VOICELESS is about a young, reserved, war veteran, who moves to Philadelphia to take a new ministry job and puts his life on the line to stand against an abortion clinic that moved across the street from the church.
EDITORS NOTE: Communities, churches, schools, and/or organizations may come together to bring VOICELESS to a theater on October 7th, the opening weekend. Readers may host a special premiere, buyout a show-time or take a group to see this important and timely film.
You have got to hand it to them (to the likes of George Soros and big progressive funders like the Tides Foundation), they know how to promote a propaganda campaign.
We have told you on innumerable occasions that in September Barack Hussein Obama will be leading a major effort at the United Nations to open our gates even wider for hundreds of thousands of third world migrants to be placed in your towns. (We learned yesterday that ORR is gearing up to take care of over 200,000 “humanitarian arrivals.”)
September is also the month when the Administration (Obama and Sec. of State Kerry) will make their final determination for the US Refugee Admissions Program and submit their plan for fiscal year 2017. They said last year that they were shooting for 100,000 refugees for FY17, but we expect the number to be much higher.
The buck stops with Speaker Paul Ryan!
And, frankly there is only one person who is now in the catbird seat to stop them this fall!—Speaker Paul Ryan. (I know your hearts are sinking, but that is the cold hard truth.) Only Congress can stop them by not granting the money needed to place hundreds of thousands of needy people, some from countries that hate us, in over 200 American towns (through 350 subcontractor offices).
They are promoting their rally as a “collective voice against intolerance!” From DCRally4Refugees (hat tip: Cathy):
In the midst of the greatest refugee crisis since WWII, advocates from across the country will gather at DCRally4Refugees, August 28, 2016 at the outdoor Sylvan Theater at the Washington Monument on the National Mall in Washington, DC, 10:00 AM – 2:30 PM (rain or shine).
The rally will raise awareness about the magnitude of the global refugee crisis, encourage advocacy and U.S. action to alleviate suffering through relief efforts and support, and stand in solidarity with refugees and displaced people worldwide. Anyone is encouraged to join the #SeaOfOrange, buy a T-shirt, attend the historic rally and use #DCRally4Refugees to show support.
Steps from the U.S. Capitol, DCRally4Refugees will call on the U.S. to provide more refugee resettlement and increased support to countries and organizations already involved, support proven relief efforts overseas, and offer resources for those who wish to help, raising a collective voice against intolerance. [Message is clear, if you are concerned about the economic costs and the security for your community you are a hateful, intolerant boob!—ed]
Please read their website carefully. They want people to attend (obviously), but they also want the Open Borders agitators across the country to send postcards to Congress, send money to them (LOL! through the already massively funded Tides Foundation) and to buy their orange T-shirts (these are master marketers!).
Here is the postcard they have prepared for their people to send to Congress. If you can’t read the list of supporting groups click on the link above. Most of the major federal resettlement contractors are listed. And, although there are other Catholic groups, I’m not seeing the US Conference of Catholic Bishops (hmmm?). What is up with that? Are you giving them too much guff in your parishes?
I still have a hard time understanding how decent concerned Christians and Jews have joined the globalists and are willing to help multinational corporations import cheap (slave!) labor! (Confirmed on my 30 day tour of the heartland).
Go here and see that they are also planning events around the country!
Only two things you must do now!
So here are the primary things you need to do in the coming weeks (in addition to putting out fires where you live) — tell Speaker Ryan and your member of Congress to cut the funding for any expansion of the UN/US State Department Refugee Admissions Program and elect Donald Trump as the next President of the United States.
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Florida’s current low-THC medical marijuana law allows for the establishment of six marijuana cultivation sites that will grow and distribute marijuana to licensed retailers.
Amendment 2 would allow for an unlimited amount of cultivation centers that could be large indoor or outdoor grows.
Energy Consumption: Increasing Florida’s Carbon Footprint: Many commercialized marijuana growers prefer indoor-cultivation because it is easier to control all aspects of the environment and it allows for perpetual harvests. Indoor cultivation uses large amounts of energy from lighting and air conditioning, an amount estimated at 8 times more than a typical commercial building and 4 times more than a hospital per-square foot. In Colorado, Denver’s electricity rate is increasing at a rate of 1.2% per year and 45% of the increase comes from medical marijuana growing facilities that used 86 million kWh in 2012 and 121 million in 2013.
Water Consumption: It is estimated that each marijuana plant consumes 6 gallons of water a day. In 2013, Fish and Wildlife officials in California (where medical marijuana is legal) investigated 264 marijuana grows and removed 129 illegal dams used to irrigate. Outdoor marijuana grows can have a major impact on watersheds as the use of water resources within a watershed ultimately affects all downstream inhabitants, even those that reside in adjacent downstream watersheds. The diversion of water from watersheds in California is having a significant impact on residents, especially in drought season. Salmon Creek watershed, a 36.9 square mile area in Humboldt County, CA, estimated water use by outdoor and greenhouse marijuana grows equals 124,185 gallons per day compared to 31,680 gallons used per day by the area’s residents.
Florida has 29 major watersheds. The lowering of the water table can lead to houses or roads falling into sinkholes. Devastating results from attempts to alter the functioning of Florida’s watersheds, specifically the Everglades, has spurred current initiatives to restore this unique ecosystem. Amendment 2 would result in dramatic alterations to our watersheds and potentially cause irreparable damage to Florida’s ecosystem.
Opponents of Amendment 2 are urging all Floridians to consider the environmental consequences of legalizing marijuana. They warn that Florida needs to protect the Sunshine state’s natural resources.
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EDITORS NOTE: To learn more on the harms of marijuana and the potential impacts of Amendment 2, please visit Don’t Let Florida Go To Pot
Milo Yiannopoulos calls Trump’s plan to introduce a screening process for prospective immigrants to the U.S. brilliant. Milo also does a superb job in candidly explaining how the left does a hatchet job on Trump to try to cover their own ineptitude and treasonous actions against the American people in their endless corruption, and are putting the population at risk before jihadists.
Milo Yiannopoulos
“Donald Trump Just Overtook The Democrats On Gay Rights”, by Milo, Breitbart, August 16, 2016:
“The madman has actually done it. God-Emperor Daddy — known to the rest of you as Republican presidential candidate Donald J Trump — has just outflanked Hillary Clinton on the Left and announced what can only be described as an ultra-progressive immigration policy.
I don’t mean progressive as it has come to be used, of course — nannying, language-policing, Muslim-pandering. I mean it’s a policy that could actually make things better for minorities.
Trump’s plan is to introduce a screening process for prospective immigrants to the U.S., testing their ideological commitment to western values like women’s rights, gay rights, and religious pluralism. It’s a brilliant plan. I’m especially inclined to say it’s brilliant because it may have been partly inspired by me.
The test will apply to all immigrants, yet its obvious target is Muslims, who, as we know, get a bit bomby in the presence of gays, a bit rapey in the presence of women who wear skirts shorter than their ankles and generally a bit hostile and violent around anyone who doesn’t have their bum in the air five times a day.
The media won’t portray this policy as progressive, of course — they’ll portray it as stupid, bigoted, and reactionary. The Washington Post, little more than a Hillary mouthpiece this election cycle, has already started, branding the proposal “crazy” and “outlandish.” But it isn’t. Actually, it’s about the most pro-gay policy I’ve ever heard from a presidential hopeful.
Trump has also promised to deport hate-preachers in the U.S. His specific wording (“send them home”) again suggests that he’s targeting Islam. Go Daddy!
“Those who are guests in our country that are preaching hate will be asked to return home immediately.” – Trump pic.twitter.com/UGAAZIuBj0
It’s odd that leftists are already starting up the outrage machine. After all, isn’t this what progressivism is supposed to be about? All around the world, Muslims are oppressing women, murdering gays, and exterminating non-Muslims. Progressives claim to want to protect the rights of gays, women and minorities, yet are silent on the greatest threat to them in the world today.
Somehow, I doubt they would be outraged if Trump threatened to deport the Westboro Baptist Church. This, despite the fact that the Westboro Baptists haven’t killed anyone, whereas a Muslim, Omar Mateen, carried out the greatest act of homophobic violence in U.S. history.
The Left, of course, think Orlando was a tragic incident of workplace violence, enabled by toxic masculinity and a lack of gun control.
I’m comfortable with people who are uncomfortable with gays, as long as they don’t want to kill us, maim us or throw us off rooftops. (Permission for lesser violence is available upon application.) For leftists, the reverse appears to be true — they’re uncomfortable with people who are uncomfortable with gays, unless they want to kill us and maim us and throw us off rooftops.
Thus, decline to bake a cake for some lesbians and you are a heinous bigot. Murder 50 fags and injure 50 more and you’re a tragic victim, probably reacting to islamophobia, whose dad will be invited to stand behind Hillary Clinton at a rally.
There’s no diplomatic way to put it. In this historic announcement, Donald Trump has dramatically overtaken the chronically Muslim-friendly Democratic Party on gay rights. I predict conservatives across the west will soon follow suit. The right is quickly realising that, thanks to the silence on Islam, it is they and not the left who are destined to safeguard women, gays, and minorities from the barbarians of the East.
