The Wisdom of Antonin Scalia

Former U.S. Supreme Court
Justice Antonin Scalia

by Newt Gingrich and Vince Haley: “I hope to impart to you the courage to have your wisdom regarded as stupidity.”

For decades, Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia shared some form of this message with countless audiences.

One might think that these words of encouragement were meant for the ears of young Federalist Society lawyers engaged in the ongoing battle to defend the Constitution.

But in fact, Justice Scalia directed these words not at fellow lawyers, but at fellow Christians.

Said Scalia at one such gathering, “surely those who adhere to all or most […] traditional Christian beliefs are regarded in the educated circles that you and I travel in as, well, simple-minded.”

As an example, he noted a recent story in the Washington Post that called Christian fundamentalists “poorly educated and easily led.”

Scalia urged that, rather than retreat, Christians confront such contempt head-on, and be willing, in the words of Saint Paul, to be seen as “fools” for their belief in God.

Scalia surely saw the obvious parallel to his day job. Just as our cultural elites look down on the Christian faithful as ignorant simpletons, so too our political elites look with scorn at Americans who believe we should remain faithful to the Constitution.

Justice Scalia proved beyond doubt that those who believe in the Constitution are no fools—and that when his opponents regarded the Founders’ wisdom as stupidity, they did so at their own peril. Time and again, he bested them in his arguments from the bench and in his written opinions, even—perhaps especially—when writing in dissent.

In the process, Scalia became one of the most consequential defenders of our constitutional order in the history of the Supreme Court.

Scalia usually had one simple question for constitutional matters that came before the Supreme Court: Who decides?

In determining the answer, he employed originalism, a mode of constitutional analysis that interprets the Constitution according to the meaning of the text as it was understood at the time it was established. Originalism rejects the idea of a judges substituting their own views about the meaning of the Constitution. Instead, he argued, judges should use the original meaning of the Constitution to guide them in their decision making.

In his recent dissenting opinion in Obergefell v. Hodges, Scalia succinctly stated the stakes involved when judges substitute their own views about the meaning of the Constitution:This practice of constitutional revision by an unelected committee of nine, always accompanied (as it is today) by extravagant praise of liberty, robs the People of the most important liberty they asserted in the Declaration of Independence and won in the Revolution of 1776: the freedom to govern themselves.The ongoing struggle to protect the freedom of Americans to govern themselves was at the heart of Scalia’s approach to judging during his long tenure on the Supreme Court.

Self-governance is also at the heart of the choice to replace Scalia on the Court.

If you are a constitutional conservative in the mold of Antonin Scalia, you view the role of the judge as one of self-restraint. You are guided by the meaning of the Constitution as it was understood by the Founders. You defer to the political branches and to the people to make judgments about important matters the Constitution says nothing about. You do not pretend to know what is best for America in the abstract and you certainly don’t claim the power to create new law, even if it may be popular to do so.

If you are an adherent of progressive legal theories, you are guided in your rulings by what you see as best for the country. You do not consider yourself limited by the original meaning of the Constitution. You believe the Constitution is a “living” document, such that new realities may require new laws in the form of Supreme Court decisions “interpreting” the Constitution. You are limited only by what the constituency you are a part of thinks it can get away with politically and by the plausibility of your interpretive justification. Both limitations are rather low thresholds. Since one political party believes as you do, and the other party is supremely reluctant to take on the executive branch let alone the judicial branch, there is much to get away with.

Our founding fathers believed that the Supreme Court was the weakest branch and that the legislative and executive branches would have ample abilities to check a Supreme Court that exceeded its powers.

But this is not true today. Over the last half century, the Supreme Court has become a permanent constitutional convention in which the whims of five appointed judges have rewritten the meaning of the Constitution and assigned to themselves the last word in the American political process. Under this new all-powerful model of judicial supremacy, federal judges have been able to redefine the Constitution and the law unchecked by the other two co-equal branches of government.

If you are wondering why there is so much upheaval about the choice to replace Justice Scalia, it is because of the all powerful model of today’s Supreme Court.

In a Republic like ours based on the rule of law and the principle that we the people govern, rights like religious freedom and the right to bear arms should not hinge on who becomes the next justice. Until we bring the courts back under the Constitution, however, they very well might.

Fortunately, in this newest battle to protect self-government, we have a model to follow. For 29 years, Antonin Scalia showed us how to defend freedom. Again and again, he reminded us of the wisdom of the Constitution—its deference to the people, its system of checks and balances.

President Obama has every right to nominate a replacement for Justice Scalia, and surely he will. But the Senate has an equal Constitutional role to play—and perhaps a greater claim to representing the will of the people. The Senators are under no obligation to confirm the President’s choice, especially when they have good reason to expect that such a nominee would do harm to our system of government and the rule of law.

That’s not stupidity. It’s a certain kind of wisdom—even if our elites refuse to regard it as such. Justice Scalia would have been pleased.
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Newt Gingrich is a former Georgia Congressman and Speaker of the U.S. House. He co-authored and was the chief architect of the "Contract with America" and a major leader in the Republican victory in the 1994 congressional elections. He is noted speaker and writer.Vince Haley is VP, Special Projects, Gingrich Productions. The above commentary was shared via Gingrich Productions and on The Washington Times.

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Hillary Lies About Lying

by Dick Morris and Eileen McGann: Hillary Clinton has been a chronic liar throughout her entire public life. Now she even lies about her lies. It’s no wonder that two-thirds of the American voters don’t believe she’s honest or trustworthy.

They’re right. She’s reflexively, consistently, perpetually dishonest. To Hillary, the truth is just one of a number of many options for an answer.

At the Nevada Town Hall, CBS reporter Scott Pelley asked Hillary whether she always tells the truth to the American people. She seemed perplexed by the question, starting the answer with “MmmHmmm.” That’s called stalling, taking time to formulate an answer that’s not quite emphatic.

Instead of a simple yes, Hillary couldn’t really be sure about whether she always tells the truth, but she “does her best to level with the American people.”

What the heck does that mean? How do you do your best to be honest? She makes it sound like some kind of very hard work is necessary to get to the truth.

You don’t try to tell the truth. The truth is static — you either tell the truth or lie. You don’t try your best to tell the truth.

We’re not talking about Aristotle pondering the truths of the universe here. We’re talking about answering a question about your own conduct. How do you try your best to figure out whether you took money from the oil companies? Or landed in sniper fire in Bosnia? Or were dead broke? Or sent classified material? Or were named after Sir Edmund Hillary? Or whether Benghazi was a response to a protest? The only reason you have to think about it is because you are NOT telling the truth.

Why is it so hard for Hillary to tell the truth? Why does it require such effort?

