is, therefore, the duty of legislators to enforce, both by precept and example, the utility, as well as the necessity of a strict adherence to the rules of distributive justice.” —James Madison (1789)

TOP RIGHT HOOKS

Obama Taints FBI’s Clinton Email Probe1

Barack Obama blew another dog whistle at the FBI, seeking to influence its investigation into the possible security threat Hillary Clinton posed by an unsecured email server during her tenure as secretary of state. “I guarantee that there is no political influence in any investigation conducted by the Justice Department, or the FBI — not just in this case, but in any case,” Obama told Fox News2 during an interview aired Sunday. “Nobody is above the law. How many times do I have to say it?”

Recently, the FBI started questioning3 longtime Clinton aides regarding the politician’s email habits, signaling that the bureau was getting close to concluding its investigation. But despite Obama’s doublespeak claims to the contrary, he can influence how the law looks on Clinton. Later in the interview, Obama asserted, “I continue to believe that she has not jeopardized America’s national security. Now what I’ve also said is that — and she has acknowledged — that there’s a carelessness, in terms of managing emails, that she has owned, and she recognizes.”

After comments like those, how could Attorney General Loretta Lynch buck the will of her boss and charge Clinton with anything more than a slap on the wrist? As the Wall Street Journal editorial board pointed out4, “A more scrupulous President would have begged off the question by claiming that he can’t comment on an ongoing investigation in a department he supervises. So saying anything was bad enough. But even more notable was Mr. Obama’s use of the word ‘intentionally’ regarding Mrs. Clinton’s actions. As a lawyer, the President knows that intent is often crucial to determining criminal liability. And he went out of his way — twice — to suggest that what Mrs. Clinton did wasn’t intentional but was mere ‘carelessness, in terms of managing emails.’” Obama signaled once again that he wants Clinton to be the heir to his legacy, and he will do anything — even publicly perverting an investigation — so one of his former cabinet members won’t receive what she is rightfully due.

A Fast and Furious Document Dump5

The Obama administration continues to obscure its hand in the Fast and Furious gun-walking scheme, even though the legal machine of Congress is grinding the truth from it. Thanks to an order6 issued by a judge in January, the Obama administration finally released thousands of documents Congress subpoenaed regarding the sting that the Obama administration wanted to use to justify more gun control7. Obama prevented Congress from fully investigating by claiming the documents were protected by executive privilege. Releasing the documents on a Friday afternoon to obscure their significance demonstrates the Obama administration would rather keep this deadly scheme in the dark.

In a statement8, House Oversight Committee Chairman Jason Chaffetz said: “As we’ve long asserted, the Committee requires and is entitled to these documents. … The Committee has a duty to understand and shine light on what was happening inside [the Department of Justice] during the time of this irresponsible operation. Yet DOJ has obstructed our investigative work for years.” Indeed, former Attorney General Eric Holder went so far in his stonewalling as to stand in contempt9 of Congress.

The post-Holder DOJ continues to stonewall, as it withheld documents from this release. As a result, the Oversight Committee appealed the judge’s ruling so that it can force the DOJ to disclose all the documents over which the committee originally sued. Seeing how far the Obama Justice Department is going to keep the truth hidden, the saga of the Fast and Furious sting is far from over — for Congress or for the families terrorized by the cartels Obama armed.

Is Trouble Brewing in Cleveland?10

Trump supporter Roger Stone says trouble is brewing in Cleveland if Trump falls short of the 1,237-delegate threshold to win the Republican nomination. In fact, he’s outright advocating that his supporters respond with thuggish tactics. Last week he warned, “We will disclose the hotels and the room numbers of those delegates [in Cleveland] who are directly involved in the steal. If you’re from Pennsylvania, we’ll tell you who the culprits are. We urge you to visit their hotel and find them. You have a right to discuss this, if you voted in the Pennsylvania primary, for example, and your votes are being disallowed.”

If that seems like an empty threat, consider this. As The New Yorker’s Evan Osnos11 explains, “you can’t have a riot without a mob.” And if anyone knows how to exploit a constituency’s anger12, it’s Trump.

This is even more concerning because the prospect of a contested convention13 is growing. Case in point: It was a good weekend for Ted Cruz. The Denver Post reports14, “The Texas senator won all 34 delegates awarded in Colorado in what amounts to a stunning rebuke of Republican front-runner Donald Trump. Cruz completed the sweep by winning all 13 delegates at the state convention in Colorado Springs.” Meanwhile, in Indiana, it’s possible not a single one of the 27 delegates headed to Cleveland will back Trump.

Trump says the GOP is “trying to subvert the movement” by using “crooked shenanigans.” And his new delegate manager, Paul Manafort, claims, “You go to these county conventions, and you see the tactics, Gestapo tactics, the scorched-earth tactics.” Two things. First, it’s Trump, not Cruz, who has benefited most from the system. Trump has won 37% of the vote so far, but 45% of the delegates. Second, the Trump campaign could have avoided this setback by doing a little homework15 on how Colorado delegates are allocated. The rules aren’t new; it’s just that nobody (except the Cruz camp) has been paying attention.

