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GOP Parallel Universes: Hyperbolic and Counter-Intuitive Myths, Claims and Canards, June 24-July 1, 2013

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The legacy of the President who dreams of nuclear disarmament is likely to be a world with far more weapons and more nuclear powers.

“The Obama Age of Proliferation, WSJ.  

So crusading for nuclear disarmament has the same net effect as crusading for a nuclear buildup?

“Spreading democracy” is code language for destabilization of the Middle East and empowerment of Muslim extremists. We should seek stabilization in the Middle East, whether democratic or dictatorial, but more often than not it comes in the form of dictatorship. There is no virtue in extremist governments because they are elected democratically, which if not sincere will be the product of voter intimidation creating the same result.

“Obama’s Syrian Deception,” Red State.

The rules are a little different when it comes to a scandal directed against a celebrity like Paula Deen, though, because the State Media has a vested interest in ramping up racial tension before the Trayvon Martin trial begins next week.  I hope you are savvy enough to realize that the institutional Left is hoping that Orlando explodes in a powder keg of racial hatred, riots, and destruction.  There’s a whole generation of people working in the State Media right now who were too young to be on the air or submitting copy when the LA Riots happened after the Rodney King verdict in the early 1990s and during the OJ Simpson or Michael Jackson trials after that.  THOSE were the stories that reporters now in their late-20s and 30s all studied in journalism school…and they’ve always wished they could be part of a giant circus like that.  They salivated when this Trayvon Martin shooting happened because it was a chance to stoke the same sort of racial tension that these people all studied in school and dreamed of one day participating in.  I think that attacking Paula Deen and calling her a “Ray Ciss” on the Friday before the trial of George Zimmerman (the man who killed Trayvon Martin…you know, the boy who Barack Obama said looked like he could be his son) is the State Media’s way of priming the pump for all of the racial fury and indignation they’ve got planned during the trial. 

 

“10 Things You Should Know About the “Ray Ciss” Attack On Paula Deen in June, 2013,” Hill Buzz.

 

the current immigration  bill “would allow stateless people in the U.S. to seek conditional lawful status if their nations have been made uninhabitable by climate change….presumably how this would work is that somebody would walk up to the U.S. border, say ‘it’s getting too hot over there’ (or cold, or wet, or dry, or windy) and be granted legal entry.”

“Dem Files Immigration Bill Amendment That Would Grant Amnesty to ‘climate change ‘refugees’”, Michelle Malkin

President Obama has managed to win election by assembling two major constituencies: 1) a lumpen proletariat that has no idea how the economy works, is dependent on the government, and votes for him because he promises more handouts; and 2) an upper-crust constituency that thinks “we already have enough,” isn’t interested in any further economic development, and believes, if anything, that we already have too much of material possessions and it’s time to start cutting back on things. This has been the theme of environmentalism for 40 years. The rationale changes — we’re undergoing a “population bomb,” we’re drowning in pollution, we’re running out of oil and other resources — but the message is always the same. We’ve got enough. Time to call off all this progress. Let’s go back to spinning our own yarn, growing our own vegetables, and putting up windmills.

“Obama’s War on Prosperity, “ The American Spectator

Lane goes on…to denounce American Christianity for failing to produce martyrs and for substituting a “heretical Americanism for Christian orthodoxy.” He insists that to put things right “Christians must risk martyrdom” to force people to either “acknowledge Jesus [as] an imperator and the church as God’s imperium or to begin drinking holy blood.”

Lane expresses frustration with what he regards as the superficial politics of press releases of “inside the Beltway” Christian Rightists. He calls for “champions of Christ to save the nation from the pagan onslaught imposing homosexual marriage, homosexual scouts, 60 million babies done to death by abortion and red ink as far as the eye can see.” The champions for Christ of his vision will “wage war for the Soul of America and trust the living God to deliver the pagan gods into our hands and restore America to her Judeo-Christian heritage and re-establish a Christian culture.”

“America’s survival is at stake,” he declares, “and this is not tall talk or exaggeration.”. 

 

“Rand Paul Operative Wants to Lead Dominionist Revolt Against the US,” Crooks and Liars

As I say,  just another day in the life of the republic: a corrupt bureaucracy dispensing federal gravy to favored clients; a pseudo-legislature passing bills unread by the people’s representatives and uncomprehended by the men who claim to have written them; and a co-regency of jurists torturing an 18th-century document in order to justify what other countries are at least honest enough to recognize as an unprecedented novelty. Whether or not, per Scalia, we should “condemn” the United States Constitution, it might be time to put the poor wee thing out of its misery.

