"There is a tide in the affairs of men which, taken at the flood leads on to fortune; omitted, all the voyage of their life is bound in shallows and miseries." -Julius Caesar Act IV Scene III
As Republicans sift through the wreckage of the presidential election and Democrats brace for the 2014 midterms, there is one clear point of agreement between them: Independent voters no longer decide elections.
http://www.politico.com/story/2012/12/the-disappearing-independent-85340.html?hp=t1
________________________________________________________________________
Even more damning, in its absence, was the report’s failure to step back and question whether the Obama administration, at its highest levels (starting with the president), created the conditions for Benghazi by overstating the decimation of al-Qaida and playing down the significance of the extremist elements, possibly al-Qaida-linked, that have reemerged in the aftermath of the Arab Spring in Libya and elsewhere. Unless this reckoning is made, it is easy to imagine a similar disaster happening in post-Assad Syria, or elsewhere in the region. This has been a chief Republican talking point against Obama since the Benghazi attacks occurred on Sept. 11.
http://www.nationaljournal.com/where-s-obama-in-the-benghazi-report-20121219
________________________________________________________________________
What you will witness today during the Democratic-led Senate Intelligence Committeeinvestigating the Benghazi terrorist attack, spearheaded by Hillary Clinton’s expected replacement, Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass), will be nothing more than a dog and pony show. Sen. Kerry will toe-the-line. This is the same John Kerry, who after he left Vietnam, accused his military brothers of war crimes without evidence, wants Hillary’s job, and to keep his future boss President Obama very happy.
We were warned these times would come: when men called evil good, and good evil; that put darkness for light, and light for darkness; that put bitter for sweet, and sweet for bitter. Take heed. Those with eyes to see and ears to hear are mourning America today.
http://www.canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/51899________________________________________________________________________
If the 2nd Amendment is responsible for Newtown, Conn. then let's have a look at what really kills Americans. Guilty and innocents alike. Let's legislatively ban the obviously responsible parties in each category of unnecessary death. (using Left-think)
Smoking related deaths - 434,000+
Obesity related deaths - 300,000+
Medical mistake-related deaths - 225,000+
Poor or non-existent health care-related deaths - 100,000+
Read more: http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2012/12/as_long_as_we_are_banning_stuff.html#ixzz2FfxyqFW1
________________________________________________________________________
I haven’t written much about the Newtown shooting. I did write my first column of the week about it because I felt I had to chime in. But I resented it. Maybe it’s because I’m becoming too sentimental about kids. Maybe it’s because I’m sick to death of death. Maybe it’s some other personal failing on my part, but I nonetheless resent being dragged into the political maw so quickly after a bunch of little kids were picked off by a madman with a gun. I agree with 90 percent of the things written by my colleagues about guns and gun control and the Second Amendment over the last week, but I nonetheless find it a bit grotesque that it’s necessary for anyone to be celebrating or defending guns before these little, little, kids have even been buried. It feels indecent to me.
The human need to “do something” is primal after moments like this, not just for those in mourning but for those who want to help those in mourning. Most of us who’ve lost a loved one know someone — or perhaps ourselves — who had to cook, or organize, or clean, or plan or do anything that lets us grasp the handrail of sanity or hold at bay the uncompromising vacuum of grief, if only temporarily. Likewise, we’ve known people who’ve implored us: What can I do? Is there anything I can do? But, often, trying to translate human impulses into government responses is the source of great folly.
http://www.nationalreview.com/corner/336172/rush-impose-reason-horror-jonah-goldberg#
_______________________________________________________________________
The worst mass-murder in a school in American history did not involve guns or shooters; it involved a bomb in an elementary school.It didn't take place in Connecticut; it took place in a rural community in Michigan called Bath.The perpetrator wasn't a young man - he was 55 years old.And the attack did not occur this year or last year - or even this decade.
The year was 1927.
_______________________________________________________________________
In the 21st century, are we returning to the racial labyrinth of the19th-century Old Confederacy, where we measure our supposed racial DNA to the nth degree? Apparently yes. ESPN sports commentator Rob Parker blasted Washington Redskins quarterback Robert Griffin III last week for admirably stating that he did not wish to be defined by his race rather than by his character: "He's black, he does his thing, but he's not really down with the cause." Parker added: "He's not one of us. He's kind of black, but he's not really like the kind of guy you really want to hang out with." (ESPN suspended Parker for his remarks.)
http://townhall.com/columnists/victordavishanson/2012/12/20/the-new-racial-derangement-syndrome-n1470329/page/full/_______________________________________________________________________
Democrats and the media insist the Community Reinvestment Act, the anti-redlining law beefed up by President Clinton, had nothing to do with the subprime mortgage crisis and recession.
But a new study by the respected National Bureau of Economic Research finds, "Yes, it did. We find that adherence to that act led to riskier lending by banks."
Added NBER: "There is a clear pattern of increased defaults for loans made by these banks in quarters around the (CRA) exam. Moreover, the effects are larger for loans made within CRA tracts," or predominantly low-income and minority areas.
