Repeat 3-Peat! 6th Yr All Hope Graduates College Bound #schoolchoice

Dr. Bill Smith: Five years ago, I had the honor and pleasure of visiting Hope Christian High School in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. The below article details Hope's sixth year in a row (repeat 3-peat) that ALL of the graduating seniors have been accepted to college and are college bound. In addition to the below article, I have also included a brief video on last year's class of 2015.

MILWAUKEE, WI: The 35 seniors at HOPE Christian High School have achieved a sixth straight year of 100 percent college acceptance.

“It’s a ‘REPEAT 3-peat’ with lasting impact,” says Tom Schalmo, principal at HOPE. “My hope for these seniors is that as they continue their education, they serve as role models for future generations in Milwaukee.”

To date, the 35 seniors scheduled to graduate this month have received 133 college acceptance letters and over $1.4 million in scholarships. That number is expected to increase as college matriculation approaches and more financial aid dollars are awarded to these students.

“Our hope is for our scholars to continue their education, get a great job and ultimately, serve their community,” Schalmo says.

HOPE Christian High School offers a comprehensive college preparatory program designed to ensure that all graduating students are prepared to attend and be successful in a post-secondary school. The program includes a curriculum aligned to the ACT College Readiness Standards, data-driven academic results and college seminar courses. As a result of this rigorous preparation, the current seniors have attained an average ACT score of 17.17 that outperforms the city, state and national averages for African American students.

Senior scholars celebrated this milestone at HOPE’s Senior Signing Day on Friday, May 26 with Senator Lena Taylor as the keynote speaker. “I found it an honor to be able to celebrate this academic milestone of excellence that the HOPE scholars achieved,” says Senator Taylor.

Similar to the typical signing day for athletes, the event gave each HOPE senior the opportunity to announce the college of their choice in front of their families, peers, faculty, and community supporters.

A recap video can be found here and additional video footage is available by contacting Melanie Johnson at 414-233-3433.

HOPE Christian High School is part of HOPE Christian Schools, a network of eight schools serving nearly 2,500 students in Milwaukee and Racine. Schools in the HOPE network focus on “3 Cs” – Christ, College and Character. HOPE scholars in K4-12th grades receive a values-based education that develops knowledge and cultivates character – the fundamental traits they need to become inspirations to their families, leaders in their communities, and successes in the workplace. For more information, visit hopeschools.org.

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Trump and Paris: Let the Negotiations Begin

by Newt Gingrich: President Trump's speech Thursday was extraordinarily important and powerful.

He set the stage for a new, practical common-sense approach to a better environment with a better economy. He also re-established the sound principle that an American President's first obligation is to the American people and the American nation. Finally, he brilliantly concluded his analysis with an emphasis on renegotiation.

As someone who taught environmental studies, participated in the second Earth Day back in 1971, and coauthored a proposal for a pro-environment conservatism with Dr. Terry Maple, I am delighted that President Trump is courageous enough to reject the social pressure, the worldwide chant of elitists, and the pleas of foreign leaders eager to preserve an anti-American treaty.

My opposition to the international swamp (a system even more destructive and dangerous than the Washington swamp) goes back a long way.

The original Kyoto Protocol (engineered by then-Vice President Al Gore and the environmental extremists) was so anti-American, the United States Senate voted 99-0 against its implementation. Even then-Senator John Kerry voted no.

The international swamp loves gigantic, expensive meetings in interesting cities. The preparatory bureaucrats and interest groups meet for months. The meetings provide them with a great excuse to stay in luxury hotels, dine at gourmet restaurants, and to share in a delicious sense that they, as the “moral elite,” have an international mechanism to force “ignorant voters” to do things to which they would otherwise never voluntarily consent. In short, these are gatherings of the people whom Nassim Taleb correctly calls the Intellectual Yet Idiot.

The most consistent pattern in these international agreements is their anti-Americanism. American liberals flock to these venues. The Left’s erroneous guilt about American success makes them eager to give away American money as a misguided atonement.

The Chinese, Indians, and others are not stupid. If American liberals want to pay them billions in 'guilt money,' they will take it. If American liberals want to cut economic deals at environmental meetings that cripple American workers and aid foreign economies, they are happy to play along.

This liberal passion for international agreements reflects their desire to circumvent the will of the American people and the American Congress. Their agenda includes a lot of expensive, destructive things that they know they could never convince the Congress or the American people to accept. So, their model instead relies on international agreements that can be used to force the Congress and the American people to involuntarily agree to the Left’s goals.

The other reason American liberals love these international meetings is that they provide them with an opportunity to leave America to go rub elbows with fellow liberals from other countries. They can gather over drinks and mutually reassure each other how superior, wise, and virtuous they are compared to the folks back home.

President Trump prefers to listen to the American people and look at the facts rather than decide what’s best for them based on foreign popularity.

To that end, yesterday, the White House released a series of background facts supporting the President Trump’s decision on economic grounds. Consider some of them:

• According to a study by NERA Consulting, meeting the Obama Administration’s requirements in the Paris Accord would cost the U.S. economy nearly $3 trillion over the next several decades.
• By 2040, our economy would lose 6.5 million industrial sector jobs – including 3.1 million manufacturing sector jobs.
• It would effectively decapitate our coal industry, which now supplies about one-third of our electric power.

The Paris Accord was also bad for American taxpayers. To quote the White House again:

• The agreement funds a UN Climate Slush Fund underwritten by American taxpayers.
• President Obama committed $3 billion to the Green Climate Fund - which is about 30 percent of the initial funding – without authorization from Congress.
• With $20 trillion in debt, the U.S. taxpayers should not be paying to subsidize other countries’ energy needs.

One last thing I would like to make clear though is that my opposition to the Paris Accord has nothing to do with President Trump's decision.

Back in December 2015, I wrote a newsletter entitled "The Paris Delusion.” At that time, I asserted:"One thing is certain about the Paris climate summit this week: nothing that happens there will affect the climate. Wishes don’t power the global economy; fossil fuels do. And developing countries will not (and should not) condemn billions of their own citizens to poverty just to indulge the fantasies of international elites.

"All of which makes President Obama’s trip there, a city struck by terrorists, a profane distraction from the threats we face, by a president trying harder and harder to hide from reality."This was a bad deal, and President Trump was right to reject it.

Some Europeans are defiantly saying they will not renegotiate the Accord.

Many Democrats will spend the next few weeks screaming instead of thinking.

Both the Europeans and the Democrats will have to decide if the environment is important enough to them to work on a new, more pro-American agreement.

Let the negotiating begin.
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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. The above commentary was shared via Gingrich Productions.

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Tags: Newt Gingrich, commentary, Donald Trump, Paris climate agreement, Let the Negotiations Begin To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service and "Like" Facebook Page - Thanks!

