THE PATRIOT POST 01/19/2015

Daily Digest January 19, 2015    THE FOUNDATION "It is necessary for every American, with becoming energy to endeavor to stop the dissemination of principles evidently destructive of the cause for which they have bled." --Mercy Warren (1805) Martin Luther King, Jeremiah Wright and Barack Obama From Dream to Nightmare By Mark Alexander "I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: 'We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.' ... I have a dream that my four children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin but by the content of their character. ... And if America is to be a great nation this must become true." --Martin Luther King Jr., August 28, 1963 Today, the once-noble Democratic Party of MLK's era has devolved into a propaganda machine fueled by hate and division, which has turned the wisdom of this iconic sovereign's most quoted remark upside down. It's as if King had said, "I have a dream that my children will one day be judged by the color of their skin, not the content of their character." To keep you fully informed, your Patriot team follows Sun Tzu's maxim from "The Art of War": "Know your enemy." Thus, we review the whole spectrum of news, policy and opinion, including notable daily dispatches from organizations like the Communist Party USA and other leftist groups, in order to better engage the adversaries of Liberty. To that end, I attended this year's MLK "Unity Prayer Breakfast," ostensibly in honor of Martin Luther King, featuring keynote speaker Jeremiah "GD America" Wright. My objective was to determine if Wright was still wrong. As you recall, Wright was the charismatic "pastor" to Barack Obama, who, for two decades prior to 2008, indoctrinated his disciple with the black supremacist doctrines of hate and the Marxist "social gospel." Wright married Barack and Michelle, baptized their children and later was identified by Obama in his biography as his primary "father figure." But in 2008, as Obama was seeking to dupe American voters and slide into the White House, Wright disappeared from the political grid after videos of his hate-filled "US-KKK-A" racist rhetoric hit YouTube. Who can forget some of his more colorful protests: "'God Bless America.' No, no, no, G-d d--m America -- that's in the Bible -- for killing innocent people. G-d d--m America for treating our citizens as less than human. G-d d--m America for as long as she acts like she is god and she is supreme." Shortly after those videos surfaced, Obama tried to distance himself from decades under Wright's rhetoric, claiming in 2008, "I am outraged by the comments that were made. His comments were not only divisive and destructive; I believe they end up giving comfort to those who prey on hate... They offend me. They rightly offend all Americans. And they should be denounced." Of course, Obama, himself a master of the "the BIG Lie," was elected and re-elected on "divisive and destructive" rhetoric preying on hate -- and indeed, he learned from a master! Now that Obama has completed his last election -- the 2014 midterm in which his policies were, as he claimed, "on the ballot, every single one of them," all of which were resoundingly defeated -- Jeremiah Wright has come out of exile. Needless to say, Wright's message was NOT about "unity." Front and center at this event was the table of honor reserved for the "peace-loving" Nation of Islam leaders, and, according to those introducing Wright, he was selected to "raise holy hell" and "set us ablaze." But, we were reminded, "Our speaker has often been misquoted and misunderstood ... as most voices for God are." Really? Wright began by ingratiating himself to his audience for a few minutes -- before dragging them down to hell. He declared that we should all be thankful for Obama's two inaugurals, saying, "Praise God and Party, but the race ain't over yet." It took him almost five minutes before singling out conservative white folks as "racist," suggesting that among those looking down on black folks today are "the countless bodies of estranged fruit hung up in the trees and left hanging in a country that is taught to hate the color of their skin. ... Black men, women and children lynched, watching to see if we understand that the Tea Party ain't nothing but a 2.0 upgrade of a lynch mob!" Sitting next to me at Wright's hatefest was my colleague, Tennessee Tea Party principal Mark West, and of course he and I were in the one-percent minority at this venue. The grassroots Tea Party movement is about Liberty for all Americans, as was Martin King's dream, but Wright would have none of that. We believe that Liberty is colorblind, but asserting individual rights and responsibilities is an affront to Wright and other race-baiters, including Obama's chief race relations counselor, Al Sharpton, and Attorney General Eric Holder. Wright wasted no time heating up Obama's latest race-bait stew: "Michael Brown was left rotting in the streets of Ferguson, Missouri, in the hot August sun like road kill ... while his murderer walks free because the prosecutor orchestrated a verdict not to indict. ... Eric Garner ... choked to death in front of a