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Hillary's expanding voter base.
Hillary's expanding voter base.
Hillary's selfie.
Hillary's selfie.
Does Black Success Matter?
By Dr. Thomas Sowell
August 16, 2016
We keep hearing that "black lives matter," but they seem to matter only when that helps politicians to get votes, or when that slogan helps demagogues demonize the police. The other 99 percent of black lives destroyed by people who are not police do not seem to attract nearly as much attention in the media.
What about black success? Does that matter? Apparently not so much.
We have heard a lot about black students failing to meet academic standards. So you might think that it would be front-page news when some whole ghetto schools not only meet, but exceed, the academic standards of schools in more upscale communities.
There are in fact whole chains of charter schools where black and Hispanic youngsters score well above the national average on tests. There are the KIPP (Knowledge IS Power Program) schools and the Success Academy schools, for example.
Only 39 percent of all students in New York state schools who were tested recently scored at the "proficient" level in math, but 100 percent of the students at the Crown Heights Success Academy school scored at that level in math. Blacks and Hispanics are 90 percent of the students in the Crown Heights Success Academy.
The Success Academy schools in general ranked in the top 2 percent in English and in the top 1 percent in math. Hispanic students in these schools reached the "proficient" level in math nearly twice as often as Hispanic students in the regular public schools. Black students in these Success Academy schools reached the "proficient" level more than twice as often as black students in the regular public schools.
What makes this all the more amazing is that these charter schools are typically located in the same ghettos or barrios where other blacks or Hispanics are failing miserably on the same tests. More than that, successful charter schools are often physically housed in the very same buildings as the unsuccessful public schools.
In other words, minority kids from the same neighborhood, going to school in classes across the hall from each other, or on different floors, are scoring far above average and far below average on the same tests.
If black success was considered half as newsworthy as black failures, such facts would be headline news — and people who have the real interests of black and other minority students at heart would be asking, "Wow! How can we get more kids into these charter schools?"
Many minority parents have already taken notice. More than 43,000 families are on waiting lists to get their children into charter schools. But admission is by lottery, and far more have to be turned away than can be admitted.
Why? Because the teachers' unions are opposed to charter schools — and they give big bucks to politicians, who in turn put obstacles and restrictions on the expansion of charter schools. These include politicians like New York's "progressive" mayor Bill de Blasio, who poses as a friend of blacks by denigrating the police, standing alongside Al Sharpton.
The net result is that 90 percent of New York City's students are taught in the regular public schools that have nothing like the success of charter schools run by KIPP and Success Academy.
That makes sense only politically, because it gains the money and the votes of the teachers' unions, for whom schools exist to provide jobs for their members, rather than to provide education for children.
If you want to understand this crazy and unconscionable situation, just follow the money and follow the votes.
Black success is a threat to political empires and to a whole social vision behind those empires. That social vision has politicians like Bill de Blasio and Hillary Clinton cast in the role of rescuers and protectors of blacks from enemies threatening on all sides. If politicians can promote paranoia, that means bigger voter turnout, which is what really matters to them.
That same social vision allows the intelligentsia, whether in the media or in academia, to be on the side of the angels against the forces of evil. That's heady stuff. And a bunch of kids taking tests doesn't look nearly as exciting on TV as a mob marching through the streets, chanting that they want "dead cops." Black success has very little to offer politicians or the intelligentsia. But black children's lives and futures ought to matter — and would, if politicians and the intelligentsia were for real.
Thomas Sowell is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305. His website is www.tsowell.com. To find out more about Thomas Sowell and read features by other Creators Syndicate columnists and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate webpage at www.creators.com.
https://www.creators.com/read/thomas-sowell/08/16/does-black-success-matter
Does Black Success Matter?
By Dr. Thomas Sowell
August 16, 2016
We keep hearing that "black lives matter," but they seem to matter only when that helps politicians to get votes, or when that slogan helps demagogues demonize the police. The other 99 percent of black lives destroyed by people who are not police do not seem to attract nearly as much attention in the media.
What about black success? Does that matter? Apparently not so much.
We have heard a lot about black students failing to meet academic standards. So you might think that it would be front-page news when some whole ghetto schools not only meet, but exceed, the academic standards of schools in more upscale communities.
There are in fact whole chains of charter schools where black and Hispanic youngsters score well above the national average on tests. There are the KIPP (Knowledge IS Power Program) schools and the Success Academy schools, for example.
Only 39 percent of all students in New York state schools who were tested recently scored at the "proficient" level in math, but 100 percent of the students at the Crown Heights Success Academy school scored at that level in math. Blacks and Hispanics are 90 percent of the students in the Crown Heights Success Academy.
The Success Academy schools in general ranked in the top 2 percent in English and in the top 1 percent in math. Hispanic students in these schools reached the "proficient" level in math nearly twice as often as Hispanic students in the regular public schools. Black students in these Success Academy schools reached the "proficient" level more than twice as often as black students in the regular public schools.
What makes this all the more amazing is that these charter schools are typically located in the same ghettos or barrios where other blacks or Hispanics are failing miserably on the same tests. More than that, successful charter schools are often physically housed in the very same buildings as the unsuccessful public schools.
In other words, minority kids from the same neighborhood, going to school in classes across the hall from each other, or on different floors, are scoring far above average and far below average on the same tests.
If black success was considered half as newsworthy as black failures, such facts would be headline news — and people who have the real interests of black and other minority students at heart would be asking, "Wow! How can we get more kids into these charter schools?"
Many minority parents have already taken notice. More than 43,000 families are on waiting lists to get their children into charter schools. But admission is by lottery, and far more have to be turned away than can be admitted.
Why? Because the teachers' unions are opposed to charter schools — and they give big bucks to politicians, who in turn put obstacles and restrictions on the expansion of charter schools. These include politicians like New York's "progressive" mayor Bill de Blasio, who poses as a friend of blacks by denigrating the police, standing alongside Al Sharpton.
The net result is that 90 percent of New York City's students are taught in the regular public schools that have nothing like the success of charter schools run by KIPP and Success Academy.
That makes sense only politically, because it gains the money and the votes of the teachers' unions, for whom schools exist to provide jobs for their members, rather than to provide education for children.
If you want to understand this crazy and unconscionable situation, just follow the money and follow the votes.
Black success is a threat to political empires and to a whole social vision behind those empires. That social vision has politicians like Bill de Blasio and Hillary Clinton cast in the role of rescuers and protectors of blacks from enemies threatening on all sides. If politicians can promote paranoia, that means bigger voter turnout, which is what really matters to them.
That same social vision allows the intelligentsia, whether in the media or in academia, to be on the side of the angels against the forces of evil. That's heady stuff. And a bunch of kids taking tests doesn't look nearly as exciting on TV as a mob marching through the streets, chanting that they want "dead cops." Black success has very little to offer politicians or the intelligentsia. But black children's lives and futures ought to matter — and would, if politicians and the intelligentsia were for real.
Thomas Sowell is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University, Stanford, CA 94305. His website is www.tsowell.com. To find out more about Thomas Sowell and read features by other Creators Syndicate columnists and cartoonists, visit the Creators Syndicate webpage at www.creators.com.
https://www.creators.com/read/thomas-sowell/08/16/does-black-success-matter
Obama Meets His Goal
By Gary Bauer
Aug. 12, 2016
Here’s one goal the president appears likely to meet: 10,000 Syrian refugees will enter the United States this fiscal year. The Associated Press reported last week that more than 2,300 refugees were admitted last month, and the current total of Syrian refuges stands at just under 8,000. The Obama White House has August and September to make up the difference.
With that in mind, Senator Jeff Sessions (R-AL) noted Wednesday that 20 “fully vetted” refugees have been implicated in terrorism in recent years.
Senator Sessions has previously warned that since the September 11, 2001, attacks, 580 individuals have been convicted on terrorism related charges in the United States, and the vast majority of them — 380 — have been foreign born.
Meanwhile, German intelligence is publicly warning today about ISIS “hit squads and sleeper cells” inside that country. “We have substantial reports that among the refugees there are hit squads. There are hundreds of these reports, some from refugees themselves,” one official said.
But, hey, Obama met his refugee goal!
Feel safer?
https://patriotpost.us/posts/44276
Obama Meets His Goal
By Gary Bauer
Aug. 12, 2016
Here’s one goal the president appears likely to meet: 10,000 Syrian refugees will enter the United States this fiscal year. The Associated Press reported last week that more than 2,300 refugees were admitted last month, and the current total of Syrian refuges stands at just under 8,000. The Obama White House has August and September to make up the difference.
With that in mind, Senator Jeff Sessions (R-AL) noted Wednesday that 20 “fully vetted” refugees have been implicated in terrorism in recent years.
Senator Sessions has previously warned that since the September 11, 2001, attacks, 580 individuals have been convicted on terrorism related charges in the United States, and the vast majority of them — 380 — have been foreign born.
Meanwhile, German intelligence is publicly warning today about ISIS “hit squads and sleeper cells” inside that country. “We have substantial reports that among the refugees there are hit squads. There are hundreds of these reports, some from refugees themselves,” one official said.