Profile In Courage, See You In Court, Planned Parenthood

by Gary Bauer, Contributing Author:  Profile In Courage -  To the great frustration of the left and the NeverTrump movement, President Donald Trump demonstrated yesterday why he is a positive force for conservatism.

Confronted by the overwhelming weight of "respectable" opinion, all telling him that he dare not withdraw from Barack Obama's Paris climate pact, facing division within the White House and his own house, confronted by calls from corporate titans begging and threatening him not to withdraw from the pact, Donald Trump did exactly what he said he would do. And the left-wing media and political establishment just can't cope.

Even 2012 GOP nominee Mitt Romney urged Trump to stay in the Paris agreement. Siding with the left and the globalists demonstrates why Romney couldn't carry the industrial Midwest and why Donald Trump is president today.

I am not going to get into the idea of climate change and whether human activity is responsible for it. That is not the point. The issue before us is whether the Paris deal was the best solution, and it clearly was not. It was simply another transfer of wealth from the United States to Third World countries.

Here are some additional observations about the president's speech yesterday and the climate pact:

• There were many great lines in President Trump's address, but the best was this one: "I was elected to represent the citizens of Pittsburgh, not Paris."
• Serious constitutional scholars doubt that Paris agreement was constitutional. Barack Obama, who frequently acted more like an emperor than a president, committed the United States to spending tens of billions of dollars, while refusing to submit the pact to the Senate as required by the Constitution for formal ratification. Without that step, the deal was not binding law.
• U.N. bureaucrats are outraged this morning. They estimate that by the year 2100 the earth's temperature will be 0.17 degrees Celsius warmer than it would have been if Trump had kept us in the climate pact. All the left-wing talking heads whose hair is on fire today will raise temperatures more than that! We have trouble predicting the weather 24 hours in advance, but they think they can predict the exact temperature 83 years from now? (By the way, their track record on such predictions is terrible.)
• Under the agreement, China, the largest emitter of carbon dioxide, did not have to take any steps to mitigate its emissions problem until 2030. Where is the logic in that?
• How much does China pollute? According to the Institute for Energy Research, for seven straight years beginning in 2005, China added two 600 megawatt coal plants every week. Obama signed a deal that would destroy the American coal industry while allowing China to do whatever it wanted for another 13 years.
• The worst myth of all this is that America has abandoned its leadership, especially on environmental issues. That is completely absurd. U.S. carbon emissions are down significantly. According to the Department of Energy, "Energy-related CO2 emissions in 2015 were about 12% below 2005 levels." President Trump is demonstrating common sense economic leadership, while the left wants to follow the lead of European socialists.

Job Growth Stalling - With unanimous opposition from Democrats and Republicans divided over repealing Obamacare and tax reform, new government figures released this morning show the urgency of action on Capitol Hill. Only 138,000 new jobs were created in May, while jobs figures for March and April were revised downward.

Job growth is still nowhere near the level we need. More evidence that President Trump did the right thing by getting the climate pact off the backs of U.S. job creators.

See You In Court - The Trump Administration filed an emergency application yesterday asking the Supreme Court to stay (or end) injunctions imposed by lower federal courts against enforcement of the president's national security order limiting immigration from Iran, Libya, Somalia, Sudan, Syria and Yemen. If the justices agree to issue a stay, the president's order could take effect immediately.

In addition, the administration also asked the high court to expedite the appeals process so that this case could be argued before the justices as early as October.

This should be an easy win at the Supreme Court -- 7-to-2 or 8-to-1 -- based on the Constitution. The law gives the president tremendous discretion to decide on national security grounds who is allowed into the country.

But as we have seen recently, left-wing ideologues on the lower federal courts have been eager to ignore the clear facts of the law in order to thwart the president's agenda. I think it is very possible that the four avowed liberals on the Supreme Court will do the same thing. That leaves us at the mercy of Justice Anthony Kennedy, who is highly unpredictable.

By the way, liberals are now begging Justice Kennedy to not retire.

Planned Parenthood: More Abortions, Fewer Services - Planned Parenthood recently released a report outlining its budget for the previous fiscal year. The nation's largest abortion business performed even more abortions, provided fewer health services and took even more of your hard-earned tax dollars in the process.

• Planned Parenthood "performed 4,349 more abortions in its latest year reported . . . than it did in the previous year it reported."
• It provided fewer than 2,900 adoption referrals, "meaning that for every 114 abortions it said it provided in that report, it gave 1 adoption referral."
• "Cancer screenings have plummeted by 50 percent over the past five years." In fact, total services performed -- not just cancer screenings -- also fell 50 percent over the same period.
• At the same time, Planned Parenthood took in $554.6 million of taxpayer money, which accounted for 41% of its revenue, and represented a $12 million increase in taxpayer subsidizes over the past five years.

I know you are as frustrated as I am by these figures. That's why I joined more than a dozen pro-life organizations this week urging Attorney General Jeff Sessions to act on the "15 criminal and regulatory referrals" issued last year against Planned Parenthood by a special House committee which investigated the pro-abortion lobby's trafficking in baby body parts.

Left-wing Conspiracies - Big media used to have a field day mocking the number of self-described conservatives who did not believe that Barack Obama was a U.S. citizen. But polling shows that 58% of liberals believe that Russia actually manipulated the voting totals in the election, something which everyone, including Barack Obama, says did not happen.
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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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Mark Zuckerberg's 'Universal Basic Income' Would Herald The End Of Capitalism

by Robert Romano: Since 1997 labor participation among working age adults —16 to 64 — peaked and has been steadily dropping, accounting for roughly 9 million Americans who did not enter the labor force but would have had participation remained at the same rate, according to data compiled by the Bureau of Labor Statistics

Overall, the number of 16 to 64 year olds not in the labor force increased 16.5 million in that time, to 55.2 million.

During that same period, the U.S. economy has dramatically slowed down. It has not grown above 4 percent since 2000, and not above 3 percent since 2005.

The issue is not a matter of virtue. Americans did not suddenly become lazy. Most of the decline occurred after the financial crisis in 2008 and 2009, which eliminated millions of jobs. What followed was the worst recovery in American history, with fewer jobs now available per capita.

But it could get worse, as some observers see this as a long-term trend.

Factors such as increased automation plus globalization and outsourcing loom large as leading the decline, and raise the prospect that as economies reach their advanced stages, individuals in the U.S., Japan and Europe will simply be working a lot less in the future.

If so, then how will Americans increasingly make a living? For most Americans not born into luxury, almost everything families take for granted — housing, food, clothing, transportation, etc. — all depend primarily on a steady, stable source of income.

So, what to do, if not work?

Facebook founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg had an answer for Harvard graduates at the 2017 commencement address on May 25: “We should explore ideas like universal basic income to make sure that everyone has a cushion to try new ideas.”

