Pelosi Is Realizing Impeachment Was a Mistake

/in , , , , /by

America is the midst of an imaginary impeachment standoff between House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell. “Both have drawn firm lines in the sand. Someone’s got to give,” one reporter recently declared.

There is, of course, nothing to “give.” Pelosi has no standing to dictate the terms of a Senate trial; no constitutional right or political leverage. Why she has put herself in a position that will ultimately end, one way or another, with her surrendering to McConnell is perplexing.

A new piece in Time magazine does shed some light on the thought process behind Pelosi’s decision to refuse to hand over articles of impeachment to a Senate whose majority doesn’t want them.

One of the most interesting nuggets in the piece isn’t that Pelosi—portrayed as courageous risk-taker—had gotten the bright idea from CNN; it’s that she specifically got it from noted felon John Dean, Nixon’s former White House lawyer.

In these trying times, we must turn to the greatest document in the history of the world to promise freedom and opportunity to its citizens for guidance. Find out more now >>

Now, Dean is often portrayed as a patriotic, whistleblowing impeachment expert—which is true insofar as he planned the Watergate coverup, and then informed on everyone whom he conspired with after they were caught.

His real expertise is cashing in on criminality for the past 50 years.

Surely Pelosi, blessed with preternatural political instincts, wouldn’t rely on Dean’s advice? Surely Pelosi wasn’t browbeaten into doing this by podcast bros and talking heads on America’s least popular major cable news network?

Because whatever you make of the case against President Donald Trump, it’s getting increasingly difficult to argue that this amateurish, constantly shifting effort by the House has been effective.

After two dramatic emergency impeachment hearings, a pretend standoff, and massive cooperative coverage from the media, poll numbers haven’t budged. They may even have ticked back toward Trump.

Yet, to hear Time tell it, Pelosi has micromanaged every step of this process, from signing off on every committee report and press release— “aides say she caught typos in the Intelligence Committee’s final report before it went out”—to picking furniture that would make Rep. Adam Schiff, D-Calif., and the more diminutive Rep. Jerry Nadler, D-N.Y., look like equals.

My working theory is this: Pelosi realized that impeachment was a mistake. She didn’t want the president to be able to tell voters that he had been exonerated by the Senate.

The only way to mitigate the damage was to undertake a ham-fisted effort to attack the Senate trial and dampen, or perhaps circumvent, that inevitable moment.

In the process, however, Pelosi destroyed the Democrats’ justification for rushing impeachment in the first place. Nadler and Schiff both argued that Trump’s tenure in office constituted a national emergency, and that the only way to save the republic from another stolen election was to move quickly.

McConnell, on the other hand, had to take only a short break from confirming judges to inform the House that the Senate would treat the impeachment of Donald Trump the same way it treated the impeachment of Bill Clinton—with a rules package that passed 100-0 in 1998.

Under the Clinton precedent, the Senate would allow both the House impeachment managers and Trump’s lawyers to make their case, with questions from the Senate to follow.

Pelosi’s defenders are running out of arguments. Washington Post blogger Jennifer Rubin now says that acting on the Clinton precedent means that moderate Republican senators such as Susan Collins of Maine “will face the real possibility that conclusive evidence of Trump’s wrongdoing will come to light after a sham trial. That would make for a disastrous, humiliating legacy.”

The gaping hole in this argument, and the reason Democrats are losing the debate, is that they’ve already claimed to have conclusive evidence of Trump’s wrongdoing. They claimed they had proof of bribery, but they didn’t include it in the impeachment articles. They claimed to have proof in the Mueller report that Trump obstructed justice, yet it’s not in the articles of impeachments either.

Rubin herself has alleged, dozens of times, that we already have definitive proof Trump has committed an impeachable offense.

In truth, if the House had made a persuasive case, there would be public pressure on Republicans to act in a different manner. That the House did not is the only reason Pelosi embraced Dean’s silly idea—which has drastically backfired.

COPYRIGHT 2020 CREATORS.COM

COMMENTARY BY

David Harsanyi

David Harsanyi is a senior writer at National Review and the author of “First Freedom: A Ride through America’s Enduring History With the Gun, From the Revolution to Today.” Twitter: .

RELATED ARTICLE: Trump: Impeachment ‘Should Not Even Be Allowed to Proceed’

A Note for our Readers:

This is a critical year in the history of our country. With the country polarized and divided on a number of issues and with roughly half of the country clamoring for increased government control—over health care, socialism, increased regulations, and open borders—we must turn to America’s founding for the answers on how best to proceed into the future.

The Heritage Foundation has compiled input from more than 100 constitutional scholars and legal experts into the country’s most thorough and compelling review of the freedoms promised to us within the United States Constitution into a free digital guide called Heritage’s Guide to the Constitution.

They’re making this guide available to all readers of The Daily Signal for free today!

GET ACCESS NOW! >>

EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Signal column is republished with permission. All rights reserved.

Antifa Violence Talk Cancelled Due to . . . Threat of Antifa Violence

/in , , , , , /by

The University of British Columbia cancelled a talk on Antifa violence by conservative journalist Andy Ngo due to the (wait for it) threat of Antifa violence.

The event, planned for January 29 and sponsored by the Free Speech Club, was originally given the go-ahead, but the university reversed its decision on December 20, citing safety and security concerns.

Antifa is a violent, Far Left protest group. Their activists are aptly described by The Epoch Times, which reported that the university is now being threatened with legal action due to the cancellation:

“Antifa activists are self-described communist anarchists who have used vandalism, physical violence, threats, and even blockades to shut down events or protest opinions they oppose. They typically dress in black, sometimes carry clubs, and wear masks to hide their faces.”

Ngo is no stranger to Antifa violence, having been the brunt of a number of brutal attacks by the group’s “activists,” one of which landed him in the hospital with a brain bleed.

Last weekend in Seattle, Antifa activists assaulted conservative reporter Elijah Schaffer, a BlazeTV contributor and host of the show “Slightly Offens*ve,” when Schaffer tried to prevent an Antifa protester from grabbing a camera from one of his producers.

The Justice Centre for Constitutional Freedoms (JCCF) demanded a reinstatement of the event in a letter to UBC president Santa Ono.

“It is an alarming betrayal of the foundational pillar of higher education—the freedom of thought, belief, opinion, and expression. Furthermore, it signals automatic acquiescence to the ‘heckler’s veto,’ which will embolden threats from those who oppose the very notion of free expression,” said Marty Moore, a JCCF lawyer.

Moore also said that cancelling the event a month in advance was unreasonable, considering the fact that “UBC could have taken numerous steps to address any safety concerns, including letting the police deal with anyone making specific threats.”

Ngo acknowledged that UBC’s concerns about Antifa violence were real, but disagreed with their response and the message it sends.

“Violence from left-wing ideologues on campuses is routine,” Ngo said. “The only thing to do is to be brave. The authoritarian Far Left seek power through intimidation, harassment, and violence, if need be. We can’t give them that.”

RELATED STORIES:

Police Stand By While Conservative Reporter Assaulted by Antifa

Conservative Journalist Andy Ngo Suffers Brain Bleed After Attack

Antifa Blocks, Berates Elderly Woman Using Walker

Midwest Grocery Chain Supports Good Values and Great Customer Service

/in , , , , /by

A false narrative among the Left is that you cannot provide great customer service without being “woke” enough. Chick-fil-A discovered this when its recent abandonment of socially conservative charity groups was greeted with dismissal by the radical LGBT group GLAAD. Apparently, in the eyes of the woke Left, being America’s most polite fast-food chain, providing quality food, and putting customers first isn’t good enough if you’re not exactly the right kind of great food provider.

So, Chick-fil-A bailed. But not everyone else has. The Midwest grocery chain Schnucks (4) is expanding its customer service while still supporting the values of The Salvation Army.

Unlike Chick-fil-A, grocery chain Schnucks isn’t abandoning The Salvation Army or its customers. The company has announced the continuation of its charitable partnership with The Salvation Army through a “round-up” donation system where consumers can round purchases to the nearest dollar. Schnucks donated 100 percent of the rounded dollars – over $200,000 in 2018 – to The Salvation Army.

Schnucks’ dedication to charity hasn’t left customers behind. The company is expanding curbside pickup services to 59 stores through a partnership with Instacart. Now customers will be able to shop faster than ever – and they won’t have to worry about the company abandoning their values as Chick-fil-A did.

Schnucks has proven, charity and customer quality can and should go hand-in-hand. Chick-fil-A used to know that – so let’s make sure Schnucks never forgets. Buy from Schnucks to thank them for showing corporate America how to balance profits and principals.

RELATED ARTICLES:

The Company Contrast – Walmart

The Company Contrast – The Home Depot

EDITORS NOTE: This 2nd Vote column is republished with permission. © All rights reserved.

Democratic Socialists Denounce Trump for Killing Iranian Terrorist

/in , , , , /by

“We took action last night to stop a war. We did not take action to start a war.”  – President Donald Trump

“To defeat Islamic extremist terrorism, we must put them on defense. If they are at war against us – which they have declared – we must commit ourselves to unconditional victory against them.” – Rudy Giuliani

“Fighting terrorism is not unlike fighting a deadly cancer. It can’t be treated just where it’s visible – every diseased cell in the body must be destroyed.”  – David Hackworth, former U.S. Army Colonel and military journalist.