 

“So Long, Self-Government, National Review

Glossary, June 1-23, 2013

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answers: what the populace is supposedly “demanding” from the Obama administration in regards to the Four Scandals. In the GOP infinite regree machine, the more “answers” the Obama administration provides on any of the four topics, the more questions are raised. (see also: “demanding”)

cap and trade: stalking horse for redistributionism and shackling energy producers and corporate “job creators”.

court packing: any Obama judicial nomination. Synonyms with “regulatory overreach”.

demanding: (verb): the American public’s quenchless thirst for “accountability” from Obama. The more they get, the more they seem to “demand,” like some deranged beast. The “demand” side always exceeds the supply side.

distracted: any talk of economic recovery, all intended to veer attention away from the sacred Three Scandals. At some very recent point in the GOP rhetorical bubble, improving economic data became the distraction, but “Benghazi” is never seen as a distraction and dry hole.

shakedown: what HUD does to banks to get them to lend more to minorities.

shamnesty: GOP shorthand for any “pathway to citizenship” for current immigrants.

the truly needy: the wedge term to justify the exclusion of hundres of thousands of food stamp recipients. Synonymous with “the truly desperate”.

upward mobility: the American Dream, always hamstrung by the “welfare state” and “government regulation,” never by corporate greed or economic stagnation.

GOP Parallel Universes: Hyperbolic and Counter-Intuitive Myths, Claims and Canards, June 14-23, 2013

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So why would 57% of the American Electorate believe that the NSA will be used to attack political opponents of Barack Obama rather than military and ideological opponents of the USA? First, he has already ordered his IRS Waffen-SS to do the same. Second, the Comprehensive Amnesty Reform bill that he has voiced his support for is an assault on the economic opportunity and viability of an already-suffering American Working Class. It is obvious through this choice of priorities that President Barack Obama cares a whole lot more about keeping you in your place rather than whether that place affords you any particular safety or hope.

“The IRS, The NSA and Comprehensive Amnesty Reform All Tie Together In a Very Nasty Way.,” Red State.

The unified field theory of right-wing paranoia.

According to Sarah Palin, the United States is “becoming a totalitarian surveillance state.” And Herman Cain said, “This train is running full speed down the tracks towards socialism and towards communism. Yes, I said it. Before we stop it and reverse it, we got to slow it down. That’s what we do in 2014.”

Remarks at Ralph Reed’s Faith & Freedom Coalition convention.

Sander and Taylor argue persuasively that the trouble with preferences is not only the injustice done to people like Abigail Fisher, who was denied admission to the University of Texas while less qualified black and Hispanic applicants were accepted — though that is unfair — but also the harm it does to those to whom such preferences are extended.

Preferences have created a widespread mismatch between minority students and the schools they attend. Minority students at all levels (least so at the very top colleges) tend to wind up at schools for which they are less well prepared than the majority of their classmates. The University of Texas is typical in awarding the equivalent of hundreds of SAT points to minority applicants. This results in minority students (who’ve been assured that they have what it takes to be successful) plunging to the bottom of the class. Students accepted under the preference regime often experience severe feelings of inferiority, social segregation, and much higher dropout rates. Both for affirmative-action “beneficiaries” and for their classmates, mismatch reinforces negative stereotypes. It also causes more African-American students to flee math, science, and engineering majors in favor of softer subjects such as education and sociology. “Black college freshmen are more likely to aspire to science or engineering careers than are white freshmen, but mismatch causes blacks to abandon these fields at twice the rate of whites.”

 

“The Unmentionable Injustice,’ National Review.

 

Let’s see here: minorities “tend to be” unprepared for the best schools and so are almost universally doomed to fail and consequently feel “inferior”. So affirmative action turns out to be the most effective way to make sure minorities fail. GOP politiscripting at its best.

More than 50,000 Americans lost their lives winning battles on the ground in Vietnam, only to have the war lost politically back home. We seem to be having a similar scenario unfolding today in Iraq, where soldiers won the war, only to have politicians lose the peace, as Iraq now increasingly aligns itself with Iran.

“The Loss of Trust,” Thomas Sowell, National Review.

 

Iraq is destined to be that most elusive political phantom, the “winnable” war that we lost. In GOP land, America can never, be definition, “lose” a war, but just have “politicians” snatch defeat from the jaws of victory.