Most people, just tell the truth, occasionally shading it to make it sound better.

But for Hillary, answering difficult questions is an arduous task, akin to making a move on a chess board. While she figuratively keeps her hand on her chess piece to keep the move tentative, she has to ponder all possible opposition responses and all vulnerabilities her move might expose. Only after rigorous examination does she remove her hand and make the move official.

She probably considers telling the truth as one of a number of considerations, but with no special priority attached to it.

The political irony is that the accumulation of these calculations — as opposed to simple truth telling — creates a negative public impression far more compelling than any of the individual truthful but discarded answers would have been.

And her ridiculous answer only reinforces her image as a liar.

Here’s the exchange:

PELLEY: You know, in ’76, Jimmy Carter famously said, “I will not lie to you.”

CLINTON: Well, I have to tell you I have tried in every way I know how literally from my years as a young lawyer all the way through my time as secretary of state to level with the American people.

PELLEY: You talk about leveling with the American people. Have you always told the truth?

CLINTON: I’ve always tried to. Always. Always.

PELLEY: Some people are gonna call that wiggle room that you just gave yourself.

CLINTON: Well, no, I’ve always tried…

PELLEY: I mean, Jimmy Carter said, “I will never lie to you.”

CLINTON: Well, but, you know, you’re asking me to say, “Have I ever?” I don’t believe I ever have. I don’t believe I ever have. I don’t believe I ever will. I’m gonna do the best I can to level with the American people.

This banter is reminiscent of a scene in Gilbert and Sullivan’s operetta H.M.S. Pinafore in which the Admiral tells the chorus that “I never, never use the big big D” (damn).

They replay, in song, “What never?”

Emphatically the Admiral answers “No never!”

“What never????” they challenge again.

This time the Admiral retreats to a Hillary-esque response “Well…hardly ever!”

In the H.M.S operetta, the chorus gives three cheers for the Admiral. In Nevada, they are likely going to vote for Sanders.
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Richard "Dick" Morris is an American political author and commentator who previously worked as a pollster, political campaign consultant, and general political consultant. He has worked on both sides of politics for candidates. Eileen McGann is an attorney who, with her husband, Dick, write columns. Their articles can be found at DickMorris.com and HillaryDaily.com.

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Bipartisan Committee Leaders Invite FBI Director and Apple CEO to Testify About Encryption

WASHINGTON, DC – Bipartisan leaders of the House Energy and Commerce Committee today invited Federal Bureau of Investigations Director James Comey and Apple Chief Executive Officer Tim Cook to appear before the committee to discuss the issues surrounding encryption – specifically when privacy and national security issues are raised.

In letters to Comey and Cook, full committee Chairman Fred Upton (R-MI), Ranking Member Frank Pallone, Jr. (D-NJ), Oversight and Investigations Subcommittee Chairman Tim Murphy (R-PA), and subcommittee Ranking Member Diana DeGette (D-CO) asked for both the FBI and Apple to explain to Congress and the American people the issues at play and how they plan to move forward.

The leaders wrote:

We invite you to testify before the Committee on Energy and Commerce, Subcommittee on Oversight and Investigations, about the issues presented by the ongoing debate related to encryption technologies.

Over the last year, with the growing availability and adoption of strong encryption measures by commercial technology providers, there has been an increasingly public and heated debate about the costs and benefits of encryption technologies, in particular, the impact these technologies have on law enforcement’s capabilities to investigate criminal conduct. …

This debate has now come to a critical juncture with the recent order by a federal magistrate to the Apple Corporation to assist the FBI in “unlocking” a security feature of a phone allegedly used by one of the perpetrators of terrorist acts in San Bernardino, California in December 2015. According to news reports, there are a number of other law enforcement officials around the country considering use of authorities to compel similar assistance by technology manufacturers. …

We anticipate this hearing will occur at the Committee’s earliest opportunity and we are grateful for your cooperation.

Read the full letters.

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Speaker Paul Ryan In The Lion's Den

Speaker Paul Ryan welcomed Speaker al-Jabouri
of Iraq to the Capitol (Source: Speaker.gov)

by Ralph Benko, Contributing Author: A great stage magician will distract his audience with his right hand while performing his conjuring tricks with his left. Washington is nothing if not a magic show. Let me show you what’s really going on while you are distracted by the razzle-dazzle of the admittedly consequential Trump/Cruz/Rubio/Bush/etc. presidential race.

There is an onrushing budget drama in the Congress. You’ll be reading about it, if you have not yet, soon. The key to its resolution lies in the “Kadlec Curve.” Every one tenth of one percent of increase in the GDP brings in, over ten years, $314 billion to the Treasury.

Follow the magician's left hand. What drama awaits us?

The Huffington Post headlines: Paul Ryan Hosts Budget Meeting With House Freedom Caucus. It Didn’t Go Well:

Ryan hosted caucus members around a large conference table in his office to tell them that, if Republicans want to pass appropriations bills this year, they have to accept the budget number that leaders from both parties agreed to at the end of October.

“There’s not a snowball’s chance in hell that I’ll vote for that,” caucus member Mo Brooks (R-Ala.) told The Huffington Post after the meeting.

Brooks wouldn’t go into details about the meeting, but made clear he was unmoved by Ryan’s arguments. Brooks said the government is on a fiscally unsustainable path, and Congress hasn’t helped with Republicans and Democrats agreeing in October to raise the 2017 budget caps by $30 billion.

Brooks said Republicans have to get serious about debt-reduction. The deficit is increasing for the first time since 2009 and the Congressional Budget Office projects spending will outpace revenue by $1.4 trillion in 2026.Full disclosure. Long ago there was a friendly relationship between the young Rep. Paul Ryan and me. And I’m a big admirer of the Freedom Caucus, especially its chairman, Rep. Jim Jordan, and its leading lights such as Rep. Mick Mulvaney.

Further disclosure: I’m an unabashed, card-carrying, member of the Vast Right Wing Conspiracy. I’m enamored both of Speaker Ryan and the Freedom Caucus.

Yet they are at odds. As the old political dodge has it: “Some of my friends passionately support the proposition. Some of my friends passionately oppose it. As for me… I stand by my friends!”

In this case, though, it’s not a dodge. There is a key to leading the Republican House Conference out of the budgetary byzantine thicket (with pockets of quicksand) in which it has been, and remains, mired. And, in my own view, Paul Ryan might be the best qualified Member of Congress — possibly the best qualified elected official in Washington — to find that key … and turn it in the lock.

