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Socialism’s False Hope

For the first time, Americans face the prospect of an openly socialist candidate potentially ascending to the Presidency.

Voter angst has given rise to interest in Bernie Sanders’ platform of a socialist system, in which production is controlled by the government. The U.S. economy faces a dearth of middle income employment. Students are deeply indebted due to sky-high college tuition.  There is a strong belief that substantial, perhaps radical, change is needed.

The feeling is understandable, but the solution is a proven failure. The “most pure” socialist nations, the Soviet Union and the nations it held in captivity, all suffered inferior economies and ill-served citizenry.  Others are exceptionally impoverished. Most feature dictatorial governments. Some semi-socialist nations have weakened economies that, ironically, could not survive without help from, or access to, the markets of capitalist economies.  China’s vaunted (but now faltering) economy would collapse if access to U.S. consumers vanished.

Some will point to the economies of European nations as an example of socialist or semi-socialist economies that have not collapsed. Once again, however, the support of the capitalist American economy proves indispensable. Both as a market, and as the major financier of the enormous cost of providing defense for the Continent, the capitalist U.S. essentially underwrites its semi-socialist allies.

Not surprisingly, Thomas Donohue, president of the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, has opposed the rising acceptance of socialism, noting:

“Socialism is a wrong and dangerous path for America. It’s failed everywhere it’s ever been tried, bringing shared misery instead of shared prosperity. It undermines personal initiative and responsibility, stunts innovation and growth, makes people serve government—not vice-versa—and robs individuals of the dignity of earning their own success and charting their own course.”

The Foundation for Economic Freedom delivered a similar message:

Curt’s first point was that change is difficult, because it involves a great deal of sacrifice viagra fast respitecaresa.org and struggle. However, they know little about how to manage the stress in their lives, how to decompress, and ultimately viagra online how to ‘de-stress.’ It is not just a goal, for many it has become a necessity, a matter of survival. These new versions of the Kamagra tablets endeavors to manage the cause of ED symptoms and deliver a stiffer penile pfizer viagra achat erection. They have years of experience in the same compositions/dosages as the original medication, with the same benefits – but at a cheaper price. cialis stores also comes in the convenient jelly form as already mentioned. “Socialism is the Big Lie of the twentieth century. While it promised prosperity, equality, and security, it delivered poverty, misery, and tyranny. Equality was achieved only in the sense that everyone was equal in his or her misery.

“In the same way that a Ponzi scheme or chain letter initially succeeds but eventually collapses, socialism may show early signs of success. But any accomplishments quickly fade as the fundamental deficiencies of central planning emerge. It is the initial illusion of success that gives government intervention its pernicious, seductive appeal. In the long run, socialism has always proven to be a formula for tyranny and misery. A pyramid scheme is ultimately unsustainable because it is based on faulty principles. Likewise, collectivism is unsustainable in the long run because it is a flawed theory. Socialism does not work because it is not consistent with fundamental principles of human behavior. The failure of socialism in countries around the world can be traced to one critical defect: it is a system that ignores incentives.

“In a capitalist economy, incentives are of the utmost importance. Market prices, the profit-and-loss system of accounting, and private property rights provide an efficient, interrelated system of incentives to guide and direct economic behavior. Capitalism is based on the theory that incentives matter! Under socialism, incentives either play a minimal role or are ignored totally. A centrally planned economy without market prices or profits, where property is owned by the state, is a system without an effective incentive mechanism to direct economic activity. By failing to emphasize incentives, socialism is a theory inconsistent with human nature and is therefore doomed to fail. Socialism is based on the theory that incentives don’t matter!”

Even socialist nations endowed with exceptional inherent wealth cannot long remain prosperous. CATO describes how Venezuela, which possesses the world’s largest oil reserves, has become impoverished under socialist leadership.

“Despite receiving over $1 trillion in oil revenues since 1999, the government has run out of cash and now relies heavily on printing money to finance itself. The result is the highest inflation rate in the world: officially 56 per cent last year, although according to calculations by Steve Hanke of Johns Hopkins University, the implied annual inflation rate is actually 330 per cent.”

The economic failures of socialism are matched by its detrimental effect on individual freedom. Ronald Reagan noted the inherent socialist tendency to attack personal liberty: “A government can’t control the economy without controlling people.” In its raw essence, socialism depends on force.

Ironically, the very problems socialists describe as a justification for their philosophy are caused by socialist-like federal programs.  The Great Recession was the result of federal mandates to financial institutions to provide loans to borrowers that were poor risks for repayment. The heavy taxes and regulations imposed on U.S. corporations have led them to be uncompetitive with their international rivals, resulting in sharply diminished employment.

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Does Obama have Hidden Goals for Cuba and Guantanamo?

Did the President make a secret deal with Havana to first close the Guantanamo Bay prison, then return the entire naval base to Cuba?

