Friday, June 20, 2014

THE PATRIOT POST 06/20/2014

THE FOUNDATION

"There is no maxim in my opinion which is more liable to be misapplied, and which therefore needs elucidation than the current one that the interest of the majority is the political standard of right and wrong.... In fact it is only reestablishing under another name and a more specious form, force as the measure of right." --James Madison, letter to James Monroe, 1786

TOP 5 RIGHT HOOKS

Contradictions on Iraq

"There's no military solution inside of Iraq, uh, certainly not one that is led by the United States," Barack Obama said as he announced sending "up to 300" U.S. military advisers to Iraq. In another contradiction, he boasted in 2011 of his pledge to "bring the war in Iraq to a responsible end" by withdrawing all U.S. forces (something he repeated ad naseum), but he said Thursday, "Keep in mind, that wasn't a decision made by me. That was a decision made by the Iraqi government." The buck stops over there. In other news, The Wall Street Journal reports, "Sunni extremists in Iraq have occupied what was once Saddam Hussein's premier chemical-weapons production facility, a complex that still contains a stockpile of old weapons, State Department and other U.S. government officials said." Wait -- Saddam Hussein had WMD? Who knew? More...
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New GOP Leadership

It was the natural order of things. Soon-to-be-former-House Majority Leader Eric Cantor stepped down, he picked Rep. Kevin McCarthy (CA) as his replacement, and the House voted another self-proclaimed "Young Gun Conservative" to replace Cantor. Rep. Steve Scalise (LA) filled McCarthy's old position as majority whip. National Review's Joel Gehrke reports the vote was taken in secret -- even GOP lawmakers were kept in the dark -- in an attempt to at least appear unified. McCarthy made one promise: "I will work every single day to make sure this conference has the courage to lead and the wisdom to listen. And we'll turn this country around." Republicans aren't shaking things up, which reveals again they expect to cruise to a big win in November on the basis of being Not Democrats. Maybe that will be enough for dissatisfied voters. More...
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Frivolous Prosecution

Wisconsin Republican Governor Scott Walker won his recall election in 2012 -- a historic feat -- after taking on his state's public unions. But Big Labor hasn't forgiven him. A judge unsealed prosecution documents accusing Walker of breaking the law because he coordinated fundraising during his campaign. The documents are a political attack that a judge has already thrown out. Heritage Foundation's Hans von Spakovsky writes, "What these unsealed documents provide is simply more evidence that local prosecutors were attempting to prosecute First Amendment-protected activity -- specifically political speech on issues -- by conservative organizations and to curtail the speech of someone they considered a political enemy. As Wisconsin Club for Growth's attorney, Andrew Grossman, said, what these documents actually show is how local prosecutors 'adopted a blatantly unconstitutional interpretation of Wisconsin law that they used to launch a secret criminal investigation targeting conservatives throughout Wisconsin.'" More...
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Reid, Kochs, Money -- Cue Tape

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-NV) took to the Senate floor Thursday to once again rail against the Koch brothers. He can't help himself. "The decisions by the Supreme Court have left the American people with a status quo in which one side's billionaires are pitted against the other side's billionaires," he said. "Except one side doesn't have many billionaires," meaning his side. Except George Soros, Warren Buffett and Tom Steyer are three that quickly come to mind. But it's those darn Koch brothers Reid can't stand. "It is not right that we have two of richest men in the world trying to buy America," he complained. "They have far more money than virtually every government." Well, they certainly have more money than the U.S. government, which is $17 trillion in the hole thanks to the likes of Reid and Co.
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Except for Its Poor Record...

"The [British National Health Service] NHS has been declared the world's best healthcare system by an international panel of experts who rated its care superior to countries which spend far more on health," crows the UK Guardian. We noted numerous problems with the study Wednesday. It seems even the Guardian is aware that all is not well in paradise, slipping in this doozy: "The only serious black mark against the NHS was its poor record on keeping people alive." As The Wall Street Journal's James Taranto quips, "So as long as you don't mind dying, the NHS is great." More...
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For more, visit Right Hooks.
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RIGHT ANALYSIS