Ryan got his start in serious politics as a junior aide to the former Congressman Jack Kemp. Kemp, Ryan’s old mentor, represents the gold standard of across-the-board economic growth philosophy and policy. Ryan astutely hired Rep. Kemp’s former chief of staff, Dave Hoppe, as his chief of staff as Speaker. This matters.

Dan McLaughlin, writing in the inimitable RedState, in reviewing Speaker Ryan’s recent speech before Heritage Action:

This frankly sounds to me like a shot across the bow at Heritage Action, Ted Cruz and a lot of the other people on the Right (this website included) who have tried to hold the Congressional GOP accountable for the maneuvering that goes into Failure Theater, and at Cruz’s blasts at the motives of the “Washington Cartel.” Ryan does have a point – if the party is unified behind a goal and moving towards it, we shouldn’t broil people over this or that individual vote. But of course, the whole reason for the broiling is that a lot of people don’t currently trust that the leadership is behind the goals it professes or is actually making any progress in that direction.Key point: “if the party is unified behind a goal and moving towards it….”

What unifying goal might that be?

Equitable prosperity, that’s what.

The key to ending the deficit was found, a few years ago, buried in an appendix to a Congressional Budget Office report by my friend Charles Kadlec. Kadlec, a major supply-side figure, was a former colleague of supply-side icon Arthur Laffer.

As previously I wrote here:

“[T]he impact of growth on the deficits … can be found in Appendix B of The Budget and Economic Outlook: Fiscal Years 2012 to 2022: every one-tenth of one percent increase in the growth rate will reduce the federal budget deficit over the next 10 years by $314 billion.” [Emphasis added.]“The Kadlec Curve.” Every one tenth of one percent of increase in the GDP brings in, over ten years, $314 billion to the Treasury. Holy smokes! That means that bringing America’s growth rate up to the Reagan-Clinton levels of around 4% would bring the US Treasury six trillion dollars over ten years! 2+% greater growth would put Uncle Sam quickly back into surplus.

Not incidentally that level of economic growth would be something like ten times as beneficial to the private sector … very much including roaring job creation and upward income mobility for median families. Win win.

Economic growth is key. How to get there?

One of Paul Ryan’s hallmarks is his pragmatic conservatism. Another is his inclusivity. Equitable prosperity, and restoring the primacy of the enterprising, does not call for grandiose propositions. That said, of the five major drivers of economic growth, the budget is the most intractable. So let’s pivot, first, to the tractable policies.

Ryan already has laid down a significant marker in his bringing to the House floor Rep. (now Ways and Means Chairman) Kevin Brady’s Centennial Monetary Commission. This is legislation, championed by the Conservative Action Project, advanced to Committee passage by Chairman Jeb Hensarling, that was co-sponsored by many members of the Freedom Caucus: Chairman Jim Jordan, and Freedom Caucus bright lights Reps. Mick Mulvaney, Raul Labrador, Louie Gohmert and David Brat.

Ryan’s leadership got the Commission legislation passed late last year. It now is under Senate consideration. That’s a bragging point for Speaker Ryan with the Freedom Caucus and in his district. Ryan’s continuing advocacy for the Commission, even after passage, would not be wasted.

While I (as was Jack Kemp) am a notorious classical gold standard advocate we gold standard advocates — Lewis E. Lehrman, Steve Forbes, and many others — carry a legitimate burden of proof. The Commission presents as the ideal way to sort out the optimal monetary policy — the Taylor Rule, NGDP targeting, or the classical gold standard — to find the optimal one for getting working family incomes rising again. Ryan can win points for pushing for its enactment. And there is more.

There is a way forward, out of box canyon that did in the good John Boehner (about which I here had warned). Ryan looks like he is riding into the same box canyon. Let’s ride out together.

The way out is to reach into the same source from which Ryan drew the Centennial Monetary Commission. Once upon a time, before he chaired Ways and Means, Rep. Kevin Brady chaired the Congressional Joint Economic Committee.

I described the JEC as “Congress’s arguably most important inner think tank” and praised Mr. Brady for having “surrounded himself with a team of advisors sophisticated in economic policy and wise in the ways of Washington.”

The Brady Brain Trust — the epitome of equitable prosperity policymakers including, among others, National Economic Policy Director Doug Centilli, world class economists Robert O’Quinn and Jeffrey Schlagenhauf, communications virtuoso Alvin Felzenberg — left a rich legacy of legislative proposals perfectly suited to the conservative governance philosophies both of Speaker Ryan and the Freedom Caucus.

Still waiting action are the Brady Brain Trust’s “Maximizing America’s Prosperity Act,” a potent way of putting strong guardrails around federal spending, even better than Gramm-Rudman, and “Smart Regulation,” a solid way of holding federal regulations to a rigorous cost/benefit analysis. Both policies should be welcome both to Ryan and the Freedom Caucus. They offer a principled way to resolve the coming showdown.

To come to peace both with Republican Regulars and with the Freedom Caucus … all Speaker Ryan needs to do is to dip into the rest of the treasure chest bequeathed by Brady’s JEC Brain Trust. This would "unite the Tribes" and push America onto the right track both by fueling growth and preventing irresponsible spending.

Speaker Ryan — one of the kindest, most conscientious, most inclusive men in politics — now is entering the Lion’s Den. There is a way out. That way forges a clear path to get America moving again. It is a way, not incidentally, that the presidential aspirants would do well to adopt.

The Kadlec Curve — “every one-tenth of one percent increase in the growth rate will reduce the federal budget deficit over the next 10 years by $314 billion” — is the most promising available counsel both to eliminate the deficit and restore equitable prosperity. It can be done by combining the Centennial Monetary Commission, Maximizing America’s Prosperity Act, and Smart Regulation. (Tax reform and expanded free trade also would be beneficial.)

By putting America back on a great growth path Speaker Ryan could play the critical path role in propelling America to equitable prosperity, tame the lions of the Freedom Caucus, turn the federal deficit into a surplus, and advance Jack Kemp's aspirations for prosperity for America and the world. By reaching more deeply into the legacy of the Brady Brain Trust Paul Ryan also just might lay groundwork for his own future ascent to the Oval Office.
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Ralph Benko is senior advisor, economics, to American Principles in Action's Gold Standard 2012 Initiative, and a contributor to the ARRA News Service. Founder of The Prosperity Caucus, he was a member of the Jack Kemp supply-side team, served in an unrelated area as a deputy general counsel in the Reagan White House. The article which first appeared in Forbes.

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Feel the Stache . . .

. . . Racist, says the hypocrite Bernie Sanders fan.

Editorial Cartoon by AF "Tony" Branco

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Who Is Screening The TSA?

