Cuban Intelligence and Russia Throw Venezuela’s Maduro a Lifeline

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Secretary of State Mike Pompeo’s recent visit to Latin America included visits to Argentina, Ecuador, Mexico and El Salvador.  The main themes of his visit were the current situation in Venezuela, human rights, terrorism, drug trafficking, and immigration.

With regard to Venezuela, Pompeo’s presence in the region sent a message that the U.S. will not abandon its goals of getting rid of Maduro’s regime. The Secretary General of the Organization of American States (OAS), Luis Almagro, has urged the Trump Administration to increase pressure on Maduro, with special emphasis on the “Cuban factor”.  20,000 Cuban intelligence agents, previously trained by the Soviet KGB and East German Stasi,have been a key element in the survival of the Cuban regime. They have been able to foil plots against Castro and have been able to survey the military to avoid a coup d’ etat. They are protecting the Maduro regime with the same methods.

In May, the Administration imposed new sanctions on Cuba that included a ban on all U.S. travel to the island.Earlier in the spring, the Trump Administration allowed U.S. citizens to sue any entity or person found to be “trafficking” in property that was expropriated from U.S. citizens after the 1959 revolution. Likewise, the Administration imposed limits on the amounts of money that Cuban Americans can send to their relatives living in Cuba.

The effect of these sanctions is being felt. Cuba is now facing shortages of food, and fuel as well as other hardships that complicate the functions of  everyday life.

However, it is important that any sanction should have a direct impact on those who occupy high positions in the security services as well as in the government of Cuba. For a regime that has become so accustomed to remain indifferent to the suffering of its own people, sanctions must affect the Cuban elites.

 Cuban intelligence is surveilling the Venezuelan military and threatening them. The role of Cuba is becoming more and more important for the survival of Maduro and his cronies as dissidence and criticism among members of the military and political elite is becoming more and more significant.

The torture and murder of Captain Rafael Acosta is a case in point. Acosta’s torture and subsequent murder constituted a message the regime sent to the military that criticism of the regime or dissent may lead to their suffering and death. Likewise, former Minister of Interior, Retired General Miguel Rodriguez was arrested last year for breaking ranks with Maduro under the charge that he “attacked the unity” of the armed forces. The events of April 30th displayed a situation where members of the intelligence service (SEBIN) such as Cristopher Figueres and the army joined the opposition and secured the liberation of opposition leader Leopoldo Lopez.

Venezuelan dissidents are being threatened with methods taught and used by Cuban intelligence. Such Cuban activities are likely to encourage “Venezuelanization” of other regimes in the region such as Nicaragua and Bolivia.

Therefore, it is crucial that the Trump sanctions be aimed at hurting the Cuban troops as well as the Venezuelan intelligence services even more than the military. At the same time, it is important to establish contacts with the military to encourage rebellion against their superiors.

In addition to the Cubans, the Russians are helping the Maduro government. On July 19th, a Venezuelan war plane manufactured in Russia aggressively chased an American plane, endangering the crew and the aircraft. United States Southern Command issued a statement via twitter pointing out that “this action demonstrates Russia’s irresponsible military support of Maduro’s regime,which undermines the international rule of law and efforts to counter illicit trafficking”. Russia has also sent 100 military experts to Venezuela.

At this point the Maduro regime is using the negotiations between itself and the opposition as a façade to gain time. Maduro has no intention of giving up power. As negotiations unfolded, Alexis Rodriguez Cabello was appointed chief of staff of the Venezuelan Bolivarian Armed Forces, the body with the most significant fire power in the country. Rodriguez Cabello is a first cousin of Diosdado Cabello, one of the strongest and most extreme members of the regime. Cabello is well known for being a key boss in the Venezuelan drug trafficking state apparatus. Likewise, General Fabio Zavarce was appointed commander of the National Guard. Zavarce is connected with a regime para-military group called “La Piedrita”. “La Piedrita”is one of the most dangerous para-military groups responsible for violent actions in the Caracas area. These appointments were probably made not only to reinforce the regime but also to weaken the power of Defense Minister, Vladimir Padrino,who has become “less reliable” after he failed to avoid acts of dissidence during the events of April 30th.

All of the above shows that the regime will not be defeated easily unless their lives are made to be areal hell. Last week the Treasury Department imposed sanctions on four high military officers believed to be responsible for the torture and assassination of Captain Acosta.Likewise, the assets of the Venezuelan General Directorate of Military Counterintelligence (DGCIM) were frozen.

Sanctions against top security and political elites must be strengthened. Likewise, sanctions against Cuba need to be reinforced. President Trump should use his leverage with Vladimir Putin to urge Russia to stop arming Venezuela. It could also be a good idea to maintain and even increase existing sanctions on Russia. The U.S. must also continue efforts to approach key members of the military to persuade them to switch sides and offer them all needed protections.

The moment the United States gives in, the Maduro regime’s survival will be guaranteed. If it does survive, it is likely that the region will continue to be infested by drug traffickers and other undesirable elements. Latin American countries, particularly in the Central American triangle are already in a state of anarchy and suffer from high levels of crime. This problem needs to be addressed urgently regardless of Maduro. The multiplication of narco-states is a threat to the neighborhood where we live.

This problem, largely ignored over the last 20 years, is an ongoing one. The removal of the Maduro regime would be just a first step in a long journey for our troubled neighborhood.

FLORIDA: Court Rules Public Officials Can’t Be Punished for Violating the Law

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A Leon County Circuit Court judge has just given rogue, anti-gun public officials a “get-out-of-jail-free card.”

This court has effectively given tacit approval for local government officials to knowingly and willfully violate the state preemption law by striking down the penalty provisions.  The message is:  go ahead and violate the law, the state can’t punish you.

Specifically, in a lawsuit brought by several anti-gun South Florida cities and counties, the court struck down the $5,000 fine and the risk of removal from office for individual public officials, local governments, and government agencies who willfully and knowing violate the state preemption law by adopting local gun control ordinances.

In their opposition brief, the NRA argued “It is a bedrock principle of American constitutional law that local governments have no legal authority to defy the will of their creator: the state.”

This ruling is like a parent telling an underage teenager, you are forbidden to smoke, drink alcohol, or do drugs — but don’t worry, if you disobey me and do it anyhow, I won’t punish you.

The ruling flies in the face of one of the basic fundamentals of the judicial system. Punishment is the deterrent component of the justice system.  Without punishment, not only will offenders will be encouraged to re-offend but others who had feared punishment will be encouraged to join the lawbreaking activities.

There is little doubt that Attorney General Ashley Moody will appeal the ruling on behalf of the state. There is no enforcement capability of laws that have no punishment.

BACKGROUND:

Florida Statutes section 790.33 is the firearms preemption statute, which prevents local governments from violating Second Amendment rights by passing gun control ordinances.  Under the law, only the Legislature can regulate the field of firearms and ammunition, a constitutionally protected area.

The preemption law was passed in 1987 but contained no penalties. No one anticipated or even imagined the disrespect for the law that some local public officials began to demonstrate.  No one foresaw that local public officials (who had sworn to uphold the law) would knowingly and willfully violate state law because there were no penalties.

In 2011, fed up with these willful violations of law, the legislature amended the statute to create civil penalties for knowingly and willfully violating the preemption law by enacting prohibited firearms or ammunition ordinances/regulation.  The penalties were imposed on the offending governmental entity and on individual public officials.

These penalties are not for accidental, unintentional or inadvertent violation of the law.  They are for KNOWINGLY AND WILLFULLY violating the law.

That any court would condone, and give tacit approval to intentional violations of the law by public officials is not only alarming, it is injurious to the fabric of the deterrent effect of the structure and intent of laws.  It is particularly perilous when it comes to those laws promulgated to shield and protect the public from the actions of imprudent public officials.

MEN AND ABORTION: The Paternal Paradox

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“No uterus, no opinion? Not so fast. Men’s roles in abortion are varied, and society’s standards for fathers and men’s voices are contradictory and complex. To understand their involvement in abortion, and the repercussions that result, we need to examine the paternal paradox…” Sarah Quale

No uterus, no opinion

It isn’t too often that men get a say. Not in the deaths of their own children, unless of course, they support the mother’s decision to abort them. Not in the case of Ryan Magers, the father in Alabama who is suing the abortion facility and pharmaceutical company in the wrongful death of his aborted child, who Alabama law and the Alabama Supreme Court declare is a person with rights. Just yesterday, Judge Chris Comer heard arguments for and against dismissal of Ryan’s case, which he declined to throw out.