“Islam is a political ideology…it definitely hides behind this notion of it being a religion, It’s like cancer…a malignant cancer in this case.”  – Lt. General Michael T. Flynn (RTD)

Where does one even begin to expose the nest of vipers who are out to destroy America’s freedoms, liberties and sovereignty, and to make themselves rich while doing it. I’m not just talking about Islamic terrorism, but about the socialists in our Congress.

The Democratic Socialists and neo-con Trotskyite Republicans (they are Marxists as well) hate President Trump for disrupting their goal of the globalization of America, and the neutralization of her world leadership.  They’d rather have Communist Red China as the world leader and Iranian terrorism (funded by our government via Obama’s gift of billions of taxpayer dollars) than have a president who directs military force at the very head of the Islamic terrorist snake.  That same snake calls America the “Great Satan,” when in fact, they are the barbaric savages who represent the demons of hell.

While Iraqis, American and Iranian-Canadians dance in the street over Soleimani’s death, the Democratic Socialists condemn the fact that Trump and Pompeo protected our embassy and our people, unlike Obama and Hillary in Benghazi.  And Soleimani helped plan the attack on U.S. government facilities in Benghazi.  The U.S. strike also killed Abu Mahdi al-Muhandis, the deputy commander of Iran-backed militias known as the Popular Mobilization Forces.  It was a laser-guided hellfire missile traveling 240 mph that took them out.

The Socialist Democrats, the mainstream media and the neo-cons in the Republican Party deceive Americans with their tongues and pens because they hate the man who has disrupted their globalist plans to ravage this country.  What they fail to understand is that when you wage war on Trump or the American people, Trump is going to wage war back.

Many politicians, both past and present have worked to lay waste to the founding precepts of this nation by those who fought to gain our freedoms.

Political Reactions to Soleimani’s Death

Despite Soleimani’s murder and torture of adults and children, he was lauded by our mainstream media as being “a brilliant military leader.” Fox News contributor Tammy Bruce commented, “Their instinct, like with al-Baghdadi’s death, is to try to cast these individuals as though they were like nice guys or maybe didn’t deserve this.”

Today’s Democratic Party and their cohorts in the media obviously don’t believe in the use of force against America’s enemies; just look at their penchant for open borders.  Their actions lead me and others to believe that the Socialist Democrats cannot be trusted to keep Americans safe.

Rand Paul says Trump should have gotten congressional approval and he disapproves of the GOP praise of terrorist Soleimani’s death.  Really Rand?  Did Obama get permission from Congress to take out bin Laden?  I believe he was lauded for doing so.  And another thing Rand, going to congress would have ended up warning this bloodthirsty terrorist that our military had him targeted.

And yes, there are leaks!

The Gateway Pundit reported that the Deep State is once again trying to damage President Trump with selective leaks to the left-wing media.  “Two ‘sources’ who had intelligence briefings (Obama holdovers) about the strike that killed Iranian military officials leaked portions of the briefings to the New York Times in order to push the narrative that President Trump authorized a drone strike that killed top Iran commander Soleimani with ‘razor thin’ evidence that an attack on American targets was imminent.”

Soleimani authorized and planned the attack on our Iraqi embassy, he was involved in Benghazi, he killed 700 American soldiers, and he murdered a thousand of his own Persians who were peacefully marching in Iran.  Escalating American attacks were planned.

In his testimony last July, U.S. Marine Gen. Joseph Dunford – now chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff – attributed responsibility for over 500 U.S. military deaths to the Islamic Revolution Guards Corps–Quds Force and its commander, Maj. Gen. Qasem Soleimani. These deaths accounted for 14 percent of U.S. combat fatalities in Iraq.

“That blood is on Iran’s hands.”

Ilhan Omar (D-MN) Somali immigrant, suggested that Trump secretly carried out the strike to provide a “distraction” from the upcoming Senate impeachment trial.

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi took a stand for brutal terrorist and Iranian general Qasem Soleimani, scolding President Donald Trump for taking a “disproportionate and provocative” hit on the terrorist.

Speaker Pelosi announced overnight that she plans on taking measures to potentially curb President Trump’s ability to conduct military operations against Iran.  Of course it never bothered her that Obama’s covert drone war comprising 536 strikes against Pakistan, Somalia and Yemen killed between 384 and 807 civilians.

Willard Mitt Romney surprisingly tweeted, “(Soleimani) had the blood of hundreds of American servicemen and women on his hands, and … was doubtlessly planning operations to further harm our citizens and allies. With ever-increasing challenges confronting us in the Middle East, it’s imperative that the U.S. and our allies articulate and pursue a coherent strategy for protecting our security interests in the region.”

Jeh Johnson, Obama’s former Homeland Security Secretary, was interviewed by Chuck Todd on Meet the Press and what he said has been ignored by the rest of the mainstream media.  Johnson said, “If you believe everything that our government is saying about General Soleimani, he was a lawful military objective, and the president, under his constitutional authority as commander in chief, had ample domestic legal authority to take him out without an additional congressional authorization. Whether he was a terrorist or a general in a military force that was engaged in armed attacks against our people, he was a lawful military objective.”  Link

Ahh yes, there’s a new sheriff in town, one who protects his people.

Joe Lieberman, former Senator (D-CT) wrote in Monday’s WSJ, “President Trump’s order to take out Soleimani was morally, constitutionally, and strategically correct.  It deserves more bipartisan support than the begrudging or negative reactions it has received thus far from my fellow Democrats.”

He even asked his fellow Democrats, ““What the hell are you doing? You’re siding with enemies of this country.”

Alan M. Dershowitz, (Democrat) wrote in Monday’s WSJ, “It was an easy call, the strike on Soleimani was lawful.  While reasonable people can debate the wisdom of killing Iranian Maj. Gen. Soleimani, there is little doubt that President Trump acted lawfully, under both domestic and international law in ordering his death.  The president has the constitutional authority to take military actions, short of declaring war, that he and his advisors deem necessary to protect American citizens.  This authority is extremely broad, especially when the actions must, by their nature, be kept secret from the intended target.”

David Petraeus, Obama’s former CIA Director and retired General was interviewed on Face the Nation. He said, “It’s impossible to overstate the significance of the attack that takes out Qasem Soleimani, and the number two militia leader in Iraq as well, who also never dared to set foot in Iraq during the surge after we missed him and he escaped. So, this is bigger than bin Laden. It’s bigger than Baghdadi.”

Reagan and Obama

Ruth King’s blog, Ruthfully Yours, reminds us…

What was the response of President Ronald Reagan to the terrorist bombing of the United States Marine barracks in 1983?

On October 23, 1983  a suicide bomber detonated a truck bomb at a building serving as barracks for the 1st Battalion 8th Marines (Battalion Landing Team – BLT 1/8) of the 2nd Marine Division, killing 220 Marines, 18 sailors and 3 soldiers, making this incident the deadliest single-day death toll for the United States in peacetime. It was no secret that the attack had been carried out by Hezbollah.

Furthermore, the evacuation of the wounded was poorly organized and executed. Trauma centers in Israel, arguably the best in the world and in Cyprus were minutes away by helicopter, but instead transports took them to Europe base hospitals several hours away. A Pentagon commission many years later was critical of those decisions.

Three-and-a-half months after the bombing and after repeatedly pledging not to do so, President Reagan ordered the withdrawal of all U.S. troops from Lebanon. Reagan never retaliated against Hezbollah or their Iranian and Syrian sponsors responsible for the bombings, a position widely endorsed by senior military officials. That’s called cut and run.

President Donald Trump did not do that.

President Obama actually foiled the plan of Israel to assassinate Soleimani in 2015.  Tyler O’Neill of PJ Media writes,

When President Donald Trump gave the order to kill Iran’s Quds Force leader Qasem Soleimani, he not only made an arguably proportionate response to the invasion of the U.S. Embassy this week but he also reversed a policy of the Obama administration. According to a report from 2018, Israel was “on the verge” of assassinating Soleimani in 2015, but Obama’s officials foiled the plan. In fact, they reached out to Iran with news of Israel’s plans.

The Trump administration, on the other hand, gave Israel a green light to assassinate Soleimani, according to a January 1, 2018 report from the Kuwaiti newspaper Al-Jarida. The paper quoted a source in Jerusalem as saying that “there is an American-Israeli agreement” that Soleimani is a “threat to the two countries’ interests in the region.”

Iran’s Threats

Endless provocations and law breaking by the Iranian’s with dozens of recent attacks on Americans was the final straw for our President.  When Iran threatened to attack the White House after America silenced their terrorist leader, the President told them that he has a list of 52 targets in Iran should the Islamic Republic attempt to take revenge on the U.S. for its elimination of Qasem Soleimani.  President Trump did not identify the targets but added that they would be “HIT VERY FAST AND VERY HARD.”

Iran has promised revenge for the death of their terrorist leader.

On January 5, 2020, the Iranian Regime offered an $80 million bounty for anyone who brings in the head of President Donald Trump for killing Qasem Soleimani.