TSA body groping and missing the terrorists

by Kerby Anderson, Contributing Author: If you fly with any regularity, you probably have at least one or two “horror” stories about your experience with the TSA. For nearly all of us, it is a minor inconvenience. Sometimes it could be quite a bit more serious.

Months ago, the inspector general of the Department of Homeland Security wrote that the vetting process used in hiring TSA workers is faulty. The inspector general found that the TSA did not identify 73 individuals with terrorism-related category codes. This is a nice way of saying that these 73 were probably on a terrorist watch list. Sleep well, America.

Part of the problem is the stunning fact that the TSA is not authorized to receive the information vital to do a thorough vetting. The report also talked about the fact that the transportation bureaucracy did not have an effective way of checking on crimes that were committed that would disqualify them from having unescorted access to “secure airport areas.”

Lest you think this is not a major problem, consider what happened in Africa. A bomber boarded an airplane with a device that exploded. He was sucked out of the airplane, and two other passengers were injured. Intelligence officers have now produced video footage from the airport showing airport employees handing the terrorist bomber a laptop before he boarded the airplane.

All of that raises the obvious question. Agents working for the TSA are supposed to be screening us, but who is screening them? This thought crossed my mind in the London airport last week, when a Muslim woman wearing a hijab was the official checking me in order to determine if I would be allowed to board the plane to Dallas.

Some of these concerns go beyond the stories you can find on the Internet when you type phrases like “TSA abuse” or “TSA nightmare stories.” We need TSA to screen passengers, but who is screening the TSA?
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Kerby Anderson is a radio talk show host heard on numerous stations via the Point of View Network endorsed by Dr. Bill Smith, Editor, ARRA News Service

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What Scalia's Passing Means for Obama's EPA Power Grab

Cap and Trade Legislation defeated so
 EPA pursues End Run with "Clean Power Plan"

by Phil Kerpen, Contributing Author: In one of Justice Scalia's final acts on the Supreme Court, Scalia successfully HALTED Obama's EPA plan to make electricity bills "necessarily skyrocket" – but it was a 5-4 vote. So while the stay is temporary relief, it now tells us very little about how the Court will ultimately rule on this crucial issue.

That's why Congress must ACT NOW to stop Obama from sending our electricity bills through the roof.

It’s more urgent than ever because Obama is using this rule as the foundation for his disastrous Paris climate treaty, which he refuses to submit to the Senate as required by the Constitution.

This EPA rule requires states to adopt cap-and-trade schemes that Obama himself admitted will make electricity prices “necessarily skyrocket.” Obama calls it a “Clean Power Plan,” but it’s really a Clean Power Grab to implement a policy Congress and the American people already rejected.

While the Supreme Court was able to halt these rules, it is highly likely that the Obama administration will continue to fight for these destructive regulations in court.

That's why I hope you will take a moment to tell Congress that they must block all funding for these illegal EPA regulations now.

Please take a moment and tell Congress to STOP Obama's Clean Power Grab!
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Phil Kerpen is president of American Commitment. Follow him at (@kerpen) and on Facebook. He is a contributing author at the ARRA News Service.

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Tags: Phil Kerpen, American Commitment, EPA Power Grab, Cap and Trade.  Clean Power Plan, Supreme Court, Congress, block funding, EPA Regulation, action item To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service. and "Like" Facebook Page - Thanks!

Will the Tea Party Legacy Define 2016?

Editorial Cartoon by William Warren

by Robert Romano: It's been exactly 7 years since Rick Santelli's Feb. 19, 2009 emotional appeal against foreclosure bailouts on the floor of the Chicago Mercantile Exchange, arguing on behalf of homeowners who paid their bills on time and in full who were being asked to also assume the costs of their neighbors who were delinquent in their payments and not credit-worthy to begin with.

"This is America! How many of you people want to pay for your neighbor's mortgage that has an extra bathroom and can't pay their bills? Raise their hand," said Santelli to a chorus of boos.

"President Obama, are you listening?" Santelli added.

"We're think of having a Chicago tea party in July, all you capitalists want to show up to Lake Michigan, I'm going to start organizing… I think we're going to be dumping in some derivative securities, what do you think about that?"

Within weeks, tea parties with tens of thousands of protestors were popping up all over the country, culminating in a Tax Day Tea Party on April 15, 2009. By 2010, the grassroots movement had helped Republicans reclaim the House of Representatives on an agenda to stop the Obama administration.

But fast forward seven years, and legislative accomplishments by the movement appear few to come by.

In 2011, Republicans had promised to cut spending by $100 billion. Instead, outlays increased by $100 billion that year. They could have attempted rescissions that year to keep the election year promise.

Instead we got sequestration, which arose out of the debt ceiling battle in 2011, an achievement by then House Speaker John Boehner. When a debt "super-committee" faiIed to produce a plan for reducing deficits by $1.2 trillion through 2021, the automatic enforcement procedures went into effect, which reduced the budget baseline by about $275 billion from 2014 through 2016.

But it began to be undone, starting with the Ryan-Murray budget deal of 2013 that came about at the end of the 2013 government shutdown.

In 2014, the original spending cap was ultimately expanded by $38.8 billion. In 2015, by $19.6 billion. In 2016, by $50.8 billion. Already, $105 billion of the $275 billion of planned cuts had been cancelled.

And in 2017 another $30 billion of $90 billion of planned automatic cuts have been cancelled — so far.

That totals sequester being reduced by a third, or $135 billion — and counting — by these bad budget deals. To be fair, the other two-thirds of cuts are still in place.

As for the debt limit, that has been suspended until after Obama leaves office, allowing borrowing through March 2017.

Then there's everything else. Taxes were increased by $600 billion at the beginning of 2013.

In 2013, House Republicans supplied the funding to implement Obamacare despite a valiant effort to defund it led by Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas).

In 2015, Congress funded Obama's executive amnesty for millions of illegal immigrants with U.S.-born children despite having majorities in both chambers of Congress. Same with Planned Parenthood.

Nothing was done to unwind mortgage giants Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac that had so much to do with causing the financial crisis.

Nor was a Dodd-Frank repeal ever laid on Obama's desk despite Republicans having both houses of Congress since the beginning of 2015.

The Export-Import Bank was reauthorized.

Congress granted Obama fast track trade authority to negotiate the Trans-Pacific Partnership.

And then, the icing on the cake was the $1.2 trillion, bloated omnibus spending bill that was just enacted at the end of 2015.

Meet the new boss, same as the old boss.

By 2016, it's fair to say that the tea party has given up on much hope that this Congress will do anything else to rein in President Barack Obama during his final year in office. They have turned their attention to the Republican presidential race, and put their support behind candidates like Ted Cruz and Donald Trump who bucked the establishment and have won the Iowa Caucus and New Hampshire Primary, respectively.