By now, it’s obvious that Mr. Obama has difficulty even saying “Islamic terrorism.”  But his dangerously inept policies are far worse than mere semantics.  There continues to be no viable reason why the Guantanamo facility, off American shores and therefore keeping U.S. citizens safe from attempted attacks to free the hazardous inmates, should be closed. There is equally no viable reason for the President to open relations with the Castro regime when it continues to oppress its own population, sponsor terrorism abroad, and allow the Russian Navy to use the island nation’s facilities. In April 2015, the President withdrew the terror-sponsor designation from Cuba, despite Havana’s ongoing offenses.

It’s long past time to ask the President very difficult questions concerning his bizarre stance on terrorism, and his views on relations with Cuba.

The President’s actions in prematurely withdrawing from Iraq, and encouraging the various Moslem Brotherhood-supported “Arab Spring” movements which expanded the influence of terrorists, were terrible mistakes. His refusal to respond to the Benghazi attack or to seriously assault ISIS call into question whether he takes the terrorist threat seriously at all. Similarly, his announcement of a withdrawal date from Afghanistan repeats the mistake he made in Iraq.

The White House response to the Paris attacks was ridiculous. Jack Kelly, writing in realclearpolitics, notes: When 44 world leaders joined 1.6 million Parisians to condemn Islamist terror… Barack Obama and Vice President Joe Biden were watching football. Secretary of State John Kerry was in India (where it’s been unseasonably cold), to give a speech on global warming. Attorney General Eric Holder was in Paris but didn’t attend because he was in “high-level meetings,” aides said. With whom? Nearly every prominent French official was at the rally.

Mr. Obama’s Oval Office remarks in response to the San Bernardino attack, falsely claiming wide-scale bias against Moslems and calling for more domestic gun control, were astounding. USNews wrote: “The shooters in San Bernardino were no more deterred by the gun control laws on the books when they modified the weapons they used than they were by the prohibition on the construction and use of the pipe bombs which, in this case at least, were fortunately duds. He doesn’t understand, and as a consequence, he’s fighting the wrong war.”
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A House Armed Services Committee release reports that “Section 1222 of the National Defense Authorization Act for FY16 require[d] the Administration to deliver a strategy for the Middle East and countering violent extremism no later than February 15, 2016.  It requires the Administration to lay out a number of elements needed to defeat terrorist groups like ISIS and al Qaeda, including a description of the role the U.S. military will play in such a strategy, a description of the coalition needed to carry out the strategy, and an assessment of efforts to disrupt foreign fighters traveling to Syria and Iraq. The White House has failed to comply.  Reacting to the the Administration’s failure to submit the strategy, Rep. Mac Thornberry (R-TX), Chairman of the House Armed Services Committee, made the following statement: ‘Unsurprisingly the Administration cannot articulate a strategy for countering violent extremists in the Middle East.  Time and again, the President has told us his strategy to defeat extremist groups like ISIS and al Qaeda is well underway; yet, months after the legal requirement was established, his Administration cannot deliver that strategy to Congress.  I fear the President’s failure to deliver this report says far more about the state of his strategy to defeat terrorists than any empty reassurance he may offer from the podium.”

Information first obtained by the Washington Free Beacon indicates that the Presidents’ plan to close the Guantanamo Bay facility may force the Pentagon to release suspected terrorists.

In a letter to Defense Secretary Carter, Rep. Duncan Hunter (R-Ca) notes the high rate of recidivism of terrorist prisoners already released from Guantanamo Bay, and questions the disposition of future captured terrorists.

The President’s action are even raising eyebrows among his staunchest supporters. Several New York Democrats, led by Senator Charles Schumer, have been outraged by Mr. Obama’s move to cut anti-terror funds from America’s top target of Islamic extremists, New York City.

Mr. Obama has provided little explanation for its policy, or lack thereof, on terrorism. Nor has there been a convincing explanation about its stance towards Guantanamo Bay in particular, or Cuba in general. The hard questions need to be asked. Are the two issues related?

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The Reality of Voting Fraud

The key issue of this year’s presidential contest may not be who the candidates are, the weak economy, or the hazardous condition of America’s national security. Increasingly, it appears that the integrity of the election process itself may be the most contentious topic to arise in the 2016 race.

Recently, as reported in the Free Beacon Ann Ravel, the former chair and current member of the Federal Election Commission stated (at a conference in Canada, interestingly enough) that the “United States political system benefits wealthy white men,” and “criticized the system by saying it is set up in such a way that makes it difficult for women and minorities to succeed.”

FEC member Ravel’s comments are not isolated words. They are part of an overall strategy to create a smokescreen for attempts to alter election results through a combination of election day antics, registration fraud, and opposition to voter id. Commissioner Ravel’s comments are designed to give cover to a bevy of approaches that seek to overcome the advantage Republicans have demonstrated in recent elections, and that the GOP is expected to have in response to anger over the dismal results of the Obama Administration’s policies at home and abroad, as well as (if Hillary is the candidate) dismay over rampant ethical issues or (if Sanders is the candidate) a rejection of a blatant socialist message.

