op ed review 5/13
THIS WEEK’S NEWS
Job openings at record high of 6.6
million.
2.2 million fewer people are now on food stamps.
Trump administration approves New Hampshire’s waiver,
becoming the fourth state to implement work requirements for Medicaid.
Trump winning over Democrats with his handling of key
issues, CNN poll finds
The May IBD/TIPP poll finds that the public is increasingly
happy with the direction of the country, as well as with their own quality of
life and financial stress levels. They also give President Trump higher marks
on leadership and on his handling of the economy.
DNC
Deputy Chair wears t-shirt that says ”I don’t believe in borders.”
Former Sen. Joseph Lieberman on President Trump’s
announcement on that the United States is pulling out of the Iran nuclear deal: “I
actually think it’s a great thing…..I think the president made the correct
decision, and, frankly, it’s a courageous decision.”
List of US allies celebrating an and to the Iran nuclear
deal.
IBD/TIPP Poll: Americans Support Tough Trump Stance On Iran
Nuclear Deal
Senate Republicans overrided the need for “blue slips” and voted
along party lines to confirm a judge to fill an opening on the 7th U.S. Circuit
Court of Appeals. The seat has been open for more than eight years, the longest
for the nation’s appellate courts.
Hillary Clinton Shut Down a Pedophile Investigation at State
Department in 2013, then it was hushed up.
No disclosures. No trial. No media frenzy. No charges filed. No
punishment. No justice. Nothing. The Deep State covered it all up. (NOTE: Robert Mueller was FBI Director at the
time. Yeah, let that sink in…)
ICE has apprehended an additional 1,600 people attempting to
illegally enter the country since April 15 as a result of the deployment of National
Guard troops to the southwest border.
FAIR estimates a tax burden of approximately $8,075 per
illegal alien family member.
Bad news: Half of all
Americans now live in ‘sanctuaries’ protecting illegal immigrants
Lt. Col. Oliver North to become next NRA president
Following Tuesday´s primary loss by Congressman Robert
Pittenger of North Carolina, there are now 63 open seats in the House in
November. Republicans hold 44 of them, Democrats 19. Meanwhile, three of the
eight Republicans up for re-election this year are leaving, and with John McCain
preparing for his funeral, it is likely that there will four open Senate seats
now held by Republicans. Given that open seats are the most likely to flip to
the other party, Republicans are worried, and should be. But not necessarily
for the reasons the experts give.
___________________________________________________________________
COLUMN OF THE WEEK
An Eagle Scout Explains the Fatal Folly of Taking the ‘Boy’
out of Boy Scouts
Scott Morefield 5/7
The
first time I walked into a Boy Scout meeting as a boy of eleven is as ingrained
in my mind as if it were yesterday. My Dad and I descended the moldy steps into
the basement of an old Methodist church, opened the door, and walked in to the
smell of freshly cut wood chips and the chopping sound of an axe hitting its
mark. A group of ten or so boys around my age and older were gathered around a
bearded, uniformed Scoutmaster who was showing them how to properly use a
hatchet. We had arrived late, just to check out the goings-on. I wasn’t into
sports, or much of anything really - except books - but a couple of my friends
were Scouts and had invited me to their meeting.
“Want
to give it a shot?” the Scoutmaster was looking at me and holding the axe out,
handle first. Before walking over and taking it I tentatively looked at my dad,
who pursed his lips and nodded approvingly. “Safety first,” the bearded man
cautioned before he proceeded to show me how to cut the wood without cutting
off any fingers in the process. As I performed that simple exercise, I remember
thinking how cool it was to be trusted to wield what could be a pretty
dangerous tool, and the responsibility made me feel bigger than my eleven
years. But most of all I remember how doing what I perceived as “man-stuff,”
surrounded by men and other boys, made me feel at least a little bit more like
a man.
Those
moments began what was to be a seven year adventure and the most significant
non-school element of my pre-teen and teen-aged life. They were years filled
with lots of “boy-stuff” under the watchful supervision of caring men and the
camaraderie of other boys. Canoeing alone on a lake. Building campfires. Barely
passing the ridiculously hard swim test at summer camp so I wouldn’t be the
only kid not allowed on the water. S’mores. Dump cake. Hobo packets.