In early 2016, Barack Hussein Obama sent them pallets of cash in unmarked cargo planes totaling $400 million. Tehran then released four Americans who were being held. (payoff) Obama then sent an additional $1.3 billion as payment on “estimated interest” of Iranian cash the U.S. had allegedly been holding since the 70s.  American taxpayer dollars given to Iran by Obama can be used for the bounty on President Trump’s head.

Conclusion

The Democrats, including the 2020 presidential candidates, are now all fearful of retaliation by Iran, claiming Trump has thrown a stick of dynamite into a powder keg. Several of our allies are reacting in the same manner…Germany, England, and France, are showing weakness rather than strength. Little tiny Israel is standing firm with our President.

Our military, at the direction of our Commander in Chief, parted the head of the snake from its terrorist body.  Donald Trump and our military have made the world a safer place. Yet, the Democratic Party refuses to give him kudos; instead, they manufacture fear for the nation claiming the fallout from Soleimani’s death will endanger our nation.

As long as President Trump is in our White House, I’m not worried about Iran.

P.S.  Another year has passed, and donations have helped to keep NewsWithViews up and running.  We thank you and we appreciate everyone’s efforts to keep this amazing site alive and well.  Please consider making monthly donations in any size so that news you’ll never hear from mainstream media will come into your inbox every morning.  You can make donations here, and please, tell your friends to sign up on the home page of NWVs to receive some of the most important news you’ll find anywhere.

© All rights reserved.

Must-watch video: Turns out impeachment wasn’t so ‘urgent’

/in , , , , /by

Where’d the “urgency” go?

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and her fellow Democrats spent months lecturing Americans to take impeachment seriously. They claimed it was a matter of national security—so important, in fact, that it excused rushing a sham “investigation” through the House of Representatives.

It was the fastest impeachment in American history. And now. . . silence.

After months of saying there was no time to waste, Speaker Pelosi pumped the brakes. Rather than delivering the articles of impeachment to the Senate for trial, she’s holding onto them, refusing to name the “managers” whose job will be to make the House Democrats’ case to the Senate.

“I’ll send them over when I’m ready,” Pelosi said today.

This stunt horribly undercuts the Democrats’ case in two big ways. First, it makes a mockery of the Constitution, which unambiguously grants the Senate the “sole power to try all impeachments.” That means Senate leaders are responsible for outlining the process they’ll follow. House leaders got to use their own rules for the impeachment inquiry and vote—they don’t get to decide how the Senate does its job, too.

Second, Pelosi’s stalling confirms the doubts of both House Republicans and Democrats who voted against impeachment: There was no evidence to move forward. Not only did Democrat leaders fail to show that President Donald J. Trump broke the law; their articles of impeachment don’t even allege that he committed a crime. For the first time in history, a President has been impeached for solely political reasons.

Even Senate Democrats are finding it hard to excuse this behavior, and a growing number of them are calling on Speaker Pelosi to end the stalling. It’s easy to see why: If even Democrats can’t take their own impeachment seriously, why should anybody else?

“Send them over”: Dianne Feinstein tells Pelosi to end the delay

Inside look: “Washington tries, and fails, to defend Nancy Pelosi’s failed impeachment strategy”

America is a nation of builders. Bureaucrats shouldn’t hold us back.

Better infrastructure in every community is key to America’s future. The list includes improved roads, bridges, airports, and other major projects that currently have to go through a maze of byzantine regulations to get over the finish line.

President Trump: My Administration is fixing this regulatory nightmare.

Today, President Trump proposed a new rule under the National Environmental Policy Act (NEPA) to ensure our infrastructure can be built in a timely, affordable manner.

“From day one, my Administration has made fixing this regulatory nightmare a top priority,” the President said. “We want to build new roads, bridges, tunnels, highways—bigger, better, faster, and we want to build them at less cost.”

The outdated regulations guiding NEPA haven’t seen a major update of this nature in more than 40 years. President Trump’s proposed rule would establish time limits of 2 years for the completion of environmental impact statements. The average time it takes right now to complete these reviews is nearly 5 years. It can drag on more than 7 years for highways.

President Trump: We’re trimming this daunting permitting process

MORE: “A needed update to the nation’s environmental rules”

MSNBC’s Chris Matthews likens jihad terror mastermind Soleimani to Princess Diana and Elvis Presley [Video]

/in , , , , , , /by

Matthews is of course correct, except for the minor detail that when Soleimani covered “Don’t Be Cruel,” he sang “Be Cruel.”

These people’s intense hatred of President Trump has driven them mad.

“Chris Matthews Compares Soleimani to Elvis Presley and Princess Diana,” by Andrew Kugle, Washington Free Beacon, January 8, 2020 (thanks to the Geller Report):

MSNBC anchor Chris Matthews on Wednesday night compared deceased Iranian terror master Qassem Soleimani to Elvis Presley and Princess Diana.

“When some people die, you don’t know what the impact is going to be. When Princess Diana died, for example, there was a huge emotional outpouring,” Matthews said. “Elvis Presley in our culture—it turns out that this general we killed was a beloved hero of the Iranian people to the point where—look at the people, we got pictures up now—these enormous crowds coming out. There’s no American emotion in this case, but there’s a hell of a lot of emotion on the other side.”

Soleimani led the Quds Force of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps which trained, funded, and armed Iran-sympathetic terrorist groups in Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, and around the Middle East, killing thousands, including hundreds of Americans.

“Should our leaders know what they’re doing when they kill somebody?” Matthews asked Rep. Joaquin Castro (D., Texas).

Castro replied that Trump’s strategy of pulling out of the nuclear deal and putting pressure on Iran has failed.

“They very much could have anticipated that Iranians would react in this way, both the Iranian public but also that the government would strike back,” Castro said. “This speaks to a much larger issue, Chris, which is the president has had a very chaotic and erratic foreign policy, especially with respect to Iran.”…

RELATED ARTICLES:

Sadiq Khan’s London: Islamic Student Association brands US ‘Terrorist State’ at embassy protests

Hamas-linked CAIR claims “discrimination” over Iranian-Canadian complaints about being detained at US border

Soleimani’s Death a Body Blow to the Islamic Republic

EDITORS NOTE: This Jihad Watch column with video is republished with permission. © All rights reserved.

House Democrats Pass War Powers Resolution Criticizing Trump’s Killing of Suleimani

/in , , , , , , /by

The Democrat-controlled House approved a resolution late Thursday aimed at reining in President Donald Trump’s future actions on Iran and condemning him for not notifying Congress before last week’s drone strike that killed an Iranian terrorist leader, who was one of the country’s most senior officials.

The resolution passed 224 to 194, with three Republicans joining the Democratic majority in supporting it and eight Democrats opposed. Rep. Justin Amash of Michigan, a Republican-turned-independent, voted for the symbolic resolution.

“Last week, the Trump administration conducted a provocative and disproportionate military airstrike targeting high-level Iranian military officials, and he did so without consulting Congress,” House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., said on the House floor.

Trump ordered a drone strike that killed Gen. Qassim Suleimani, head of the Quds Force, the terrorist arm of Iran’s Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, on Jan. 3. Suleimani commanded numerous terrorist attacks, which killed about 600 Americans, according to the State Department.

The demand for socialism is on the rise from young Americans today. But is socialism even morally sound? Find out more now >>

“When I first heard from the administration, the secretary of defense and chairman of the Joint Chiefs, I said, ‘Why did you not consult Congress?’” Pelosi said. “They said, ‘Because we had to keep this close.’ You had to keep it close from the ‘Gang of Eight,’ the leadership of Congress?”

The “Gang of Eight” comprises the House speaker and House minority leader, Senate majority and minority leaders, and the chairmen and ranking members of the House and Senate Intelligence committees.

The House on Thursday passed the measure as a concurrent resolution, which means it’s nonbinding and would not be forwarded to the Senate or president—who would be unlikely to sign it anyway—and would not carry the force of law. Rather, it’s a statement by the House against the administration’s action.

“We know full well, better than many in the administration, the importance of classified information,” Pelosi said. “So, who were they keeping it close from? They admitted they were keeping it close from the Congress of the United States.”

The nonbinding resolution was sponsored by freshman Rep. Elissa Slotkin, D-Mich., who has a background with the CIA and the Defense Department.

Sen. Tim Kaine, D-Va., has introduced companion legislation in the Senate. The Senate is controlled by Republicans, where it is unlikely to get a vote.

The War Powers Act is a 1973 law that obligates the president to provide notification to Congress about a military action within 48 hours and gives Congress limited ability to prohibit further action.

During the House floor debate, Trump retweeted former national security adviser John Bolton’s criticism of the War Powers Act, saying he agreed that the law was unconstitutional and should be repealed.

Earlier Thursday, in remarks at the White House, Trump defended the decision to kill Suleimani.

Rep. Mark Meadows, R-N.C., noted that the administration took action to kill a dangerous terrorist and criticized the Democrats who are attacking him for it.

“I never thought that I would hear, on this House floor, an apology to the Iranian people for an action that we took that was justified, taking out a terrorist,” he said.

The North Carolina lawmaker noted the carnage caused by the Iranian general killed in the strike.

We have a gentleman who gave his legs in service to this country, and yet we are apologizing to the Iranians with a nonbinding resolution that is nothing more than a press release.

It has no effect. It doesn’t do anything. … All they are doing is trying to get a press release to keep them from having a primary opponent.

