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« on: June 07, 2016, 06:38:02 PM » |
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The Patriot Post Digest 6-6-2016
From The Federalist Patriot
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Mid-Day Digest
Jun. 6, 2016
THE FOUNDATION
“Here comes the orator! With his flood of words, and his drop of reason.” —Benjamin Franklin (1735)
TOP RIGHT HOOKS
Fact-Challenged Obama Touts Economic Record1
Despite a dismal May jobs report2 that showed only 38,000 jobs were added to the economy last month, Barack Obama stubbornly stayed on message to say in his weekly address over the weekend that he brought back the American economy. Earlier in the week, before the report dropped, Obama visited Elkhart, Indiana, to tout his economic “legacy”3 and despite facts to the contrary, Obama claimed the city’s recovery was due to his policies. “It’s also because we made a series of smart decisions early in my presidency,” Obama said, pointing to such policies as bailing out the auto industry and pouring subsidies into the otherwise not-yet-viable alternative energy sector.
Ignoring the recent headlines, Obama turned political with his fact-free speech when he mentioned the presidential election. “We’ve got to come together, around our common economic goals,” Obama said. “We’ve got to push back against policies that protect powerful special interests, and push for a better deal for all working Americans. That’s the choice you’ll get to make this year.”
But if you want to see a frozen economy, only look at what Obama hath wrought. At least one economist — from the left-leaning Brookings Institution no less — says4 the economy may have actually lost 4,000 jobs in May. Add that to the Bureau of Labor Statistics' downward revision that said 59,000 jobs were not actually added in March and April. And while the Federal Reserve was going to decide whether to raise interest rates again in a few days, that’s now off the table5 again because the jobs report indicates the nation is still mired in anemic growth. A few weeks ago, Fed Chairwoman Janet Yellen said6 she may consider imposing negative interest rates in an effort to get the economy growing again. While Obama’s regulation has choked out industries such as coal, he had the gall to blame “Republicans in Congress” for blocking his job-creating “investments.” Reality, however, is more telling than Obama’s words.
Clinton’s Constitutional Contempt7
Hillary Clinton is no fan of guns or of the Second Amendment. That’s not news to anyone reading these pages, or anyone who’s been paying attention since she advocated banning “assault weapons” in the early 1990s. As for this campaign, back in October, she discussed her plan for more gun control8. Beyond the leftist platitude of “universal background checks,” which we already essentially have, she declared that gun manufacturers should be liable for how their products are used. She has also praised Australian gun confiscation9 as something worth looking into.
So questions about her interpretation of the Second Amendment are justified. And former Clintonista George Stephanopoulos actually asked her a tough one: “Do you believe that an individual’s right to bear arms is a constitutional right — that it’s not linked to service in a militia?”
Clinton did her best to evade the question beyond blaming “the late Justice Scalia” for his ruling in the Heller case. Before that ruling, she argued, “there was a nuanced reading of the Second Amendment.” She proceeded to regurgitate her policy preferences, before insisting, “If it is a constitutional right, then it, like every other constitutional right, is subject to reasonable regulation” (emphasis added). Clinton is only grudgingly conceding that the Supreme Court has ruled bearing arms an individual right, not that the Constitution clearly enumerates it. She’s also strongly implying that she would both regulate it further and nominate judges who would work to limit it. Democrats have nothing but contempt for the Constitution, though they cloak it in rhetoric of feigned respect.
Islamic State, Not Climate Change, Is Greatest Security Threat10
When John Kerry was registering his objection to the United States going into Iraq, he said of George W. Bush, he “took his eye off the ball,” by which Kerry meant going into Afghanistan was okay but not into Iraq. Obama used the same phrase five years later just before he entered the White House to describe Bush’s decision to invade the country. At that time, he was already making plans to order U.S. troops out of Iraq.
We know what happened next. The pullout left a vacuum11 in which the Islamic State festered and grew. Meanwhile the Obama administration shifted its focus to global warming. In September 2014, Kerry declared12 that climate change was the biggest threat this nation faced. And in preparation for the UN climate treaty, the administration said13 climate change was “an urgent and growing threat to our national security, contributing to increased natural disasters, refugee flows, and conflicts over basic resources like food and water.”
Now, the State Department has issued a report14 on terrorism across the globe that named the Islamic State as the greatest global threat. The State Department reported, “Toward the end of 2015, ISIL fighters conducted a series of external attacks in France, Lebanon, and Turkey, demonstrating the organization’s capabilities to carry out deadly plots beyond Iraq and Syria and also exposing weakness in international border security measures and systems. These attacks may also have been staged in an effort to assert a narrative of victory in the face of steady losses of territory in Iraq and Syria.” The fight against the Islamic State might be making gains, but it does not mean the group is contained nor the world safe from attack. Someone took his eye off the ball, and it wasn’t George W. Bush.
Oh, and one more thing — the State Department identified the number one state sponsor of terrorism: Iran. Clearly, Obama’s $150 billion gift to the mullahs through the nuclear deal will work out just fine.
D-Day and Ronald Reagan15
Today is the anniversary of D-Day. More than 160,000 troops landed on a 50-mile stretch of heavily fortified beaches along the Normandy coast of France in what was the largest invasion force in history, involving more than 5,000 ships and 13,000 aircraft. Some 9,000 Allied soldiers were killed or wounded that day. We owe these Patriots and generations of others an enormous debt of gratitude, and we owe them our steadfast devotion to Liberty over tyranny in our own day, so that the gift of Liberty may be extended to the next generation.
Read Ronald Reagan’s speech on the 40th anniversary16.
Speaking of Reagan, Saturday marked 12 years since his passing. Don’t miss our 2004 tribute to the Gipper17.
BEST OF RIGHT OPINION
Todd Starnes: School Sends Sheriff to Order Child to Stop Sharing Bible Verses18
Jeff Jacoby: Should You Need the Government’s Permission to Work?19
George Will: Britain, Too, Is Infected With Political Silliness20
For more, visit Right Opinion21.
FEATURED RIGHT ANALYSIS
The Left’s Culture War ‘Victory’22
By Arnold Ahlert
If one is conservative, a recent Washington Post article23 by Barton Swaim should raise one’s hackles on two counts. First, Swaim asserts the Left has won the culture war. Second, while some conservatives will resist that assertion, Swaim contends “many do not.” He argues, “Many have finally given up on the whole idea of a culture war or are willing to admit they lost it. They are determined only to remain who they are and to live as amiably and productively as they can in a culture that doesn’t look like them and doesn’t belong to them.” Perhaps the surrenderists should reconsider for the simplest of reasons: If the Left has won the culture war, it is the epitome of a Pyrrhic victory.
Or to paraphrase a familiar quote from the Vietnam War era, the Left had to destroy the nation in order to save it.
The signs are everywhere. “In 2014, 28% of young men were living with a spouse or partner in their own home, while 35% were living in the home of their parent(s),” a Pew study reveals24. Pew further notes this particular change in status for adults between the ages of 18 and 34 is occurring “for the first time in more than 130 years.” The remaining 22% are living with another relative, a non-relative, or in group quarters such as college dormitories. The primary reason? A “postponement of, if not retreat from, marriage,” Pew explains. “In addition, a growing share of young adults may be eschewing marriage altogether.”
In other words, we are seeing the postponement of a critical component of adulthood for as long as possible by the same cohort of Americans who have heartily embraced “safe spaces” — the foremost of which is apparently mom and dad’s house. |