[nChrist]

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The Patriot Post Digest 4-11-2016
From The Federalist Patriot
Free Email Subscription
________________________________________

BEST OF RIGHT OPINION

    Hans von Spakovsky: The Left’s Climate Inquisition’s New Target16
    Jeff Jacoby: If You Don’t Rent to Criminals, Are You a Racist?17
    Peggy Noonan: New York’s Vote Matters for a Change18

For more, visit Right Opinion19.

FEATURED RIGHT ANALYSIS
Are We Still a Nation of Laws?20

By Arnold Ahlert

How the Supreme Court rules in the case United States v. Texas may provide the ultimate indication of whether we remain a nation of laws or devolve into a nation of men — headed by a de facto dictator formerly known as the president of the United States.

In 2012, the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program was implemented21 by the Department of Homeland Security (DHS). Part of that implementation included criteria for determining when prosecutors could choose not to enforce immigration laws outlined in the program. Those who qualified were also allowed to apply for citizenship. Two years later, DHS established Deferred Action for Parents of Americans and Lawful Permanent Residents (DAPA) for parents and lawful permanent residents. Both programs, initiated by Barack Obama, had the same goal based on the same premise: granting de facto amnesty to millions of illegals based on “prosecutorial discretion” as defined solely by the executive branch of the federal government.

(More strategically22, Obama knew he risked losing in court. But he got credit for pandering to Hispanics by at least trying to implement amnesty, while any legal loss would save him from angering unions, who don’t want to compete with cheap illegal labor.)

His overreach didn’t sit well with Texas and 25 other states, which filed suit. On Feb. 16, 2015, federal district Judge Andrew S. Hanen ruled23 in favor of the states, one day before hundreds of thousands of illegals would have begun applying for permits and work protection under the program. A week later, the U.S. government asked Hanen to lift his injunction while it appealed his ruling to the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals in New Orleans, pushing the laughable argument that such was necessary “to ensure that the Department of Homeland Security is able to most effectively protect national security, public safety, and the integrity of the border.” Hanen denied the request24, and also eviscerated the Obama administration for granting three-year periods of deferred action to 108,081 individuals between the implementation of DAPA and the preliminary injunction — and then lying about it.

The administration then asked the Fifth Circuit court to stay the injunction pending an appeal. That request too was denied25 by a three-member panel on May 26, 2015. It meant the administration could not implement DAPA until the Fifth Circuit ruled on the injunction itself. On Nov. 9, 2015, the Fifth Circuit reaffirmed26 Hanen’s original injunction.

On April 18, the Supreme Court will hear arguments on the case.

In the meantime, U.S. Solicitor General Donald Verrilli is advancing the argument that the Obama administration has even more prosecutorial discretion to advance this constitutionally dubious agenda. Verrilli claims Obama not only has the power to continue allowing millions of illegals to keep violating immigration law, but also the power to make them eligible for federal benefit programs, such as Social Security, disability and Medicare. Verrilli admits the prosecutorial discretion that enables deferred action “does not confer lawful immigration status or provide any defense to removal,” and that aliens with deferred action status “thus cannot receive food stamps, Supplemental Security Income, temporary aid for needy families, and many other federal benefits.” However, he insists that illegals remain eligible for “earned-benefit programs.” Verrilli stated, “A non-qualified alien is not categorically barred, however, from participating in certain federal earned-benefit programs associated with lawfully working in the United States — the Social Security retirement and disability, Medicare, and railroad-worker programs — so long as the alien is ‘lawfully present in the United States as determined by the [DHS secretary].’”

That would be DHS Secretary Jeh Johnson, who recently asserted the millions of illegals currently residing in America are “not going away,” and are “in effect” citizens. The same Jeh Johnson who told27 the Senate Homeland Security Committee that “there’s only so much border security you can accomplish” to stem three years' worth of surges across our Southern border. He said so less than one month after National Border Patrol Council president Brandon Judd told28 the immigration subcommittee of House Judiciary Committee that the administration had ordered U.S. Customs and Border Protection agents to release illegal immigrants and no longer issue Notices to Appear (NTAs) at deportation hearings.

Thus, despite everything this administration says, illegals continue to flood into the nation.

Last week, 43 U.S. senators filed29 a friend-of-the-court brief (amici curiae) to the Supreme Court supporting the states' side of the litigation: “As members of the Senate, amici have an unquestionable interest in protecting the legislative powers that Article I of the Constitution confers upon the Congress of the United States.” Article I states, “All legislative Powers herein granted shall be vested in a Congress of the United States.” The House filed a similar brief.

But who’s kidding whom? One of the most consequential legislative powers vested in Congress is the power of the purse. Yet when it came time during the 2015 budget negotiations to defund the DHS in response to Obama’s amnesty initiatives, the Senate caved first, followed by the House shortly thereafter. They are now relying on the Supreme Court to validate the same powers they themselves abdicated.

