op ed review 12/29
THIS WEEK’S NEWS
Republicans have a 49%-44% edge over Democrats in a generic
ballot, a key 2014 midterm election indicator, according to a new CNN/ORC
International poll.
“When Republicans are on the short end of such polls–as, for
example, after the recent partial government slowdown–there is no shortage of
advice from the media. Move to the center! Get rid of those “radicals!” Become
Democrats! Note, however, the deafening silence when the Democrats are trailing
in the same polls.”
On Monday, CNN/ORC released new polling data showing that
the Affordable Care Act has reached a record low approval rating in that
survey.
Senate Democrat worries about
ObamaCare ‘meltdown’
Fact-checkers at PolitiFact and the Washington Post
designated “If you like your health care plan, you can keep it” as 2013´s “Lie
of the Year.”
Not even vending machines are outside the scope of Obamacare
mandates. Under the bill's new labeling regulations nutrition information must
be placed next to each slot of candy bars, chips, peanuts and cracker-jacks.
This new mandate will cost the vending machine industry an estimated $25.8 million
initially and an additional $24 million for every subsequent year.
Women comprise biggest opposition to ObamaCare
Democrats will pay political price for Obamacare in 2014
“Chamber of Commerce to Spend $50
Million to Crush Tea Party”
A&E caves,
welcomes Phil Robertson back to 'Duck Dynasty'
Thanks to fierce customer backlash and a strong anti-Cracker
Barrel Twitter campaign, the restaurant tweeted on Sunday that Duck Dynasty
products are back on the shelves. "We made a mistake, we listened to you,
and we apologize."
“Has A&E Awakened a Sleeping Giant?”
“In its rush to pass a budget deal, Congress voted to slice
the benefits of veterans, even those who retire after suffering injuries while
serving their country. This unconscionable sneak attack on former members of
the armed services was evidently inserted into the legislation by GOP House
Budget Chairman Paul Ryan during talks with lead Democratic negotiator, Sen.
Patty Murray. He ought to be ashamed.”
“Disposable: Paul Ryan´s Budget Epitomizes How Washington Actually Sees
Veterans”
Females in the Marine Corps currently are
not required to do even a single pull-up, and a deadline mandating that by Jan.
1, 2014, they be able to do at least 3 pull-ups as part of their training
has been delayed for at least a year, the Corps quietly announced on social
media.
Oklahoma
Bill Would Require Pledge of Allegiance
in Schools
National Security Advisor Susan Rice appeared on 60 Minutes
with Lesley Stahl, and one of the issues she addressed was the continued
fallout from the Edward Snowden NSA leaks. Rice argued that NSA officials
didn’t lie about intel dragnets, they just “inadvertently made false
representations.”
Formula for happiness:
about 40 percent of conservative women say they are very happy. That
makes them slightly happier than conservative men and significantly happier
than liberal women. The unhappiest of all are liberal men; only about a fifth
consider themselves very happy.
Former Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee, who suddenly entered the
2016 Republican presidential sweepstakes this month, has surged to the top of
those most favored by GOP voters, costing support for Texas Sen. Ted Cruz and
Wisconsin Rep. Paul Ryan in a new poll. Of eight potential presidential
candidates listed by YouGov/Economist in the most recent survey, Huckabee won
the highest favorable rating from Republicans, at 65 percent. New Jersey Gov.
Chris Christie, was dead last with a favorable rating of 47 percent.
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THIS WEEK’S FEATURED COLUMN
Walter Williams 12/25
Dumb Politicians
Politicians can be progressives, liberals, conservatives, Democrats or
Republicans, and right-wingers. They just can't be dumb. The American people
will never elect them to office. Let's look at it. For years, I used to blame politicians for our economic and social mess. That changed during the 1980s as a result of several lunches with Sen. Jesse Helms, R-N.C., which produced an epiphany of sorts. At the time, I had written several columns highly critical of farm subsidies and handouts. Helms agreed, saying something should be done. Then he asked me whether I could tell him how he could vote against them and remain a senator from North Carolina. He said that if he voted against them, North Carolinians would vote him out of office and replace him with somebody probably worse. My epiphany came when I asked myself whether it was reasonable to expect a politician to commit what he considered to be political suicide -- in a word, be dumb.