Read More At IBD: http://news.investors.com/ibd-editorials-perspective/122012-637924-faults-community-reinvestment-act-cra-mortgage-defaults.htm#ixzz2Fg6KmX7f
________________________________________________________________________
We live in an entertainment culture soaked in graphic, often sadistic, violence. Older folks find themselves stunned by what a desensitized youth finds routine, often amusing. It’s not just movies. Young men sit for hours pulling video-game triggers, mowing down human beings en masse without pain or consequence. And we profess shock when a small cadre of unstable, deeply deranged, dangerously isolated young men go out and enact the overlearned narrative.
If we’re serious about curtailing future Columbines and Newtowns, everything — guns, commitment, culture — must be on the table. It’s not hard for President Obama to call out the NRA. But will he call out the ACLU? And will he call out his Hollywood friends?
http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/charles-krauthammer-the-roots-of-mass-murder/2012/12/20/e4d99594-4ae3-11e2-b709-667035ff9029_story.html
________________________________________________________________________
The chairman and the vice chairman of the State Department Accountability Review Board (ARB) that investigated the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks on U.S. facilities in Benghazi, Libya, made dramatically different statements on Wednesday about the duration of those attacks that resulted in the deaths of four Americans.
The relevant duration of the event shrunk from "almost eight hours" to "only about 20 or 30 minutes" when a reporter asked this "accountability" team why the U.S. military had not been sent to Benghazi to help that night.
During his opening statement at a State Department briefing, Ambassador Thomas Pickering, who chaired the ARB, said the terrorist attacks occurred over a span of almost eight hours.
http://cnsnews.com/news/article/why-obama-sent-no-rescue-benghazi-lasted-8-hours-was-over-30-minutes
________________________________________________________________________
Many forms of violence and hardship have befallen Syria’s people as the country’s civil war has escalated this year. But the Syrian government’s attack here on Dec. 12 pointed to one of the war’s irrefutable patterns: the deliberate targeting of civilians by President Bashar al-Assad’s military, in this case with a weapon that is impossible to use precisely.
Syrians on both sides in this fight have suffered from the bloodshed and sectarian furies given dark license by the war. The victims of the cluster bomb attacks describe the tactic as collective punishment, a mass reprisal against populations that are with the rebels.
Many forms of violence and hardship have befallen Syria’s people as the country’s civil war has escalated this year. But the Syrian government’s attack here on Dec. 12 pointed to one of the war’s irrefutable patterns: the deliberate targeting of civilians by President Bashar al-Assad’s military, in this case with a weapon that is impossible to use precisely.
Syrians on both sides in this fight have suffered from the bloodshed and sectarian furies given dark license by the war. The victims of the cluster bomb attacks describe the tactic as collective punishment, a mass reprisal against populations that are with the rebels.
________________________________________________________________________
China’s government provided goods and expertise for Iran’s nuclear program in the past and also gave Tehran’s Islamist regime missiles and other arms as part of the nations’ anti-United States policies, according to a congressional commission report made public Thursday.
“The authoritarian governments centered in Beijing and Tehran share an animus towards ‘hegemonism’ and a fear of internal instability,” the report prepared for the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission states.
“In recent decades the United States, supported by regional allies and security partners, has represented the principal hegemonic threat to Iran and China in two different regional contexts: the Persian Gulf and the Western Pacific.”
_______________________________________________________________________
In August 2011, five months after Syria erupted into violence over government repression, President Obama declaredthat Bashar Assad should resign from office. Though Obama didn’t use the words “regime change,” he was effectively making that the goal of U.S. policy.
Sixteen months have passed since the president issued his statement. Over that period, the United States did very little to strengthen the relatively moderate, pro-Western Syrian rebels who are competing for arms and influence with extremist, anti-Western rebels tied to al-Qaeda. Instead, the Obama administration relied on the United Nations to broker a diplomatic solution. This strategy was always destined to fail, and it did, with Russia and China vetoing three separate Security Council resolutions. As a result, the situation in Syria is far worse and far more dangerous in December 2012 than it was in August 2011.
_____________________________________________________________
“There were giants in the earth in those days.” The death on December 19 of Robert Bork—superb legal scholar, preeminent constitutional thinker, principled public servant—calls to mind the other giants of American conservatism who have left us in the last decade: Bill Buckley and Irving Kristol, Milton Friedman and James Q. Wilson, Richard John Neuhaus and Jeane Kirkpatrick, Ronald Reagan and Jack Kemp. They were the greatest conservative generation. They rode into the valley of liberal orthodoxies and emerged sometimes triumphant, always unbowed. When can their glory fade? They left our nation stronger and better for their efforts.
Those who knew them do their best to carry on the fight. Inspired by their example and effort, by their boldness and wisdom, remembering the uphill struggles of the early years, they do their best to keep the banner aloft and moving forward. But what of the next generation?
http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/greatest-conservative-generation_690824.html
No comments:
Post a Comment