op ed review 11/25
THIS WEEK’S NEWS
More Americans will use food stamps to buy their
Thanksgiving dinner this year than ever before,
An analysis by Breitbart News has found that the number of
individuals on food stamps now exceeds the combined populations of 24 states
and the District of Columbia.
Fresh off his reelection, President Obama is asking his
supporters to complete a survey that asks the people being polled to check off
which “constituency groups” they identify with – there are 22 groups listed but
none for “whites” or “men.”
Democratic National Committee Chair Debbie Wasserman-Schultz
proudly brags that the Democratic party is “majority minority and female.”
While the Republican Party “got whiter and more male”.
Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner said Friday that Congress
should stop placing legal limits on the amount of money the government can
borrow and effectively lift the debt limit to infinity.
Is The Obama EPA Running Its Own Black-Ops Program?
Top Republican senator ditching Norquist anti-tax pledge
A Senate proposal touted as protecting Americans' e-mail
privacy has been quietly rewritten, giving government agencies more
surveillance power than they possess under current law. Leahy's rewritten bill
would allow more than 22 agencies -- including the Securities and Exchange
Commission and the Federal Communications Commission -- to access Americans'
e-mail, Google Docs files, Facebook wall posts, and Twitter direct messages
without a search warrant.
It is only two weeks since his re-election, and his second
term remains two months away, but Barack Obama is already blundering again on
the world stage, with the kind of gaffes that would have been plastered on the
front page of The New York Times if they had been committed by George W. Bush
when he was in the White House.
How Cambodia´s first lady mocked President Obama with a
handshake greeting typically reserved for servants
God bless Texas. After the election this month, in which a
Democratic incumbent hung onto the presidency while gaining fewer votes than
his first election, there was plenty of bragging about the outcome from the
Left. Some claimed that deep-red Texas might become a swing state in the very
near future, but TNR’s Nate Cohn throws a big deluge of cold water — and math —
on that bet: Despite favorable Latino
turnout and support, Obama did worse in Texas than he did four years ago and
lost by a decisive 16-point margin.
As Operation Pillar of Defense launches into its sixth day,
a clear hero has already emerged: Iron Dome. Since the operation began, Iron
Dome has intercepted more than 300 rockets launched at Israel with a stellar success rate
of 85 percent. The anti-missile system has become a huge source of pride for
Israelis, both because of the lives it has undoubtedly saved and because the
technology is homegrown.
“This is the defense system Ronnie wanted for us. The left
hooted. Now we don't have it.”
Jobless foreigners are being forcibly ejected from Belgium
following a public outcry at a massive surge in immigration, it was revealed
yesterday. Belgian authorities have introduced a law allowing the withdrawal of
residency rights from any newcomers remaining unemployed for six months after
arriving in the country. The crackdown is being seen as a huge turnaround for
the country that is home to many EU institutions and was previously seen as one
of the most welcoming nations in Europe for
migrants.
Big labor feels its oats: Is the United
States becoming another France, with daily strikes not a
bug but a feature? Sure looks like it, with a surge of union actions in the
wake of Obama´s re-election.
An atheist group at Dartmouth College
is planning an event aimed at skewering the reputation of the late Mother
Teresa.
Death of Twinkies: A Union Contract Hit. Workers
were asked to take an 8% pay cut and pay 17% of their health-care costs instead
of zero. Welcome to the club, guys. For this, they would have received
25% ownership of Hostess plus $100 million of Hostess debt to be paid back to
the unions. But the bakers wouldn’t budge….
_____________________________________________________________________________
THIS WEEK’S FEATURED
COLUMN
Alan Azkler
11/23
Obama won re-election
in one of the worst economic periods in American history. Collectively the GOP
brain trust is correct
in their analysis of why Romney lost yet has missed the most fundamental point. The new
America Culture just didn't feel good voting Romney…Rush Limbaugh
believes it's difficult to beat Santa Claus. Ann Coulter believes the country
has reached the tipping point. Laura Ingram believes the loss was the fault of
those running the Romney campaign. Bill O'Reilly, "Romney lost because he
was an establishment Candidate and it's not a traditional America anymore. "Sean Hannity
believes "It's time to start nominating disciplined, principled,
conservatives; men and women will who will defeat their opponents, not
themselves." Newt Gingrich, "We were clearly wrong on a whole range
of fronts." Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal attributed Romney's loss to a lack
of "a specific vision that connected with the American people." Sen.