As the body counts — and rape counts — in Europe rack up, gays — and others on Islam’s kill-list — will realize that in a world of Muslim migration, conservative immigration policies are actually the most progressive. Meanwhile, the claims of self-proclaimed leftists to champion the rights of women and minorities will ring increasingly hollow.
Voters are starting to take notice of all this.
Throughout this election cycle, Trump has been attacked as a bigot and a reactionary on immigration. With this new plan, though, he has proven beyond doubt that he’s the only person running for President who can stick up for chicks and queers.
Face facts, guys. It is the political Left that wants to flood America with violent homophobes and misogynists, not Trump. No-one with a clear-eyed view of Muslim culture can believe otherwise….”
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“The Pope and others in the Church are not telling the truth about Islam. Some think they are doing so deliberately as part of a strategy to prevent further radicalization. Some (myself included) think they are doing so out of sheer naïveté. In either case, if they continue to defend Islam as a peaceful religion, it is bound to result in a crisis of trust and a crisis of faith.”
I think they are doing this out of a false and misguided understanding of Christian charity that is so welcoming to “the stranger” that it won’t stop welcoming him even at the point of civilizational suicide. This foolishness combined with the globalist agenda of the political and media elites has the Church and the West in the fix they’re in. As millions of Muslims stream into Europe, and mainstream politicians and the Church demonize opposition to this suicidal madness as “hatred” and “bigotry,” millions of Christians stream out of the Church that has abandoned them, and the free world, at the hour of greatest need.
(By the way, it was our own Hugh Fitzgerald who first noted the #NotMyPope hashtag here on August 4.)
“The Church and Islam: The Next Cover-up Scandal,” by William Kilpatrick, Crisis, August 10, 2016:
“#NotMyPope.” In the wake of Pope Francis’ equivocal response to the murder of a French priest by two Islamic jihadists, that’s the top trending hashtag in France and in Belgium.
Which raises a question: Is the Pope doing more harm than good by continuing to deny—in the face of a mountain of evidence—that Islam has anything to do with violence?
As I’ve noted several times in the past, the Church’s handling of the Islamic crisis may prove to be far more scandalous than its handling of the sex abuse crisis. The main scandal surrounding the revelation of priestly sex abuse was that it was covered up for a very long time by priests, pastors, and even bishops. By their silence, many Church officials were, in effect, denying that there was a serious problem. The effect on Catholic morale was profound. In those places which were most seriously affected by the scandals, such as Massachusetts and Ireland, church attendance dropped off dramatically. Disaffected Catholics didn’t necessarily lose their faith in God but they did lose faith in the Catholic Church.
The Church’s handling of the numerous cases of “Islamic abuse” has the potential for causing a greater scandal. The similarities are striking. Once again we have Church leaders who deny that there is any serious problem. This can be seen, for example, in Pope Francis’ repeated assurances that Islamic violence is the work of “a small group of fundamentalists” who, according to him, don’t have anything to do with Islam. And once again, we have a cover-up—this time of the aggressive nature of Islam. After every terrorist incident, the Pope or some Vatican spokesman leaps to the defense of Islam lest anyone get the idea that there is a link between Islam and violence.
This is sometimes done by denying that terrorist groups or individual jihadists are motivated by religious beliefs (despite voluminous evidence that they are). Sometimes it is done by drawing a moral equivalence between Islam and other religions. Recently, when asked why he did not speak of Islamic violence, the Pope replied that “If I speak of Islamic violence, I must speak of Catholic violence.” Of course, it’s a false comparison. When Catholics commit violence they do not do so in the name of their religion, but in violation of it. Most people realize that there is an enormous difference between the Catholic “who has murdered his girlfriend,” and the jihadist who slits a priest’s throat while shouting “Allahu Akbar.”
And that’s the problem. More and more people can see that what the Pope and others in the hierarchy are saying about Islam and Islamic violence doesn’t comport with reality. If things continue in this direction, it will generate an enormous crisis of confidence in the Church. It is potentially a crisis of much great proportion than the sex abuse scandals. This time the victims of the cover-up will be counted not in the thousands, but in the tens of millions. And this time we will be talking not about damaged lives, but about dead bodies.
Millions of Christians in the Middle East and Africa are already dead as a result of jihad violence, and millions more have been forced to flee their homes (see here and here). It’s estimated that some two million were killed by Muslims in Sudan alone between 1983 and 1995. Many of the victims were completely unprepared because they had been assured by Church leaders that Islam is a peaceful religion just like Christianity or Judaism. In Europe, millions more are threatened by an influx of Muslim migrants—a migration that many Church authorities have encouraged. As Robert Spencer put it in a recent column, “The Pope is betraying the Christians of the Middle East and the world, and all the victims of jihad violence, by repeating palpable falsehoods about the motivating ideology of attacks upon them.” Jean-Clément Jeanbart, the Melkite Greek Catholic Archbishop of Aleppo, said something similar last year when he criticized his brother bishops in France for ignoring the persecution of Middle Eastern Christians. He castigated them for being uninformed and in thrall to political correctness.
The Pope and others in the Church are not telling the truth about Islam. Some think they are doing so deliberately as part of a strategy to prevent further radicalization. Some (myself included) think they are doing so out of sheer naïveté. In either case, if they continue to defend Islam as a peaceful religion, it is bound to result in a crisis of trust and a crisis of faith….
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The city of Milwaukee was once a prosperous, thriving metropolis. For years it was the world’s foremost beer-producing city, and home to four of the largest breweries on earth (Schlitz, Blatz, Pabst, and Miller). Almost every major American brewery, in fact, had at least one factory in Milwaukee. These employed thousands of local residents in jobs that formed the foundation of the city’s middle class. Other major corporations in the city during the first half of the twentieth century included the A. F. Gallun & Sons leather tanning company; the machinery manufacturer Allis-Chalmers; the heavy-mining equipment producer Bucyrus Erie Company; the Falk Corporation, producer of industrial power transmission products; the electrical component maker Cutler-Hammer; and the A.O. Smith Corporation, a major manufacturer of automotive frames.
Politically, Milwaukee has not had a Republican mayor since 1908. Every mayor since then has been a Democrat—with the exception of three who were openly Socialist. The first of the Socialists—in fact the first Socialist mayor of any major American city—was Emil Seidel, who held office from 1910-12; he also ran for U.S. Vice President in 1912, on the Socialist Party of America ticket. In 1916 Daniel Webster Hoan became Milwaukee’s second Socialist mayor, and his 24-year tenure in office was the longest continuous Socialist administration in American history. The city’s third Socialist mayor was Frank Paul Zeidler, who served three terms from 1948-60. A vocal supporter of the nascent civil rights movement, Zeidler and his administration oversaw the large-scale construction of public housing as a means of promoting racial and economic justice. Zeidler spoke out forcefully in favor of what he termed “public enterprise,” the notion that government could uplift the condition of the poor via the efficient dispensation of taxpayer-funded public services.
By the end of Zeidler’s mayoralty in 1960, Milwaukee’s black population had nearly quintupled during the preceding 15 years, from 13,000 in 1945 to more than 62,000 in 1960. A major cause of this trend was the massive northward migration of Southern blacks which was set in motion by the outbreak of World War II, and which transformed African Americans from a largely rural to a mostly urban people. Beginning in the early 1940s, millions of black workers from the South boarded buses and trains and headed to Northern cities, like Milwaukee, to fill many of the jobs vacated by the nearly 16 million white men who had gone off to war. Demand for black labor was heightened further by the now-urgent requirements of military-equipment production.
As Milwaukee’s black population grew, the burgeoning civil rights movement began to make its presence felt in the city. One of the more noteworthy local figures in the movement was Father James Groppi, a Catholic priest who in 1965 became especially involved in the crusade against housing discrimination.
But local black radicals, allied ideologically with the black militancy that was sweeping many American cities in the Sixties, were wholly dissatisfied with what they viewed as the inadequate pace of racial reforms. And in the summer of 1967 the race riots that rocked Detroit and Newark sparked a similar—though less devastating—outburst in Milwaukee. All told, the Milwaukee disturbances resulted in 3 deaths, about 100 injuries, and 1,740 arrests.
In response to the rioting, Democrat Henry Maier, who served as mayor of Milwaukee from 1960-88, swiftly unveiled a “39-Point Program” designed to address the inner-city problems of poverty and racism that liberal Democrats widely cited as the causes of the riots. Alternatively dubbed the “Little Marshall Plan,” this program sought to enlist government at all levels—local, state, and federal—to pour money into initiatives like housing construction, youth programs, and “community renewal” as a means of pacifying an angry populace. But in the eyes of local black leftists, it was too little, too late. As Mrs. Vel Phillips, a black member of Milwaukee’s Common Council, said in April 1968, the mayor’s 39-point program had failed to demonstrate any “visible effect on the root causes” of ghetto unrest. “Every day is growing worse,” she continued. “Hope goes a long way toward keeping things cool, but Negroes never get anything concrete to hang their hopes on. I don’t believe in violence, and I hope we don’t have any more. But we’d all better realize that many young Negroes have reached the point where they’re ready and willing to die because they figure they have nothing to lose.”