The idea is that the federal government would just cut checks, say, starting at $10,000 as proposed by the American Enterprise Institute’s Charles Murray, for every single American. To be fair, Murray calls for such a system to replace the current system of government programs including those for the elderly like Social Security and Medicare.

Zuckerberg, however, made no such distinction. The implication, then, with his broad, vague call for “universal basic income” is as a sort of add-on for the already existing structure of hundreds of billions of dollars of taxpayer-subsidized supplemental income and retirement programs.

Say, the $10,000 figure was applied to 254 million Americans over the age of 16. That would cost an extra $2.5 trillion a year. Think that might put a little strain on all the other government programs, particularly those directed at seniors? The national debt, already $20 trillion, would double in about 6 years.

Which, if the economy does not get moving — the last 10 years were the slowest average annual growth recorded in U.S. history, even worse than the Great Depression — may ultimately be the future that awaits the American people, whether they like it or not.

A future, that is, where jobs become rare and the calls for guaranteed income grow, for once an entitlement is granted, after a century of experience, it will never be rescinded.

Never mind the fact that the idea simply defies human nature for individuals to take care of their own families.

Or that the American people, including millions of Millennials who Zuckerberg pretends to represent, just voted, not for welfare, but for jobs in 2016 under the platform of President Donald Trump, who promised to bring work by to the U.S.

Or that no level of automation could truly replace the need for individuals to work.

Or to the extent that as universal income gradually replaces a significant percent work, to the extent that individuals wind up making less than if they had been working, it would reduce consumer expenditures — becoming a net drag on the economy.

It would truly be the nanny state, forevermore, with declining standards of living.

Then, elections would revolve around not how to best grow the economy or create jobs in the private sector, but how much everyone’s annual stipend should be increased. Both businesses and individuals would clamor for more, since then more goods and services could be bought and sold — a vicious cycle of ever-increasing dependency.

Ultimately, individual welfare will become corporate welfare, affirming the end of capitalism as we know it and confirming that the American system is no longer one of innovation, but of subsidy.

Zuckerberg joked at the Harvard commencement address that Millennials do not need to find their purpose, that they try do that instinctively. He believes that a little extra income would create room for innovation, and incentivize individuals to become producers. But just the opposite would occur.

Instead, guaranteed income would crowd out other potential opportunities in the economy, disincentivize risk-taking and reward complacency — wrecking individuals’ sense of purpose. Individuals, working less, would transition to simply being consumers.

After all, why take risks and try to invent something when the government will take care of you for free and you can sit around watching streaming movies, playing games, or worse? Surely, such a system would create more opportunities for leisure activity. Yet, necessity is the mother of all invention. Remove need and what remains?

Again, there are already 55.2 million 16 to 64 year olds not in the labor force, an increase of 16.5 million since 1997 as labor participation declined. How many more would join those ranks under Zuckerberg’s plan?

Ultimately, like utopianists of the years past, Zuckerberg’s political program of “universal basic income,” if implemented, will be judged by what it led to. If his vision leads to even less growth, fewer jobs per capita and lower incomes, combined with declining living standards and more debt, it will end up on the same ash heap of history as other failed ideologies that couldn’t keep their promises.
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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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Has Permian Productivity Peaked?

by Nick Cunningham: The U.S. shale industry might have just received a huge windfall with the nine-month extension of the OPEC cuts. Shale output was already expected to come roaring back this year, but the extension of the cuts provides even more room in the market for shale drillers to step into.

The sky is the limit, it seems. However, there are growing signs that the U.S. shale industry could be reaching the end of the low-hanging fruit. Or, more specifically, drilling costs are starting to rise and the enormous leaps in production that can be obtained by simply adding more rigs also appears to be running into some trouble.

According to the EIA’s Drilling Productivity Report, productivity (as opposed to absolute production) is set to fall next month in the Permian Basin. In other words, the average rig will only be able to produce an estimated 630 barrels per day of initial production from a new well, down 10 b/d from the 640 b/d that such a rig might have produced in May. That is convoluted way of saying that the ever-increasing returns on throwing more rigs at the problem might be hitting a ceiling.

This is a very notable development – it is the first time that the EIA predicts falling well productivity per rig since it began tracking the data several years ago. Still, because the rig count has increased so much, there will still be more production coming out of the Permian. It’s just that as drillers gobble up all the best spots to drill, it will become more and more difficult to find easy pickings.

Moreover, simply drilling the wells is only one part of the equation. As Collin Eaton of Fuel Fix notes, companies are drilling wells at a faster pace than contractors can frac them. The shortage of completion crews means that the backlog of drilled but uncompleted wells (DUCs) has shot up over the past year, rising by more than 60 percent to 1,995 in April 2017 from a year earlier.

The strain on contractors means that drilling costs will also rise. Oilfield service companies bore the brunt of the market downturn over the past three years, forced to slash their rates because of the lack of work. Oil producers have consistently and repeatedly boasted about their “efficiency gains,” but much of the cost-savings came from soaking service companies.

That could be at an end. The rise in drilling activity means that oilfield service companies finally have more leverage to hike their prices. The results could be an upswing in costs for producers. Service costs could jump by 20 percent this year, according to an estimate from S&P Global Platts.

But it isn’t all rosy for service companies either. Fuel Fix notes that they have to rebuild their rig fleets after scrapping so many during the last few years. Also, finding enough people to return to work after savagely cutting payrolls will be a challenge.

Overall, however, production is still expected to increase. Generous financing from Wall Street will ensure that capital is not a limiting factor. Consequently, the shale industry will continue to shower West Texas with money, rigs and people. Oil will flow in larger volumes this year and probably next year, barring another downturn. The Permian, for instance, is still expected to add more than 70,000 bpd of additional output between May and June.

Also, OPEC’s determination to prevent another downturn in prices provides some certainty to shale drillers. OPEC is erasing some of the risk for drillers to deploy resources in the Permian. On an annual basis, the EIA estimates that U.S. oil production will average 9.3 million barrels per day (mb/d) in 2017 and a staggering 10.0 mb/d in 2018.

But if well productivity has peaked, the marginal barrel will be a bit trickier to produce next year than it was in, say, late 2016.
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Nick Cunningham authored this article contributed by James Stafford the editor of OilPrice.com, the leading online energy news site, to the ARRA News Service.

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Donald Trump Denounces A Planetary Scam

Dr. Gérard Pince

by Dr. Gérard Pince, Contributing French Author: By leaving the Paris Agreements, Donald Trump does a huge service to western peoples who have been victims of a financial and scientific fraud.

Just as with the invasion of migration and relocations, climate warming is a tool intended to transfer the richness of our compatriots to the poor populations in order to allow multinational companies to sell their wares on the world market. In effect, in the light of these agreements, the Western countries undertake to provide $100 billion per year to the under-developed countries, and this sum is due to increase all five years!