Many factors in illegal voting and registration are in play, particularly with the increase in illegal immigration, allowing noncitizens to obtain driver’s licenses and “motor voter” rules in many states that offer voter registration when applying for a license.

The NOLO legal website notes:

“Due to the Motor Vehicle Act of 1993 (also known as the ‘Motor Voter Act’), states are required to provide people with the opportunity to register to vote when they apply for or renew their driver’s licenses. However, while a minority of states ask for proof of citizenship at the time of voter registration, employees in most states may not inquire about citizenship status before asking noncitizens if they desire to register to vote… some noncitizens are misinformed about their eligibility to vote. For example, a campaign worker may tell you that permanent residents (green card holders) may register to vote, even when they are not eligible, or a canvasser may knock on your door to ask you to register and give you incorrect information.”

Legitimate questions continue to go unanswered. Some proficiency in English is required for citizenship, but some states print ballots in numerous languages. Why?
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Intelligentuspolitics.com reports:

“Dozens of lawsuits have been filed by the Obama Justice Department, the Democrat Party, the Clinton campaign and various other groups … Their primary and continuing objective has been to convince the electorate that there is no voter fraud, an objective with which they have had moderate success. To understand the magnitude of this effort, perform a Google exact-match search for the phrase ‘voter fraud is a myth.’ Google has 3,940 articles in their index that use that exact phrase. What are the odds? That is a great deal of content with the exact same phrase and message.

Their secondary goal has been to convince voters that voting rules of any kind constitute Republican voter suppression… Again looking at search trends, in the last eight years, ‘Republican voter suppression’ produces 11,500 exact-match Google search results and ‘GOP voter suppression’ produces 15,100 exact-match search results. Their most aggressive efforts are dedicated to opposing maintenance of voter registration rolls and opposing voter ID laws. These initiatives pose a very real threat to successful voter fraud. Democrats combine media bombardment with a mind boggling assortment of frivolous lawsuits to oppose voter ID laws.”

Reason.comreports:

“In a 2015 study that is currently under review, Lindsay Nielson—a political scientist at the University of San Diego—parses the effects of stricter voter ID laws on the voting patterns of the young, the elderly, the poor, and racial minorities [in general elections]. …Nielson finds that “there is little evidence that racial minorities are less likely than whites to vote when states institute voter identification requirements.” … There is also “no statistically significant gap in estimated turnout [between high-income and low-income voter] when the identification law becomes stricter.”

The U.S. Supreme Court, in its 2008 upholding of the constitutionality of Indiana’s voter identification law, stated that obvious examples of voter fraud exist throughout U.S, history.  The Heritage Foundation notes that the “Nonpartisan Commission on Federal Election Reform, chaired by former President Jimmy Carter and former Secretary of State James Baker, found that our ‘electoral system cannot inspire public confidence if no safeguards exist to deter fraud or to confirm the identity of voters.”

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Climate may be Cooling, not Warming

Scientific studies reported as recently as January are throwing the climate change debate into turmoil.

A number of scientists, examining the most recent solar studies, believe that the Sun is entering a quiet phase, and it may cause the Earth to cool, not warm.  It could change the political calculus behind the entire drive to engage in measures meant to address the theory of man-made global warming.

According to scientific sources reported in Space Today, the sun is  registering its quietest activity since records were first kept around 1750.

In December, as reported in the British newspaper Sunday Express  “A team of European researchers have unveiled a scientific model showing that the Earth is likely to experience a “mini ice age” from 2030 to 2040 as a result of decreased solar activity… at the National Astronomy Meeting in Wales, Northumbria University professor Valentina Zharkova said fluctuations an 11-year cycle of solar activity the sun goes through would be responsible for a freeze, the like of which has not been experienced since the 1600s.

A Principia Scientific  report disclosed:  A “New study by respected German scientists discredits alarmist global warming claims….climate cooling, not warming [is] more likely for the rest of this century. [According to] The Die kalte Sonne… Dr. Alexander Hempelmann and Carl Otto Weiss carefully examined climate changes of the past and have found that the recent [warming] changes (of the last 40 years) are nothing out of the ordinary and that we need to worry about a global cooling that will persist until 2080.

Space .com  notes: “Scientists have also often speculated whether the Maunder Minimum, a 70-year dearth of sunspots in the late 17th to early 18th century, was linked with the coldest part of the Little Ice Age, during which Europe and North America experienced bitterly cold winters. This regional cooling might be linked with a drop in the sun’s extreme ultraviolet radiation. In fact, the sun could currently be on the cusp of a miniature version of the Maunder Minimum, since the current solar cycle is the weakest in more than 50 years.”
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Nature World News notes that: “It is known that the Sun plays an important part in controlling the Earth’s climate, but now researchers show that solar activity affects climate change more than previously thought, according to recent research. That is, especially during the Earth’s “cooler periods.