The Office of Management and Budget calculates that more than 40 percent of federal spending is for entitlements for the elderly in the forms of Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, housing and other assistance programs. Total entitlement spending comes to about 62 percent of federal spending. The Congressional Budget Office estimates that entitlement spending will consume all federal tax revenue by 2048.
Only a dumb politician would argue that something must be done immediately about the main components of entitlement spending: Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid. Senior citizens indignantly would tell him that what they're receiving are not entitlements. It's their money that Congress put aside for them. They would attack any politician who told them that the only way they get Social Security and Medicare money is through taxes levied on current workers. The smart politician would go along with these people's vision that Social Security and Medicare are their money that the government was holding for them. The dumb politician, who is truthful about Social Security and Medicare and their devastating impact on our nation's future, would be run out of office.
Social Security and Medicare are by no means the only sources of unsustainable congressional spending. There are billions upon billions in handouts going to farmers, corporations, poor people and thousands of federal programs that have no constitutional basis whatsoever. But a smart politician reasons that if Congress enables one group of Americans to live at the expense of another American, then in fairness, what possible argument can be made for not giving that same right to other groups of Americans? Making a constitutional and moral argument against the growth of handouts would qualify as dumb.
Let's examine some statements of past Americans whom we've mistakenly called great but would be deemed both heartless and dumb if they were around today. In 1794, James Madison, the father of our Constitution, irate over a $15,000 congressional appropriation to assist some French refugees, said, "I cannot undertake to lay my finger on that article of the Constitution which granted a right to Congress of expending, on objects of benevolence, the money of their constituents." He added, "Charity is no part of the legislative duty of the government."
In 1854, President Franklin Pierce vetoed a bill intended to help the mentally ill, saying, "I cannot find any authority in the Constitution for public charity" ... and to approve such spending "would be contrary to the letter and the spirit of the Constitution and subversive to the whole theory upon which the Union of these States is founded."
Grover Cleveland vetoed hundreds of congressional spending bills during his two terms as president in the late 1800s. His often stated veto message was, "I can find no warrant for such an appropriation in the Constitution."
If these men were around today, making similar statements, Americans would hold them in contempt and disqualify them from office. That's a sad commentary on how we've trashed our Constitution.
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FROM OTHER COLUMNS
“The Obamacare rollout that began nearly three months ago
has proved more disastrous than all but a few critics of the legislation dared
to predict. Polling shows increasing opposition to the legislation and to the
credibility of Obama Democrats who, falsely, assured people they could keep
their policies and their doctors if they liked them. The apparent skepticism of
most voters that government could competently administer the health care sector
seems to have been justified – and then some. Gallup reports that 72% of Americans see big
government, not big business or big labor, as the biggest threat to the nation’s
future – the highest number since the question was first asked in 1965. The
Obama Democrats assumed Americans would embrace big government policies. They
seem to have proved the opposite.”
-Michael Barone
“[T]he Obama
administration has spent longer botching the implementation of Obamacare than
the Roosevelt and Truman administrations spent fighting and winning the Second
World War…… Now, it is true that building the Hoover Dam – that icon of
activist liberal government – did take a bit longer (four and a half years),
but at the end of that process the Hoover Dam actually worked.”
-Ed
Haislmaier
“…..I don’t know what irritates me most about this
phenomenon. Is it the lack of simple decorum? Or is it the infantilization of
our popular culture? … [P]utting a young man in red flannel pajamas in order to
convince 20-somethings to act responsibly wasn’t the most effective visual cue
the Obamacare supporters could have chosen. When we depict young adults like
infants, we shouldn’t expect that they will behave as grownups.”
