“These certainly appear to be politically motivated since the ministry had run some newspaper ads – not mentioning any candidates – simply urging people to vote for candidates with biblical values,” he said.
DeMoss called the IRS audit “very troubling and said it could have a “chilling effect on people across the country.”
I wouldn’t be surprised if other Christian organizations start coming out of the woodwork with similar complaints.
It’s going to be a long hot summer for the White House.
If I didn’t know any better, I’d say the US Army is being run by the left-wing, anti- Christian hate group SPLC. They seem to be trying to stamp out any and all religious sentiment in its soldiers, as well as trying to discourage those with religious beliefs from even serving in the Army. Unless Congress steps up and does something to stop it, religious freedom in the military will be a thing of the past.
An Army officer assigned to a U.S. base says he tried to access SBC.net from his government computer but instead got a message that said the site was being blocked by “Team CONUS.” The message he received read:
“The site you have requested has been blocked by Team CONUS (C-TNOSC/RECERT-CONUS) due to hostile content.”
Team CONUS is the Department of Defense management and computer network overseer of the military’s Continental U.S. (CONUS) Theater Network Operations and Security Center (C-TNOSC) and Regional Computer Emergency Response Team (RCERT).
“So the Southern Baptist Convention is now considered hostile to the U.S. Army … It just corroborates the recent string of events highlighted by AFA,” the officer wrote in an email to American Family Association (AFA).
Earlier this month, a shocking story broke about an Army instructor in Pennsylvania who labeled Evangelical Christians, Catholics, Orthodox Jews and Mormons “religious extremists” alongside Hamas and al Qaeda during an Army Reserve Equal Opportunity training brief on extremism. An Army spokesman told Todd Starnes of Fox News that this was an “isolated incident not condoned by the Dept. of the Army.”
It was not an isolated incident.
A few days later, Todd Starnes reported at Townhall that an Army officer at Ft. Campbell, KY had recently sent an email to subordinates using similar descriptions to describe two mainstream Christian ministries that were put in the same category as Neo-Nazis, Racist Skinheads, White Nationalists and the Ku Klux Klan.
Rep. Randy Forbes, R-Va., told Fox News that soldiers have been seeing a steady attack on faith and religious freedom in the military. “We are getting a lot of calls from soldiers saying, ‘We’re afraid of going to church. We’re afraid to be seen praying. We’re afraid that would hurt our careers, our promotions.’”
Forbes questioned Defense Secretary Chuck Hagel about the religious liberty issue during a recent House Armed Services Committee meeting.
A couple of weeks ago, at least a dozen members of Congress signed a letter demanding the Secretary of the Army rescind and apologize for the patently absurd briefing that labeled Evangelical Christians, Orthodox Jews, Mormons and Catholics as religious extremist groups alongside Hamas, al Qaeda and the KKK.
“This is astonishing and offensive,” read a draft of the letter written by Rep. Doug Lamborn (R-CO). “We call on you to rescind this briefing and apologize for its content and set the record straight on the Army’s view on these faith groups by providing a balanced briefing on religious extremism.”
It’s almost like Obama is trying to cultivate an Army of left-wing atheists.
I can’t tell you how sick and tired I am of hearing about totalitarian liberal fascist freaks in the public schools trying to cram their collectivist ideologies into into our innocent kids’ heads.
The Blazebroke this latest example of a left-wing teacher trying to indoctrinate children after an attorney had come to the Jacksonville elementary school to teach the students about the Bill of Rights.
The words are written in crayon, in the haphazard bumpiness of a child’s scrawl.
“I am willing to give up some of my constitutional rights in order to be safer or more secure.”
They’re the words that Florida father Aaron Harvey was stunned to find his fourth-grade son had written, after a lesson in school about the Constitution.
According to Harvey, after the attorney left, fourth-grade teacher Cheryl Sabb dictated the sentence to some of the class and made them copy it down. But the school is telling a different story.
Harvey told The Blaze he received a call from the school Friday morning that featured the principal, guidance counselor and Sabb. He was told the sentence came during the lesson with the lawyer, that Sabb had nothing to do with it, and that Harvey’s son “wrote it on his own free will.”
Harvey said he had spoken to a girl in the class who specifically said Sabb handpicked students to write the sentence.
“All the children are pointing at the teacher,” Harvey said Friday. “They [the school] told me that my son wrote that on his own free will — there’s no way he knew how to write that on his own free will. He likes to use some big words to flourish — [but] if he was going to put together a sentence that political I’m sure it would be more jumbled than a nice sentence like that.”
If the school’s administrators refuse to accept responsibility and apologize for something that egregious, it’s time to raise a stink, and/or take your kids out of that school, parents.
Full disclosure: I hope I didn’t give the impression that I think all public school teachers are like this. All my kids go or have gone (two are in college) to public schools. The vast majority of teachers we’ve had have been wonderful people who are dedicated to their work and love children. These instances we’ve been seeing – whether it be teachers having kids sing songs praising Obama, slamming Republicans, the military, making them take ridiculous vows — I think are the exception to the rule in most areas. (Although I couldn’t vouch for deep blue urban areas.)
Anyway, here’s another awful story, and it’s not about the teacher – it’s about the curriculum..
Varebrook said she doesn’t believe her daughter’s teacher is the problem, but rather the curriculum she’s forced to teach.“I don’t think her teacher is a radical indoctrinator, it’s the curriculum,” she said. “It’s not factual. Every piece of homework I’ve seen paints conservatism in a negative light.
“I can only imagine what high school is going to bring.”
On the back side of the crossword puzzle was a political survey students were required to fill out to identify their beliefs, something Varebrook believes is equally troubling.
RELATED:
Obama wants the state to have them for one more year.
In his budget proposal unveiled today, President Obama proposed expanding free, high-quality prekindergarten to all 4-year-olds from low- and moderate-income families. He said it would cost the federal government $75 billion over the coming decade.
“We’re not banning anything. All we’re saying is, we want to show you just how big the cup is. If you want 32 ounces, take two cups to your seat. If you want 64, carry four. But our hope is, if you only take one, you won’t go back.”
When Gregory asked, “Where’s the line? Where is too far for government to go?” he answered:
“I do not think we should ban most things.”
Seriously.
Nanny Bloomberg says he wants to spend his money to “educate the public” about the dangers of Big Gulps, cigarettes and guns. Because people need to know that cigarettes, fatty foods, sugary drinks, and getting shot with assault rifles are bad for them.
Note how piously the unctuous Nanny Bloomberg claims he’s not “banning anything,” when in fact that’s exactly what he tried to do until a New York state judge drop-kicked his assertion of unfettered government authority and bureaucratic oversight through the goal posts of personal freedom — a concept that is itself under direct attack by fascists like Bloomberg, who has married his $27 billion personal fortune to his power as NYC mayor in an attempt to impose his will on the residents of the five boroughs and beyond.