This is a sad, sad day. Yet here we are, having another speech to try to take on the president of the United States for actually taking out a terrorist.

I would ask my colleagues the opposite. How many Americans does a terrorist have to kill before they join with us? Is 600 not enough? Does it have to be 1,000, or 10,000? A million?

At some point, we have to stand up and let the long arm of justice go in and take out these terrorists.

In retaliation for the strike that killed Suleimani, Iran launched missiles at two U.S. military bases in Iraq on Tuesday, but there were no casualties. Trump announced on Wednesday he would be pushing more sanctions on Iran in response to the attack.

COLUMN BY

Fred Lucas

Fred Lucas is the White House correspondent for The Daily Signal and co-host of “The Right Side of History” podcast. Lucas is also the author of “Tainted by Suspicion: The Secret Deals and Electoral Chaos of Disputed Presidential Elections.” Send an email to Fred. Twitter: @FredLucasWH.

RELATED ARTICLE: No, Sen. Mike Lee Isn’t Breaking With the President on Iran. But He Has a Point.

A Note for our Readers:

With the demand for socialism at an all-time high among our young people—our future leaders and decisionmakers—the experts at Heritage stopped and asked a question that not many have asked:

Is socialism really morally sound?

The researchers at The Heritage Foundation have put together a guide to help you and our fellow Americans better understand the 9 Ways That Socialism Will Morally Bankrupt America.

They’re making this guide available to all readers of The Daily Signal for free today!

GET YOUR FREE COPY NOW! >>

EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Signal column is republished with permission. © All rights reserved.

The troubling terminations you’ve never heard of. Not all abortions end an unwanted pregnancy, and that makes a difference to the women

/in , , , , , /by

Does the termination of an unwanted pregnancy harm women’s mental health? No more than giving birth in such circumstances, according to mainstream social scientists and medical associations. Perhaps. But what about women who terminate a wanted pregnancy?

A new study by sociologist Donald Paul Sullins focuses on this neglected minority – about 1 in 7 of reported abortions in the United States – and finds there is no room for complacency about the effects of abortion among them. In the following interview he talks to MercatorNet about this study, the first of its kind, published in November in the Swiss medical journal Medicina.

Golden Globes award winner Michelle Williams more or less shouted her abortion as a good career move that she does not regret. She has a daughter of 14 and is happily pregnant again at age 39. Isn’t Williams living proof of the therapeutic value of abortion?

Ms. Williams’ declaration is very consistent with the results of my study.  The child she aborted clearly was not a wanted pregnancy, and the study found that women who only aborted one or more unwanted pregnancies experienced much lower affective distress (depression, anxiety, suicidality). This is why ignoring wanted pregnancy abortions, acting as if only unwanted pregnancies were ever aborted, tends to understate how much hurt is out there for women after abortion.

There is no question that the chances for advancement in a highly demanding, competitive career often improve by removing inconvenient persons and commitments, whether through divorce, not crediting someone else’s work, character assassination, or– in Michelle Williams’ case — killing an inconveniently conceived child before birth.  Civilized people generally do not boast about exercising such brutal career realpolitik, but Ms. Williams probably (let us hope for her sake) does not comprehend the humanity of the unborn life she took.

She has no way of knowing what the acceptance and love of that terminated life, a close reflection of her own being, may have contributed to her own growth in dignity and humanity.  For all she knows, her career may have been improved, or maybe her career would have suffered but her life and happiness improved. We have no way of knowing what pain and struggle may lie (lay?) behind her defiant public mask.  Why did she feel the need, after announcing her abortion, to reassure her living child of her love for her?  Did she sense that her daughter (and we) may wonder?

In the #MeToo era, it is also appropriate to ask who was the father of the child she felt she needed to abort. Would presenting this man with a child after having sexual relations with him have impeded her career?  Male sexual exploitation does not end just with hurt feelings or degradation for the woman. Perhaps this was not the case for Ms. Williams, but for every actress who found a pregnancy inconvenient to her career there are probably several men in the film industry who have urged or insisted that she obtain an abortion.

The career obstacle for both men and women of having a child at the wrong time is a mirror image of the career and personal obstructions met by women who refuse to have sex with the right men.  Whatever her personal circumstances, Ms. Williams’ statement reflects the typical Hollywood product, in which women’s sexuality exists primarily to service male desire, and women consequently have little agency. As one Hollywood actress (don’t remember who) said of her new boyfriend, voicing a common feeling of young women today, ” I have to give him what he wants, or he will get it somewhere else.”

Even if some women experience mental health problems after an abortion, research seems to show that these are no greater on the whole than those of women who give birth, and that they soon pass away. Have researchers been missing something?

Yes.  Both the idea that mental health problems are not increased by abortion and that they are not reduced by childbearing are myths perpetrated by poor research, in this case studies that follow women for only a very short time, some only a few days and often only a few months. So far, every study that has followed women 10 years or longer post-abortion have reported significant mental health problems, compared to women who give birth.

It is important to note that most of this difference is not due to psychological deficits from an abortion but to psychological benefits from having a child.  In the Add Health data I studied, childbirth reduced mental health risk by 29% following wanted pregnancies and by 12% even with unwanted pregnancies.

The reasons for this defect in the research, I believe, is that most abortion researchers tend to think of an abortion as a detached clinical event, and do not take into account the way that having an abortion, including making the choice and defending it, alters the life course, relationships and outlook of the woman involved.  As I put it in the paper:

“The experience of deciding upon, experiencing, and recovering from the termination of a pregnancy brings many life factors to bear for women, all of which may influence subsequent mental health. For these reasons, it may be more accurate to conceive of an abortion, not as a discrete cause of mental health outcomes (a clinical event), but as one factor in a complex of influences (a life event) that together affect a woman’s level of psychological well-being or distress.”

It seems amazing that yours is the “first study ever” of wanted pregnancy abortions. Surely there is plenty of evidence of them, especially with the increase in terminations for fetal abnormality, and all we hear about #MeToo and domestic violence?

The most influential researchers have simply assumed that only unwanted pregnancies are aborted. Many studies simply define aborted pregnancies as unwanted, even when not preceded by contraception. In 2008 the American Psychological Association (APA) dismissed all wanted pregnancy abortions as due only to fetal abnormality, but (as I show in the study) such abnormalities, even if we could detect them perfectly (we detect only about 60%) and even if all of them were aborted (many are not), could account for only a small proportion of reported wanted pregnancy abortions.  When not forced to check a box on a survey, very few women spontaneously describe their aborted child as “unwanted”. There is almost always a level of ambivalence, regret and resignation, that is expressed in complex feelings about the abortion.

It is difficult for OB/GYNs in other countries to understand the sales-like pressure to have an abortion faced by women in American abortion clinics. The movie “Unplanned” does a good job of illustrating this. The abortion rate in the United States has been much higher than in countries where abortions are performed in public hospitals with no profit incentive. A recent study of Utah clinics found that just a three-day waiting period resulted in 8% of women reversing their initial decision to have an abortion.

There have been one or two studies of fetal abnormality abortions, and studies that have looked at all abortions regardless of pregnancy intention have thereby included wanted pregnancy abortions mixed in with all the others, but mine is the first study of all wanted pregnancy abortions as a distinct category.

In your study, what data and measures did you use and what did they reveal about wanted pregnancy abortions? How serious were the effects compared to giving birth or unwanted pregnancy abortions?

The study examined the National Longitudinal Study of Adolescent to Adult Health (Add Health), which followed a representative cohort of 3,935 ever-pregnant U.S. women from age 15 to age 28, gathering data from three successive interviews. I looked at seven psychological disorders which Add Health measured using criteria from the APA’s Diagnostic and Statistical Manual (DSM): depression, suicide ideation, anxiety, and abuse of or addiction to hard drugs, alcohol, opioids or marijuana.  Mental health was compared both before and after pregnancy, abortion and birth, and was adjusted for 20 covariates that, my previous research had suggested, account for higher mental health problems, apart from an abortion.  These were 1 = childhood physical abuse, 2 = childhood sexual abuse, 3 = childhood verbal abuse, 4 = depression, 5 = anxiety, 6 = suicidal ideation, 7 = alcohol abuse, 8 = drug abuse, 9 = nicotine dependence, 10 = cannabis abuse, 11 = conduct problems in school, 12 = neuroticism, 13 = neighborhood integration, 14 = grade point average (gpa), 15 = ever raped, 16 = relationship satisfaction, 17 = educational attainment, 18 = respondent poverty income, 19 = marital status, and 20 = intimate partner violence.

I found that by age 28, U.S. women who had ever had an abortion of a wanted pregnancy were 84% more likely to experience higher numbers of the seven psychological disorders than were women who had carried all wanted pregnancies to term.  Women who had ever aborted any pregnancy were 74% more likely to experience higher psychological disorders compared to those who had given birth.

Experiencing wanted pregnancy abortion led to higher affective distress (depression, anxiety and suicidality) than abortions of unwanted pregnancies, relative to the corresponding births.  Risk of these psychological difficulties was only 18% higher following abortion of only unwanted pregnancies, but 69% higher following abortion of one or more wanted pregnancies.

What is the significance of your finding about substance abuse?