Other candidates, like one-time tea party favorite Sen. Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), have failed to gain traction, still mired by his Gang of 8 embrace of illegal immigration amnesty-like policies.

But even with the attention on the nominating process, one can be certain that disaffected GOP voters will still be watching closely on how the Republican Congress handles issues like the Puerto Rico bailout, Obama's imminent Supreme Court nomination, the mass criminal release bill and the budget.

It's all a far cry from Santelli's famous rant of 2009. And yet the spirit of the tea party lives on. One thing is for certain, whoever goes on to win the nomination of either party and ultimately the White House will be held by the same standard — if their election year promises turn out to just be more hot air.
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Robert Romano is the Senior Editor of Americans for Limited Government. His article was first shared on the ALG's NetRight Daily blog.

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Tags: Robert Romano, Americans For Limited Government, Tea Party Legacy, 2016, expanded government, Big Government, overspending, William Warren, editorial cartoon To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service. and "Like" Facebook Page - Thanks!

Needless List? (Sen. Rubio's Metamorphosis On Draft Registration)

by Paul Jacob, Contributing Author: Are Republican presidential candidates getting the NFL draft and the military draft confused?

Get drafted by the NFL and you’re a millionaire. Participation is voluntary. Get “chosen” by the Selective Service System for the military draft and you could wind up in combat. Participation is involuntary.

Last Sunday at Townhall, I wondered why Republican presidential candidates keep talking about registering young females for a future draft like they are bestowing some great benefit, as if women are clamoring for the equal chance to be conscripted.

Sen. Marco Rubio first agreed that draft registration should be expanded to women. He then elaborated, “I’m open to Selective Service being opened up to women that want to be a part of it.”

Wait a second . . . the current male-only draft registration isn’t optional. It’s mandatory — under the threat of five years in prison and a $250,000 fine. This I know first-hand.

After Sen. Ted Cruz suggested Rubio and other presidential contenders were “nuts” to support forcing women to register, Rubio tried to explain on Fox News Sunday: “What I’ve never said and I don’t support is that we are going to draft women and force them into combat roles. That’s absurd.”

The senator volunteered that he did not “believe anyone ever will” be drafted, because “that’s not the nature of modern warfare.”

“I’m actually in favor of a volunteer armed forces,” he told host Chris Wallace. “I’m not even sure we need Selective Service anymore.”

Calling it “just a registry of names for a draft that’s never going to happen,” Rubio added, “I don’t know why we still have Selective Service.”

Me neither.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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Paul Jacobs is author of Common Sense which provides daily commentary about the issues impacting America and about the citizens who are doing something about them. He is also President of the Liberty Initiative Fund (LIFe) as well as Citizens in Charge Foundation. Jacobs is a contributing author on the ARRA News Service.

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Obama’s Silence Should Be a Clue to Police: Standing at Their Side Is Not on His Agenda

Members of the Harford County Sheriff's Office Honor Guard
with the flag draped casket of Senior Deputy Patrick B. Dailey
during his funeral in Joppa, MD (2/17/10). Dailey was shot &
killed while responding to a complaint at an restaurant.  Senior
Deputy Mark Logsdon was also slain before deputies killed
the gunman. (AP Photo/Matt Button/CNSNews.com)

by Ron Hosko: In the space of less than a week, February 5th to February 11th, six U.S. law enforcement officers were gunned down in the line of duty. A seventh, and his pilot, lost his life in a California plane crash.

Sgt. Jason Goodding was shot dead in Seaside, CA while encountering a man he recognized as having a felony warrant. Three days later, Deputy Derek Greer was killed in Mesa, CO by a 17-year-old suspect when responding to a “man with a gun” call. Two days later, two veteran Maryland deputies, Patrick Dailey and Mark Logsdon, were shot dead by a 68-year-old suspect after one of the deputies approached him in a restaurant and asked, “How’s your day?” The next day, Fargo, ND officer Jason Moszer died from a gunshot wound during a standoff with a barricaded domestic violence subject, and Riverdale, GA Major Gregory Barney was shot and killed while assisting other officers in serving a warrant. Six officers with decades of experience shot down in less than a week.

In a reported Facebook posting by the sheriff of the two Maryland deputies, the sheriff suggested he would be holding a seat for President Obama at the deputies’ funerals. That seat, of course, was empty. As were any similarly held seats at the funerals for the other officers. And this president offered no words of comfort to the respective police chiefs and sheriffs, or to their families, or to the American law enforcement family, which is the point here. Law enforcement should invite no comment, should expect no response and should stop wasting their time and energy waiting on our president to do the right thing when it comes to police officers making the ultimate sacrifice. His absence and silence tells us all we need to know.

In contrast, the president dispatched three White House emissaries to the funeral of an overgrown teenager who robbed a Ferguson, Missouri convenience store before assaulting the shopkeeper and then attacking a uniformed police officer who dared to shoo him out of the middle of the street. Today, he is filling seats in the White House as he hosts a Black Lives Matter activist who sees Michael Brown as an icon of his anti-cop movement.

Soon, the president will mark one of the two pillars of his term in office – Obamacare and the normalization of relations with Cuba – when he travels to that oppressive country and celebrates with the Castros. And the law enforcement leadership in America should once again manage their anger as our president sips drinks and poses for pictures with two dictators while saying nothing about cop-killing fugitive Joanne Chesimard or the dozens of other fugitives from U.S. justice who found sanctuary in Cuba. Her seat, and all the others on an extradition flight to the United States will be unfilled as securing justice for them doesn’t fit into the normalization strategy.

Our men and women in blue, now watching violent crime turn upward after two decades of decline, now fearful that their next citizen encounter will be the subject of a misinterpreted viral video, now ever more cautious in responding to calls for assistance that might put them into a criminal’s gunsights, need to see this president as he is and not what they want him to be. Standing at their side, either mourning at the funeral of a fallen hero or figuratively in the broader fight against crime in America, is not on his agenda.

Sadly, the pandering and posturing of those who tout criminal justice reform schemes that point to police as the problem only portends more of the same mistreatment of law enforcement, perhaps at another misguided president’s hands.
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Ron Hosko was formerly Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) assistant director and is currently president of the Law Enforcement Legal Defense Fund. This article was first shared by CNSNews.Com a division of the Media Research a research and education 501(c)(3) non-profit organization.

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Almost Half of US Residents Still Pay No Federal Income Tax

by Patrick Tyrrell: According to data published by the IRS and the U.S. Census Bureau, 44.2 percent of U.S. residents paid no federal income tax in 2013 (the most recent year for which data is available).