Scott Brown, "We need to be a larger-tent party." Mitt Romney believed
"The Obama campaign was following the old playbook of giving a lot of
stuff to groups that they hoped they could get to vote for them and be
motivated to go out to the polls"
Contrary to what is believed by the
GOP leadership and conservative talking heads, the devastating loss of the
presidency was not tied to a failure to expound the virtues of conservative
values widely held by the majority of Americans. We have to promote
conservative values to a new American culture that needs to feel good about
voting conservative. We cannot make them vote conservative because it's the
right thing to do. We need to attract the attention of the culture so they are
ready to hear the conservative narrative.
In the last election, Republicans and Mitt Romney came
across as the scolding parent to an audience of adolescents. Romney, while
preaching to adult conservatives, told the liberal children it's time to get
out of bed, brush your teeth, put on your Sunday best because we are going to
Church and that's final. The electorate heard an overbearing parent telling
them they must grow up; get to work, and work hard to make a better life.
And the RNC brain trust wonders why this message failed to
pierce the cultural ear buds? OMG, Romney not BFF. How did this cultural shift happen?
Government monopoly of public education has facilitated a
cultural shift since the era of the Great Society. Schools teach students to
feign rational approaches to problem solving and filter decisions through
emotions. How does it make you feel implementing your solution? Public
education rewards effort over results, because it is not fair that students
have different skills or abilities -- it's not your grades that count but how
you feel about your attempts to pursue them! History is no longer about facts
but is taught from an emotional perspective. America enslaved Africans to farm
land stolen from the indigenous people. You shouldn't feel good about that nor
should you be proud to be American.
Obama wooed voters with emotional focus-group tested
messages, allowing them to accept the abysmal failure his presidency. Voters
re-elected him because it felt good to vote for him, again. Overview of the DNC
message, "vote for us because you should be free to do what you want when
you want to do it!" No worries, the government will be there to provide
for your needs and get this we will make those overbearing parents pay for it!
Romney's candidacy was the perfect representation of what a
Reagan Conservative should be. He lost because America's cultural base has shifted
from a self-reliant, God, Family, and Country culture to a nation of dependency
looking to the government to socially provide and legislate fairness. America's
populace is willing to trade liberty for social security.
Hence any candidate preaching conservative values does not resonate with this
New American Culture.
The RNC needs to accept that we have a culture of
adolescents remaining there well into their 30's, and be knowledgeable of the
cultural differences with the Hispanic, Black and Asian communities. Successfully
broadcasting conservative values in a culturally specific message that allows
each demographic to feel good about their voting decision is a winning
strategy. Successful candidates have to make the electorate aware that
conservative values are fair and compassionate, changing how the new culture
perceives them.
Conservatives believe all American's should have unlimited
opportunities in a robust flourishing economy. All voters are welcome in our
tents who want the freedom to choose their destiny. Our opponents are the party
that wants you to believe you can do whatever you want without consequences, as
long as you follow the government rules -- clearly an oxymoron.
Conservatives really do understand people want to have the
freedom to make their own decisions and pursue happiness, we get that. We call
it liberty. We believe that nobody likes an overbearing parent or overreaching
government telling you what you can and cannot do. We have solutions that are fair for all
American's. Vote with us because when you are ready to succeed, you and all
Americans will have great opportunities.
The RNC should spend a few million on anthropologists to
study the new culture, determine why they vote, and promote a message to
attract them. With the electorate ready any conservative candidate will succeed
in 2016.
Also worth reading
this week, Cal Thomas is pessimistic, Michael Ledeen sees a silver lining
Cal Thomas Nov 8
Great nations and proud empires have always collapsed from within before
they were conquered from without.