Our job is to educate .., all we’re trying to do is educate.
No, yer honor, your job is to manage the city government, to make sure the snow gets shoveled and the trash gets picked up, not to lecture the rest of us and use the power of City Hall to impose your particular life-style choices on everybody else. But that’s what happens when conservatives let the Left seize the narrative and promote governmental mission creep. Once government “addresses” a problem by throwing taxpayer money at it, it’s only a short hop to government claiming — as Bloomberg does in the clip — that because government spends money on a “problem,” it now has the right to dictate personal behavior. Sheer genius, really.
You just heard Mayor Bloomberg, but he’s going to find out this is a country of the people, by the people, and for the people. And he can’t spend enough of his $27 billion to try to impose his will on the American public. They don’t want him in their restaurants, they don’t want him in their homes. They don’t want him telling them what food to eat: and they sure don’t want him telling them what self-defense firearms to own.
Added LaPierre: “He can’t buy America.”
To this, Gregory asked if the NRA isn’t at least a little concerned with Bloomberg. After all, “he wants to be the counterweight to [the NRA].”
And this is where LaPierre shined:
[The NRA has] millions of people, sending us $5, $10, $15, $20 checks saying, “Stand up to this guy who says we can only have three bullets,” which is what he said. “Stand up to this guy who says ridiculous things like, ‘The NRA wants firearms with nukes on them.’” I mean, it’s insane the stuff he says.
New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg said on Sunday: Sometimes government does know best. And in those cases, Americans should just cede their rights.
“I do think there are certain times we should infringe on your freedom,” Mr. Bloomberg said, during an appearance on NBC. He made the statement during discussion of his soda ban — just shot down by the courts — and insistence that his fight to control sugary drink portion sizes in the city would go forth.
Its incredible when non-Jews play the Antisemitism card as a way to attack their political opponents, its downright disgusting when its an Anti-Semite playing that card. This morning on the Morning Joe program, Mike Barnicle and Al Sharpton agreed that part of the opposition to Mike Bloomberg’s Gun Control efforts are caused by Antisemitism.
One of the great ironies of the gun control debate is that everyone who calls for gun control still wants a man with a gun protecting him. Every governor in America has armed security. You have to go through a metal detector guarded by men with guns to get into the Capitol building. Barack Obama has hundreds of Secret Service agents carrying fully automatic weapons who protect his safety. Even run-of-the-mill Democrats who want to take guns away from everyone else will unhesitatingly pick up the phone and call the police if they feel threatened — so that a man with a gun can show up and make them safe.
I don’t know how many millions of dollars Michael Bloomberg is sitting on in his bank account – and frankly, it’s none of my business – but if he keeps blowing it at this pace, he may run the tank dry before too long. The king of all nanny state ideals is dumping another $12M into ad buys to pump up support for new anti-second amendment initiatives. But if you watch this latest, tug at your heartstrings, down home advertisement, there’s one thing conspicuously missing.
Determined to persuade Congress to act in response to that shooting, Mr. Bloomberg on Monday will begin bankrolling a $12 million national advertising campaign that focuses on senators who he believes might be persuaded to support a pending package of federal regulations to curb gun violence. The ads, in 13 states, will blanket those senators’ districts during an Easter Congressional recess that is to be followed by debate over the legislation.
In a telling sign of how much the white-hot demands for gun control have been tempered by political reality, Mr. Bloomberg’s commercials make no mention of an assault weapons ban once sought by the White House and its allies, instead focusing on the more achievable goal of universal background checks.
The Hill is reporting that John McCain (R-AZ), who has affixed his name to such legislation or proposed legislation as McCain-Feingold (CFR), McCain-Kennedy (immigration) and McCain-Lieberman (climate change), is a key player in the quest to expand background check for gun purchasers.
Also “considering” signing on are Senator Susan Collins (R-ME) and Senator Dean Heller (R-NV). The proposal contains some “compromises” such as letting “rural gun owners conduct background checks from their home computers. Another would give military veterans who have been declared mentally unfit to own a gun a process for appealing that finding.”
McCain has a B+ rating from the NRA and Heller has an A, for the time being. According to the Hill, their support for background checks lends some credibility to the effort to recruit further support from senate Republicans. Other possible supporters do not rate as well by the NRA, Collins has a C- and Mark Kirk (R-IL), who is already on board, has an F.
Three months after the shooting rampage at a Connecticut elementary school shocked the country, the Senate is poised to debate a gun package that includes several measures, the most contentious requiring near-universal background checks on all gun sales.
What the extremists do is spread fear and unrealistic theories of conspiracies and the citizenry that needs to be armed because the government is possibly tyrannical, and they need their arms to defend themselves against the tyrannical government,” Cuomo continued. This is true: at gun rallies, I’ve heard this “slippery slope” line of argument from multiple attendees. They view the right to bear arms as a kind of check against government power.
Malarchy, Cuomo said.
“Common sense. Cool heads. Moderation. And remember there’s a majority of people in this state, this nation [that support gun control measures] and they have rights, too. It’s not just the Second Amendment right. People have a right to be safe,” he said. “Criminals and the mentally ill don’t have a right to a gun. They don’t. And you need a system and government regulation to keep guns out of the hands of criminals and the mentally ill.”
…
“These people are spreading fear because the facts don’t work for them,” Cuomo said.
First off, the Second Amendment is an absoulte right guaranteed by the Constitution. It can not be trumped by a made up generalization such as “people have a right to be safe”. Assuming that Second Amendment advocates getting their way will result in people being less safe makes Cuomo sound … well … paranoid.
The ad does not specify if the man is an actor, but he violates all three gun safety rules taught by the National Rifle Association (NRA). (Click here to see the ads.)
The first rule is to always keep the gun pointed in a safe direction. In this case, the children are playing in the yard. Although the viewers can’t see what is to the side of the truck, the man should be pointing the muzzle in the air or at the ground.
The second NRA rule is always keep your finger off the trigger until ready to shoot.
The parody song seems sort of funny… if you’re in the mind to insult half the country. His act used to be mostly impressions, and he deploys decent impressions of Charlton Heston and Sam Elliot here. The main lyric, that it takes a “cold dead hand” to pull the trigger, is… well, clever-ish for internet baiting.
But that’s all it is, isn’t it? Baiting? The disconnect here is that Jim Carrey imagines himself as heroically changing the public debate and speaking great truths to power… when in fact he’s poisoning the well. He’s not shifting the public debate; he’s freezing it further.