Another Bunch of Hot Air From Al Gore

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In the upcoming issue of Rolling Stone, our jet-setting former vice president and unsuccessful aspirant for the Oval Office fells a lot of trees and spills a lot of ink (to the tune of 7,000-plus words) preaching to the choir the sky will fall unless we do something about carbon emissions. Never mind that a June snowstorm blanketed parts of the Rocky Mountains with over a foot of snow, or that Antarctic sea ice isn't melting like Newsweek (and Gore) claims it is.
If you can stand the clunky prose and hackneyed logic long enough to read through Gore's piece, you'll find that he blames some new and unusual suspects. Who knew, for example, that global warming could be laid at the feet of Harry Reid's favorite boogeymen, the Koch brothers? And of course, Gore claims that catastrophic storms like Haiyan or Sandy were caused by warmer-than-normal ocean temperatures reflective of global warming, yet he ignores the "warming hiatus" our planet has enjoyed since 1998. Such storms are only "unprecedented" because we have better methods of measuring them; on the other hand, we have no real way of knowing the severity of storms during acknowledged warm periods like those which occurred during medieval times -- long before SUVs and Koch brothers roamed the planet.
Gore, of course, has a number of remedies for this ailment, and some of them would line his pockets. He notes, "We have the policy tools that can dramatically accelerate the transition to clean energy that market forces will eventually produce at a slower pace. The most important has long since been identified: We have to put a price on carbon in our markets, and we need to eliminate the massive subsidies that fuel the profligate emissions of global-warming pollution." Yes, cap-and-trade is back. Instead of selectively eliminating subsidies, however, let's eliminate all energy subsidies and let the free market decide what survives.
Gore forgets carve-outs for cyclical energy sources such as wind and solar power, generally known as a "renewable energy portfolio," create their own subsidies, as utilities have to provide these regardless of price or pay a non-compliance fee. That little detail is, of course, a small casualty to the noble cause of propagandizing about so-called "global climate change."
Yet Gore goes beyond the political realm, darkly warning, "In order to accomplish these policy shifts, we must not only put a price on carbon in markets, but also find a way to put a price on climate denial in our politics." No one is denying that our climate changes; the points of contention are who (or what) is to blame and what can (or should) be done about it -- not to mention the folly of believing the earth's current climate is now optimal and only mankind can control it. Maybe the Creator will have something to say about all this.
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Jindal Breaks With Common Core

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Louisiana Republican Governor Bobby Jindal withdrew his state from Common Core, the federal government's awkward and cumbersome attempt to control public education. Louisiana is not the first state to balk at the Common Core initiative, but Jindal's decision to back out of the program makes news in part because he was an early supporter. He is also a potential 2016 presidential candidate, so every move he makes will be scrutinized by the media. Education Secretary Arne Duncan accused Jindal of making a cold political calculation, giving further proof that in politics, you're only a flip-flopper if you change your mind against leftists. Otherwise, it's known as "evolving."
Read the rest here.

Profiles of Valor: Marine Cpl. Kyle Carpenter

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Marine Cpl. William Kyle Carpenter received the Medal of Honor Thursday for his heroic actions in Afghanistan, where he jumped on a grenade to save a fellow Marine. He is the 15th member of the Armed Forces to receive the Medal for actions in Afghanistan or Iraq.
"You always hear 'band of brothers,' and that's exactly what we are," he said. "I'll say I'm not surprised and no way patting myself on the back, because I know that if you put a thousand Marines in that situation, they would all do the same exact thing for me."
We told Carpenter's story in March before a date was set for the ceremony. Read the rest here.
For more, visit Right Analysis.

TOP 5 RIGHT OPINION COLUMNS

For more, visit Right Opinion.

OPINION IN BRIEF

Swiss psychiatrist Carl Gustav Jung (1875-1961): "Every form of addiction is bad, no matter whether the narcotic be alcohol or morphine or idealism."
Columnists L. Brent Bozell & Tim Graham: "The U.S. Patent and Trademark Office found its way to the front page by declaring the word 'Redskins' was offensive and therefore unworthy of trademark protection under a 1946 law that proscribes trademarks for 'immoral, deceptive, or scandalous matter.' MSNBC anchor Joy-Ann Reid reported this news with an obscenity warning before airing a clip of Sen. Harry Reid: 'And I just warn people, he does use the name of the team. So, I'm just going to warn you guys about that in advance.' She's not alone. Liberal sports writers refuse to type the word in their columns. Welcome to the latest controversy where the left, which has removed every moral objection to traditional understandings of profanity, continues its own crusade to ban words that violate their sensitivities on race, gender and sexual preference."
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Columnist Mona Charen: "A few questions for President Barack Obama. ... If it is in the U.S. national security interest to keep Iraq from disintegrating, why are you deploying at most 300 special forces -- just 50 more than you sent to find and destroy Joseph Kony of the Lord's Resistance Army in Uganda? Does Kony represent a comparable threat to the United States in your judgment? ... You scolded President George W. Bush -- by implication -- during your remarks when you said that the present crisis should remind us of 'the need to ask hard questions before we take action abroad, particularly military action.' Did you ask hard questions before making the decision to withdraw all forces from Iraq, or were you more interested bragging rights about 'ending wars'? Do you see now that the enemy gets a vote?"
Comedian Argus Hamilton: "The White House added to its edicts of killing coal, opening the border, and altering the ACA Tuesday by canceling the property rights of the Redskins owner. It's the only way they can govern. Barack Obama's approval rating is so low now, the only thing he's above is the law."
Semper Vigilo, Fortis, Paratus et Fidelis!
Nate Jackson for The Patriot Post Editorial Team
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