Campfire
stories. Games, teasing, and general rowdiness. Sleeping alone in the middle of
the woods as a part of the Order of the Arrow Ordeal. Peeling myself out of a
semi-warm sleeping bag on a freezing February morning in 1986 to watch Haley’s
Comet pay a rare visit to Earth’s orbit. Picking up and sorting food for the
hungry as a part of our annual food drive. Lugging a wooden sled across town to
compete with other troops in Scouting skills contests, all of which involved
plenty of cool “boy-stuff” like tying knots and building things.
There
was a lot of “doing” in Scouting, but the ultimate goal was always the same.
The Boy Scouts of America started in 1910 as a way to promote good citizenship
and Christian morality, two years after Sir Robert Baden-Powell founded the
movement in England. “We aim for the practice of Christianity in their everyday
life and dealings, and not merely the profession of its theology on Sundays,”
Baden-Powell wrote in Scouting For Boys.
The
iconography was, in many instances, literally Norman 'Rockwellian,' from the chivalry of a crisply
uniformed boy saluting the American flag or helping an old lady across the
street to the Native American symbolism incorporated into the Order of the
Arrow rituals. From the ceremonies to the symbols to the reading materials and
skills learned - all were meant to teach, to prepare, but most of all to endear
a heartfelt respect for our Creator, our family, our country, our environment,
and the world around us.
In
Scouting, progressing from rank to rank felt like it meant something, and I
knew that becoming an Eagle Scout would be something I would cherish the rest
of my life. Neil Armstrong was an Eagle Scout. So was former President Ford and
our then-Tennessee Governor Lamar Alexander. “Former Scouts have walked on the
Moon, become President, and won the Heisman Trophy,” said President Reagan at a
luncheon commemorating the group’s 75th anniversary in 1985. “Today they serve
as Cabinet Secretaries, as my Press Secretary, and in the Congress. In fact,
about two-thirds of the Members of the Congress have been in the Boy Scouts.”
I
was proud to be a Scout, prouder still to earn my Eagle rank just before my
18th birthday.
But
of course, as we all know, once social justice warriors gets their slimy
tentacles into something their thirst is never quenched until that something is
entirely destroyed, and such has it been with Boy Scouting ever since its
clueless national leaders began leading the organization down that perilous
cliff. From openly gay scout leaders to transgender members to just last
Wednesday, when the organization officially announced a name change to Scouts BSA because,
well, Boy Scouting isn’t just for boys anymore.
“We’re
trying to find the right way to say we’re here for both young men and young
women,” said hapless Boy Scouts Chief Scout Executive Mike Surbaugh. Because
everyone is the same, don’t you know. Because little boys and little girls are,
as far as today’s liberals are concerned, identical to each other in every
possible way except a few ‘easily changeable’ body parts.
Of
course, anyone with half a brain knows that boys and girls are different, but
reason and common sense has never stopped a rabid social justice warrior from
wanting to impose their twisted view of reality on the rest of us.
Ironically,
their attack on Boy Scouting has also hurt the other group founded by
Baden-Powell and his sister, Agnes - Girl Scouts. Though the decision to allow
girls was applauded by various progressive and feminist groups, Girl Scout
representatives themselves are less than amused. "The Boy Scouts' house is
on fire," Girl Scouts told ABC News in a statement last October when the decision to allow
girls was first announced. "Instead of addressing systemic issues of
continuing sexual assault, financial mismanagement and deficient programming,
BSA's senior management wants to add an accelerant to the house fire by
recruiting girls."
Imagine,
girls wanting a place to come of age and be themselves without the immaturity
and awkwardness of gross boys. Imagine, girls wanting to do
"girl-stuff."