“Scientists have long debated how the activity of the Sun might influence climate, and new findings indicate that its impact is not constant. For the last 12,000 years, since the last Ice Age ended, the Earth has generally experienced a warm climate. However, during this period the climate has not been stable and temperatures have varied. So we have had a slightly cooler climate during the last 4,000 years, and ocean currents in the North Atlantic have been weaker.”

Science Times  describes the impact reduced solar activity may have:

“While solar activity is declining, our Earth may be slowly heading for a new ice age, according to scientists. Studying the decreasing number of sunspots, researchers found that we are possibly entering a nearly spotless solar cycle. This could result in lower temperatures for decades…In the 1645 it started a similar era with almost no spots, the so-called Maunder Minimum period. This coincided with the ‘Little Ice Age’ and it lasted for around 70 years. At that time North America and Europe experienced lower than average temperatures. However, up to date the theory that lower solar activity can cause climate change is still controversial since scientists do not have enough convincing evident to prove this correlation. A Lomonosov Moscow State University researcher, Helen Popova, predicts that this minimum will lead to a significant cooling similar to what was experienced during the Maunder Minimum Period if the existing theories about the impact of solar activity on the climate are true.

ClimateDepot reported in 2013 “Scientists at Russia’s famous Pulkovo Observatory are convinced that the world is in for a period of global cooling.  Global warming which has been the subject of so many discussions in recent years, may give way to global cooling. According to scientists from the Pulkovo Observatory in St.Petersburg, solar activity is waning, so the average yearly temperature will begin to decline as well. Scientists from Britain and the US chime in saying that forecasts for global cooling are far from groundless.”

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Internet Censorship on the Rise

Free speech on the internet continues to take a pounding on several key fronts.

Under pressure from heavy handed governments abroad and threats of lawsuits and left wing agitation in the U.S., the wide-open, free-wheeling character of the internet may see its days numbered.

Twitter, the source for very short comments and observations, is the latest battleground. The Daily Signal reports that a so-called “Trust and Safety Council,” containing left-wing groups with a history of endorsing political correctness and opposing free speech, is preparing to decide how to police what is allowed to be on and what will be forbidden on Twitter.

Self-censorship by internet forums is the new wave for blocking freedom of expression in cyberspace.

Breitbart reports that the German government is demanding that Google, Facebook and Twitter remove what it considers anti-immigrant “hate speech.” Of course, there was no precise definition of hate speech, leaving almost all comments opposed to the governments’ policies subject to censorship—exactly the result Berlin wanted.

The internet giants caved in, agreeing to delete any objected-to material within a day after a request to do so was delivered.

“The German government’s demand that social media giants Google, Facebook and Twitter remove what it calls anti-migrant ‘hate speech’ is having its first real test in the wake of the sickening sex attacks in Cologne over New Year’s Eve.”

Breitbart notes that The outlets agreed to apply domestic laws, rather than their own corporate policies, to reviews of posts, and already users in Germany are expressing disgust at the policy which came straight from German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s office.”

Organizations such as the Gatestone Institute, which reports extensively on immigration issues, may be particularly hard hit.

“With Gatestone’s commitment to educating readers about what the media do not want them to know, however unpleasant these events may sound to would-be censors, we are concerned that if we disagree with policies that Facebook believes politically correct, it may decide to censor Gatestone, or even ban it.

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“it just so happens to turn out that, lo and behold, this idea of “racist” speech appears to include anything critical of the EU’s current catastrophic immigration policy. … In lieu of violence, speech is one of the best ways for people to vent their feelings…Just last week, reports from the Netherlands told of Dutch citizens being visited by the police and warned about posting anti-mass-immigration sentiments on Twitter and other social media.”

In the U.S., there is a legal gray area when it comes to censorship by a private corporation, as opposed to a government agency.

The First Amendment Center notes that “The Bill of Rights provides protection for individual liberty from actions by government officials. This is called the state-action doctrine. Private property is not government-owned. Restrictions on individuals’ free-speech rights on private property do not involve state action.

“However, a few states have interpreted their own state constitutions to provide even greater free-speech protection than the federal Constitution offers. For example, the New Jersey Supreme Court has ruled that individuals have free-speech rights at privately owned shopping malls. Most state supreme courts that have examined the issue have disagreed. In April 2002, the Iowa Supreme Court refused to extend its definition of public property to include large, privately owned shopping malls.”

Internet sites such as Google, Facebook, and Twitter are private, and not necessarily bound by the First Amendment. But what if the censorship on those sites is the result of government action or pressure? That is a legal dispute that needs resolution. Outside of the United States, where there are, of course, no First Amendment protections, the ability of even relatively open regimes to take action is not as restrained as it is within America.