In addition, our economies have imposed on them heavy ecological constraints which are not imposed on the other continents. For example, nothing is planned for stemming the increase delusional massive deforestation by the African nations which poses a greater risk to the resources in humus and in fresh water on the planet. Such a scenario can only impoverish our peoples by destroying jobs by the millions and confirming a low growth as was pointed out quite rightly by the American President.

This financial scam is based on a scientific lie on an unprecedented scale. It is argued that the warming would be due to greenhouse gases emitted by the West and would have increased by 30%. However, the planet has experienced significant climate change well before the emergence of industrial activities. In the Middle Ages, a cooling intervened and the Norse colonies of Greenland disappeared (in Danish, Greenland means "country green").

From the eighteenth century, the temperature has increased again causing a decline of the glaciers. Remember that the cycle of CO2 is based on a balance between its production which emanates from the decomposition of the organic matter and its absorption by the oceans and forests that sequester carbon. Is the 30% increase due to emissions by industry or the massive deforestation undertaken by the under-developed countries? In fact, we do not know the cause of these phenomena which may also result due to solar activity or volcanic eruptions.

The courageous decision of Donald Trump also contemplates the renegotiation or the abandonment of a multitude of multinational agreements which was developed under the auspices of the United Nations. There sole purpose of the UN has been to undermine the power of our western civilization. All lucid persons should welcome President Trump's decision as a first victory against the return of barbarism and the enslavement of our countries
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Gérard Pince is French and a resident of Paris. He has a Ph.D, in Economic Development, M.S. in Economics and Finance and a Law Degree. He taught economics and is a retired Director of the Central Bank of France having served in several countries. He is an inventor and French patent holder. He established and serves as Chairman of the Free World Academy. He is an ARRA News Service foreign correspondent and contributing author. [This article was translated from French to English with the aid of both Google Translate and FreeTranslation.com. Further clarification was made by the editor.]

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Is Afghanistan a Lost Cause?

by Patrick Buchanan: “We are there and we are committed” was the regular retort of Secretary of State Dean Rusk during the war in Vietnam.

Whatever you may think of our decision to go in, Rusk was saying, if we walk away, the United States loses the first war in its history, with all that means for Southeast Asia and America’s position in the world.

We face a similar moment of decision.

Wednesday, a truck bomb exploded near the diplomatic quarter of Kabul, killing 90 and wounding 460. So terrible was the atrocity that the Taliban denied complicity. It is believed to have been the work of the Haqqani network.

This “horrific and shameful attack demonstrates these terrorists’ compete disregard for human life and their nihilistic opposition to the dream of a peaceful future for Afghanistan,” said Hugo Llordens, a U.S. diplomat in Kabul.

The message the truck bombers sent to the Afghan people? Not even in the heart of this capital can your government keep civilian workers and its own employees safe.

Message to America: After investing hundreds of billions and 2,000 U.S. lives in the 15 years since 9/11, we are further from victory than we have ever been.

President Obama, believing Afghanistan was the right war, and Iraq the wrong war, ramped up the U.S. presence in 2011 to 100,000 troops. His plan: Cripple the Taliban, train the Afghan army and security forces, stabilize the government, and withdraw American forces by the end of his second term.

Obama fell short, leaving President Trump with 8,500 U.S. troops in Afghanistan, and Kabul’s control more tenuous than ever. The Taliban hold more territory and are active in more provinces than they have been since being driven from power in 2001. And Afghan forces are suffering casualties at the highest rate of the war.

Stated starkly, the war in Afghanistan is slowly being lost.

Indeed, Trump has inherited what seems to be an unwinnable war, if he is not prepared to send a new U.S. army to block the Taliban from taking power. And it is hard to believe that the American people would approve of any large reintroduction of U.S. forces.

The U.S. commander there, Gen. John Nicholson, has requested at least 3,000 more U.S. troops to train the Afghan army and stabilize the country while seeking a negotiated end to the war.

Trump’s conundrum: 3,000 or 5,000 more U.S. troops can at best help the Afghan security forces sustain the present stalemate.

But if we could not defeat the Taliban with 100,000 U.S. troops in country in 2011, we are not going to defeat a stronger Taliban with a U.S. force one-seventh of that size. And if a guerrilla army does not lose, it wins.

Yet it is hard to see how Trump can refuse to send more troops. If he says we have invested enough blood and treasure, the handwriting will be on the wall. Reports that both Russia and Iran are already talking to the Taliban suggest that they see a Taliban takeover as inevitable.

Should Trump announce any timetable for withdrawal, it would send shock waves through the Afghan government, army and society.

Any awareness that their great superpower ally was departing, now or soon, or refusing to invest more after 15 years, would be a psychological blow from which President Ashraf Ghani’s government might not recover.

What would a Taliban victory mean?

The Afghan people, especially those who cast their lot with us, could undergo something like what befell the South Vietnamese and Cambodians in 1975. It would be a defeat for us almost as far-reaching as was the defeat for the Soviet Union, when the Red Army was forced to pull out after a decade of war in the 1980s.

For the USSR, that Afghan defeat proved a near-fatal blow.

And if we pulled up stakes and departed, the exodus from Afghanistan would be huge and we would face a moral crisis of how many refugees we would accept, and how many we would leave behind to their fate.

Fifteen years ago, some of us argued that an attempt to remake Afghanistan and Iraq in our image was utopian folly, almost certain, given the history and culture of the entire region, to fail.

Yet we plunged in.

In 2001, it was Afghanistan. In 2003, we invaded and occupied Iraq. Then we attacked Libya and ousted Gadhafi. Then we intervened in Syria. Then we backed the Saudi war to crush the Houthi rebels in Yemen.

Given the trillions sunk and lost, and the hundreds of thousands, if not millions, dead, how have we benefited ourselves, or these peoples?

As Rusk said, “We are there and we are committed.”

And the inevitable departure of the United States from the Middle East, which is coming, just as the British, French and Soviet empires had to depart, will likely do lasting damage to the American soul.
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Patrick Buchanan is currently a conservative columnist, political analyst, chairman of The American Cause foundation and an editor of The American Conservative. He has been a senior advisor to three Presidents, a two-time candidate for the Republican presidential nomination, and was the presidential nominee of the Reform Party in 2000. He blogs at the Patrick J. Buchanan.

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Head Over Heels . . .

. . . It appears that Kathy Griffin may be creating a new love interest in the ISIS camp with he recent fake Trump head disaster.

Editorial Cartoon by AF "Tony" Branco

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Homer's Recall Odyssey

by Paul Jacob, Contributing Author: Freedom of speech isn’t a free pass to avoid the consequences of what one says. Or does. Tell that to three members of the Homer, Alaska, city council — Donna Aderhold, David Lewis and Catriona Reynolds — who are the subject of a recall petition.

Well, a superior court judge just did.

Represented by the ACLU, the trio sued to block a recall petition with more than enough voter signatures. Their lawsuit challenged the city attorney’s acceptance of the legal rationale for the recall, claiming the recall attempt punishes the politicians for their speech.