But, hey, Obama met his refugee goal!
Feel safer?
https://patriotpost.us/posts/44276
Monday Short Cuts
By Patriot Post Staff
Aug. 15, 2016
The Gipper: “We are for aiding our allies by sharing our material blessings with nations which share our fundamental beliefs, but we are against doling out money government to government, creating bureaucracy, if not socialism, all over the world.”
For the record: “[Donald] Trump is right that most of the media want him to lose, but then that was also true of George W. Bush, George H.W. Bush and Ronald Reagan. It’s true of every Republican presidential nominee. The difference is that Mr. Trump has made it so easy for the media and his opponents.” —The Wall Street Journal
Non Compos Mentis: “I think … Hillary Clinton is the best for the country. I’m not thinking about it as a Republican. I’m thinking about it as a U.S. citizen. … I think she’d make a darn good president.” —Carlos Gutierrez, former commerce secretary for George W. Bush
Finger wagging jackass: “[T]he FBI director said … he had to amend his previous day’s statement that [Hillary] had never received any emails marked classified. They saw two little notes with a ‘C’ on it — this is the biggest load of bull I’ve ever heard — that were about telephone calls that she needed to make. … Does that sound threatening to the national security to you?” —Bill Clinton
Nothing to see here! “[Clinton’s email scandal has] been investigated, no action has been taken by the Justice Department. They found no basis for any kind of action. I really do think it’s time for the candidates and for the American people to move on and talk about the real issues.” —former Defense Secretary Leon Panetta
Braying Jenny: “Assad, by what he did in his country, allowed ISIS to move into … Syria and get strongholds and recruit. That was the work and support of [Vladimir] Putin, who is Trump’s best buddy. So you can say Trump and his friend Putin are the founder of ISIS, which probably would be more accurate than calling out the commander in chief1 in that way.” —Sen. Claire McCaskill
And last… “Regarding the overnight rioting in Milwaukee, some good news: President Obama is on vacation and won’t be issuing inflammatory comments.” —@weknowwhatsbest
https://patriotpost.us/posts/44288
Monday Short Cuts
By Patriot Post Staff
Aug. 15, 2016
The Gipper: “We are for aiding our allies by sharing our material blessings with nations which share our fundamental beliefs, but we are against doling out money government to government, creating bureaucracy, if not socialism, all over the world.”
For the record: “[Donald] Trump is right that most of the media want him to lose, but then that was also true of George W. Bush, George H.W. Bush and Ronald Reagan. It’s true of every Republican presidential nominee. The difference is that Mr. Trump has made it so easy for the media and his opponents.” —The Wall Street Journal
Non Compos Mentis: “I think … Hillary Clinton is the best for the country. I’m not thinking about it as a Republican. I’m thinking about it as a U.S. citizen. … I think she’d make a darn good president.” —Carlos Gutierrez, former commerce secretary for George W. Bush
Finger wagging jackass: “[T]he FBI director said … he had to amend his previous day’s statement that [Hillary] had never received any emails marked classified. They saw two little notes with a ‘C’ on it — this is the biggest load of bull I’ve ever heard — that were about telephone calls that she needed to make. … Does that sound threatening to the national security to you?” —Bill Clinton
Nothing to see here! “[Clinton’s email scandal has] been investigated, no action has been taken by the Justice Department. They found no basis for any kind of action. I really do think it’s time for the candidates and for the American people to move on and talk about the real issues.” —former Defense Secretary Leon Panetta
Braying Jenny: “Assad, by what he did in his country, allowed ISIS to move into … Syria and get strongholds and recruit. That was the work and support of [Vladimir] Putin, who is Trump’s best buddy. So you can say Trump and his friend Putin are the founder of ISIS, which probably would be more accurate than calling out the commander in chief1 in that way.” —Sen. Claire McCaskill
And last… “Regarding the overnight rioting in Milwaukee, some good news: President Obama is on vacation and won’t be issuing inflammatory comments.” —@weknowwhatsbest
https://patriotpost.us/posts/44288
Top DOJ Official Denounced Ransom Payment to Iran
By National Security Desk
Aug. 15, 2016
If the criticism over the $400 million Barack Obama gave to Iran1 is a bunch of malarkey, as his administration attests, then why did the head of the national security division at the Justice Department wave red flags over the idea?
The startling revelation comes courtesy of a new Wall Street Journal report2. According to WSJ, “John Carlin, a Senate-confirmed administration appointee, raised concerns when the State Department notified Justice officials of its plan to deliver to Iran a planeful of cash, saying it would be viewed as a ransom payment, these people said.” Carlin is not just anybody — he’s a TOP Justice official.
As the Journal goes on to explain, “The objection of senior Justice Department officials was that Iranian officials were likely to view the $400 million payment as ransom, thereby undercutting a longstanding U.S. policy that the government doesn’t pay ransom for American hostages… The policy is based on a concern that paying ransom could encourage more Americans to become targets for hostage-takers.” They were right.
Aside from the terrible optics and violation of criminal law this situation created, the DOJ’s concerns also fail to corroborate Obama’s narrative: “A Justice Department spokesman has said the agency ‘fully supported the ultimate outcome of the administration’s resolution of several issues with Iran,’ including the settlement of the long-running arms case, ‘as well as the return of U.S. citizens detained in Iran.’”
Meanwhile, the Obama administration has given Iran its blessing3 in building two additional nuclear plants. But what’s more likely: That Iran won’t use these plants predominately for nuclear proliferation in the form of a radioactive bomb, or that Obama’s $400 million cash payment wasn’t considered a ransom payment? Either way, America loses.
https://patriotpost.us/posts/44286
Top DOJ Official Denounced Ransom Payment to Iran
By National Security Desk
Aug. 15, 2016
If the criticism over the $400 million Barack Obama gave to Iran1 is a bunch of malarkey, as his administration attests, then why did the head of the national security division at the Justice Department wave red flags over the idea?
The startling revelation comes courtesy of a new Wall Street Journal report2. According to WSJ, “John Carlin, a Senate-confirmed administration appointee, raised concerns when the State Department notified Justice officials of its plan to deliver to Iran a planeful of cash, saying it would be viewed as a ransom payment, these people said.” Carlin is not just anybody — he’s a TOP Justice official.
As the Journal goes on to explain, “The objection of senior Justice Department officials was that Iranian officials were likely to view the $400 million payment as ransom, thereby undercutting a longstanding U.S. policy that the government doesn’t pay ransom for American hostages… The policy is based on a concern that paying ransom could encourage more Americans to become targets for hostage-takers.” They were right.
Aside from the terrible optics and violation of criminal law this situation created, the DOJ’s concerns also fail to corroborate Obama’s narrative: “A Justice Department spokesman has said the agency ‘fully supported the ultimate outcome of the administration’s resolution of several issues with Iran,’ including the settlement of the long-running arms case, ‘as well as the return of U.S. citizens detained in Iran.’”
Meanwhile, the Obama administration has given Iran its blessing3 in building two additional nuclear plants. But what’s more likely: That Iran won’t use these plants predominately for nuclear proliferation in the form of a radioactive bomb, or that Obama’s $400 million cash payment wasn’t considered a ransom payment? Either way, America loses.
https://patriotpost.us/posts/44286
Hillary's Generous Donation to Herself
By Thomas Gallatin
Aug. 15, 2016
In a typical Friday afternoon news dump, Hillary Clinton released her 2015 tax return. As for income, Hillary herself hauled in $1,475,000 in speaking fees, while Bill netted $5,250,000. There was much fanfare in the Leftmedia over the fact that she gave over $1 million of her income to charity. But what about the details of that charitable giving? As usual with the Leftmedia, those details simply don’t matter when it comes to Clinton — it’s that fact that she gave so much to “charity” that counts. What charity? Well, virtually all of it went to the Clinton Foundation. Yes, Clinton donated to her own foundation, a foundation that exists solely for the purpose of propping up the Clinton political brand. In other words, Clinton has been paying Bill’s salary and buying political capital through her foundation.
Couple her “charitable” giving with the recent emails released from Judicial Watch, which strongly indicate that Hillary moonlighted for her foundation1 while she was secretary of state, and the picture becomes clearer of a woman who has for years been actively organizing and manipulating the system for her own political aims.
Not only have the Clintons donated to their own foundation, but companies that already paid lucrative speaking fees to the Clintons also donated to the foundation. Douglas Becker is CEO of Laureate Education, a for-profit university, which is a major donor to the Clinton Foundation. This past year Laureate paid Bill over $1 million in speaking fees, and that’s just the latest in an annual haul2 for Bill from Laureate. This same Douglas Becker also heads a non-profit called the International Youth Foundation, which received millions from USAID in 2010. USAID is a wing of the State Department. And Americans are expected to believe that Hillary Clinton had no connection to the Clinton Foundation while she served as secretary of state. Yeah, right.
https://patriotpost.us/posts/44285
Hillary's Generous Donation to Herself
By Thomas Gallatin
Aug. 15, 2016
In a typical Friday afternoon news dump, Hillary Clinton released her 2015 tax return. As for income, Hillary herself hauled in $1,475,000 in speaking fees, while Bill netted $5,250,000. There was much fanfare in the Leftmedia over the fact that she gave over $1 million of her income to charity. But what about the details of that charitable giving? As usual with the Leftmedia, those details simply don’t matter when it comes to Clinton — it’s that fact that she gave so much to “charity” that counts. What charity? Well, virtually all of it went to the Clinton Foundation. Yes, Clinton donated to her own foundation, a foundation that exists solely for the purpose of propping up the Clinton political brand. In other words, Clinton has been paying Bill’s salary and buying political capital through her foundation.