Somehow, we have created an absurd situation in which a resident of Oaxaca, often fleeing racial and class oppression in Mexico, becomes defined as a victim of American pathologies the nanosecond he crosses the border. In turn, America, the generous host, is reinvented as a culpable oppressor that has treated the illegal alien so badly that his children deserve job and college-admission preference. Mexico likewise must be reinvented, from the exporter of superfluous human beings to the liberal champion of its stolen human assets.

“Illegal Immigration: Elite Illiberality,” Victor Davis Hanson, National Review.

 

You know, I’ve always said that I didn’t want to be given a job because I was a female, I wanted it because I was the most well-qualified person for the job. And making certain that companies are going to move forward in that vein, that is what women want. They don’t want the decisions made in Washington. They want to be able to have the power and the control and the ability to make those decisions for themselves.

Rep. Martha Blackburn (R-Ten.), on Meet The Press. She also argues that the House’s new anti-abortion bill is actually designed to help women.

.Rubio Aide 1: Yeah. I mean, one of the problems you have with this, “Oh there’s American workers who are unemployed.” There are American workers who, for lack of a better term, can’t cut it. There shouldn’t be a presumption that every American worker is a star performer. There are people who just can’t get it, can’t do it, don’t want to do it. [etc.,

Shorter Rubio aide:  There’s a reason unemployed Americans are unemployed. They aren’t star performers. Screw ‘em. We’re bringing in workers from abroad!

 

“Rubio Doubles Down Into Disaster,” Daily Caller.

“I’d hire a gay guy if I thought he was a good worker. But if he comes into work in a tutu … he’s not producing what I want in my office,” said Cornel Rasor, the current chairman of the resolutions committee of the Idaho GOP, according to the Spokesman-Review. “If a guy has a particular predilection and keeps it to himself, that’s fine,” Rasor continued. “But if he wants to use my business as a platform for his lifestyle, why should I have to subsidize that? And that’s what these anti-discrimination laws do.

 Idaho Republic Cornel Rasor, Salon.
Representative Louie Gohmert (R-TX) on Thursday denied it was “evil” for Republicans to want to cut food stamps because poor people used the program to purchase extravagant foods. The Texas congressman complained that Democrats had portrayed Republicans as evil because they supported a measure to cut nearly 2 million low-income people off the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program, which would mainly impact working families with children. On the other hand, Gohmert said, poor people were using food stamps to buy food that other Americans could not afford. He claimed his “broken-hearted” constituents had repeatedly told him they had seen people use food stamps to buy king crab legs.

“Because he does pay income tax, he doesn’t get more back than he pays in, he is actually helping pay for king crab legs when he can’t pay for them for himself,” Gohmert explained.

“How can you begrudge somebody who feels that way,” he added. “How can you begrudge anyone who steps up on behalf of constituents who feel that way. We don’t want anyone to go hungry, and from the amount of obesity in this country by people who we’re told do not have enough to eat, it does seem like we could have a debate about this issue without allegations about wanting to slap down or starve children.”

 

On the  House floor . Reagan’s “welfare queen” meme lives on in perpetuity.

GOP Parallel Universes: Hyperbolic and Counter-Intuitive Myths, Claims and Canards, May 30-June 11, 2013

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Based on almost everything we’ve heard so far from IRS officials and the Obama administration, perhaps the surest sign that a political purpose played a role in the targeting is their adamant insistence that it did not. “Politics and the IRS: Protesting Too Much,” National Review.  Alice-In Wonderland logic: guilty until proven innocent.
Where then was his conscience when he sent thousands of young Americans to fight and die for something he believed unwinnable? More than 1,500 Americans have died in Afghanistan since Obama became president (more than three times the number killed in Bush’s eight years). For what cause did they die? What did Obama achieve? And why does no one care about the outcome of Obama’s war? “The Forgotten War,” Mona Charen, National Review. So now it’s “Obama’s war”?
First of all, this is another example of an international organization attempting to dictate policy to sovereign nation-states, which is generally a bad idea and moves us closer towards a global government in which policy is set further away from home and increasingly by bureaucrats in Switzerland. Let me repeat: If moves like this gain traction, it will no longer be us, via our elected representatives, setting policy, but instead, it will be the WHO, which also wants to limit how much fat, salt, etc., you eat. “World Health Organization’s Continuing Attempts To Usurp American Sovereignty,” Red State.GOP response to WHO initiative to ban tobacco advertising, promotion, and sponsorship. It won’t be long before the UN decides what and how much you’ll eat.
Sen. Saxby Chambliss (R-GA) on Tuesday suggested that the “hormone level created by nature” was to blame for rapes in the military and that all pregnant servicewomen should be investigated to make sure their condition was the result of consensual sex.At a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing on sexual assaults within the military, Chambliss opined that the Pentagon’s decision to allow women in combat roles was only going to make the problem worse.The Georgia Republican recalled that “several years ago when we had the first females go out on an aircraft carrier, when they returned to port, a significant percentage of those females were pregnant.””Was any investigation made by the Navy following that incident to determine whether or not all of those pregnancies occurred as a result of consensual acts?” he asked Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Jonathan Greenert.The admiral replied that he did not have details of the incident immediately available, but he pledged to follow up.Chambliss noted that Democratic proposals to modify the Uniform Code of Military Justice (UCMJ) and take sexual assault reporting outside of the victim’s chain of command might not work because young servicemen were being driven by their “nature.”