President Obama's re-election mirrors the self-indulgent, greedy and
envious nation we are rapidly becoming…..The central message coming out of the
election seems to be that we are no longer the America
of our Founders, or even the America
that existed during World War II, which produced our "greatest
generation." Instead, the election validates the enormous cultural shift
that has been taking place since the '60s when a countercultural bomb was
dropped on society, producing moral fallout that continues to this day……….Young
people are taught in public schools, at major universities, on television and
in movies, that every life choice is acceptable and every tenet open to
interpretation……No one has to be personally responsible. No education; no
motivation; no life plan? No problem. The government will take care of you……….Other
signs of cultural decay are accepted with little notice. According to data from
the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, 40 percent of babies born in America are
born to unmarried women. Shrug. Abortion clinics continue to operate. Yawn……..
Michael Ledeen
11/21
….Inevitably, the “America is doomed” sermon is
preached in many places, both by prophets who welcome it, and by those who
dread it. Lots of true believers in the American Revolution are currently
whining that all is lost, that the counterrevolutionaries have won an
irreversible victory, and that we should either trim our sails and adopt the
multiculti doctrines, or emulate the heroes of Red Dawn and take to the
hills, fully armed, and fight back a la Davy Crockett…..Somebody should tell
the garment-renderers and sackcloth-and-ashes crowd that we’ve been through a
lot worse than this, and recovered well enough to save the world……..Here’s my
little message to the deep thinkers: in this life, there is no final
victory. Enemies abound. We defeated the two monster totalitarian
forces of the twentieth century, and we’re now under attack from the great
jihadi totalitarians of the new century. We can certainly win. In
the course of that fight we will make lots of mistakes, and we will have some
very bad leaders. If we’re up to it, and if we’re lucky, we’ll also get
some great leaders……As for the moaning and keening Republicans, you’ve got an
amazing number of governors, and some of them are doing spectacularly
well. The Dems are stuck with New York, Massachusetts, and California,
who incarnate true blue doctrines, and are in a mess. Events are likely
to demonstrate the failure of blueness in this country, as they have
abroad. So stick to your principles and don’t try to be “more like
them.” Nobody needs pseudo-blues, if people want to vote left, they’ll
vote for the real thing, not you-pretending-to-be-them-except-cuter.
Ann Coulter: Most Americans don’t realize
that, decades ago, the Democrats instituted a long-term plan to gradually turn
the United States into a Third World nation. The country would become poorer and
less free, but Democrats would have an unbeatable majority! Under Teddy
Kennedy’s 1965 immigration act, our immigration policy changed from one that
replicated the existing ethnic population to one that strictly favored
unskilled immigrants from the Third World.
Since 1968, 85 percent of legal immigrants have come from what is euphemistically
called “developing countries.” We can’t admit computer scientists from Spain fleeing
their failing socialist nation because we have to make room for a recent
Senegalese immigrant’s brother-in-law with no skills but great needs. Jonas
Salk’s parents would be unable to immigrate to America today. But the good news
is: Rich liberals and soulless businessmen have no trouble finding cheap busboys,
gardeners and nannies…….
_____________________________________________________________________________
FROM OTHER COLUMNS
"'Welcome to USA.gov,' a website maintained by the
Department of Homeland Security's U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services
(USCIS), bills itself as the 'primary gateway for new immigrants to find basic
information on how to settle in the United States' -- featuring a prominent
section for new immigrants about how to access government benefits. 'Depending
on your immigration status, length of time in the United States, and income, you may
be eligible for some federal benefit programs,' the Web page reads. ... The DHS
page offers links to government websites that explain how to access benefits
including food stamps, Supplemental Security Income (SSI), Medicaid, Medicare,
Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) and the 'official website with
information on all available federal benefit programs.' ... WelcometoUSA.gov
also boasts to immigrants that '[f]ree public education for children is one
reason many immigrants come to the United States.' ... A Republican Budget
Committee staffer noted that the issue is not only the offerings without
eligibility, but also the fact that the government is providing immigrants
visas with the expectation that they will avail themselves of government assistance."