Couple her “charitable” giving with the recent emails released from Judicial Watch, which strongly indicate that Hillary moonlighted for her foundation1 while she was secretary of state, and the picture becomes clearer of a woman who has for years been actively organizing and manipulating the system for her own political aims.
Not only have the Clintons donated to their own foundation, but companies that already paid lucrative speaking fees to the Clintons also donated to the foundation. Douglas Becker is CEO of Laureate Education, a for-profit university, which is a major donor to the Clinton Foundation. This past year Laureate paid Bill over $1 million in speaking fees, and that’s just the latest in an annual haul2 for Bill from Laureate. This same Douglas Becker also heads a non-profit called the International Youth Foundation, which received millions from USAID in 2010. USAID is a wing of the State Department. And Americans are expected to believe that Hillary Clinton had no connection to the Clinton Foundation while she served as secretary of state. Yeah, right.
https://patriotpost.us/posts/44285
The Immigrant's Dilemma
by Victor Davis Hanson
Thursday, August 11, 2016
Nearly a half-century ago, Bob Dylan wrote a mixed ode to the immigrant, in a way that no doubt might earn him charges of racism, nativism, and xenophobia in today’s politically-correct age. Yet Dylan was trying to express the paradoxes of leaving one’s homeland for an entirely new political and cultural landscape that often overwhelms the newcomer. “I pity the poor immigrant,” he sang, “Who wishes he would’ve stayed home.”
Never has the immigrant to the West been more confused. In the twenty-first century, immigration almost always moves in a single direction—poor and desperate non-Western people abandon their homes in Latin America, Africa, and Asia seemingly to join quite different cultures in Europe and the United States. The West has neither the population growth nor the poverty any more to send huddled masses to the new lands. And yet, today, these immigrants arrive in Western countries that are strange fantasylands compared to what they were expecting. The newcomer is rarely reminded of why he left home, or why, after doing so, he chose the West, and not Russia, China, Bolivia, or the Sudan for his destination.
Western governments and the larger culture could easily instruct the immigrant that the Western tradition is far more likely to embrace constitutional government, personal freedom, free-market economics, the importance of private property, religious tolerance, free expression, due process, an independent judiciary, and a larger culture of self-criticism and introspection. But to do so would put the lie to multiculturalism and the belief in different but equal cultures.
These precise Western values allow the immigrant to enjoy a security, affluence, and freedom unknown in his abandoned homeland. Yet, we, the host, prefer not to “judge” those other places, and thus do not fully embrace the immigrant’s ostensible wish to become one of us. We dare not ethnocentrically elevate our culture over others. Instead, we rebrand the human sins of slavery, sexism, and racism as uniquely Western depravities rather than age-old pathologies that predated the West and still exist unchecked outside it. The immigrant immediately senses that his troubled Western host is not so much privileged as unsure and unhappy—and ripe for psychological exploitation. Hyphenation and tribalism, not the melting pot, are often seen as the natural, expected and more “authentic” path for the recently arrived.
Note that most immigrants do not arrive with natural empathy for the West. Most forsake countries that are hostile to the West. International surveys reveal that the United States, for example, is not popular in China, Latin America, or the Middle East—the current popular launching pads to America. In such places, popular opinion is shaped by the relentless propaganda of autocratic governments, which deride Western decadence, colonialism, imperialism, and racism. Latin American poverty, for example, is often explained as a result of el Norte exploitation rather than flawed political institutions.
The new arrival to Western lands is soon patronized as an icon of “difference.” The immigrant is not usually asked to learn the language of his new homeland, much less to quickly assimilate and integrate into Western culture. Instead, the Western multiculturalist host allows the newcomer to pick and choose from a buffet of culture and language: to set up a Sharia court in London, to practice female circumcision in France, to conduct business in Spanish at the DMV office in Bakersfield, or simply to ignore seeking legal status. He also finds an existing rich menu of grievances lodged against a stereotyped dominant white, male, heterosexual Christian culture, which is to be faulted for its past sins, while never praised for having played a major part in the creation of something desirable in the present. A newcomer from Jalisco may have experienced racism only in Mexico, but the second that he crosses the border, he at once finds careerist benefits in regurgitating new gripes against his generous host—without acknowledging that, for some reason, the water is suddenly safe to drink, the police do not take petty bribes, the hospitals serve all comers, and people of all backgrounds line up patiently to be treated equally by government clerks.
Confusion naturally results. No immigrant from lower Mexico or Yemen wishes to return home. He also senses that he can remain largely Honduran or Yemeni, even amid his new Western home—as long as enough of his fellow residents do not follow his example. If everyone were to do that, then the immigrant would quickly leave and seek out Westernism somewhere else.
As a result of such trends, the melting-pot forces of the past are becoming ossified and the West is becoming tribalized. Large blocks of the population self-segregate in the suburbs of Amsterdam, Paris, Los Angeles, and London, romanticizing the countries that they have rejected, while carefully embracing particular elements of their newly adopted homelands that they find either useful or profitable.
How did this approach to immigration develop?
The first reason is politics. The twentieth century progressive experiment has reached its tired limits in the twenty-first century. Even in the age of Obama, more Americans identify as conservative than liberal. Vast majorities do not agree with the trajectory of the government. They poll that they are unhappy with the present political environment, especially with the culturally and socially imposed limits of free expression. Americans remain deeply suspicious of mandated redistribution, multiculturalism, radical environmentalism, and the growth of an omnipotent federal government.
For European socialists and American progressives, one political solution is to change the demographic rather than scale back the message, preferring illegal, bloc, and un-vetted immigration rather than diverse, legal, meritocratic, and measured immigration policies that might yield a different long-term ideological result. Massive immigration of impoverished non-Westerners into the West creates new—and predictable—voters, if the indigent are offered immediate state benefactions, predicated on nurturing grievances against their hosts. Southern Mexico may operate on racist protocols that drive out indigenous people. No matter: after reaching the United States, the Mexican national can be encouraged to think that newly discovered prejudice and poverty explain why he has not almost immediately reached parity with native-born Americans—and will never find equality without the help of the Democratic Party and the liberal ideology that fuels it.
Second, Westerners are simply more ignorant than they used to be. Twenty-first-century Western liberal man has reached such a level of comfort and prosperity that he no longer needs or wishes to reflect on the origins of his advantage. Smart phones, sophisticated automobiles, unfettered social media, and widely affordable consumer goods are seen as birthrights that appear as naturally as sweet fruits on a wild vine that require no particular husbandry or nurturing. Westerners simply self-censor themselves or are ill-equipped to explain why they enjoy such advantages —and lack the knowledge to explain the fonts of their own society’s wealth.
Third, there is guilt. As implied earlier, we have never in history witnessed civilizations as rich and leisured as contemporary Europe, North America, and much of the former British Commonwealth. The bane of the poor in the United States is not endemic hunger but obesity, which, for example, largely explains why one of three Californians admitted to the hospital for any cause will be found upon admittance to suffer from the onset Type II diabetes. Mini-riots in the inner city can break out over gaining immediate access to luxury goods, not an inability to purchase staples at the local grocery store.
Such bounty in the West often creates among privileged elites a paradoxical sense of guilt over existing luxury even as it fuels a desire for even more it. If an upper-middle class Westerner drives a nice car, and has access to untold consumer goods, he feels, at least in the abstract, that his own privilege must be unfair, and proof of rigged inequality. He worries that his unlimited bounty may come at the expense of the American poor (who are not poor by global standards). Yet Western liberal man has a sense that unassimilated communities or the inner city are also places of greater crime and poorer schools, better avoided if possible, and most assuredly not the landscapes where one would wish to live or raise children.
So it is hard to square that progressive circle of idealism and realist self-interest. The Westerner does his best in the abstract by praising the non-West, lauding all cultures as equal, and deprecating his own legacy and traditions. That way, he manages to guiltlessly enjoy his exceptional Western privilege and is never responsible for the ramifications of his own ideology. He demands La Raza and Africana studies programs for minority students, but would never wish his own son to enroll in such classes, given their inability to provide a broad and competitive liberal education. If charter schools are denounced as pernicious for the inner city poor, then tony prep schools can be sought out easily enough for one’s own offspring.