When the Sixties ended, Milwaukee was still known chiefly for its manufacturing. As of 1970, seven of the city’s top ten companies were engaged in that industry; together they employed nearly 47,000 people. But as the cost of manufacturing in the U.S. skyrocketed in subsequent decades—in large measure because of the unsustainably lavish deals that pro-Democrat unions had repeatedly negotiated on behalf of their dues-paying members—many of these businesses elected to move their operations abroad. Between 1970 and 2011, Milwaukee lost no fewer than 40% of its manufacturing jobs—a trend that dealt a severe economic blow to the entire city. From 1970 to 2007, the percentage of families in the Milwaukee metro area that were middle-class declined from 37% to 24%, while the percentage of households that were poor spiked from 23% to 31%.
Today, per capita income in Milwaukee is $19,199 (32% below the national average); median household income is $35,823 (33% below the national average); and the poverty rate is 28.3% (nearly double the national average).
While joblessness and poverty plague the lives of so many Milwaukeeans, the ever-present threat of crime may be an even larger affliction for them. Milwaukee today has a violent crime rate that is 2.6 times greater than the national average, including a robbery rate of 4.4 times the national average and a murder rate that is triple the national average. African Americans are involved in these crimes in highly disproportionate numbers. In 2012, for instance, fully 80% of all homicide victims in the city were black, as were three-fourths of the known suspects.
The children of Milwaukee, meanwhile, have their own heavy cross to bear. Though the city’s public school system annually spends some $14,200 (about one-third more than the national average) in taxpayer funds on the education of each K-12 student in its jurisdiction, the the overall high-school graduation rate in the Milwaukee Public Schools (MPS) is a paltry 62.8%—far below Wisconsin’s 87% statewide average. On standardized National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP) tests administered in 2013 to measure students’ academic abilities:
Notably, in 1990 the Wisconsin State Legislature passed a bill creating the Milwaukee Parental Choice Program (MPCP), the first publicly funded voucher initiative in the United States. Though lawmakers initially restricted it to just 1,000 low-income public school students within the city, MPCP has since grown to become the largest voucher program in America, serving more than 20,000 students. A 2011 study published by School Choice Wisconsin indicated that students in the MPCP had a graduation rate 18% higher than their counterparts in the Milwaukee Public Schools (MPS). Moreover, like other voucher programs across the county, the MPCP operates much more efficiently, from an economic standpoint, than the public school system. As the Heritage Foundation noted: “At $6,442 per scholarship, the vouchers are less than half the $15,034 spent by MPS.”
Regardless of these facts, however, the teachers unions have fought tooth-and-nail against the MPCP. In 2013, for instance, Bob Peterson, president of the Milwaukee Teachers Education Association, denounced efforts to expand the use of vouchers as “slash and burn” measures designed to “destroy public schools.” The City Journal notes:
“According to the union-led anti-school-choice coalition, the problem with vouchers is that they are likely to cream off the best and brightest kids presently attending inner-city public schools, leaving only the most disadvantaged and academically unprepared children. Yet almost in the same breath, opponents of vouchers contend that those ‘cream of the crop’ children and their parents are too stupid to avoid being victimized by educational charlatans. Dire warnings about ‘witchcraft’ schools, ‘Farrakhan’ schools, and ‘creationist’ schools greedily waiting to get their hands on voucher money have been stock features in the teachers’ union propaganda.”
Another Milwaukee entity that strongly opposes voucher programs is the Educators’ Network for Social Justice (ENSJ), an alliance of classroom teachers and post-secondary instructors who have allied themselves with the Democratic Party of Milwaukee County and a number of local Democrat politicians. Committed to “promoting pro-justice curricula and policies so that all students in the Milwaukee area are better served,” ENSJ also opposes the use of standardized tests to measure student achievement and aptitude. In 2008, members of ENSJ and the organization Rethinking Schools co-founded a Social Studies Task Force designed to articulate concerns about the content of a social studies textbook series that was up for adoption by the Milwaukee Public Schools. ENSJ’s major objection was that the textbooks devoted insufficient attention to the “racism,” “anti-Semitism,” “stereotypes,” and “discrimination” that, by ENSJ’s telling, had always been a major part of American history. Yet another bone of contention was that the books did not discuss the fact that some early U.S. presidents were slave owners. According to ENSJ, it is impossible to “even minimally understand U.S. history” without exploring “racism,” “the dispossession of Native Americans from their lands,” “slavery and lynchings,” or the “anti-Chinese riots at the turn of the century in which hundreds were killed.” “By omitting the ‘r’ word” from their historical narrative, adds ENSJ, “texts help to obscure racism’s relationship to economic exploitation—whether in the case of slavery, the theft of Indian and Mexican land, the underpayment and mistreatment of Chinese railroad workers in the mid-19th century, or the use of Third World sweatshop workers today.”
As a consequence of the poverty, crime, unemployment, and dysfunctional school system that have become the hallmarks of life in Milwaukee, the city’s population has declined markedly in recent decades, from 741,000 in 1960 to just 599,000 today. An estimated 5,000 houses—mostly in impoverished neighborhoods—are vacant and abandoned throughout the city.
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EDITORS NOTE: This piece was originally posted in May 2014.
It is hard to believe that a “Barry Goldwater” Conservative is claiming that President Obama is a “man of his word.” But it is true! Please read on.
My perspective is absolutely unique. TWICE a year I travel to Islamic State (ISIS) – controlled borders to oversee the rescue efforts of women and families who are held against their will by ISIS. I literally RESCUE them from ISIS! Then I sponsor intense rehabilitation efforts for them.
As I witness first-hand the unbelievable effects of ISIS control, I now totally understand how the West must, I repeat, MUST defeat ISIS at every turn. I’ve spoken personally to women (former sex slaves) and families who are now “survivor of ISIS” and understand the vulgarity of the beast.
It is against my personal backdrop, that I genuinely oppose the Obama/Clinton narrative about ISIS!
Obama is a “man of his word.”
But let me refresh you about the “word” that Barrack Obama made just before assuming the presidency.
Let’s refresh our memory to a September 7, 2008 Sunday morning televised “Meet the Press” . Then, Senator Barrack Hussein Obama, was asked about his stance on the American flag.
Senator Obama commented:
As I’ve said about the flag pin, I don’t want to be perceived as taking sides. There are a lot of people in the world to whom the American flag is a symbol of oppression… The anthem itself conveys a war-like message. You know, the bombs bursting in air and all that sort of thing.
The National Anthem should be ‘swapped’ for something less parochial and less bellicose. I like the song, ‘I’d Like to Teach the World to Sing’. If that were our anthem, then, I might salute it. In my opinion, we should consider reinventing our National Anthem as well as ‘redesign’ our flag to better offer our enemies hope and love.
It is my intention, if elected, to DISARM America to the level of acceptance to our Middle East brethren. If we, as a nation of warring people, conduct ourselves like the nations of Islam, where peace prevails…perhaps a state or period of mutual accord could exist between our governments…
When I become President, I will seek a pact of agreement to end hostilities between those who have been at war or in a state of enmity, and a freedom of disquieting oppressive thoughts. We, as a nation, have placed upon the nations of Islam, an unfair injustice which my wife disrespects the flag and she and I have attended several flag burning ceremonies in the past.
…I have found myself about to become the President of the United States and I have put my hatred aside. I will use my power to bring CHANGE to this nation, and offer the people a new path.
My wife and I look forward to becoming our country’s first black family. Indeed, CHANGE is about to overwhelm the United States of America.
Well. Mr. President, judging by what is happening around the world, you sure are a “man of your word!”
In my opinion from ISIS borders…
On the 75th anniversary of Kristallnacht 1938, when thousands of Jews were kidnapped and thrown into concentration camps, synagogues were burned, Jewish homes and businesses were destroyed, and Jewish property was seized, author Stephen Halbrook explained in his frightening Washington Times article “What made the Nazi Holocaust possible? Gun Control” that the simplest answer was the correct one: Jewish-owned guns were registered “and thus easily confiscated.”
The Al Katz Center will host a series of lectures throughout September on the lessons of gun control for the Jews in Nazi controlled nations, as a German child’s eyewitness account describes:
The doorbell rang, and they came in demanding, “We are looking for weapons.” My father answered that we didn’t have any weapons. They shouted back, “Get out….” We went outside in the yard – other[s] … stood around, just looked at us never saying a word … The mob finally left and we went inside ….
They had wrecked the furniture. Dishes, glass, and ornaments were broken …. I remembered the smell for years.
Another eyewitness of Kristallnacht lost her beloved father that night:
“At our house, the men searched my dad for weapons or something and then took him away. We learned later that all Jewish men between 18 and 60 had been arrested,” including Louis Katz, father of Al Katz, for whom the Al Katz Center is named.
The schedule of lectures is:
September 11 – The 1931 Nazi takeover plot to deny food to Jews and to execute persons refusing to surrender their guns leading to German registration of all firearms and confiscation thereof
September 13 – Use of gun registration records to identify, disarm, and attack Jews and political opponents of the Nazis accompanied by mass seizures of guns and revocations of gun licenses; Gestapo ban of gun clubs, arrests of their leaders, opponents placed in concentration camps, and prohibition of firearm permits to Jews
September 20 – The new Nazi Weapons Law of November 11, 1938, two days after Kristallnacht, prohibiting all Jews from acquiring, possessing, and carrying firearms, ammunition, and stabbing weapons, under penalty of imprisonment for up to five years
September 27 – Jewish armed resistance in the Warsaw Ghetto, Sobibor concentration camp, and other sites, saving many thousands of lives, despite the fact that weapons were very scarce.
