The Patriot Post Digest 8-21-2018

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The Patriot Post Digest 8-21-2018
From The Federalist Patriot
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The Patriot Post® · Mid-Day Digest

Aug. 21, 2018 · https://patriotpost.us/digests/57774-mid-day-digest

THE FOUNDATION

“A wise and frugal government … shall restrain men from injuring one another, shall leave them otherwise free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor the bread it has earned. This is the sum of good government.” —Thomas Jefferson (1801)

https://patriotpost.us/fqd/57773-founders-quote-daily

IN TODAY’S EDITION

Another win as Trump undoes Obama’s coal-killing regulations.
Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel is right. Wait … what?
Trump celebrates ICE and the Border Patrol in the face of leftist hysterics.
Good news the media ignored: ObamaCare premiums rose less than feared.
Daily Features: Top Headlines, Memes, Cartoons, Columnists, and Short Cuts.

IN BRIEF
Trump Rolls Back Obama’s Anti-Coal Regs1

Thomas Gallatin

Today, the Environmental Protection Agency will follow through on one of President Donald Trump’s major campaign promises in announcing plans for rolling back Barack Obama’s coal-killing environmental regulations on power-plant emissions. According to2 The Wall Street Journal, “The new plan … recommends a menu of upgrades designed to let coal-fired plants produce energy with less fuel and seeks to eliminate triggers that mandate costly technological overhauls at coal plants. While the Clean Power Plan was designed to reduce greenhouse gases and fight the cause of climate change, the Trump administration cast the regulation as setting unfair rules that coal plants wouldn’t be able to meet.” As EPA Administrator Andrew Wheeler explained, “The entire Obama administration plan was centered around doing away with coal.” Trump’s administration is correct about Obama’s power grab3.

The news was welcomed by Hal Quinn, president and chief executive of the National Mining Association, who noted that Obama’s Clean Power Plan “was a major impediment for our industry going forward in terms of what our markets look like.” Quinn added that the EPA’s action today “removes that pressure.”

The EPA noted that the decrease in coal-powered plants has created “tremendous strain on the power infrastructure even without the added pressures of an EPA mandate to further shift away from additional coal-fired generation.” The Trump administration argues that coal is an important fuel source and that its continuing decline threatens the electricity supply to the nation’s businesses and consumers.

The EPA’s plan would scrap most of Obama’s Clean Power Plan, leaving the authority for determining power-plant regulations up to individual states. The EPA will also deemphasize the Obama-era obsession over climate change, instead focusing on balancing concerns for both the environment and the economic importance of thriving industry.

Environmental groups and leftists were quick to cry foul, insisting Trump’s actions are illegal and will endanger the environment. There is little doubt that the courts will be heavily involved going forward. But, for now at least, Trump is delivering yet another win for American industry and energy.

https://patriotpost.us/articles/57770-trump-rolls-back-obamas-anti-coal-regs

Chicago Mayor’s Rare Candidness Assailed4
Jordan Candler

Chicago is notorious for the number of homicides tallied there every year. For example, on the weekend of August 3-5, the number of people gunned down in Chicago totaled 74, a dozen of whom died. This past weekend, six people were murdered out of nearly 60 shot. Minorities are responsible for most of the hundreds of homicides that occur in Chicago on an annual basis. Obviously, longstanding leftist policies aren’t working. More importantly, a dearth of morality and spiritual conviction is the underlying catalyst, which even Chicago Mayor Rahm Emanuel at least peripherally seems to understand. He recently admonished5:

This may not be politically correct, but I know the power of what faith and family can do. … Our kids need that structure. … I am asking … that we also don’t shy away from a full discussion about the importance of family and faith helping to develop and nurture character, self-respect, a value system and a moral compass that allows kids to know good from bad, and right from wrong.

If we’re going to solve this … we’ve got to have a real discussion. … Parts of the conversation cannot be off-limits because it’s not politically comfortable. … We are going to discuss issues that have been taboo in years past because they are part of the solution. … We also have a responsibility to help nurture character. It plays a role. Our kids need that moral structure in their lives. And we cannot be scared to have this conversation.

Emanuel’s message is the point — and conservative columnist Walter Williams would surely agree6 — yet it’s been largely ignored by leftists for decades. In truth, a message of faith and morality needs to be repeated throughout the country’s urban corridors. After all, Chicago is hardly alone when it comes to high homicide rates. Nevertheless, Fox News reports that “Emanuel is once again coming under fire for blaming a lack of morals in predominantly black and Hispanic neighborhoods for the recent spate of violent crime.” The report adds, “Critics quickly called him out for what they dubbed tone-deaf comments, in which he seemed to be blaming the victims.” These critics are simply condoning the status quo — and worse.