“The young folks coming in to each of your services are anywhere from 17 to 22 or 23,” he pointed out. “Gee-whiz, the hormone level created by nature sets in place the possibility for these types of things to occur. So, we’ve got to be very careful on our side.”

.

 

 

don’t some remarks just seem to parody themselves?
The kind of coup that’s taking place here is nationalizing one-sixth of the economy, the health care system, under control of government. They’ve taken it over. They are attempting to totally bastardize the immigration system in this country, take that over and destroy it. If you look at the IRS scandal, this is what happens in tinhorn banana republics: enemies of the regime are targeted, punished, votes suppressed, not allowed to raise money, basically not allowed to be in opposition. We’re in the middle of a coup. And the question is not whether Obama survives it, folks, it’s whether the country does. “Will the US Even Survive Obama’s Full Term?” Rush Limbaugh show. Apparently offering universal health care constitutes a government coup.
When he tells you to “reject those voices,” he’s like the Wizard of Oz telling Dorothy not to pay attention to the man behind the curtain. He doesn’t want his constituency to see reality. He doesn’t want you to recognize that tyranny is indeed lurking around the corner – or even closer than that. He especially doesn’t want to people to recognize that he is the face of that tyranny. “Tyranny ‘Just Around the Corner’,” World News Daily. What would these tin foil-hatted folks be doing or saying in the face of real tyranny?  The fact that no one’s been charged with a crime because of the four scandals doesn’t seem to be a major clue to them that calling it all some uber-tyranny may be a tad bit of an overreaction.
The Alinsky teaching, community organizing, Marxist has brought Chicago thug politics to the national scene. Reward your friends with the people’s money, intimidate and denigrate your opposition, and use the power of government at every level to advance your own agenda, punish your enemies and protect your lies. Why should anyone be surprised?Obama and his leftist radicals will say anything to anyone to obfuscate the truth, cover up their failures and “fundamentally transform” America into a socialist welfare state that is wholly dependent on government for healthcare, food, housing, and education. This has been apparent from the beginning. Why should anyone be surprised?This has been the goal of the Progressives for a generation. Obama is the culmination of decades of school indoctrination, media social engineering and Communist manipulation. Why should anyone be surprised? “Why is Anyone Surprised? U.S. Has Been Chicagoized ,” US Action NewsThe Commie threat never went away–it just lay low until Obama became its avatar.
And can we really believe that Obama was unaware of the Mao ornament on the White House Christmas tree? “Obama Is A Marxist,” US Action News.no doubt part of the War on Christmas.
The Communist Manifesto dictates, among other things:

  • The abolition of private property (You didn’t build that)
  • A heavy progressive or graduated income tax (“fair share”).
  • Abolition of all rights of inheritance (death tax)
  • Centralization of credit in the hands of the state, by means of a national bank (Federal Reserve creates money out of thin air)
  • Centralization of the means of communications (Obama appointed a socialist sympathizer to the FCC)
  • Extension of factories and instruments of production owned by the state, (General Motors, Chrysler, banks, healthcare)
  • Free education for all children in public schools. (indoctrination centers that you are forced to pay for)

 

 “Has Obama Already Bankrupted America?” US Action News.

