THE PATRIOT POST 03/04/2015

Daily Digest March 4, 2015    THE FOUNDATION "The necessity of reciprocal checks in the exercise of political power, by dividing and distributing it into different depositories, and constituting each the guardian of the public weal against invasions by the others, has been evinced by experiments ancient and modern, some of them in our country and under our own eyes." --George Washington, Farewell Address, 1796 TOP 5 RIGHT HOOKS Obama: Netanyahu Said 'Nothing New' (Read on for the full analysis of Benjamin Netanyahu's remarks below.) In a rebuttal to Israeli Prime Minster Benjamin Netanyahu's speech before Congress, Barack Obama petulantly insisted, "As far as I can tell, there was nothing new. ... The prime minister didn't offer any viable alternatives." But neither has Obama, which is precisely the reason for Netanyahu's visit. The problem isn't that Israel has no strategy for halting Iran's nuclear program; rather Obama doesn't agree with the military response it would likely entail. He claimed, "Iran has in fact frozen its program, rolled back some of its most dangerous, highly enriched uranium, and subjected itself to the kinds of verifications and inspections that we had not previously seen." What delusional absurdity. Iran is doing the complete opposite, much of it underground, but Obama nevertheless says his plan is working and nuked Netanyahu for opposing the deal that prompted negotiations: "When we shaped that interim deal ... Netanyahu made almost the precise same speech about how dangerous that deal was going to be." Well, yeah. Look at where we are now. Amping up the tough-talk even further, Obama promised, "What I can guarantee is that if it's a deal I sign off on, I will be able to prove that it is the best way for us to prevent Iran from getting nuclear weapons." And you can also keep your health insurance. Comment | Share Pelosi 'Near Tears' Throughout Bibi's Speech House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi suffered mightily through Benjamin Netanyahu's speech. And it had barely concluded before she released a statement: "The unbreakable bonds between the United States and Israel are rooted in our shared values, our common ideals and mutual interests. ... That is why, as one who values the U.S.-Israel relationship, and loves Israel, I was near tears throughout the Prime Minister's speech -- saddened by the insult to the intelligence of the United States as part of the P5 +1 nations, and saddened by the condescension toward our knowledge of the threat posed by Iran and our broader commitment to preventing nuclear proliferation." Netanyahu's speech was of value because Barack Obama has so spectacularly failed when it comes to nuclear negotiations with Iran. Pelosi can cry about insults to her intelligence, but the real crying shame is her party is so partisan that many Democrats refused to stand even when Netanyahu declared there must never be another Holocaust. Astoundingly shameful. Comment | Share House Passes 'Clean' DHS Bill Left with no viable alternative, the House voted 257-167 Tuesday to pass a full-year funding bill for the Department of Homeland Security. More than two-thirds of Republicans voted "no." The vote essentially ends the fruitless standoff over Barack Obama's unconstitutional immigration actions, as the Senate passed the same bill, 68-31, last week. Unfortunately, Republicans spent more time fighting each other than countering Obama, and from the outset they chose an unwinnable strategy. As the old adage goes, never take a hostage you're not willing to shoot, and Republicans clearly forgot that advice. Again. Speaker John Boehner blamed the Senate: "Unfortunately, the fight was never won in the other chamber. Democrats stayed united and blocked our bill, and our Republican colleagues in the Senate never found a way to win this fight." But he also offered a silver lining. "I am as outraged and frustrated as you at the lawless and unconstitutional actions of this president," Boehner told House Republicans during a conference meeting. "I believe this decision -- considering where we are -- is the right one for this team, and the right one for this country. The good news is that the president's executive action has been stopped, for now. This matter will continue to be litigated in the courts, where we have our best chance of winning this fight." Time will tell, but Obama has proved he's not willing to bow to anyone. More... Comment | Share SCOTUS Hears Second Challenge to ObamaCare Today the Supreme Court will hear the arguments in King v. Burwell, a challenge to ObamaCare that contends subsidies granted via the federal health exchange are illegal under the "Affordable" Care Act because the law permits them only under state exchanges. The pressure is on Chief Justice John Roberts, who was the deciding vote when the court upheld ObamaCare in 2012. In his last opinion on ObamaCare, Roberts -- to paraphrase Charles Dickens -- made the law into an ass, declaring the federal government could compel people to buy goods (a.k.a. health insurance) by calling it a tax. Because he showed himself susceptible to political intimidation in 2012, the Left is now running editorials claiming that, if Roberts allows SCOTUS to strike down ObamaCare this time, it will show itself to be a bench of activist judges. In The Washington Post, leftist reporter Robert Barnes wrote, "[T]he eponymous head of the Roberts court has the most to lose. After all, its decisions cannot be respected if the court is not respected." In his nomination hearing, Roberts said