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EDITORS NOTE: Stephen Halbrook is an author and lawyer known for his litigation on behalf of the National Rifle Association. He has written extensively about the original meanings of the Second Amendment and the Fourteenth Amendment.
The cost of each of the events is $7 per adult; $3 per student; healthy kosher refreshments with vegan options and discussion materials included
To order autographed copies books by Stephen Halbrook, famed Nazi gun control author, will be taken. RSVP – Beverly Newman at 941-313-9239 or visit our website www.alkatzcenter.org to register.
…..and that $2.2 billion is only for the Office of Refugee Resettlement (HHS) portion of the costs! It does not include the US State Department funding or the cost of security screening. Nor does it cover the cost of most welfare, subsidized housing, medical care and most of the cost of educating the children. They aren’t saying yet how many Syrians Obama will be requesting.
While I was on my 30 day ‘listening tour’ that took me to 13 mid-western and western states, the Obama Administration held a press conference call about the stepped-up Syrian Muslim refugee flow in to the US. Thanks to Christine for sending the transcript which I decided to post below in full.
Just so you know, all of the officials on the call are Obama appointees. Remember them! These are the people who are changing the demographics and the character of your home towns.
Anne Richard and Robert Carey both revolved in to their government perches from a refugee resettlement contracting agency (the International Rescue Committee). Shin Inouye is a former Washington, D.C. spokesman for the ACLU. And, for my friends in Montgomery County, MD, León Rodríguez was once your county attorney.
These Obama appointees are all hard core open (NO!) borders advocates, and if Hillary is elected they will likely be able to stay on and continue their work of changing America by changing the people!
And, if you are wondering, Obama has one more shot in September to make a determination about how many refugees will be admitted to the US in the next fiscal year.
We know what Obama is going to do, but what will Paul Ryan do?
It will be up to Speaker Paul Ryan and the REPUBLICANS to decide if the numbers Obama is requesting will be acceptable because it is Congress that will fund (or not fund!) the President’s final request!
This (below) is from a press conference call on August 5th. Those of you doing research around the country on what is happening where you live will find this useful.
BTW, I am struck by how little the reporters know about the program and so they largely wasted their questions.
See phone numbers at the end for the public affairs office of each government agency responsible for the refugee program. If you are reporting via alternative media about what is happening where you live, try calling those numbers! Call and ask questions even if you already know the answers!
Coordinator:
Welcome and thank you for standing by. At this time all participants are in a listen-only mode until the Question and Answer session of today’s conference. At that time you may press Star 1 on your phone to ask a question.
I would like to inform all parties that today’s conference is being recorded. If you have any objections you may disconnect at this time. I would now like to turn the conference over to Shin Inouye, USCIS. Thank you, you may begin.
Shin Inouye
Shin Inouye:
Thank you (Sheila) and thank you all for joining us today to discuss the current state of Syrian refugees security screening and admissions. As a reminder this call is on the record and without embargo. On the call we have Assistant Secretary of State, The Bureau of Population Refugees and Migration, Anne C. Richard, US Citizenship and Immigration Services or USCIS Director Leon Rodriguez, and Health and Human Services Director of Refugee Resettlement, Robert “(Bob)” Carey.
We’ll have our speakers offer remarks about their agency’s respective roles in the refugee process and then open up the call to your questions. Let me first turn it over to Assistant Secretary Richard.
Anne Richard:
Anne Richard
Thanks, this is Anne speaking. The United States has been a global leader in the resettlement of refugees. That’s why last year the President made a renewed commitment to help in some of the most vulnerable refugees in the world, pledging to increase the number of refugees we will accept from around the world to 85,000 from 70,000 per year over the last three years. As part of this commitment we also pledged to welcome at least 10,000 refugees fleeing the terrible conflict in Syria.
To that end early in the fiscal year we began working to adjust the capacity of our refugee admissions program, to bring many more refugees to the United States. To welcome more refugees from Syria we worked with the Department of Homeland Security, with our intelligence community and with other relevant agencies to upgrade our capacities to conduct security screening. DHS increased the number of the DHS offices available to interview applicants so that more security screening interviews could take place for more applicants, resulting in more refugees approved for travel.
In Jordan, for example, between February and April of this year we worked with DHS to surge additional staff to Jordan where DHS offices conducted interviews for about 12,000 UNHCR referred refugee applicants. In Beirut, Lebanon we restarted interviews of refugees in February. These had stopped for a year because of space limitations in the embassy compound. In Turkey we added staff to the resettlement support center in Istanbul that covers refugee processing in Turkey and Lebanon and DHS sent additional officers to conduct interviews.
In Iraq we began processing refugee resettlement cases in Erbil in December 2015. Thanks to these efforts and through the coordinated efforts of the Department of State, Department of Homeland Security, Department of Health and Human Services, we can now say that we have 8,000 Syrian refugees so far this year and that we are very confident that we will welcome at least 10,000 refugees from Syria by the end of this fiscal year. Monthly totals have climbed from low numbers of refugees admitted in the first half of the year to higher numbers recently.
In May, June and July the impact of our investments in and the enhancements to the process began to be realized. Our expectation from the beginning was that the rate of Syrian refugee admissions would increase over time as referrals from UNHCR — the Human Refugee Agency — UNHCR increased as we added to the capacity to process more cases referred to us and as DHS sent more DHS officers to the field to conduct the necessary rigorous and exhaustive security screening.
Briefly and in closing we want to reiterate that this is just one line of multiple lines of effort that the US government is undertaking to help the victims of terrible conflicts and crisis around the world. I want to remind you all that President Obama will convene the leader’s summit on refugees on the margins of the 71st session of the UN General Assembly in September. This summit is about encouraging all countries to take action and do more now.
Wealthy governments are asked to make new and significant contributions relating to humanitarian financing and refugee resettlement or admissions – other forms of admission to their country. Countries that host refugees are asked to make new commitments related to refugee self-reliance and inclusion, with a specific focus on letting refugees work and allowing refugee children to go to school. The purpose of the summit is to recruit other countries to join with us and make a real difference in the world’s contributions towards helping refugees.
At this point I’d like to turn to my colleague, the head of USCIS, Leon Rodriguez.
Leon Rodriguez:
Thank you Anne and thank you for your presentation. I too am gratified with the success that we’ve had in refugee admissions, particularly with respect to Syrian admissions. The process that we have applied to reach those admission levels is the same process that we have applied for many years – actually with a few enhancements that have further strengthened that process.
Leon Rodriguez
There are basically two critical components to the process and adjudicating, whether an individual is admitted to the United States as a refugee after that individual has been referred to us by the United Nations high commissioner and refugees and by the State Department. The first is to determine – this is what our officers do to determine whether that individual actually qualifies as a refugee – whether they meet the legal definition.
The legal definition that we use is derived from the United Nation’s convention on refugees, and that definition is used by all of the signatory countries to the convention, although in many cases each country interprets the conventions slightly differently. The second aspect and probably particularly critical for this discussion is we determined if — notwithstanding the fact that the individual meets the legal definition of refugee — if there is still some basis to deny that individual admission to the United States.
That can occur in one of two ways. In some cases we have – we exercise our discretion. For example if we have concerns about that individual’s credibility. In other cases we may have evidence that that individual falls under a specific category of inadmissibility. For example, if there is evidence that they are a known or suspected terrorist. To do that we used a number of tools. From my perspective the most critical of those tools is the refugee officer – is our highly trained, highly experienced staff that we deployed throughout the world to screen refugees.
Before they get there they have been extensively trained both in the legal tenants surrounding refugee law — the grounds inadmissibility that I discussed before — but also very critically in fraud detection and prevention, security protocols, interviewing techniques, credibility analysis.
They’ve also been briefed in country conditions and in regional conditions and again that briefing is often extensive, and the depth of that briefing grows as we spend more time in a particular refugee environment, be that the Syrian environment, the Iraqi environment, the Somalian environment, or as the case may be, the central American environment. The interviews that are conducted by those officers are frequently extensive – pro-credibility issues and pro-particular basis of inadmissibility.
In the specific cases of Syrians there are additional steps that are also taken. All of those cases or the majority of those cases, rather, are subject to something we call Syrian enhanced review, which provides us specific in-depth support both from our Refugee Affairs division and our Fraud Detection and National Security directorate to provide enhanced view of those cases before the interviews even occur overseas. This is intelligence-driven support – for example it yields specific lines of questioning that our officers are prepared to ask.
It also includes social media review of certain Syrian refugee applicants. Additionally and during the course of the interview an officer identifies areas of national security concern about a candidate, and that case moves into what we call the controlled application review and resolution process – essentially a hold process where further investigation and inquiry into that case occurs.