Over the past several years, the abortion industry and its feminist allies have run an aggressive campaign against fathers like Ryan, to bring more men into their movement, right alongside the “no uterus, no opinion” mantra. While this seems like a contradiction on the surface, there is a consistent, underlying criterion for membership in the #BroChoice in-crowd. You must unequivocally and unabashedly champion legal abortion.

On Twitter in May, feminist author and Vox media host Liz Plank called for men to respond with stories of how legal abortion benefits them. Responses to her controversial tweet varied.

According to #BroChoice men, who reflect an oversexualized culture that discourages chivalry and responsibility, women have the absolute right to “do whatever they want with their own body.” But there are rules.

  1. Bodily autonomy especially applies to a woman who enters an abortion facility.
  2. Bodily autonomy doesn’t apply to a woman in a dorm room, at a party, or in Hollywood.

Why is that?

Because abortion frees men, not women.

Abortion frees men from responsibility and commitment. It frees them to be totally unaccountable to a woman’s heart and to any life that’s created from his sexual relationship with her. But there is a cold truth that remains.

Every aborted child has a father.

The six roles men typically play

When it comes to abortion, the father is typically involved in one of six ways:

  1. He supports the abortion and usually brings her to the appointment and/or pays for it.
  2. He pressures her into having the abortion, sometimes threatening harm or loss of support.
  3. He abandons her and the decision altogether.
  4. He passively leaves the decision to her, often because he is confused or feels voiceless.
  5. He fights for the life of his child, but fails to convince her not to abort.
  6. He doesn’t even know about the pregnancy or the abortion until later, or possibly never.

Out of this complexity of roles springs the paternal paradox, described in brief by another response to Liz Plank’s tweet.

Here’s what this paradox looks like a little more broadly:

  • When women have an abortion, it’s viewed as an exclamation of their “reproductive rights” and freedom from male oppression.
  • When men pressure women to abort, they are labeled controlling, abusive, and oppressive.
  • When women ignore a man’s objection to an abortion, men have no legal recourse for the death of their own children.
  • But when women allow their children to be born, men are legally obligated to take financial responsibility.

To further understand this paradox, we must also consider what research shows about how men’s involvement, or lack thereof, impacts an abortion decision.

The father’s impact on decision making and outcomes

Ever since Roe v Wade, academic journals and research institutes have published studies on the reasons women have abortions. More recently, inquiries have focused on how lack of support and coercion impact the abortion decision and the effect coercion has on post-abortive emotional outcomes. Here is a small glimpse into this ever-growing body of research:

Sources of pressure from the father of the child can range from threats of abandonment to domestic abuse, and even homicide, which is one of the leading causes of death of pregnant women.  Other sources of pressure come from:

  • Parents of minor children that fear a pregnancy will bring shame on the family
  • A shame-based or secretive environment within a woman’s church
  • Counseling that’s rushed and driven by abortion profits
  • Doctors who insist women abort pre-born children with poor or terminal diagnoses
  • Traffickers in their attempts to control or punish their victims
  • Situations in which children are conceived in rape or incest, as Jennifer Christie, a mother from rape, can attest.

Aside from coercion, several surveys report that single motherhood and concerns about current relationships also contribute significantly to the decision to abort.

We can reasonably conclude that, in playing the roles of abortion supporter, coercer, abandoner, and passive bystander, men contribute directly to the confusion, fear, and uncertainty that often accompany a woman’s unexpected pregnancy and impact her decision to abort.  So much for “no uterus, no opinion.”

A shift in our understanding

Up until recently, the pro-life answer to “no uterus, no opinion” has been a simple historical reminder that one doesn’t have to be a victim of an injustice to stand up against it. The South’s argument for slavery was essentially “no slaves/no opinion,” yet scores of white abolitionists stood against the horrors perpetrated against those of African descent.

Similarly, the fight for women’s suffrage surged forward to obliterate the “no property/no say” argument. Yet there is a rich history of “suffragents” who helped make the right to vote (and own property) a reality for women.

But the time has come to move beyond this historical rebuttal, as empirical evidence is beginning to show that men are directly and deeply impacted by abortion, even though they aren’t the ones on the abortion table. Here are a few of the organizations that showcase this work:

  • The Alliance for Post-Abortion Research and Training (APART) houses current research papers, literature reviews, clinical reports, and academic publications on this subject. On the Fact Sheets page of their website, select the Men and Abortion tab.
  • The Life Issues Institute’s Men & Abortion Network (MAN) initiative provides studies on the effects of abortion on men and links to counseling and mentoring services.
  • The Abortion and Men area of the Elliot Institute’s website includes peer-reviewed research, academic articles, and post-abortive healing resources for men.

Anecdotal evidence is also growing and inspiring new ministries to help men work through the deaths of the children they couldn’t or wouldn’t protect. For example:

Lost fatherhood and God’s design

Every person who reports feelings of regret after abortion experiences his or her grief in different ways, yet a growing body of evidence here, too, suggests common behavior patterns and psychological symptomsassociated with post-abortion trauma. What’s not often considered, however, is post-abortion trauma in the context of God-designed gender.

Men are created by God to be leaders (Exodus 18:21, 1 Corinthians 11:3), and they are called by God to be honorable (1 Peter 3:7) and sacrificial (Ephesians 5:25-27). Deep in the spirit of a man is an innate need to be respected; to protect his loved ones from harm. To deny a man this core need and fundamental design is to strip him of his natural, God-ordained purpose. The result is a drifting powerlessness that can take its toll on a man’s self-image, causing a profound sense of loss and hopelessness. It can also bring excessive guilt and shame, fear, depression, sexual dysfunction, alcohol and drug abuse, significant damage to his peer relationships, and even suicide.

Men suffer greatly, but differently, from abortion. Yet our society continues to deny there is any suffering or regret from anyone at all.

If you or someone you know is experiencing emotional and spiritual trauma as the father of an aborted child, please reach out using the resources provided above. Men, like women, deserve to replace the death connection abortion creates with a life connection that forgiveness and healing through Jesus Christ brings.

RELATED ARTICLES:

Authorities Find More Bodies of Aborted Babies on Property of Abortionist Who Kept 2,246 as Trophies

Elizabeth Warren Repeatedly Lies About Getting Fired for Being Pregnant, Liberal Media Ignores It

Beto O’Rourke Unveils Plan to Force Americans to Fund Abortions, Make Abortion Up to Birth National Law

RELATED VIDEO: Pro-Abortion Mob Punching, Kicking and Spitting on Pro-Lifers

EDITORS NOTE: This Personhood.org column is republished with permission. All rights reserved.

It’s about the content of Elijah Cummings’ character, not the color of his skin

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Before I begin to address the latest twitter storm focused on Congressman Elijah Cummings (D-MD District 7) let’s look at some data on Cummings’ district, which includes much of the City of Baltimore but reaches into Baltimore and Howard counties.

It is important to note that the Baltimore City Council Presidents since 1923 to today have all been Democrats. It is also important to know that all of the current members of the Baltimore City Council are Democrats.

According to the BALTIMORE CITY: 2017 NEIGHBORHOOD HEALTH PROFILE released by the Baltimore City Health Department:

  • The Baltimore population is Black or African American 62.8%.
  • The percentage of children living in single-parent household is 64.8%.
  • The of Baltimore citizens unemployed is 13.1%.
  • The percentage of Baltimore families in poverty is 28.8%.
  • Baltimore has a Hardship Index of 51. (The Hardship Index combines information from six socioeconomic indicators – housing, poverty, unemployment, education, income, and dependency.)
  • The rate of rat complaints in Baltimore is 408.8 per 10,000 households.
  • The City of Baltimore’s homicide rate is 3.9, with the youth homicide mortality rate at 31.3. (The homicide rate is based upon the number of homicides that occurred per 10,000 residents.)

U.S. Congressman Elijah Cummings, and Maryland’s 7th District, are now the focus of President Trump. Why?

Here is House Oversight and Reform Committee Chair Congressman Elijah Cummings (D-MD) yelling at President Trump’s acting DHS chief.