We ask very little of today’s immigrant—neither legality and prior meritocratic achievement, nor rapid assimilation and integration into the West. As a result, he sees no reason to adopt a language or culture other than his own, and often instead seeks to carve out a pseudo-non-Western existence while attached to the umbilical cord of Western largess and freedom. Contempt rather than gratitude often follows—as seen in San Bernardino, Orlando, Paris, and Munich and beyond.
I pity the poor immigrant and what we do to him.
http://www.hoover.org/research/immigrants-dilemma
The Immigrant's Dilemma
by Victor Davis Hanson
Thursday, August 11, 2016
Nearly a half-century ago, Bob Dylan wrote a mixed ode to the immigrant, in a way that no doubt might earn him charges of racism, nativism, and xenophobia in today’s politically-correct age. Yet Dylan was trying to express the paradoxes of leaving one’s homeland for an entirely new political and cultural landscape that often overwhelms the newcomer. “I pity the poor immigrant,” he sang, “Who wishes he would’ve stayed home.”
Never has the immigrant to the West been more confused. In the twenty-first century, immigration almost always moves in a single direction—poor and desperate non-Western people abandon their homes in Latin America, Africa, and Asia seemingly to join quite different cultures in Europe and the United States. The West has neither the population growth nor the poverty any more to send huddled masses to the new lands. And yet, today, these immigrants arrive in Western countries that are strange fantasylands compared to what they were expecting. The newcomer is rarely reminded of why he left home, or why, after doing so, he chose the West, and not Russia, China, Bolivia, or the Sudan for his destination.
Western governments and the larger culture could easily instruct the immigrant that the Western tradition is far more likely to embrace constitutional government, personal freedom, free-market economics, the importance of private property, religious tolerance, free expression, due process, an independent judiciary, and a larger culture of self-criticism and introspection. But to do so would put the lie to multiculturalism and the belief in different but equal cultures.
These precise Western values allow the immigrant to enjoy a security, affluence, and freedom unknown in his abandoned homeland. Yet, we, the host, prefer not to “judge” those other places, and thus do not fully embrace the immigrant’s ostensible wish to become one of us. We dare not ethnocentrically elevate our culture over others. Instead, we rebrand the human sins of slavery, sexism, and racism as uniquely Western depravities rather than age-old pathologies that predated the West and still exist unchecked outside it. The immigrant immediately senses that his troubled Western host is not so much privileged as unsure and unhappy—and ripe for psychological exploitation. Hyphenation and tribalism, not the melting pot, are often seen as the natural, expected and more “authentic” path for the recently arrived.
Note that most immigrants do not arrive with natural empathy for the West. Most forsake countries that are hostile to the West. International surveys reveal that the United States, for example, is not popular in China, Latin America, or the Middle East—the current popular launching pads to America. In such places, popular opinion is shaped by the relentless propaganda of autocratic governments, which deride Western decadence, colonialism, imperialism, and racism. Latin American poverty, for example, is often explained as a result of el Norte exploitation rather than flawed political institutions.
The new arrival to Western lands is soon patronized as an icon of “difference.” The immigrant is not usually asked to learn the language of his new homeland, much less to quickly assimilate and integrate into Western culture. Instead, the Western multiculturalist host allows the newcomer to pick and choose from a buffet of culture and language: to set up a Sharia court in London, to practice female circumcision in France, to conduct business in Spanish at the DMV office in Bakersfield, or simply to ignore seeking legal status. He also finds an existing rich menu of grievances lodged against a stereotyped dominant white, male, heterosexual Christian culture, which is to be faulted for its past sins, while never praised for having played a major part in the creation of something desirable in the present. A newcomer from Jalisco may have experienced racism only in Mexico, but the second that he crosses the border, he at once finds careerist benefits in regurgitating new gripes against his generous host—without acknowledging that, for some reason, the water is suddenly safe to drink, the police do not take petty bribes, the hospitals serve all comers, and people of all backgrounds line up patiently to be treated equally by government clerks.
Confusion naturally results. No immigrant from lower Mexico or Yemen wishes to return home. He also senses that he can remain largely Honduran or Yemeni, even amid his new Western home—as long as enough of his fellow residents do not follow his example. If everyone were to do that, then the immigrant would quickly leave and seek out Westernism somewhere else.
As a result of such trends, the melting-pot forces of the past are becoming ossified and the West is becoming tribalized. Large blocks of the population self-segregate in the suburbs of Amsterdam, Paris, Los Angeles, and London, romanticizing the countries that they have rejected, while carefully embracing particular elements of their newly adopted homelands that they find either useful or profitable.
How did this approach to immigration develop?
The first reason is politics. The twentieth century progressive experiment has reached its tired limits in the twenty-first century. Even in the age of Obama, more Americans identify as conservative than liberal. Vast majorities do not agree with the trajectory of the government. They poll that they are unhappy with the present political environment, especially with the culturally and socially imposed limits of free expression. Americans remain deeply suspicious of mandated redistribution, multiculturalism, radical environmentalism, and the growth of an omnipotent federal government.
For European socialists and American progressives, one political solution is to change the demographic rather than scale back the message, preferring illegal, bloc, and un-vetted immigration rather than diverse, legal, meritocratic, and measured immigration policies that might yield a different long-term ideological result. Massive immigration of impoverished non-Westerners into the West creates new—and predictable—voters, if the indigent are offered immediate state benefactions, predicated on nurturing grievances against their hosts. Southern Mexico may operate on racist protocols that drive out indigenous people. No matter: after reaching the United States, the Mexican national can be encouraged to think that newly discovered prejudice and poverty explain why he has not almost immediately reached parity with native-born Americans—and will never find equality without the help of the Democratic Party and the liberal ideology that fuels it.
Second, Westerners are simply more ignorant than they used to be. Twenty-first-century Western liberal man has reached such a level of comfort and prosperity that he no longer needs or wishes to reflect on the origins of his advantage. Smart phones, sophisticated automobiles, unfettered social media, and widely affordable consumer goods are seen as birthrights that appear as naturally as sweet fruits on a wild vine that require no particular husbandry or nurturing. Westerners simply self-censor themselves or are ill-equipped to explain why they enjoy such advantages —and lack the knowledge to explain the fonts of their own society’s wealth.
Third, there is guilt. As implied earlier, we have never in history witnessed civilizations as rich and leisured as contemporary Europe, North America, and much of the former British Commonwealth. The bane of the poor in the United States is not endemic hunger but obesity, which, for example, largely explains why one of three Californians admitted to the hospital for any cause will be found upon admittance to suffer from the onset Type II diabetes. Mini-riots in the inner city can break out over gaining immediate access to luxury goods, not an inability to purchase staples at the local grocery store.
Such bounty in the West often creates among privileged elites a paradoxical sense of guilt over existing luxury even as it fuels a desire for even more it. If an upper-middle class Westerner drives a nice car, and has access to untold consumer goods, he feels, at least in the abstract, that his own privilege must be unfair, and proof of rigged inequality. He worries that his unlimited bounty may come at the expense of the American poor (who are not poor by global standards). Yet Western liberal man has a sense that unassimilated communities or the inner city are also places of greater crime and poorer schools, better avoided if possible, and most assuredly not the landscapes where one would wish to live or raise children.
So it is hard to square that progressive circle of idealism and realist self-interest. The Westerner does his best in the abstract by praising the non-West, lauding all cultures as equal, and deprecating his own legacy and traditions. That way, he manages to guiltlessly enjoy his exceptional Western privilege and is never responsible for the ramifications of his own ideology. He demands La Raza and Africana studies programs for minority students, but would never wish his own son to enroll in such classes, given their inability to provide a broad and competitive liberal education. If charter schools are denounced as pernicious for the inner city poor, then tony prep schools can be sought out easily enough for one’s own offspring.
We ask very little of today’s immigrant—neither legality and prior meritocratic achievement, nor rapid assimilation and integration into the West. As a result, he sees no reason to adopt a language or culture other than his own, and often instead seeks to carve out a pseudo-non-Western existence while attached to the umbilical cord of Western largess and freedom. Contempt rather than gratitude often follows—as seen in San Bernardino, Orlando, Paris, and Munich and beyond.
I pity the poor immigrant and what we do to him.
http://www.hoover.org/research/immigrants-dilemma
Her excuse, personal information. The closer to the election the less effect. Classic Clinton stall tactics and the government has the 'Don't probe or expose anything that can have a dramatically effect a national election.'
Private server:
Freedom of Information Act cannot be enforced. The obvious premeditated nature of this criminal activity would eliminate all Republicans but the Clintons are still free.
Emails Renew Questions About Clinton Foundation and State Dept. Overlap (probably already posted. Love the medical article:)
WASHINGTON — A new batch of State Department emails released Tuesday showed the close and sometimes overlapping interests between the Clinton Foundation and the State Department when Hillary Clinton served as secretary of state.
The documents raised new questions about whether the charitable foundation worked to reward its donors with access and influence at the State Department, a charge that Mrs. Clinton has faced in the past and has always denied.
In one email exchange, for instance, an executive at the Clinton Foundation in 2009 sought to put a billionaire donor in touch with the United States ambassador to Lebanon because of the donor’s interests there.