At the same time we have a number of law enforcement and intelligence resources that our officers utilize in order to determine whether there is any derogatory — and that’s a critical term — derogatory information about that individual. Those sources can come from State Department databases, databases of customs and border protection, the Department of Defense, but most critically from both the United States law enforcement and intelligence communities, including the FBI as well as a number of intelligence community partners as well.
One particularly important aspect there is a process that we call the intra-agency check which involves queries of a series of intelligence community holdings. That occurs not only prior to the interview of the individual but actually occurs on the recurrent basis during the entire process of that individual’s adjudication, and in many cases actually beyond the period of that individual’s admissions. So that if new derogatory information arises about that individual we are able to act on that derogatory individual – derogatory information at any time that that information may arise.
We have on an ongoing basis the implementing improvements to these processes – much of that is law enforcement sensitive or intelligence community protected. But those improvements have been occurring on an ongoing basis. I believe that this information is very critical because it really rebuts what is a widely held view that in fact we do not have resources against which to vet these individuals.
In fact literally hundreds of individuals from different countries, including hundreds of individuals from Syria, have had their admissions to the United States denied because of information that was found in these databases. Additionally, a number of other individuals have been denied admissions or have been placed on hold because we have determined – we have accessed that there are credibility concerns that have arisen during the interview process.
And that process is the same one that we conducted a year ago, two years ago and last week, and we will continue as we move through the process of screening refugees to apply those methodologies. Thank you.
Shin Inouye:
Thank you Director Rodriguez. Next we’ll hear from Director Carey.
Robert Carey:
Robert Carey
Okay thank you. (Bob) Carey here. We could go to the work of your Office of Refugee Resettlement, under the Refugee Act of 1980 Congress created within the Department of Health and Human Service and the Office of Refugee Resettlement, and we are charged with providing refugees with resettlement assistance. This assistance includes employment training and placement, English language instruction, cash assistance and additional social services, all of which are designed to assist refugees in integrating into their new communities and to promote early self-sufficiency.
ORR carries out this work through an extensive public-private partnership network and funding to state governments and non-profit organizations across the US. In fiscal year 2016 ORR expects to serve upwards of 200,000 humanitarian migrants. So these humanitarian migrants include refugees, but also asylees, keeping Asian entrance on unaccompanied refugee minors, victims of torture and unaccompanied children.
Our work includes collaborations at the federal and state level with resettlement agencies, resettled refugees themselves and members of the communities that welcomed them. A central goal of the program is to ensure that states and municipalities have the best information available to help them prepare for incoming refugees. To this end each state has a state refugee coordinator, and often a state refugee health coordinator who oversees services and refugee benefits provisioned to eligible individuals in the given state.
The President’s fiscal year 2017 budget requests include $2.2 billion for ORR programs and that represents the cost of maintaining services for additional refugees and other entrance and unaccompanied children primarily from Central America. The President’s budget request would support a total of 213,000 humanitarian arrivals including 100,000 refugees in 2017. Once a refugee arrives in the US they are eligible to access the same benefits as American citizens who are here legally including temporary aide to newly families, Medicaid, SSI, and SNAP.
When refugees do not meet eligibility requirements for these programs ORR provides time-limited refugee cash assistance and refugee medical assistance. Social services and targeted assistance funds are allocated to states based on a formula tied to the prior two years of refugee arrivals, and that accounts for refugees and other entrance movements to other states after their initial resettlement on their path to legal permanent residence and citizenship.
ORR also supports additional programs to refugees and integrating which include migrant enterprise development assistance for ethnic community organizations, agricultural partnerships and services for survivors of torture. Another critical service we provide is school impact program funding which provides approximately $15 million for activities that assists children in adjusting to school after the trauma of war flight and all too often interrupted education.
As an alternative to access and cash assistance refugees may also enroll in what is known as the Matching Grant program – that’s Intensive Case Management program conducted by private non-profit organizations which assists refugees in finding employment and in economic self-sufficiency – self-sufficiency within four to six months after their arrival in the US and which is funded with a combination of private and government funds. And at the end of the program last year 82% were self-sufficient at the end of 180 days. [This is a joke, refugees can still be receiving most forms of welfare, such as food stamps and housing help and still be labeled “self-sufficient.”—-ed]
In summary, the Office of Refugee Resettlement stands committed to welcoming integrating newcomers into the fabric of our society. We believe this goal benefits not only refugees and their families, but strengthens communities and our nation as a whole and refugee resettlement is a reflection of our core value of who we are as a country, providing protection to individuals fleeing persecution on the basis of their race, religion, political opinions or membership in a social group. So thank you.
Shin Inouye:
Thank you Director Carey and thank you to all of our speakers. Operator if we can go ahead and open it up or if you could provide the instructions for how folks can ask questions.
Coordinator:
Thank you. We will now begin the Question and Answer session. If you would like to ask a question please press Star 1 to unmute your phone and record your name clearly. If you need to withdraw your question press Star 2. Again to ask a question please press Star 1.
Our first question comes from Julia Edwards with Reuters – your line is open.
Julia Edwards:
Hi, thank you. I was wondering if you could quantify how many refugees or how refugees were not considered after the additional screening procedures that were put in place by Congress at the end of last year? Or was there anyone who was ruled out as a result of this additional screening measures being put in place?
Leon Rodriguez:
I think that the screening measures were never actually voted into effect that you’re discussing, so when I talk about screening measures they’re basically the ones that we apply as our part of our ordinary process – that is joined between USCIS, State Department, the law enforcement intelligence community partners. And again what I would say is based on that screening – just speaking to the Syrian case, you know, hundreds – I wouldn’t be able to put a specific number on it now but hundreds have been denied.
There are even larger numbers of individuals who go on hold because concerns have been raised or – and also individuals who are denied on a credibility basis because our officers determined that there are concerns about the accounts that they’re given when we interview them.
Coordinator:
Our next question comes from Julie Davis with the New York Times. Your line is open.
Julie Davis:
Hi there. Well I was hoping you could be more specific about how many of the Syrian applicants had been denied because of the information that was found on the databases or put on hold because of credibility concerns. It sounds like you don’t have those numbers now. Would that be something you could get to us after the call potentially?
Leon Rodriguez:
Yes we can see if we can get you those numbers. Again what I will share are those numbers are large. When we’re talking still about, you know, we’re talking about 8,000 who have been cleared for admission this year we’re still talking about a substantial number who have either been denied or held because of these types of concerns.
Julie Davis:
Okay and also I’m wondering whether you can say, based on the up-ticks that you described, just in May, June, July – I assume August, you’re expecting will be the same if not larger in terms of refuge – Syrian refugees resettled. Do you expect that to continue rising into fiscal 2017, and do you have any estimate at all of how many Syrian refugees you may be looking at welcoming as a result of this surge in the next, you know, after the fiscal year ends?
Leon Rodriguez:
Actually I’m going to share a little bit more of an answer to your first question and I think I’m going to defer to my State Department colleagues. So our approval rates are 80%, denial rate is 7%, and the balance is hold – that kind of reflects the overall universe. So, you know, I can’t give you specific numbers that reflects about our clip of approvals denials and holds.
Julie Davis:
Got it.
Leon Rodriguez:
And Anne I’m wondering if you want to – I don’t know if you’re in a position to talk about next year or not…
Anne Richard:
Well just to say the current pace of arrivals will continue through the end of this fiscal year so we may exceed 10,000 and for next year we will continue to welcome large numbers of Syrians, but it’s too soon to have a target figure established.
Coordinator:
Thank you. And our next question comes from Jared Goyette with PRI. Your line is open.
Jared Goyette:
Hi I was just wondering if you could provide any detail to the I-130 program and if that’s had any impact in terms of the numbers of, you know, the number of Syrian refugees coming in – that’s of course the family petition? Thank you.
Anne Richard:
No we don’t have numbers for you for this call but we can follow-up on that after the call.
Jared Goyette:
Okay thanks.
Coordinator:
The next question comes from Nick Ballasy with PJ Media News your line is open.
Nicholas Ballasy:
Thanks for taking the question. My first – the first part of my question is among the applications for refugee status that have been denied, you said some of them were denied – was it because of national security or terrorism issues? And then the second part of my question is as you know, if you’re applying for legal status by marrying a US citizen or in a different category, you have to prove you have the financial support and you’re not a public charge and you also have to pay thousands of dollars in fees for those applications.
Why are refugees treated differently than people seeking legal status in the United States through the legal immigration process?
Leon Rodriguez:
Sure, this is Leon Rodriguez and I’ll invite my colleagues to chime in as well. You know, the fact is that refugees are refugees because they’re often coming out of war-torn countries or countries devastated in some other way. Frequently individuals have been living away from their countries without any means of securing a livelihood, or in many cases when we’re talking about Syrians, of having their children educated. So more typically individuals do not have the economic wherewithal. It’s also – frankly it’s a statutory decision that was made. We do not have authority to charge any kind of fee for refugees – it’s not a legal authority that we have.
Nicholas Ballasy:
And then the issue of the denied applications, was the reason for any of those denials national security or…
Leon Rodriguez:
Yes.
Nicholas Ballasy:
…(test) and concerns?
Leon Rodriguez:
Yes.
Shin Inouye:
All right (Sheila) if you could move to the next question please?