By choosing a strategy of thoughtless, insulting personalization of the issue, he blows up any path but the one himself chose. That is, does he expect a non-personalized, thoughtful response to his personalized, thoughtless baiting? He simultaneously seems very self-congratulatory about his baiting on Twitter, promoting his Dr. Demento song as if it’s going to change the world.
Would you like to meet the Democrats that voted to destroy your Second Amendment rights? Would you like to meet those traitorous Senators that voted to give the power over your rights to the United Nations?
Fortunately, the odious, anti-American treaty was again voted down by the full Senate, but 46 Senators voted in favor of handing over our Constitutional rights to the UN.
Senator Jim Inhofe (R-OK) offered Amendment 139 that was passed with a 53 to 46 vote. His Amendment contained language to affirm that foreign treaties would not trump the U.S. Constitution.
As New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg pumps millions of dollars into the airwaves, President Obama is getting ready for a brand new campaign. Obama will travel around the country on a gun control tour, despite Democrat Harry Reid killing Senator Dianne Feinstein’s latest gun control legislation last week. Reid has offered for Feinstein to issue her legislation as an amendment, but won’t bring the legislation as part of a larger gun control package to the Senate floor for a vote.
Politico’s Lois Romano: And I think that before this whole fight is over, we’re going to be spending hundreds of millions of dollars on this. You know, he made a very clever point. He’s trying to paint Bloomberg as a guy that’s just gonna buy everything. But the one thing the one thing that’s going on here is optics, and, you know, basically Bloomberg has on his side, sort of this whole notion that it’s time to do something different. And Wayne LaPierre is looking like a tired old white guy that’s clinging on to something of the past.
MSNBC’s Tamron Hall: Well, I’ll let you say that.
With her “clinging” remark, Romano sounds an awful lot like Politico’s hero Obama doesn’t she?
What’s especially revealing is that Politico spent most of the 2012 campaign lashing out against Citizens United, the Supreme Court decision that returned First Amendment rights to corporations. Until Citizens United, only media corporations like Politico were allowed to spend unlimited amounts of money to affect the political process.
For months, and led by former George Soros’ employee Ken Vogel, Politico lashed out against this ”outside money” and made the Koch brothers into its bogeyman.
“The president is going to act,” said Biden, giving some comments to the press before a meeting with victims of gun violence. “There are executives orders, there’s executive action that can be taken. We haven’t decided what that is yet. But we’re compiling it all with the help of the attorney general and the rest of the cabinet members as well as legislative action that we believe is required.”
Biden said that this is a moral issue and that “it’s critically important that we act.”
Biden talked also about taking responsible action. “As the president said, if you’re actions result in only saving one life, they’re worth taking. But I’m convinced we can affect the well-being of millions of americans and take thousands of people out of harm’s way if we act responsibly.”
The sort of actions Sheriff Joe is talking about wouldn’t result in saving any lives, but from what I’ve been reading on conservative blogs and forums, would result in massive civil disobedience and quite possibly the spilling of a lot of blood. Why is the Regime stocking up on guns and bullets, former Navy Seal Matt Brackenrecently asked:
Tens of thousands of new “assault weapons,” enough to shoot all of the billions (with a “b”) of .223 and .40 caliber hollow-point bullets recently purchased by our federal law enforcement agencies in unprecedented new acquisitions. Are we suddenly expecting a foreign invasion I missed reading about? Wouldn’t that be the job of the military? Why do our federal law enforcement agencies suddenly need tens of thousands of “assault weapons” and billions of new hollow-point (not training) bullets, many times more than in previous years?
Who knows. It’s none of our business, I’m sure.
Although they reportedly haven’t decided what actions will be taken, the measures promise to be draconian, turning formerly law abiding citizens into criminals, overnight:
Among the most brazen assaults being considered by the administration is a proposal that would criminalize all private sales of guns that did not keep the federal government in the loop. The scheme, which would purport to require a full federal background check for every gun sale in America, aims to track all firearms in the country through a federal database. It would also represent an attack on gun shows. According to newsreports, the administration seems to believe that the unconstitutional scheme can be implemented by “executive order.”
Gun rights activists have already shot down similar schemes, saying a national registry would simply serve as a prelude to outright confiscation later — as has happened on countless occasions throughout history, often just before governments engaged in mass murder of dissidents and target groups. However, despite massive opposition and public vows of civil disobedience, Obama and some Democrat lawmakers are determined to build an expensive federal register of all guns in America, complete with fingerprints. How such measures would reduce crime or violence remains unclear, but critics of the proposal say that was never the point anyway.
***
Incredibly, despite the fact that virtually every mass shooting in America has occurred in so-called “gun free zones” mandated by federal statutes, Obama is reportedly planning to double down on that scheme as well. According to news reports citing administration officials, the president will be seeking to, among other ideas, increase penalties for violators — perhaps teachers or school administrators who leave a firearm in their car, for example.
Even as Obama’s own children attend a school with numerous armed guards and Secret Service agents, kids without taxpayer-funded protection are expected to remain sitting ducks in “gun free” zones that critics have called “magnets” for mass shooters. Aside from being unconstitutional, how stricter penalties for gun possession would deter somebody intent on murder and probably suicide remains unclear. Gun rights advocates, meanwhile, have called for repealing the half-baked statute purporting to infringe on the right to keep and bear arms in certain areas, saying it only affects law-abiding citizens anyway.
Obama hopes to implement much of the anti-gun rights agenda by executive fiat. However, he also has a plan that he thinks will help ram other unpopular and unconstitutional gun control measures through Congress, according to a Washington Post article published over the weekend outlining parts of the attack. Like he did with ObamaCare, which is still opposed by most Americans, the president is plotting to create a “coalition” to get behind his schemes. This time, he hopes it will consist of big companies such as Wal-Mart, which would benefit financially, as well as some religious leaders and even law-enforcement personnel who can be prodded into jumping on board. The plan would also try to fracture the opposition.
Obama and his henchmen know exactly what they’re doing.
(AP Photo/Carolyn Kaster)Biden, right, with President of the National Association of Police Organizations and Boston police officer, Thomas Nee, center and Holder (OH JOY), far left
Was this supposed to be a secret? Because I don’t see it being reported anywhere outside the conservative media.
Sipsey Street has learned that a key member of the President’s committee to find “the solution” to school shootings, has a son who was convicted of plotting a Columbine-style school massacre — possibly with a service pistol obtained from his father. Nee is the former head of the Boston Police Patrolman’s Association and is currently the head of the National Association of Police Organizations. In short, says one source familiar with the notoriously anti-firearm Nee, “he is a political hack/thug/activist who happens to carry a badge.”