After watching this exchange President Trump tweeted:

Rep, Elijah Cummings has been a brutal bully, shouting and screaming at the great men & women of Border Patrol about conditions at the Southern Border, when actually his Baltimore district is FAR WORSE and more dangerous. His district is considered the Worst in the USA……

….As proven last week during a Congressional tour, the Border is clean, efficient & well run, just very crowded. Cumming District is a disgusting, rat and rodent infested mess. If he spent more time in Baltimore, maybe he could help clean up this very dangerous & filthy place

President went on tweeting:

Why is so much money sent to the Elijah Cummings district when it is considered the worst run and most dangerous anywhere in the United States. No human being would want to live there. Where is all this money going? How much is stolen? Investigate this corrupt mess immediately!

Elijah Cummings spends all of his time trying to hurt innocent people through “Oversight.” He does NOTHING for his very poor, very dangerous and very badly run district! Take a look…. #BlacksForTrump2020

So sad that Elijah Cummings has been able to do so little for the people of Baltimore. Statistically, Baltimore ranks last in almost every major category. Cummings has done nothing but milk Baltimore dry, but the public is getting wise to the bad job that he is doing!

Baltimore, under the leadership of Elijah Cummings, has the worst Crime Statistics in the Nation. 25 years of all talk, no action! So tired of listening to the same old Bull…Next, Reverend Al will show up to complain & protest. Nothing will get done for the people in need. Sad!

Representative Cummings has been in Congress since 1996. According to USASPENDING.gov in FY 2018 Maryland’s 7th Congressional District received approximately $15.7 billion in grants, benefits and other assistance from the federal government.

Money is not the problem in Rep. Cummings’ District. Single parent homes is the root cause of the poverty, unemployment, crime and dysfunction.

Dear Rep. Cummings, the people in your district are human beings too.

© All rights reserved.

RELATED ARTICLES:

Trump, Baltimore, and the Diminishing Potency of the ‘Race Card’

She went on Fox News to expose the conditions in West Baltimore, and now she’s under SIEGE from hackers, media, trolls

Baltimore Rat Infestation Is So Bad They Made A Documentary About It 2 Years Ago

WATCH: Democrat Baltimore Mayor Caught On Camera Complaining About ‘Rats, Dead Animals’ Last Year

WATCH: Sen. Bernie Sanders Trashed ‘Third World’ Baltimore Years Before Trump Did

Trump Says Baltimore Is A Dump, The Media Freaks Out. Then Came Videos Of Garbage Strewn Everywhere

$12K A Day: How White Liberals Profit From Pushing ‘White Privilege’

Baltimore on List of Top Ten ‘Rattiest Cities,’ All Run by Democrats…

…PBS Aired ‘Rat Film’ Documentary on Elijah Cummings’ City — Last Year…

…Former Mayor: ‘You Can Smell the Rats’

The New Segregationism: Trump Can’t Cite Well-Established Fact of Baltimore’s Rat Problem, Because Cummings Is Black

RELATED VIDEO: Baltimore’s Lexington Market Voluntarily Closes After Viral Video Shows Rodent In Display Case.

“Smart” Guns and Mandatory Storage: Two Bad Policy Ideas Cut from the Same Tattered Cloth

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Whenever a tragedy strikes that involves a firearm, no matter how statistically rare the event may actually be, you can count on anti-gun extremists to try to exploit it. The responses from those opposed to the Second Amendment upon hearing that a fatality resulted when a firearm was used by a criminal, or accessed by someone who should not have access, tend to sound fairly similar. If a ban isn’t the response selected from the handful of ideas gun control advocates have been promoting for decades, then added restrictions on law-abiding gun owners is the policy du jour.

Restricting access to guns is a very popular notion among those who feel there should be far less freedom when it comes to responsible gun ownership.

In a misguided and misinformed attempt to limit access to firearms by those who should not have access to them (at least, in the mind of the supporters of gun control), the idea of mandatory storage laws was born. And as firearm technology has advanced (although not nearly as fast as anti-gun advocates think or would like), the little brother of mandatory storage laws, “smart” gun mandates, was conceived.

Methods for securing and storing firearms, as well as “smart” guns, may very well be options that law-abiding gun owners will want to explore to see if either or both satisfy their particular needs. But the operative word here is “options.”

Government mandates on “safe” storage and “smart” guns are not just anathema to those who cherish individual liberty, but are policies ill-conceived, and potentially deadly.

Mandatory storage laws, which the gun-ban community euphemistically refers to as “safe” storage laws, tend to look like they were all spit out of the same gun-control factory, with only small variations. In general, they require all firearms within the home to be locked with a trigger-locking device or kept in a locked container or safe, unless a firearm is in the actual possession of the lawful owner.

What these proposals overlook is the fact that gun safety and storage is a matter of personal responsibility and every person’s situation is different. It is unreasonable for the government to impose a one-size-fits-all solution. More importantly, mandatory storage laws invade people’s homes and forces them to render their firearms useless in a self-defense situation by locking them up.

In addition, those who wish to gain access to a firearm for nefarious purposes are not going to be deterred by a trigger lock or a locked container; both devices having been shown to be easily defeated by determined criminals. And while a safe is certainly far more reliable for securing firearms, their cost is prohibitive for many.

“Smart” gun mandates are similarly problematic, although perhaps even more dangerous.

While the idea of a gun that can only be used by someone authorized to use it is intriguing, the technology simply doesn’t exist. There have certainly been developments in the field, but everything that has been offered or tested has had problems. Either the “smart” aspect of restricting who may use it is easily defeated, or the gun aspect of firing when an authorized user is operating it is unreliable.

Being unable to access a firearm when needed, because it is locked away in a safe or otherwise “secured” is one thing. Trying to use a firearm to defend yourself or your loved ones against a violent criminal, only to find the “smart” technology fails at the most critical time, could be even worse.

In spite of the fact that at least one Democrat Presidential candidate seems convinced “smart” guns are a thing, they simply are not.

In the real world, firearms remain useful and effective tools in the hands of law-abiding citizens as a deterrent to violent crime. But only if the government doesn’t mandate ridiculous and dangerous policies like storage requirements or “smart” guns. And this isn’t just a hypothetical argument, as an incident in San Diego, California recently highlighted.

According to reports, a man broke into a home in the Lake Murray area of San Diego, then attacked and stabbed the homeowner. The violent criminal was only stopped when the victim’s 20-year-old son, according to police, “retrieved a firearm and shot the intruder.”

So, why is this case particularly poignant? Because San Diego recently took the first steps to implementing a mandatory storage law.

The proposal “would require gun owners to store guns in a locked container or disable them with a trigger lock when not in the person’s immediate control or being worn on their person.” Had the law been in effect this week, and had the victims of this violent assault been in compliance, one wonders whether the outcome would have been dramatically, and tragically, different.

If the victim’s son was unable to access the firearm he used without first opening a safe or removing a trigger lock, provided he even had the ability to do either, the violent criminal may very well have continued his assault unabated.

Even the local news notes some are questioning the new proposed storage requirements in light of this crime, stating, “The situation is making residents think twice about the new law that, if it were already in effect, could have altered the outcome of this burglary.”

Of course, similar concerns could be raised if San Diego had a “smart” gun mandate in place, but at least the City Council hasn’t taken that approach…yet.

On the other side of the country, however, the Garden State had already decided “smart” gun mandates should remain part of the future of gun control.

In 2002, New Jersey passed a law stating that, once “smart” guns were certified as viable, only handguns incorporating this technology could be sold in the state. This, of course, amounts to nothing more than a ban on traditional handguns. But after almost two decades, “smart” gun technology remained unproven, unreliable, and undesired by America’s gun owners. Without any significant developments or improvements in “smart” gun research that would lead to certification of firearms that satisfy the law passed in 2002, anti-gunners are using a new approach to attempting to force these mythical products into existence.

Last week, rabidly anti-gun New Jersey Governor Phil Murphy (D) signed into law a requirement that every gun dealer in the state offer at least one model of “smart” gun for sale. A commission will be established to determine a list of firearms that qualify as “smart” guns.

Typically, when you have to force businesses to sell a product, that’s a very strong indicator that there is not a market for the product. New Jersey gun shops may be forced to put a “smart” gun on their shelves, but the anti-gun zealots are more likely to see dust collecting rather than actual sales.

And while some might consider this new law an improvement, as it repeals the 2002 law that sought to require only “smart” guns be sold, don’t expect this to be the end of what anti-gun legislators will do to continue their ongoing war against gun owners in New Jersey.