-Linda
Chavez
_______________________________________________________________________
LEFTIST WATCH
In his widely noted speech, President Obama said that
"a dangerous and growing inequality and lack of upward mobility" is
"the defining challenge of our time." This belief makes Mr. Obama
unique: Unlike the other presidents since World War II, he places inequality
above economic growth as the organizing principle of U.S. economic policy.
Nancy Pelosi: “Our
view of the law is that it – if somebody is here without sufficient
documentation, that is not reason for
deportation.”
Planned Parenthood Pens ´Twelve Days of Contraception´ Christmas Carol
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ISLAM
Right at holiday time, a Muslim "charity" in Toronto has started a highly offensive advertising
campaign in the Toronto
subway declaring Jesus is no God. Just for a micro-second, imagine what hell
would break loose if a Christian group on the eve of Ramadan (or heck, any day
of the year), sponsored subway ads declaring Mohammed was no prophet. Actually,
that´s a trick question because the Toronto Transit Commission would never
permit such an ad to be posted.
__________________________________________________________________________
BOOKS
Matthew Continetti:
“The holidays are a good time for conservatives to lick our wounds,
reflect on the recent past, and contemplate new beginnings. My three
recommendations describe the complicated realities of ethnic politics in America in the
21st century. Conservatives and Republicans have to grasp that the America of
Ronald Reagan no longer exists. First, there’s Tom Wolfe’s Back to Blood. Fans
of Wolfe’s prose and sociological insight will not be disappointed as the master
turns his gimlet eye to Miami.
Second, there’s Joel Kotkin’s The Next Hundred Million: America in
2050. Kotkin argues against American decline. Third, there’s Thomas Sowell’s
Ethnic America, which was first published in 1981. Sowell’s history of
American ethnic groups, from Germans and Irish to blacks and Mexicans, is one
of the most unlikely page-turners I’ve read.”
Terrell: In a recent
and very good book, John L. Allen comes to the judgment that “Christians today
indisputably are the most persecuted religious body on the planet,” and he
concludes that “the transcendent human rights concern of our time is this
rarely noted persecution.”
__________________________________________________________________________
GLOBALONEY
Climate: Those humming the words to "White
Christmas" got their wish big-time as snow covered more than half the
lower 48 states as of mid-December, putting snowless winters on the pile of
failed climate predictions. More than half of the continental U.S. had snow
cover as of Dec. 15, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration (NOAA), the most in 11 years. That exposes as worthless the
predictions of the climate scammers of snowless winters as far as the eye can
see. In 2006, by comparison, snow covered just 12% of these states.
________________________________________________________
ARTICLES
“Obama has begun repealing Obamacare”
President Obama, by issuing new rules that erode Obamacare´s
"financial structure," is putting the health insurance industry --
and taxpayers -- at risk.
Krauthammer: "The insurers
understand that they´re going to be completely ruined. And what´s going to happen as a result of
this? There´s only one way out, a huge government bailout of the insurers is
waiting at the end of next year."
Advice to conservative candidates in 2014: “If there’s one thing at which conservatives
and Republicans excel, it’s snatching defeat from the jaws of victory.
Republicans would control the Senate today were it not for poorly prepared
candidates and badly run campaigns. As the political world prepares for the 2014
election, it’s equally important to remember the mistakes from the past and be
proactive on the issues that will motivate voters to go to the polls……….Just
because voters are running away from Democrats doesn’t mean they’ll run to
Republicans. You won’t win a majority in the Senate by default. The easy thing
to do is vote for an incumbent because, even through the lies, you know what
you’re getting. The second easiest thing to do is not vote. Republicans need
voters to choose the most difficult path before them – invest their faith in
someone they don’t know. They need to trust that not only will they do
something better, but that they know what they’re doing. Getting distracted by
shiny object issues and worse, not being prepared for how to handle them, will
not win anyone’s trust, and it sure as hell won’t win anyone’s vote.”
A quiet but intense struggle over money and influence is
roiling the Republican Party just as the 2014 election season is getting
underway. At least a dozen “super PACs” are setting up to back individual
Republican candidates for the United States Senate, challenging the strategic
and financial dominance that Karl Rove and the group he co-founded, American
Crossroads, have enjoyed ever since the Supreme Court’s Citizens United
decision in 2010.