No doubt many of the non-payers would willingly pay income tax in exchange for the chance to work in a more dynamic economy that generated more and better jobs. But our labor market has been hobbled by government regulations, cronyism, government power grabs, a tax code nobody understands, and federal waste.

The chart tells the story.

In 1962, the percentage of people who did not pay federal income taxes themselves and who were not claimed as dependents by someone who paid federal income taxes stood at 24.0 percent; it fell to 12.6 percent by 1969 before beginning a ragged and ultimately steady increase.

By 2000, the percentage was 34.1 percent; by 2009, it was 49.6 percent. The number dropped to 44.7 percent in 2011, and it has hovered around 44 percent ever since.

An astounding 33.67 percent of tax returns are filed only to claim benefits while not paying any income tax. That is up from 18.64 percent in 1990.

As President Ronald Reagan said on Jan, 20, 1981, in his inaugural address, “Government is not the solution to our problem. Government is the problem.”

The federal government stands in the way of success for too many people. Establishing a limited federal government is as critical now as when Reagan said those words.
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Patrick Tyrrell is a research coordinator in The Heritage Foundation’s Center for Data Analysis.

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Congressional Report Exposes EPA's 'Pattern of Deception' in Colorado Mine Spill

by Kristiana Mork: Two federal agencies put out misinformation and inconsistent explanations of the government’s role in the Gold King Mine blowout and water contamination in Colorado last summer, a congressional report says.

The report specifically faults the Environmental Protection Agency and Department of the Interior for their actions related to the Aug. 5 incident, in which 3 million gallons of water laced with mercury, arsenic, and other toxic metals spilled into a creek and rivers near Silverton, Colo., after EPA workers excavated a tunnel entrance to the mine.

“This report peels back one more layer in what many increasingly view as a pattern of deception on the part of the EPA and [Department of Interior],” Rep. Rob Bishop, R-Utah, chairman of the Natural Resources Committee, said in a formal statement.

The report, released Thursday by the House committee, evaluates the two agencies’ explanations of the incident, which contaminated Cement Creek and the San Juan and Animas rivers.

Rep. Louie Gohmert, R-Texas, chairman of the Natural Resources Committee’s oversight and investigations subcommittee, said in the same statement, “After almost six months, we are still trying to get to the bottom of the catastrophic spill and find out who to hold accountable.”

According to the 74-page report, concerns about the Gold King Mine date to before 2009, when mine water began destabilizing waste rock dump, reducing water quality in Cement Creek and the Animas River.

The EPA reportedly monitored the mine for years, until September 2014, when it sent workers to investigate drainage problems. After a two-hour excavation, the agency postponed the project for lack of time and resources.

The House report notes that EPA workers incorrectly concluded that the floor of the adit, or tunnel entrance, was six feet below the surface of the accumulated waste rock. The EPA failed to confirm the conclusions, leading the agency to believe “the adit was not pressurized,” the report says.

Despite statements from Hays Griswold, an on-scene coordinator for the EPA, that he knew at least “some pressure” was in the mine, the agency didn’t test for pressure.

Testing “could have revealed that the mine was pressurized and prevented the blowout,” the report says.

Excavations began again last August 4th and continued the next day when the mine erupted.

The report concludes that explanations offered by the EPA and Interior “offer shifting accounts of the events leading up to the spill and contain numerous errors, omissions, and inconsistencies, some of which are not attributable to error or incompetence alone.”

Katie Tubb, a research associate for the Thomas A. Roe Institute for Economic Policy Studies at The Heritage Foundation, said, “EPA must be held responsible for its actions, and this report is an important piece of that accountability.” Tubb added:Good environmental policy is primarily an issue of who is best equipped to manage the environment well. As the committee’s report illustrates, the EPA and [Department of Interior] are massive black boxes—accountability is difficult. States and local communities simply can do a better job of reflecting the environmental interests of the people impacted most and can better be held responsible by their constituents.Bill Gardner, town administrator of Silverton, Colo., told The Daily Signal that a “collection of shortfalls” probably caused the incident.

However, Gardner said, “what is clearly unproductive is to keep talking about whose fault the Gold King Mine blowout was.”

EPA spokeswoman Nancy Grantham told The Daily Signal that she is “reviewing the report.”
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Kristiana Mork is a member of the Young Leaders Program at The Heritage Foundation.

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Tags: Congressional Report, Gold King Mine, blowout, water contamination, faults, EPA, Environmental Protection Agency, Department of the Interior To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service. and "Like" Facebook Page - Thanks!

U.S. Removed Cuba From Terrorist List After Hezbollah Opened Base On Island

by Judicial Watch: A few years before the Obama administration removed Cuba from the U.S. list of nations that sponsor terrorism Hezbollah established an operational base on the communist island, according to intelligence received by Hillary Clinton when she was Secretary of State.

The information comes straight from electronic mail released by the State Department over the weekend as part of ongoing litigation from several groups, including Judicial Watch, and media outlets surrounding Clinton’s use of a private server to send and receive classified information as Secretary of State. This alarming information has been ignored by the mainstream media, which served as the president’s most vocal cheerleader when he established diplomatic ties with Cuba last summer. After appearing for decades on the U.S. government’s list of nations that sponsor terrorism, the Obama administration officially removed it to lay the groundwork for a full renewal of diplomatic ties.

Nevertheless, the administration knew that the radical Lebanon-based Islamic group Hezbollah had opened a base in Cuba, just 90 miles from the U.S, a few years earlier. In a cable dated September 9, 2011 Clinton is informed that “extremely sensitive sources reported in confidence that the Israeli Intelligence and Security Service (Mossad) has informed the leadership of the Israeli Government that Hezbollah is establishing an operational base in Cuba, designed to support terrorist attacks throughout Latin America.” The cable goes on to say that “the Hezbollah office in Cuba is being established under direct orders from the current General Secretary Hasan Nasrallah, who replaced Musawi in 1992. According to the information available to this source, in preparation for establishment of the base, Nasrallah, working from inside of Lebanon, carried out secret negotiations with representatives of the Cuban Government, particularly the Cuban Intelligence Service (General Intelligence Directorate — DGI), agreeing to , maintain a very low profile inside of Cuba. Nasrallah also promised to take measures to avoid any trail of evidence that could lead back to Cuba in the event of a Hezbollah attack in Latin America.”