Governor Murphy, after signing the new law, has already stated his desire that only “smart” guns be sold in New Jersey. Once somebody develops one that qualifies under the current law, regardless of how reliable it is, it can be placed on the approved-for-sale list. At that point, reviving the 2002 law would be the obvious next step.

Storage mandates and “smart” gun requirements will continue to be falsely promoted as safety measures in the never-ending war on law-abiding, responsible gun owners. But limiting the use of firearms by those facing assault by violent criminals, either because of storage requirements that delay access or technology that is subject to inopportune failure, is likely to lead to unintended, and sadly tragic, consequences.

RELATED ARTICLES:

Never Enough: New Zealand Government Pushes Even More Gun Control

A Pair of Academics Question Gun Control Orthodoxy

Energy & Environmental News

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For the full version of the latest Energy and Environmental Newsletter, please click here… To review some of the highlights, see below.

Since there is such a diversity of interesting material, the Newsletter articles are subdivided into seven categories. Note that this issue has special sections on Offshore Wind Energy and Presidential Energy Policies.

My vote for the three most outstanding articles this cycle: Against Climate Panic, for Climate Hope,  Climate Trillions Frittered in the Wind and Liberal Professor Warns: Google Manipulating Voters ‘on a Massive Scale’.

Here is a short slideshow outlining multiple reasons why AGW computer models are suspect. Let me know any suggestions for improvements.

Energy Economics —

Study: The Social Cost of Carbon and Carbon Taxes
Wind Farm Back-of-the-Envelope Economic Analysis
The Confusions of the ‘Conservative’ Carbon Tax
Inconvenient Energy Realities
What It Will Take for the Wind and Solar Industries to Collapse

Energy: Wind Turbine Health & Environmental —

Infrasound Guidelines: Antiquated and irrelevant for protecting populations
Archive: Big Wind’s Dirty Little Secret — Radioactive Waste
Study: The Impact of Wind Energy on Wildlife and the Environment
Study: Green Killing Machines — the impact of renewables on wildlife and nature

Energy: Offshore Wind Energy —

Lake Erie Wind Project Shows Green Political Correctness Is A Disease
Developer: We won’t pursue wind farm in waters off Hamptons
Cuomo’s incredible wind-power pander
Offshore Wind Fiascos Illustrate the Absurdity of Climate Change Policies
Proposed New England Offshore Wind Facility Suffers Major Defeat

US Energy Policy and Presidential Politics —

U.S. Energy Is Hotspot In Trump’s Economy
Dems’ Energy Ideas Confused, Disastrous
AOC & Sanders seek a do-over for the Green New Deal
Green New Deal position by US Democrat candidates (so far all support)
Nuclear energy position by US Democrat candidates (mixed)

Energy Misc —

Fact-Check: Fearmongers Over Nevada’s Yucca Mountain
Tucker Carlson TV segment: the Green New Deal is a Power Play
100% Renewable Is 100% Unachievable, Even If You’re An Optimist
Sustainability and Global Warming Give Birth to Renewable Energy
Prepare for green blackouts: That’s what’s in store for New York
Balloon Tests to Simulate Turbine Height
Battery Storage—An Infinitesimal Part of Electrical Power

Global Warming (AGW) —

Excellent short video: Climate Apartheid?
Study: Human CO2 Emissions have little Effect on Atmospheric CO2
Study: No Experimental Evidence for Significant Man-made Climate Change
Big Government Is Not the Answer to Climate Change
How climate change got labeled a ‘crisis’
Things Keep Getting Worse For The Fake “Science” Of Climate Change
What Is The Biggest Holocaust? Green Fascism Reborn!
Short video: We Should Fire Fraudulent Data Presenters

Misc (Education, Science, Politics, etc.) —

US EPA: Air Pollution Trends Show Cleaner Air, Growing Economy
White House discusses real environmental solutions, media loses their minds
The Guardian Spreads Anti-Americanism
A Survivor of China’s Forced Labor Camp Urges US to Reject Socialism
Democratic Socialism Newspeak
Government is a great servant — but horrid master
YouTube ad policy bans keyword ‘Christian’ as unacceptable content

Note 1: We recommend reading the Newsletter on your computer, not your phone, as some documents (e.g. PDFs) are much easier to read on a computer… We’ve tried to use common fonts, etc. to minimize display issues.

Note 2: Our intention is to put some balance into what most people see from the mainstream media about energy and environmental issues… As always, please pass this on to open-minded citizens, and link to this on your social media sites. If there are others who you think would benefit from being on our energy & environmental email list, please let me know. If at any time you’d like to be taken off this list, simply send me an email saying that.

Note 3: This Newsletter is intended to supplement the material on our website, WiseEnergy.org. For wind warriors, the most important page there is the Winning page.

Note 4: I am not an attorney, so no material appearing in any of the Newsletters (or our WiseEnergy.org website) should be construed as giving legal advice. My recommendation has always been: consult a competent licensed attorney when you are involved with legal issues.

VIDEO: This Lawsuit Over ‘Sex’ and ‘Gender Identity’ Will Have Sweeping Implications

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“I felt like I had been punched in the stomach. I was just gasping for air.”

That’s how Nancy Rost recalls the moments after her husband, Tom, walked through the door of their home six years ago this month.

In his hand, Tom held a letter from a longtime employee. On his face, the easy confidence Nancy had seen from Tom every day since they met each other as children was missing, replaced by a palpable sense of anxiety.

Immediately, Tom and Nancy knew that the contents of the letter had the potential to devastate R.G. & G.R. Harris Funeral Homes, which Tom’s grandfather had established in 1910 to serve grieving families throughout Detroit.

As it stands now, Tom’s five-generation family business is in the hands of the Supreme Court, with oral arguments scheduled for Oct. 8.

No doubt, his case will have sweeping implications across American life.


So, what was in the letter?

Anthony Stephens, a biological male employee who had agreed to and followed the funeral home’s sex-specific dress code for more than six years, intended to show up to work—as well as to the homes of grieving families—dressed as a woman.

For years, Tom’s company had required employees to agree to and abide by a sex-specific dress code that aligned with the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission requirements. The regulation-consistent policy ensured that family members of a deceased loved one could focus on processing their grief, not on the funeral home or its employees.

Over the next two weeks, Tom carefully considered his situation. Tom was concerned for Stephens—a longtime, valued employee—and for Stephens’ family. He also had to consider the rest of his staff, including an 80-year-old female employee, who would be sharing the women’s restroom facility with Stephens.

Finally, Tom pondered the impact on the funeral home’s clients.

In the end, Tom decided that he could not agree to Stephens’ proposal. That decision was fully in line with federal law. Yet, in a matter of months, the Equal Employment Opportunity Commission sued the funeral home.

Later, following the commission’s urging, a federal court of appeals effectively redefined the word “sex” in federal law to mean “gender identity.”

Enacted by Congress in 1964, Title VII of the Civil Rights Act has long protected women, along with racial and religious minorities, from unjust discrimination in the workplace.

Redefining the term “sex” in that law to mean “gender identity” would create chaotic, unworkable situations and unjustly punish business owners like Tom while destroying important gains women and girls have made over the past 50 years.

Indeed, Tom Rost’s case, in which Alliance Defending Freedom represents the funeral home, is just the tip of the iceberg.

Blurring the legal differences between male and female forces women and girls to endure unequal treatment because some men and boys believe that they are women.

In Connecticut, for instance, two boys competing as girls have set state records in 15 events over the past two years, while costing girls like Selina Soule over 50 chances at next-level races.

In Anchorage, Alaska, city officials have weaponized gender ideology to argue that a women’s shelter must allow a biological male to sleep 3 feet away from women who have been victimized by rape, sex trafficking, and domestic violence.

Refusing even to discuss these and other issues that result from redefining “sex” to mean “gender identity,” Democratic lawmakers have put forward the paradoxically named Equality Act that would institutionalize these harms under federal law.

While that bill has stalled in the Senate, federal courts like the one that ruled against Harris Funeral Homes have acted to effectively change the law on their own, imposing their own policy preferences and punishing business owners who were simply acting in compliance with the law Congress actually enacted.

Tom and Nancy Rost have the right to depend on what the law says—not what judges or bureaucrats want it to be.

In R.G. & G.R. Harris Funeral Homes v. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission, the Supreme Court has a golden opportunity to affirm that changing the law is only something Congress can do, particularly in a context as complicated as changing the meaning of “sex” itself.