Sources point out that not mentioned in state-run media accounts of the Biden comission is that Thomas Nee’s son was arrested and convicted for plotting a Columbine-style attack on Marshfield High School in Massachusetts. Additionally, says one source, “Joseph Nee might have armed himself at one point with his father’s service pistol though that story went off the radar.”
This source continued, “As usual, the ‘solution’ will be the attempted theft of freedoms from the innocent while the root causes of these evil shootings, especially dysfunctional parents will be ignored.”
There are a ton of links out there re this story, here are a few.
Left-wing defenders say this makes him all the more qualified to be on the task force because he’s an expert on gun violence in his own home, or something. They also gleefully point out that the son of American Conservative Union President and newly elected president of the National Rifle Association, David Keene, was convicted and sentenced to 10 years in prison for a road rage incident in which he reportedly fired a hand gun from his moving vehicle at another car on the George Washington Memorial Parkway in Virginia. So take that, Wingnuts!
That only begs the question – why isn’t Keene on the task force, too, then?
Apparently only anti- 2nd Amendment failed parents need apply for Obama’s gun violence commission – and time is of the essence,ya’ll!
The task force is still reviewing proposals and has not made any final decisions, but they will likely do so soon. Major County Sheriffs’ Association President Richard Stanek, one of the dozens of law enforcement leaders to meet with the vice-president in the wake of the Newtown shooting, told the Post that Biden “indicated that there was a very short timeline for him to get back to the president with his recommendations because the American public has a short memory.
In other words, hurry up! The second season of Here Comes Honey Boo Boo just started and our low info voters are already drifting away from our anti- gun zeitgeist….Quick! We can’t let this crisis go to waste!!1!!
Matt Bracken has another excellent piece up at Western Rifle Shooters Association: Dear Mr. Security Agent:
When alternately trumpeting or ignoring crime stories based entirely on the races of the perpetrators and the victims isn’t enough to convey the media’s full slant, they will invent stories or lie freely, as we saw in the Trayvon Martin case, with video footage edited and spliced to deliberately portray “white-Hispanic” George Zimmerman as a racist killer. Selectively covering or ignoring crimes depending on the races of the victims and perpetrators is a vital part of the process of scapegoating. The unspoken message is clearly conveyed: crimes against disfavored groups just don’t matter. The violence prone absorb the lesson, and the result is a wave of racial attacks such as those described under the rubric of “the knockout game.”
Or consider the types of cartoons that are considered acceptable today in mainstream publications, portraying prototypical older white Christian men—presumably filthy-rich conservative Republicans—as hate-spewing maniacal villains, complete with fangs, Confederate flags, prominent Christian crosses and gigantic, threatening guns. Compare these viciously racist cartoons to the vilest anti-Semitic cartoons created by Nazi propagandists before and during World War II. I am not speaking of cartoons drawn by nobodies and posted on obscure fringe websites, I am talking about cartoons printed in mainstream newspapers, cartoons that would be condemned if the targeted group was any other than the scapegoat.
Cartoons are not serious, you say? Then how about a paper in an approved and sanctioned semi-official U.S. military publication, written by a War College professor in good standing. Serious enough for you? Google the “Small Wars Journal” piece entitled “Full Spectrum Operations in the Homeland: A Vision of the Future,” by Colonel Kevin Benson, USA (ret), 2012. The “full spectrum operations” envisaged for the Army in the homeland are not made against hypothetical hostile drug cartels in the Southwest, or urban gangs, or the traditionally ambiguous and vague “Pineland Liberation Group,” or “Orangeland People’s Front,” hypothetical stand-ins named to offend no one, not even by accident.
This long-standing neutral naming protocol is tossed aside in “Full Spectrum Operations in the Homeland,” where the new domestic enemy that the U.S. Army must crush is a neo-KKK, a white racist “Tea Party terrorist” organization, headquartered in, of all places, Darlington, South Carolina. Yes, the NASCAR Darlington. Anybody who has been in or near an actual Tea Party event or rally knows the crowd is made up mainly of an older white population, a quiet group that leaves no mess behind, not even a stray poster, and causes no fuss.
Yet “Full Spectrum Operations in the Homeland” postulates that these white grandpas and grannies will be the very group that the U.S. Army will be called upon to crush in its first major battles on American soil since 1865. The message this paper sends throughout the upper ranks of the War-College-trained military, actually naming an ethnic group—Southern whites—as the national enemy to “hypothetically” be crushed by the Army in the year 2016, is simply mind-boggling.
I usually wait until Saturday to post PJTV‘s Trifecta with Stephen Green, Scott Ott, and Bill Whittle, but yesterday’s particularly grim episode is a must watch:
The filmmaker behind “Innocence of Muslims,” a film that some blame for the Middle East riots, was taken into custody. Is this the end of the First Amendment as we know it?
Bill Whittle is especially affecting as he tries to control his rage over the regime’s harassment of the Mohammed filmmaker:
House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi on Thursday endorsed a movement announced by other congressional Democrats on Wednesday to ratify an amendment to the U.S. Constitution that would allow Congress to regulate political speech when it is engaged in by corporations as opposed to individuals.
The First Amendment says in part: “Congress shall make no law … abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press…”
Television networks, newspapers, publishing houses, movie studios and think tanks, as well as political action committees, are usually organized as, or elements of, corporations.
Pelosi said the Democrats’ effort to amend the Constitution is part of a three-pronged strategy that also includes promoting the DISCLOSE Act, which would increase disclosure requirements for organizations running political ads, and “reducing the roll of money in campaigns” (which some Democrats have said can be done through taxpayer funding of campaigns).
The constitutional amendment the Democrats seek would reverse the Supreme Court’s 2010 decision in Citizens United v. Federal Election Commission. In that decision the court said that the First Amendment protects a right of free speech for corporations as well as for individuals, and that corporations (including those that produce newspapers, films and books) have a right to speak about politicians and their records just as individuals do.
Government-financed political propaganda at the Department of Labor is causing discomfort for some employees.
Signs posted in at least 20 DOL elevators depict Secretary Hilda Solis carrying a bullhorn and rallying alongside the Rev. Al Sharpton, the Free Beacon has learned. Next to the pictures is a quote from Solis that reads in part: “We all march in our own way.”
“Whether we take to the streets or simply do our work with integrity and commitment here at the U.S. Department of Labor… we are all marching toward the same goals: safe workplaces, fair pay, dignity of the job, secure retirement, and opportunities to make a better life,” the poster states.
It concludes with a call to action.
“I believe in the power of collective action. We all play a role. We all march.”
Several employees labeled the ads as offensive, referring to them as shameless political propaganda, said one DOL employee who requested anonymity.