Come 2014, these five ambitious Senate hopefuls might storm
their way onto Capitol Hill and change the Republican Party, with Ted Cruz as
their hero. If Ted Cruz seems like a one-of-a-kind, give it time.
Media
Research Center
presents its annual Pantsuit Patrol Award to the person its distinguished panel
judges believe best blew Hillary Clinton’s horn during the year. And…the
envelope goes to…Newsweek/Daily Beast editor Tina Brown, who slobbered all over
“Her Magnificence” in a January 2 article: “The idea of losing Hillary has
seemed especially unbearable at this political moment. It’s as if she has
become, literally, the ship of state. She stands for maturity, tenacity, and
self-discipline at a time when everyone else in Washington seems to be, in more senses than
one, going off a cliff…”
“Democrat politicians do not want respectful disagreement
between Evangelicals and gays. War between homosexuals and evangelicals is
important for them. The Democratic Party, in order to raise money from gays and
lock in millennial votes, is attacking freedom of thought, speech and religion.
This is a basic community organizing tactic: encourage grievance, divide the
community, fan the flames of conflict, and inject government power into social
problems. By putting their own political interests before every other value,
Democrats have pushed our country into a culture clash that is becoming
unresolvable…… The political fortune -- we're talking money, folks -- of the
Democratic Party relies on fomenting hatred between gays and evangelicals.”
“Image control has been crucial to gay activists…..any
filmmaker who does not conform his gay characters to a positive and largely
asexual template is likely to be criticized. The arrival of the AIDS
pandemic helped reinforce this pressure by offering up a new version of a time
honored movie stereotype -- the terminally ill secular saint. Today it is
allowable to use a gay drama queen as a comedic foil, but only if he is also
shown to have a heart of gold. Otherwise gay characters have to be
positive. In recent years such gay
characters have been everywhere on TV and in movies……Thanks to the
proliferation of gay characters on TV in recent years many Americans vastly
overestimate the percentage of the population that is gay.”
http://www.americanthinker.com/2013/12/reality_bites_gays.html
The Next Ronald Reagan Is The Leader
Who Rediscovers Something Very Basic
VDH Somehow we as a
nation went from the iconic Marlboro Man to Pajama Boy — from the noble
individual with a bad habit to the ignoble without a good habit — without a
blink in between. There are lots of revolting things in the Pajama Boy ad.
After all, how can you top all at once a nerdy-looking child-man dressed in
infantile pajamas while cradling a cup of hot chocolate with the smug assurance
that he is running your life more than you his?
Prager: “As a Jew, and a religious one at that, I
want to wish my fellow Americans a Merry Christmas. Not “Happy Holidays.”
___________________________________________________________________________
NOTEWORTHY WEBSITES
The top ten Obama constitutional violations of 2013
This Classic Commercial Thanks Our Troops For Their Service
To Our Country
From Costa Rica's
Great Balls to Death Valley's wandering rocks:
The 10 bizarre phenomenon that still have scientists baffled
How Y’all, Youse and You Guys Talk: What does the way
you speak say about where you’re from? Answer all the questions below to see
your personal dialect map.
Brunel's Eighth Wonder of the World restored: Grand entrance
to world's first underwater tunnel will return to glory after 145 years
“Britain's
littlest shepherd, aged two, a lamb called Twinkle - and a bond between boy and
sheep that will melt your heart”
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2529309/Britains-littlest-shepherd-aged-two-lamb-called-Twinkle-bond-boy-sheep-melt-heart.html#ixzz2oaxkDDsJ
__________________________________________________________________________
LATE NITE
Leno: President Obama has named a top former Microsoft
executive to run and fix the ObamaCare website. Hey, how about fixing Windows
first?......... Are you all done with your Christmas shopping? I bought a lot
more people gifts this year than I thought I did. You know why? I used my
credit card at Target. That’s why.
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6:03 PM
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