COMMENTARY BY

John Bursch

John Bursch is vice president of appellate advocacy and senior counsel for Alliance Defending Freedom.

Dear Readers:

With the recent conservative victories related to tax cuts, the Supreme Court, and other major issues, it is easy to become complacent.

However, the liberal Left is not backing down. They are rallying supporters to advance their agenda, moving this nation further from the vision of our founding fathers.

If we are to continue to bring this nation back to our founding principles of limited government and fiscal conservatism, we need to come together as a group of likeminded conservatives.

This is the mission of The Heritage Foundation. We want to continue to develop and present conservative solutions to the nation’s toughest problems. And we cannot do this alone.

We are looking for a select few conservatives to become a Heritage Foundation member. With your membership, you’ll qualify for all associated benefits and you’ll help keep our nation great for future generations.

ACTIVATE YOUR MEMBERSHIP TODAY

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

PODCAST: Prize-Winning Student Film Shows What It Means to Be American

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What does it mean to be American? That was the question over 6,000 students attempted to answer through a short film in the 2019 C-SPAN StudentCam competition.

The Daily Signal spoke with Eli Scott and Mason Daugherty, the grand-prize winners of the competition, to find out how they defined what it means to be American, and what they learned as they spoke with political leaders and policy experts across the aisle.

Virginia Allen: I am joined on The Daily Signal Podcast by Eli Scott and Mason Daugherty, the 2019 grand-prize winners of the C-SPAN student film competition. Eli and Mason are rising seniors at Imagine International Academy of North Texas in McKinney, Texas. Eli and Mason, thank you all for joining me today.

Mason Daugherty: Thank you for having us, Virginia.

Eli Scott: Yeah, thanks for having us on.

Allen: This year C-SPAN received nearly 3,000 documentary submissions from over 6,300 students from all over the country. And all these documentaries had to answer the question “What does it mean to be American?“

Eli and Mason, your film won the grand prize. Congratulations to both of you.

Daugherty: Thank you.

Allen: Now, how did you all answer that question of what does it mean to be American?

Daugherty: We really started at a position where we wanted to find something that people wouldn’t typically think about when it comes to being an American.

I mean, we’ve got the Constitution, the Bill of Rights. We have all of our founding documents. We have the ideals of the Founding Fathers that remain with us, but we wanted to take it into a direction that has existed from then and existed until now.

We found that to be holding your government accountable and the responsibility in the role of citizens in preserving our democratic republic. That’s how we got there.

Scott: Holding your government accountable is a truly unique American aspect and not many other people around the world can claim to enjoy that freedom and privilege.

Although it’s a little bit unconventional, I think it honestly is one of the most important ones and withholding our integrity and structure as a society.

Allen: Yeah, absolutely. How did you answer that question of as American people, how do we go about holding the government accountable?

Daugherty: What we agreed on and what we learned from speaking with numerous people from different political leanings is that it starts at a local level and a state level, and then onto a federal level.

It is so easy and almost effortless to be active in your local community on a political level. At your city council, you can pretty easily get a meeting with your mayor. If you live in a small town, medium-sized city, and they’re the people who listen to you, they’re the people that you can talk to and suggest maybe policy, anything like that. And you’ll see those changes in your daily life on state and federal issues.

You can hold them accountable, you can elect who you want to be in power, you can communicate your views by voting, but it’s a lot easier to do that on a local level. And that’s where it all comes from.

Scott: I think it’s a common misconception among the general public … we see on the news Trump, Trump, Trump, executive, executive, executive, Congress, and then that becomes ingrained into their heads and you begin to think of it as a distant kind of goal to where only the privileged and people with money can attain that.

Reverse engineer it. Who actually consents to those? What’s impacting you directly? It’s not those people that necessarily while, yes, they can …

The biggest impacts you’ll see on your day-to-day life are coming from the people who might live in the same neighborhood as you. Once you’re able to realize that and put into action specific goals you can collectivize with people who you live around, be nice to one’s neighbor.

So, starting at a much lower level is one of the common themes that we found to be the most significant impact to you as an American citizen.

Daugherty: One more thing, it was a completely bipartisan issue of holding your governor accountable, fighting corruption. We spoke with people from more progressive grassroots organizations … Then, of course The Heritage Foundation, libertarian legal scholars, and everybody had different interpretations about how to hold one one’s government accountable, but it’s something that really tied everyone together.

I think that really showed in the final cut of the video. It’s something that pulls everyone together no matter what your political leaning is.

Allen: Can you share a little bit about the process of actually making the film? I know you both put so much work into this project. Did you have a favorite part? Was there something especially challenging that stands out in your mind?

Daugherty: Of course. My background is in freelance video production for companies and people in my community. This is what I love to do on a daily basis, and when we were approached with this opportunity, I said, “Yes. Let’s do this.” Although, I had never really shot a formal documentary that you think of when you see on like “Dateline.”

There was a lot of learning. We both collaborated quite significantly. Eli, more so on the people PR, anything scheduled. And then my focus remained on how do we communicate what we’re talking about in the best way possible to the people who will be watching it?

It was a very dynamic relationship and I think that was what made it stronger is that we can each specialize on our own areas and make things go a lot more smoothly so that the quality at the end would be higher.

I think the hardest part, and then we didn’t realize this initially, was just how long it would take to edit and how many possibilities we would have and different directions that we could have taken it in.

In the end, that would have conveyed widely different messages. We spent a good month in the editing room, last December, trying to finalize it and turn out the final copy, the “final copy” that we were happy with.

Scott: Absolutely. I think the collaboration aspect is what really made the video how it is. We’re both passionate about our own things. you’re more visually creative and that really showed.

It was a wonderfully made, wonderfully executed video and being a really big fan of debate in history and politics, I was able to really search and research things and speak with people that I’d been wanting to speak with for years and really delve into the whole issue of corruption and government accountability firsthand, whether it was special-interest groups, it was professor Randy Barnett at Georgetown Law, or anybody of that sort.

It was a really interesting thing to undertake and the collaboration really shown through.

Allen: You are both rising seniors in high school. Where did this interest in politics and, specifically, conservative policy come from at your young age?

Daugherty: We’ve been both in same grade and that same school for a while now and through connection and friendship, we were both involved in our school’s Youth and Government and we have a fabulous history teacher, Ms. Presley. If you’re out there, thank you.

It kind of nurtured our interests and I think it’s just kind of in us, as a commonality that we’ve had. We’ve been able to engage in certain debates and conversations over things and that’s kind of how we call it. Do you want to add to that?

Scott: Yeah. The wonderful thing about Mason was that we’re always debating, even arguing sometimes, about ideas politically, even though we’re kind of on the same side of the spectrum. We have that ability to disagree with each other and still get along.

I think that’s wonderful and that’s what the more conservative side kind of champions. You can have disagreements with each other and get along and not fight and that’s sort of something that’s been catalyzed through Youth and Government through other extracurricular activities.

Even growing up in Texas has probably had a lot of an influence on it, but really seeing what the conservatives, the Republicans are doing in Washington currently and what they’ve done in the past.

It’s been a really interesting thing to live through and it’s had a big influence on my views on politics and I think a lot of other people in our generation, and I think it’s going to continue to grow as people go into college and our generation and it’s going end up pretty, pretty cool.

Allen: You did so much traveling as you made this film and you came to D.C. and you did interviews at The Heritage Foundation and on the hill. What was maybe one or two surprising takeaways as you were meeting with these various leaders from across the aisle?

Daugherty: One of the most common things I found on both the local and federal level is how nonpartisan of a topic this is. There’s some deep accordance to be had with that.

Scott: Yeah, we saw, no matter who we interviewed, there were things that tied us all together—young Americans, old Americans, conservatives, liberals—and that was wonderful. I mean, scholars, people at special-interest groups, or grassroots organizations. It was really wonderful to see and I think that really kind of showed in the video and the final cut just how nonpartisan of an issue it was.

Allen: I watched the film. It’s excellent, so strong. You all did an amazing job making it. How has it been received by your peers?

Daugherty: I’d say well. I think I confused them a little bit because, traditionally, in class and outside of school, we’re usually associated with a bit more conservative-leaning values, but the way we tried to present this video was that this isn’t a partisan issue. This is something that everybody needs to be concerned about and that unites us all.