“It is propaganda. This is what being in a Chinese factory during the Cultural Revolution is like,” the source said. “It’s offensive. It’s saying that we’re all on the side of Trayvon Martin, or whatever Sharpton is doing, and the people of Labor should be for it.”
The source, who noted that other employees have recoiled at the sight of the posters, added that the endorsement of Sharpton and his tactics is offensive to Jewish people.
“It’s offensive to Jewish people because Sharpton was the engineer of a pogrom in Crown Heights” New York, explained the source.
The pool reporter estimated that there were a couple dozen kids in the audience of about 350, and Michelle Obama spent much of her speech talking to them.
“I mean, I can’t tell you in the last election how many grandparents I ran into who said, I wasn’t going to vote for Barack Obama until my grandson talked to me, until my great-grandson talked to me, and talked about the future he wanted for this country,” she said.
“You can get out there with your parents. You guys can knock on doors. I had one young lady who brought me a petition — she’s already working. You can convince wrong people. Sometimes we don’t listen to ourselves, but we will listen to our children.”
No, nothing surprises me about this bunch, anymore.
The picture is from a march a few weeks ago in Alabama. Solis joined an array of activists to reenact the historic civil rights march from Selma to Montgomery.
On her right arm is SEIU exec R. Eliseo Medina. On her left is, of course, MSNBC host Rev. Al Sharpton. And that’s Jesse Jackson on the other side of Delores Huerta and AFL-CIO Executive Vice President Arlene Holt Baker.
The photo depicts Solis acting as an emissary of the Obama administration protesting against Alabama’s strict new law combating illegal immigration. Solis has her arms locked with Sharpton, and Jackson is a few feet away. The poster also carries a message for federal government employees — who are traditionally expected to be apolitical in the performance of their duties.
An interesting place for the Labor Secretary to be, since last I checked, illegal immigrants were taking jobs away from American workers.
Last August, the feds raided Gibson for allegedly using an inappropriate tariff code on wood from India, which would be a violation of The Lacey Act. “They…come in with weapons, they seized a half-million dollars worth of property, they shut our factory down, and they have not charged us with anything,” says Gibson Guitars CEO Henry Juszkiewicz. The issue is not even whether the wood in question was endangered, but whether the wood was the correct level of thickness and finish before being exported from India. Gibson had previously been raided under The Lacey Act for imports from Madagascar.
Both governments involved say the transactions were lawful, the U.S. government says it wasn’t, but six months after the last raid, they haven’t filed any charges and they won’t allow Gibson to have a day in court to hash this out.
An important discussion on the genesis of the financial crisis with two experts in the field, Ann Barnhardt and Warren Pollock . Their theory is that the fraudsters are setting up a precedent for putting the banking collapse on the backs of customers – a trial balloon to see what they can get away with. They financially “rape” these innocent dupes, who should be at the very front of the line….but have ended up with no seat at the table.
Ann Barnhardt and I (Warren Pollock) have an open conversation organized to provide background to this crisis, the setting of legal precedent, netting, settlement, and future trends including a potential bank holiday. We talk about MF Global as it applies to savings and commercial banking, brokerage, insurance, and commodities. We talk about numeric impossibility of solving the problem, incest between government and finance, having the victim of the crisis pay rather than the fraudster. We explain how the MF Global bankruptcy process will define how customer funds will be treated in a bank holiday. We talk about the idea of having an honest bank holiday to root out fraud vs an economic crisis which plays to looting and criminal activity of vested interest.
On Wednesday, the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform held a hearing entitled, “Pay for Performance: Should Fannie and Freddie Executives Be Receiving Millions In Bonuses?” The hearing examined executive compensation issues at Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, which are currently held in conservatorship by the Federal Government. Issa played a clip of the above video to start off the hearing:
Key Moments (via Oversight and Reform):
“What benchmarks are Fannie and Freddie meeting for such bonuses to kick in, especially in light of the taxpayer loss of approximately $170 billion?” – Rep. Walberg
“As I’ve reported in my written statement, these losses that the taxpayers are absorbing are a result of business decisions made pre-conservatorship and mortgages that were originated pre-conservatorship. And one of the focal points for the executive compensation for the executives of Fannie and Freddie are their efforts to try to minimize losses on that book of business. They can’t undo mortgages that are made, but what they can do is they can take aggressive actions to mitigate those losses through loan modifications and other foreclosure prevention activities. And I report monthly to the House Financial Services Committee and the Senate Banking Committee on the efforts that have been undertaken to that end and the array of things in which they are assessed and go to efforts to minimize losses, undertake homeowner assistance, assure that there is ongoing liquidity in the market, and to be working with us on things, such as the servicing improvements.” – Mr. DeMarco
“But in light of all that continues on and in light of what Mr. Cummings mentioned also about his people, likewise in my state of Michigan, you stated your opposition yesterday to putting these executives on par with the federal pay scale… Why do you oppose that? And do you believe federal agencies cannot perform their duties because they don’t offer Wall Street-sized paychecks?” – Rep. Walberg
“I oppose it simply for the matter that I believe enacting that and immediately putting all the employees at Fannie and Freddie on a completely different pay scale is going to result in the taxpayer losses to Fannie and Freddie going up, not down… These remain business entities, and they remain regulated entities. They are not government agencies.” – Mr. DeMarco
“I understand all of that. Our citizens don’t. We’re at tough times, and sometimes difficult decisions have to be made. And if indeed there’s public service like you indicated, that you want to provide a service, then I think the two gentlemen seated next to you have indicated the same thing. They’re challenges we face.” – Mr. Walberg
“Earlier this year, you stated that you would leave to the FHFA what your appropriate compensation would be. If Mr. DeMarco changed course and decided that your compensation should be curtailed, would you be fine with that?” –Rep. Walberg
“I would evaluate my own personal options, but that would be the decision of the Board and Director DeMarco.” – Mr. Williams
“Don’t you think we could get qualified people to do your jobs and the jobs of those other senior executives without having to pay millions of dollars?” – Rep. Farenthold
“This is a new team. We’ve reduced executive compensation by 50%. We’ve reduced the number of senior executives by 30%. But I can tell you, are these jobs competitive? Yes. In the course of three months, I lost five senior vice presidents – out of the company, two with financial services and other companies where I can assure you they were making more money and had better career prospects as a result. These are challenging jobs in challenging circumstances, and we need to pay and reward the people who are doing the job.” – Mr. Williams
“Mr. Haldeman, as far as Freddie Mac, you’re the CEO. Do you think it [is a success]?” – Dr. Desjarlais
“I would divide the company into two parts, and this is, in part, a reference to an earlier question of whether I would invest in Freddie Mac… I would definitely invest in the company from 2009 on. I’m incredibly proud of the work of our employees from 2009 on. We have a very, very high quality book. Our people are entirely committed to making sure that we participate in responsible lending going forward.” – Mr. Haldeman
“Are they justified, then? Should they be given two to three million dollar bonuses?” –Dr. Desjarlais
“I believe given the framework that was put in place, they are justified because the framework was designed in consultation with the Special Master of Treasury looking at large financial institutions that operate as private companies, not as government agencies, to develop a compensation structure in amounts, I believe what we struck here was an appropriate balance cognizant of what the marketplace looks like.” – Mr. DeMarco
“At what year will Fannie have repaid the Treasury?” – Rep. McHenry
“As you know with a 10% dividend on the amount that’s drawed, we will never fully be able to pay back the amount that’s due to the Treasury.” – Mr. Williams
“What year will the GSEs be able to repay the taxpayers for this extraordinary support?” – Rep. McHenry
“I do not believe they will repay the taxpayer in full.” – Mr. DeMarco
“Ever?” – Rep. McHenry
“Unless we keep this conservatorship going to my children and beyond, no.” – Mr. DeMarco
Correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t the government picking winners and losers – government interventions using taxpayer money, extracted by the force of law, against the taxpayers will — a form of Fascism?