Coordinator:
Absolutely and as a reminder if you would like to ask a question you can press Star 1 on your phone and record your name when prompted. Our next question comes from Lauren Ashburn with EWTN. Your line is open.
Lauren Ashburn:
Thank you very much and thank you for taking my call. The percentage of those Syrian refugees who have been let into the country – what percent are Muslims? Do you have that breakdown?
Anne Richard:
Yes, most are Muslims over 99% are Muslims. [At least she is being honest! But, the reporter wasted her question because that information is readily available elsewhere.—ed]
Lauren Ashburn:
And then what percent are of religious (execution) are fleeing (because they) say religious persecution?
Anne Richard:
I don’t have that breakdown for you.
Lauren Ashburn:
Okay and then you mentioned, Secretary Carey – you mentioned that 82% are self-sufficient at the end of 180 days and I was wondering how long do the rest of them stay on benefits? How long do you extend the benefits?
Robert Carey:
The benefits access depends on the category. There are some individuals for whom, you know, refugee cash assistance can be extended for up to eight months for certain individuals, and then others may be eligible for mainstream benefits if they fit the qualifications.
Lauren Ashburn:
Okay, thanks.
Coordinator:
Our next question comes from (Esa Gomez) with ABC News. Your line is open.
(Esa Gomez):
I was wondering out of the 8,000 of the admitted refugees how many of them were children?
Anne Richard:
I should – we should have that number for you. Seventy eight percent were women and children and the number of children we’ll have to get you but let’s see – nearly – let’s see, 4,576 were under 18 – just a little under half female and roughly half male of the children. [Does this really give us any comfort when we know it is the Somali “children” who grew up in America that have been the most radicalized of the Muslim migrants?—ed]
(Esa Gomez):
Is that of the children or women and children?
Anne Richard:
So the first number I gave you the 78% were women and children. And then the second that’s 78% out of 8,000. And then the number of children is – or under 18 year olds is 4,576 and they’re roughly half and half men and – girls and boys rather.
(Esa Gomez):
Oh okay, thank you.
Coordinator:
And again as a reminder you can press Star 1 on your phone and record your name if you have a question. One moment please for any additional questions. We are showing no further questions at this time. (Unintelligible)…
Shin Inouye:
(Unintelligible) (a couple). All right, well thank you (Sheila). Thank you all for joining us. As a reminder this call is on the record and without embargo. If you have any additional questions here are the phone numbers for the respective public affairs offices for the participants on the call. The State Department is at 202-647-2492. Once again The State Department is 202-647-2492. USCIS is at 202-272-1200. Once again USCIS is at 202-272-1200. And HHS is at 202-401-9215. Once again HHS is at 202-401-9215. Thank you very much.
Coordinator:
That does conclude today’s conference. Thank you for participating. You may disconnect at this time.
This post is filed in our ‘where to find information’ category, here.
The opening ceremonies of the Olympic Games are always a breathtaking spectacle. With each Olympic experience, one wonders what great technical and artistic miracles special effects technicians will produce for future Olympic ceremonies. This year we were told that we could also look forward to seeing the greatest Olympian of all time, Michael Phelps… the winner of 19 gold medals in previous Olympics… marching at the head of the U.S. contingent, proudly carrying the stars and stripes.
But when the U.S. team entered the stadium we were immediately distracted. There, in the first row of athletes, just off Phelps’ left shoulder, was a young Muslim woman wearing a hijab. What were the chances that, of the 554 members of the U.S. team, the one Muslim athlete on the team would end up marching in the front row? Was it an accident… pure chance? Or was she purposely placed in the front row by U.S. Olympic officials in an excess of political correctness?
It didn’t take long for the young woman, Ibtihaj Muhammad, to answer that question for us. In an interview with the Associated Press, she said,
“I wish that, not just my life, but the lives of Muslims all over the world were a little bit easier, particularly in the United States. I’m hoping that with my first time appearance as a member of Team USA here at the Olympics, I’m hoping that the rhetoric around the Muslim community will change.” She went on to say, “I am excited to represent not just myself, my family, and my country – but also the greater Muslim community.”
A report in the August 8, 2016 edition of Frontpagemag.com, titled “Muslim-American Olympian Criticizes her Country,” explained that, while Michael Phelps was elected by his teammates to carry the American flag, he was pressured to decline the honor in favor of Ms. Muhammad. According to the report, a CNN op-ed piece addressed to Phelps by W. Kamau Bell, suggested, “America has enough tall, successful rich white guys hogging the spotlight,” and that, “Muhammad carrying the flag would be nearly a one-stop inclusion shop.”
One wonders whether Ms. Muhammad has ever expressed concern over the difficulty of everyday life for Christians living in countries with Muslim majorities… assuming they are even allowed to live there. It is difficult to avoid the thought of what fate might have in store for a young Christian or Jewish woman who might go to a Muslim country and complain publicly about her “treatment.”
It was also interesting to ponder the nature of Ms. Muhammad’s sport. Was she a swimmer, a diver, a volleyball player, or a gymnast? We could quickly reject all of those possibilities because of the skimpiness of the costumes worn in those events. Participation in any of those sports would have made her an immediate target of Muslim religious police who might have had her stoned to death for exposing too much of her body. Or they might have ordered her father or a brother to kill her in an “honor killing” for bringing shame upon her family name.
As it turns out, Ms. Muhammad’s sport of choice is fencing. This is understandable because, given the penchant of Muslims for hacking, stabbing, or slashing non-Muslims with knives, axes, machetes, and other sharp instruments, it’s only natural that Ms. Muhammad would gravitate toward the fencing competition. Fighting and attacking others with knives and other sharp objects appears to be in the Muslim DNA.
If Ms. Muhammad is unhappy in America, or made to feel ill at ease, one wonders why she continues to live here. She is certainly free to live in any one of the many majority Muslim countries of the world. She would likely be unable to drive an automobile, go to college, marry the man of her choice, participate in sports, or leave her home without being accompanied by her father or a brother. But what the heck… if that would make her happy then she should go for it. Most Americans would be happy to help defray the cost of a one-way plane ticket to the destination of her choice.
Like most Muslims in the U.S., Ms. Muhammad appears to be upset that she is expected to fully assimilate into American society. It has apparently escaped her attention that, when Germans, Swedes, and Norwegians arrived in America, they made no demands that the people already here must become Lutherans. She is apparently unaware that, when Italians and the Spanish arrived here in large numbers, they made no demands that all Jews and Protestants must convert to Catholicism. And when the British began arriving here in the 16th century, they made no demands that all Native Americans must swear allegiance to the Anglican Church or forfeit their lives. Yet, in the late 20th century and the early 21st century, Muslims emigrating to America arrive here fully convinced that it is their duty to ultimately convert all non-Muslim Americans, and that the U.S. Constitution and U.S. federal and state law should be superseded by Sharia law.
In a July 14, 2016 article in the Washington Times, titled “Deport all Muslims who support shariah law,” former House Speaker Newt Gingrich is quoted as saying that, while all Muslim mosques should be monitored, the American ruling class is afraid to do so. He said, “This is the fault of Western elites who lack the guts to do what is right, to do what is necessary… We better rethink the rules, or we’re going to lose the war.” He concluded by suggesting that we should identify all Muslims who believe in Sharia law over U.S. law and deport those who do.
Gingrich’s politically incorrect suggestion created a firestorm of criticism from liberals and Democrats, much like Donald Trump’s suggestion that all Muslim immigration should be put on hold until we find a way to adequately vet them. What critics fail to understand is that we already have sufficient statutory authority to do exactly as Trump and Gingrich suggest.
For example, every Muslim immigrant who obtains U.S. citizenship though the naturalization process is required to take the statutory citizenship oath, as prescribed by Congress. The oath reads, in part, as follows:
“I hereby declare, on oath, that I absolutely and entirely renounce and abjure all allegiance and fidelity to any foreign prince, potentate, state, or sovereignty, of whom or which I have heretofore been a subject or citizen; that I will support and defend the Constitution and laws of the United States of America against all enemies, foreign and domestic; that I will bear true faith and allegiance to the same… and that I take this obligation freely, without any mental reservation or purpose of evasion; so help me God.”
EDITORS NOTE: As Hawaii this week celebrates its statehood, it’s worth remembering that the archipelago was once staunchly Republican territory. In fact, it was southern Senate Democrats who blocked its statehood for decades over fears that the minority-majority state would elect two senators who would tip the balance in the civil rights debate.
Therefore, Hawaii’s prospects at statehood were tied to Alaska’s, which many thought would be more Democratic. They would only be admitted as a package deal – a modern day Missouri Compromise of sorts. As Hawaii Free Press reporter Ryan Yasukawa explained in a 2009 article, “The state of Hawaii being the
50th state and not the 49th is no coincidence.”
“With a Republican President Eisenhower and Democratic majority in Congress, Democrats first sent an Alaska bill to the president to see if he would sign the bill admitting a state which at the time was expected to elect two Democrat senators. If Eisenhower signed the Alaska bill, a Hawaii bill would be sent up thereafter.”
It was an unjust reality for the island territory. Hawaii had 499,000 people in 1950 (more than Wyoming’s 290,000 or Nevada’s 160,000) while Alaska had only 128,000. “Hawaii also had a competent private sector economy (tourism) while Alaska’s economy was government-dependent,” Michael Barone told me an email. “Nevertheless, Hawaii subordinated its case to Alaska.”