he was an umpire that called "balls and strikes and not to pitch or bat." But if Roberts ends up being the meek umpire at home plate scared of the crowd, he may redefine "state" to mean any level of government. And that ruling will not only cement ObamaCare into law, it will open up a flood of federal government expansion. More... Comment | Share Warren Buffett Doesn't Like Being Demonized Warren Buffett may be the poster child for the Left's goal of taxing the rich through a "Buffett rule," but it doesn't mean the man likes the law when the political speech is stripped away. Sen. Elizabeth Warren has been griping about the rich, not hiding the fact she wants to strip Wall Street of its money. Buffett doesn't like it and he put down a Coke long enough to air his grievance to CNBC. "She would do better if she was less angry and demonized less," Buffett said. "I believe in hate the sin, love the sinner. And I also believe in praising by name and criticizing by category. … I do think it's a mistake to get angry with your -- with people that disagree with you. I mean, in the end we do have to work together." Looks like Buffett wants the government to ask politely if it could just take his money. Notably, Warren attained her position by playing people like him against a jealous middle and lower class. In other words, it's Warren's style that made the "Buffett rule" popular. More... Comment | Share For more, visit Right Hooks. Share RIGHT ANALYSIS The Commando vs. the Community Organizer In a much-anticipated and contentious address to Congress, Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Tuesday spoke bluntly about the threat posed by the Islamic Republic of Iran's pursuit of nuclear weapons. He was downright presidential -- something our nation has sorely lacked for the last six years. Netanyahu's 45-minute speech recounted Iran's past acts of terror, its continued call for the destruction of Israel, its recent success in spreading malign influence and control through the Middle East, and its track record of cheating and lying to the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA). Netanyahu drew a line in the sand, and Barack Obama's response will no doubt be on the wrong side. Indeed, Obama immediately claimed there was "nothing new" in the prime minister's speech, and in a sense he's right: The facts about Iran are not new, nor are they in dispute, even among those currently negotiating with Iran. The key point is that Netanyahu and like-minded people believe the deal toward which Obama is working rewards Iran with a path to nuclear weapons rather than preventing Iran from obtaining them -- something even the Obama administration still says would be "unacceptable." Obama obviously resents that a leader of Netanyahu's stature would attempt to upset the diplomatic apple cart by speaking the plain truth at a time when the Obama administration seems determined to ignore the truth in pursuit of a deal --any deal. Netanyahu raised three key points that the Obama administration is loath to acknowledge: The current Iranian regime is and will always be an enemy of the United States; Iran has proven time and time again that it cannot be trusted; and this is a bad deal we are better off without. These three points are unassailable. Here's the most critical excerpt of the speech: "Don't be fooled. The battle between Iran and ISIS doesn't turn Iran into a friend of America. "Iran and ISIS are competing for the crown of militant Islam. One calls itself the Islamic Republic. The other calls itself the Islamic State. Both want to impose a militant Islamic empire first on the region and then on the entire world. They just disagree among themselves who will be the ruler of that empire. ... So when it comes to Iran and ISIS, the enemy of your enemy is your enemy. "The difference is that ISIS is armed with butcher knives, captured weapons and YouTube, whereas Iran could soon be armed with intercontinental ballistic missiles and nuclear bombs. We must always remember -- I'll say it one more time -- the greatest dangers facing our world is the marriage of militant Islam with nuclear weapons. To defeat ISIS and let Iran get nuclear weapons would be to win the battle, but lose the war. We can't let that happen. "But that, my friends, is exactly what could happen, if the deal now being negotiated is accepted by Iran. That deal will not prevent Iran from developing nuclear weapons. It would all but guarantee that Iran gets those weapons -- lots of them. ... "The foremost sponsor of global terrorism could be weeks away from having enough enriched uranium for an entire arsenal of nuclear weapons and this with full international legitimacy." The Iranian regime is not just a regular dictatorship that hates and fears the United States. It is not Cuba, or Venezuela, or even North Korea. The senior clerics and office-holders in Iran are not just in power to enrich themselves and kill off their political enemies (although there is plenty of that in Iran). The entire leadership chain in Iran, from Supreme Leader Khamenei down through the legislative body and the parallel body of clerics that shape policy, are all true believers in the Islamic Revolution and as such are reflexively, congenitally anti-America. The "Death to America" signs so popular in Iran are not just political theater; they express the true feelings of the hard-liners who have ruled Iran since 1979. Despite all the swooning Western media talk about current Iranian President Hassan Ruhani's "reformist" nature, he is of a kind with Khamenei, with his