Good Week For Tyrants | The Left's Hate Speech | Hope And Blessings

by Gary Bauer, Contributing Author: A Good Week For Tyrants - Castro is crowing in Cuba. The mullahs are merry in Tehran. Kim Jong-un is kicking it up in North Korea. And Obama is back on the golf course.

Saturday, Cuban President Raul Castro delivered an hour-long victory speech before the Cuban National Assembly. The communist spies released by Obama were given a hero's welcome. A gloating Castro declared, "Now we've really won the war."

He went on to state that any economic reforms would be intended to promote "prosperous and sustainable communism." And just to clear up any lingering confusion about Obama's normalization of relations, Castro bluntly stated, "No one should believe that improving relations with the United States means Cuba renouncing its ideas."

The Obama White House made mindboggling concessions to the Cubans. What exactly did we get out of it?

Not surprisingly, the mullahs in Tehran are looking at Cuba and concluding Obama will cave on sanctions. A spokesman for Iran's Foreign Ministry said over the weekend that Cuba's victory proves that "policies of isolation and sanctions imposed by the major powers . . . are ineffective." (Is Obama getting his talking points from Tehran? That's what he said about our policies!)

Those nuclear negotiations just got a lot harder. The Iranians had little incentive to negotiate in good faith before. After seeing Cuba's resistance get rewarded, they have zero incentive to do anything now.

Meanwhile, the administration's non-response to North Korea's cyberattack on Sony continues to disappoint. Before heading off for his Hawaiian vacation, Obama downplayed the attack on Sony as just "cyber-vandalism."

Today's Washington Post reports that administration officials asked for China's help in responding to North Korea's attack. That's insane! There is evidence that China likely helped the North Korean hackers. Not surprisingly, Beijing declined to lift a finger.

Yesterday Internet service in North Korea went down for nine hours. Some speculate this might have been U.S. retaliation for the Sony attack, I mean vandalism. If that was Obama's idea of a "proportional response," it was a waste of time. Temporarily annoying the hackers by taking down their Internet service for few hours is meaningless.

According to the Associated Press, North Korea is "one of the least-wired and poorest countries in the world." The AP adds that taking down North Korea's Internet would be a purely "symbolic" gesture and "probably more inconvenient to foreigners."

There is much more the administration could do to tighten sanctions and further isolate the Stalinist regime. But given Obama's penchant for rewarding our enemies, I won't hold my breath.


The Left's Hate Speech - New York City Mayor Bill de Blasio, Attorney General Eric Holder and Al Sharpton have been scrambling for cover since Saturday's assassination of two New York City police officers. They are trying to deny any responsibility for the shooting deaths of Rafael Ramos and Wenjian Liu, in spite of months of rhetorical attacks against law enforcement. But the left can't have it both ways.

The Oklahoma City bombing took place during a time when conservatives were warning that government was becoming too big and too powerful. President Bill Clinton immediately seized on that horrible event and attempted to twist normal conservative beliefs about limited government into "hate speech," blaming the bombing on Rush Limbaugh and "hate radio."

I also recall well how the pro-family movement was collectively blamed for the death of Matthew Shepard. Conservatives spent months trying to beat back those canards.

By the left's own standards, Obama, Holder, de Blasio and Sharpton must bear some culpability for the deaths of Officers Ramos and Liu. Obama encouraged Al Sharpton at the White House to keep the protests "on course." And we know that there is a significant element among the political left that is prone to violence. The Occupy Wall Street movement amassed quite a rap sheet.

The deaths of Trayvon Martin, Michael Brown and Eric Garner have been exploited to push a left-wing narrative and inflame racial discord. But there was zero evidence of racism in any of those cases. And in the cases of Brown and Garner, the evidence didn't even support charges of excessive force by the police. Grand juries refused to indict the police officers, but that didn't stop the left from indicting all cops collectively and American society generally.

Sadly, it's not surprising that after months of stoking tensions, a weak response to riots in Ferguson, no defense of the rule of law and no condemnation of radicals chanting, "What do we want? Dead cops! When do we want it? Now," that someone would act to fulfill that chant.

Saturday night, the head of New York City's police union said that there was "Blood on many hands." He's right. The left deserves its share of collective blame.

Attempting to restore calm to his city yesterday, Mayor de Blasio asked that the protest be suspended until Officers Ramos and Liu are buried. That seems eminently reasonable. But, of course, Al Sharpton is refusing to cooperate.

Hope And Blessings - Christmas is a time of hope and blessings, a celebration of life and salvation. The Scriptures teach us that children are a blessing from God. It has also been said that the birth of each new child is a sign that God has not yet given up on this world.

That was never more true than the night two thousand years ago when the Son of Man was born in Bethlehem; born to bring the hope of salvation and the blessing of eternal life. When the Christ Child came into the world, his cry pierced the night and split all of human history in half.

During a sermon in 1926, Reverend James Allan Francis summarized the profound impact of life of Jesus Christ. No doubt many of you will recognize his words:Here is a man who was born in an obscure village as the child of a peasant woman. He grew up in another obscure village. He worked in a carpenter shop until he was thirty and then for three years was an itinerant preacher.

He never wrote a book. He never held an office. He never owned a home. He never had a family. He never went to college. He never put his foot inside a big city. He never traveled two hundred miles from the place where he was born. He never did one of the things that usually accompany greatness.

He had no credentials but himself. He had nothing to do with this world except the naked power of his divine manhood. While still a young man the tide of popular opinion turned against him. His friends ran away. One of them denied him. Another betrayed him.

He was turned over to his enemies. He went through the mockery of a trial. He was nailed upon the cross between two thieves. His executioners gambled for the only piece of property he had on earth while he was dying, and that was his coat. When he was dead, he was taken down and laid in a borrowed grave through the pity of a friend.

Nineteen wide centuries have come and gone and today he is the center of the human race and the leader of the column of progress.

I am far within the mark when I say that all the armies that ever marched, and all the navies that were ever built, and all the parliaments that ever sat and all the kings that ever reigned, put together, have not affected the life of man upon the earth as powerfully as has this one solitary life.No one can predict the headlines in the weeks and months ahead, but we can rest assured that one day every head will bow and every knee will bend before the King of Kings.

While the focus of Christmas is, of course, Christ's birth in Bethlehem, I can't escape Christmas' unique role in the birth of our nation. It was on Christmas night in 1776 that General George Washington crossed the Delaware River and launched a daring surprise attack on the Hessian mercenaries. Washington's victory at the Battle of Trenton was a turning point in the American Revolution. Surely God was there, and I pray that the God of Abraham is with us still!

My friends, I thank God for each and every one of you. Your prayers and encouragement sustain me as we continue to fight the good fight for faith, family and freedom.

Merry Christmas! And may you enjoy all of God's richest blessings in the year ahead.
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Gary Bauer is a conservative family values advocate and serves as president of American Values and chairman of the Campaign for Working Families

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