Obama’s report to Congress indicating his intent to rescind Cuba’s State Sponsor of Terrorism designation included a certification that Cuba had not provided any support for international terrorism during the previous six-months. It also claimed that Cuba had provided assurances that it will not support acts of international terrorism in the future. This was May, 2015 when the State Department announced the island nation was officially off the terrorist list because it “meets the statutory criteria for rescission.” In the announcement the agency also wrote this: “While the United States has significant concerns and disagreements with a wide range of Cuba’s policies and actions, these fall outside the criteria relevant to the rescission of a State Sponsor of Terrorism designation.” The new Clinton email creates a number of questions relating to the agency’s abrupt move to clear Cuba as a sponsor of terrorism.

Hezbollah’s involvement in Latin America is nothing new and in fact Judicial Watch has been reporting it for years. In 2013 JW published a story about Hezbollah infiltrating the southwest U.S. border by joining forces with Mexican drug cartels that have long operated in the region. The recently released Clinton email, states that a “particularly sensitive source” confirmed that in the 1980s Hezbollah carried out similar contingency casing operations against U.S., British, and Israeli facilities and businesses in Latin America, Europe and North Africa. In 1992 Islamic Jihad, acting on behalf of Hezbollah, bombed the Israeli Embassy in Buenos Aires, Argentina in retaliation for the death of Hezbollah General Secretary Abbas al-Musawi, the email says.

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GOP Baffled As Voters Rally To Popular Candidate

Ann Coulter signs "Adios America!"
 for ARRA News Service editor.

by Ann Coulter: Donald Trump's latest bombshell, claiming the Bush administration lied about weapons of mass destruction to get us into the Iraq War, is just him doing wheelies on the way to the nomination. He's apparently decided it would be fun to taunt the entire GOP by demonstrating that he can say anything and his voters won't care.

I wish he'd stop showing off, the little scamp, but maybe the GOP establishment will finally get the message that voters have been waiting a really long time for a candidate who would put Americans first. Not donors, not plutocrats, not foreigners, and certainly not foreign plutocrats (i.e., Fox News).

Trump is the first presidential candidate in 50 years who might conceivably: (1) deport illegal aliens, (2) build a wall, (3) block Muslim immigration, (4) flout political correctness, (5) bring manufacturing home, and (6) end the GOP's neurotic compulsion to start wars in some godforsaken part of the world.

That's all that matters! Are you listening yet, RNC?

There is not another candidate who agrees with Trump on all these positions. Maybe one issue, but not all of them -- and if it's immigration, they would be lying.

Even Ted Cruz still refuses to say he'd deport illegal aliens (unless they're arrested for breaking some other law), build a wall (instead he talks about "border security," which is code for: No Wall), or reduce legal immigration at all.

Trump is like a greatest-hits album. The two political parties are the record companies, refusing to put all the hits on one album and instead forcing us to choose between Republicans who will depress wages through immigration and bad trade deals, or Democrats who pretend to care about working-class Americans while sacralizing abortion and gay marriage.

Trump is right about President Bush not keeping us safe -- though not about his "Bush lied" argument that makes me want to strangle him. This is what Trump said last October on "Coyote News Sunday" (FNC) about how things would have been different on 9/11 under President Trump:

"Well, I would have been much different, I must tell you. ... I am extremely, extremely tough on illegal immigration. I'm extremely tough on people coming into this country. I believe that if I were running things, I doubt ... that those people would have been in the country."

And that was before Trump announced his plan for a temporary ban on Muslim immigration! (By contrast, as governor of Florida, Jeb! aggressively pushed a bill to allow illegal aliens to get driver's licenses, less than three years AFTER 13 of 19 hijackers used Florida driver's licenses to board the planes on 9/11.)

It is apparently considered less controversial to send a million troops to the Middle East than to stop printing visas for would-be terrorists.

It's not just George W. Bush's open-borders policy that cries out for re-examination. During a debate with Al Gore one year before the 9/11 attack -- committed by Arabs on U.S. commercial airlines -- he pre-emptively denounced the racial profiling of Arabs by airport security.

The Wall Street Journal proclaimed that "the 'racial profiling' issue might help Bush win Michigan." (Good call, WSJ! Bush lost Michigan, anyway.)

In June 2001 -- three months before the attack committed by Arabs on U.S. commercial airlines -- the Bush administration undertook a study to ensure that Arabs were not being disproportionately stopped by airport security.

When U.S. Airways ticket agent Michael Tuohey laid eyes on Mohamed Atta on the morning of 9/11, he got a "chill" and thought to himself, "If this guy doesn't look like an Arab terrorist, then nothing does." But then, he says, he gave himself a politically correct "slap," and handed Atta his ticket.

Atta proceeded to murder 3,000 Americans. But at least no undue scrutiny of Arabs was taking place at U.S. Airports!

The Marco Rubios, Nikki Haleys, Paul Ryans, Jeb!, Zeppo and Shemp Bushes of the GOP say: "Vote for me -- we may have a terrorist attack, but at least we'll know we did the right thing!" Trump says: "I'm going to protect you."

That's why it doesn't matter when Trump pops off and says things that are not conservative orthodoxy -- or even true!

Even if you think Trump is a libertine, shallow narcissist, you know he will do what no other Republican will: Go to Washington, kick ass, mock political correctness, build a wall, deport illegals, bring manufacturing home, and end the GOP's peculiar fixation with remaking the Muslim world.

This is our last chance. It's similar to the "point of no return" global warming alarmists keep talking about, except our data isn't fake.

At our current rate of immigration/transformation, if we don't break the donor fever grip now, we never will. This kind of correction isn't just a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity, it's a once-in-a-millennium opportunity.

The GOP didn't hear us with Eric Cantor, with the 2014 election or with John Boehner. After all that, they still gave us Nikki Haley and Paul Ryan. President Trump is the last and only message they will understand.
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Ann Coulter is a conservative author of ten New York Times bestsellers, writes numerous columns and is a frequent guest on numerous radio and TV shows. Her web site is AnnCoulter.com She is the author of Adios America which she signed and gave to the editor, ARRA News Service editor at the 2015 Eagle Council. Photo above.

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Tags: GOP Baffled, Voters Rally, Donald Trump. Ann Coulter, Audios America, deport illegal aliens,build a wall, block Muslim immigration, flout political correctness, bring manufacturing home, end compulsion to start wars To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service. and "Like" Facebook Page - Thanks!

Poll Position, Neutral On Israel, Supreme Chaos

by Gary Bauer, Contributing Author: Poll Position: The Democrats
The 2016 presidential campaign diverges this weekend with Democrats holding caucuses in Nevada while Republicans have a primary in South Carolina. In both cases, the race is wide open. I'll start with the Democrats.

After an extremely close and highly questionable win in Iowa, Hillary Clinton got trounced in New Hampshire. Her campaign and its media allies dismissed the results for a variety of reasons -- lack of diversity, familiarity with Sanders, etc. The Clinton campaign assured everyone that she would perform better in states -- like Nevada -- with larger minority populations.