I was surprised to find that whether an aborted pregnancy had been wanted or unwanted had no effect on post-abortion rates of substance abuse.  Overall, risk of substance abuse (of alcohol, opioids, marijuana, or illegal drugs) was twice as high (elevated 100%) for women following any abortion, but was unaffected by pregnancy intention.  Only a few studies have examined the association of abortion and substance abuse; more study is needed to understand what is going on in this area.

My hunch is that pregnancies that may be subject to abortion and substance abuse reflect risk-taking, self-destructive behavior, and their co-occurrence reflects a system of mutually reinforcing moral hazard.  I hope to explore this idea in a future study.

What is it about the design of your study that gives you confidence in its findings?

By comparison to cross-sectional studies that only take a snapshot of women at a single point in time, my study is more like a series of pictures that can show changes over time. The exact same women were interviewed at three points in time to determine the effect of their prior pregnancy history on their current mental health. Only a handful of abortion studies have used such rigorous longitudinal designs.

In addition, the Add Health data, funded by a consortium of U.S. federal agencies, are widely acknowledged to be among the most comprehensive and accurate in the world. Response rates and follow-up rates are high (over 80%) and the measures are well-designed and independently validated.

Having said that, it is important to acknowledge that no empirical study can offer definitive proof, and this one is subject to several limitations. Most importantly, every study of abortion using population data is limited by the fact that many abortions are not reported, so we can only talk about the abortions we know of. Since a woman who is more troubled by her abortion is less likely to report it, I think my study probably understates the true level of post-abortion distress for U.S. women. Other limitations are discussed in the study.

No doubt the fact that you are a Catholic priest working in a Catholic university will provoke some prejudice against your research, so it is interesting that studies by secular researchers  in Scandinavia and by David Fergusson in New Zealand support your findings. What do their studies show?

Pedersen (studying women in Sweden) and Fergusson found similar problems for women following abortions because they used a similar longitudinal design that followed women for a decade or more after their abortion. Fergusson found that ever-aborting women had 1.4 times higher overall risk (not relative to births) of mental health problems; my study found 1.2 times higher risk.

The similarity has nothing to do with their personal religious or moral convictions about abortion as public policy.  Several recent studies from Finland, by scholars who reflect that culture’s uncontroversial acceptance of abortion as reproductive health care, have found similar persistent problems for post-abortion women, such as a doubled risk of suicide, 25% higher overall mortality, and higher emotional distress among women who wanted to give birth.  This doesn’t reflect an anti-abortion bias, but just the fact that Finland has excellent health registry population data and is able to follow women’s health for a long time to see the outcomes.

Accusing me of anti-abortion bias because I am Catholic reflects a shallow ignorance of the Catholic enterprise.  Many scientists today do not even believe in objective truth, and so cannot imagine someone who does not approach scientific topics with anything more than a narrow ideology to propagate.  It is very true that my faith strongly affects my research, but not in the manner critics think.  The principles of the Catholic faith, out of which modern science developed, call for faithful scientists to be rigorously objective in their research.  Only by looking as hard as I can to find empirical evidence that contradicts the claims of my faith can I then have confidence that any resulting findings which may be consistent with faith-claims have any validity. This process — the logic of the null hypothesis — is not external to the scientific method, but is central to what every scientist should be doing.

There is a great deal of bias in abortion research, but it’s not from the religiously oriented scholars for the most part. The main difference between myself and most scholars who research U.S. abortions is that I am not employed or funded by an abortion provider.  Over 90% of U.S. abortion studies have as one or more co-authors a researcher who works for an abortion provider or a research center funded by an abortion provider. Their assertively benign findings about the experience and effects of abortion are highly self-serving and rarely withstand careful scrutiny.

What, so far, has been the response to your latest study from other researchers?

It is too soon to tell much.  Friendly researchers I know (most, but not all, opposed to abortion) have written words of appreciation and praise, and invited a couple of lectures to explain the findings further.  Pro-life attorneys have been ecstatic. With the study I published a “crosswalk” that addresses some critical responses to a similar earlier study from pro-abortion researchers. I will be interested to see what their eventual responses will be to the measures I took in this study to address those concerns.

COLUMN BY

Rev. Donald Paul Sullins, MDiv., PhD, is a Research Associate Professor of Sociology at The Catholic University of America and Senior Research Associate at The Ruth Institute. He is also Director of the Leo Institute for Catholic Social Research.

Reference: Sullins DP. Affective and Substance Abuse Disorders Following Abortion by Pregnancy Intention in the United States: A Longitudinal Cohort Study. Medicina. 2019 Nov;55(11):741. Available at: https://www.mdpi.com/1010-660X/55/11/741  The article can be freely accessed and reproduced.

RELATED ARTICLES:

Planned Parenthood Sets New Record for Abortions in a Single Year

Why we should respect doctors’ conscientious objections

EDITORS NOTE: This MercatorNet column is republished with permission. © All rights reserved.

NY Times Embarrasses Itself Again – On Iran-9/11 Ties. No wonder the president calls them ‘fake news.’

/in , , , , , /by

The sloppy New York Times is once-again embarrassing itself. In a prominent “fact-check” piece appearing on Friday, cub reporter Zach Montague ripped into Vice President Mike Pence for a series of tweets that described the terror-drenched record of the ex-Quds Force commander, Qassem Suleymani.

At issue was Pence’s account of Suleymani’s links to the September 11, 2001 attacks on America. In one tweet, the vice president noted that Suleymani and his terrorists “assisted in the clandestine travel to Afghanistan of 10 of the 12 terrorists who carried out the September 11 terrorist attacks in the Untied States.

Assisted in the clandestine travel to Afghanistan of 10 of the 12 terrorists who carried out the September 11 terrorist attacks in the United States.

— Mike Pence (@Mike_Pence) January 3, 2020

This prompted the NY Times to snipe, “How Mr. Pence arrived at this number and this account is unclear” since there was nothing in “public United States intelligence” [sic] linking the two, or indeed, anyone in Iran to the 9/11 attacks.

Montague could have consulted former NY Times Philip Shenon, whose 2008 book about the 9/11 Commission reprised a story I revealed several years earlier about the discovery by Commission staff of some 75 highly classified NSA intercepts that spelled out in great detail the help Iran offered al Qaeda in furtherance of the 9/11 plot.

If he had just Googled, “Iran 9/11 ties,” he would have discovered a July 18, 2004 article by Shenon stating that the final report of the 9/11 Commission would include “information drawn from intelligence reports about Iran’s ties to the al Qaeda hijackers.”

He also would have found another New York Times article, this one dated May 20, 2011, about significant new evidence presented to a federal district court in Manhattan by attorneys on behalf of 9/11 victims about Iran’s direct, material assistance to the al Qaeda hijackers and the 9/11 plot.

While still on Google, he would have found additional articles on Iran’s ties to 9/11 in such pro-Trump publications as Time magazine. And others here, here and here.

(Disclosure: I provided expert testimony in the Iran 9/11 case based on debriefings I conducted with defectors from Iranian intelligence who had personal knowledge of Iran’s ties to al Qaeda and specifically to the 9/11 conspiracy; I also provided historical testimony on Iran’s ties to Sunni terrorist groups.)

Ace reporter Montague could have consulted the 9/11 Commission Report itself. On p. 240 he would have read, “we now have evidence suggesting that 8 to 10 of the 14 Saudi “muscle” operatives traveled into or out of Iran between October 2000 and February 2001.”

But Montague is fixated on the numbers. “To start, many observers were quick to point out that 19 terrorists, not 12, were involved in the attacks.”

You read that right: a New York Times reporter really is suggesting that the vice president has no clue how many hijackers were involved in 9/11.

My book, Countdown to Crisis: the Coming Nuclear Showdown with Iran, details what the U.S. knew at the time and what was later learned about Iran’s involvement in the 9/11 plot. In addition to the 8 or 10 muscle hijackers who traveled to and from Afghanistan from Iran under the protection of the Quds Force, other operatives cited in the 9/11 Commission report also traveled to Iran, including a Tawfiq bin Attash, aka “Khallad,” and a German-based operative named Ramzi bin al-Shibi. (Hint: that makes 10 to 12).

How do we know this activity was linked to Qassem Suleymani? Because their travel into and out of Iran was coordinated by an individual identified in the 9/11 Commission report as “a senior operative of Hezbollah,” but who we now know was Imad Mugniyeh, a top lieutenant of Suleymani’s from Lebanon. (Mugniyeh was killed in Damascus in February 2008 and has a rap sheet almost as long as Suleymani’s and Osama bin Laden’s).

Mugniyeh never lifted a finger – not in Iraq, not in Lebanon, or in Syria, or Afghanistan or Iran –  without Suleymani’s approval. I wrote about Mugniyeh and his role in the 9/11 plot in a 2006 profile that appeared in Reader’s Digest, here.

Shortly after the 9/11 attacks, Suleymani and his men established a “rat line” to exfiltrate al Qaeda fighters from Afghanistan to Iran.

Hundreds of al Qaeda fighters lived in Iran for many years after 9/11, including top al Qaeda financiers and members of Osama Bin Laden’s own family, under Suleymani’s control.