Granted,
some of this “boy and girl stuff” overlaps. Obviously, girls can canoe, camp
out, and do pretty much anything a boy can, if she wants. But whether it’s a
sports team or Boy or Girl Scouting, groups formed based on gender can provide
a healthy, nurturing place for kids to come of age, not suppressing their
God-given instincts and preferences but rather celebrating them and learning
how to express themselves and function socially within the training wheels of
those of their own gender.
Because
try as liberals might to erase it, gender is and will always be “a thing.” “The
benefit of the single-gender environment has been well-documented by educators,
scholars, other girl- and youth-serving organizations,” writes the Girl Scout blog, and they couldn’t be more on point.
Check out this list of advantages of single-sex schools, a privilege only available to the
rich. Sports teams provide similar life experiences, of course, but that
wouldn’t have been an option for 80’s me. Sadly, ‘2018 everybody’ will no
longer have the option, at least as far as Boy Scouting is concerned.
I
am grateful for Scouting and what it meant to me growing up. But I am also
angry at what liberals have turned the group into, as well as the fact that, a
decade from now, it very likely won’t exist. Because tragically, the Boy
Scouts’ stubborn march to ‘inclusivity’ at any cost has managed to gut the
organization of what made it special in the first place, which inevitably
reminded me of this key quote from the movie The Incredibles -
“If
everyone is special, no one is.”
___________________________________________________________________
FROM OTHER COLUMNS
“The Iran Deal in tatters, three American hostages safely
returned from North Korea, which now offers to denuclearize and end the Korean
War after 68 years, five top ISIS leaders captured — and that’s just this
week.”
-Michael
Knowles
___________________________________________________________________
GLOBALONEY
How’s that global warming working out for you? Coldest April
in 20 years across the United States…
“King County sues big oil companies for downplaying global
warming”
Here’s a study you won’t hear about: “No impact on groundwater from fracking”
Hypocrites: A study by Cornell and the University of
Michigan researchers found that those “highly concerned” about climate change
were less likely to engage in recycling and other eco-friendly behaviors than
global-warming skeptics.
__________________________________________________________________
LEFTIST WATCH
5 Reasons The Southern Poverty Law Center Is A
Hate-Mongering Scam
Leftie billionaire Tom Steyer Mother's Day Ad: All Young
Republicans Are Charlottesville White Nationalists
A union-backed activist group says Amazon should be charged
with a crime for its threat to roll back job growth if the Seattle City Council
imposes the “ head tax” on companies to pay for services for the homeless.
“Major Democratic donors in New York have discreetly formed
a new political alliance to raise roughly $10 million that would be injected
into as many as two dozen key House battlegrounds in an effort to wrest control
of Congress from Republicans.”
More education failure:
“200 George Washington University students have signed a petition
calling on the school to adopt a new mascot and nickname, saying the current
"Colonials" moniker "has too deep a connection to
colonization."
__________________________________________________________________
ARTICLES
The Democrats' War On Capitalism
Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., wants
the federal government to guarantee a job for every American willing and able
to work. The proposal sounds compassionate and enlightened, but in practice, it
would almost certainly be a disaster. The fact that it's taken seriously is
evidence that many Democrats, like Republicans before them, embrace loony economic
agendas that are more public-relations gestures than sensible policy.
One of the talking points
Democrats and the left often drag out to justify reversing the Trump tax cuts
is that the U.S. is "undertaxed" compared with other nations. A new
study shows that's false.
If you thought conservatives
could “make nice” with liberals, that “both sides have the country’s best
interest at heart,” you were wrong.
For eight years, the sane-minded of America suffered under a
socialist-minded Barack Obama who scoffed law, mocked the Constitution and
destroyed all that mattered on pretty near all matters tied to virtue,
tradition, humble service and competent leadership. Now Donald Trump has come
and with just over a year of leadership, has steadily and surely begun to
repair what Obama broke.
Astonishing story of the search for the remains of the Apostle
Paul: Why few know of Texas oilman, agnostic archaeologist and
historic find.
_______________________________________________________________
WISE
WORDS
“If duties are too high, they lessen the consumption; the
collection is eluded; and the product to the treasury is not so great as when
they are confined within proper and moderate bounds.”
-Alexander
Hamilton
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