L.A. Skyscraper Shown Exploding in New ISIS 'Promise Fulfilled' Threat

PJ Media: ISIS supporter image.

by Bridget Johnson: An ISIS-supporting group posted an image online depicting an explosion at the top of the third-tallest office tower in downtown Los Angeles.

Though ISIS backers operating under a number of media alliances regularly craft and circulate threats and recruitment propaganda in the form of posters and video, Los Angeles is rarely featured as a target. The online jihadists trend toward threatening New York, Washington, Las Vegas, and large European cities.

The new image shows a camouflage-clad jihadist holding an ISIS flag with the evening L.A. skyline in the background and the glow of flames photo-shopped coming from the hillside beneath his feet. An explosion is photo-shopped onto the top of the Aon Center, the 62-story tower at 707 Wilshire Blvd. in the city's financial district. The original photo used appears to be from Shutterstock.

The words above the image: "Our promise will soon be fulfilled."

The city of Los Angeles routinely reminds residents that landmarks and transportation hubs -- such as Los Angeles International Airport, targeted in a foiled 2000 al-Qaeda plot -- are potential terrorist targets. Terror groups have always routinely complained about products from Hollywood making their way into popular culture in Muslim-majority nations.

The U.S. Bank Tower, which is the second-tallest building in L.A., was discussed as a potential target by Osama bin Laden and Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in 1999 as they planned the 9/11 attacks. In 2006, President George W. Bush said that Mohammed, in October 2001, "had already set in motion a plan to have terrorist operatives hijack an airplane using shoe bombs to breach the cockpit door, and fly the plane into the tallest building on the West Coast" -- at the time, the U.S. Bank Tower, then known as Library Tower.

After the complex coordinated terror attacks in Paris in November 2015, L.A. officials realized that "iconic and symbolic targets are not as high on terrorists' priority list as killing high numbers of people," Michael Downing, the Los Angeles Police Department's anti-terrorism deputy chief, said at the time.

In the wake of the Paris attacks, the LAPD increased security at a Justin Bieber concert and increased outreach on security procedures at soft targets such as malls, restaurants and movie theaters.

L.A. was included in a 2016 ISIS July 4 threat that warned "there will be a device placed in either Heathrow, LAX or JFK airports." The threat coincided with another ISIS attack on a soft target: the Holey Artisan Bakery in Dhaka, Bangladesh, where 22 civilians and two police officers were killed by five terrorists.
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Bridget Johnson is a veteran journalist whose news articles and opinion columns have run in dozens of news outlets across the globe. Bridget first came to Washington to be online editor at The Hill. She is the Washington Editor for PJ Media.

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Remembering the Importance of George Washington

by Newt Gingrich: When you observe Presidents’ Day, whether you are spending a long weekend with friends and family or just relaxing and catching up on chores or hobbies, take some time to reflect on why this holiday is so important to our country.

What we now call Presidents’ Day was originally the national recognition of the birth of President George Washington. As a country, we have celebrated Washington’s birth since 1800 (the year after Washington died) because he played such a critical role in our country’s founding – and very survival.

As I mention in the first episode of my new podcast Newt’s World, which debuts this weekend, many biographies and histories describe Washington as not only extraordinary – but actually essential to the creation of America. Had he died during his first big military assignment at Fort Necessity (where he helped start the French and Indian War), or later fighting the French in the Pennsylvania woods, or at any of the many battles in the early part of the revolution which were military disasters for the Americans, the country would simply have remained a British colony for untold years to come.

On one hand, Washington was essential to eventually defeating the British – largely through pure determination, courage, and faith rather than specific military expertise.

After one of his early battles in the French and Indian War, Washington had four bullet holes in his jacket – bullets that missed him by inches. In that same battle, two of his horses were shot and killed out from under him, yet he emerged from the fray uninjured. Washington later wrote to his brother saying that it must have been divine providence that he survived. Then, about a decade after that war, a Native American leader independently repeated Washington’s remark, saying that he had his best marksmen fire at Washington but none were able to hit him. The Indian leader stated that Washington would one day be the leader of a great nation.

Later, when Washington (having lost nearly 27,500 men to fighting, illness, injury, or desertion) called his generals in to explain he would be taking his remaining 2,400 tired, cold soldiers, across the Delaware River in a snowstorm in the dead of winter, so they could ambush trained Hessian mercenary soldiers in Trenton, they thought he was crazy. Yet, Washington took Trenton with minimal American casualties.

These are amazing stories. But Washington was essential to the survival of America once the fighting had finished. The political turmoil that happened once the British surrendered was real, and it threatened to jeopardize the entire American experiment in self-government.

Remember, Washington had spent eight years of his life fighting the strongest military in the world. He had been away from his farm, his wife, and the life that he loved. Then, he sees the country he sought to help create was in many ways tearing itself apart. Despite this, he did not want or ask for the presidency.

When his generals, who were frustrated by politics and lack of pay, wanted to over throw Congress to bring order to the new country, he put a stop to the potential rebellion. When the Continental Congress convened, he turned in his sword, resigned, and went back to Mount Vernon. It was only through strong urging from Jefferson, Madison, Hamilton, and other Founding Fathers that he agreed to accept his election as our first president – and it took even more convincing from them for him to sit a second term. His fellow founders were so adamant about Washington leading the country in those early days because they knew he was the only one who could do it.

So, please take time to reflect on Washington on Monday – perhaps listen to my podcast – and consider how this one person shaped our entire history. He helped forge the framework of freedom that allows each of us to pursue happiness and create better futures for ourselves, our families, and our fellow Americans.

More than any other figure, Americans stand on his shoulders.
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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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If You Build It, They Will... Sue?

by Tony Perkins: It's been a long and winding road, but Congress flew out of town today after putting one of its most contentious battles to bed: the immigration funding bill. Of course, as liberal leaders point out, the deal won't be out of the headlines for long, especially if it means President Trump is going to check off another promise and build the wall without them.

"We're going to confront the national security crisis on our southern border..." the president told reporters on an unusually warm day in Washington, "one way or the other, we have to do it." None of this comes as a surprise to people on the Hill, who never expected the White House to give up on one of its signature priorities. If Congress will only give him the money for 50 miles of border barriers, then he'll look somewhere else for the rest. "President Trump will sign the government funding bill, and as he has stated before, he will also take other executive action -- including a national emergency -- to ensure we stop the national security and humanitarian crisis at the border," the White House's statement said. "The President is once again delivering on his promise to build the wall, protect the border, and secure our great country."

Democrats, who've been preparing for this day for weeks, were out of the gate immediately with doomsday prophecies and legal threats. "A Democratic president can declare emergencies as well," House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) warned. "So the precedent that the president is setting here is something that should be met with great unease and dismay by Republicans." Prepare, she went on, for a Democratic president to call gun control a national emergency -- or her lieutenants insisted "climate change" or "income inequality."