Parallel GOP Universes: Hyperbolic and Counter-Intuitive Myths, Claims and Canards, May 18-May 29, 2013

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Obamacare navigators will have access to highly personal data from potential “customers” to assess their “needs.” That means income levels, birth dates, addresses, eligibility for government assistance, Social Security numbers, and sensitive medical information. They’ll be targeting both individuals and small businesses. Anyone they can lay their grubby hands on. Who’s getting the navigator grants and training? “Community groups” in 33 states that naturally include socialized-medicine-supporting unions and Saul Alinsky–steeped activist outfits.On Capitol Hill last week, a top Obamacare official told GOP lawmakers that navigators will not be required to undergo background checks. Criminal records are not automatically disqualifying — and that includes identity theft. The federal rule-makers will require online training of a measly 20 hours. Health-care-regulations watchdog Betsy McCaughey adds that navigators “don’t have to know math or insurance, but rules announced April 5 specify you have to match the race, ethnicity, and language preferences of the neighborhood that will be targeted.”

The Obamacare navigator corps smacks of ACORN redux, stocked with demographically tailored Democratic-party recruitment operatives, not objective, informed insurance experts.

 “Obamacare ‘Navigators,’ Michael Malkin, The National Review.  In a breathtakingly paranoid piece, Malkin manages to link the ACA with Saul Alinsky, ACORN, the “brass knuckled” SEIU,  terrorists, and Kathleen Sibelius’s “abortion-racketeering friends”  at Planned Parenthood.
Is Britain to be run in the shadows by some diehard Western traditionalists pulling the levers of free-market capitalism, democracy, and freedom of the individual, so that in its plazas and squares others have the freedom and wherewithal to damn just those values? In Britain, as in the West in general, deportation is a fossilized concept. Unity is passé. Patriotism is long suspect. The hip metrosexual cultures of the urban West strain to find fault in their inheritance, and seem to appreciate those who do that in the most cool fashion — but always with the expectation that there will be some poor blokes who, in terms of clean water, medical care, free speech, and dependable electricity, ensure that London is not Lagos, that Stockholm is not Damascus, and that Los Angeles is not Nuevo Laredo. “Western Cultural Suicide,” Victor David Hanson, The National Review”.  The chief existential  threat to America now seem to be “the hip meteosexual cultures of the West”. “Metrosexual” . Really? I thought that hoary pejorative had been consigned to the linguistic dustbin in the mid-1990s.
the potential scandal of HHS secretary Kathleen Sebelius raising private money to pitch Obamacare is “the Obama administration’s own Iran/Contra.”  Charles Krauthammer, on Fox News.  Yes, sure it’s a good analogy, except that disseminating information about health care is not exactly the same as, 1) selling arms to terrorists; and, 2) trading arms for hostages and lying about it to Congress. 
Kootenai County, Idaho Sheriff Ben Wolfinger threatened on Friday to drop his department’s sponsorship of a Boy Scout troop because “[i]t would be inappropriate for the sheriff’s office to sponsor an organization that is promoting a lifestyle that is in violation of state law.” Just in case there was any ambiguity regarding what “lifestyle” Wolfinger was referring to, he also sent a copy of an anti-sodomy statute that is still on the books in Idaho to an official for the Boy Scouts. Boy Scouts of America’s National Council voted last week to stop discriminating against gay scouts, although they will continue to exclude LGBT people from scout leadership. 

“Idaho Sheriff Threatens To Stop Sponsoring Boy Scout Troop Because ‘Sodomy’ Is Illegal”, Think Progress.

 
Pompeo, who visited Guantanamo Bay last week, said that was not the case as he becomes visibly agitated after being confronted with facts.“It is not a crisis mode,” he said Sunday. “We have prisoners down there that have chosen not to consume calories, have chosen not to take protein. We now have an obligation to try to take care of them. The last thing to say about these folks who are assertedly hunger strikers is that they look to me like a lot of them have put on weight.”

 