“To conclude that anytime a recall petition is based in part or in whole on what a politician said is protected by the First Amendment,” Superior Court Judge Erin Marston ruled, “would be to eviscerate the recall statute to such an extent that the populace would almost never be able to seek recall of any of their elected officials.”

Now the recall moves forward.

In most of this Land of the Free, citizens lack the ability to recall their elected officials. In places that do have the process, it is rarely used. When it is used, it is often portrayed as voters throwing a temper tantrum.

Or an unfair election do-over.

Or mean-spirited ‘vendetta politics.’

Not so. The petition requirements make recalls very difficult. Recalls don’t happen without some serious problems with the current officeholder(s). And once a recall is triggered, there follows a democratic vote to decide whether citizens want to keep the sitting hireling or find someone new.

Seems pretty reasonable.

When politicians are recalled and removed, they deserve it.*

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.

* The problem seems never to be that good politicians are being recalled, but that too many politicians who should be recalled are not. Back in 2003, the governor of California was recalled. He deserved it. In 2011, a whopping 88 percent of Miami-Dade County voted to recall Mayor Carlos Alvarez. He earned it, too.
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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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Tags: Paul Jacob, Common Sense, Homer's Recall Odyssey, Homer, Alaska To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service and "Like" Facebook Page - Thanks!

Agreement is Possible

by Kerby Anderson, Contributing Author: A recent Gallup poll found that three fourths (77%) of Americans believe we are a divided nation. But we may not be as divided on as many issues as we think.

Dirk Philipsen believes that Americans actually agree on a lot. He says one reason we seem to disagree is due to “tribalism.” He lives in the North Carolina Research Triangle, home of the UNC-Duke basketball rivalry. His favorite teams are ‘Duke and anyone playing the University of North Carolina.” This basketball rivalry provides a glimpse into the problem of tribal thinking. It is OK in basketball but dangerous in politics.

He says you can fill a room with Tea Party members, Wall Street activists, and concerned Americans and find agreement. Imagine they were to have a conversation about values and goals without any reference to political labels and catchwords. You would find people concerned about concentrated power, out-of-control change, and concerns about a government that no longer represents the people.

For example, one study found that 9 out of 10 Americans (independent of party affiliation) would prefer radically less inequality. Half of them feel that corporations have too much influence. None of them want their tax dollars wasted. And only 19 percent trust their government.

He teaches economic history and reminds us that we have seen this tribalism (even when there is consensus) in other nations. They call it “externalization.” We blame the other guy and hunker down in our own positions. We divide into groups as “us” versus “them.” We end up building walls instead of bridges.

I think the task before us is simple. Americans need to decide if they will continue to participate in this tribal game that continues to divide us or reject the forces trying to divide us. We can find common sense solutions that will address the problems that concern all Americans.
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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, agreement, tribal game, common solutionsTo share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service and "Like" Facebook Page - Thanks!

How Some State Politicians Are Using Government to Threaten Free Speech

by Jeremy Cady & Dan Caldwell: When it comes to threatening the free speech rights of American citizens, progressives have largely been the culprits at the federal level.

Yet increasingly, Republican state legislators have taken up this crusade.

Last month, New Mexico Gov. Susana Martinez rightly vetoed a Republican-supported bill that would have forced nonprofits to disclose their supporters’ personal information, saying it would “likely discourage charities and other groups that are primarily non-political from advocating for their cause.”

Now, New Mexico’s Democratic secretary of state might impose the same disclosure requirements through campaign finance rules she plans to unveil later this year.

Nonprofits also came under attack this January in South Carolina. There, Republican state Sen. Hugh Leatherman introduced a bill that sought to limit the type of speech nonprofit groups could engage in when participating in public policy debates.

Things aren’t much better in South Dakota. Last year, voters in that state narrowly passed a ballot initiative that would have drastically changed state campaign finance laws.

That measure, which was overturned by the Legislature in January, sought to subsidize political campaigns with taxpayer dollars and require additional disclosures of private information that could have opened citizens up to harassment.

Then came a political tiff in Missouri that spilled over into a threat to free speech.

After state Sen. Rob Schaaf found himself at odds with Republican Gov. Eric Greitens throughout the legislative session, a nonprofit group that supported the governor repeatedly criticized the senator.

In return, Schaaf doubled down by proposing legislation he had previously introduced, which would force nonprofits to report the names and personal information of their private supporters.

Proponents of these kinds of disclosure bills claim transparency is their goal. But we require transparency from government, not the other way around.

As the U.S. Supreme Court noted in 1958’s landmark NAACP v. Alabama opinion, there is a “vital relationship between freedom to associate and privacy in one’s association,” and the revelation of the identity of the NAACP’s “rank-and-file members has exposed these members to … loss of employment, threat of physical coercion, and … public hostility,” among other forms of intimidation.

Threats of intimidation for holding certain beliefs still persist. And with modern technology, disclosed membership lists could be accessed by internet trolls, social media mobs, and protest organizers in mere seconds.

A few strokes of the keyboard and suddenly, a reputation is destroyed, a business boycotted into ruin, or a home vandalized because an individual donated to the “wrong” nonprofit.

In addition to compelling private organizations to disclose their supporters, some measures, like those in South Dakota and Missouri, also give tremendous power to state ethics commissions.

While seemingly benign, charging these bodies with regulating and enforcing disclosures poses a significant threat to private citizens’ right to support causes in which they believe.

Deborah Jordahl, a political consultant in Wisconsin, can speak to this firsthand.

In 2013, armed law enforcement officers executed a predawn raid of her home. They confiscated records, computers, and smartphones; prevented her from calling her lawyer; and told her that she wasn’t allowed to tell anyone about what happened.

Jordahl was not alone in this. Several other private citizens in Wisconsin had their homes ransacked and lives upended in what came to be known as the John Doe investigation, carried out at the behest of the Wisconsin Government Accountability Board and a special prosecutor.

Another private citizen targeted in the investigation, Cindy Archer, said, “It destroyed my career, it destroyed my life, it changed who I am.”

What were their crimes? They didn’t commit any. They engaged in lawful policy advocacy as private citizens. Powerful officials just happened to disagree with them.

Lawmakers who support disclosure laws appear oblivious to the potential for such abuse. One South Dakota legislator asked, “Why are you afraid to associate your name with something you support?”

The answer is retaliation, as Schaaf can attest. Recently, he said he and his colleagues have “to be able to have a free and fair discussion,” and not be “afraid of doing the right thing” simply because someone might run ads ridiculing them.

If Schaaf and other elected officials, who have chosen to be public figures, could be silenced by fear of ridicule, then certainly he should understand why private citizens might be hushed by his disclosure law.