At the beginning of the year, Clinton enjoyed a 23-point lead over Bernie Sanders in Nevada. But two polls conducted this month find many Nevada Democrats are now "feeling the Bern" -- the race has turned into a dead heat.

In fact, it is so scrambled that the big labor bosses at the AFL-CIO, who were expected to endorse Hillary Clinton next week, announced yesterday that they were canceling the vote and would "refrain from endorsing any candidate at this moment."

Poll Position: The Republicans
A new NBC/Wall Street Journal national poll stunned pundits with its extraordinary findings -- Texas Senator Ted Cruz has overtaken Donald Trump in the GOP primary. Here are the results:Cruz 28%
Trump 26%
Rubio 17%
Kasich 11%
Carson 10%
Bush 4%To be fair, no other national poll shows Cruz ahead of Trump so this one could remain an "outlier."

What about Saturday's vote in South Carolina? Polls in the Palmetto State have consistently shown Donald Trump with a large lead. But there is a trend emerging -- his numbers are falling. One poll conducted two weeks ago had Trump leading by 22 points. A new Fox News poll finds Trump leading by 13 points.

The Fox and NBC/Wall Street Journal polls were conducted after last Saturday's debate, and could reflect a shift in voter attitudes after what many pundits have called Trump's worst performance.

If he wins South Carolina by eight points or less, the second place finisher will claim a moral victory. Meanwhile, the real battle is for third place. There will be pressure on the lower-tier finishers to drop out so the field can coalesce around an alternative to Trump.

And on that point, the NBC/Wall Street Journal survey has some interesting findings. In a two-man race, Cruz would beat Trump 56% to 40%, and Marco Rubio would beat Trump 57% to 41%. But Trump would beat Jeb Bush 54% to 43%, and he would defeat John Kasich 52% to 44%.

Neutral On Israel?
During a forum yesterday hosted by MSNBC, Trump was asked what he would do to promote peace between Israelis and Palestinians. He acknowledged that it was "the toughest deal of all" to achieve, that good people had failed before, but he would try.

Then host Joe Scarborough asked him which side was responsible for past failures -- Israelis or Palestinians. That's where Trump lost me. Here's what he said:"You know, I don't want to get into it. . . If I win, I don't want to be in a position where I'm saying to you [my choice] and the other side now says, 'We don't want Trump involved.' Let me be sort of a neutral guy. . . I'm going to give it a shot. . . So I don't want to say whose fault it is. I don't think it helps."I almost fell off my chair when I heard that.

To his credit, Trump has been very vocal about radical Islam. So how in the world can he possibly remain neutral between Israelis and Palestinians?

Israel is built on the same values we cherish. Palestinian society, which he acknowledged, is permeated by a culture of death. Israelis are being stabbed daily. Palestinian Islamists are the ones doing the stabbing!

How can anyone be neutral between the region's only true democratic republic and a committed ally, and the death-worshipping jihadists of Hamas, Hezbollah, Islamic Jihad, etc.?

The Palestinian Authority has rejected multiple peace offers. The Palestinians are not interested in peace with Israel or even a piece of Israel. They want the elimination of Israel.

After eight years of Barack Obama, we need a president who will proudly stand with Israel against our common enemies.

Supreme Chaos
The death of Justice Antonin Scalia is creating chaos on Capitol Hill. Today's Washington Post reports, "Senate Republicans clashed Wednesday over how to battle President Obama's expected Supreme Court nomination." In addition, the White House is refusing to rule out a recess appointment.

This president has stopped at nothing to push his radical agenda. Sadly, in many cases, GOP leaders have allowed him to stop at nothing. As one Republican leader told me, "We don't want to fall into Obama's trap and get distracted from our agenda."

So Obama gets to do whatever he wants because we're too busy trying to do what exactly? I can't think of a more pressing item on the Republican agenda right now than preventing Barack Obama from appointing Scalia's replacement!

If Obama makes a recess appointment, the Republican leadership will have no one to blame but itself. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, backed up by a unanimous Supreme Court decision, has full authority to decide when or if the Senate goes into recess.

By the way, Senate Democrats once went on the record in opposition to recess appointments of Supreme Court justices.

Here's something to encourage the nervous Nellies in the GOP: The NBC/Wall Street Journal poll found that Americans were evenly divided over whether the Senate should vote this year on an Obama Supreme Court nominee -- 43% said yes, while 42% said no. Clearly, the country is not clamoring for a third Obama justice.
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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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Tags: Gary Bauer, Campaign for Working Families, Poll Position, Democrats, Republicans, Neutral On Israel, Donald Trump, Supreme Chaos To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service. and "Like" Facebook Page - Thanks!

Billionaire Class Conspiracy

by Kerby Anderson, Contributing Author: When Bernie Sanders won the New Hampshire primary last week, one of the commentators talked about how the senator believes there is a conspiracy afoot. He argues that the reason we have so much income inequality is due to the fact that the billionaire class has “rigged” the economy.

He makes it sound like this is a uniquely American problem. It is not. You can find similar gains by the “one percent” in places like Canada, the U.K., and some other European countries. And we might mention that most of the increase in income inequality over the last quarter century took place when fellow Democrats Bill Clinton and Barack Obama were president.

His conspiracy is rather paranoid, don’t you think? There are only a few hundred billionaires in America. We are to believe that this small, secretive cabal rigged the system so they can get ahead, but you cannot.

These billionaires made their wealth by designing software you use on your computer, by buying land and developing it, by building stores that sell goods at the lowest possible price, and by developing new and more efficient ways to extract oil and gas from the ground.

Bernie Sanders ignores most of these billionaires but talks about people and banks on Wall Street that speculate. As I mentioned in the previous commentary, that is why a movie like The Big Short helps his campaign. It tells the story of some investors who bet against the housing market because they concluded it would fail.

So far the opponents of Bernie Sanders (Hillary Clinton or the future Republican nominee) have not critiqued his billionaire class conspiracy. The response has generally gone like this: “That’s fine Uncle Bernie. No go back to your bed in the basement, and we will call you when dinner is ready.”

It’s time for some candidates and some pundits to address his billionaire class conspiracy with some facts and common sense. The voters need to know the flaws in this conspiracy.
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Kerby Anderson is a radio talk show host heard on numerous stations via the Point of View Network endorsed by Dr. Bill Smith, Editor, ARRA News Service

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Tags: Kerby Anderson, Viewpoints, Point of View, Democrat, Socialist, Bernie Sanders, Billionaire, Class, Conspiriacy To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service. and "Like" Facebook Page - Thanks!