“If the president is allowed to go ahead and to do this, and it’s decided that it’s constitutional, then you can send Congress home,” explains political analyst Charles Krauthammer.

And if they got their way, some leftists would have the Supreme Court fill the vacuum. “The possibility of five or six Democratic justices allows one to imagine what might be done in other areas,” fantasizes30 Erwin Chemerinsky in a column for The Atlantic. “Might the Court find a constitutional right to education and conclude that disparities in school funding violate the Constitution? Might the Court find that the racial injustices in the criminal-justice system violate equal protection?”

[nChrist]

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The Patriot Post Digest 4-11-2016
From The Federalist Patriot
Free Email Subscription
________________________________________

No doubt there are plenty of things a leftist-dominated Supreme Court could “discover” in an all out embrace of a “living constitution.”

What the current Court should determine is that Obama’s attempt to write immigration law wholly on his own is unconstitutional. And while most Americans assume eight Justices will decide the outcome due to Antonin Scalia’s death, only seven should be adjudicating this case. That’s because Justice Sonia Sotomayor served as a board member and vice president for LatinoJustice, a Ford Foundation- and Soros-funded group advocating for open borders and DAPA’s legality. Before that she was member of the National Council of La Raza, another radical open borders organization with racialist undertones.

That’s what would happen in a nation of laws. Beginning April 18, we’ll find out if America is still that kind of nation.

MORE ORIGINAL PERSPECTIVE

    ANALYSIS: Bill Clinton and the Hypocrites31
    Low-Crime Vermont to Blame for NYC Crime?32
    Administration Rushes Vetting of Syrian Refugees33
    Obama’s Regulatory Decrees to Get Worse34

TOP HEADLINES

    Sotomayor Wants More Diversity on Court35
    Brussels Terrorists Planned Another Hit on France36
    Wisconsin Right-to-Work Law Struck Down37

For more, visit Patriot Headline Report38

OPINION IN BRIEF

Hans von Spakovsky: “In a truly outrageous abuse of his authority and a misuse of the law, the attorney general of the U.S. Virgin Islands, Claude E. Walker, has served a subpoena on the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) demanding documents related to CEI’s research on global ‘climate change.’ … The voluminous, harassing 14-page subpoena says Inquisitor Walker is investigating ExxonMobil for ‘misrepresenting its knowledge of the likelihood that its products and activities have contributed to and are continuing to contribute to climate change in order to defraud the Government … and consumers.’ This supposedly violates the Criminally Influenced and Corrupt Organizations Act, which is the Virgin Islands' version of the federal Racketeer Influenced and Corrupt Organization Act, or RICO. … This investigation is intended to silence and chill any opposition. It is disgraceful and contemptible behavior by public officials who are willing to exploit their power to achieve ideological ends. … What is happening to ExxonMobil and to the Competitive Enterprise Institute is persecution. It is an affront to our grand tradition of free speech and vigorous scientific debate and should not be tolerated.”

SHORT CUTS

The Gipper: “We need true tax reform that will at least make a start toward restoring for our children the American Dream that wealth is denied to no one, that each individual has the right to fly as high as his strength and ability will take him. … But we cannot have such reform while our tax policy is engineered by people who view the tax as a means of achieving changes in our social structure.”

Upright: “Whatever their mistakes, Republican leaders have built the largest majority in Congress and the states since the 1920s. They’ve developed the most ambitious reform agenda in decades — on taxes, entitlements and even poverty. Anyone who claims there’s no difference between Paul Ryan and Tom DeLay, or for that matter President Obama, is obtuse or dishonest. If Republicans had stayed focused on the Obama record and Hillary Clinton, they’d now be uniting with a great chance to retake the White House and reform the federal government.” —The Wall Street Journal

Non Compos Mentis: “We really are the only advanced democracy on Earth that systematically and purposely makes it really hard for people to vote. … And there’s a legacy to that that grows directly out of a history in which first property-owning men, then white men, then white folks didn’t want women, minorities to participate in the political process and be able to empower themselves in that fashion. … Australia has got mandatory voting. You start getting 70-80 percent voting rates, that’s transformative.” —Barack Obama

Oops: “[My worst mistake was] probably failing to plan for the day after what I think was the right thing to do in intervening in Libya.” —Barack Obama

The BIG Lie: “That is beyond absurd. [Republicans are] saying a lot of things these days, and I’m just going to let them say whatever they choose to say. ISIS was primarily the result of the [power] vacuum in Syria caused by Assad first and foremost, aided and abetted by Iran and Russia.” —Hillary Clinton on why neither she nor Barack Obama are to blame for the rise of the Islamic State

Blind squirrel finds a nut: “She may have the experience to be president of the United States. No one can argue that. But in terms of her judgment, something is clearly lacking.” —Bernie Sanders

Late-night humor: “John Kasich had to move his campaign event to a larger venue when he got more RSVPs than expected. Kasich said, ‘We had to move it from a toll booth to a Sunglass Hut.’” —Conan O'Brien

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.