predecessor Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, and indeed even with Old Whiskers himself -- Ruhollah Khomeini. Regarding Iran's trustworthiness in any deal we might reach, we have said it so many times we've lost count: We are in the nuclear mess with Iran precisely because it has lied, cheated and obfuscated repeatedly under the previous deal known as the Non-Proliferation Treaty (NPT). Twelve years of work through the UNSC, the P5+1, the EU-3 and the IAEA Board of Governors were all about getting Iran to meet its sworn obligations under the NPT and demonstrate it was only working on peaceful nuclear energy. In report after report the IAEA offered the same assessment going back to 2003: "We are unable to verify that all nuclear material in Iran is in peaceful activities." But the Obama administration tells us with a straight face that somehow Iran can be held to the terms of a new deal. As for the deal itself, political analyst Charles Krauthammer explained that it would allow Iran to finish the work necessary for an industrial-scale nuclear complex, including all the stages of mining, converting, processing, enriching and fabricating uranium. Only the final step of weaponization is left out of this deal, and Iran's unresolved past and present weapons-related work is one of the largest points of concern at the IAEA. In other words, with the blessing of the United States and our negotiating partners, Iran would be allowed 10 years to build up its infrastructure without fear of sanctions or other penalties, and would suffer no penalty for splitting apart the NPT. This is a bad deal, and Netanyahu is right that we are better off without it. Netanyahu ended his speech with a familiar refrain, but one that should not be taken lightly: "The days when the Jewish people remained passive in the face of genocidal enemies, those days are over. ... For the first time in 100 generations, we, the Jewish people, can defend ourselves. This is why, as a prime minister of Israel, I can promise you one more thing: Even if Israel has to stand alone, Israel will stand." The Israelis have watched and waited as the United States and the rest of the world tried to convince Iran to give up its nuclear ambitions, but Israel will not wait forever. If Iran is not held to its NPT obligations to verify the peaceful nature of its nuclear program, a day will come, perhaps far earlier than any of us imagine, when Israel will decide it cannot wait any longer. Finally, a post script of sorts. House Speaker John Boehner showed leadership in inviting Netanyahu to speak. He also very appropriately presented Netanyahu with a bust of Winston Churchill. In contrast, Barack Obama came into the Oval Office in 2009 to find such a Churchill bust, given by the British to George W. Bush. Obama promptly returned it to England. Comment | Share Hillary Clinton's Transparent Deception Hillary Clinton is reportedly telling donors she will enter the presidential race in April. She sees it as a move that would assuage worries within her party and prime the fundraising pumps. But Mrs. Clinton has far greater problems than when to announce her coronation bid. Illustrating everything voters don't like about the Clintons, The New York Times broke the story that Clinton did not use or even set up an official government email account during her entire tenure as secretary of state. Instead, she used private email for all her official correspondence. Furthermore, the Times reported, her staff did nothing to preserve her personal emails on department servers. Failing to use a government email account for all correspondence is a violation of the National Archives and Records Act. According to Jason Baron, former director of litigation at the National Archives and Records Administration, "It is very difficult to conceive of a scenario -- short of nuclear winter -- where an agency would be justified in allowing its cabinet-level head officer to solely use a private email communications channel for the conduct of government business." The Times reports Hillary's staff turned over 55,000 pages of her emails to Rep. Trey Gowdy's Select House Committee on Benghazi. But Gowdy responded that only "several hundred of these emails were ... turned over" to his committee. He said also Clinton seems to have used multiple personal accounts. The primary one, clintonemail.com, was set up on the day her Senate confirmation hearings began in 2009. In other words, she had a plan. "It was not as if she had both an official and a private email account," Gowdy said. "She did not use personal email in addition to government email. She used personal email in lieu of government email. And she had more than one private email account." "[O]nly she has the complete record," Gowdy continued. "And the committee is going to have to go to her, her lawyers and her email providers to ensure we have access to everything." Gowdy added, "One should also be concerned about the national security implications of former Secretary Clinton of using exclusively personal email accounts for the conducting of official U.S. foreign policy." By filing a Freedom of Information Act lawsuit, Judicial Watch recently obtained a number of emails that prove the State Department knew immediately that our embassy in Benghazi was under attack by terrorists. The emails tell the story in a chilling series of short messages that describe the worsening events that occurred Sept. 11-12, 2012, as well as reveal the administration's series of lies about what really happened. Not being privy thus far to Clinton's own emails, we are left to