 GOP Rep: Gitmo Hunger Strikers Look Like They’ve Put On Weight, in  quoting Rep. Mike Pompeo (R-Kansas), on MSNBC. 
Should we fail to do so, there will be a reaction against the resulting violence long before the Mississippi, The Thames or any other river flows with blood. Should our nation be foolish enough to pass immigration legislation along the lines of the current “Gang of 8” monstrosity, diversity will be our fascism; not our strength. Either the state or an outraged mob of the people will react against the violence in the streets and our freedoms as Americans could well be taken away from us. “Comprehensive Amnesty Reform Could Lead to Fascism,” Red State
And there it is: Dopey stimulus, obtuse bailout, noodle-headed  Obamacare, half-wit Dodd-Frank, damfool IRS Tea Party crashers, AP and Fox News beset by oafish peeping Toms and the Benghazi tale told by an idiot. One could go on. Stupid is a great force in human affairs. And the great force has a commander in chief.  “Stupid,” P.J. O’Rourke, The Evening Standard.
The key question now is whether we are willing to accept a Khamenei Doctrine, whereby no state that is part of the Iran/Hezbollah security system is permitted to leave it. Of course, the Brezhnev Doctrine was that of a global superpower armed to the teeth with nuclear weapons; the Khamenei Doctrine is that of a third world state, Iran, of only 75 million people and so far without a nuclear arsenal. And this is what makes the American   position to date so incomprehensible, and so dangerous. Nasrallah and Khamenei are taking a gamble based on their assessment of us–that we will do nothing even in the face of their sending expeditionary forces to Syria. So far they have been proved right. Will we really accept this action on their part, with its consequences throughout the Middle East?Put another way, Nasrallah and Khamenei have decided to win. They understand the costs of losing, and the benefits of winning, and have made their decision. The United States has made no such decision and appears content to lose.

 

 “The Brezhnev Doctrine, Iran Style,” Elliot Abrams, The Weekly Standard.  The Domino Theory  revived From 1967.

Glossary, May 7-16, 2013

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an anatomy of key memes, phrases and obsessions in Wall Street Journal editorials and other precincts of the GOP blogosphere, May 7-16, 2013

and don’t forget the four people who died in Benghazi: insert in almost any story about the IRS, the AP, Obamacare, Iran, Syria, etc.  Now the rhetorical equivalent of adding “in bed” to the end of a fortune cookie message.

concerns are rising: passive voice and passive-aggressiveness combined in one opening rhetorical gambit.

Hamlet: Obama’s Syria dithering.

I don’t mean to be negative, but….: a typical Fox News correspondent’s rhetorical move after savaging Obama for a minute or so. This is usually a transition to even more savaging. Beyond passive aggressiveness. See also “concern is growing”.

overreach: any Obama administration initiative. Anything beyond a libertarian view of extremely limited government.

real facts: whatever the prevailing GOP meta-narrative is about any given issue of the day. These are always concealed by Obama, and whatever he says he can never “come clean,” both literally and symbolically.

scandal: anything the GOP finds questionable about the Obama administration. Benghazi, for example, is now always called a “scandal”, even though—like Whitewater—there is no apparent crime.

skills-based immigration:  state of the artHeritage Foundation dog-whistle term for screening immigrants by projected productivity & IQ. For a devastating chronology of how this term -basically a eugenics-based argument-has evolved, see Charles Blow’s 5/9/13 NY Times column, “Terms of Art.”

Parallel GOP Universes: Hyperbolic and Counter-Intuitive Myths, Claims and Canards, May 8-May 15, 2013

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We are not only losing the war with enemies whose stated goal is our destruction we are led by a political party that constantly finds excuses not to take these enemies seriously and never has to account for its disgraceful conduct because its potential opposition is mute. The only way to reverse this trend is to mount a campaign to put Obama’s support for the Muslim Brotherhood at the forefront of the political debate and to educate Americans about the real dangers we face. Americans need to become aware of the Islamic-supremacist threat of the malignant designs of the Muslim Brotherhood and of the disasters that may lie ahead because of the Obama administration’s policies of appeasing and enabling our enemies’ evil ambitions

David Horowitz, “How Obama Betrayed America”, National Review.

And fourth, the free breakfast profoundly weakens young people’s character. When you grow up learning to depend on the state, you will almost inevitably — even understandably — assume that the state will take care of you. And you will grow up also assuming — as do Europeans, who give far less to charity than Americans for this very reason — that the state will take care of your fellow citizens, including your own children.

These are the ways in which the Left has damaged children and families through free school breakfasts.

Why, then, do progressives advocate it? Because it meets three essential characteristics of the left wing: It strengthens the state; it has governmental authority replace parental authority; and, perhaps most important, it makes progressives feel good about themselves. The overriding concern of the Left is not whether a program does good. It is whether it feels good.

“No More Free Breakfasts,” National Review. The moral rot of the empire started with free breakfasts for poor children. The Left’s “destroy the children” campaign has been unmasked at last.