Within the U.S., key censorship pressure comes from pressure groups.  When applied to internet sites, this could result in a fracturing of sites, with progressive/left wing groups patronizing self-censored sites, and the rest of the nation clicking onto sites that may be formed to continue the tradition of free speech in cyberspace.

More overtly heavy-handed internet censorship comes from Russia, China, and some Moslem nations. North Korea is noted for almost total lack of internet access by the general population.

Organizations such as George Soros’ “Open Society Foundation” are at the forefront of pressuring governments to engage in censorship. It is their contention that free speech rights are subject to restrictions if they offend religious or ethnic groups.  Frequently, their interpretation of “offensive” is less than convincing.

With the scheduled handoff of internet control from the U.S. to an international body, in accordance with President Obama’s policy, the prospects for freedom of speech in cyberspace appear deeply troubled.

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Why Americans are Angry

Party leaders and pundits continue to wonder about the obvious anger on the part of the voters. They shouldn’t be so shocked.

The perception that the “Washington establishment” has failed the American people is accurate. The voters are taking out their justified anger at politicians whom they perceive to be representing more of the same.

The decline of the United States and the prospect that the millennials may be the first generation to inherit a diminished nation has, correctly, been laid at the foot of those currently in office.

Older Americans certainly have a right to be angry.  From Obamacare’s Independent Patient Advisory Board, which decides whether saving a senior’s life is cost effective, to the repeated lack of cost of living increases under Social Security, there has never been a time when the over 65 crowd has been less respected.

The middle class has taken it on the chin repeatedly.  Their net worth has declined, many of their jobs have moved overseas, and their 401k’s have not done well. They have become the “sandwich generation,” supporting their twenty-something kids who can’t find jobs and their older parents whose health care has been reduced and whose social security payments have not kept pace with inflation.  Extremist attempts to slash energy sources and raise prices in return for negligible gains in questionable environmental statistics present a clear threat to homeowners’ ability to heat and light their homes.

Blacks within inner cities have been treated worse than at any time since segregation ended.  Many of their youth can’t find starting-level employment because the positions have been taken by the vast numbers of illegals allowed into the nation. Race relations, which had been improving steadily and substantially for half a century, have been set back as a result of progressives false or exaggerated statements seeking to gin up the voting base and distract from the failures of their economic policies.

Youth, as a whole, have been ill-served. Upon reaching college, they have had their free speech rights abridged by leftist administrators and professors. They have been charged unjustifiably, outrageously high tuition rates, and upon graduation have had few job opportunities.

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Seven years ago, America was the “indispensable nation,” sometimes feared, sometimes respected, sometimes hated, but always the most important factor in any international matter of any consequence. Seven years of cuts to the military, demanded by President Obama and bartered away by establishment Republicans, ended that. Combined with diplomatic moves so inept that “amateurish” doesn’t begin to convey the foolishness of it, The U.S. is seen as a has-been on the world stage, incapable of defending its interests or those of its allies.

Examples are rampant. The premature withdrawal from Iraq—whatever one thought of the war there in the first place—created the vacuum that allowed ISIS to prosper. The “Reset” with Russia allowed Moscow to replace Washington as the major power in Europe. The failure to even diplomatically confront China’s aggression in the Philippines and elsewhere encouraged Beijing’s hardliners to adopt intimidation as a matter of course. The refusal to forcefully confront Islamic extremists—or even utter those words—after the murder of an American ambassador, the slayings in San Bernardino, the bombing of the Boston Marathon, and so much more, have portrayed the United States as rudderless, weak, and cowardly. The failure to confront the growing presence of Russian, Chinese, and terrorist military elements in our own hemisphere is negligence writ large.

Utterly counterproductive moves, including encouraging the attempted toppling of pro-Western regimes in the Middle East, and opening up discussions with the Taliban in Afghanistan, have left the American public openly wondering whether the White House is even paying attention.

Many Americans are furious that federal agencies have been misused for partisan political purposes. The Internal Revenue Service, the Federal Election Commission, and the Department of Justice are among the examples.

While all these very real crises go unaddressed, false or exaggerated problems get the spotlight.  While isolated examples of law enforcement abuse may occur, there is no war on minorities by police forces. There is no wave of discrimination against Muslims (indeed, FBI statistics indicate that Jews are far more prone to be the target of hate crimes.) Wall Street is not seeking to rob the middle class. Asking unions to not force people to join, and demanding that union leaders be accountable for pension plans they administer, is not an attack on collective bargaining. There are no substantive reports of government agencies harassing LGBT individuals.

Listening to leftist politicians, pundits, and academicians, many Americans wonder whether any of the individuals employed in those rarified fields inhabit the same reality as the rest of the country. It’s no wonder the voters are angry.