wonder if the thousands of emails she generated on private servers over her four years as secretary of state will completely discredit her -- that's no doubt why she employed the method. Clinton is by no means the first or only public official to use private email for public business, but she might be the first to do so exclusively. And media outlets Left and Right are attacking her for it. Jonah Goldberg at National Review asked a particularly salient question about all the investigations into Benghazi. With the multi-thousands of pages of paper floating around, he said, "[Y]ou'd think the non-existence of an official e-mail account would have been noticed. Why did it take so long?" Goldberg credits Gowdy for being the first to notice the missing account. But Ron Fournier, writing in National Journal, had harsher words for the aspiring first woman president: "Two weeks ago we learned that the Clinton Foundation accepted contributions from foreign countries. Assurances from ... Obama ... that [none] were made during her tenure ... were false." Both Clinton's and Obama's actions were "sleazy and stupid," Fournier added. "We've had sleazy and stupid -- and, now, with these emails, suspicious. If she runs, are we going to have a full Seven Dwarfs? Seedy. Sanctimonious. Self-important. Slick." Fournier concluded that it may be time for Clinton to abandon her White House bid. Naturally, Hillary is defiant. Tuesday night at an EMILY's List party, she repeated ad nauseam her usual sermon about women's empowerment and hammered away at "that old trickle-down economics" class warfare. She said nothing about the emails. After all, the presidency is her right, and she will continue to pursue it. We hope Gowdy's committee throws a wrench in the gears of Clinton's election machine. He's determined to get the emails, while she'll do whatever she can to stop him. But many Democrats who've already been whispering about dumping Hillary (again) might decide the timing is right to find a better candidate. Comment | Share For more, visit Right Analysis. TOP 5 RIGHT OPINION COLUMNS Jim DeMint: If Not Now ... When? Will the GOP Majority Ever Stand for Anything? Arnold Ahlert: Hillary's Public Records Deception Ben Shapiro: The Hillary Cover-Up and the End of Democracy Terence Jeffrey: Why Would an Ayatollah Build Secret Uranium-Enrichment Facilities? Michael Barone: If America Is Mars and Europe Venus, How Is Europe Doing? For more, visit Right Opinion. OPINION IN BRIEF Philosopher Sir Francis Bacon (1561-1626): "It is a strange desire to seek power and to lose liberty, or to seek power over others and to lose power over a man's self." Columnist Jim DeMint: "Despite the fact that Republicans have majorities in both the House and the Senate that were elected on a pledge to fight against President Obama’s executive amnesty, and despite forcing through a big spending bill at the end of 2014 with the promise they would fight later on Homeland Security appropriations, they are now punting the issue entirely. ... The absurdity of this situation is that fighting the president’s executive amnesty through Department of Homeland Security appropriations was the strategy created by Republican leaders. Now that the time to fight has arrived, the generals are running from the battlefield and blaming the infantry they told to lead the charge. If the Republican majority in both houses of Congress is not willing to take a stand and fight against the government takeover of America’s healthcare system or the president’s arrogant usurpation of the constitutional powers of Congress, then what will they fight for? Who will stand with freedom-minded Americans who sent this majority to Washington to fight for them? I hope my former colleagues will ask themselves: 'If not us, who? If not now, when?'" Comment | Share Columnist Ben Shapiro: "On Monday, The New York Times reported that former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton never -- not once -- used her official State Department email address for her official communications. ... Welcome to the most transparent administration in American history, where the Federal Communications Commission can regulate the Internet and keep those regulations secret before a vote, where top government officials can deliberately hide their emails from the public, but where your health records, income and emails are all government business. ... What possible violations of the Constitutional system will Americans actually fight? The list of possibilities grows short. Reports emerged this week suggesting that President Obama will consider banning bullets by executive order, effectively castrating the Second Amendment by fiat. Shrug. The Obama White House announced this week that Obama was 'very interested' in unilaterally raising taxes. Shrug. Democracies die not with a whimper or a bang but with a shrug. When we don’t care enough about the system to stop its breakdown ... the constitutional order collapses. But so what? By electing Hillary Clinton the presidency, we’ll strike a blow against non-existent generalized sexism in American society. And that’s far more important than having an answerable, accountable government." Comment | Share Comedian Argus Hamilton: "Washington, D.C., officially legalized the possession and home growing of marijuana at midnight on Thursday. The city is now the only national capital in the world where pot is legal. The next day the president confronted Michelle and claimed half of her White House garden as community property." 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.