video camera while his murderers are set free by bigoted bozos." And so Wright continued -- ad nauseum. In addition to my Tea Party colleague, there were three other people at our table, black folks, who were genuinely devoted to "unity in Christ" as clearly distinguishable from Wright's message of racial disunity. One of them had an interesting observation: "If one was to examine the civil rights movement of the Sixties and compare it to the social justice movements of today, you would find one glaring difference. MLK's success was partly due to thousands of college students and young people actively engaged and empowered by the message and practice of non-violence. But young people are not as engaged in the 'social justice' movements of the Al Sharptons and the Jeremiah Wrights because we are several generations removed from the racism and discrimination that was experienced by blacks prior to the civil rights movement. The next generation has no actual point of reference for such racism. We have enjoyed the fruit of King's labor. Thus, the Baby Boomers of the civil rights movement endeavor to instill their hate and bitterness into the current generation by fomenting social unrest over incidents like Brown and Garner. When those race baiters are dead and gone, then we might be truly 'free at last.'" At Martin King's funeral, one Bible passage, Matthew 5:9, summed up his life's mission: "Blessed are the peacemakers, for they will be called sons of God." But Obama and his cadres of race-baiters are anything but peacemakers. They have betrayed King's legacy, turning his dream into a nightmare for millions of black men, women and children now enslaved on urban poverty plantations by five decades of failed "Great Society" economic and social policies. Comment | Share Robert E. Lee Today we also take a moment to remember the birth anniversary of Robert E. Lee (1807-1870), one of the greatest military commanders in American history. He was also a great man of faith who gave his all for the cause of Liberty and states' rights. Read more and comment here. TOP 5 RIGHT HOOKS Sharpton Attacks Hollywood Over Perceived Selma Snub Al Sharpton wanted "Selma" to sweep the Oscars. The film tells the story of Martin Luther King Jr.'s marches from Selma to Montgomery in 1965, and it was only nominated for Best Motion Picture, but that wasn't good enough for race-baiter Sharpton. He's calling an "emergency meeting" with his Hollywood task force to decide what to do, because, in his eyes, the Oscars are not diverse enough this year. "With all of the talent in Selma and other Black movies this year," Sharpton said, "it is hard to believe that we have less diversity in the nominations today than in recent history. ... The movie industry is like the Rocky Mountains, the higher you get, the whiter it gets." Sharpton -- who has no film criticism cred to date -- probably threatened to attack Hollywood over this issue because he wants to sway the decision, not to mention this sort of shakedown is how he makes his living. Comment | Share SOTU Will Push Income Redistribution Barack Obama will use his State of the Union Address tomorrow to call on the Republican Congress to pass his progressive tax policies. It will not be a speech to update the legislative body on the state of the union, but to embarrass Republicans before the nation. Obama will promise tax plans that redistribute "free" stuff, calling on Congress to hike taxes so the government rakes in an extra $320 billion over 10 years and can then "give" the middle class $175 billion. Top White House aide Dan Pfeiffer said, "I think we should have a debate in this country between middle-class economics and trickle-down economics. I think, in divided government, each side should lay out their agenda, what they think is in the best interest of the country." Liberals miss that "trickle-down economics" -- their pejorative term for Reaganomics -- is based on people keeping their own hard-earned income. Obama proposes increasing the capital gains and dividend tax rate to 28%, placing a limit on how much money Americans can save for retirement -- and even taxing college saving plans to pay for his "free" community college boondoggle. So much for encouraging responsible personal finance. It's a shameful policy rooted in envy. More... Comment | Share Obama Goes on Offense, Will Seek 7% Budget Hike Congressional Republicans better take note that Barack Obama has no intention of quietly riding off into the sunset -- even if he does frequently check out and play more golf over the next two years. "I'm not going to spend the next two years on defense; I'm going to play offense," he told congressional Democrats Thursday. Part of that offense is going to be on the budget, which the White House is due to release on Feb. 2. According to officials who leaked details, Obama wants to increase spending by 7% -- clearly indicating he's not content with allowing Republicans to slow down his spending bonanza. Thanks in large part to the sequester and the stalemate in Congress since 2011, the budget deficit for the fiscal year ending Sept. 30 was $483 billion -- the smallest since 2007. Obviously, that's better