King said Obama ignores athletes such as former New York Jets backup quarterback Tim Tebow, who express their Christian faith, but was quick to call with his congratulations when former Washington Wizards player Jason Collins announced he is gay.

“These are ways that the culture gets undermined, where it gets divided, and the people on this side take their followership from that kind of leadership,” King said. “And one notch at a time, one click at a time, American civilization, American culture, Western civilization, Western Judeo-Christendom are eroded.”

“Obama Lowering American Values,” Steve King, R-Iowa, on the House floor. All it took was one gay NBA player to bring down Western Civilization.

The result is a paradox. As the ambitions of government in the Obama era have expanded, respect for the institution of government has reached new lows. These scandals add another layer of cynicism. And the practical political effects are very real. Who is more likely this month than last to trust the federal government with the implementation of Obamacare (in part by the IRS), the enforcement of new gun-control laws or the securing of the southern border?

“Government’s Heavy Hand Felt in AP, IRS Scandals,” Michael Gerson, Washington Post. Nothing like throwing out the baby with the bathwater. Why trust the guv’ment with anything? This is the cynical nihilism at the heart of the GOP vision.

Republicans have waited five years for the moment to put the screws to Obama — and they have one-third of all congressional committees on the case now.

“DC Turns on Obama,” Mike Allen and Jim Vandehei, Politico. Oh, right, they’ve shown such bipartisan spirit and self-restraint blocking every Obama policy initiative, sabotaging budget negotiations at the last minute, holding up confirmations for months or even years, etc. Give me a break. Weather forecast: three and a half more years of non-stop hearings, leaks and cries for impeachment. The GOP is governing by negation.

Parallel GOP Universes: Hyperbolic and Counter-Intuitive GOP Claims, Myths and Canards, April 30-May 6, 2013

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Mr. Summers says governments should borrow more now at near-zero interest rates to invest in future growth. But this is what we were told in 2009-2010, when Mr. Summers was in the White House, and the $830 billion stimulus was used to finance not primarily roads or bridges but more unionized teachers, higher transfer payments, and green-energy projects that have since failed. Why will it be different this time? It will only be different this time if the GOP stops blocking Obama’s call for more stimulus spending for roads and bridges.     “Debt and Growth”, WSJ
Clearly, we need faith as a component, and its just silly to say otherwise. You know the Age of Enlightenment and Reason gave way to moral relativism. And moral relativism is what led us all the way down the dark path to the Holocaust…Dark periods of history is what we arrive at when we leave God out of the equation Penny Nance, CEO, Concerned Women For America.Bet you didn’t know that the Enlightenment led right to the Holocaust.
The legislation, being worked up by Representative Lamar Smith (R-TX), represents the latest-and bluntest-attack on NSF by congressional Republicans seeking to halt what they believe is frivolous and wasteful research being funded in the social sciences. Last month Senator Tom Coburn (R-OK) successfully attached language to a 2013 spending bill that prohibits NSF from funding any political science research for the rest of the fiscal year unless its director certifies that it pertains to economic development or national security. Smith’s draft bill, called the “High Quality Research Act,” would apply similar language to NSF’s entire research portfolio across all the disciplines it supports. “US Lawmaker Proposes New Criteria for Choosing NSF Grants,” Science.The end of the Enlightnment.
On Fox News last night Senator Lindsey Graham drew parallels between the Obama administration’s response to the Boston Marathon bombing and the 9/11 attacks in Benghazi, saying it “sounds like Susan Rice all over again.” “Right after Benghazi [they said] there’s no evidence of an al-Qaeda connection here,” Graham told Sean Hannity. Graham says the administration downplayed the idea of a “broader plot” in the Boston bombing and portrayed it as an isolated, “spontaneous” event. “The more you know about these two guys, they certainly didn’t learn all this in the bottom of their basement,” he added. “This administration doesn’t want to admit . . . bin Laden’s dead, but radical Islam’s on the rise.” Graham warned. “We need to up our game.”   “Graham Sees Similarities Between Boston and Benghazi,” National Review.