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Obama’s Unilateral Immigration Policy

Has the Obama Administration decided to unilaterally, without the involvement of Congress, change the immigration law of the United States? Department of Homeland Security Secretary Jeh Johnson states:

“In January 2016, overall apprehensions on our southwest border – an indicator of total attempts to cross the border illegally — declined 36 percent from the previous month, and were at the lowest levels since January 2015. Also, in January 2016, apprehensions of unaccompanied children declined by 54 percent compared to the month before, and apprehensions of those in families declined by 65 percent in the same period.

“On the one hand, the new enforcement policy announced by the President and me on November 20, 2014 makes clear that our limited resources for immigration enforcement will not be dedicated to the removal of those who have committed no serious crimes, have been in this country for years, and have families here. Under our new policy, these people are not priorities for removal… when enforcing the immigration laws, our personnel will not, except in emergency circumstances, apprehend an individual at a place of worship, a school, a hospital or doctor’s office or other sensitive location…Secretary Kerry announced on January 13 that we are expanding our Refugee Admissions Program to help vulnerable men, women and children in Central America. The U.S. government is partnering with the UN High Commissioner for Refugees and non-governmental organizations in the region to implement this as soon as possible. This approach builds on our recently established Central American Minors program, which is now providing an in-country refugee processing option for certain children with parents in the United States, as well as the existing asylum process.”

While Secretary Johnson claims that his agency is concentrating on criminal illegal aliens, studies by Paul Bedard, writing in the Washington Examiner  indicate otherwise. “Criminal prosecution of immigration offenses over the past five years is down 36 percent, and the once-successful program of detaining illegal immigrants in state and local jails is in free fall, down by two-thirds, according reports from two federal agencies. Justice Department statistics show that criminal prosecutions for crimes such as unlawful re-entry by an illegal in November totalled 4,861, down 13.2 percent over the previous month. Over the past year, that number is down 22.3 percent. According to the Center for Immigration Studies, which analyzed the data, that is a five year decline of criminal prosecutions of 36 percent.”

In an article written for Roll Call Sen. Jeff Sessions and Rep. Dave Brat warned that “America is about to break every known immigration record…The Census Bureau projects that the foreign-born share of the U.S. population will soon eclipse the highest levels ever documented, and will continue surging to new record highs each year to come. In Washington, immigration reform has devolved into a euphemism for legislation that opens America’s borders, floods her labor markets and gives corporations the legal right to import new foreign workers to replace their existing employees at lower pay…This is not immigration reform. This is the dissolution of the nation state, of the principle that a government exists to serve its own people.”
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In a report entitled “Immigration Handbook for the New Republican Majority”   outlining how Congress should respond to White House actions, Senator Sessions has accused the Obama Administration of acting unilaterally and in defiance of the Constitution.

“President Obama has declared null and void the sovereign immigration laws of the United States in order to implement immigration measures the Congress has repeatedly and explicitly rejected. His order grants five million illegal immigrants work permits, Social Security, Medicare, and free tax credits—taking jobs and benefits directly from struggling American workers. U.S. citizens have been stripped of their protections they are entitled to under law…

“President Obama’s former ICE Director, John Sandweg, famously conceded: “if you’re a run-of-the-mill immigrant here illegally, your odds of getting deported are close to zero.” Since entering office, President Obama has engaged in a sustained campaign to collapse immigration enforcement. My office has compiled a detailed timeline of his actions, including many dangerous directives not widely known to the public—a copy of which can be provided upon request…

“Consider the illegal immigration surge from Central America. Approximately 99 percent of those who arrived in that surge—whether minors or adults in family units—are still in the United States, according to DHS data. 16 Instead of removing illegal immigrants, the President has expended enormous time, energy, and resources into resettling newly arrived illegal immigrants throughout the United States. Any border security plan that leaves this resettlement operation intact is doomed to failure. Jessica Vaughan at the Center for Immigration Studies estimates that more than 100,000 illegal immigrants who showed up at the border [in 2014] have been freed into the United States.”

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Obama Repeats Past Mistakes in Afghanistan

Deeply disturbing news comes from a recent Congressional hearing on Afghanistan.

Unlike the contentious political skirmishes that surrounded the Iraq war and U.S. involvement in Libya, America’s military action against the Taliban, which has now become the nation’s longest fight, were widely supported. Clearly, that organization’s involvement in the destruction of the World Trade Center and the Pentagon made the necessity for a response beyond question.

However, in a repeat of questionable political dictates from the Vietnam era, U.S. and allied forces did not engage in full scale warfare designed to bring about absolute victory.  The enemy was allowed to take haven across national borders, and rules of engagement designed more for public opinion and legal scholars took precedence over actually defeating the foe.

In accordance with President Obama’s drive to end U.S. combat operations and withdraw most troops, similar to his policy in Iraq which allowed ISIS to become a major regional power, Americans are handing off combat duties to Afghan forces.  Unfortunately, they do not seem ready or capable of handling the responsibility.