Then, with a straight face few could have conjured, Pelosi went on, "This is plainly a power grab by a disappointed President, who has gone outside the bounds of the law to try to get what he failed to achieve in the constitutional legislative process." Sound familiar? It ought to. That's Democratic Policymaking 101 -- and Pelosi teaches the class! If anyone's gone outside the bounds of the legislative process, it's the party in charge of the House. Remember same-sex marriage? The victory that Pelosi admitted "they could never get legislatively?" Or how about the entire two terms of Barack Obama, whose presidency could be summed up in one word -- lawlessness. He made more end-runs around Congress than an NFL fullback.

Even more incredibly, Ken Klukowski points out in Breitbart, Pelosi is trying to characterize this as some sort of malevolent power grab."That is laughable to the point of being absurd. President Trump is not claiming any inherent authority under Article II of the Constitution. Instead, he is acting exclusively within the authority that Congress has explicitly granted to any president under the National Emergencies Act, which triggers 136 separate statutory powers that Congress has embedded in various laws. Presidents have declared 59 emergencies since 1979, most recently this month when President Trump declared an emergency regarding the turmoil in Venezuela. This is only one more emergency, similar to the previous 59. Congress has authorized this. The Constitution will not burst into flames. The sky will not fall. Try the decaf."As Ken points out, the Secure Fence Act of 2006 already authorizes building the wall. "So the issue," he goes on isn't one of power but "funding." "He does not require any additional authority from Congress; he requires only money." Even so, the president shrugged, the reality is, the Democrats will sue no matter what. "We will have a national emergency, and we will then be sued," he said almost nonchalantly. "Then we'll end up in the Supreme Court, and hopefully we'll get a fair shake, and we'll win at the Supreme Court -- just like the [travel] ban."

Anything the president does, Ken argues, will end up in court. "Law, no law, emergency, no emergency... makes no difference. The litigation equation will not change. Some are also cautioning that a national emergency would create a dangerous precedent. That too is a canard. The only powers that an emergency declaration would trigger are the emergency powers that Congress has built into various federal laws. It would not lead to gun confiscations, because there is no law giving any president power to seize guns during an emergency. (Such a law would be unconstitutional in any event, because it would violate the Second Amendment.)."

As Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) made quite clear earlier today, it's time for the Democrats to get serious about real solutions. If they don't come prepared to secure our border in the next round of appropriations, voters will know exactly who to blame.
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Tony Perkins is President of the Family Research Council . This article was on Tony Perkin's Washington Update and written with the aid of FRC senior writers.

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Arkansas Legislature Passes Bill to Prohibit Abortion if Roe Overturned

Arkansas Capitol

Jerry Cox, Contributing Author: Yesterday the Arkansas Legislature passed S.B. 149 by Sen. Jason Rapert (R – Conway).

This good bill prohibits abortion in Arkansas if Roe v. Wade is overturned by the U.S. Supreme Court or by a federal constitutional amendment.

The bill received 72 votes in the Arkansas House of Representatives yesterday, and 29 votes in the Arkansas Senate last week.

Out of 135 state legislators, only 26 lawmakers voted against the bill; eight representatives in the Arkansas House did not vote one way or the other on the bill.

You can find out how your state representative and state senator voted by looking at the information below.

ARKANSAS HOUSE VOTES
The Following Representatives Voted For the Bill:

Barker Beck Bentley Berry Boyd Bragg Breaux Brown Capp Cavenaugh Christiansen Cloud Coleman C. Cooper Cozart Crawford A. Davis M. Davis Deffenbaugh Della Rosa Dotson Eaves Eubanks Evans

C. Fite L. Fite Fortner Gates Gazaway Gonzales M. Gray Hawks Hillman G. Hodges Hollowell House Jean Jett L. Johnson Kelly Ladyman Lowery Lundstrum Lynch Maddox J. Mayberry McCollum McKenzie

McNair S. Meeks Miller Payton Penzo Petty Richey Richmond Rushing Rye Shepherd Slape B. Smith S. Smith Sorvillo Speaks Sullivan Tosh Vaught Wardlaw Watson Wing Womack Wooten

The Following Representatives Voted Against the Bill:

F. Allen Blake Burch Clowney A. Collins D. Douglas D. Ferguson K. Ferguson V. Flowers D. Garner

Glover Godfrey Love Magie McCullough Murdock Nicks Scott Walker D. Whitaker

The Following Representatives Did Not Vote:

Dalby Fielding M. Hodges Holcomb

Perry Pilkington Richardson Warren

SENATE VOTES
The Following Senator Voted For the Bill:

B. Ballinger Bledsoe Caldwell E. Cheatham A. Clark J. Cooper B. Davis J. Dismang L. Eads J. English

Flippo T. Garner K. Hammer J. Hendren Hester Hickey Hill Irvin B. Johnson M. Johnson

Maloch M. Pitsch Rapert Rice B. Sample G. Stubblefield J. Sturch Teague D. Wallace

The Following Senators Voted Against the Bill:

Bond L. Chesterfield Elliott

S. Flowers K. Ingram G. Leding

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Jerry Cox is the founder and president of Family Council and the Education Alliance and a contributing author to the ARRA News Service.

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Nancy Pelosi Earned Fortune on IPO Stock Through ‘Illegal’ Insider Trading

by Pamela Geller: The new Nazi Party, the party of treason, is also the party of deep and unrestrained corruption. While the Democrats spin endless fantasies about supposed collusion between Trump and Russia, the corruption is pandemic on their side of the aisle. The fortune that Nancy Pelosi has amassed clearly hasn’t come from her Congressional salary. So where has it come from? There needs to be a full, searching, serious investigation of Pelosi’s finances, but there won’t be, because her fellow Democrats are as corrupt as she is, and Congressional Republicans are spineless wimps and RINOs.

“Nancy Pelosi Earned Fortune on IPO Stock Through ‘Illegal’ Insider Trading,” by Jay Greenberg, Neon Nettle, February 11, 2019 (thanks to Christian):

Nancy Pelosi earned a fortune buying IPO stocks using “illegal” insider trading techniques that would result in years of jail time for the average person, a newly resurfaced investigation found.

Pelosi reportedly used the information she had exclusive access to as Speaker of the House to make trades on stocks, allegedly netting the senior Democrat up to $100,000 in 48 hours on a single trade.

As the battle continues between President Donald Trump and Pelosi’s Democrats over funding for additional border security, the House speaker’s own home often gets brought into the argument. In January Pelosi declared walls to be “an immorality,” yet many have asked if walls are “immoral,” then why is the Pelosis’ mansion surrounded by a wall?

When these questions are asked, it draws attention to lavish property Nancy and Paul Pelosi call home, yet questions as to how the couple has amounted the vast wealth required to live such a lifestyle are never adequately answered.

According to the House Press Gallery, House speakers earn an annual salary of $223,500, which amounts to a roughly $30,000 raise for Pelosi, who is now again the third-highest-paid elected official in the U.S. federal government (after the president and vice president). Of course, this is a substantial salary by any means, but it doesn’t come anywhere near to accounting for Nancy Pelosi’s huge net worth.