I have people, extended family who watched it, who I’m not as close to, but they were legitimately wondering what direction we were going with. The fact that we were able to trip up even some of the closest people that we know and make them question, “What is this truly?” And so that was a really surprising reaction we had.

Scott: Yeah. The impressive thing is that I think a lot of people had different takeaways from the video.

The more progressive, more liberal people that saw the video and commented on it basically said, “Well, good job communicating more progressive values and stuff.”

They were impressed that, as Texans, we kind of took that on and then, maybe a teacher or a family member who was more conservative, really took away the issues of suspicion of power or limiting the power of the federal government.

Everyone took something away from it. Even the peers.

We have a very diverse class of people everywhere in the political spectrum and everyone really had their own takeaways and there were no real negative comments. Nobody was offended by the video. That was really cool because there are a lot of other ways, as Mason said, that we could have cut the video up, extended it, added more clips in where it could be extremely partisan based on what people said, how we edited it.

Daugherty: Beyond the politics side of it, people, [who may have not been as familiar with the topics we discussed] really enjoyed having a way … to kind of connect the dots in their own heads.

I think that’s what’s so special about the video is we’re able to present maybe more a complex topic but presented it in such a way that anybody who wants to can become familiar and engaged with it and learn something that they had not known beforehand.

Scott: Yeah.

Allen: What is next for you guys? Do you want to keep making more films? Are you hoping to continue to be involved in political thought and debate?

Daugherty: Well, C-SPAN is hosting the 2020 StudentCam competition. With the election coming up, it’s very tempting to … we can both vote this election and so, I think there’s just as much potential this time around.

What do you think, Eli?

Scott: I absolutely agree with that because the topic revolves on issues that we would like the candidates in 2022 to examine or bring as part of their campaign and I think that this gives us an opportunity to communicate to potential voters, people in our generation, anybody who views the video. That’s going to be what the power is.

So, I agree. It’s very tempting to do that. Besides that, I think some future steps, future goals would be to keep filmmaking as a medium that we always use to express whatever we’re interested in. Politics is one of the biggest things. Debating, having open discussions, freedoms, freedom of speech.

It’s all really good things that can be communicated through video really well. And it broadens the audience of politics as a whole, especially with young filmmakers kind of putting out that content.

Daugherty: Definitely. Just beyond the competition, filmmaking is something that I live and breathe and it’s a lot of fun, honestly, to have so much work put into a project.

I will continue to hopefully do passion projects, [that are] not necessarily bound by any sort of guidelines, but that I can manifest what it is that I might be feeling or an issue that pops up in a community or something I just want to highlight and help get more attention to.

Beyond that, in terms of career, I’m a little bit unsure currently, though I know wherever I go, filmmaking will be an integral part of it and a powerful medium of doing so.

Allen: Well, I look forward to seeing future films by you guys. Where can the film be found?

Scott: Definitely. Anybody who’s interested in seeing the film can go to studentcam.org. We’re located on the past winners page for the 2019 competition.

Allen: That’s great. Mason and Eli, thank you.

Daugherty: Thank you.

Scott: Yes. Thanks again, Virginia. It’s been a pleasure.

COLUMN BY

Virginia Allen

Virginia Allen is a contributor to The Daily Signal. Send an email to Virginia. Twitter: @Virginia_Allen5.

Dear Readers:

With the recent conservative victories related to tax cuts, the Supreme Court, and other major issues, it is easy to become complacent.

However, the liberal Left is not backing down. They are rallying supporters to advance their agenda, moving this nation further from the vision of our founding fathers.

If we are to continue to bring this nation back to our founding principles of limited government and fiscal conservatism, we need to come together as a group of likeminded conservatives.

This is the mission of The Heritage Foundation. We want to continue to develop and present conservative solutions to the nation’s toughest problems. And we cannot do this alone.

We are looking for a select few conservatives to become a Heritage Foundation member. With your membership, you’ll qualify for all associated benefits and you’ll help keep our nation great for future generations.

ACTIVATE YOUR MEMBERSHIP TODAY

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

The Green New Deal: What It Means for Medicine

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Preview: 

  • The truth has been acknowledged by Alexandria Ocasio Cortez’s own chief of staff, Saikat Chakrabarti The Green New Deal is not primarily about greening the planet or controlling the climate. It’s about socialism, as the people from whom she plagiarized it have said all along. It’s a fundamental transformation of our way of life.
  • What Americans need to know is the gritty detail behind the virtuous-sounding platitudes. How will their choices be constrained? How much will costs go up—for rent, utilities, fuel, food, and, of course, taxes? How will their standard of living be affected? And how will their actual medical care and health—as opposed to their health insurance card—be affected?

The truth has been acknowledged by Alexandria Ocasio Cortez’s own chief of staff, Saikat Chakrabarti The Green New Deal is not primarily about greening the planet or controlling the climate. It’s about socialism, as the people from whom she plagiarized it have said all along. It’s a fundamental transformation of our way of life.

Since everything you do leaves a “carbon footprint,” the GND encompasses literally everything—especially your medical care.

The first question is whether you should be alive at all. In his sensational 1968 book, The Population Bomb, entomologist (insect specialist) Paul Ehrlich predicted that hundreds of millions of people would starve to death in the 1970s. That bomb fizzled, but he still believes that civilization is doomed within decades, as humanity places inexorable burdens on our Planet’s life support systems. The optimum population of the planet is less than 2 billion, he thinks, or 5.6 billion fewer than we have now.

Once you’re here, Ehrlich and his acolytes would apparently tolerate your presence, although the decline in U.S. life expectancy for the third consecutive year would likely be good news. But having children is another matter. The demographic legacy of one person, calculated over the average time for that person’s lineage to die out, is about 6 person-lifetimes in the U.S., with eventual emission of 9,441 tons of carbon dioxide. So, “reproductive health” ideally means no reproduction for most people, and many millennials (and celebrities) seem to embrace that idea. Predictably, unrestricted or even free abortion is an article of faith among Democrat candidates. And the LGBTQ agenda, also favored by all, tends to contribute to the goal of population reduction.

Ironically, politicians still talk about “our children and our grandchildren,” though they may work to assure that many of us don’t have any.

The U.S. health care sector is said to account for around 10 percent of the CO2 generated in the U.S. and thus “could be implicated” in 10 percent (20,000) of the nearly 200,000 premature deaths attributable to air pollution annually in the United States. (There are about 3 million annual deaths in the U.S., and it is impossible to identify even one as being premature because of air pollution; the argument is purely statistical.) Thus, hospitals are supposedly killing people, albeit indirectly, by using carbon-based energy for heating, air conditioning, elevators, lighting, ventilators, etc.

Surgery is a special problem, beyond the use of electricity, because anesthetic gases that might have a greenhouse effect are vented to the atmosphere. So, are anesthesiologists to worry about a hypothetical tiny effect on the climate 50 years from now, instead of the best treatment for the patient?

“Social determinants of health” are the trendiest subject in “healthcare reform.” GND prescriptions would profoundly affect those. Diet would be mostly plant-based foods, with meat limited, ultimately to 1 oz per day. Living space would be restricted, some propose to 320 sq ft per person, with no single-family homes allowed except for trailers. Energy efficiency standards would entail restrictions on entry of outside air, without regard to effects on indoor air pollution, including bacteria and viruses. (More than 300 people in a huge Hong Kong apartment building were infected with severe acute respiratory distress syndrome [SARS] because of this.) Transportation would be mostly walking, bicycling, or public transport. Private vehicles, except possibly electric, might be banned entirely, with roads converted to parks and walkways. It is not clear what emergency responders would do. If electricity came mostly from wind and solar it would be scarce, unreliable, and many times more expensive than now. (Already tens of thousands of deaths in the UKare attributed to inability to afford adequate heating, as costs of “renewable” electricity soared.)

The Democratic presidential debates, except for some squabbling over things like alleged racism, were a display of groupthink. Everybody raised a hand in favor of the GND and universal health care. Some are more radical than others; Kamala Harris insists that we have a “climate crisis,” not just “climate change.” What Americans need to know is the gritty detail behind the virtuous-sounding platitudes. How will their choices be constrained? How much will costs go up—for rent, utilities, fuel, food, and, of course, taxes? How will their standard of living be affected? And how will their actual medical care and health—as opposed to their health insurance card—be affected?

© All rights reserved.