Rep. Vicky Hartzler (R-Mo.) Chair of the House Armed Service Submcommittee on Oversight and investigations, stated “In reading the recent Congressional reports submitted by our witnesses, and listening to testimony from General Campbell, the subcommittee understands that the Afghan security forces are still in their nascent stages of becoming a professionalized, self-sustaining, and capable institution.  But, there are still various shortfalls and insufficient capabilities in important functions hindering these goals.

“The Afghan forces do not have enough airplanes or helicopters, especially those capable of providing close-air support.  While there clearly has been improvement, the ability to collect and disseminate ample intelligence is lacking, as is the ability to maintain and account for equipment.  Even the ‘bread and butter’ administrative issues, such as pay, leave, and medical services for Afghan forces need attention…these challenges are compounded by the fact that 70 percent of the problems facing Afghan Security forces result from poor senior leadership within the Afghan Ministries of Defense and the Interior.
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“The Taliban are emboldened, the Haqqani Network continues to sponsor terrorist attacks, and there is a growing Islamic State presence in Afghanistan…

“I am concerned that the president’s current budget request for aiding the Afghan forces is $200 million less than last year’s amount, and the Administration plans to withdrawal U.S. forces down to 5,500 beginning as soon as April of this year.  We must not prematurely reduce our commitment to the people of Afghanistan.  All one needs to do is look at the result of premature withdrawal in Iraq to determine what will happen if we repeat near history and prematurely leave Afghanistan.”

As noted in a Stratfor review,  “…the Taliban’s 15-year insurgency is escalating. The militant group now controls more territory than at any time since the United States launched Operation Enduring Freedom in October 2001. Worse still, the Taliban’s resolve to continue waging war remains undiminished…Army Gen. John Campbell, the outgoing commander of U.S. forces in Afghanistan, commented that Afghanistan has reached an inflection point, warning that 2016 could be even worse than 2015 if the United States fails to prosecute a consistent and effective strategy. Campbell also urged Congress to extend its annual $4.1 billion aid package to Afghanistan until at least 2020.”

Quoting Taliban sources, Longwar Journal notes that the organization as saying  embraced this death and destruction for the sake of some silly ministerial posts or a share of the power.  ‘This objective’ mentioned in the above quote is the re-establishment of the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan, the Taliban’s official name of its government. The Taliban has insisted from the very beginning that it will settle for nothing less than regaining full power.”

Over objections based both on practical and moral grounds, the Obama Administration opened discussions with the Taliban in 2011.  Since then, Taliban forces have become more brazen and effective.

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Obamacare impact on seniors

At several campaign events, Democrat candidates have disapprovingly noted that the U.S. lags behind European and other nations in not having full government health care.

A closer examination reveals that may be a good thing. It has become a fairly common pattern for foreign leaders seeking the most advanced care to travel—sometimes secretly—to America for treatment. Forbes reports that “An estimated 40% of all medical travelers are looking for the world’s most advanced technologies…Commonly seeking cutting-edge cardiovascular, neurological or oncology treatments, the bulk of medical travelers head to U.S. medical facilities … there’s the United States’ reputation when it comes to health care…”

A study from the Batelle Technology Partnership Practice  notes that the U.S. is the world’s leader in medical innovation, although increasing taxes and regulations may affect that going forward. There are viable and very relevant questions as to whether the adoption of European style medical care would change that.

One group of Americans has a particular vulnerability to the flaws in government-administered health care: senior citizens. The United Kingdom’s National Health Service (NHS), often set up as an example for those advocating government-administered health care in the U.S., has been frequently criticized for its failure to meet the needs of older patients.

The BBC has disclosed that English and Welsh health experts are concerned that older people in need of urgent help are being failed by the NHS, and the NHS’s own studies concur.  “Too many over-65s end up in accident and emergency unnecessarily” according to the NHS Confederation’s Commission on Improving Urgent Care for Older People. The group said this was because of a “lack of help when they fell ill…The commission’s report said older people were “poorly served.”

America’s most significant step towards greater federal involvement in health care has presented significant challenges to quality health care for seniors.

In 2014, John Goodman, writing for Forbes, stressed that “One of the best kept secrets of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) is that it imposes a global budget on Medicare spending – for the first time in the program’s history. Heretofore, Medicare was a pure entitlement program. The government had to pay for whatever care the elderly and the disabled obtained. But going forward, the health reform law imposes a cap on spending.

“For most of its history, per capita Medicare spending in real terms grew at about twice the rate of growth of real per capita GDP – just like the rest of the health care system. But going forward, the law requires Medicare to grow at a rate that is not much more than the growth of GDP – regardless of what happens to other health care spending. If the historical trend continues, that means spending on health care for the elderly and the disabled will grow about half as fast as spending on everyone else’s care.”