than the trillion-dollar deficits of Obama's early years, and lower deficits are likely why the economy is finally showing signs of life. That means increasing spending by 7% isn't going to be good. It's up to the Republican-controlled Congress to stop Obama in his tracks. More... Comment | Share Ryan: No Gas Tax Hike Some in Washington, including Republicans, have recently pushed a hike in the gas tax. What better time to gouge consumers replenish the Highway Trust Fund than when drivers are finally paying less at the pump? Well, House Ways and Means Chairman Paul Ryan (R-WI) put an end to such talk, saying flatly, "We won't pass a gas tax." Ryan added that he'd love to tackle more comprehensive tax reform, saying, "We just want to make sure we have the best possible tax reform that creates jobs [and] is fair." But he also acknowledged Barack Obama stands in the way of any sensible tax policy. In related news, Ryan recently announced that he would not seek the 2016 GOP presidential nomination, despite calls for him to run. For our part, we're glad to see him running the Ways and Means Committee, as it seems he's right where he belongs. Comment | Share Biden's Shotgun Unused During Security Threat Joe Biden's home security was put to the test Saturday, as someone fired four shots from a pistol near the vice president's Delaware estate. And no, it wasn't from Biden's double-barrel shotgun. Last year, the vice president said his home security consisted of a 12-gauge shotgun and that he didn't need an AR-15 rifle. "I promise you, as I told my wife -- we live in an area that's wooded and somewhat secluded -- I said if there is ever a problem, just walk out on the balcony, walk out, put that double barrel shotgun, and fire two blasts outside the house. I promise you whoever is coming in is not going," he said. Biden failed to mention he also had a Secret Service detail backing up the ol' scattershot. The suspect fired the gun from a speeding vehicle on the public road hundreds of yards from the politician's house before speeding off. But all the president's horses and all the president's men couldn't find the person who took the shots again. Maybe the Biden's should consider a weapon with a bit more ... range. More... Comment | Share For more, visit Right Hooks. Share RIGHT ANALYSIS Obamanet, Er, Net Neutrality During Barack Obama's seventh State of the Union Address Tuesday evening, he'll reveal his plans to "protect" the Internet through "net neutrality" -- to address a largely manufactured crisis with, naturally, government control and regulation. After transforming America with ObamaCare -- changing the full-time work week to 30 hours, increasing the amount of "out-of-pocket" cash expenses due to astronomical deductibles, and the most infamous of BIG Lies that "If you like your plan, you can keep your plan" -- heed this warning: More transformation is on the way. Enter, Obamanet, otherwise known as "net neutrality." The manufactured crisis exists in the contrived priority of some web content over other content. In language that Al Sharpton would be proud of, the University of California Berkeley opines [emphasis added]: "Without a net neutral stance in what is carried over their pipes (referring to internet carriers such as AT&T, Verizon, Comcast, etc.), network providers can choose to discriminate and decide how fast data will be transmitted and at what quality." Never mind that some consumers pay for a premium plan to access unlimited bandwidth to meet the needs for high-end volume and quality, while the average consumer chooses to pay for a service adequate to meet their needs. In the world of the Left, it is "discrimination" unless equal service is available to every user of the Internet at the exact same price. It's "discrimination" if, say, medical records are prioritized over your Facebook status update. It's "discrimination" if you choose a less expensive Internet service to meet your user needs while a major content carrier pays more for use and for the extra bandwidth required to deliver that voluminous digital content. The only thing left to do, according to the same folks who want the government to pick our doctors and to make sure a single male is carrying insurance that pays for gynecological visits, is for the federal government to regulate the Internet to make sure we pay the exact same price for the exact same access. Former Obama fundraiser and appointed Federal Communications Commission Chief Tom Wheeler has signaled he's prepared to move forward with Obama's "solution" to this horrific "discrimination" that most of us call consumerism through massive expansion of powers over Internet access. The simplest way to explain Obama's plan is that he wants to turn the Internet into a government-controlled and regulated utility, like telephone landlines. The Internet service to your wireless smartphones, hand-held devices, laptop computers and to the corporate giant in your region would be classified under Title II of the Communications Act as a telecommunications service. This "Communications Act" was passed in June 1934. Yep, that would be more than 80 years ago. The scope of the law was to dramatically