-Caroline May
______________________________________________________________________________
BOOKS, FILM
“Two of
the most interesting stars in the world of conservative broadcasting have newly
published books timed for the for the Christmas season.”
http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/11/conservatives_using_alinskys_rule_number_5.html#ixzz2Cxuv7j29
http://www.americanthinker.com/2012/11/conservatives_using_alinskys_rule_number_5.html#ixzz2Cxuv7j29
_____________________________________________________________________________
ISLAM
“Tel Aviv bus hit by
bomb; Hamas celebrates”
IBD editorial: Israel
Vs. Hamas Is Civilization Vs. Savagery
This clip from Fathi Hamad, the Hamas Interior Minister in
Gaza, is a few years old, but all too relevant in this current conflict, as he
boasts of Hamas’ willingness and even eagerness to use children and the elderly
as human shields. “For the Palestinian people, death has become an industry, at
which women excel, and so do all the people living on this land.
Krauthammer: Hamas "Very Adept At the Pornography Of
Grief"
Islamic Jihad deputy chief Ziyad Nahala said on Sunday in an
interview with Egyptian television that all of the organization´s weapons came
from Iran.
“Leader of California Taliban cell
arrested yesterday was US Air Force
veteran”
____________________________________________________________________________
LEFTIST WATCH
Liberal economist Paul Krugman calls for a return to 91% tax
rates on the wealthy.
Forget all that turkey, stuffing and pumpkin pie, today
should be a day of fasting and atonement for American “sin.” That’s according
to Robert Jensen, a journalism professor at the University
of Texas at Austin. Jensen, known for his hard-left
politics, also calls Thanksgiving a “white-supremacist holiday.”
The commentators at Fox News will love this one. In 2001, San Francisco became the
first city in the country to cover the cost of sex change surgeries for
transgender city employees. In 2007, it became the first city in the country to
provide health care for all uninsured residents through its Healthy San
Francisco program. Now, San Francisco
is combining those firsts into yet another pioneering move by becoming the
first city in the country to cover the cost of gender reassignment surgeries
for its uninsured residents.
___________________________________________________________________________
ARTICLES
The GOP Turnout Myth: What matters is how
the GOP did in the battleground states. And there? Mr. Romney beat Mr. McCain's
numbers in every single battleground, save Ohio. In some cases, his improvement was
significant. ……what ought
to scare the GOP is this: Even with higher GOP turnout in key states, even with
Mr. Obama shedding voters, Democrats still won. Mr. Obama accomplished this by
tapping new minority voters in numbers that beat even Mr. Romney's better
turnout…..consider Ohio, where Mr. Romney won independents by 10 points. This
lead mattered little, though, given that black turnout increased by 178,000
votes, and the president won 96% of the black vote. Mr. Obama's margin of
victory there was 103,000…… it would take relatively modest minority-voter
shifts toward Republicans to return the party to a dominating force. The GOP
might see that as the enormous opportunity it is, rather than a problem. The
key to winning turnout is having more people to turn out in the first place.
Exit polls from the 2012 election show that Mitt Romney
would have lost Wisconsin, Iowa,
and New Hampshire
even if he had received 100% of the Hispanic vote in those states. This
undercuts the notion that Republicans will not win national elections unless
they moderate their stances on issues like amnesty and the DREAM Act to court
more Hispanics. Hispanics still do not make up a significant number of voters
in some of the country´s most important swing states…..
“……Moreover, because Hispanics favor
Democratic positions on a wide range of big issues having nothing to do with
immigration, supporting liberal immigration reform will not win many Hispanic
votes. Given these realities, I see no political case, from a Republican point
of view, for supporting a path to citizenship for illegal aliens. To contrary,
supporting such reform looks something like an act of political suicide.”
At Yale
University, you can be
prevented from putting an F. Scott Fitzgerald quote on your T-shirt. At Tufts,
you can be censured for quoting certain passages from the Quran. Welcome to the
most authoritarian institution in America: the modern university—"a
bizarre, parallel dimension." The
latest was last week at Fordham
University, where
President Joseph McShane scolded College Republicans for the sin of inviting
Ann Coulter to speak.
Grover Norquist:
Standing in stark contrast to the outcome of the presidential and U.S.
Senate races, Republicans strengthened their control of state capitols on Nov.