In another email, the foundation appeared to push aides to Mrs. Clinton to help find a job for a foundation associate. Her aides indicated that the department was working on the request.
Mrs. Clinton’s presidential campaign, which has been shadowed for 17 months by the controversy over the private email server she used exclusively while at the State Department, said that the emails released Tuesday had no bearing on the foundation’s work.
The State Department turned the new emails over to a conservative advocacy group, Judicial Watch, as part of a lawsuit that the group brought under the Freedom of Information Act.
The documents included 44 emails that were not among some 55,000 pages of emails that Mrs. Clinton had previously given to the State Department, which she said represented all her “work-related” emails. The document release centers on discussions between Mrs. Clinton’s aides and Clinton Foundation executives about a number of donors and associates with interests before the State Department.
Tom Fitton, the president of Judicial Watch, charged that Mrs. Clinton “hid” the documents from the public because they appeared to contradict her official pledge in 2009 to remove herself from Clinton Foundation business while leading the State Department.
The documents indicate, he said in a telephone interview, that “the State Department and the Clinton Foundation worked hand in hand in terms of policy and donor effort.”
“There was no daylight between the two under Mrs. Clinton, and this was contrary to her promises,” he added.
A number of the email exchanges released Tuesday included Huma Abedin, who was a top adviser to Mrs. Clinton at the State Department and later worked at the Clinton Foundation.
In April 2009, Douglas J. Band, who led the foundation’s Clinton Global Initiative, emailed Ms. Abedin and Cheryl D. Mills, another top adviser to Mrs. Clinton, for help with a donor.
Mr. Band wrote that he needed to connect Gilbert Chagoury, a Lebanese-Nigerian billionaire who was one of the foundation’s top donors, with someone at the State Department to talk about his interests in Lebanon.
“It’s jeff feltman,” Ms. Abedin answered, referring to Jeffrey Feltman, who was the American ambassador to Lebanon at the time. “I’m sure he knows him. I’ll talk to jeff.”
Mr. Band asked her to call Mr. Chagoury immediately if possible. “This is very important,” he wrote.
In a separate email exchange, Mr. Band passed along to Ms. Abedin and Ms. Mills a request for “a favor” from an associate who had recently been on a Clinton Foundation trip to Haiti and was apparently seeking work at the State Department.
The State Department deleted much of the information about the associate, including his name and the outcome of the job referral, in turning over the emails to Judicial Watch.
In one undeleted section, however, Mr. Band wrote that it was “important to take care of” the associate’s request. A short time later, Ms. Abedin wrote back to say: “We all have him on our radar. Personnel has been sending him options.”
The Clinton campaign suggested that Mr. Band was acting in his capacity as former President Bill Clinton’s personal assistant, not in his role overseeing the Clinton Global Initiative.
Regarding the exchanges between Mr. Band and Mrs. Clinton’s aides, the campaign said in a statement: “Neither of these emails involve the secretary or relate to the foundation’s work. They are communications between her aides and the president’s personal aide, and indeed the recommendation was for one of the secretary’s former staffers who was not employed by the foundation.” The campaign did not elaborate.
The F.B.I. spent more than a year examining Mrs. Clinton’s use of a private email account, but it is not clear how the work of the Clinton Foundation figured into that investigation.
James B. Comey Jr., the F.B.I. director, was noticeably circumspect in an appearance last month before the House oversight committee when Republicans questioned whether the investigation had looked at the Clinton Foundation. Twice, he declined to say.
Follow The New York Times’s politics and Washington coverage on Facebook and Twitter, and sign up for the First Draft politics newsletter.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/emails-renew-questions-about-clinton-foundation-and-state-dept-overlap/ar-BBvsbs3?li=BBnb7Kz&ocid=edgsp
Emails Renew Questions About Clinton Foundation and State Dept. Overlap (probably already posted. Love the medical article:)
WASHINGTON — A new batch of State Department emails released Tuesday showed the close and sometimes overlapping interests between the Clinton Foundation and the State Department when Hillary Clinton served as secretary of state.
The documents raised new questions about whether the charitable foundation worked to reward its donors with access and influence at the State Department, a charge that Mrs. Clinton has faced in the past and has always denied.
In one email exchange, for instance, an executive at the Clinton Foundation in 2009 sought to put a billionaire donor in touch with the United States ambassador to Lebanon because of the donor’s interests there.
In another email, the foundation appeared to push aides to Mrs. Clinton to help find a job for a foundation associate. Her aides indicated that the department was working on the request.
Mrs. Clinton’s presidential campaign, which has been shadowed for 17 months by the controversy over the private email server she used exclusively while at the State Department, said that the emails released Tuesday had no bearing on the foundation’s work.
The State Department turned the new emails over to a conservative advocacy group, Judicial Watch, as part of a lawsuit that the group brought under the Freedom of Information Act.
The documents included 44 emails that were not among some 55,000 pages of emails that Mrs. Clinton had previously given to the State Department, which she said represented all her “work-related” emails. The document release centers on discussions between Mrs. Clinton’s aides and Clinton Foundation executives about a number of donors and associates with interests before the State Department.
Tom Fitton, the president of Judicial Watch, charged that Mrs. Clinton “hid” the documents from the public because they appeared to contradict her official pledge in 2009 to remove herself from Clinton Foundation business while leading the State Department.
The documents indicate, he said in a telephone interview, that “the State Department and the Clinton Foundation worked hand in hand in terms of policy and donor effort.”
“There was no daylight between the two under Mrs. Clinton, and this was contrary to her promises,” he added.
A number of the email exchanges released Tuesday included Huma Abedin, who was a top adviser to Mrs. Clinton at the State Department and later worked at the Clinton Foundation.
In April 2009, Douglas J. Band, who led the foundation’s Clinton Global Initiative, emailed Ms. Abedin and Cheryl D. Mills, another top adviser to Mrs. Clinton, for help with a donor.
Mr. Band wrote that he needed to connect Gilbert Chagoury, a Lebanese-Nigerian billionaire who was one of the foundation’s top donors, with someone at the State Department to talk about his interests in Lebanon.
“It’s jeff feltman,” Ms. Abedin answered, referring to Jeffrey Feltman, who was the American ambassador to Lebanon at the time. “I’m sure he knows him. I’ll talk to jeff.”
Mr. Band asked her to call Mr. Chagoury immediately if possible. “This is very important,” he wrote.
In a separate email exchange, Mr. Band passed along to Ms. Abedin and Ms. Mills a request for “a favor” from an associate who had recently been on a Clinton Foundation trip to Haiti and was apparently seeking work at the State Department.
The State Department deleted much of the information about the associate, including his name and the outcome of the job referral, in turning over the emails to Judicial Watch.
In one undeleted section, however, Mr. Band wrote that it was “important to take care of” the associate’s request. A short time later, Ms. Abedin wrote back to say: “We all have him on our radar. Personnel has been sending him options.”
The Clinton campaign suggested that Mr. Band was acting in his capacity as former President Bill Clinton’s personal assistant, not in his role overseeing the Clinton Global Initiative.
Regarding the exchanges between Mr. Band and Mrs. Clinton’s aides, the campaign said in a statement: “Neither of these emails involve the secretary or relate to the foundation’s work. They are communications between her aides and the president’s personal aide, and indeed the recommendation was for one of the secretary’s former staffers who was not employed by the foundation.” The campaign did not elaborate.
The F.B.I. spent more than a year examining Mrs. Clinton’s use of a private email account, but it is not clear how the work of the Clinton Foundation figured into that investigation.
James B. Comey Jr., the F.B.I. director, was noticeably circumspect in an appearance last month before the House oversight committee when Republicans questioned whether the investigation had looked at the Clinton Foundation. Twice, he declined to say.
Follow The New York Times’s politics and Washington coverage on Facebook and Twitter, and sign up for the First Draft politics newsletter.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/emails-renew-questions-about-clinton-foundation-and-state-dept-overlap/ar-BBvsbs3?li=BBnb7Kz&ocid=edgsp
Hang in there.
I'm with you on that.
Thanks.
I don't know why Shrillary wants to claim she's the first woman President, seems we have one right now depending on what sex he/she feels he/she is that day...... He did learn his 'lead from behind' when in Hawaii....
Are we surprised?.... This is standard operating procedure for the Shrill. Make everything look as perfect as possible. Totally focus grouped and organized. Top criminal operation.
Aspen Security Forum: Extremism rises with rise of social media
rcarroll@aspentimes.com
Monika Bickert, head of Facebook's Global Policy Management division, said Friday at the Aspen Security Forum that there's a growing effort to identify extremists using social media as a platform to recruit and radicalize.
A new layer of complexity in counter-terrorism efforts is the Islamic State and other extremist groups exploiting social media as a recruiting tool.
That was according to a panel of experts Friday at the Aspen Security Forum in a session entitled “Countering Violent Extremism.”
“We know these groups are going to try to use our platform to radicalize and recruit new members,” said Facebook’s Monika Bickert, who is head of the company’s global policy management division. “Certainly after there are attacks we do see some people praising attackers; we do see them praising leaders of ISIS or extremist ideologies, ... so the challenge really is finding the content and removing it.”