According to Time, estimates of Pelosi’s net worth vary. Roll Call’s most recent Wealth of Congress analysis says she’s worth at least $16 million, but OpenSecrets puts her around $100 million.

She has refused to talk about it. What we do know comes from her financial disclosure reports. For example, she and her husband, Paul, own a house and vineyard in California that’s worth at least $5 million and that brought in between $15,000 and $50,000 in grape sales in 2017. She owns a commercial property and a four-story building in San Francisco that each earned her at least $100,000. She also has stock in Apple, Facebook, and Disney.

Paul Pelosi makes most of his cash from Financial Leasing Services, Inc., an investment company. But he’s not always bringing home the metaphorical bacon: He recently lost millions of dollars as the owner of the Sacramento Mountain Lions, a soccer team in the short-lived United Football League, according to Roll Call.

“He’s a private person, not involved in political life,” a Pelosi spokeswoman told the San Francisco Chronicle in 2007. “Mr. Pelosi’s investments are separate from hers, and they have separate careers.”

So Nancy Pelosi’s vineyard, property, salary, and stock add up to a substantial amount of income, but if her net worth is really estimated to be up to a whopping $100 million, where is the rest of the money coming from?…----------------
Pamela Geller (@pamelageller)is the founder, editor and publisher of The Geller Report and President of the American Freedom Defense Initiative (AFDI) and Stop Islamization of America (SIOA).

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Tags: Pamela Geller, Nancy Pelosi, Earned Fortune, IPO Stock, Illegal Insider Trading To share or post to your site, click on "Post Link". Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service and "Like" Facebook Page - Thanks!

William Barr Is Our New Attorney General

. . . Here Are 4 Things He Should Focus on Right Away

Attorney General William Barr 

Hans von Spakovsky & Cully Stimson: With the confirmation of William Barr as the 85th attorney general of the United States, we now have an experienced hand leading the Department of Justice.

At his confirmation hearing, Barr vowed to focus on violent crime, enforce our immigration laws, and protect the right to vote. But our country faces many additional challenges today, many of which require the active involvement of the attorney general. Barr, who also served in the post under President George H.W. Bush, is uniquely qualified to lead the department at this time.

It would have been hard for President Donald Trump to pick someone with a more detailed knowledge of the inner workings of the Justice Department and Capitol Hill. Barr also previously served as the deputy attorney general (the No. 2 slot) and the assistant attorney general of the Office of Legal Counsel. That office provides legal analysis and advice to the attorney general and the president.

In short, Barr doesn’t need a monthslong learning curve to understand how the department operates.

Barr made it clear in his confirmation hearing that he intends to ensure that the Justice Department, which includes the FBI, will “enforce the law evenhandedly and with integrity.”

Barr promised that the department’s conduct would be “above and away from politics.” Nothing, he added, “could be more destructive of our system of government, of the rule of law, or the Department of Justice as an institution, than any toleration of political interference with the enforcement of the law.”

So what should Barr focus on, and why?

Implement the First Step Act. Barr told the Senate Judiciary Committee that he would “diligently” implement the First Step Act, the biggest criminal reform legislation passed in recent years.

He also said he would concentrate on “chronic, violent criminals” as well as on the violence “rearing its head in the political realm.” Hopefully that means the department will investigate those who foment political violence, and prosecute them if their actions violate federal criminal law.

Enforce immigration laws. Barr made it clear he wouldn’t back away from Trump’s No. 1 priority: the enforcement of our immigration laws.

As he said, we have “the most liberal and expansive immigration laws in the world.” But “countenancing” the “lawlessness” of illegal aliens who “flout our legal system by crashing in through the back door … would be grossly unfair to those abiding by the rules.” In fact, it “would create unsafe conditions on our borders” and it “would permit an avenue for criminals and terrorists to gain access to our country.”

With Barr at the helm, count on the Justice Department to step up its vigorous enforcement of our immigration laws against illegal aliens and those cities and states that are trying to obstruct federal enforcement.

Renew FISA Sunset Provisions. Three key laws that help protect our national security are set to expire in December. Barr has extensive experience on the utility of these provisions, and should lay the groundwork now to get Congress to reauthorize those tools early.

The three provisions are the business record provision (FISA Section 501), roving wiretaps (FISA Section 105(c)), and the lone wolf amendment (FISA Section 101(b)(1)(C)).

Cybersecurity and Countering Foreign Influence. State actors have ramped up efforts in recent years against the United States and American companies.

China, in particular, has engaged in economic and scientific espionage and theft of intellectual property. Foreign intelligence services have engaged in influence operations, violated data privacy, and exploited loopholes and fissures to obtain personal information for espionage and disinformation operations.

Barr should empower the National Security Division of the Justice Department to ramp up efforts to address these complex issues in an aggressive manner, consistent with the law.

Barr is the right man for the job, at the right time. The Department of Justice is fortunate to have a man of Barr’s integrity, intelligence, and experience to lead it during these challenging times.
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Hans von Spakovsky  (@HvonSpakovsky is an authority on a wide range of issues—including civil rights, civil justice, the First Amendment, immigration, the rule of law and government reform—as a senior legal fellow in The Heritage Foundation’s Edwin Meese III Center for Legal and Judicial Studies and manager of the think tank’s Election Law. Cully Stimson (@cullystimson is a leading expert in national security, homeland security, crime control, immigration and drug policy at The Heritage Foundation’s Center for Legal and Judicial Studies and the Center for National Defense. H/T The Daily Signal.

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Trump Is Right, The Order, A False Argument

Gary Bauer

by Gary Bauer, Contributing Author: Trump Is Right - If you want a good example of fake news, the hysteria over President Trump's declaration of a national emergency at the border is it.

You are being told by a media mob that the president has made himself a dictator, that he is using powers he does not have. Senate Democrat Leader Chuck Schumer called Trump's decision "lawless."

Here are the facts:
Congress has repeatedly granted the president the power to declare national emergencies since 1976.

The left-wing Brennan Center for Justice has identified 123 statutory powers -- that means authority already existing in the law approved by Congress -- that the president can exercise under an emergency declaration.

This power has been used nearly 60 times and by every president since Jimmy Carter, who declared two national emergencies. Reagan declared six. George H. W. Bush four. Clinton seventeen. George W. Bush twelve. Obama thirteen.

Donald Trump has already used this power three times during his administration. No one freaked out then.
There are 31 active national emergencies still in effect.

In 2005, two Democrat governors, Janet Napolitano (D-AZ) and Bill Richardson (D-NM) declared states of emergency at their borders due to surging illegal immigration, crime and violence -- the same issues President Trump is citing today.President Trump has every legal right to issue this emergency declaration.

But, as he conceded during his press conference this morning, there will be a flurry of lawsuits. And he will probably lose in lower left-wing courts still dominated by Obama appointees. I expect the administration to fast-track its appeals to the Supreme Court, where I also expect Trump will prevail, just as he did on the travel ban.