The Department of Treasury began exposing Iran’s ties to al Qaeda in 2003, when it sanctioned six al Qaeda members working with Abu Musab al-Zarkowi, who headed al Qaeda in Iraq, another group aided by the Quds Force. On the next-to-last day of the Bush 43 administration, Treasury spelled out al Qaeda’s working relationship with Iran in detail.

So there is lots of evidence that Vice President Pence was 100% right – just none of it accessible to the phony newsmen wearing ideological blinders at the New York Times.

When someone pointed out the Times article to me over the weekend, there was a button labeled “suggest a correction,” so I suggested that the reporter look at p. 240 of the 9/11 Commission report, and to be helpful, included a brief quote.

Since then, the Times has removed the correction button, but has not made any corrections. No wonder the President calls them “fake news.”

RELATED VIDEOS:

Never aired, Donald Trump interview from 1980

IRAN’S ISLAMIC REPUBLIC – 40 YEARS OF TERROR AND CRIME

EDITORS NOTE: This FrontPage Magazine column is republished with permission. © All rights reserved.

And Then There Were None

/in , , , , , /by

In 2008, Abby Johnson, the manager of the Bryan, Texas (100 miles from Houston) Planned Parenthood, became that organization’s Employee of the Year.

By 2009, she quit for conscience’ sake. Why?

That year, for the first time, she saw an ultrasound of an abortion of a 13-week old unborn child in her own clinic. This was not a blob of tissue, a clump of cells, a non-living being. This was a baby that was fighting for his life.

Although Abby Johnson was a good salesman of abortions and thought that she was helping women through her work, seeing that baby fighting for his life caused the scales to fall from her eyes.

Abby says that after she saw that ultrasound,

“I knew that I had been part of a lie. I had been a part of a corrupt system, a corrupt organization, that really preyed upon women in their vulnerable states, and I knew that I needed to leave.”

She has now written a book (with Cindy Lambert) called Unplanned, and PureFlix (“God’s Not Dead”) has now turned that book into an excellent movie.

Abby Johnson has also started an outreach, And Then There Were None (ATTWN), to help abortion workers leave the field. I have interviewed Abby before and have previously written about her story. But here is an update about ATTWN, since I interviewed for Christian television two of her assistants at ATTWN recently.

One of them is Meagan Weber, who told me,

“[Abby] wrote her book hoping that a worker would pick it up as a skeptic and see the truth, and see themselves through her words, and within three months of her book’s release in 2011, she had 17 abortion workers contact her for help.”

In effect, Abby and those 17 workers became the beginning of her work to help transition abortion clinic workers out of the field. Her reasoning is simple. She says in her ATTWN website, abortionworker.com,

“We always say that nobody grows up wanting to work in the abortion industry. Nobody. Our vision statement for ‘And then there were none’ is ‘No abortion clinic workers, no abortion clinics, no abortions’—it starts with the workers. We see ourselves as being part of a pro-love movement. That we want to love these workers out of the clinics. We want to love them to a path of healing, and we want to love them back into a relationship with Jesus Christ.”

As an abortion worker, Abby Johnson had thought that what she was doing at Planned Parenthood was helping women. But she learned the hard way that the real bottom line of Planned Parenthood was its bottom line.

Weber, who serves as Abby Johnson’s Assistant, told me, “They asked her to increase the number of abortions at her facility by half, and so she said, ‘Don’t we tell the media that we want to reduce the number of abortions to make them safe, legal, and rare?’ And her supervisor laughed and said, ‘Well, Abbey, how do you think we make our money?’ And she really was blindsided by that.”

Weber also says, “Leaving your job in the abortion industry is not like leaving your job in a fast food outlet. It has the same high turnover rate, but you don’t just leave your job, you leave your friends, you leave your ideology…you go from one day championing women’s rights and abortion rights to the next day having to humble yourself and say, ‘I was wrong. I was part of a very evil system,’ and they have to come to terms with that. So there is a lot of emotional trauma, and there is abandonment.”

I also have spoken with Laura Ricketts of ATTWN for Christian television. She observed, “As we walk through the process of healing them, as we meet their practical needs with financial assistance, with resume writing, with jobs search help, as we help them pay their bills, get back on their feet, once their practical needs are met, they are ready to meet their emotion and spiritual needs.”

So far the organization has been able to help hundreds of clinic workers get out of the abortion field. Meagan states, “And so here we are seven years later, and we’ve helped 550 workers and 7 full-time doctors.”

The movie alone helped cause about a hundred abortion clinic workers to respond…to consider coming out. Ricketts told me, “I think one of the most exciting things about the movie is the impact it had across the country and now across the world. We saw hearts changed, abortion clinic workers leaving their jobs.”

Abby Johnson says, “My story is really an exposé. It’s pulling back the curtain into an industry that has been normalized. Abortion has been so incredibly normalized in our society, and it’s anything but normal.”

© All rights reserved.

Democrats Grasping At Straws To Impeach Trump Now Regret Banning Straws

/in , , /by

WASHINGTON, D.C.—Democrats desperately grasping at straws to find grounds to impeach and convict Trump announced Tuesday they are now regretting banning plastic straws.

“We started grasping for straws but suddenly realized we had banned them a while back,” a downcast Nancy Pelosi told reporters. “We really should have seen this coming.”

Many congresspeople keep straws on hand for the express purpose of grasping at them. They get them out when they really don’t like a politician on the other side of the aisle and need to find something to condemn him or her for. Sadly, the Democrats banned their straws a while back for using harmful plastics and now have nothing to grasp for.

The Democratic leaders tried to reach for paper straws instead, but they instantly crumbled into a fine powder.

Babylon Bee subscriber John Sherman contributed to this report. If you want to get involved with the staff writers at The Babylon Bee, check out our membership options here!

RELATED SATIRE:

CNN Attacks Babylon Bee: ‘The Internet Is Only Big Enough For One Fake News Site’

Authorities Investigating Dangerous Breach In Hollywood Bubble

Iran Announces They Will Stop Pretending To Follow Nuclear Deal

Michelle Williams: ‘Sometimes You Just Have To Ask Yourself, ‘How Many People Do I Have To Kill To Get An Acting Career?”

‘I Caught My Wife Watching ‘The Last Jedi’—Is This Grounds For Divorce?’

‘It Is More Important To Be Morally Right Than Factually Correct,’ Says Woman Who Is Neither

EDITORS NOTE: This political satire by The Babylon Bee is republished with permission. All rights reserved.

Rep. Jayapal: Trump ‘Recklessly Assassinated’ Iran’s Soleimani

/in , , , , /by

Rep. Pramila Jayapal declared on Wednesday that “there was no raw evidence” of an “imminent threat” to justify killing Iranian terrorism chief Qasem Soleimani, whom President Trump “recklessly assassinated.”

After a classified congressional briefing on the air strike which vaporized Soleimani, Jayapal stated, “President Trump recklessly assassinated Qasem Soleimani. He had no evidence of an imminent threat or attack, and we say that coming from a classified briefing where again, there was no raw evidence presented that there was an imminent threat.”

That’s not what the Pentagon avowed in a statement confirming the death of the terrorist leader: “General Soleimani was actively developing plans to attack American diplomats and service members in Iraq and throughout the region. This strike was aimed at deterring future Iranian attack plans.”

Had former President Obama eliminated Soleimani, Democrats would be praising his bold, decisive strategy. But anything Trump does must be condemned.

Pramila Jayapal

6 Known Connections

Jayapal believes:

  • all women should have not only the right to undergo an abortion at any stage of pregnancy, but also to receive a government subsidy for an abortion if they are in financial need;
  • the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare) should serve as a stepping stone toward the eventual implementation of a government-run healthcare system, which Jayapal describes as “Medicare For All”;
  • all employers, public and private, should be legally required to implement affirmative-action hiring and promotion policies that give preference to nonwhites and women, as compensation for historical injustices;
  • U.S. defense spending should be scaled back dramatically;
  • wealthy people should be required to pay much higher tax rates than those who earn less;
  • voter ID laws are racially motivated attempts to suppress minority voting and should be eliminated.

To learn more, click on the profile link here.

Search our constantly growing database of the left and its Agendas

RELATED TWEET: Watch as Secretary of State Pompeo holds back a laugh when ask if Soleimani was on a peace mission.

EDITORS NOTE: This Discover The Networks column is republished with permission. © All rights reserved.

MAGA Hat-Wearing Teen Just Got a Settlement From CNN. Media: Learn Your Lesson.

/in , , , , /by

While the media often portray themselves as noble guardians of the truth who keep a close watch on those in power, the reality is quite the opposite: It is they who are in power and often swoop down to crush the powerless.

This was the case in the frenzy surrounding Nick Sandmann, a teenage student at Covington Catholic High School who donned a “Make American Great Again” hat and became cast as a national villain overnight.

On Tuesday, Sandmann enjoyed some measure of vindication. After suing multiple media outlets for libel, including the Washington Post, he confirmed that CNN had reached a settlement with him for damages and “emotional distress” caused by the network’s coverage of the viral incident that took place in 2019.

The demand for socialism is on the rise from young Americans today. But is socialism even morally sound? Find out more now >>

The financial terms of Sandmann’s settlement were not disclosed.

In January 2019, a series of major media outlets published stories about a videotaped encounter he had with a Native American activist in Washington, D.C. That viral video proved to be highly deceptive, as was the media account about the incident, which painted a complex scene in simple terms.