And the challenge is formidable, she conceded.
“Facebook alone has 1.6 billion users, which means we have billions of posts every day; billions of photos everyday,” she said, adding that 4 in 5 Facebook users are not in the United States.
Many of the radicalized who live in countries in conflict are seduced by propaganda on the internet, said Jessica Stern, an expert on terrorism and author of several books on the subject. Those young people become ISIS members because “it’s the best job they can find” or their friends persuade them to join. The recruits often are better educated than their countrymen, she said.
“What makes this so tragic are these families that come from war zones,” she said. “They’re severely traumatized, and the mother is likely to think ‘my kid is inside on the internet. That means he is safe.’ That is the place where the kid is least safe.”
The rise of extremism in the West, she said, is an even more pressing concern, she said.
“I think alienation, a search for identity, discomfiture, alienation from the heritage community, as well as the country they’re living in, together that’s a risk,” Stern said.
George Selim, who runs the community partnerships program for the Department of Homeland Security, added, “It’s one of the hardest questions we face as a society today.”
Companies such as Google and Twitter are focusing more on picking up on signs that someone is or is becoming radicalized. They’re also working with young people and college students in counter-extremism efforts. The federal government, however, likely wouldn’t be an effective messenger in that crusade, said U.S. Rep. Ed Royce, R-Calif., calling on Hollywood and Silicon Valley to be involved. Royce also said it would serve the U.S. well to look at what has worked in other countries.
“Because of the internet, because of the evolution of the internet, especially with encryption ... is going to allow people who want to use violence towards their ends to figure out new ways to communicate, to recruit,” he said. “We’re up against some major challenges here.”
“The No. 1 threat to the homeland is (the Islamic State’s) ability to recruit and radicalize, and that’s where Homeland Security’s resources are going,” Selim said.
The discussion was moderated by Noah Shachtman, executive editor of the Daily Beast.
http://www.aspentimes.com/news/23167559-113/aspen-security-forum-extremism-rises-with-rise-of
videos of the multiple topics:
http://aspensecurityforum.org/media/live-video/
Aspen Security Forum: Extremism rises with rise of social media
rcarroll@aspentimes.com
Monika Bickert, head of Facebook's Global Policy Management division, said Friday at the Aspen Security Forum that there's a growing effort to identify extremists using social media as a platform to recruit and radicalize.
A new layer of complexity in counter-terrorism efforts is the Islamic State and other extremist groups exploiting social media as a recruiting tool.
That was according to a panel of experts Friday at the Aspen Security Forum in a session entitled “Countering Violent Extremism.”
“We know these groups are going to try to use our platform to radicalize and recruit new members,” said Facebook’s Monika Bickert, who is head of the company’s global policy management division. “Certainly after there are attacks we do see some people praising attackers; we do see them praising leaders of ISIS or extremist ideologies, ... so the challenge really is finding the content and removing it.”
And the challenge is formidable, she conceded.
“Facebook alone has 1.6 billion users, which means we have billions of posts every day; billions of photos everyday,” she said, adding that 4 in 5 Facebook users are not in the United States.
Many of the radicalized who live in countries in conflict are seduced by propaganda on the internet, said Jessica Stern, an expert on terrorism and author of several books on the subject. Those young people become ISIS members because “it’s the best job they can find” or their friends persuade them to join. The recruits often are better educated than their countrymen, she said.
“What makes this so tragic are these families that come from war zones,” she said. “They’re severely traumatized, and the mother is likely to think ‘my kid is inside on the internet. That means he is safe.’ That is the place where the kid is least safe.”
The rise of extremism in the West, she said, is an even more pressing concern, she said.
“I think alienation, a search for identity, discomfiture, alienation from the heritage community, as well as the country they’re living in, together that’s a risk,” Stern said.
George Selim, who runs the community partnerships program for the Department of Homeland Security, added, “It’s one of the hardest questions we face as a society today.”
Companies such as Google and Twitter are focusing more on picking up on signs that someone is or is becoming radicalized. They’re also working with young people and college students in counter-extremism efforts. The federal government, however, likely wouldn’t be an effective messenger in that crusade, said U.S. Rep. Ed Royce, R-Calif., calling on Hollywood and Silicon Valley to be involved. Royce also said it would serve the U.S. well to look at what has worked in other countries.
“Because of the internet, because of the evolution of the internet, especially with encryption ... is going to allow people who want to use violence towards their ends to figure out new ways to communicate, to recruit,” he said. “We’re up against some major challenges here.”
“The No. 1 threat to the homeland is (the Islamic State’s) ability to recruit and radicalize, and that’s where Homeland Security’s resources are going,” Selim said.
The discussion was moderated by Noah Shachtman, executive editor of the Daily Beast.
http://www.aspentimes.com/news/23167559-113/aspen-security-forum-extremism-rises-with-rise-of
videos of the multiple topics:
http://aspensecurityforum.org/media/live-video/
I think this is an important video people should listen to as we watch the media wash out the truth about Hillary and Bill. People just don't get it. The Clintons are serial liars and live on other people's money. Government seems to be the only place where radicals can make a fortune breaking the law while stealing our rights.
Hillary: What Bill Left Out – Dick Morris TV: Lunch Alert!
By Dick Morris on July 27, 2016
http://www.dickmorris.com/hillary-bill-left-dick-morris-tv-lunch-alert/
People might not like Dick Morris but he does know the Clintons up close and personal and is willing to correct the record.
This has to make one wonder, where is the push back by Trump and basically the Republican Party as a whole.
I think this is an important video people should listen to as we watch the media wash out the truth about Hillary and Bill. People just don't get it. The Clintons are serial liars and live on other people's money. Government seems to be the only place where radicals can make a fortune breaking the law while stealing our rights.
Hillary: What Bill Left Out – Dick Morris TV: Lunch Alert!
By Dick Morris on July 27, 2016
http://www.dickmorris.com/hillary-bill-left-dick-morris-tv-lunch-alert/
People might not like Dick Morris but he does know the Clintons up close and personal and is willing to correct the record.
This has to make one wonder, where is the push back by Trump and basically the Republican Party as a whole.
Clinton Says, 'We'll Fix It!' Well, Who Broke It?
By Nate Jackson
Jul. 29, 2016
The 2016 Democrat National Convention began with a conspicuous lack of American flags. Oh, a few were burned outside the hall, and other flags made an appearance, but it wasn’t until Thursday night that Democrats finally tried to appear really patriotic. Big flags were distributed throughout the hall for Hillary Clinton’s speech. Predictably, however, she was the weakest part of her own convention. She slammed Donald Trump and promised to fix all that ails the country. But that message was severely undermined by remembering who broke it in the first place.
Here are the lowlights:
“America is stronger because of President Obama’s leadership.”
The night’s first lie. America is anything but stronger because of the Obama-Clinton governing duo.
“I want to thank Bernie Sanders. … You’ve put economic and social justice issues front and center, where they belong. And to all of your supporters here and around the country: I want you to know, I’ve heard you. Your cause is our cause. Our country needs your ideas, energy and passion. That’s the only way we can turn our progressive platform into real change for America. We wrote it together — now let’s go out there and make it happen together.”
She fought off more heckling from Bernie’s folks during her speech, but she’s right in one sense — the Vermont socialist helped push the party further left.
“My friends, we’ve come to Philadelphia — the birthplace of our nation — because what happened in this city 240 years ago still has something to teach us today. We all know the story. But we usually focus on how it turned out, and not enough on how close that story came to never being written at all. … By the time they left Philadelphia, they had begun to see themselves as one nation. That’s what made it possible to stand up to a king. … Remember: Our Founders fought a revolution and wrote a Constitution so America would never be a nation where one person had all the power.”
It just doesn’t work for Clinton to co-opt our Founders, who crafted documents severely limiting the power of the federal government. Democrats advocate ever-increasing and unlimited government power into every facet of our lives, and nearly everything they push and do is contrary to our founding. No one has done more to trash the Constitution than Obama, who Clinton wants to emulate.
“[Donald Trump has] taken the Republican Party a long way — from ‘Morning in America’ to ‘Midnight in America.’”
No, Trump didn’t take us there — Democrats ruling from Washington did.
“I’ve been your first lady. Served eight years as a senator from the great state of New York. I ran for president and lost. Then I represented all of you as secretary of state. … The truth is, through all these years of public service, the ‘service’ part has always come easier to me than the ‘public’ part. I get it that some people just don’t know what to make of me.”
Clinton’s humble-brag is obnoxious. She regularly tries to portray herself as the Most Qualified Candidate Ever™ while simultaneously some misunderstood private person. She is and always has been about one thing: acquiring power. The truth is every American knows Hillary, and few trust her, even if they will blindly vote for her.
“No one gets through life alone. We have to look out for each other and lift each other up. [My mother] made sure I learned the words of our Methodist faith: ‘Do all the good you can, for all the people you can, in all the ways you can, as long as ever you can.’”