Here's something to keep in mind: No one questions the president's authority to send troops to the border. Every president in recent memory has done it. Those troops regularly help build additional fencing to secure the border.

If the president can do that, why can't he tell them to dig holes and pour concrete? Of course, he can, as constitutional law professor Jonathan Turley explains here and here.

The Order - There is an emergency at the border. Current apprehensions have surged 84% and are on pace to reach a 10-year record of more 730,000 illegal border crossings this year.

In the past two years, ICE agents arrested more than 260,000 criminal aliens who were responsible for 30,000 sex crimes and 4,000 murders. These crimes, and the untold suffering they caused, never should have happened.

The failure of our politicians to secure the border and protect our citizens is what is truly immoral in this debate, not the wall.

President Trump is right to issue this emergency declaration.

The order Trump signed today authorizes the administration to reallocate approximately $8.1 billion from various sources.
$600 million from the Treasury Forfeiture Fund.

$2.5 billion from Department of Defense funds for Counterdrug Activities.

$3.6 billion from Department of Defense military construction projects.In short, the president is using seized assets from drug cartels and funds already set aside for drug interdiction and military construction projects. There's no better use of these funds than securing the border to keep drugs and gangs out.

By the way, the left is all in on open borders. But don't take my word for it.

Watch Beto O'Rourke vow to tear down the El Paso wall. And just on the other side of that wall is one of the most dangerous cities in the world.

A False Argument - Now that I knocked down the fake news, I want to address the false argument that many conservatives may fall for, and which some Republican member of Congress are already making. And that is: What about the precedent this emergency declaration will set?

Speaker Nancy Pelosi raised it yesterday because she knows conservatives are susceptible to arguments about process and the rule of law. Pelosi suggested a future liberal president might declare a national emergency on gun violence.

Others have fretted about a future President Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez declaring a national emergency to impose her Green New Deal.

That argument is absurd, and we shouldn't fall for the left's scare tactics.

As I have already noted, there is no precedent being set here. The authority Trump is using has been used repeatedly by every president since Jimmy Carter. Trump is following precedent.

Moreover, Pelosi is demonstrating her contempt for the Constitution. The president does not have the power to nullify a constitutional right. There is no authority to unilaterally invalidate the Second Amendment.

No American has a right to have a border without a wall. But every American has a right to own a firearm. No American will lose anything because of the president's emergency declaration. But his order will keep people who should not be here out of the country.

Finally, when the left is in power, it doesn't care about precedent. Liberals do whatever they have to do to advance their agenda.

When state after state passed laws protecting traditional marriage, the Obama Administration and other left-wing politicians refused to defend those laws. What was the precedent for that?

There was a time in our nation's history when filibusters against judges and executive appointments were extraordinarily rare. But after George W. Bush was elected, the left broke precedent and abused the filibuster to repeatedly block his judges in order to preserve its grip on the courts.

Later, when it was convenient for Democrats, then-Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid broke the rules to make it easier to confirm Obama's judges in order to preserve the left's grip on the courts.

I am glad Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell said yesterday that he supports the president's emergency declaration because a few weeks ago he indicated that he would not.

Now I hope McConnell will change his mind again and end the legislative filibuster. Had he done so when President Trump urged him to at any point in the past two years, we would not be in this position today.

Sen. McConnell doesn't want to change the rules on the legislative filibuster now because, ever the gentleman, he assumes Chuck Schumer will afford him the same courtesy to block legislation the next time Democrats control the White House and the Senate.

Seriously?

Progressives won't hesitate to fundamentally change the rules the next time they have power and the chance to complete their socialist transformation of America.

We shouldn't be trying to govern the country with one hand tied behind our back!
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Gary Bauer (@GaryLBauer)  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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Green Means Stop . . .

. . . High-speed rail projects are collapsing across the country, as the Green New Deal is asking for more rail projects and no air travel.

Editorial Cartoon by AF "Tony" Branco

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Pelosi Threatens National Emergency For Guns

by Tom Knighton: President Trump is going to have his border wall, he says, even if he has to declare a national emergency to build the blasted thing. Doing so would free up money that he can more or less use at his discretion. While he’d probably rather not, he’s willing to do it.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi warns that if he does that, a Democrat could do the same thing on guns.House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said President Trump’s plan to use a national emergency declaration to unilaterally provide federal funding for a border wall would set a precedent Republicans may come to regret.

Democrats, she said, could use it later to enact their own priorities, such as increasing gun control.

“Why don’t you declare that a national emergency? I wish you would,” Pelosi during a press conference Thursday, noting it was the one-year anniversary of the high school shooting in Parkland, Fla., that killed 17 students and staff. “But a Democratic president can do that.”Now, I’m not going to get into whether or not President Trump should declare an emergency to build the wall. It’s neither here nor there.

But there are some significant differences between building a wall and essentially dismantling a key part of the United States Constitution.

For one thing, the wall is a physical barrier. It’s a real, tangible thing. It’s something that can be constructed and then left in place. To make it go away, Congress would have to appropriate funding explicitly to tear it down, something I don’t think they’d be likely to do.

Declaring a national emergency and using it for gun control becomes a very different matter, though.

For one thing, you’re not talking about building something or appropriating money for a given project. Instead, you’re talking about creating legislation out of the ether. That is never going to hold up, and because it’s intangible, it’s going to go away when the emergency ends. Unless, of course, they keep declaring national emergencies so they can do away with things like elections.

I wouldn’t rule that out in the least.

Anyway, there’s also another fact to consider, and that’s how gun owners will react to such a move. Let me tell you, it won’t be pretty.

To be fair, gun owners have been prepared to deal with mild infringements for years. Oh, we’ll kvetch about universal background checks or magazines restrictions, but we’ll tend to work around it.

There’s no reason to believe that a Democrat declaring a national emergency and using it for gun control would stop with those measures. At a minimum, expect the semi-automatic ban many are pushing. If that happens, hold onto your hats, folks, because it’s going to get ugly.

There are a lot of people who have vowed not to give up their AR-15s or similar rifles. They have ammunition stockpiled and aren’t remotely interested in playing nice after such a ban. They’re willing to die for what they believe.

I’m right there with them.

Pelosi can talk about something like that, but no one is going to die because a wall exists, contrary to the rhetoric from the Left. Try to use a national emergency to create gun control, and it’s not that people may die, they will die.
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Tom Knighton is a Navy veteran, a former newspaperman, a novelist, and a blogger at Bearing Arms. He lives with his family in Southwest Georgia.