It was a shameful example of media outlets rushing to fuel a preconceived narrative, recklessly pursuing a story with a high potential for “rage clicks” as well as high potential to permanently harm a teenager who never sought the public spotlight.

This story was fake news built on top of fake news, a leading example of why Americans have lost trust in media and journalists. It was Example A of how the media can fail to act with appropriate objectivity in the search to shine a light on those in power, and can instead be weaponized against the powerless who don’t have favored status in America’s elite newsrooms.

Celebrities, politicians, and social media mobs did the work of piling on to destroy a young person who had been carelessly dropped into the maelstrom.

In a now-deleted tweet, former CNN host Reza Aslan said that Sandmann had a “punchable face.”

The whole situation was a fine example of why the Founders distrusted unchecked democracy.

Crowds can easily be ginned up into a mob by false information, and as the frenzy peaks, the rights and very lives of individuals can be ruthlessly trampled on.

None of this would have happened if CNN and other outlets had been more cautious in their reporting on a story with such explosive potential. Instead, they were derelict.

They chose to push the tale that Sandmann acted in an aggressive and racist manner toward a Native American man, who simply wanted to protest peacefully and play music.

As my colleague, Katrina Trinko, wrote at the time: “Finally, [the media] had a piece of proof that supported their cherished narrative: that most Trump supporters were bigots and racists who backed the wall and other initiatives because of their racist views.”

Only after these stories were published, and the mobs had been armed with their digital pitchforks, did a slow trickle of information begin to reveal the reality of the situation.

With time, it became clear that the facts did not support the misleading initial reports and commentary.

Sandmann, it turns out, had not been the aggressor in the situation. The Native American man, Nathan Phillips, actually approached the teen after being egged on by a group of Black Hebrew Israelites, a black nationalist group, who had been yelling out racist and other derogatory comments, but were completely absent in the initial reporting.

In addition, many outlets initially reported (falsely) that Phillips was a “veteran,” which of course increased the rage toward Sandmann. That turned out not to be true after a review of his military records, which revealed that he had briefly been in the U.S. Marines, but never deployed.

In the end, the media’s forced story collapsed under the weight of evidence.

One would hope that the Covington fiasco would be a wake up call for the media, a “teachable moment.”

But given all of the other media follies in the last few years and a poor response to public criticism, it seems unlikely the media will change their ways.

To win back the public, media outlets need to ditch their preconceived narratives and work harder to find the truth.

COMMENTARY BY

Jarrett Stepman

Jarrett Stepman is a contributor to The Daily Signal and co-host of The Right Side of History podcast. Send an email to Jarrett. He is also the author of the new book, “The War on History: The Conspiracy to Rewrite America’s Past.”  Twitter: .

RELATED ARTICLE: Media Lawyer Explains Why CNN Settlement in Libel Case Is Big Deal

A Note for our Readers:

With the demand for socialism at an all-time high among our young people—our future leaders and decisionmakers—the experts at Heritage stopped and asked a question that not many have asked:

Is socialism really morally sound?

The researchers at The Heritage Foundation have put together a guide to help you and our fellow Americans better understand the 9 Ways That Socialism Will Morally Bankrupt America.

They’re making this guide available to all readers of The Daily Signal for free today!

GET YOUR FREE COPY NOW! >>

EDITORS NOTE: This Daily Signal column is republished with permission. © All rights reserved.

THE ECONOMY: The Big White Elephant in the Room

/in , , , , , /by

If you are wondering why the Democrats in Congress are so aggressively resisting President Trump, look no further than the big white elephant in the room, the economy.

More than anything, the Democrats are terrified of the president’s accomplishments in terms of the economy as it poses the single biggest threat to their regaining control of the House, along with winning the Senate and Presidency. They have been putting on a full court press against the president in the hopes the American taxpayer will forget the prosperity triggered by Mr. Trump’s policies.

This is why Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D CA-12) made her formal request for articles of impeachment on Thursday, December 5th; one day before the release of the Labor Department’s December report on job growth, the second-biggest monthly gain in the Trump presidency. Knowing such a report of prosperity would hurt them politically, the Democrats tried to preempt it by calling for impeachment, thereby disrupting the news cycle.

If you will excuse the pun, the economy represents the Trump card for the 2020 presidential election. The Democrats have tried to run from it, take credit for it, say that is was a flash in the pan, even calling it a total failure. There is one problem, the Democrats are offering no alternatives other than Socialism and skyrocketing taxes, which would likely cause the economy to go into a tailspin. The Democrats fully understand the political importance of a prosperous economy on the American public, and know it is the biggest obstacle to their success, which explains why we are faced with an impeachment based on flimsy charges and evidence

These diversionary tactics have been going on since Mr. Trump assumed the presidency. To illustrate:

First, the Democrats claimed it was President Obama’s policies, not President Trump’s, that pointed the economy in the right direction. In reality, President Obama’s true economic record doesn’t come anywhere close to President Trump’s, and the Democrats know this, but hope they can fool the public. To illustrate, everyone knows manufacturing stalled out at the end of President Obama’s term, yet it has been experiencing a Rennaisance under President Trump. According to Barron’s just one year ago, “2018 was the best year for manufacturing job growth in the U.S. since 1997. Factories added 264,000 workers in 2018, up from 176,000 workers in 2017.” It was even better in 2019

Even the Washington Post, one of the president’s chief antagonists, had to reluctantly admit the economy is booming, “The November and December data is preliminary, so the numbers could change, but without a doubt, it’s a great result: the largest annual gain in manufacturing jobs since the Great Recession wiped out nearly 1.4 million just in 2009.”

Second, the Democrats insist the United States is going into a recession. This is nothing more than political spin. If you study the data, this is simply not true. It is scary the Democrats want to panic the public with a doom-and-gloom scenario, but this is politics and they hope it will trick people into voting for them. Whether you like President Trump or not, it is disturbing the Democrats want to see the country fail.

Third, the Democrats would have us believe the Trump tax cuts only benefit the rich. The tax cuts helped John Q. Public in terms of putting more money in their pockets, which invigorated consumer confidence and led to the largest holiday spending spree in history, thereby propelling business and jobs even farther.

It has also brought more jobs back to our shores. As Bloomberg recently admitted, “Corporations have brought back more than $1 trillion of overseas profits to the U.S. since Congress overhauled the international tax system and prodded companies to repatriate offshore funds, a report showed Thursday.” And even more is on the way. It is no small wonder the unemployment numbers have declined sharply, particularly for African-Americans, Latinos, Asians, and women, which will help President Trump at the ballot box, all of which terrifies the Democrats.

The Reshoring Initiative, a group which monitors jobs returning to our shores, insists President Trump is setting records for companies returning jobs to our shores. All of this translates into more jobs, a higher Gross Domestic Product (GDP), and prosperity for everyone.

It is likely the Democrats will try other diversionary tactics in order to dissuade people from voting for the president. I suspect, they will make some obscure claims that the stock markets, which have reached historic highs recently, will flounder and decline, or maybe claim it is slow and grew faster under Democrat administrations. They may also delay pending trade deals, all of which helps American workers.

All of these false claims and political histrionics is aimed at diverting Americans from the big white elephant in the room, the economy, which will ultimately torpedo Democrat fortunes in 2020, a year of reckoning for them. This is why they refuse to discuss it. We should be celebrating the economy, as opposed to trying to torpedo it. The American public will look past the facade, and likely re-elect the president, making him the most effective president since Theodore Roosevelt.

Just remember, “It’s the economy, stupid!”

Keep the Faith!

P.S. – Also do not forget my books, “How to Run a Nonprofit” and “Tim’s Senior Moments”, both available in Printed and eBook form.

EDITORS NOTE: This Bryce is Right column is republished with permission. © All rights reserved. All trademarks both marked and unmarked belong to their respective companies.

The Axis of Evil: A Base of Soviet Fascism

/in , , , , , /by

When the fortieth President of the U.S. Ronald Reagan said “NO” to Michael Gorbachev in Reykjavik, he himself was not absolutely sure of his accuracy. Many years of fighting Communists helped his intuition to choose a correct answer. Dealing with the Union members in Hollywood, he had learned the methods of deception and Communist’s fraud and trickery. These experiences and awareness of the enemy dictated “NO.” I am reminding you of Reagan’s achievements for a reason—following him all four U.S. Presidents, unfortunately, did not fully understand know Communism/Socialism, which, by the way, is not dead today. That exact fact had produced the calamity in politics inside and outside current America…

The Soviet System and Ideology of Soviet Fascism

Watching Fox News regular, I viewed once the Bret Baier show Three Days in Moscow: Ronald Reagan and the Fall of the Soviet Empire. Understanding this fall is crucial to give Americans a sense of history and bring to light the leaders of the world at a time of war. Yet, knowing the truth about the subject is imperative. Misleading phrases used in the report have the opposite effect. Bret’s phrase “the Soviet System was crushed” is very wrong and misleading. As a matter of fact, the Soviet Union did not collapse in 1991—it was Socialist economy, unable to produce that collapsed. Yet, the other part of the Soviet System, all security services have survived. I use the term KGB talking about them. It was the force of the KGB that helped Socialism to deceive and fool people by using Stalinist Political Correctness for seventy years. In 1991 the fraud died in the country where Socialism was born and practiced. Yet, the Soviet System continues functioning and controlling the population. The people of the KGB and the bureaucracy of the Soviet System were usurping governmental power, and prolonging the life of the fake ideology…

In the labyrinth of the Soviet history and politics the KGB catapulted Putin to the Presidency of the Russian Federation… The knowledge he obtained from his teacher Yuri Andropov came with him to the Kremlin. Not a lot has changed in Russia: instead of failed Socialism Russia has now a Crony capitalism run by the Soviet System. The war against Western civilization and predominantly against American interests is still intact and history should determine a new term identifying the ideology of giant hate based on the militant, aggressive and expansionist force in Russia. I did it many years ago calling the dogma Soviet fascism and knowledge of Stalinism had provided me with the adequate definition of the ideology.