change the manner in which telephone and radio communications were regulated. Simply, services defined as Title I were information services and would be regulated with a less-heavy hand while the Title II services, such as telephone, would be deemed utilities and would be subject to stricter rules and oversight. The Republican-led Congress was opposed to this action ... last month. Now, however, there seems to be pressure building for a legislative "remedy" to this ginned-up discrimination. There is political merit to offering a conservative solution so as to take away the imperial Obama's practice of circumventing Congress. But the GOP seems in danger of merely rubber-stamping Obama's plan. In short, Obama and his money-man-turned-FCC-boss want to "free" the Internet through regulation and to define Internet access according to 1934 rules. And they say conservatives want to turn back the clock. Comment | Share Pork Chops and PC Progressivism's downward spiral has been considerably accelerated by Oxford University Press (OUP). In a move that garnered heartily deserved ridicule, OUP warned their writers to avoid making any references to pork, pigs and sausages, lest it "offend" Jews and Muslims. The guidelines became public during a discussion about free speech on BBC Radio 4's "Today" following the Paris atrocities. "I've got a letter here that was sent out by OUP to an author doing something for young people," said program presenter Jim Naughtie. "Among the things prohibited in the text that was commissioned by OUP was the following: Pigs plus sausages, or anything else which could be perceived as pork." He concluded, "Now, if a respectable publisher, tied to an academic institution, is saying you've got to write a book in which you cannot mention pigs because some people might be offended, it's just ludicrous. It is just a joke." OUP tried to defend the move, saying, "Many of the educational materials we publish in the UK are sold in more than 150 countries, and as such they need to consider a range of cultural differences and sensitivities. Our editorial guidelines are intended to help ensure that the resources that we produce can be disseminated to the widest possible audience." One is left to wonder which particular countries have a reputation of pig or pork hatred that runs so deep, the mere mention of the word is likely to spawn anger, or perhaps violence. Furthermore, taking OUP's ban literally, as it were, is a far more extensive project than one might imagine. According to Thesaurus.com, there are 10 synonyms for pig, seven for bacon and nine for sausage. Additionally, there are 29 synonyms for pork-related products. What about the notion that barring these forbidden words is intended to keep Muslims and Jews from going over the edge? Khalid Mahmood, a Muslim and Labor Party member of Parliament, characterized the guidelines as "absolute utter nonsense." He added, "[W]hen people go too far, that brings the whole discussion into disrepute." OUP didn't fare much better on the Jewish aide of the equation. "Jewish law prohibits eating pork, not the mention of the word or the animal from which it derives," a spokesman for the Jewish Leadership Council said. So what's really going on here? Self-censorship. It's not self-censorship driven by concerns for cultural "sensitivities," but by the same kind of abject cowardice that drove our ostensible paragons of free expression in the media to pixilate or censor the Charlie Hebdo cartoons that ostensibly precipitated the slaughter of 17 people in Paris. The same cowardice that elicited statements about the limits of free speech if it "offends" someone, even as that is precisely the kind of free expression most in need of defending. Those reading between the lines know what these guidelines are really all about: fear of radical Islam. And nothing makes that more obvious than OUP's attempt to include Jews among those who would take offense. Their inclusion by OUP is a classic straw-man gambit designed to deflect attention away from their real concern -- head-chopping radical Islamic thugs who have apparently intimidated the world's largest university press. The fraud becomes even more apparent when one discovers there is an OUP India, a subsidiary in a nation with a large Hindu population -- one that considers the cow a sacred representation of all other animals. Why no ban of the word "cow" and "anything that could be perceived" as beef? The answer is simple. Hindus, along with believers in all the world's other major religions, embrace the concept of societal pluralism -- with one glaring exception: Islam. For the overwhelming majority of Muslims, it's Sharia law, a concept totally at odds with secular government, or nothing. And while many Muslims embrace secular government and the pluralism it guarantees, they are considered every bit the infidel -- and just as expendable -- as anyone else who resists the radical Islamists' determination to impose religious totalitarianism on the entire world. By any means necessary. Thus it is no coincidence that OUP's warning emerged following the Paris carnage. And while they drape their reticence in a patina of sensitivity, their