Anonymous speech has been part of the American political tradition since our founding. In “Common Sense,” “the Federalist Papers,” and other works, anonymity allowed ideas to be spoken without threat of intimidation and heard without bias.

Politicians who advance disclosure laws are showing they would rather attack the speaker than debate issues and ideas on their merits. This is corrosive to our democratic process. Anonymous speech is not.
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Jeremy Cady is the Missouri state director of Americans for Prosperity. Dan Caldwell is the director of policy for Concerned Veterans for America. Article via The Daily Signal

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Tags: State Politicians. Using Government, to Threaten, Free Speech, Jeremy Cady, Dan Caldwell, The Daily Signal To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service and "Like" Facebook Page - Thanks!

Trump Asks Supreme Court Asks Supreme Court To Hear Travel Ban Case

by Ryan Lovelace, Washington Examiner: President Trump's administration formally petitioned the Supreme Court to hear arguments over his travel ban in an expedited fashion and restore the ban immediately.

The filing indicates Trump's team wants the high court to review the petition quickly so that arguments could begin promptly at the start of the next term. Scheduled oral arguments have ended for the existing term, which concludes this month.

"Regardless of whether a stay is granted, the government respectfully requests expedited briefing and consideration of its petition of a writ of certiorari," said the Trump team on Thursday. "In that manner, if the petition can be considered before the Court adjourns, and if the Court grants review, merits briefing could be completed by the beginning of the next Term, thereby avoiding further delay in the final resolution of the exceptionally important issues presented."

The petition asks the high court to review the legality of the lower-court blockade of Trump's ban, whether the ban violates the Establishment Clause of the Constitution, and whether the blockade of the ban is "impermissibly overbroad."

Trump has made multiple attempts to implement his ban and has been slapped down each time. Trump's second executive order refining his ban prevents nationals of six Muslim-majority countries — Iran, Libya, Somalia, Syria, Sudan and Yemen — from entering the United States for 90 days. A district court judge in Maryland blocked the provision of the newest order that applies to foreign citizens from the six countries listed in the order, and the government subsequently appealed the decision to the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals.

The Trump team's request for review from the Supreme Court comes after the 4th Circuit Court of Appeals kept in place a lower-court blockade of the travel ban. Litigation before the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals remained pending. Attorney General Jeff Sessions subsequently said the Justice Department would appeal to the Supreme Court.

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Tags: Trump administration, petitions Supreme Court, Travel ban case  To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service and "Like" Facebook Page - Thanks!

Press Barking (Mad) Up The Wrong Tree

by Ann Coulter: The American media are so obsessed with their own Russian collusion story that they can't see the possibility of actual corruption right in front of their noses. It's gotten to the point that Trump could start shooting reporters on the White House lawn and The New York Times' headline would be: In Trump's New Tack, Echoes of Russia.

In fairness to the media, this is all part of the liberal proclivity to embrace any conspiracy theory under the right conditions. There are random conservatives who might believe nutty things from time to time, but conspiracy-mongering is a plant that doesn't fully bloom except in the soil of liberalism.

The psychoanalyst Erich Fromm argued that because freedom is terrifying, one way to escape the anxiety is to have a strong belief system, providing a central magnet for all the metal filings to coalesce around.

Liberals have no strong belief systems, only base impulses. This is why their passions must be corralled into conspiracy theories, to bring conformity to their lives. They hate Trump, so everything he does must be on orders from Moscow.

Meanwhile, it is a known fact that the FBI is looking at Trump's son-in-law, Jared Kushner. It is a known fact that the Kushner family has used its connections to President Trump to drum up Chinese investors for the family's real estate portfolio. It is a known fact that Jared is looking for investors in his 666 Fifth Avenue building, which is underwater. It is a known fact that Jared met with the Russian ambassador -- as well as a representative of a state-owned Russian bank -- during the transition. It is a known fact that he neglected to mention those meetings on his security clearance forms.

All of this is probably perfectly aboveboard. But if you weren't insane, the blindingly obvious question would be: Why did Kushner meet with the head of a state-controlled Russian bank?

That's not what our media want to know! Reporters see all those facts, put 2 and 2 together and ask: How does this advance the narrative that Russia colluded with the Trump campaign to steal the election from Hillary?

This is why the press blared alarmist headlines about Kushner's attempt to set up a "back channel" with Russia, a fact as important and disturbing as the square footage of Jared's office.

Liberals are desperate for anything sneaky with Russia because, unfortunately, there is still neither a coherent theory, nor any evidence, of Russian collusion with the Trump campaign to sway the election.

The argument is that Russia hacked John Podesta's emails and turned them over to Wikileaks in order to reveal to American voters that the Democratic National Committee ... conspired against Bernie Sanders! And that would have swung the election against Hillary because -- well, actually, there's no theory on how it was supposed to work, exactly, but liberals believe that trained Russian spymasters thought it was a capital idea.

Buttressing this crackpot theory, there is, helpfully, zero evidence. Despite the FBI investigating alleged Russian collusion for nearly one year now, there's still not a speck of evidence that Russia colluded with the Trump campaign, only insinuations and dramatic headlines.

The FBI itself never investigated the DNC email leaks, but outsourced review of the Democrats' servers to a cyber-security firm hired by the DNC. It raised no red flags with our Jacques Clouseau-like FBI that the DNC's chosen investigator, CrowdStrike, is affiliated with a fanatically anti-Russian Ukrainian billionaire.

CrowdStrike's smoking gun proving a Russian plot to elect Trump was the fact that the malware program used against the DNC was identical to a malware program used by the Russians to disable 80 percent of Ukraine's howitzers in its war with Russian separatists in 2014.

Except then it turned out that: a) Russia isn't the only hacker with that malware; b) Ukraine's howitzers hadn't, in fact, been disabled; and c) Ukraine's howitzer app had never even been hacked.

Other cyber-security firms scoffed at CrowdStrike's report, explaining that the "Fancy Bear" malware allegedly found in the DNC hacks may have originated with Russia, but once Russia had used it, every hacker had it. As cybersecurity expert Jeffrey Carr explained to The Miami Herald, malware isn't "a bomb or an artillery shell. (It) doesn't detonate on impact and destroy itself."

The study cited by CrowdStrike for its claim about the Ukrainian howitzers was written by the International Institute for Strategic Studies. But IISS has since explained that CrowdStrike misunderstood its report. True, Ukraine's supply of howitzers was depleted. But that reduction occurred years earlier and had nothing to do with Russia.

Technical experts with Ukraine's military further denied that their artillery app had ever been hacked, at all.

Weirdly, liberals cite the very absence of evidence to say: That's why we need an investigation!

As long as we're calling for investigations of any kook theory, how about an independent commission to investigate whether Sen. Chuck Schumer is a child molester? Schumer was Anthony Weiner's mentor, which is already more evidence than the media have for their Russian collusion story.