She’s right — on an individual level. Jesus never advocated big government and forced income redistribution to achieve those ends.
“Too many people haven’t had a pay raise since the crash. There’s too much inequality. Too little social mobility. … Now, I don’t think President Obama and Vice President Biden get the credit they deserve for saving us from the worst economic crisis of our lifetimes. Our economy is so much stronger than when they took office. … But none of us can be satisfied with the status quo. … I’ve heard from so many of you who feel like the economy just isn’t working. Some of you are frustrated — even furious. And you know what? You’re right. It’s not yet working the way it should.”
So which is it? Economic malaise, or incredible and underappreciated prosperity? GDP grew just 1.2% in the second quarter, continuing a historic streak of sub-3% growth under Obama’s policies. So why is she running as the status quo candidate?
“Bernie Sanders and I will work together to make college tuition-free for the middle class and debt-free for all. … We’re not only going to make all these investments, we’re going to pay for every single one of them. And here’s how: Wall Street, corporations and the super-rich are going to start paying their fair share of taxes.”
“Free” stuff on the backs of those who already pay the lion’s share of the taxes is a familiar and tiresome refrain. But it sure works for young people who stand to benefit.
“We need to appoint Supreme Court justices who will get money out of politics and expand voting rights, not restrict them. And we’ll pass a constitutional amendment to overturn Citizens United. … I’m not here to repeal the Second Amendment. I’m not here to take away your guns. I just don’t want you to be shot by someone who shouldn’t have a gun in the first place. We should be working with responsible gun owners to pass common-sense reforms and keep guns out of the hands of criminals, terrorists and all others who would do us harm.”
She attacked both the First and Second Amendments. Citizens United was a 5-4 Supreme Court ruling upholding free political speech as the Founders intended. She promises to overturn it, trampling the First Amendment. And her gun control proposals2 infringe on the Second Amendment while failing to solve any problems, all while framed in such a way as to make it seem as if Republicans favor giving guns to criminals and terrorists.
“I’ve laid out my strategy for defeating ISIS. … It won’t be easy or quick, but make no mistake — we will prevail.”
As the chief diplomatic agent of Obama’s foreign policy, Clinton bears significant responsibility for the current disaster in the Middle East. The Islamic State exists because Obama and Clinton abandoned Iraq, wasting American blood and treasure for political gain. She led the charge to create a haven for the Islamic State in Libya. So it’s nice that she now wants to defeat it, but she helped create it.
“Tonight, we’ve reached a milestone in our nation’s march toward a more perfect union: the first time that a major party has nominated a woman for president.”
The problem is that it’s this woman3.
Heaven knows we could rebut more of her speech, but we’ll grant mercy and stop there. This woman should never again step foot in the Oval Office, though the unfortunate reality is that it’s at least a 50/50 chance that she will occupy it.
https://patriotpost.us/articles/44041
Clinton Says, 'We'll Fix It!' Well, Who Broke It?
By Nate Jackson
Jul. 29, 2016
The 2016 Democrat National Convention began with a conspicuous lack of American flags. Oh, a few were burned outside the hall, and other flags made an appearance, but it wasn’t until Thursday night that Democrats finally tried to appear really patriotic. Big flags were distributed throughout the hall for Hillary Clinton’s speech. Predictably, however, she was the weakest part of her own convention. She slammed Donald Trump and promised to fix all that ails the country. But that message was severely undermined by remembering who broke it in the first place.
Here are the lowlights:
“America is stronger because of President Obama’s leadership.”
The night’s first lie. America is anything but stronger because of the Obama-Clinton governing duo.
“I want to thank Bernie Sanders. … You’ve put economic and social justice issues front and center, where they belong. And to all of your supporters here and around the country: I want you to know, I’ve heard you. Your cause is our cause. Our country needs your ideas, energy and passion. That’s the only way we can turn our progressive platform into real change for America. We wrote it together — now let’s go out there and make it happen together.”
She fought off more heckling from Bernie’s folks during her speech, but she’s right in one sense — the Vermont socialist helped push the party further left.
“My friends, we’ve come to Philadelphia — the birthplace of our nation — because what happened in this city 240 years ago still has something to teach us today. We all know the story. But we usually focus on how it turned out, and not enough on how close that story came to never being written at all. … By the time they left Philadelphia, they had begun to see themselves as one nation. That’s what made it possible to stand up to a king. … Remember: Our Founders fought a revolution and wrote a Constitution so America would never be a nation where one person had all the power.”
It just doesn’t work for Clinton to co-opt our Founders, who crafted documents severely limiting the power of the federal government. Democrats advocate ever-increasing and unlimited government power into every facet of our lives, and nearly everything they push and do is contrary to our founding. No one has done more to trash the Constitution than Obama, who Clinton wants to emulate.
“[Donald Trump has] taken the Republican Party a long way — from ‘Morning in America’ to ‘Midnight in America.’”
No, Trump didn’t take us there — Democrats ruling from Washington did.
“I’ve been your first lady. Served eight years as a senator from the great state of New York. I ran for president and lost. Then I represented all of you as secretary of state. … The truth is, through all these years of public service, the ‘service’ part has always come easier to me than the ‘public’ part. I get it that some people just don’t know what to make of me.”
Clinton’s humble-brag is obnoxious. She regularly tries to portray herself as the Most Qualified Candidate Ever™ while simultaneously some misunderstood private person. She is and always has been about one thing: acquiring power. The truth is every American knows Hillary, and few trust her, even if they will blindly vote for her.
“No one gets through life alone. We have to look out for each other and lift each other up. [My mother] made sure I learned the words of our Methodist faith: ‘Do all the good you can, for all the people you can, in all the ways you can, as long as ever you can.’”
She’s right — on an individual level. Jesus never advocated big government and forced income redistribution to achieve those ends.
“Too many people haven’t had a pay raise since the crash. There’s too much inequality. Too little social mobility. … Now, I don’t think President Obama and Vice President Biden get the credit they deserve for saving us from the worst economic crisis of our lifetimes. Our economy is so much stronger than when they took office. … But none of us can be satisfied with the status quo. … I’ve heard from so many of you who feel like the economy just isn’t working. Some of you are frustrated — even furious. And you know what? You’re right. It’s not yet working the way it should.”
So which is it? Economic malaise, or incredible and underappreciated prosperity? GDP grew just 1.2% in the second quarter, continuing a historic streak of sub-3% growth under Obama’s policies. So why is she running as the status quo candidate?
“Bernie Sanders and I will work together to make college tuition-free for the middle class and debt-free for all. … We’re not only going to make all these investments, we’re going to pay for every single one of them. And here’s how: Wall Street, corporations and the super-rich are going to start paying their fair share of taxes.”
“Free” stuff on the backs of those who already pay the lion’s share of the taxes is a familiar and tiresome refrain. But it sure works for young people who stand to benefit.
“We need to appoint Supreme Court justices who will get money out of politics and expand voting rights, not restrict them. And we’ll pass a constitutional amendment to overturn Citizens United. … I’m not here to repeal the Second Amendment. I’m not here to take away your guns. I just don’t want you to be shot by someone who shouldn’t have a gun in the first place. We should be working with responsible gun owners to pass common-sense reforms and keep guns out of the hands of criminals, terrorists and all others who would do us harm.”
She attacked both the First and Second Amendments. Citizens United was a 5-4 Supreme Court ruling upholding free political speech as the Founders intended. She promises to overturn it, trampling the First Amendment. And her gun control proposals2 infringe on the Second Amendment while failing to solve any problems, all while framed in such a way as to make it seem as if Republicans favor giving guns to criminals and terrorists.
“I’ve laid out my strategy for defeating ISIS. … It won’t be easy or quick, but make no mistake — we will prevail.”
As the chief diplomatic agent of Obama’s foreign policy, Clinton bears significant responsibility for the current disaster in the Middle East. The Islamic State exists because Obama and Clinton abandoned Iraq, wasting American blood and treasure for political gain. She led the charge to create a haven for the Islamic State in Libya. So it’s nice that she now wants to defeat it, but she helped create it.
“Tonight, we’ve reached a milestone in our nation’s march toward a more perfect union: the first time that a major party has nominated a woman for president.”
The problem is that it’s this woman3.
Heaven knows we could rebut more of her speech, but we’ll grant mercy and stop there. This woman should never again step foot in the Oval Office, though the unfortunate reality is that it’s at least a 50/50 chance that she will occupy it.
https://patriotpost.us/articles/44041
FDA Calls for More Restrictions on Fluoroquinolone Use (comments)
By Kristin J. Kelley
Edited by Susan Sadoughi, MD, and André Sofair, MD, MPH
The risks for "disabling and potentially permanent" side effects associated with systemic fluoroquinolone antibacterials (e.g., ciprofloxacin, moxifloxacin) generally outweigh the benefits in patients with sinusitis, bronchitis, and uncomplicated urinary tract infections, the FDA warned late last week. Fluoroquinolones should only be used for these indications when patients don't have other treatment options, the agency said.