As Williams says, “What’s needed most is to get poor people to change their behavior. … If we wait for Washington to solve our problems, we’ll be waiting for a long time.” It’s rare that we can agree with Mayor Rahm “Never Let a Crisis Go to Waste” Emanuel, but alas, his remarks on Chicago violence are appropriate and long overdue. His message is great, but will he stick to it? Depends on whether he has character.

https://patriotpost.us/articles/57757-chicago-mayors-rare-candidness-assailed

Top Headlines7

Russian hackers targeted conservative think tanks prior to midterms (Fox News8)
Trump’s ICE deports NAZI war criminal who stayed under Obama (The Daily Wire9)
Trump’s rollback of CAFE mandates is a big win for car buyers, consumer choice (The Daily Signal10)
IRS still lacks protections for sensitive taxpayer information (The Washington Free Beacon11)
The Department of Education wants to publicize student debt to earnings data for students at all colleges (National Review12)
Doctor shortages explode thanks to ObamaCare — who could have predicted that? (Investor’s Business Daily13)
Protesters take down Confederate statue on UNC campus (Washington Examiner14)
Antifa in Portland beat up a Bernie bro because he was carrying a “fascist” American flag (Hot Air15)
Trump administration files suit against Facebook for “discriminatory” policies (The Daily Wire16)
Humor: Facebook claims kidnapping Dennis Prager, torturing him in abandoned warehouse was “honest mistake” (The Babylon Bee17)
Policy: Don’t subsidize coal; just stop trying to kill it off (Washington Examiner18)
Policy: Forcing China to be trustworthy (American Enterprise Institute19)
For more of today’s news, visit Patriot Headline Report20.

https://patriotpost.us/articles/57772-tuesday-top-headlines

Florida Officer Helps Homeless Man Land a Job21
“Going above and beyond the call of duty, one Florida officer helped a man get a clean shave so he could land a job. … Tallahassee Police Officer Tony Carlson said he noticed a man having some issues with his razor outside of a gas station” and he stopped to assist.

For more, visit KTLA22.

https://patriotpost.us/articles/57767-florida-officer-helps-homeless-man-land-a-job

FEATURED ANALYSIS
Immigration Problem? Put Some ICE on It28

Lewis Morris

President Donald Trump hosted an event at the White House Monday honoring29 the men and women of the Immigration and Customs Enforcement and the Customs and Border Protection agencies.

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The Patriot Post Digest 8-21-2018
From The Federalist Patriot
Free Email Subscription
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“You are the patriots and you are the heroes,” Trump told the assembled agents and agency personnel. “You keep us safe and you keep us free. I am honored every single day to serve as your commander-in-chief. I will never leave your side; I will never leave the fight.”

It’s a good thing, too. Both agencies are increasingly under fire by the Left and the media as the debate simmers over illegal immigration and how the government is supposed to handle it. According to leftists, the government shouldn’t do anything at all about illegal immigration. In fact, they are calling for the outright abolition of ICE30.

Don’t underestimate the power behind that challenge. The proposal to dismantle ICE may have started as an offhand remark by Bernie Sanders’s socialist padawan Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, but it is now a mainstream Democrat plank. Likely 2020 presidential candidates such as Kirsten Gillibrand, Elizabeth Warren, and Kamala Harris have all joined the call. And three House Democrats introduced legislation to follow through.

Leftists claim that U.S. border policies are harsh and inhumane, and their media lackeys dutifully go along, bending stories any way they can to fit that narrative. Take, for instance, the widely reported story31 of the illegal immigrant picked up by ICE while taking his pregnant wife to the hospital to have her baby. Conveniently left out of the reporting by virtually every major news outlet — at least the headlines or flashing TV alerts that most people see — was that the man was ducking an outstanding warrant issued for his arrest in Mexico on homicide charges.

Stories like this are meant to cast ICE as the villain, which then leads to further attacks against the agency. What many don’t understand, however, is that ICE is the backbone of America’s immigration enforcement32. There would be (even more) chaos without it.

ICE is the principal agency for enforcing immigration laws inside the U.S., including the apprehension of illegal immigrants who have slipped past the Border Patrol; combatting the smuggling of weapons, drugs, and people into the country; and investigating immigration fraud schemes. ICE also protects immigrant communities by cracking down on criminal activity that takes place there. Gangs and other bad guys generally commit crimes in the communities in which they reside, making legal immigrants the victims.