RELATED ARTICLE: The Green New Deal: Less About Climate, More About Control

VIDEO DOCUMENTARY: ‘Grooming’ in the UK

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Posted by Eeyore

H/T Gates of Vienna

RELATED ARTICLES:

Political correctness enabled Muslim grooming gangs to rape hundreds of white girls for more than a decade

Catholic Bishops Bemoan Possible Further Slowdown of Refugee Admissions

RELATED VIDEO: The Establishment is Still in Denial About Muslim Rape Gangs

VIDEO: Ilhan Omar Bashes Progressive Muslim Leader

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The first ever Muslim Caucus, designed to collect and amplify Muslim voices in the media, came with heavy blows and criticisms against Congresswoman Ilhan Omar.

During a panel event, Omar was asked two questions by Ani Zonneveld, president of Muslims for Progressive Values. The second question was about female genital mutilation (FGM). Zonneveld asked Omar to make a statement against FGM.

FGM particularly affects the Somali community Ilhan Omar is from and represents. It was an opportunity for Omar, a political leader who has supported a bill against FGM, to go one further and use her broad platform to remind people that FGM should be outlawed in every state.

Instead, Zonneveld received a harsh backlash from the freshman congresswoman. Berating Zonneveld, Omar said,

Your second question is an appalling question because there are bills that we vote on, bills we sponsor, many statements we put out, and then we’re in a panel like this and the question is posed: ‘Could you and Rashida do this?’ And it’s like, how often — should I make a schedule? Does this need to be on repeat every five minutes? Should I be like, ‘So today I forgot to condemn al-Qaeda, so here’s the al-Qaeda one, today I forgot to condemn FGM, so here it goes, today I forgot to condemn Hamas, so here it goes, you know what I mean?

Ilhan Omar’s harsh response to a respected Muslim progressive leader triggered a wave of reaction from Muslim Americans. While many Muslim Americans were not pleased by the lack of diversity of Muslims in the Muslim Caucus, many were even less pleased that a legitimate question from one Muslim human rights activist to a Muslim political leader would yield such a harsh response.

Watch Omar:

I spoke with Democratic activist and female imam, Rabi’a Keeble to unpack the events of the day and what we can learn from the conflict within the American Muslim community when it comes to pushing forward a human rights agenda.

RELATED STORIES:

Is Ilhan Omar a ‘Failed American Experiment?’

Ilhan Omar Slams US on Fourth of July 

Ilhan Omar Controversy: Where Does She Get Her Views?

VIDEO: ‘Hamas takes kids to the front line to die’

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Hamas’s use of children in clashes with IDF; with Col. (res.) Olivier Rafowicz.

The Jihad Squad now runs the Democratic Party

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“That power to influence policy has always been the ultimate purpose of the Communist Party’s infiltration.  It was much more dangerous, and, as events have proved, much more difficult to detect, than espionage, which beside it is trivial, though the two go hand in hand.” – Whitacre Chambers

“I am not a critic of the West; I am a critic of the weakness of the West. I am a critic of a fact we can’t comprehend: how one can lose one’s spiritual strength, one’s will power and possessing freedom, not value it, not be willing to make sacrifices for it.” ― Alexander Solzhenitsyn, Warning to the West

The jihad squad consists of four congresswomen — Reps. Ilhan Omar of Minnesota, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez of New York, Rashida Tlaib of Michigan and Ayanna Pressley of Massachusetts.  All of them wish to generationally change our country.

These jihadi Janes are committed communists. They willingly have abrogated their oaths of office in an ideology rooted not in Philadelphia, but in Moscow.  Political jihad is their game, obvious in their hatred of our culture, our nation, our Constitution, and ultimately the white European founders of our magnificent country.

They are motivated by their desire to advance a leftist, globalist system that would relegate our liberty to the trash bin.  These unaccountable jihadi Janes who share in their affinity for international communism have full contempt for the rule of law.  They do not believe in America-first, and their opponents are immediately charged with being racist bigots, including Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi.

Pelosi Loses Control

Speaker Pelosi is being bullied by the new young jihadi Jane members, despite news of Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (AOC) and Pelosi’s “gracious” meeting.  Social media was recently ablaze regarding Nancy’s open war with AOC and the “Justice Democrats,” (a political movement advocating a gradual transition from capitalism to socialism by democratic means).  Pelosi is struggling to retain control of her party.

She realizes that moving too far to the left will drive democrat voters into the arms of Trump.  She has continually fought against bringing charges of impeachment against our President, knowing it could destroy the chances of retaining their House majority.

Pelosi exhibited considerable forbearance with AOC and the rest of the Squad for the first few months after they joined Congress. She had to put out a few fires for them, of course, including several conflagrations related to their propensity to trade in anti-Semitic slurs. But the attacks on the Democratic caucus, not to mention Pelosi personally, by a staffer exhausted the speaker’s patience. She singled out Chakrabarti in a closed-door meeting and told him, “Do not tweet about our members and expect us to think that that is just OK.”  Link

The mainstream media has shown their true democratic socialist colors by continually supporting and endorsing the jihadi Janes and those who agree with their radical stances.  Pelosi has allowed her party to launch wave after wave of protests against our President and the Republican Party shouting “racism” at every turn.  Now she is feeling the brunt of that attack from these four jihadi Janes as they charge her with discriminating against women of color when she defies their totalitarian stratagems. Their continual hackneyed charge of racism has become so cavalier that the very meaning has been diluted.

Let’s first take a look at “Alexandria O-C” including those who fund the her.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez

Ocasio-Cortez may seem ignorant and uneducated, but this would belie the fact that she auditioned and was chosen for this position and is funded by a wealthy trust fund kid.  Don’t be fooled by her, she is being heavily promoted.

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (AOC) was raised in Yorktown Heights, an affluent, mostly-white town in Westchester County, New York. She went on to earn degrees in both economics and international relations at Boston University. During her time as a student there, she also worked for the late Senator Ted Kennedy on matters involving immigration and foreign affairs.

In 2012 she started a publishing company, Brook Avenue Press (BAP), which produced children’s books portraying the Bronx in a positive light. (The state of New York dissolved BAP in October 2016, which occurs when a business fails to file a tax return or pay its corporate taxes. On July 6, 2017, the state placed a warrant on the company for non-payment of corporate taxes. As of March 2019, BAP still owed $1,870.36.)

Chosen for Office

Like Obama, AOC was an effective community organizer.  They both were taught Saul Alinsky’s communist tactics.  AOC’s run for Congress came into being as a result of a recruiting campaign organized by a group called Justice Democrats (JD), which in 2017 began holding auditions for potential candidates to run for various U.S. Congressional seats on its leftist political platform.  (JD was founded in 2017 by Cenk Uygur of the “regressive” online news program The Young Turks, Kyle Kulinski of Secular Talk, and former Bernie Sanders presidential campaign staffers Zack Exley and Saikat Chakrabarti. Their goal is to replace mainstream Democrats with socialist challengers.)

Recognizing her potential for eventually becoming an influential political figure, the newly formed leftist organization Brand New Congress (BNC), a PAC founded by Zach Exley and Saikat Chakrabarti, contacted her and encouraged her to run for a seat in the U.S. House of Representatives.  That same year, Ocasio-Cortez served as an organizer for Senator Bernie Sanders’s presidential bid, and in December of 2017, she spoke at a Black Lives Matter rally.

Supporters and endorsers of AOC’s 2018 congressional campaign were Bernie Sanders, Zephyr Teachout, Cynthia Nixon, Barack Obama, MoveOn.org, Our Revolution, the Democratic Socialists of America, and Black Lives Matter. U.S. Rep. Barbara Lee contributed money to the campaign.

Chakrabarti and Trust Fund Money

AOC is the leader of a movement, not just a congresswoman. Saikat Chakrabarti, for his part, has been much more than Ocasio-Cortez’s chief of staff—he’s become the chief strategist of a generational insurgency.

Like her jihadi Jane sisters, AOC promotes the Green New Deal, (which is nothing more than U.N. Agenda 2030), Medicare for all, tuition-free colleges, limits to the Second Amendment, the dissolution of Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) and the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) along with open borders, murder of unborn babies up to and after birth, and a 70% tax rate for those who earn $10 million or more.  Like her jihadi Jane sisters, she is anti-Israel/anti-Jew and has defended and praised the Islamist activist Linda Sarsour.