The Soviet System is Alive and Well

A lot has changed in the world for the last thirty years, in term of new technology and industry, yet the Soviet objectives, strategy, methods, and tactics of war remains the same in the Kremlin. The Chief Commissar of this war is Vladimir Putin and the countries of the Axis of Evil including China and Iran are all under his ideological command. Yes, China economically and militarily is a major threat for us, but the ideology, agenda, strategy, tactics, methods, and tricks inculcated by the KGB in all countries of the Axis of Evil plays a crucial role. It took Stalin 29 years to create the Chinese Communist State…Do you remember the Gulag in Russia? China has the same Gulag on a quadrupled scale—the Soviet System is alive and well.

Professor Niall Ferguson calls this war—the Cold War II, I strongly disagree. Writing about this asymmetrical war for the last thirty years, I called it WW III and defined it as “Recruitment, infiltration, drugs and assassinations”. If the Cold War was officially between U.S. and Russia, today it is multi-national aggressive and disruptive global forces of the Axis of Evil under Russian ideological command, attacking Western civilization every day. Read my column: The Ideology of Soviet Fascism vs. Trump, December 6, 2019 and a book What is Happening to America?  The Hidden Truth of Global Destruction, Xlibris, 2012, pp. 161-180

America and its Intel apparatus had apparently been sleeping for those thirty + years given the enemies a tremendous opportunity to fulfill their agenda spreading the ideology of Communism/Socialism. And all these years, I was warning you by my books and columns describing that agenda of an asymmetrical-proxy global war (I called it WW III), infiltration, and destruction of Western civilization from within. Today, thirty years later, we are coming very close to the agenda declared by Lenin/Stalin Dogma to be fulfilled. Infiltration and the destruction of Western civilization from within gradually, but surely is going on in Europe and America. The war is surely underway on our planet: we experiencing it in the beginning of 2020…

The airstrike that killed Maj. Gen. Qassem Soleimani caught the world by surprise. Massive escalation with Iran will follow—we can expect “harsh retaliation” against U.S. forces and allies. A shadow General Solaimani led vicious attacks against our forces across the Middle East. He was a terrorist, and war criminals, I was writing about him and know something vitally important, nobody is talking about. General Qassem Soleimani grew from the Iranian Revolution 1979 and close ties with Russia. He was trained by the Russian Security Services for many years, while the KGB was building the Revolutionary Guard and Quds-Force. I believed that Soleimani learned Russian and had a friendly relation with Vladimir Putin. He was a Putin’s point-man for the Mideast in the Axis of Evil. The number of Americans killed by him is astonishing. After reading the column in the New York Times, I believe my predictions had been right.

“The commander helped direct wars in Iraq, Syria, Lebanon and Yemen, and he became the face of Iran’s efforts to build a regional bloc of Shiite power. He changed the shape of the Syrian civil war and tightened Iran’s grip on Iraq. He was behind hundreds of American deaths in Iraq and waves of militia attacks against Israel. And for two decades, his every move lit up the communications networks — and fed the obsessions — of intelligence operatives across the Middle East. On Friday, Maj. Gen. Qassim Soleimani, the powerful and shadowy 62-year-old spymaster at the head of Iran’s security machinery, was killed by an American drone strike near the Baghdad airport…” Qassim Soleimani, Master of Iran’s Intrigue, Built a Shiite Axis of Power in Mideast, New York Times, January 3, 2020

Please, pay attention to “a Shiite Axis of Power in Mideast,” those are the key words. Do you remember that I was writing about the Axis of Evil under Russian umbrella for last decade? It is about the countries adhered to the ideology of Soviet Fascism, waging an asymmetrical-proxy war against the West. Soleimani is not a master of Iranian intrigue—Vladimir Putin, a devoted disciple of Comrade Stalin is. There are two points to prove it. Stalin visited Iran in his youth and left the order to his disciples to infiltrate Mideast via Iran. And the second his decision—to stretch America’s forces by involving the U.S. to a war in the Mideast, as he put it: “the sectarian war will never end.”  The Axis of Evil, ran by Putin does just that in the case of Iran. … “a Shiite Axis of Power in Mideast,”  is a part of the Axis of Evil. If you know the Soviet System, you’ll indicate many other cases of the Axis of Evil adhered to the ideology of Soviet Fascism involved.

“An Iraqi security source: Two Katyusha rockets landed in the vicinity of the American embassy in Baghdad,” Al-Arabiya reported on Twitter in Arabic. Reuters reported that two Katyusha rockets also hit Balad air base, an Iraqi Air Force station that hosts U.S. forces and is located about 50 miles north of Baghdad. Breaking: Explosions Near Baghdad Embassy, Rockets Pummel Nearby Air Base by Jared Harris WJ, January 4, 2020. Are you familiar with the name Katyusha? It is a Russian name of a woman or the name of the deadly Russian artillery-rockets. The criminals who have Katyusha rockets are sponsored by Putin’s Russia and belong to the Axis of Evil.  I called all their leaders—Stalinist Charlatans.  

Qassim Soleimani was killed, because he represented a country of the Axis of Evil waging a war against Western civilization, his footprint was global. President Trump is the first American President, who grasp the depth, parameters, and nefarious danger of the Axis of Evil, built on the Soviet System’s foundation. The Axis of Evil has intertwined all the current Evils of the world—The Soviet System, the ideology of Soviet fascism, and Russia. The revenge in the realms of usual mechanism of Soviet Fascism has already started in the Iraqi Parliament enforcing our leave from Iraq—the legacy of the KGB asset—Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki. I don’t know about the current one, but knowledge of Soviet fascism is a MUST…

The revenge in the future can be a variety of different terrorist acts of sabotage and destruction to destabilize the world: a crush of an American civil plane with 200 people on board, a catastrophic car’s accident with many deaths, or an orchestrated massive wild fire in any place of the world in the countries of different continents. Soviet Fascism never sleeps. You can read about all possible acts of revenge in the above mentioned book: What is Happening to America? Xlibris, 2012

 The Stalinist Charlatans in America

I’ve already introduced you to the term Stalinist Charlatans in my column Soviet Fascism Attacks America Via Democrat Party. The recent events should open your eyes even wider on the goings-on within the Democrat Party—the impeachment game. As a matter of fact, all Stalinist Charlatans in America belongs to the Democrat Party. This is the answer to sham-impeachment, when the Kremlin is behind impeaching the U.S. President Donald J. Trump. The KGB infiltrated the Dems’ leadership the same way it had infiltrated all countries of the Axis of Evil, including the building of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard and Quds-Forces. There is a possibility that those nefarious entities in Iran have been built on the money that Democrat Obama had given to Iran…

There is more: look at the Dems’ candidates for the U.S. presidency, 6 of them were sponsored by the KGB and the KGB agent, Georg Soros. Stop deceiving yourself talking about Radical Left, they are Stalinist Charlatans! They are the carriers of the ideology of Soviet fascism in America!

Watching the scenes of mourning the death of Solaimani in Iran, I recalled the same event in Moscow after the death of Comrade Stalin in March 5, 1953. I was a participant in Moscow and the scenes were analogous. When people believe in the cult of personality of their leaders, they behave emotionally the same way in the system that cultivated cult of personality under the ideology of Soviet Fascism. And we should understand the nature of this ideology to confront it successfully. Now I read that 40 people were killed in the mourning Solaimani in Iran. The same thing happened at Stalin’s funeral when tens of people were killed in the chaos of emotions mourning Stalin. Most Americans and especially the current FBI Director doesn’t know Soviet fascism and can’t defend us adequately to the threat of menace we are facing…

My fellow Americans!

The Axis of Evil is waging a war against Western civilization for decades. President Donald J. Trump was acting bravely and decisively against the global terrorist conglomerate. God bless him! God bless now and forever our political system, left to us by our Founding Fathers! We must keep defending our exceptional and most humane American Republic! We must stop and expose America’s traitors!

To be continued www.simonapipko1.com.

© All rights reserved.

RELATED ARTICLES:

Iran Fires 15 Ballistic Missiles at US Bases in Iraq

How the Left Manipulates Language to Defeat Conservatives

Copyright © 2024 DrRichSwier.com LLC. A Florida Cooperation. All rights reserved. The DrRichSwier.com is a not-for-profit news forum for intelligent Conservative commentary. Opinions expressed by writers are solely their own. Republishing of columns on this website requires the permission of both the author and editor. For more information contact: drswier@gmail.com.