There are other agencies that also handle some of these tasks, but they are already stretched beyond their limits. The sheer volume of cases is more than any single law enforcement agency can bear. Consider that last year over 700,000 people overstayed their visas33. That is 300,000 more people than the number apprehended while trying to illegally cross the U.S. border with Mexico during that same period.

Take ICE out of the picture, and the whole immigration system would quickly unravel — which is exactly what the Left wants.

It has been said that Democrats and the Left care more about illegal immigrants than they do about American citizens. But even that’s a stretch because they don’t care about illegal immigrants, either. The leftist call for open borders is an attempt to break down American society by overwhelming our communities and our culture with bad people from foreign lands. Leftists discourage assimilation and the learning of English to help further that goal. Democrats see a fresh batch of voters they can hook onto the government dole and keep leftists in office.

But is this a political winner for Democrats? Not necessarily. As W. James Antle III notes34, “House Republicans brought a pro-ICE resolution up for a vote to dare Democrats to vote against it — just 34 did, though 133 voted ‘present’ — while Trump brings it up often on the campaign trail.”

People need to look beyond the rhetoric that demonizes ICE and support the agency’s work to protect American communities from fraud, crime, and terrorism. Without ICE, American streets will not be safe. And that’s why Trump’s celebration yesterday was welcome.

https://patriotpost.us/articles/57769-immigration-problem-put-some-ice-on-it

MORE ANALYSIS FROM THE PATRIOT POST

‘Affordable Care’ Becomes Slightly More Affordable35 — Insurance companies request rate increases at levels substantially below earlier projections.
Video: A Nation of Immigrants36 — The United States still maintains the most generous immigration policies in the world.

OPINION IN BRIEF

Investor’s Business Daily37: “How about removing security clearances for all former employees of the federal government’s national security agencies? Let’s remove the political temptation entirely. After all, letting them keep those security clearances is really a form of extra monetary compensation. No, it doesn’t show up on any ledger. But it does let former intelligence bureaucrats leverage access to taxpayer-funded intelligence for personal profit and political advantage. Brennan was a case in point, but there are many others, as we noted above. Some argue that America is safer because former officials with access to secrets might have to confer with the government in an emergency. But that argument, too, is bogus. Even lacking current security access, any of the former spy chiefs and high-level national security functionaries could have their security clearances restored and quickly get up to speed in an emergency. It’s time to end the profiteering from information gathered on Americans’ behalf for cynical, partisan political use. We should end privileged access to our nation’s secrets.”

SHORT CUTS

For the record: “The Democrats and the Left here are not interested in the truth. They’re interested in taking down Donald Trump. Which is a great point that Rudy Giuliani is making. He’s saying, ‘No, no, no, the thing that you’re calling the truth here — that’s not the truth.’” —Michael Knowles

Braying Jenny: “I’m outraged every day by something our president has done or said or left undone or neglected, or who he has recently bullied on Twitter or television.” —Chelsea Clinton

Alpha Jackass I: “He would certainly like to.” —New York Times columnist Michelle Goldberg rebutting MSNBC’s Katy Tur, who said Trump “is not rounding people up and murdering them without any due process.”

Alpha Jackass II: “I will tell you one joke… Do you know the difference between a crisis and a catastrophe? … A crisis is if Donald Trump falls into the Potomac River and can’t swim. … And a catastrophe is anybody saves his ass.” —Rep. Alcee Hastings (D-FL)

Village idiots: “I would love for Al Franken to run again. … I don’t want to diminish anyone’s legitimate claim of feeling like they’ve been assaulted, because that’s your feeling, but I think there is a very big difference of a man putting his arm around you — he’s a comedian. I’ve touched people’s breasts and genitals, I can’t imagine how many times, in photos. That doesn’t excuse it, but … that’s not a rape. That’s not sexual assault.” —Chelsea, er, Handler

And last… “We need hatred in the Church. A real, profound hatred for sin. It is easy to say we hate sin, but how many of us really hate it? How many of us hate sin like we hate cancer? Evil will proliferate if we do not make war against it with righteous hatred and anger in our hearts.” —Matt Walsh

https://patriotpost.us/articles/57768-tuesday-short-cuts

Join our editors and staff 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. We also humbly ask prayer for your Patriot team, that our mission would seed and encourage the spirit of Liberty in the hearts and minds of our countrymen.

Semper Vigilans Fortis Paratus et Fidelis

Nate Jackson, Managing Editor
Mark Alexander, Publisher