True, I don't have proof that Schumer is a child molester, but I just started this investigation! Was there collusion between Schumer and Weiner in the selection of the underage girl Weiner sexted with? Neither man has yet issued a full and convincing denial.

Obviously, the point of an independent investigation isn't to find any actual wrongdoing. It's to hurt Trump. But if that's your objective, American media, as loath as I am to give you helpful suggestions, the wafer-thin evidence that exists all points to Kushner, not collusion.
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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 ARRA News Service editor at the 2015 Eagle Council.

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Tags: Ann Coulter, Press, Barking Up The Wrong Tree To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service and "Like" Facebook Page - Thanks!

Putting American Families First

Former President Obama’s UN Agreement ‘Unfairly Jeopardized The American Economy’
SEN. MITCH McCONNELL (R-KY): “I applaud President Trump and his administration for dealing yet another significant blow to the Obama Administration’s assault on domestic energy production and jobs. President Obama made commitments in this deal based off a costly power plan that we knew at the time was on shaky legal ground.  By withdrawing from this unattainable mandate, President Trump has reiterated his commitment to protecting middle class families across the country and workers throughout coal country from higher energy prices and potential job loss.” (Sen. McConnell, Press Release, 6/1/2017)

• McCONNELL: “Throughout my career in the Senate, I’ve worked hard to defend coal communities and the jobs that they, and so many across the country, depend upon. These men and women have dedicated their lives to providing an affordable and reliable power source for our homes, businesses, and communities. They deserve our respect and our support. (Sen. McConnell, Floor Remarks, 3/28/2017)

“Why this matters: Pulling out of Paris is the biggest thing Trump could do to unravel Obama's climate legacy. … How it happened: A letter from 22 Republican Senators (including Mitch McConnell) that called for a clean exit had reinforced Trump's instincts to withdraw…” (“Scoop: Trump Is Pulling U.S. Out Of Paris Climate Deal,” Axios, 5/31/2017)

• 22 SENATORS: “…we urge you to make a clean exit from the Paris Agreement so that your Administration can follow through on its commitment to rescind the Clean Power Plan.” (22 Senators, Letter To President Trump, 5/25/2017)
• “Trump’s decision fulfills a key campaign promise to supporters of his run for president, widely supported by Republican members of congress who felt that the treaty unfairly jeopardized the American economy.” (“Donald Trump Will Exit Paris Climate Change Agreement,” Breitbart, 5/31/2017)

The ‘War On Coal’ Families Was ‘The Centerpiece Of Obama’s Climate Agenda’
“The [EPA’s power plant] rule… is the centerpiece of Obama’s climate agenda — but its sweeping scope and strict standards make it an especially contentious regulation.” (“Wave Of Litigation Hits Obama Climate Rule,” The Hill, 10/24/15)

• “The heart of the U.S. commitment consists of proposed EPA power plant regulations that industry groups and congressional Republicans are already trying to undercut, both by pursuing court challenges and by urging states not to comply.” (“Obama Pledges Greenhouse Gas Emissions Cuts,” Politico, 3/31/15)
• “…Obama and other world leaders [will] meet in Paris to agree to a worldwide pact to fight global warming. …Together, the regulations are the biggest part of Obama’s pledge going into the talks to reduce the United States’ greenhouse gases…” (“Senate Votes To Strike Down Obama’s Climate Rules,” The Hill, 11/17/15)

OBAMA ADMINISTRATION: ‘A War On Coal Is Exactly What’s Needed’
“…Obama’s new rules are absolutely changing the trajectory of the power industry. He has been an ally in the war on coal …” (“Obama’s Ozone Lesson,” Politico, 10/15)

DANIEL P. SCHRAG, Obama White House Climate Adviser: ‘A war on coal is exactly what’s needed’ “The one thing the president really needs to do now is to begin the process of shutting down the conventional coal plants. …a war on coal is exactly what’s needed.” (The New York Times, 6/25/13)

HILLARY CLINTON: “We’re going to put a lot of coal miners and coal companies out of business.” (“Why Putting Coal Miners Out Of Work Is A Very Bad Thing To Say In West Virginia,” The Washington Post, 5/10/16)

Obama EPA Official: ‘Make examples out of people,’ ‘crucify them’ “The Romans used to conquer little villages in the Mediterranean. They’d go into a little Turkish (sic) town somewhere, they’d find the first five guys they saw and they would crucify them. And then you know that town was really easy to manage for the next few years. And so you make examples out of people...” (Forbes, 4/26/12)

REAL IMPACT: ‘Come And Look At Our Little Children, Look At Our People, Mr. President,’ ‘We’re Hurting’
THE U.S. CHAMBER OF COMMERCE: ‘As many as 224,000 jobs would be eliminated’ “The country’s largest business lobby warned Wednesday that the Obama administration’s proposal to impose new limits on greenhouse gas emissions from power plants could eclipse $50 billion in annual costs through 2030. … The Chamber’s study says as many as 224,000 jobs would be eliminated annually through 2030 under the proposal.” (“Chamber: Costs Of EPA Climate Rule Could Top $50 Billion A Year,” The Hill, 5/28/14)

• GARY LOCKHART, Coal Miner: “Our biggest worries now are just trying to keep a roof over our heads, food on the table, telling your family that this was all caused by the EPA, directed by our President for his political agenda.” (Coal Listening Session, Kentucky, 12/6/13)
• HOWARD ABSHIRE, Coal Miner: “Come and look at our little children, look at our people, Mr. President. You're not hurting for a job; you've got one. I don't have one. … We're hurting. You say you're the president of the people? Well we're people too.” (Coal Listening Session, Kentucky, 12/6/13)

FLASHBACK: ‘Mitch McConnell Is Going All In’ Opposing The Obama Administration’s ‘Deeply Regressive Energy Regulations’
SALON: “Mitch McConnell is going all in on his promise ‘do everything [he] can to try to stop’ the EPA.” (Salon, 3/20/15)

• LIBERAL GREG SARGENT: “It might actually work.” (Greg Sargent, The Washington Posts’ ‘The Plum Line,’ 3/23/15)

SEN. MITCH McCONNELL (R-KY): “The Obama administration's so-called ‘clean power’ regulation seeks to shut down more of America's power generation under the guise of protecting the climate. In reality, this proposed regulation would have a negligible effect on global climate but a profoundly negative impact on countless American families already struggling. The regulation is unfair. It's probably illegal. And state officials can do something about it; in fact, many are already fighting back. I'm calling for others to join.” (Sen. McConnell, “States Should Reject Obama Mandate For Clean-Power Regulations,” Lexington Herald Leader, 3/3/15)

• “Earlier in March, McConnell encouraged states to opt out of the EPA’s Clean Power Plan with an op-ed in the Lexington Herald-Leader. On Thursday, McConnell took it a step further by sending a letter to all 50 governors...” (“McConnell Is Now Going Outside Of The Senate To Obstruct Obama,” New Republic, 3/20/15)