A New York Post review of Obamacare’s effect on healthcare for seniors: “It’s skimping on it, socking seniors with unexpected bills for “observation care” and likely shortening their lives…”

Senior Living.com   notes: “The cuts to Medicare—about $700 billion between 2013 and 2022—are actually decreases in the spending rate for this program. According to the Congressional Budget Office, the cuts will be felt in hospital services, Medicare Advantage plans, skilled nursing services, home health services and others. “

Dan Weber, writing for the Washington Times, describes another attack on senior care under Obamacare:

“Medicare’s home health care services, formerly serving 3.5 million elderly beneficiaries across the country, were cut under Obamacare. The cut deleted exactly 14 percent, or an estimated $22 billion, from these lowest-income Americans over four years. …This cut does irreparable damage to recipients of Medicare’s home health care services, those who are aged, homebound and sicker than the average Medicare population. Indeed, nearly two-thirds of Medicare home health care users live at or below the federal poverty level, meaning they are the most economically compromised of America’s precious senior citizens.”

The Galen Organization summarizes the impact on Medicare:

“ObamaCare doesn’t modernize the program or improve it for seniors. ObamaCare’s solutions are detrimental to today’s seniors:

  • The law takes $716 billion out of Medicare over 10 years to help fund a huge expansion of taxpayer subsidies for health coverage.
  • It creates an unelected, unaccountable board — the Independent Payment Advisory Board — with powers to limit payment and access to health care for seniors and which will become Medicare’s rationing board. ObamaCare drives your doctors and hospitals out of Medicare
  • The law makes deep cuts in payments to physicians treating Medicare patients.
  • Cuts to Medicare providers mean it will be harder for seniors to find doctors and hospitals to treat them.
  • Doctors are already threatening to drop out of the program in large numbers if the payment cuts go into effect.
  • Medicare actuaries predict that more than 40% of Medicare providers eventually will either go out of business or stop seeing Medicare patients altogether if the law’s cuts take effect.”

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Scalia’s Loss Endangers Rights

The loss posed by the death of Supreme Court Associate Justice Antonin Scalia can only be understood by examining the vital role he played in defending the Constitution.

Scalia was a preeminent advocate of the concept of originalism, the defense of the fixed meaning of America’s guiding document. He once said that ““What is a moderate interpretation of the text? Halfway between what it really means and what you’d like it to mean.”

His views are vital at a time when judicial activism, the replacing of the normal legislative process with changing law through court decisions, has been so commonplace. The concept of “living constitutionalism,” the idea that trades relying on what the document actually says with an interpretation based on the views (and goals) of an individual judge, endangers the entire governing scheme of the nation, and the underlying guaranteed rights provided by it.

According to the Heritage Foundation  Scalia believed that “…that those who make, interpret, and enforce the law ought to be guided by the meaning of the United States Constitution–the supreme law of the land–as it was originally written. This view came to be seriously eroded over the course of the last century with the rise of the theory of the Constitution as a ‘living document’ with no fixed meaning, subject to changing interpretations according to the spirit of the times.”

Originalism stands as a bulwark preventing the watering down of the Constitution. While many instances of loose interpretation are performed by judges who believe they are acting on the best of intentions, the end result jeopardizes key freedoms in return for temporary expediency, in pursuit of goals that could be better achieved through means more compliant with the explicit wording of the central law.

In the book, “Terms of Engagement: how our courts should enforce the Constitution’s promise of limited government,” Clark Neilly III, senior attorney for the Institute of Justice, writes:

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Some of the most sacrosanct rights provided by the Bill of Rights could be lost by judicial activism which ignores the actual wording contained within it.  One example: The role of money in politics is certainly controversial. But the responses to it, which generally involve measures which limit or ignore the First Amendment, are attempted “cures” far worse than the “disease.”

President Obama’s impatience with the separation of powers and the Constitution’s governing scheme is well known.  He has unblushingly proclaimed that “I can’t wait for Congress,” and “I have a pen and a phone and I know how to use them.”  Despite the obvious threats this poses to the Constitutional order, those who favor the specific programs or goals he advocates ignore the larger issue of insuring the rule of law over the rule of a powerful ruler, and they have not protested. They apparently disregard the potential that a future President of a different political persuasion could run roughshod over their rights if that practice is permitted.

In his study, “On the Brink,” John Lott, writing at the start of the Obama Administration, predicted: “Obama’s most powerful weapon in transforming America will be the federal judges he appoints who share his radical philosophy…”

The lack of defense of a literal reading of the Bill of Rights in addressing populist issues is significant. Legislation was introduced in the Senate to limit the First Amendment, to address the role of money in politics. Numerous local governments continue to ignore the Second Amendment. Fourth Amendment privacy rights are arguably compromised in attempts to fight terrorism. The growing size of Washington’s regulatory agencies runs roughshod over the entire concept of the Ninth and Tenth Amendments, which provide that those powers not given to the federal government belong to the people and the states.

That’s one half of the entire Bill of Rights.  Justice Scalia’s voice will be sorely missed.