Side effects can compromise the nerves, central nervous system, tendons, muscles, and joints. Symptoms may include confusion; hallucinations; joint, muscle, and tendon pain; or a tingling sensation (i.e., "pins and needles".
The action follows advisory panel recommendations made in late 2015 for stronger label warnings. The labels were previously updated in 2013 to warn of increased risk for peripheral neuropathy. Additionally, in 2008, a boxed warning was added to note risks for tendinitis and tendon rupture.
See the linked FDA drug safety communication for a full list of fluoroquinolones currently approved for systemic use.
Link(s):
FDA MedWatch safety alert (Free)
FDA drug safety communication (Free)
FDA briefing document on benefits and risks of systemic fluoroquinolones (Free PDF)
Background: Physician's First Watch coverage of 2015 advisory panel vote (Free)
Reader Comments (11)
Reply
Russell N. Other, Other, Retired
27 May 2016 2:19 PM
I am a victim of Levofloxacin, 4 Achilles tendon tears, Have tried to find Attorney for that, but that ship sailed. However did retain one recently for an aortic aneurysm I suffered about 8 months later. I was blessed it was found on a CT scan for back issues (I have Rheumatoid Disease) If you anyone you know has had issues there is a Facebook page "Fluoroquinolone toxicity Group" Good place for support and references.
Reply
Mark A Girard Other, Disabled by fluoroquinolones!
27 May 2016 4:09 AM
Thanks for reporting on the FDAs much needed warnings that fluoroquinolones, or FQs, should only be used when other options have run out. These drugs are not nearly as safe as once believed. The short list of damage that fluoroquinolones (FQs) did to me includes blood clots, broken blood vessels, bloated failing veins carved from 13 entry points, erratic blood pressure, hemochromatosis, liver damage, kidney damage, pulmonary edema, collapsed lung, hernia, torn lumbar muscle, half dozen bulging discs when I had none a few years before, shrinking eyeballs, tinnitus, multi-chemical sensitivity, gastrointestinal distress, hair loss, crumbling teeth, nosebleeds, nails fall off, spontaneous tendon ruptures, a cartilage transplant, ligament damage, cognitive impairment and other indescribably horrific mental anguish and psychosis, anxiety attacks that had me cowering in a corner, from nothing, and one of the worst, was wicked altitude sickness which forced me to bail abruptly from the town I loved so much, Leadville, Colorado, and now I can't even come to the lower parts of the state without becoming terribly sick. There were/are about a hundred or so other "symptoms" of my fluoroquinolone toxicity, but that gives a quick snapshot of what the last 8.5 yrs have been all about. I cannot tell you how important it is for everyone to learn what the names of these drugs are and to make sure you do not take them, unless you are exposed to anthrax or the plague, and I would actually try my luck with the plague, seriously. I really wish they would have done something less drastic than giving me Levaquin, like cutting off my leg. That is how awful being "floxed" really is. Amputation is less drastic than Levaquin.
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Tracy Jean Other, disabled
19 May 2016 12:28 AM
Thank you FDA .This is overdue. Cipro disabled me 2 years ago. I was unable to work in my profession as a social worker. I had no idea an antibiotic could wreck my body, my career, my social life, and my family counting on me. Wayyyyyy overdue. Wake up.
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Debbie
18 May 2016 1:36 PM
Call your health Insurance requesting that they turn down prescriptions for Floxin medicines for urinary tract and sinus infections as the FDA says doctors need not to prescribe for this ! Tell them they will save money afterwards with all the damage the cause ! Maybe the message will get out to doctors and hospitals to rid or at least slow down these meds . I hope to at least make the doctors comply with these findings ! Let us do our part in getting the word out to our Health insurance they have to clean up what the FDA refuses to see that this medicine needs to be pulled !!
Reply
Cassie Other, Other
18 May 2016 12:17 PM
In 2012 I was prescribed Cipro. No way would I have ever believed the outcome and especially that the one stupid pill I took could hurt me so bad. If someone else had told me that, I'd have probably been like some of the other people I've met, in disbelief. It's impossible to fathem the amount of pain it put me in or describe my pain in details that could be felt, but it was so bad that I had to have an MRI on my knee the following day, which cost us over $400 after insurance. Doctors have told me repeatedly it wasn't the Cipro, but unfortunately their simply saying that can't change the facts to fit their response. I was there! I have kept all of my records. I'm not a hypochondriac and rarely see the doctor more than once a year for my annual thyroid test. I was physically fit and in perfect health, minus a stomach pain that wound up being diagnosed as IBS, taking Cipro "just in case" it might be diverticulitis at 34. It was a very huge mistake on my part, that has caused me to fear all prescription drugs. I still have joint, muscle and tendon pain four years later that can't be cured. It moves around and comes in flares. Sometimes remitting for a while, only to come back. I'm not sure it'll ever go away permanently, but I continue to work and am doing way better than most. Thank you for your coverage on the FDA's new warnings. I'm glad others might be saved going through the same.
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Rose Schmidt, M.S., P.G. Other, Other
18 May 2016 12:52 AM
Thank you for covering this story within the medical community. Like others, I was first met with denial and disbelief when I went to my PCP describing my 'flox' symptoms. I brought her journal articles, etc., detailing how fluoroquinolones damage collagen. She was kind, caring, and compassionate. After she read the material, I could tell that she was shocked and saddened, that this commonly prescribed antibiotic could inflict so much harm, when she had dedicated her career to patient care. Even once she acknowledged the FQs as the cause, she still felt helpless, because she didn't know what to do for me, as there is no established treatment protocol to reverse the damage. The FDA has finally acknowledged the damage FQs cause, which is a step in the right direction.
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Donna Sumner Other, Other, St George, Utah
17 May 2016 2:35 AM
Has there been any myelitis as a result of the cipro
Reply
Mandy
16 May 2016 9:35 PM
Thank you for covering this important and potentially life saving story! I have been suffering from levaquin poisoning since 2006. More than 9 years after taking my final fluoroquinolone pill, I still can not function as well as many 80 year olds. I am 48 and I have a good friend who is 84 and she has had to help me carry groceries because her back and joints are healthier than mine. I was very athletic the until the day I got postnasal drip and took levaquin. Doctors are NOT aware of how dangerous these drugs are. In fact, when I have gone to doctors for help to find treatment for the levaquin side effects, many of those doctors have literally laughed at me and they insisted that levaquin is extremely safe and couldn't possibly cause any long term side effects. SOMEONE has worked hard to convince doctors that these drugs are as safe a candy. Something MUST be done to correct that very dangerous and very wrong perception among so many doctors. They need to know that these antibiotics can completely disable (and even kill) a young, healthy and athletic person. They are far from safe drugs and this has been known for many years. Just look at the peer reviewed studies on mitochondrial toxicity from fluoroquinolones. Thank you for helping to spread awareness.
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Simo Other
16 May 2016 6:28 PM
This announcement by the FDA is a huge step in the right direction. These fluoroquinolone antibiotics can ruin your life. Cipro changed me from a very athletic and active person to one that averages a major tendon/joint surgery every 2 years. Seven surgeries in 13 years with more needed all thanks to the permanent damage this antibiotic did to my tendons. The FDA is now admitting how dangerous these drugs are and hopefully doctors take heed and don't dismiss these severe adverse reactions as rare because they aren't. Bravo FDA, now please educate the medical industry so that our kids and their kids can avoid this nightmare.
Reply
Berry, BA Other, Other
16 May 2016 4:53 PM
Disabled since 2001 after taking 5 Cipro tablets
Reply
Elizabeth Lo Geriatrics
16 May 2016 4:44 PM
Long overdue! Too many have been permanently and severely injured by these chemotherapeutic drugs disguised as antibiotics. Hopefully, these drugs will now only be prescribed in life threatening situations after all other options have been exhausted.
Unreal. Glad we're not there this year. London in spring, done.
Here is the difference in reporting the French execution of a priest today. NYT vs. London Daily Mail
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/27/world/europe/normandy-france-church-attack.html?_r=0
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3708394/Two-men-armed-knives-people-hostage-French-church.html
Here is the difference in reporting the French execution of a priest today. NYT vs. London Daily Mail
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/07/27/world/europe/normandy-france-church-attack.html?_r=0
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3708394/Two-men-armed-knives-people-hostage-French-church.html
We have friends in Normandy today, have their two boys with them. Fortunately, Dad is former French Special Forces and he's been there for nearly two months with the boys and knows the area extremely well. One of the few who could protect the young guys, do what would be needed to be done.
This story is almost mute in this country. BO opened our doors and Shrillary would roll out the welcome mat too. What's it take America, the left are the enablers of this, here and worldwide.
If only you could assist with his speech writing. If he would say it straight up, more would listen and push his agenda.
Say CHEESE!!!!!!!!
Proof that reaching one's hands as high as possible is slimming for both people...... good way to lose one's appetite. Two heart attacks waiting to happen.
Say CHEESE!!!!!!!!
Proof that reaching one's hands as high as possible is slimming for both people...... good way to lose one's appetite. Two heart attacks waiting to happen.