Denigrating Faith, Supremes Step Up, Confronting Iran

Gary Bauer

by Gary Bauer: Denigrating Faith
During a recent interview, Barack Obama lamely attempted to explain why President Trump made gains with Hispanic voters in this year's election. Of course, the fear of socialism was nowhere in his answer.

He is incapable of admitting that once you've experienced socialism in places like Cuba or Venezuela, you won't look so kindly on a party that includes socialists like Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and her Squad.

Instead, Obama pointed to the faith of some Hispanics, saying that evangelical Hispanics overlooked Trump's racist remarks about Mexicans and policies that put "undocumented workers in cages" because they agreed with him on issues like abortion and marriage.

Of course, I disagree with Mr. Obama's analysis. The media always grossly distorted the president's remarks, and Obama built those so-called "cages."

But Obama's comment was just another indication that the left doesn't understand evangelical Christians or Orthodox Jews. The left's faith is identity politics. Obama was frustrated that evangelical Hispanics did not define themselves based on race, and that they made their faith a higher priority.

This is why the left thought it could threaten the Little Sisters of the Poor with bankruptcy and jail. But the Little Sisters refused to compromise their faith and their mission to serve the poor.

Meanwhile, liberal governors are using emergency powers to define what is "essential," and they are declaring that churches and synagogues aren't essential. But millions of Americans believe faith is absolutely essential.

In fact, religious liberty was so essential to our founding fathers that they specifically included it in the First Amendment to the Constitution.

Religious liberty is going to be one of the major battlefields if Joe Biden is declared the winner of the presidential contest. He has been clear about his intolerance for traditional Christian and Orthodox Jewish values.

Supremes Step Up

As COVID restrictions get more onerous, houses of worship have borne the brunt of some of the worst decisions by state and local politicians. Abortion clinics and marijuana dispensaries were declared "essential," while churches and synagogues were closed in spite of the First Amendment's guarantee of religious liberty.

Many conservatives were disappointed this summer when the Supreme Court refused to intervene in a Nevada lawsuit that argued churches were being held to a different standard than casinos.

I am pleased to report that the Supreme Court did intervene late last week in a case challenging New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo's shutdown of churches and synagogues. In a 5 to 4 decision, the Supreme Court issued an injunction against Cuomo's order. Writing for the majority, Justice Neil Gorsuch declared:

It is time -- past time -- to make plain that, while the pandemic poses many grave challenges, there is no world in which the Constitution tolerates color-coded executive edicts that reopen liquor stores and bike shops but shutter churches, synagogues, and mosques."

And what a difference one justice makes. We lost the Nevada case on a 5 to 4 ruling by Chief Justice John Roberts. This time, we prevailed with Justice Amy Coney Barrett defending religious liberty instead of Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg restricting it.

Confronting Iran
While Americans were celebrating Thanksgiving, Israel allegedly carried out a targeted strike against Iran's top nuclear scientist, Mohsen Fakhrizadeh. The Israeli strike should be a reason for decent human beings all over the world to celebrate. After all, we cannot tolerate a Holocaust-denying regime obtaining nuclear weapons.

Yet former Obama CIA Director John Brennan condemned the assassination as "criminal" and "highly reckless." No, what's criminal and highly reckless is turning a blind eye to Iran's regional aggression, its terrorist activity and its nuclear ambitions.

Unfortunately, Brennan is representative of the kind of people a Biden Administration will be filled with, people who want to negotiate with and do business with a regime that chants "Death to America! Death to Israel!"

Brennan and other Obama-era officials suggested that the assassination of Fakhrizadeh was merely an attempt by Trump to handcuff Biden's diplomatic efforts with Iran, which are expected to begin in earnest early next year.

First of all, we don't know if the U.S. had anything to do with the strike. But it is worth remembering what happened around this time four years ago at the end of the Obama presidency and before Trump took office.

Then-President Obama ordered our U.N. ambassador not to veto a condemnation of Israel by the U.N. Security Council that suggested Israel had no claim to Jerusalem, Judea and Samaria. That's what Obama and Biden were doing on their way out of office. They were attacking our ally Israel.

In stark contrast, Donald Trump is spending every minute he has doing everything he can to take out enemies of the free world.

Confirmation Conflicts
Some of Joe Biden's nominees are coming under fire from the left and the right over their lobbying work in the Washington swamp. It turns out that Antony Blinken, Avril Haines and Michele Flournoy worked for a left-wing lobbying firm whose client list remains secret.

Responding to reports that WestExec is not obligated to release its client list, Senator John Cornyn tweeted, "The Senate is not obligated to confirm anyone who hides this information."

For example, it is widely suspected that WestExec has lobbied on behalf of companies connected to the Chinese government. The speculation is grounded in some truth given that WestExec advertises its ability to "manage China-related risk in an era of strategic competition."

Speaking of China, the Trump Administration is sanctioning two more Chinese companies affiliated with the communist regime and its military. Semiconductor Manufacturing International Corporation (SMIC), China's largest maker of semiconductors, and China National Offshore Oil Corporation (CNOOC), a major Chinese energy company, are being added to the U.S. blacklist.

The move is the latest in a series of actions by the Trump Administration to "target what it sees as Beijing's efforts to enlist corporations to harness emerging civilian technologies for military purposes."

Media Malfeasance
The media have been having celebrating and praising Joe Biden for naming "an all female press team" as if it was some unique accomplishment. As you might expect, Trump Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany had something to say about that.

McEnany tweeted that President Trump, First Lady Melania Trump, Vice President Pence and Second Lady Karen Pence have "all female senior press teams."
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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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