LAST CONGRESS: he Senate Joined ‘Avalanche Of Attacks On The Obama Administration’s Rules’ Assaulting Coal Families
“Both chambers of Congress this week are set to join the avalanche of attacks on the Obama administration’s rules limiting emissions from the power sector.” (“Republicans Attack Climate Rules To Send Message To UN,” National Journal, 10/26/15)

SEN. MITCH McCONNELL (R-KY): “Tonight, the U.S. Senate voted to stand up for Middle Class Americans, and specifically our hard working Kentucky coal miners and their families, by voting to overturn the Obama Administration’s deeply regressive energy regulations that would eliminate good-paying jobs, punish the poor, and make it even harder for Kentuckians to put food on the table.” (“Senate Attacks Obama’s Landmark Climate Rules,” Huffington Post, 11/18/15)

• “The Senate resolution, which passed 52 to 46, would scuttle a rule that would significantly cut heat-trapping carbon emissions from existing coal-fired power plants. That Environmental Protection Agency rule, released in August, is the centerpiece of Mr. Obama's efforts to address climate change. A second resolution, which also passed 52 to 46, would strike a related E.P.A. rule intended to freeze construction of future coal-fired power plants.” (“Senate Rejects Obama Plan To Cut Emissions At Coal-Burning Plants,” The New York Times, 11/18/15)

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Tags: Putting, American Families, First,
Former President Obama, UN Agreement, Unfairly Jeopardized, American Economy To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service and "Like" Facebook Page - Thanks!

Still Whining, Subpoenas Issued, Targeting Israel, Tel Aviv For Now

Gary Bauer

by Gary Bauer, Contributing Author:  Still Whining. . . Hillary Clinton may have made it into the Guinness Book of World Records yesterday. In a rambling interview at a tech conference, Hillary blamed at least 18 things for her defeat last year, which must be some kind of record for the most excuses by a losing candidate.

Of course, Hillary blamed the Russians. She blamed sexism. But, believe it or not, she also blamed the Democratic National Committee, which as we know tilted the whole primary process for her and against Bernie Sanders.

Amazingly, she blamed the New York Times for allegedly making her email scandal look like "Pearl Harbor." Clinton even blamed big liberal donors for not investing enough in grassroots organizations and for not buying up more media outlets.

But it gets even more bizarre.

Keep in mind the venue of this speech. Hillary was speaking to the 2017 Code Conference, which bills itself as "the most prestigious event in tech and media." Referring to her email scandal, putting top secret national security emails on an unsecured server, Hillary said, "This was the biggest nothing-burger ever."

The American people obviously didn't see it that way. And I suspect the tech executives she was addressing take the security of their corporate information much more seriously than she treated our country's secrets.

But there's more. Here's what Clinton said about Donald Trump:

"He does have a visceral grasp of America's political underbelly. He really understands how to inflame people, how to motivate them, how to bond with them. Over whatever their grievance is. Whatever resentment or point of anger that you may have . . . Islamophobia, whatever it is."There she goes again. That is Hillary speaking about you, the American people. Last year, you were "deplorable and irredeemable." Now you're "hateful and resentful," like Obama's "bitter clingers."

Of course, the tremendous irony is that the entire message of the left is built on fear. Progressives tell blacks that if Republicans win, they will "put y'all back in chains." Women will lose control of their bodies. Gays will go to jail.

The left's whole message is essentially "Middle Americaphobia" -- the irrational fear of traditional American values and what this country stands for.

Subpoenas Issued - The House Intelligence Committee issued seven subpoenas yesterday related to the continuing investigation of Russia's interference in the elections. Three of those subpoenas are aimed at finding out who in the Obama Administration led efforts to unmask or expose the identities of U.S. citizens caught up in government surveillance of foreign nationals.

The Obama officials under subpoena are: former CIA Director John Brennan, former National Security Adviser Susan Rice and former U.N. Ambassador Samantha Power.

Brennan and Rice are obvious choices for additional questioning. Their positions gave them access to that kind of sensitive material. But as the Wall Street Journal asks today, "Why would a diplomat [Ms. Power] need to know the names of Trump officials?"

According to James Rosen of Fox News, "House investigators . . . are now devoting more scrutiny to Power, and they have come to see her role in the unmasking as 'larger than previously known,' allegedly eclipsing the others named."

Last week, Rep. Trey Gowdy (R-SC) grilled Brennan about his knowledge of the unmasking of U.S. citizens in intelligence reports and specifically whether he recalled any ambassadors requesting that names be unmasked. Brennan hedged his response and his body language was curious. (Watch it here just past the two minute mark.)

We continue to believe that the big crime of recent months was not campaign collusion with the Russians (for which there is zero evidence) but the abuse of our national security laws for political gain.

We know that the Russians are up to no good. But it is much more damaging to our republic if the American people cannot trust our own government. Using the national security apparatus to target political opponents rather than foreign enemies is what police states do.

Targeting Israel - Several anti-Israel organizations are holding an event on Capitol Hill next week entitled "50 Years of Israeli Military Occupation & Life for Palestinian Children." Speakers at the event have previously accused Israel of "genocide."

The event is being held in the Cannon House Office Building. Space in the Cannon Building can only be reserved by a member of Congress. Yet the representative sponsoring this event is choosing to remain anonymous.

It is telling that the member of Congress sponsoring this event is so cowardly that he or she is attempting to hide their identity. The event is anti-Semitic on its face, and I can guarantee that the elected official sponsoring this event has not tried to organize boycotts of Iran or Syria.

It is disgusting that the only truly democratic nation in the Middle East is being targeted on Capitol Hill. American taxpayers should not be forced to subsidize organizations that are boycotting and undermining Israel, our most reliable ally in the region.

Tel Aviv. . . For Now - Citing the potential of future peace talks between Israelis and Palestinians, the White House announced today that President Trump had signed a waiver delaying, once again, the relocation of the U.S. Embassy in Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. Reacting to the announcement, Christians United for Israel issued the following statement:"We are disappointed the President chose at this time to sign the Jerusalem Embassy Act waiver but remain hopeful that he will fulfill his campaign pledge and move the U.S. Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem. The President knows that Jerusalem is the eternal and undivided capital of Israel and we strongly believe that the location of our embassy should reflect that reality. We look forward to continuing to work with the Trump Administration to strengthen the U.S.-Israel alliance and defeat the radical Islamic terrorists that threaten both our nations."While the continued delay is disappointing, I was encouraged by the remarks of Press Secretary Sean Spicer, who reiterated President Trump's unwavering support for Israel. Spicer also added, "As [President Trump] has repeatedly stated his intention to move the embassy, the question is not if that move happens, but only when."
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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, Still Whining, Subpoenas Issued, Targeting Israel, Tel Aviv For Now To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service and "Like" Facebook Page - Thanks!