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Bernie Sanders On Ilhan Omar: “We Will Stand By Our Muslim Brothers And Sisters"

. . . But will they stand by him?
by Robert Spencer: Jewish Insider reported Thursday:
SCOOP: HEARD LAST NIGHT — Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) on a conference call hosted by Jim Zogby, Co-Chair of the DNC’s Ethnic Council, when asked about the controversy over Rep. Ilhan Omar’s tweets about AIPAC: “I talked to Ilhan last night to give her my personal support. We will stand by our Muslim brothers and sisters.”Questions that establishment media journalists would ask Bernie Sanders if they were actually journalists and ever asked Leftists tough questions:

1. Yes, you stand by your Muslim brothers and sisters, but will they stand by you, when the chips are down? Remember the Communist Tudeh Party in Iran, which supported Khomeini and the Islamic Revolution, only to be banned and persecuted by the Khomeini regime.

2. If a first-term Jewish Congresswoman had posted a series of tweets criticizing jihad mass murder and Sharia oppression of women, gays, and others, how many seconds would it have taken you to withdraw your support from her and denounce her?

3. Why doesn’t Ilhan Omar’s retailing of anti-Semitic conspiracy theories bother you? Aren’t you aware of how these conspiracy theories have been used to incite violence against Jews? Haven’t you paused to consider what her obvious belief in these conspiracy theories reveals about her character?

4. The Qur’an depicts the Jews as inveterately evil and bent on destroying the well-being of the Muslims. They are the strongest of all people in enmity toward the Muslims (5:82); they fabricate things and falsely ascribe them to Allah (2:79; 3:75, 3:181); they claim that Allah’s power is limited (5:64); they love to listen to lies (5:41); they disobey Allah and never observe his commands (5:13). They are disputing and quarreling (2:247); hiding the truth and misleading people (3:78); staging rebellion against the prophets and rejecting their guidance (2:55); being hypocritical (2:14, 2:44); giving preference to their own interests over the teachings of Muhammad (2:87); wishing evil for people and trying to mislead them (2:109); feeling pain when others are happy or fortunate (3:120); being arrogant about their being Allah’s beloved people (5:18); devouring people’s wealth by subterfuge (4:161); slandering the true religion and being cursed by Allah (4:46); killing the prophets (2:61); being merciless and heartless (2:74); never keeping their promises or fulfilling their words (2:100); being unrestrained in committing sins (5:79); being cowardly (59:13-14); being miserly (4:53); being transformed into apes and pigs for breaking the Sabbath (2:63-65; 5:59-60; 7:166); and more. They are under Allah’s curse (9:30), and Muslims should wage war against them and subjugate them under Islamic hegemony (9:29).

Now, I know you’re not a religious man and don’t take religious texts seriously, but do you understand that Ilhan Omar, as a believing, Sharia-observant Muslim, most likely does take these texts seriously, and probably thinks that they reveal eternal truths that provide her with insight into human interaction now and in all situations? She is, after all, a product of a culture that reveres these texts, and she has never given any sign of departing from the values or norms of that culture.

5. In light of question #4, do you really think that no matter how useful you may be at the moment to Ilhan Omar, that she regards you with anything other than utter contempt? Do you really think that she does not see you as an enemy of Allah who strives to impede the efforts of the Muslims in any possible way?

You may protest at this, that since you are not a religious Jew, this could not possibly be the case, but a constant characteristic of Islamic supremacists is to speak of all Americans as Christians and all Israelis as Jews, despite the fact that many are not religiously observant. Ilhan Omar has never given any indication that she does not see the world in any way other than the way an Islamic supremacist would see it.

You will doubtless call me an “Islamophobe,” Mr. Sanders, and consider the friendship and mutual respect you have established with Ms. Omar to be unshakeable. And you may well be right on the latter; human nature is everywhere the same, and it may be that Ilhan Omar will depart from what the Qur’an and Sunnah tell her about Jews in your case, and establish a lasting bond. There are plenty of precedents. But there are also plenty of precedents of Muslims establishing friendships with Jews and then turning on their Jewish friends, opting for adherence to the Qur’an and Sunnah instead of for the friendship. Boston Marathon bomber Tamerlan Tsarnaev murdered three of his Jewish friends on September 11, 2011. In August 2003 in Houston, after becoming serious and devout in his observance of Islam, Mohammed Ali Alayed murdered his Jewish friend Ariel Sellouk.

Am I saying Ilhan Omar is going to kill you, Bernie? Of course not. But it’s extremely unlikely that she is ever going to like you. And for all the support you give her, you will be out on your ear as fast as the Tudeh Party the minute you become no longer useful.

Go ahead, call me an “Islamophobe.” But one day you may discover that what I am saying here was not so “racist” and “bigoted” after all.
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Robert Spencer is the director of Jihad Watch and a Shillman Fellow at the David Horowitz Freedom Center. He is author of the New York Times bestsellers The Politically Incorrect Guide to Islam (and the Crusades) and The Truth About Muhammad. His new book is The History of Jihad From Muhammad to ISIS Published on FrontPage Mag.

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Why Are Leading Democratic Presidential Candidates Endorsing 'the Green Dream, or Whatever They Call It'?

Michael Barone

by Michael Barone: There's an old joke about an egotistical politician whose disgruntled speechwriter, just before quitting, prepares a draft that promises the moon, and specifics for how to pay for it, on the first two pages, and leaves the third page blank except for the words "You're on your own now."

That's the position that freshman Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez's Green New Deal package, co-introduced by Sen. Edward Markey, has left the several Democratic presidential candidates who rushed to endorse it. AOC (as she's often called) herself has tried to repudiate some of it, as an early draft or a Republican prank. New York Times and Washington Post reporters have indulged her alibis.

But someone wrote it, someone whose goal is to "achieve net-zero greenhouse gas emissions and" -- incidentally -- "create economic prosperity for all" in just 10 years.

One representative plank: "build out high-speed rail at a scale where air travel stops becoming necessary." Another: "create affordable public transit available to all, with goal to replace every combustion-engine vehicle." A third: "Work with farmers and ranchers to create a sustainable, pollution and greenhouse gas free, food system that ensures universal access to healthy food."

Sounds kinda drastic, especially if you sometimes fly several hours to vacation or visit relatives, or if you drive an SUV or a pickup truck, or eat meat from methane-emitting cattle or hogs.

But in their FAQs, which they maintain was sent out by mistake or something, AOC's folks assure voters that their goal is "net-zero, rather than zero emissions, in 10 years because we aren't sure that we'll be able to fully get rid of farting cows and airplanes that fast." These people who say they couldn't put out the right press release assure us they "can ramp up renewable manufacturing and power production, retrofit every building in America, build the smart grid, overhaul transportation and agriculture" in 10 years.

By this point, it should be apparent that the Green New Deal -- "the green dream, or whatever they call it," in House Speaker Nancy Pelosi's words -- is never going to happen. If you had any doubt, this week, California's new Democratic governor, Gavin Newsom, announced he was ditching his predecessor Jerry Brown's state high-speed rail line, which he said "would cost too much and take too long." It was sold to voters in 2008 as costing $40 billion. Current estimates are it will take $77 billion until completion in 2033.