AOC supports Antifa even after an Antifa activist attempted to carry out a terror attack against an ICE facility in Tacoma, Washington on July 13, 2019 and injured journalist Andy Ngo at a Portland, Oregon rally.

Wealthy trust fund kid Saikat Chakrabarti became AOC’s congressional campaign manager in 2018, and her chief of staff in Congress in 2019. He sets the policy for the jihadi Squad, and he wants to eliminate Nancy Pelosi.  Chakrabarti’s Brand New Congress (BNC) and Justice Democrats were major supporters of Ocasio-Cortez’s campaign.

BNC consists of Democrats who would bring “justice” to a deeply flawed nation that was “founded on slavery and genocide” and had “never been able to escape that legacy.” They claim the U.S. is replete with “establishment politicians who reject the racial justice demands of the Black Lives Matter movement and sit by as racial inequality persists and even worsens.”

Chakrabarti stated, “The Green New Deal? We didn’t start that out as a climate thing. We started this as a means of reversing and overthrowing the economy. It’s an economic idea.” Thereby admitting what all of climate change is! He writes their speeches. They are his minions. He controls the money.

By the way, AOC is being challenged.  Jamaican immigrant, Sherie Murray is running against AOC in 2020.  She was featured on Lou Dobb’s show on July 25th, 2019.  Murray was a supporter of AOC in 2016, and voted for Barack Obama both times.  She is not what Fox News is reporting her to be.

Chakrabarti helped establish two political action committees that paid a corporation he ran more than $1 million in 2016 and 2017, federal campaign finance records show.  And they were right in Knoxville, TN.  On March 6, 2019, the Daily Caller reported that according to corporate filings which it had obtained, AOC and her top aide had held “majority control over Justice Democrats,” who were crucial to her election victory.

Chakrabarti resigned from JD’s board, and the PAC’s website no longer lists Ocasio-Cortez as a governor, but government documents show the two still hold majority control.  Here is the Federal Election Commission (FEC) complaint.

Former FEC Commissioner Brad Smith said AOC never disclosed her control of the PAC to the FEC.  If she intentionally withheld that information from the FEC, both she and Chakrabarti “could be facing jail time.” Link

Conclusion

Jihadi Jane, Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, is the leader of the jihad squad.  Never believe she’s stupid…she’s being groomed and promoted; the rest of the squad will follow.  Next up, Somalian Congresswoman Ilhan Omar.

BDS advocate Ilhan Omar uses an Israeli company to power her website

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She doesn’t have to worry, of course: the establishment media will never call her out on this hypocrisy.

“Whoops: BDS Proponent Ilhan Omar uses Israeli company to Power Website,” by David Sidman, Breaking Israel News, July 23, 2019:

Congresswoman Ilhan Omar (D, MN), who introduced legislation that seeks to protect those who want to boycott, divest and sanction (BDS) Israel, uses an Israeli company to power her own website.

Reddit user ‘EthanB111’, noticed that the site ‘IlhanOmar.com’ is powered by WIX, a company that allows its customers to easily build websites using simple drag and drop tools. WIX does not hide the fact that they are based in Tel Aviv, Israel.

Before the freshman congresswoman was elected, she actually told Jewish voters that she opposed the BDS movement saying: “I believe right now with the BDS movement, it’s not helpful”.

But the CAIR affiliated candidate quickly changed her stripes when she introduced House Resolution 496, which states: “that all Americans have the right to participate in boycotts in pursuit of civil and human rights,” US Rep. Ilhan Omar invoked several previous examples where she says that “boycotts have been effectively used” in the United States and around the world. She also caused a controversy when she compared boycotting Israel to the boycott of Nazi Germany.

In a statement, Omar said: “Americans of conscience have a proud history of participating in boycotts to advocate for human rights abroad including … boycotting Nazi Germany from March 1933 to October 1941 in response to the dehumanization of the Jewish people in the lead-up to the Holocaust”.

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

PODCAST: ‘What Am I Doing?’ Gender Hysteria Takes Its Toll

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“I was 17… I finally started on testosterone gel, later switching to injections. It was a huge thing when my voice broke, and my figure started changing — my hips narrowed, my shoulders broadened. It felt right. Passing as a man, I felt safer in public places, I was taken more seriously when I spoke, and I felt more confident. Then I had chest surgery. It was botched, and I was left with terrible scarring. I was traumatized. For the first time, I asked myself, ‘What am I doing?‘”

Moya Sarner is in her late 20s now. She fights the waves of regret over what she did to her body almost every day, especially when she thinks about having children. If only someone had counseled her, she says wistfully. “I might not have transitioned. I was so focused on trying to change my gender, I never stopped to think about what gender meant.” The people treating her should have. And now there are Moyas all around the world suffering because no one told them the truth — that there’s freedom from their pain without destroying how they were made.

In England, gender clinicians, nurses, and therapists are pleading with the country to stop putting children on this irreversible path. The medical staff at Tavistock, England’s only gender clinic, was horrified enough to go public, many of them resigning over the horrifying things they witnessed behind closed doors. Some doctors, they said, would openly lie to patients and parents, fast-tracking what turned out to be extremely painful and devastating surgeries for children, who were usually suffering from deeper issues. When staffers like Kirsty Entwistle tried to intervene in certain cases, she was considered intolerant.

“Since leaving…” she writes in an open letter, “I have continued to follow transgender issues online and one of the things that I have felt concerned about is seeing the bullying and intimidation for those people who raise valid concerns about children making a medical transition… I am also concerned that the attempts of Tavistock & Portman professionals, including former GIDS clinicians, to voice concerns about GIDS practice do not appear to have sunk in.” Several employees have gone to the press, something, Kirsty points out, “clinical psychologists are not known for.” And when they do, desperate to protect children’s well-being, “you have to take them seriously.”

Psychoanalyst Dr. Marcus Evans, who also quit, told the BBC he was worried the clinic was searching for “quick solutions” for young patients. “This is the opposite of what needs to be done,” he insisted. “There is a lot at stake here as these decisions have far-reaching consequences.” In a secret report sent to the U.K.’s Sunday Times, multiple staffers accused Tavistock of using puberty-blocking drugs or surgery as the cure-all for “multiple problems such as historic child abuse in the family, bereavement… and a very significant incidence of autism spectrum disorder.”

But if the medical staff ever suggested that these experiences might be tied to a child’s “wish to transition,” Entwistle said, they “ran the risk of being called transphobic.” There’s an “unspoken rule,” she explained. “Clinicians do not tell families: ‘Your child is not transgender.'” That’s especially disturbing now, since the clinic is overwhelmed with referrals for kids. More than 2,510 have asked for appointments this year — a 400 percent spike from the 97 in 2009!

Other doctors walked out because their objections were flat-out ignored. They thought their patients were being subjected to “long-term damage” because Tavistock refused to stand up to the pressure” from “highly politicized” transgender-activist groups. They are “making decisions that will have a major impact on children and young people’s bodies and lives … without a robust evidence base,” Kirstey fumed. One example, she points out, is that parents were routinely told that puberty blockers are “fully reversible,” when the effects, she argues, are impossible to know. Girls like Moya may never be able to have children because no one told them the risks. Risks like infertility, sexual dysfunction, memory loss, bone fractures and osteoporosis, strokes, testicular cancer, suicidal tendencies, and on and on, Dr. Michelle Cretella explained on “Washington Watch.” “So these are not benign drugs.”

“I mean, we have physicians and drug companies profiting off of the suffering of children… when some of these kids who are gender confused are suffering from an emotional disturbance — and others are being talked into it by the very people who are supposed to be helping them… [P]rior to the wholesale promotion of transgenderism, the vast majority of children who were confused about their sex, if they were supported through natural puberty, outgrew the confusion. That’s a fact [that’s] been documented in at least 11 studies. But again, that was before all the transgender propaganda.”

For the time being, the Tavistock headline seems to be generating a surprising amount of outrage. Conservative activists who’ve been waiting for the public to catch on to the nightmare that is gender ideology are relieved that these clinicians are brave enough to stand up and say, “Enough.” “I’ve always thought if the public really knew what ‘transition’ entailed,” one conservative activist said, holding gruesome photos of patients’ surgery scars, “they would object, and it would stop. I think the U.K. is collectively reaching a point of critical mass where too many of us know what is happening.”

Tony Perkins’ Washington Update is written with the aid of FRC senior writers.

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EDITORS NOTE: This FRC column with podcast is republished with permission. All rights reserved.