They see parallels between EVERYTHING and Benghazi. Call it BDS—Benghazi Derangement Syndrome.
This all fits what the TrueSpeak Institute’s Jim Guirard calls Obama’s “harm offensive.” The one-time chief of staff to Louisiana’s late Democratic senator Russell Long says, “Obama’s strategy, tactics, and constant modus operandi seem to be ‘First, do all possible harm’ to the public in managing the mandated spending limitations, and then blame the damage, the suffering, and — in the case of airline safety — the deadly danger on the Republicans.”… Obama is doing something diabolical: harming and endangering Americans so they will scream for more spending. Targeting the people this way confirms that Obama’s reign has little to do with good intentions and lots to do with swelling Washington’s budget and deepening its penetration in our lives. “Sequester Cynicism,” National Review. Another impeachable offense that the American public are inexplicably overlooking.
As homosexuals come out of the closet, Christians go into it. “Authenticity” is highly prized in society today, provided that what one feels falls safely within the dictates of political correctness. Sports analyst Chris Broussard stepped briefly outside of the Christian closet on Monday and paid the price for it. “Personally I don’t believe that you can live an openly homosexual lifestyle or an openly premarital sex [lifestyle] between heterosexuals. If you’re openly living that type of lifestyle, the Bible says you know them by their fruits, it says that’s a sin,” Broussard said on ESPN. “If you’re openly living in unrepentant sin, whatever it may be, not just homosexuality, adultery, fornication, premarital sex between heterosexuals, whatever it may be. I think that’s walking in open rebellion to God and to Jesus Christ.”   “A Sportscaster Comes Out As A Christian,” The American Spectator. That’s right– middle-aged white, American male Christians are among the most oppressed.

Demonized and Lionized, April 20-May 1, 2013

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Demonized                                                    thought crime

Janet Napolitano DHS bullet hoarding
Fisker Automotive DOE loans; thinking that “green energy” has any viable future
Gaby Giffords “gun grabber”
Lindsey Graham Even daring to venture the opinion that Obama’s budget might be a “place to start on a grand bargain”.
Kathleen Sibelius Prevention and Public Health Fund monies used  for “local bike-path, community-gardening, and pet-neutering projects; to lobby for soda taxes; and to pay for $300 million in TV-ad spots designed to resign the American people to their fates under Obamacare.
Joe Scarborough Daring to oppose the NRA on gun control

 

Lionized                                                          heroic framing

George W. Bush Suddenly comparable to Harry Truman in stature. Fighting AIDS in Africa often cited as signal accomplishment.
Robert Rubio Re-assuring GOP critics on is immigration stance by saying it’s Ok to racial profile Muslim students
Ted Cruz Only about 100 days into his first Senate term, is already being touted as next GOP Presidential pick

Glossary, April 20-27, 2013

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an anatomy of key memes, phrases and obsessions in Wall Street Journal editorials and other precincts of the GOP blogosphere, April 20-27, 2013

assimilation:the first casualty of the Boston bombings. (See also “food stamp jihadists” and “the ethnic grievance lobby”).

character: (see also, “moral compass”).  A trump-card virtue, considered to be exclusively possessed by Margaret Thatcher, Ronald Reagan, and, lately and astonishingly, Bush 43.  Lacking this virtue, Obama is always merely “calculating” and bent upon his collectivist, totalitarian, redistributionist makeover of the United States.

entitlement culture: the source of all ills in America; the nation of “takers, not makers”; Food Stamp America.  Evil spawn of earlier “moocher” memes such as “hippie” culture and myths of Negro laziness. Apparently, though, corporations are entitled to tax breaks, legal immunity, and subsidies.

the ethnic grievance lobby: along with Big Business and Big Labor, the main political force behind immigration reform.

food stamp jihadists: The Boston Massacre bombings are looking to be a trifecta for the GOP: immigrant-bashing,  welfare bashing, and a renewed war of eternal vigilance against “terror”.

people control: the real aim of the “gun control” (aka, “gun grabbers”) crowd.

sequester scare strategy:  any furloughs or budget cuts that are dire enough to nudge public opinion toward the Kenyan Pretender. The GOP always suggests alternative budget cuts, usually  for ridiculous-sounding (but sound) research projects, office supplies, travel budgets, or Acorn (“community organizing”)-style funding. These alternatives are always referred as “smart spending”.

socialist degeneration, cycle of: creating a reduced, weakened private sector that can’t generate enough jobs to raise the working poor out of poverty.

Third World experience: part of the growing GOP Politiscript lexicon for Obamacare. (See also “train wreck” ).  In this case, shorthand for FUBAR. The Republicans can never admit that any aspect of Obamacare is anything other than a catastrophic meltdown of the entire health care system and the inevitable result of government trying to do anything.

tolerance: liberals giving into sentiment about suspending civil liberties—no one is tolerant in a foxhole or when it comes to approving secret domestic wiretaps.