With fervent opposition from leading Democrats such as Sens.William Fulbright (Ark.), Albert Gore Sr. (Tenn.), Sam Ervin (N.C.) and Richard Russell (Ga.), it’s understandable that Hawaii favored Republicans. But Barone explained that southern Democratic segregationalists were not the only reason why Hawaii was traditionally Republican.
The following remarks were made by Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. on Thursday, September 17, 1959 at the Hawaii House of Representatives 1959 First Special Session:
“Mr. Speaker, distinguished members of the House of Representatives of this great new state in our Union, ladies and gentlemen:
It is certainly a delightful privilege and pleasure for me to have this great opportunity and, I shall say, it is a great honor to come before you today and to have the privilege of saying just a few words to you about some of the pressing problems confronting our nation and our world.
I come to you with a great deal of appreciation and great feeling of appreciation, I should say, for what has been accomplished in this beautiful setting and in this beautiful state of our Union. As I think of the struggle that we are engaged in in the South land, we look to you for inspiration and as a noble example, where you have already accomplished in the area of racial harmony and racial justice, what we are struggling to accomplish in other sections of the country, and you can never know what it means to those of us caught for the moment in the tragic and often dark midnight of man’s inhumanity to man, to come to a place where we see the glowing daybreak of freedom and dignity and racial justice.
People ask me from time to time as I travel across the country and over the world whether there has been any real progress in the area of race relations, and I always answer it by saying that there are three basic attitudes that one can take toward the question of progress in the area of race relations. One can take the attitude of extreme optimism. The extreme optimist would contend that we have come a long, long way in the area of race relations, and he would point proudly to the strides that have been made in the area of civil rights in the last few decades. And, from this, he would conclude that the problem is just about solved now and that we can sit down comfortably by the wayside and wait on the coming of the inevitable.
And then segregation is still with us. Although we have seen the walls gradually crumble, it is still with us. I imply that figuratively speaking, that Old Man Segregation is on his death bed, but you know history has proven that social systems have a great last-minute breathing power, and the guardians of the status quo are always on hand with their oxygen tents to keep the old order alive, and this is exactly what we see today. So segregation is still with us. We are confronted in the South in its glaring and conspicuous forms, and we are confronted in almost every other section of the nation in its hidden and subtle forms. But if democracy is to live, segregation must die. Segregation is a cancer in the body politic which must be removed before our democratic health can be realized. In a real sense, the shape of the world today does not permit us the luxury of an anemic democracy. If we are to survive, if we are to stand as a force in the world, if we are to maintain our prestige, we must solve this problem because people are looking over to America.
MLK and other civil rights leaders wear lei on 1965 march from Selma to Montgomery, Alabama.
While on the 1965 march from Selma to Montgomery, marchers wore leis to symbolize their peaceful intentions.
Just two years ago I traveled all over Africa and talked with leaders from that great continent. One of the things they said to me was this: No amount of extensive handouts and beautiful words would be substitutes for treating our brothers in the United States as first-class citizens and human beings. This came to me from mouth of Prime Minister Nkrumah of Ghana.
Just four months ago, I traveled throughout India and the Middle East and talked with many of the people and leaders of that great country and other people in the Middle East, and these are the things they talked about: That we must solve this problem if we are to stand and to maintain our prestige. And I can remember very vividly meeting people all over Europe and in the Middle East and in the Far East, and even though many of them could not speak English, they knew how to say ‘Little Rock.’
And these are the things that we must be concerned about – we must be concerned about because we love America and we are out to free not only the Negro. This is not our struggle today to free 17,000,000 Negroes. It’s bigger than that. We are seeking to free the soul of America. Segregation debilitates the white man as well as the Negro. We are to free all men, all races and all groups. This is our responsibility and this is our challenge, and we look to this great new state in our Union as the example and as the inspiration. As we move on in this realm, let us move on with the faith that this problem can be solved, and that it will be solved, believing firmly that all reality hinges on moral foundations, and we are struggling for what is right, and we are destined to win.
We have come a long, long way. We have a long, long way to go. I close, if you will permit me, by quoting the words of an old Negro slave preacher. He didn’t quite have his grammar right, but he uttered some words in the form of a prayer with great symbolic profundity and these are the works he said: ‘Lord, we ain’t what we want to be; we ain’t what we ought to be; we ain’t what we gonna be, but thank God, we ain’t what we was.’ Thank you.”
At the conclusion of his address, there was much applause.
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EDITORS NOTE: Photos: MLK in Hawaii 1959. PDF: Hawaii House Blog.
SARASOTA, FL. – The Muslim Charity Helping Hand for Relief and Development (HHRD) has a YouTube video on the Islamic Circle of North America Central Florida channel. The video is titled HHRD Orphan Aid Event In Sarasota FL Masjid:
The HHRD website lists the Islamic Circle of North America as one of its “partners.” Other Florida based partners include: The Islamic Society of Sarasota & Bradenton, Inc., FL, and the School of Islamic Studies of Broward, Inc. FL,
The Investigative Project on Terrorism reports:
The Islamic Circle of North America (ICNA) is preaching a global Caliphate and Islamic Shari’a law over America to its members, according to the 2010 ICNA Member’s Hand Book. This is a very different message than the group’s public outreach efforts, and contradicts claims that the organization is a tolerant, mainstream Islamic group.
As the hand book spells out, the organization’s ultimate goal is “the Establishment of Islam” as the sole basis of global society and governance. It also encourages members to deceive people in its proselytizing campaign to help fulfill this goal. This aim is one that ICNA has been actively pursuing as the group has set its sights on America’s constitutional separation of religion and state.
[ … ]
As the hand book explains, ICNA doesn’t just believe that religion is a private affair. “Establishment of the Religion” extends beyond the individual and family and into the society, state, and world. “These words [Establishment of the Religion] include not only practicing the religion in individual and collective life and propagating its true teaching to others, but also striving to make this Deen [religion] a way of life for all,” the hand book reads.
In a September 2013 article titled Helping Hand honored despite close ties to a Hamas-funding Pakistani charity, Money Jihad reports:
Charity Navigator, a leading evaluator of nonprofit groups in the U.S., has published 15 different “top 10” lists to help donors assess charities. Among those lists is a list of 10 charities with low overhead costs that rely on private donations. Helping Hand for Relief and Development, a Michigan-based Islamic charity, ranks seventh on that list.
Charity Navigator does not appear to have factored in Helping Hand’s ongoing cooperation (see here and here) with the Al-Khidmat Foundation, a Pakistani charity which gave a 6 million rupee check to Hamas leader Khaled Meshaal in 2006.
The Pakistani tie-in is even more alarming considering that the auditing firm that prepared Helping Hand’s financial statement for 2011, the most recent year available, divulged that “We did not audit the financial statements of the Organization’s operations in Pakistan which reflect total assets and revenues constituting 55 percent and 60 percent, respectively, of the related consolidated totals.”
[ … ]
The Muslim advocacy group ICNA has also congratulated Helping Hand for the rating in a press release. But the ICNA statement should be taken with a grain of salt because 1) ICNA is a partner organization with Helping Hand, and 2) ICNA has received a loan from Helping Hand with favorable financing terms. ICNA’s indebtedness to Helping Hand was not disclosed in the press release.
Read more.
As Floridians across the state attend memorial services honoring the fallen on the 15th anniversary of the 9/11/2001 attack, perhaps it is best to understand that Islam and its teachings are alive and well in the Sunshine State.
The same ideology that led Mohammed Atta to fly a plane into the World Trade Center is the same ideology that led Omar Mateen, a Muslim who pledged allegiance to the Islamic State, to slaughter 49 at the Pulse gay night club in Orlando, Florida.
Nothing has changed.
Signs of the cultural schisms and declining love of country that are the chief legacy of the Obama presidency are all around us. And while not the most serious, one of the most unfortunate and pathetic is that Americans can no longer agree that a fellow patriot’s gold medal at the Olympics is something to be celebrated. At least not when the gold involves pulling a trigger.
Nineteen-year-old Virginian Ginny Thrasher became the first gold medalist of the 2016 Summer Olympiad last Saturday, winning the women’s 10-meter air rifle competition in an upset over heavily-favored China, whose competitors in the event have six prior Olympic medals between them.
Ginny’s is a classic Cinderella story of a young athlete ascending to the top of her sport in her very first Olympic appearance. And while her stiffest competition have long been dominating international matches, Ginny’s first exposure to the shooting sports occurred only few years ago, on a hunting trip with her grandfather. Taking her first whitetail proved to be a formative experience for Ginny, as the then-figure skater began devoting her full competitive energies to marksmanship.
Fortunately, in addition to her grandfather, she had support and training from her father, who is retired from the U.S. Air Force. She also had ready access to firearm safety training and scholastic shooting programs at two public institutions, West Springfield High School and perennial NCAA shooting standout West Virginia University. During her freshman year last season at WVU, Ginny won the individual small-bore and air rifle titles, paving her way to national prominence and a place on the U.S. shooting team.