Tarek Fatah, moderate Muslim advocate, and political progressive, recently told an auditorium, filled with thousands of Canadians, that Americans need to know that “the religion of Islam is being used as a tool by a fascist force,” and has infiltrated the White House. The speech was given in Toronto at Ideacity, “Canada’s premiere meeting of the minds”.
“The dangers we face; if we do not confront them today, our children will not forgive us tomorrow”. Tarek Fatah delivers a passionate call to action, asking the ideacity 2011 audience to draw the distinction between Islam as a faith and Islamism as an ideology.
Before we go on, here’s a little background on Tarek Fatah, via Wikipedia:
Tarek Fatah (born November 20, 1949) is a Canadian political activist, writer, and broadcaster. He is the author of Chasing a Mirage: The Tragic Illusion of an Islamic State[1] published by John Wiley & Sons. In the book Fatah challenges the notion that the establishment of an Islamic state is a necessary prerequisite to entering the state of Islam. He suggests that the idea of an Islamic state is merely a mirage that Muslims have been made to chase for over a millennium. Chasing a Mirage was shortlisted for the $35,000 Donner Prize for 2008–09.
Fatah’s second book, titled The Jew Is Not My Enemy: Unveiling the Myths that Fuel Muslim Anti-Semitism,[3] was published by McClelland & Stewart in October 2010.
In May 2009, Fatah joined CFRB 1010. Later that fall, he joined John Moore‘s morning show as a contributor.[4] Currently, he co-hosts “Friendly Fire,” with Ryan Doyle on CFRB NewsTalk 1010′s evening show.
“I want you to focus and I hope you can talk to your families and your friends and your neighbors that when someone says that there is a penetration of Jihadi Islamists within Canadian society, do not dismiss it as some right-wing xenophobic racist rant.
Today in the White House there are three members of the Muslim Brotherhood that influence Obama’s policy.
One is Rashad Hussain of Indian origin who is the American Ambassador to the 52 nation organization of Islamic countries.
Dialia Mogahed who writes his speech who comes from the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt.
Just day before yesterday, another woman, an academic, was appointed in that circle.
This is happening while we sit silent and I say that as a Liberal Democrat, as someone who worked and campaigned for Barack Obama.
We have evidence in Canada of this penetration that’s going on.”
When I hear this in the wake of our recent grievous losses in Afghanistan — losses that some are whispering could have, should have been avoided, I am sick to my stomach.
Longtime readers of this blog already know I, and many others in the conservative media went to great lengths to expose Obama’s radical associations and supporters in 2008. I can still hear the the left’s wailing refrain, “Guilt by association!”. No, you idiots. It was guilt of association. No normal person is friendly with that many Islamic radicals and Marxists as I tried to point out here, and here.
Khalidi, a Yasser Arafat toady, got $75,000 through Obama and Weather Underground terrorist William Ayers from the Woods Foundation, and later Khalidi returned the favor by hosting a fundraiser for Obama. Obama “lavished praise” on Khalidi in 2003 when the former PLO functionary took a job at Columbia University, according to an LA Times article last year. It’s hardly ancient history, and Khalidi is hardly an acquaintance.
Hey, LA Times. Now that we know, or at least suspect Obama is giving White House appointments to active members of the Muslim Brotherhood….do you think you release the freakin’ tape, already?
Noisy Room continues:
Obama’s embrace of those who hate America and actively pursue the destruction of our country from within and externally has been on display for quite awhile and it’s time we see, speak and hear the truth.
Obama brought the Muslim Brotherhood into our White House; no one but Obama did this. He brought George Soros into our White House, an anti-Semite who aided the Nazi’s and a financial terrorist who is making billions off the economic misery Obama has purposely caused in our country. Many Americans fail to understand this while the media hides the truth. From corrupt dictators (e.g. inviting President Ali Bongo of Gabon to the White House) to domestic terrorists (e.g. Bill Ayers) to self-proclaimed Communist/Marxist (e.g. Van Jones), these, and many more like them, are the people Obama brings into our White House… these are his friends and associates.
Do you know people like this? Do you work with people like this? Would you appoint three Muslim Brotherhood members to the White House if you were President?
The Muslim Brotherhood creed:
“Allah is our objective, the prophet is our leader, the Koran is our law, Jihad is our way, dying in the way of Allah is our highest hope.”
“Jihad is our way” explicitly endorses the reinstatement of a worldwide Islamic regime.
On February 14, (2010) the Global Muslim Brotherhood Report first broke the story of Rashad Hussain’s statements about Sami al-Arian:
Rashad Hussain, White House official and President Obama’s newly appointed Special Envoy to the Organization of Islamic Conference, has a history of participation in events connected with the U.S. Muslim Brotherhood as well as support for Brotherhood causes, once having called prosecution of the U.S. leader of a Palestinian terrorist organization one of many “politically motivated persecutions.”
In “Appeasing the Muslim Brotherhood” at FrontPage today, Nonie Darwish exposes his closest Islamic adviser, Dalia Mogahed:
When President Obama spoke to the Muslim world in Cairo last June, a large portion of his guests were leaders and members of the Muslim Brotherhood. The speech was designed to please them more than supporting the reformist movement in Egypt and across the Muslim world.
The Obama administration has hired the first White House Muslim advisor, Dalia Mogahed, who helped with writing Obama’s speech. Mogahed is herself an Islamic ideologue who supports Islamic Sharia and denies any connection between radical Islam and terrorism. Mogahed, who was born in Egypt, has also been a firm defender of the Council on American-Islamic Relations (CAIR) and the Islamic Society of North America (ISNA). Both of these US groups are tied to the Muslim Brotherhood.