6. The GOP went into 2012 with unified control of the governor’s mansions and
legislatures in 24 states and will come out with full political control of 25
states. Democrats will head into 2013 with a disadvantage at the state level,
having total control of just 13 states.
Max Boot: The latest Gaza war is only a few
days old, but already one conclusion can be drawn: missile defense works. This
is only the latest vindication for the vision of Ronald Reagan who is emerging
as a consensus pick for one of the all-time great U.S. presidents. For it was Ronald
Reagan who made missile defense a major priority for the U.S. and our allies.
But none of his colleagues can compete with the media
acclaim cascading over Chief Justice John Roberts after his solo decision
upholding Obamacare last June. The editors of Esquire have included Chief
Justice Roberts in their December "Americans of the Year" issue,
praising his "nimbleness.” The
Chief Justice also made the Atlantic Monthly's list of "Brave
Thinkers" of 2012, by which they mean thinkers who agree with the Atlantic's liberal editors. The Chief Justice gets credit
for "maintaining the Court's legitimacy" with a ruling "both
brave and shrewd."
When government gets bigger, big business typically benefits
at the expense of smaller competitors, consumers, and taxpayers. Obamacare is
demonstrating this rule.
Thomas Sowell on unions: “Unions Kill The
Goose That Made Hostess Brands Gold”
http://news.investors.com/ibd-editorials-on-the-right/111912-633985-unions-dont-always-benefit-workers.htm#ixzz2CjXGjRl9
http://news.investors.com/ibd-editorials-on-the-right/111912-633985-unions-dont-always-benefit-workers.htm#ixzz2CjXGjRl9
________________________________________________________________________
NOTEWORTHY WEBSITES
National
Absurdity Day: Our top picks of the worst
http://news.investors.com/politics-andrew-malcolm/112012-634069-national-absurdity-day-twinkies-nativity-scenes-chicago-pays-parents-to-care.htm#ixzz2CmIE6h6G
http://news.investors.com/politics-andrew-malcolm/112012-634069-national-absurdity-day-twinkies-nativity-scenes-chicago-pays-parents-to-care.htm#ixzz2CmIE6h6G
Electoral map: Which
direction did each state move and by how much?
“We figured four years of a bad economy and liberal disillusionment with
Hopenchange combined with a powerful conservative zeal to beat him would mean a
redder map this time. And … it was redder, in nearly every state. Just not red
enough.”
Amazing
collection of photographs from 1914 captures everyday life in Paris
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2236989/Photographs-Paris-1914-taken-collection-Albert-Khan-Museum-Paris.html#ixzz2D3t04xft
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2236989/Photographs-Paris-1914-taken-collection-Albert-Khan-Museum-Paris.html#ixzz2D3t04xft
From the
“greatest collection of Civil war photography in existence.”
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2237476/Civil-War-era-photograph-collection-displays-dignity-young-men-join-battle.html#ixzz2D6A0Fe4c
_______________________________________________________________________
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2237476/Civil-War-era-photograph-collection-displays-dignity-young-men-join-battle.html#ixzz2D6A0Fe4c
_______________________________________________________________________
WISE WORDS
“When I
took up my little sling and aimed at Communism, I also hit something else...the
forces of that great socialist revolution, which, in the name of liberalism,
spasmodically, incompletely, somewhat formlessly, but always in the same
direction, has been inching its ice cap over the nation for two decades.
-Whitaker Chambers,
“Witness”
“The best argument against democracy is a five-minute conversation with the average voter.”
-Winston Churchill
“Men are qualified for civil
liberty in exact proportion to their disposition to put moral chains on their
own appetites; in proportion as their love of justice is above their rapacity;
in proportion of their soundness and sobriety of understanding are above their
vanity and presumption; in proportion as they are more disposed to listen to
the counsel of the wise and good in preference to the flattery of knaves.
Society cannot exist unless a controlling power on the will and appetite is
placed somewhere…and the less of it there is within, the more there must be
without. Is it ordained in the eternal constitution of things that men of
intemperate minds cannot be free: their passions forge their fetters.”
-Edmund Burke
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