Ginny’s story could only be written in America, where firearms are woven into the fabric of ordinary life and where even a suburban teenage girl can find top notch marksmanship training and support right in her own neighborhood.
“I am so proud of being American,” she told ABC News. “I am so proud to stand on that podium, to listen to my nation’s anthem and to just be able to represent, and start off this Rio 2016 games on such a positive note.”
Now it’s no surprise that the chattering classes from abroad haven’t been as enthusiastic in embracing Ginny as the vast majority of Americans. Gun-hating Piers Morgan, a sterling example of why the British Empire has declined so precipitously, weighed in early with his mockery. “LEAST SURPRISING BREAKING NEWS EVER,” he tweeted, “America’s 1st Olympic Gold Medal is for Shooting. #Thrasher.”
But it’s disappointing that antigun politics prevent even some Americans from celebrating their countrywoman’s outstanding accomplishment. Wil Wheaton (yes, we checked, and apparently he’s a celebrity of sorts), reacted to Ginny’s win with this tweet: “America’s first gold medal in the 2016 Olympics was won by a teenager for shooting. Because we now live inside @TheOnion.”
The Twittersphere featured a number of similar comments, albeit many by people who have no public persona or whose public persona is even more obscure than Wil Wheaton’s.
And the Washington Post, in an otherwise relatively straightforward profile of the golden girl, nevertheless could not help commenting on her “menacing name” and “high-powered, German-made weapon.”
In that regard, the Post was wrong on everything except the origin of Ginny’s Feinwerkbau 700. While it was made in Germany, it’s basically a more sophisticated version of the pellet guns many American children grow up with and use to learn the fundamentals of safe shooting and gun handling. It is designed specifically for marksmanship competitions, not as a weapon. And propelling a .177 caliber pellet at a maximum velocity of 570 feet per second, it’s not even especially powerful by air gun standards. What distinguishes it most is its pinpoint accuracy at competition range, something that only really matters in the hands of an expert user like Ginny Thrasher.
Simply put, any suggestion that Ginny’s participation in elite shooting competition on behalf of her university and country somehow promotes a “culture of violence” or firearm-related crime is like suggesting that the Olympic torch should be faulted for contributing to global warming.
Indeed, a variety of shooting sports have a long-established history in the Olympic Games. And for good reason. Many traditional Olympic events are rooted in disciplines that have a martial pedigree, including biathlon, wrestling, boxing, archery, javelin, and equestrian events. Yet according to the International Olympic Committee’s charter:
“The goal of Olympism is to place sport at the service of the harmonious development of humankind, with a view to promoting a peaceful society concerned with the preservation of human dignity.”
In other words, the Olympics provide a forum for countries to contend with one another in contests of strength, courage, precision, speed, and skill, but without bloodshed and with the goal of mutual elevation, not conquest or subjugation.
That’s a pretty intuitive concept for most people to grasp.
As for Ginny, she’s not letting ginned up “controversies” interfere with the achievement of her Olympic dreams. You don’t become Olympic shooting champion, after all, if you are easily distracted. Rather than focus on polemics, Ginny said, “I just tried to focus on the competition.”
That’s what makes Ginny an international winner and an American success story.
And while most Americans will continue to embrace her as a hero, her detractors on Twitter will no doubt keep making fools of themselves, 140 characters at a time.
I met Donald Trump seven years ago at his Mir-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach,Florida. I was there with friend to raise money to fight what we saw as the growing threat of radical Islam in the Middle East and the potential of that ideology coming to America.
I was standing in the foyer of Mir-a-Lago when Mr. Trump came in. He greeted staff and then came over to us and introduced himself. He then asked what was going on in the room where my friend was speaking to donors about the growing threats from Islamic militants. Hearing this Mr. Trump then entered the room, walked to the front and took the microphone from my friend.
Mr. Trump then gave a 15 minute impromptu analysis of why the Middle East was important to American foreign policy, the threat of radical Islam and what America needed to do to contain the threat. After his remarks those in the room, consisting of major donors and activists, gave Mr. Trump a standing ovation. Upon leaving the room Mr. Trump wrote a check to help our cause to expose the threat of radical Islam to Western civilization.
Mr. Trump returned to talking with staff as if they were his family.
BTW, Rudy Giuliani walked into the estate and Mr. Trump and America’s Mayor had breakfast.
That is my personal one-time experience with Donald Trump. It is a lasting one.
Perhaps one needs to understand what is in Mr. Trump’s heart. Hat tip to World New Politics for exposing how Mr. Trump is a man with a big heart. This report shows the character of the man who I met seven years ago.
In 1997, Trump defied societal conventions when he purchased his Mar-a-Lago estate in Palm Beach, Florida and converted it into a private club.
Folks, I am sick of being told by people on our side to walk-on-eggshells when pushing back against Leftist activist’s super aggressive attacks on our traditions, values and heroes. Consequently, we continue to allow Leftists to demonize good guys and urinate on everything Americans have held dear for decades. Whenever we say no to Leftist’s attacks on our culture, the mainstream media runs to attack us with the Left’s red-hot branding iron. They burn an “H” in the middle of your forehead, marking you a hater.
Case in point: The horrific epidemic of assassinations of police caused by Black Lives Matter have inspired me to produce a Blue Lives Matter Rally: Honoring America’s Police – our brave men and women in blue. Can you believe that Leftists say celebrating our police is hateful? A few fearful conservatives have told me they want nothing to do with my rally. This is yet another example of how far we have fallen, allowing ourselves to be intimidated and controlled by evil.
You are probably as sick of hearing me state the following truth as I am sick of having to say it. Black Lives Matter was founded on a lie. Their lie says Michael Brown was murdered by a racist white cop while Michael had his hands up, pleading with the officer not to shoot him. The truth is Michael Brown was a 6 foot, 300 pound criminal. Brown was shot while attacking Officer Wilson inside his patrol car attempting to take his gun.
And yet, Obama, mainstream media, Hollywood and the Democrat party, all continue to do their part to promote the “hands up, don’t shoot” lie. Despite Black Lives Matter boldly declaring it open season on killing whites and police, Obama honored the hate group at the White House. Obama even praised them for their “outstanding work”. http://bit.ly/1Qv2H9W
The Democrat National Convention featured Michael Brown’s mom as a speaker, in essence, sending out a clarion call to young blacks across America to keep ambushing and assassinating cops.
Meanwhile, some conservatives caution me not to produce an uplifting family event honoring cops because Leftists will deem the event hateful. It’s a crazy world we are living in folks.
Folks, I realize that bad cops exist, just as there are bad apples in every profession. For crying out loud, Jesus had 12 disciples and one of them was a fraud; Judas. Stats confirm that most cops are good guys daily laying their lives on the line to protect and defend us.
This experience I had as a black youth involving white cops bears repeating.
It was the 1970s. My black cousin had a nervous breakdown. His wife called me to their home. My 6 foot, over 200 pound, cousin held his two toddler sons hostage in his basement. He was an emotional wreck, crying while threatening to murder his boys and himself.
Two white Baltimore cops arrived first on the scene. One officer was young and energetic. The other was older, much slower and obese. The veteran cop struggled up the 8 front steps and hobbled into their row house to the basement doorway. After catching his breath, with wisdom and compassion, the cop reasoned with my cousin. “C’mon son, I know how you feel. But you do not want to do this.” Remarkably, my cousin surrendered to the fatherly cop. He did not spend a long time, if any time, in jail. My cousin is alive and well today.
Heather Mac Donald is author of, “The War on Cops: How the New Attack on Law and Order Makes Everyone Less Safe.”
Mac Donald’s research has revealed that no government agency is more committed to saving black lives than police; saving tens of thousands of minority lives since the mid-1990s.
Folks, the truth is blacks pose the biggest threat to black lives. So many black men have been killed by other blacks in 2012 alone that it would take cops 40 years to match the number.
Incredibly, the mainstream media basically ignored a mob of Black Lives Matter activists marching down a NY street boldly chanting, “What do we want? Dead cops! When do we want it? Now!”
“But no Lloyd, having a rally honoring cops may anger Black Lives Matter. The media will spin it as a hate event.” Folks, we must counter evil with good.
I have booked the Ocean Convention Center in Daytona Beach Florida for a Blue Lives Matter Rally to honor America’s police, our brave men and women in blue. The date is Saturday, September 10th. The time is 11am to 2pm.
I hope to book Heather Mac Donald to speak and numerous other celebrities. Celebs who cannot physically attend will send their message on video. I plan to do a brief tribute to each officer who has been assassinated by BLM thugs.
I originally planned to have a black choir sing. My black conservative buddy from Racial Policy Center, Mychal Massie scolded me. “Don’t have a black choir. We have enough division. Have a choir of all Americans.” I like that.
It is going to be a great, fun, and uplifting event for the entire family. Hopefully, my buddy from Tim Allen’s Home Improvement TV sitcom, Jimmy Labriola, can come and do his hilarious stand-up act.
I have also asked Victoria Jackson from Saturday Night Live to participate.
We need funding to pull this off. The venue costs $2000. Then, there is the cost of the production company, sound company, house band and etc. Please visit our crowd funding page and give.
“All that is needed for evil to prosper is for good men to do nothing.” Let’s come together and do something good folks.