According to an article by Stephen Schwartz, a prominent American convert to Islam, in the Weekly Standard on October 20, 2009, it turns out that the Islam embraced by Mogahed is decidedly fundamentalist — a brand that endorses Shariah or Islamic law (which, of course, goes against American laws), approves of a restricted role for women (including the wearing of the Muslim headdress, hajib, in public), and calls for a global Islamic government.
Born in Egypt, Mogahed was brought to America as a child; earned a master’s in business; collaborated with tireless defender of radical Islam Georgetown professor John L. Esposito in producing a controversial study, Who Speaks for Islam? What a Billion Muslims Really Think; and became a senior analyst and executive director of the Gallup Center for Muslim Studies.
Soros is waging his own personal ideological war against America by shoveling seemingly limitless funds into organizations giving life to his “progressive” vision of social justice.
That vision, like the Muslim Brotherhood’s, identifies America and Israel as the “Great Satan” and “Little Satan” respectively, who must be demolished to pave the way for a purifying, redemptive utopia. These common enemies unite progressives and Islamic fundamentalists in what David Horowitz has coined an “unholy alliance.” As Andrew C. McCarthy writes in The Grand Jihad, “With their collectivist philosophy, transnational outlook, totalitarian demands, and revolutionary designs, Islamists are natural allies of the radical Left.”
***
Thus Soros and his spokesmen like Muasher see opportunity in the unrest roiling the Middle East and North Africa – opportunity to support the enemy of their enemy. The numerous ties of Soros and his Shadow Party cohorts have been documented; they include the master puppeteer’s own Open Society Institute and various anti-Western Islamist groups in the revolutions. It has been confirmed, for instance, that the International Crisis Group (ICG), led in part by Soros, has long petitioned for the Egyptian government to “normalize” ties with the previously banned Brotherhood – for example, in a June 2008 report called “Egypt’s Muslim Brothers: Confrontation or Integration?” And this talking point is echoed by Brian Katulis, senior fellow at the Soros-funded Center for American Progress: “Any real democratic opening would lead to greater participation of groups like the Muslim Brotherhood in a future Egyptian government.”
Soros himself has put forth this argument. In a February Washington Post editorial entitled “Why Obama Has to Get Egypt Right,” he asserts with almost comic optimism that “the Muslim Brotherhood’s cooperation with [Egyptian opposition leader] Mohamed ElBaradei, the Nobel laureate who is seeking to run for president, is a hopeful sign that it intends to play a constructive role in a democratic political system.”
***
… by calling for the Muslim Brotherhood to be given a seat at the table and a hand in fashioning the future of the Arab world, George Soros may be biting off more than he can chew with this alliance of convenience. To quote Andrew McCarthy again:
Revolutionaries of Islam and the Left make fast friends when there is a common enemy to besiege. Leftists, however, are essentially nihilists whose hazy vision prioritizes power over what is to be done with power… Islamists, who have very settled convictions about what is to be done with power, are much less so. Even their compromises keep their long-term goals in their sights. Thus do Leftists consistently overrate their ability to control Islamists.
Whatever nasty surprise awaits Soros and the Left in the long-run, at the present time they and the Muslim Brotherhood are solidifying a formidable alliance that threatens American capitalism, sovereignty, and security at home and abroad.
Staffers with Vice President Joe Biden confined an ORLANDO SENTINEL reporter in a closet this week to keep him from mingling with high-powered guests gathered for a Dem fundraiser.
Reporter Scott Powers was the designated "pool reporter" for the vice president's Wednesday visit to the massive Winter Park, Fla., home of developer and philanthropist Alan Ginsburg. The veep hadn't arrived yet but most of the 150 guests (minimum $500 donation) had. They were busy noshing on caprese crostini with oven-dried mozzarella and basil, rosemary flatbread with grapes honey and gorgonzola cheese and bacon deviled eggs, before a lunch of grilled chicken Caesar and garden vegetable wraps.
Not so for Powers. A "low-level staffer" put Powers in a storage closet and then stood guard outside the door, Powers told the DRUDGE REPORT. "When I'd stick my head out, they'd say, 'Not yet. We'll let you know when you can come out.'"
And no crustini for Powers, either. He made do with a bottle of water to sip as he sat at a tiny makeshift desk, right next to a bag marked "consignment." Powers was closeted at about 11:30 a.m., held for about an hour and 15 minutes, came out for 35 minutes of remarks by Biden and Sen. Bill Nelson, Florida Democrat, and then returned to his jail for the remainder of the event.
Powers' phone didn't work in the closet, but his Blackberry did, so he fired a picture of his impromptu prison to his editors, who posted a short blog item on the lack of freedom of the press under the veep's control.
“Scott – You have our sincere apologies for the lack of a better hold room today,” wrote Vice President Biden spokeswoman Elizabeth Alexander last Wednesday to Orlando Sentinel reporter Scott Powers.
“Lack of a better hold room” is an interesting way of putting it. In order to keep Powers from mingling with guests at a Democratic fundraiser last Wednesday, Powers was escorted into a storage closet by a Biden staffer.
Powers was the designated pool reporter, there to record the proceedings for the press corps in general.
He told ABC News that he showed up at 11:15 a.m. Wednesday to cover Vice President Biden and Sen. Bill Nelson, D-Fla., attending a $500-a-head fundraiser at the Winter Park manse of developer Alan Ginsburg.
A young female staffer met him at the door and brought him to the storage closet.
“You’re going to have to wait in here until the VP gets here,” he says she told him.
Making matters worse, Biden didn’t arrive until more than an hour later.
***
Biden’s office added that in this particular occasion, “half of the hold room was used for storage by the home’s owner and the other half was open space. A table and chair were set up for the reporter to allow him to file his story afterwards and work while he waited for the speaking program to begin. It was designated as the hold space because of its close proximity to the event room. The speaking program began approximately one hour after the reporter arrived, which he covered as the pool reporter, and he departed the home as soon as the motorcade left (about 15 mins after the speaking program ended).”
Alexander’s note to Powers ended: “Thank you for your patience and flexibility.”
If the other half of the room was open space, why was the table and chair situated practically on top of garage sale stuff? It doesn’t look like the guy even had elbow room.
Simon Neville (does that sound like a British name, or what) of The Daily Mail dryly notes:
Just ten days ago, President Obama’s spokesman Jay Carney told reporters: ‘journalists should be protected and allowed to do their work.’