But it's worth reflecting on what the GND tells us about American leftists. Far from encouraging 21st-century technology, they want to abandon 20th-century tech (planes, non-electric autos) and go back to 19th (trains). Far from accommodating individual choices, they want to boss everyone around.

Those family farmers they extol will have to wait to get to town if their electric vehicle is out of juice because the wind isn't blowing and the sun isn't shining and they're still waiting for the "affordable public transit" to reach their farm. Maybe they can use bike lanes.

And it's not at all clear that coastal sophisticates will be content to be stuck on slow-moving trains and stuck off on sidings for 20 or so hours out in what they like to call flyover country until someone cleverer than Gavin Newsom can gin up the federal printing press to pay for high-speed rail tracks between Manhattan and Hollywood.

Those on the political left -- whether struggling Generation Z bartenders from Queens or rich homeowners in Brentwood, California -- share a withering contempt for and thinly veiled hostility toward ordinary middle-income people, raising families and shopping at malls and navigating enormous SUVs (needed for kids car seats) into the fast-food carryout lanes.

Leftists love to confine vulgar people to rail lines -- high-speed rail or urban subways -- and force them into high-rise apartments, which they design. They hate single-family-home suburbs and the automobile that let ordinary people go where they want to go, when they want to and with as many stops as they like.

Voters feel differently. In France, where most people live beyond walking distance of the Paris Metro, the gilets jaunes have led a successful rebellion against a carbon tax, i.e. a tax on driving. In Washington state last November, voters, even in the county that includes Seattle, soundly rejected a carbon tax.

Now Markey says it's unfair to bring the Green New Deal to the Senate floor. The label polls well. But, he suspects, the substance won't. So why have presidential candidates Cory Booker, Kirsten Gillibrand, Kamala Harris, Amy Klobuchar and Elizabeth Warren endorsed this foolishness?
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Michael Barone is a Senior Political Analyst for the Washington Examiner and a Resident Fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, a Fox News Channel and co-author of The Almanac of American Politics. Shared by Rasmussen Reports.

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Marijuana, Mental Illness and Violence

by Dr. Walter E. Williams: Ten states and Washington, D.C., have legalized the recreational use of marijuana. Twenty-two other states, along with U.S. territories Puerto Rico and Guam, allow marijuana to be used for medical purposes.

Let’s examine some hidden issues about marijuana use. Before we start, permit me to state my values about medical or recreational use of any drug. We each own ourselves. If we choose to take chances with substances that can ruin our health, lead to death and otherwise destroy our own lives, that’s our right. But we do not have a right to harm others in the process of harming ourselves.

Alex Berenson is a graduate of Yale University, with degrees in history and economics. He delivered a speech last month at Hillsdale College’s Allan P. Kirby, Jr. Center for Constitutional Studies and Citizenship in Washington, D.C., on the hidden dangers of marijuana use. He told his audience, “Almost everything that you think you know about the health effects of cannabis, almost everything that advocates and the media have told you for a generation, is wrong.”

The active ingredient in marijuana is tetrahydrocannabinol, or THC. Marijuana is most commonly prescribed for pain, but it’s rarely tested against other pain relief drugs, such as ibuprofen. Last July, a large four-year study of Australian patients with chronic pain showed that cannabis use was associated with greater pain over time. Marijuana, like alcohol, is too weak as a painkiller for people with terminal cancer. They need opiates. Berenson said, “Even cannabis advocates, like Rob Kampia, who co-founded the Marijuana Policy Project … acknowledge that they have always viewed medical marijuana laws mostly as a way to protect recreational users.”

Marijuana legalization advocates sometimes argue that its use reduces opiate use. That is untrue. Berenson said, “The United States and Canada, which are the countries that have the most opioid use, also have by far the worst problem with … cannabis.”

Marijuana carries not only a devastating physical health risk but also mental health dangers. A 2017 National Academy of Medicine study found that “cannabis use is likely to increase the risk of developing schizophrenia and other psychoses; the higher the use, the greater the risk. … Regular cannabis use is likely to increase the risk for developing social anxiety disorder.” Also, a paper in the American Journal of Psychiatry last year showed that people who used cannabis in 2001 were almost three times as likely to use opiates three years later, even after adjusting for other potential risks.

Something else that’s not given much attention is that cannabis today is much more potent than it was in the 1970s, when most marijuana contained less than 2 percent THC. Today marijuana routinely contains 20 to 25 percent THC, as a result of sophisticated farming and cloning techniques. As such, it produces a stronger and quicker high. Berenson said that the difference between yesterday’s marijuana and today’s is like the difference between “near beer and a martini.”

Berenson cited several studies and other findings showing a relationship between marijuana use and violence and crime. According to a 2007 paper in The Medical Journal of Australia on 88 felons who had committed homicide during psychotic episodes, almost two-thirds reported misusing cannabis. A 2012 paper in the Journal of Interpersonal Violence examined a federal survey of more than 9,000 adolescents and found that marijuana use was associated with a doubling of domestic violence.

The first four states to legalize marijuana for recreational use were Colorado, Washington, Alaska and Oregon. In 2013, those states combined had about 450 murders and 30,300 aggravated assaults. In 2017, they had almost 620 murders and 38,000 aggravated assaults — an increase of 37 percent for murders and 25 percent for aggravated assaults, far greater than the national increase, even after accounting for differences in population growth.

One of the problems with legalization of marijuana is that it gives social sanction to its use. A preferable strategy would be simple decriminalization, which does not imply social sanction. Moreover, where there is no criminal activity associated with any drug usage, it should be treated as a medical problem, as opposed to a criminal problem.
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Walter Williams (@WE_Williams) is an American economist, social commentator, and author of over 150 publications. He has a Ph.D. and M.A. in Economics from the UCLA and B.A. in economics from California State University. He also holds a Doctor of Humane Letters from Virginia Union University and Grove City College, Doctor of Laws from Washington and Jefferson College. He has served on the faculty of George Mason University in Fairfax, Virginia, as John M. Olin Distinguished Professor of Economics, since 1980. Visit his website: WalterEWilliams.com and view a list of other articles and works.

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Will Diversity Be the Death of the Democrats?

by Patrick Buchanan: Both of America’s great national parties are coalitions.

But it is the Democratic Party that never ceases to celebrate diversity — racial, religious, ethnic, cultural — as its own and as America’s “greatest strength.”

Understandably so, for the party is home to a multitude of minorities.

It is the domain of the LGBTQ movement. In presidential elections, Democrats win 70 percent of Hispanics, Jews and Asian-Americans, and 90 percent of African-Americans.

Yet, lately, the party seems to be careening into a virtual war of all against all.

Democratic Governor Ralph Northam and Attorney General Mark Herring of Virginia have both admitted to using blackface.

Northam imitated Michael Jackson’s “moonwalk” in a 1984 dance contest. Herring, in 1980 at the University of Virginia, did a blackface impression of rap icon Kurtis Blow, who called it ugly and degrading.

The resignations of both have been demanded by Virginia’s black leadership. Northam and Herring, however, are defying the demands.

Meanwhile, Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax, only the second black ever to win statewide office, has been charged by two women with rape. And the demands for his resignation are growing louder and most insistent.

Yet if Fairfax is forced out, while the white governor and white attorney general get a pass, black leaders warn, all hell is going to bust loose.

The Democratic Party of Virginia was already convulsed over all the monuments, statues, schools, parks, highways and streets that bear the names of slave owners, Confederate soldiers and 19th- and 20th-century segregationists.

Across the Potomac, Ilhan Omar, the first ever Somali-American to serve in Congress, and a Muslim, ignited a firestorm last week when she gave this as the reason Congress faithfully votes the AIPAC line on Israel: “It’s all about the Benjamins, baby.”

The reference is to $100 bills, on which Ben Franklin’s face appears. The line is a rap lyric from a 1997 song by Puff Daddy.

Omar was saying Congress has been bought.

The House Democratic leadership demanded and got an apology from Omar for her use of an “anti-Semitic trope.”

But Omar now has company in the House. Palestinian-American Rep. Rashida Tlaib, also a Muslim, shares and airs her views on Israel.

The problem for Democrats?

These provocateurs are magnets for media. They speak for a rising minority in the party that regards Israel as an apartheid state that oppresses Palestinians. And they find an echo among millennials on the party’s socialist left.

As Thursday’s Washington Post headlined, this Omar flap “could forecast a Democratic divide on Israel.”

Indeed, it may have already done so.

When Senate Republicans proposed legislation to allow states to refuse to hire individuals or contractors who support the BDS movement to boycott Israel, Senators Kamala Harris, Cory Booker, Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders all voted no.

The four say they are supporting freedom of speech to condemn Israeli policy. But to others it looks like a progressive Democratic blessing for those urging that Israel be treated the same way Ian Smith’s Rhodesia and apartheid South Africa were treated.

Within the Democratic coalition, Asian-Americans are now in conflict with blacks and Hispanics over admission policies at elite schools and universities.

Asian-Americans are “overrepresented” where students are admitted based on test scores or entrance exams. Black and Hispanic leaders are demanding that student bodies, regardless of test scores, look like the community. And if this requires affirmative action based upon race and ethnicity, so be it.

The LBGTQ community is now in court demanding all the rights and protections of the civil rights laws of the ’60s. This will bring gay groups into constant collisions with religious communities that adhere to traditional moral views on homosexuality.

The minorities of color in the Democratic coalition are growing, as the base of the GOP is aging and shrinking. But these minorities are also becoming more rivalrous, competitive and demanding. And the further they move left, they more they move outside the American mainstream.

The pledge of allegiance this writer recited every day of school, reads: “I pledge allegiance to the flag of the United States of America, and to the republic for which it stands, one nation under God, indivisible, with liberty and justice for all.”

Today, the antifa left desecrates the flag, as liberals praise NFL players who “take a knee” during the national anthem. Militant migrants march under Mexican flags to protest border security policies. The “republic” has been by “our democracy.”

We are no longer “one nation … indivisible” We have almost ceased talking to one another. As for “under God,” added in 1954, Democrats at their Charlotte Convention sought to have God excised from the party platform.

“Liberty” has been supplanted by diversity, “justice” by equality.

But as Revolutionary France, Stalin’s USSR, Mao’s China, Castro’s Cuba and Hugo Chavez’s Venezuela proved, regimes that promise utopian and egalitarian societies inevitably reveal themselves to be undertakers of freedom, America’s cause.
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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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Greenlighting Socialism

by Paul Jacob, Contributing Author: Can we blame U.S. Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-NY), really?

A decade of quantitative easing, along with trillion-dollar annual deficits run up recently by congressional Republicans, have paved a debt-ridden road upon which she hopes her massive Green New Deal (GND) might glide.

We can derisively point to the now-withdrawn FAQ, which the congresswoman’s staff “accidentally” posted on the Web and sent out to reporters. It was “unfinished,” and “erroneously” said the GND would be “guaranteeing . . . Economic security for all who are unable or unwilling to work.“

But of course, read the actual totalitarian-esque House Resolution — calling for “a new national, social, industrial, and economic mobilization on a scale not seen since World War II and the New Deal era” and labeling it “a historic opportunity” — and tell me the silly FAQ isn’t accurate.

The GND promises to “create millions of good, high-wage jobs . . . provide unprecedented levels of prosperity and economic security for all people . . . and . . . counteract systemic injustices.” It must, of course, after wiping out tens of millions of jobs in private health insurance (2.6 million) and fossil fuels (10 million).

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell has been so kind as to announce he will bring the GND to a vote in the Senate. Put Senators on record. And more than 100 Democrats in Congress, including four declared presidential candidates — Sens. Cory Booker (D-N.J.), Kirsten Gillibrand (D-N.Y.), Kamala Harris (D-Calif.), and Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) — have endorsed the Green New Deal resolution.

Give AOC her due. She has brought fresh young energy to old-fashioned socialism.

And leading Democrats out of the shadows.

This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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Paul Jacob (@Common_Sense_PJ ) 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. Jacob is a contributing author on the ARRA News Service.

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The Virginia Blackface Follies

Democratic Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam

by Larry Elder: The “blackface scandal” proved beneficial for two things. It displaced the frenzy over Democratic Virginia Gov. Ralph Northam’s support for a law lifting many restrictions on late-term abortion. It also took away headlines and news print space from the commonwealth’s Democratic lieutenant governor, who faces two sexual assault allegations.

But the blackface controversy has legs.

Northam’s 1984 medical school yearbook page depicted a photograph of someone in blackface and someone in a KKK outfit, both apparently holding cans of beer. At first, Northam apologized for the pictures, arguing that they do not accurately reflect his character. The next day he said that, upon review, he is neither the person posing in blackface nor the one in the KKK outfit. Nor did he know how the photos ended up on his yearbook page. He admits that he once learned the moonwalk and applied black shoe polish to his cheeks to appear as Michael Jackson for a dance contest. When a reporter asked Northam if he could still do the moonwalk, Northam’s wife stepped in, calling the request “inappropriate.” Maybe she had seen him do it and was not impressed.

A page designer of that yearbook explained the process. Each student, he said, submitted the pictures to appear on the student’s page. This means, whether or not Northam is the person in blackface or in the KKK outfit, he nevertheless selected the photographs. The page designer doubts the pictures somehow got mixed up. Still, Northam insists he will not resign. “I have thought about resigning,” he said, “but I’ve also thought about what Virginia needs right now. And I really think that I’m in a position where I can take Virginia to the next level, and it will be very positive.”

But there’s more. Turns out there are two Virginia blackface scandals.

Democratic Virginia Attorney General Matt Herring admits that he, too, wore blackface to a party to imitate “rappers we listened to … like Kurtis Blow.” Herring was 19. In his statement of apology, he said, “the shame of that moment has haunted me for decades.” The “shame” of wearing blackface on one occasion to a party to impersonate a rapper Herring listened to “haunted” him “for decades”?

Virginia Democratic lawmakers demand Northam’s resignation, as have many Republican members of the Virginia legislature. Hillary Clinton tweeted: “This has gone on too long. There is nothing to debate. He must resign.” Presidential candidate Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif., tweeted, “The governor of Virginia should step aside so the public can heal and move forward together.”

But wait. Blacks, the group presumably the most offended by blackface pictures, want the governor to stay in office. A new Washington Post-Schar School poll asked, “Considering everything, do you think that Northam should step down as a governor of Virginia or not?” While Virginians as a whole are split evenly on whether Northam “should step down,” 58 percent of black Virginians want him to stay, with 37 percent disagreeing, a 21-point margin in favor of the governor. Apparently, blacks in Virginia have resisted the call to hop up and salute the flag of victimhood.

Critics of President Donald Trump accuse him of coarsening “race relations,” of creating an atmosphere through the use of “racist dog whistles” to “normalize” racism. But according to Gallup polls since 2001, non-Hispanic whites’ ratings of “relations between whites and blacks” as “very good” or “somewhat” good peaked at 75 percent in 2007, during the George W. Bush administration. It declined steeply during the presidency of Barack Obama, reaching a low of 45 percent in 2015. For blacks, ratings of “very good” or “somewhat good” race relations also peaked during the Bush administration, at 70 percent in 2001. As recently as 2013, the number for blacks stood strong at 66 percent, but by 2016, it had dropped to 49 percent. The drop in those perceiving “race relations” as “very good” or “somewhat good” occurred well before Trump descended the elevator at Trump Towers to announce his candidacy for president.

Get out the magic wand, wave it over America and remove the racism, along with any blackface makeup.

Nearly 70 percent of black kids are born to unwed mothers. The dropout rate in some urban high schools approaches 50 percent. Of those who do graduate, many cannot read or do math at a 12th-grade level.

The No. 1 cause of preventable death for young white men is accidents, such as car accidents. The No. 1 cause of preventable death for young black men is homicide, almost always committed by other young black men. In Chicago, a city approximately one-third white, one-third black and one-third Hispanic, blacks accounted for nearly 80 percent of homicide victims in 2018, and most of these cases remain unsolved. According to a 2017 report by the Centers for Disease Control, a black child is almost 10 times more likely to be a victim of a gun-related homicide than a white child.

But let’s talk about 35-year-old blackface pictures.
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Larry Elder (@larryelder) is a best-selling author and radio talk-show host, an American lawyer, writer and radio and television personality who is also known as the "Sage From South Central." To find out more about Larry Elder. Visit his website at LarryElder.com for list of other articles.

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AOC Is No Outlier

David Limbaugh

by David Limbaugh: The main problem in American politics is not the obvious polarization but the underlying reasons for it. Partisanship, angst and divisiveness are all preferable to surrendering the culture and fundamentally transforming the republic.

The Democratic Party has deceived much of the public into believing that its positions aren’t extreme, but the truth is coming out now for all to see. Such veritable crackpots as Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez are not merely fringe fruitcakes; they are just bringing the party out of the closet.

It’s as if half this decades-long leftist conspiracy to turn America into a socialist hellhole has finally been exposed by the unwitting soldiers of the revolution, who have understood everything about it but were told to keep their mouths shut about their ultimate goals.

The party’s ostensible centrists are panicking, realizing that unless they can successfully cast AOC et al. as outliers, the party faces an electoral bloodbath in 2020. But there are few remaining Democratic centrists.

How many national Democratic officeholders are pro-life? How many really believe in enforcing the country’s borders? How many reject the rampant practice of identity politics and the racialization of virtually every issue? How many object to the coarsening of the culture? How many defend religious liberty for Christians? How many champion the free market? How many oppose lawless judicial activism? How many support equal opportunity rather than equal outcomes?

There will be an interesting tug of war in the Democratic Party over the next few years as its pragmatic elements attempt to muzzle AOC before the reality of the party’s extremism is irreversibly planted in the minds of American voters.

Can you imagine the hysteria in the smokeless-filled rooms of the Democratic National Committee, with half the party’s bosses desperately conspiring to shut AOC up and the other half warning against anything too overt, knowing that the party’s rabid base is every bit as radical as AOC and company?

I am cautiously encouraged by the left’s premature self-exposure, because President Trump will handily win re-election if Democrats continue this pattern of defiance. No matter how much they demonize Trump, they’ll fail in direct proportion to their openness about their radical agenda.

But my optimism is tempered by the Democrats’ survival instinct and warrior spirit. They still have time to stanch the bleeding and stage a transfusion by quickly calling an audible, awkwardly persuading AOC to get back in the closet, pretending to moderate themselves and somehow, in the midst of all this contradictory confusion, mollifying their base and principal benefactors.

The most gratifying development to date is that for once, Republicans are positioned to capitalize on the Democrats’ potentially fatal confessional. Indeed, President Trump jumped right on this in his State of the Union speech in starkly contrasting the parties’ respective visions for America.

By presenting the Republican Party as bullish on America — the party of optimism, growth, life, opportunity, the rule of law, robust liberty, national sovereignty and peace through strength — and showcasing the Democratic Party as the party of death, malaise, identity politics, lawlessness and open borders, Trump has thrown down the gauntlet and set the stage for the 2020 campaign, which is now fully underway. Contrary to the prevailing narrative, Trump is anything but a policy extremist.

Trump is ideally suited to lead the GOP (and the nation) at this pivotal moment because he is nothing if not a warrior, and we stand to lose this country for generations — and possibly for good — if we don’t take this fight to our opposition and engage in it with intensity that is equal to or greater than that of the indefatigable Democrats.
Let the usual leftist suspects and their media comrades lecture us about partisanship and divisiveness, but they are the ones assaulting the principles, traditions and constitutional framework that have made this nation great, and it would be an immoral abandonment of the nation and everything we believe in to surrender just to stave off this bogus criticism and win the accolades of the left.

Some people don’t have a taste for the fight and believe that lukewarm overtures across the aisle could result in glorious harmony — as if pretending to get along were better than saving the nation for our children. How many times will we have to be short-sheeted by Democrats before we realize there is no compromising with them? Don’t the recent border negotiations show which party demands concessions, gives none and paints the other as the partisan wretch? The vaunted history of bipartisan compromise has consistently resulted in the Democrats marching the football further down the field toward the socialist goal post. Our failure to fight back has resulted in the urgency that now confronts us.

Sure, we must fight fairly, but that includes exposing the left’s real agenda and its disastrous consequences for America and every day highlighting the dramatic differences in the parties’ visions and emphasizing, in no uncertain terms, that only one of those visions is compatible with the survival of the republic as founded.
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David Limbaugh is a writer, author and attorney. His latest book is "Jesus is Risen: Paul and the Early Church." Follow him on Twitter& @davidlimbaugh and his website at davidlimbaugh.com.

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