actions bring to mind a quote by Winston Churchill: "An appeaser is one who feeds a crocodile, hoping it will eat him last." Sadly, OUP is not the only publishing giant that has attempted to kowtow to Islamist sensibilities. Until they were shamed into a reversal, HarperCollins Publishers, one of the world's leading English-language publishers, omitted Israel from English-language atlases sold to schools in the Middle East. Collins Bartholomew, the subsidiary that produced them, explained that Israel's inclusion was "unacceptable" to its customers in the Gulf and that the change incorporated "local preferences." Local preferences utterly at odds with reality. Americans should be clear about the progressive ideology that drives such calculated groveling. It is the despicable notion that we can "win the hearts and minds" of those who would annihilate us if we simply learn to be more "attuned" to their totalitarian worldview. For the Left, that adjustment requires an acknowledgement the Islamist worldview is not only legitimate, but that their animus toward Western culture was wholly engendered by Western culture itself. Hence the more familiar "why do they hate us" cluelessness that drives leftists in search of something, anything, that will make us more likable. And if that means eliminating words from books and countries from maps, so be it. All one has to do is substitute the words "Nazi Germany" for "radical Islam" and the utter folly of such an approach becomes clear. Progressivism and political correctness are headed for the ash heap of history because outbursts of "high-minded" cowardice following orchestrated atrocity isn't likely to win converts to the cause. That and the fact that no one wants to die, simply to satisfy progressive sensibilities. Comment | Share For more, visit Right Analysis. TOP 5 RIGHT OPINION COLUMNS John C. Goodman: How ObamaCare Harms Low-Income Workers Stephen Moore: The IRS Has Around 100,000 Employees. And Yet It's Still Incredibly Incompetent. Star Parker: Show the World That Americans 'Choose Life' Ken Blackwell: The Energy Deniers George Will: Mitt's Third Run Would Be No Charm For more, visit Right Opinion. OPINION IN BRIEF The Gipper: "We must always ask: Is government working to liberate and empower the individual? Is it creating incentives for people to produce, save, invest and profit from legitimate risks and honest toil? Or does it seek to compel, command and coerce people into submission and dependence?" Columnist John C. Goodman: "By this time next year, we may find that many workers who earn within a few dollars of the minimum wage have less income and less insurance coverage (as a group) than they did before the [ObamaCare] mandate began to take effect. This is the conclusion I draw from my survey in December of 136 fast-food restaurants (franchisees) that employed close to 3,500 workers. ... Almost half the workforce of these restaurants was involuntarily reduced to part time and has less income as a result. These employees have also lost the opportunity to have the coverage they most prefer: mini-med plans that pay for medical care they are most likely to need. Those few remaining full-time employees will get mini-med insurance for themselves, but they are unlikely to be able to afford coverage for any dependents they have. They will not get an ObamaCare bronze plan unless they fork over about one-tenth of their take-home pay, and they won't be able to get bronze coverage for other family members unless they forfeit more than half their income. Out of 3,500 employees, only one that we know of got the kind of insurance that the architects of the Affordable Care Act wanted everyone to have." Comment | Share Economist Stephen Moore: "The IRS is nearly an $11 billion a year agency with some 100,000 employees. Congress wants to cut its budget by less than 4 percent and the agency says it can't function. During the recession many businesses took cuts of 30 percent or 40 percent, and they did it by becoming more efficient and cutting waste. Meanwhile, the IRS has spent millions of dollars on conferences at exotic resorts for its employees with some suites costing $3,000 a night. And [IRS Commissioner John] Koskinen says he can't find places to cut. The IRS has also been rocked by scandals of targeting, abusing and financially harming individuals and conservative groups it doesn't agree with. Maybe it could shut down that division and use those resources to help taxpayers. ... Washington demands full accountability and accuracy from tax filers, but the tax collection department is the least accountable agency of government. If the IRS can't administer the tax code with 100,000 employees, it sounds like we need a new IRS and a new tax system." Comment | Share Comedian Seth Meyers: "Liam Neeson spoke out [last] week and said that he believes America has too many guns. And nearly all of them were used by Liam Neeson in 'Taken 3.'" Semper Vigilo, Fortis, Paratus et Fidelis! Join us in daily prayer for our Patriots in uniform -- Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines and Coast Guardsmen -- standing in harm's way in defense of Liberty, and for their families.