Biden has a history of trouble with the media in Orlando. Trouble meaning – a reporter once asked him some tough questions during the 2008 campaign, and Biden, used to softballs, was forced to lie and obfuscate his way through the entire interview. You may remember this – I sure as hell do.
What a breath of fresh air this woman was:
One day later, Team Obama announced a “non-negotiable” blackout of WFTV.
Two and a half years later, it’s painfully obvious that all of her questions were entirely valid, and Biden’s answers, just the typical dishonest bull we get from this bunch.
Make the victim a political figure, and the chatterati and the self-righteous get bent completely out of shape, and start to consider how depriving some people of their rights is a good thing.
I think it is horrible that a pathetic loser nutjob decided to reach out and touch fame by going to a Tuscon Safeway where Representative Gabrielle “Gabby” Giffords was meeting with constituents.
I think it is reprehensible that a partisan eagerness to assign blame started before she entered surgery.
The Palin-Derangment Syndrome sufferers couldn’t wait to lay this at her doorstep, recalling her Facebook page on which she had “picked her targets” in the last campaign, of which Representative Giffords was one. The denouncements rang out loud and numerous, connecting the two. And then reminders that Sarah Palin, a Republican wasn’t the only one to use such a practice, but then, some reminders that the Democratic Leadership Committee had used the practice in 2004, and that the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee, under the leadership of Chris Van Holland had posted a similar map earlier in the same year as Palin’s map. And the denunciatory tweets slowed.
Then, we found out about the shooter’s channel on youtube, on which he posted rambling, incoherent texts about “conscious dreaming” general hatred of the government, and lists among his favorite books Mein Kampf and The Communist Manifesto. Now the usual suspects started to get quiet. Maybe it was because it was hard to denounce the eeeeevvvvviillll Reich Wingers for their hate-filled vitriolic speech when you’re busy scrubbing your website and pushing things down the memory hole that are so obviously hypocritical that even your regular readers would have a hard time not seeing how foolish you look. And the wave of snarky tweets slowed, and the raised hands pointing fingers were slowly and quietly lowered.
But the slow rumble continued. Discussion of “motives” and “filters” and “vitriolic speech” continued.
And when Pima County Sheriff Clarence Dupnik finally held his presser later in the day, it was a public relations consultant’s nightmare. He was rambling, repetitive, and dismissive of those who shared the podium with him, but despite it being an ongoing investigation, one in which he claims the shooter did not act alone, the Sheriff chose not to miss an opportunity to wave the bloody shirt, and vilify those who say things he doesn’t like:
In case you missed it, here is the money shot:
“But again I’d just like to say that when you look at unbalanced people, how they respond to the vitriol that comes out of certain people’s mouths about tearing down the government, the anger, the hatred, the bigotry that goes on in this country is getting to be outrageous. And, unfortunately, Arizona I believe has become sort of the capital. We have become the Mecca for prejudice and bigotry.”
Never let a friend’s tragedy go to waste. Politicize everything.
Not surprisingly, the Sheriff is…wait for it…a Democrat. And not just any Democrat, he is one who announced that he would not enforce a law duly passed by his state’s legislature. When those charged with enforcing the law announce that they will not, the result is lawlessness. I’m not surprised he’s upset about anger toward the government. His determination that his judgement superseded that of the legislature is exactly the kind of usurpation that many Americans are fed up with. But his tactless and ill-timed rant only joins a larger chorus repeated by the chatterati and the sanctimonious hand-wringing self-appointed cognoscenti about how speech that opposes certain government policies and those who advance them is “hate speech“, and the speakers must be held accountable for what those who hear them might do.
The problem is that these people don’t stop in illustrating what they don’t like. They frequently skip past a meaningful analysis, and happily skip into the fields of their ownhate, which they frequently turn around and heap in great piles at the feet of the objects of their own scorn and derision. And in succumbing to their impulses to point fingers and delude themselves about their own innate goodness, they forget very important things.
Speech is an expression of thought. It can be saintly and inspiring. It can be venomous and painful. It can comfort. It can edify. It can cause laughter. It can educate. It can repulse. But unfortunately, our society continues to grow in the belief that among our many blessed freedoms is a freedom not to be offended, and like most pernicious lies that make some of us feel better, we not only believe in this freedom not to be offended, we believe that it trumps other freedoms.
This freedom to not be offended has been the starting point for state-sanctioned discrimination against those who exercise their freedom to perform actions consistent with their Christian faith. But the progressives, who want to believe that they really can make everyone else conform to what they believe is “better behavior” have not been happy with this application of a non-existent right. And that’s why attacking speech they don’t like is so important. They have to paint it as “hate speech”, usually in hateful terms of their own. They have to portray it as pejoratively as possible, and do their own fear mongering about the potential ill-effects, creating the mental image of grisly murders of government officials at the hands of stooge-like listeners to talk radio and viewers of FOX news, because if some weak-willed person was programmed by these “hate merchants” and did just that, then it would only highlight the need step forward, and shut down these voices of dissent, if only for the preservation of the republic. This is of course, antithetical to the very concept of personal responsibility, another concept that they dislike, and attack on many fronts with specious arguments, and meddling certainty and entitlement. But in working so hard to create at “nightmare scenario” that hasn’t yet happened, they overlook something very fundamental:
We were intended to have the right to criticize government. We were intended to have the right express discontent, anger, and yes, even rage at those who ran afoul of us while serving in our names. This right is fundamental to a free society, because a society that would criminalize speech would criminalize thought in the same act. And criminalizing thought that opposes the current government, its officials, or its policy is to kill the genius of America, because all freedoms would be forfeit to whomever was strong enough, or powerful enough to determine what thoughts and what words are criminal. Progressives cannot make better men through the enacting of laws that determine what speech, and by inevitable extension, what thoughts are correct, no more than such laws will make people more “civil”. You might force these things to be the only expression allowed, but to do so will be to foment resentment, and only lead to a boiling ugliness seeking an outlet.
People’s thoughts are the only things that they will ever be able to truly call their own. You may not like them when they are expressed in words, but they aren’t yours to restrain, chain, squelch, or suppress. If they have merit, then they will find an audience that values them. If they do not, then their value to society will be low, and they will be treated accordingly.
Tragedies often move people to action. Remember that you are dealing with people who never let a crisis go to waste and who are sensitive to all hate but their own. There is no reason to surrender freedom for security when it comes to speech, especially since one will not lead to the other. There are valid reasons why people are “anti-government’, or more accurately “anti-the-current-government” these days, and your birthright and the sanctity of your thoughts are not subject to their tender sensitivities.
UPDATE: Another voice of reason from an unexpected quarter…if they keep this up, then there might be hope for the American Left yet…Richard Roper helps with some sorely needed perspective:
