Woman Sues Abortion Center Over Violation of Informed Consent Regarding Fetal Research

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Jessica Duran is suing Southwestern Women’s Options (SWO), an abortion center in New Mexico, for giving her aborted daughter’s body to University of New Mexico for taxpayer-funded fetal research without her knowledge or consent.

Duran, who received an abortion from SWO in 2012, is being supported in her lawsuit by non-profit pro-life group New Mexico Alliance for Life (NMAFL).

At a press conference at the University of New Mexico Monday morning, Duran said “my right to choose was violated” by SWO. “They take advantage of women like me in frantic situations by not giving us all the facts and information we are entitled to,” Duran said.

According to the lawsuit filed at the Second Judicial District Court in Bernalillo County, New Mexico, SWO provided Duran with a consent form indicating that “tissue and parts” of her aborted baby could be used in medical research. However, the center failed to inform Duran of important specifics, such as the nature and extent of how her baby would be used in research, the fact that SWO was the sole supplier of fetal tissue to UNM (several SWO staff physicians are also volunteer faculty members at UNM), who she could contact with questions about the process, or the fact that the donation of her baby’s body to fetal research was voluntary.

“I was never informed of the University of New Mexico’s collaboration with SWO for research,” Duran said in a NMAFL press release Monday morning, “which appears to have influenced SWO employees to encourage me to abort my daughter.”

Duran’s lawsuit accuses SWO of deceptive trade practices and violation of state law, which requires informed consent before providing an abortion.

“We have evidence that suggests UNM and SWO have been violating women’s rights to informed consent since 1995,” said Elisa Martinez, NMAFL Director, in Monday’s press release. Martinez and Duran are asking New Mexico Attorney General Hector Balderas to criminally investigate SWO and UNM.

NMAFL isn’t the only group investigating the relationship between and fetal harvesting practices of SWO and NMAFL. The Congressional Select Panel on Infant Lives issued a criminal referral to Balderas earlier this year for “prosecution of various acts” by SWO and UNM.

“UNM Health Sciences Center and Southwestern Women’s Options can no longer deny wrongdoing,” Martinez said; “there are victims out there who were deceived and whose rights were violated in the harvesting of aborted babies’ bodies.”

NMAFL has launched a new website where women like Duran who have had abortions at SWO and believe their rights were violated can submit a complaint.

At the press conference, Martinez further detailed the “shocking” practices NMAFL had discovered in their investigation of SWO and UNM, including the dissecting of an unborn 7-month old brain by students at a UNM summer camp. The brain had been ordered “whole and fixed” by UNM from SWO.

Laura Rosecrans of Surrendered Hearts Abortion Recovery Ministries said that many women are re-traumatized when they learn after-the-fact that their aborted babies’ bodies are used for such purposes.

“My baby was not just a clump of cells,” Duran said in NMAFL’s press release Monday morning. “That’s the lie that is being exposed: my baby was fully human, and her body was highly valuable for the sum of her parts, for UNM research projects.”

Watch the recorded press conference from NFMAL here. (For more from the author of “Woman Sues Abortion Center Over Violation of Informed Consent Regarding Fetal Research” please click HERE)

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‘Make Christmas Great Again. Skip Church!’ Says New Atheist Billboard

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The group American Atheists is once again campaigning to keep people out of the pews on Christmas.

After featuring an image of Santa on their billboards last year, urging passers-by to “Go ahead and skip church! Just be good for goodness’ sake,” American Atheists is doubling down.

This year, the group has debuted not one, but two signs, which will be up for the entire month of December in cities such as Colorado Springs, Colo., Lynchburg, Va. and Shreveport, La. The group has even been so kind as to provide a map of their billboard’s locations (see below).

The first and more widespread billboard depicts a young girl texting a friend there’s “no way” she’s going to church this Christmas because she doesn’t “believe that stuff anymore.” And her parents? They’ll just have to “get over it.” Charming young lady.

The second billboard takes its play right out of Donald Trump’s signature campaign hat — or, one could say, right off of it. “Make Christmas Great Again,” the sign declares, “Skip Church!”

American Atheists announced the billboards last Thursday in a post on their website.

“In what has become an annual holiday tradition, American Atheists launched two billboards nationwide urging viewers to celebrate an ‘atheist Christmas’ by skipping church,” the release said.

Following the announcement, the group took to social media to share coverage of their billboards as well as to counter their critics.

“‘Anti-Christian?’ Nah,” the group tweeted in one response to a Fox News video. “Anti-church, anti-being-forced-to-do-things-you-don’t-believe, maybe. We’re happy to discuss.”

This journalist could live under a rock, but I’ve never heard of someone being forced to attend a church service before. On the contrary, I’ve come across many a parent who have regretfully informed me that their son or daughter had decided not to come to church — usually with a prayer request attached. But never “forced.”

No Belief in God? No Consistency of Message Either

Also, a quick scroll down the Twitter page finds this tweet from just last week, in response to Donald Trump tapping Rep. Tom Price, Ga.-R, for Secretary of the Department of Health and Human Services.

“Price is a co-sponsor of the disastrous ‘First Amendment Defense Act’ that lets people break civil rights laws they think their god apposes (sic),” along with the follow up tweet, “The re-definition of ‘religious liberty’ by people like Price has eroded the rights of women, LGBT people, and all Americans. We must fight.” That doesn’t sound very “anti-being-forced-to-do-things-you-don’t-believe” to me.

In another response to the same Fox News clip, American Atheists said, “Also: ‘War on Christmas?’ We’re literally saying that it’s fine to celebrate Xmas w/out the religious stuff. Not sure how that’s a ‘war.’” This tweet came after the group’s original billboard announcement on Twitter, which was gleefully accompanied with “#WarOnChristmas”.

The ChristianExaminer, in their report of the billboards, called American Atheists out on their misleading use of a statistic in the billboard announcement.

According to the announcement,

A recent survey from the Public Religion Research Institute shows that a quarter of Americans and almost 40% of young people are atheist or non-religious. This billboard campaign is specifically aimed at that growing population, especially those who no longer believe but still occasionally attend religious services or call themselves religious despite their lack of belief.

“Presumably, they believe a good number of that group is atheist. But they aren’t telling the whole story,” the ChristianExaminer writes.

The “nones” are comprised of those disenchanted with religion, those apathetic to it, and those who are “unattached” to a denomination or church. Among the apathetic and unattached, a significant number still claim to believe in God. The number of true atheists still hovers around 11 percent of the U.S. population.

The American Atheists billboards came right as the Freedom From Religion Foundation released their own December activism plan, dubbed “Heathens’ Greetings — FFRF’s Winter Solstice Survival Guide.” In the release, the FFRF announced the beginning of its “annual “War on State/Church Separation” and called for activists to “create a little controversy” — possibly with the group’s Bill of Rights “Nativity” displays. (For more from the author of “‘Make Christmas Great Again. Skip Church!’ Says New Atheist Billboard” please click HERE)

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Is It Time to Replace the Term ‘Evangelicals’ With ‘Red Letter Christians’?

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In a recent New York Times op-ed titled “The Evangelicalism of Old White Men Is Dead,” white Christian leaders Tony Campolo and Shane Claiborne argue that “the reputation of evangelicalism” is a “casualty” of the Trump election. Consequently, they suggest that this could be a “moment in our history for evangelicals to repent and be ‘born again’ again as Red Letter Christians,” meaning Christians who follow the words of Jesus, which are often printed in red in our Bibles.

Their logic is clear and straightforward.

First, they argue that evangelicalism was widely associated with Donald Trump, with more than 80 percent of white evangelicals voting for Trump despite “large numbers of African-American, Latino, Asian, young and female evangelicals who were fiercely opposed to the racism, sexism and xenophobia of Mr. Trump’s campaign and the hypocrisy of a candidate who built a casino empire while flouting morality.”

Second, they claim, “As a result, much of the good that went by the name ‘evangelicalism’ has been clouded over; now a new movement is needed to replace it.”

Third, they note that the fastest growing religious identity in America is the “nones,” meaning people who claim no religious affiliation, with millennials leading the way. And, the authors claim, “They left the church because they gave up on evangelical leadership. Nothing sums up their objections more clearly than evangelicals’ embrace of Mr. Trump. Didn’t Jesus say, ‘Blessed are the meek’ and ‘Love your enemies’”? In the words of Andy Crouch, the executive editor of Christianity Today, who criticized both candidates, evangelical enthusiasm for Mr. Trump “gives our neighbors ample reason to doubt that we believe Jesus is Lord.”

Fourth, since the future of evangelicalism does not lie with older, more conservative white evangelicals but rather with younger, non-white, more progressive evangelicals, it’s time for a new identity. Why not Red Letter Christians?

How should we respond?

First, for several years now we have heard that (white) evangelical influence in America is waning, yet the power of white evangelicals to help elect Donald Trump (and, perhaps, help influence his decision-making) reminds us that our obituary is being written prematurely. In fact, the Vice-President elect is himself a white evangelical.

Second, I welcome with joy the growing number of non-white evangelical leaders in America, and if they outnumber whites in the future (I write this as a white evangelical), to the extent that reflects national demographics, that would be absolutely wonderful. I would point out, however, that many of today’s rising, non-white evangelical leaders are strong conservatives, in contrast with some of the leaders pointed to by Campolo and Claiborne.

Third, and most importantly, Prof. Campolo, as the best-known leader in the “Red Letter Christian” movement, has put himself outside the pale of evangelicalism by embracing same-sex “marriage.” In fact, I do not believe that he can call himself a Red Letter Christian, since it is impossible to follow the words of Jesus and to embrace gay “marriage” at the same time, as was easily demonstrated a few years back on the Piers Morgan show.

And so, despite Tony Campolo putting forth many excellent challenges to the evangelical church in years past, and despite the many good works done by Shane Claiborne, I would strongly question whether they are the ones to set the next agenda for the evangelical movement, whatever that movement’s name might be.

That being said, I totally agree with them that: 1) evangelicals need to be associated with the name of Jesus more than with the name of Trump (while at the same time doing whatever they can to be a blessing to President Trump and his administration); 2) some evangelicals have hurt their own reputations by almost beatifying Trump and supporting him in a way that overlooked his failings; and 3) the words of Jesus are often grossly neglected by Christians today and paying attention to His words and seeking to follow His words would be transformational for the Church.

To offer just a few examples, paying careful attention to the words of Jesus would:

Radically redefine our standards of sexual purity (see Matthew 5:27-30).

Challenge our loose views of divorce and remarriage (see Matthew 5:31-32).

Turn our worldview upside down (see Matthew 5:3-12).

Remind of us the high cost of being disciples (see Luke 9:57-62; 14:25-35).

Call us to walk in sacrificial love to others, including our enemies (see Luke 6:27-38).

Expose our religious hypocrisy (see Matthew 23:1-39).

Renew our zeal to reach a lost and dying world (see Matthew 28:18-20).

Invite us to fresh intimacy with the Lord (see John 15:1-8).

Call us to repentance and revival, both personal and corporate (see Revelation 2:1-3:22).

Let us, then, make special note of the words of Jesus as we read our Bibles, thereby proving ourselves to be His disciples.

This is what our country needs more than anything: for the followers of Jesus to truly follow Jesus and for the church to truly be the church.

In this, I concur with Tony Campolo and Shane Claiborne. (For more from the author of “Is It Time to Replace the Term ‘Evangelicals’ With ‘Red Letter Christians’?” please click HERE)

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From Refugees to the Iran Deal: Will Congress Get Its Act Together Under President Trump?

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For the latest evidence of the price the American people have paid for a feckless Republican Congress, look no further than the impunity with which the Obama administration is acting in a direct rebuke to the American people on one of the core national security concerns of our time.

Or was one of the central themes of the presidential election that Barack Obama’s party just lost not the need to assert American sovereignty and our national interest first by at least pausing immigration from jihadist hotspots?

Alas, it is only fitting that the swan song of this administration reads as follows: “Bring us your tired, your poor, your unvetted refugees.”

The news to which I am referring comes from a Fox report that the U.S. State Department has classified details on a deal the Obama administration cut with Australia resulting in the resettlement of approximately 2,500 refugees to the U.S. from countries such as Iran, Afghanistan and Iraq, among other Islamic supremacist-majority nations — refugees rejected by the Australians themselves.

There is the usual outrage around this deal, including the fact that the president has never articulated why it is in America’s national interest to import refugees from Islamic supremacist nations at a time when Islamic supremacists tell us they wish to infiltrate by embedding among such peoples. And what about the fact that our FBI director said we were incapable of vetting such refugees? Likewise, the Obama administration has remained mum rather than demanding that other Islamic nations take responsibility for absorbing such refugees given similarity in culture, the relative logistical ease with which such actions could be taken, financial wherewithal. Fundamentally, the Obama administration continues to show compassion for non-Americans over and above those who elected him.

A theme I raised in a recent piece in opposition to the choice of Senate Foreign Relations Cmte Chair Bob Corker, R-Tenn. (F, 45%) for secretary of state in President-elect Trump’s administration recurs in this story well, further reflecting the damage Sen. Corker has wrought and why he ought not to reach Foggy Bottom.

In a letter on the matter addressed to DHS Secretary Jeh Johnson and Secretary of State John Kerry, Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa. (D, 66%) and Rep. Bob Goodlatte, R-Va. (D, 64%) wrote “This situation is concerning for many reasons,” continuing “your departments negotiated an international agreement regarding refugees without consulting or notifying Congress.”

The very Senate treaty ratification power that readers will recall Sen. Corker turned on its head in the Iran Deal, essentially conceding the Senate’s check on the president’s seminal disastrous piece of foreign policy, is what the president relied on to negotiate this secret agreement. This follows the president’s neglect of the senate with respect to the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty.

What fear should a president have when Congress fails to adequately use its oversight powers, powers of the purse, advice and consent and impeachment powers in the face of a rampantly lawless agenda?

A President Donald Trump is going to have to clean up President Obama’s numerous messes, and at every turn face a Democratic minority that unlike Republicans in the Obama years will have no fear of using every parliamentary and political trick and maneuver to thwart policy they do not like and corrupt that which they cannot stop.

But he is also going to have to deal with a Republican Congress that has shown itself to be lacking in spine for the last eight years.

The reassertion of Congressional power during the Trump years will certainly be a welcome thing.

Let us hope however that it is not so one-sided as to allow President Obama’s most disastrous actions to substantially survive. (For more from the author of “From Refugees to the Iran Deal: Will Congress Get Its Act Together Under President Trump?” please click HERE)

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Wrong Kind of Black? Twitter Libs Can’t Handle Ben Carson’s HUD Appointment

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News broke Monday morning that President-elect Donald Trump will nominate former presidential rival Dr. Ben Carson to be his Secretary of Housing and Urban Development.

And the immediate reaction from many on social media was incredulous skepticism.

A few people cited statements made by Carson spokesman Armstrong Williams indicating that Dr. Carson felt he was unqualified to hold a cabinet-level position. Williams told the Hill that “Dr. Carson feels he has no government experience, he’s never run a federal agency. The last thing he would want to do was take a position that could cripple the presidency.”

Carson clarified his position in a November 15 Facebook post, indicating that his decision not to seek a cabinet position “has nothing to do with the complexity of the job as is being reported by some news outlets.”

It seems the president-elect convinced Dr. Carson to change his mind. And now Carson is being mercilessly ridiculed.

But here’s the thing:

Yeah, that’s definitely not happening.

The tolerance mob out in full force to nuke this appointment today. As for Dr. Carson, he’s just “honored” to serve.

(For more from the author of “Wrong Kind of Black? Twitter Libs Can’t Handle Ben Carson’s HUD Appointment” please click HERE)

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Japanese Prime Minister’s Pearl Harbor Visit Will Further Reconciliation

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Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe announced he would travel to Pearl Harbor later this month, the first Japanese leader to do so.

Abe commented he would accompany President Barack Obama to “pay tribute [and] comfort the souls” of those who died from both countries during World War II.

He emphasized his intent to “send messages about the importance of reconciliation” between the U.S. and Japan, former wartime enemies who became strong allies.

Abe’s visit, if not a quid pro quo for Obama’s visit to Hiroshima in May, makes a fitting counterpart to that trip, marking the alpha and omega of World War II in the Pacific.

In that sense, the two trips serve the same purpose as the USS Missouri, the location of the August 1945 signing of the treaty ending World War II, which is now moored next to the wreck of the USS Arizona, which was sunk during the December 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor.

Abe’s remarks at Pearl Harbor will be scrutinized for indications of Japanese remorse for its wartime hostilities. But Abe has already made several speeches striking a contrite tone.

During an April 2015 visit to Washington, he commented on his visit to the World War II Memorial, highlighting the battles of Pearl Harbor, Bataan, Corregidor, and the Coral Sea.

The prime minister expressed “eternal condolences” and “deep repentance” for the “lost dreams and lost futures of those young Americans.” Abe acknowledged “our actions brought suffering to the peoples of Asia, and vowed again to “uphold the views expressed by the previous prime ministers.”

In August 2015, Abe commemorated the 70th anniversary of the end of World War II by releasing a statement to make amends to Japan’s neighbors. Abe went further in acknowledging Japan’s wartime actions.

In December 2015, Abe and South Korean President Park Geun-hye were able to forge an agreement that provided a foundation for reconciliation of difficult historic issues arising from Japan’s 1910-1945 occupation of the Korean Peninsula.

America is often accused of having a short memory. But World War II remains a bedrock historic era and a lodestar for America’s sense of who we are as a country.

Pearl Harbor made clear that isolationism was not a viable way to avoid the dangers of the world. Withdrawing from the world and raising the drawbridge did not deter America’s enemies. The same is true today.

The United States arose phoenix-like from the devastation of Pearl Harbor and America’s “Greatest Generation” endured the crucible of war to bring peace and stability to the Pacific.

The U.S. and Japan overcame the animosity of conflict to become enduring partners and allies. That dichotomy is both a realization of Thomas Jefferson’s warning that “the price of freedom is eternal vigilance” and a symbol of what democracies can achieve together. (For more from the author of “Japanese Prime Minister’s Pearl Harbor Visit Will Further Reconciliation” please click HERE)

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Obama Administration Not Finished yet With Executive Actions, Regulations

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On Monday, President Barack Obama issued his fifth executive order since the Nov. 8 election. In this case, it was to create a National Invasive Species Council to compile a report by 2020 on how to prevent such species from affecting climate change, food safety, and even military readiness.

Citing national security concerns, Obama issued another order on Friday blocking Chinese firm Fujian Grand Chip from buying Aixtron, a German company operating in California that produces crystalline layers used as semiconductors in U.S. weapons systems.

Executive orders aren’t the only means for Obama to act without Congress before he leaves office on Jan. 20.

A new policy on highly skilled immigrants, restrictions on for-profit colleges, and energy efficiency standards are among the matters that the administration wants that don’t require congressional authorization that the Obama administration is moving aggressively in the post-election to complete before Obama exits on Jan. 20.

Executive actions and administrative regulations were planned and considered before the election and not a result of Republican Donald Trump’s victory, White House press secretary Josh Earnest said at a White House press briefing, noting executive actions and regulations take “a lot of preparation.”

“I’m not going to rule out additional executive actions that the administration may take between now and January 20—after all, the president of the United States is the president of the United States until Jan. 20,” Earnest told The Daily Signal, adding:

But what I can rule out are any sort of hastily added executive actions that weren’t previously considered that would just be tacked on at the end. But are there some actions that have been in the pipeline for quite some time that could be announced between now and Jan. 20? That possibility certainly exists, but I don’t have anything to preview at this point.

Politico reported the list of Obama administration actions before leaving office includes:

A U.S. citizenship and immigration policy to make it easier for employers to sponsor highly skilled immigrants;

An Education Department policy to provide debt relief to students at for-profit colleges;

The Transportation Department is moving to ban cellphone calls on commercial flights;

The Occupational Safety and Health Administration could limit exposure to beryllium, a metal used in electronics and aerospace industries believed to pose lung cancer risks; and

The Department of Health and Human Services is seeking to change how doctors and hospitals get paid for administering drugs under Medicare Part B.

The fact that Trump could overturn much executive or administrative actions doesn’t appear to have caused pause, as the Federal Register has grown by 9,000 pages since Nov. 8, said Ryan Young, a fellow with the Competitive Enterprise Institute.

Gina McCarthy, the Environmental Protection Agency administrator, seemed eager for more action in a memo to staff sent to employees after the Nov. 8 election, which was obtained by the Washington Examiner.

“As I’ve mentioned to you before, we’re running—not walking—through the finish line of President Obama’s presidency,” McCarthy wrote. “Thank you for taking that run with me. I’m looking forward to all the progress that still lies ahead.”

Whether the regulations or executive actions are hasty shouldn’t really be the key question, said James Gattuso, a senior research fellow who studies regulatory issues for The Heritage Foundation.

“As far as I’m concerned, if it takes a long time to adopt rules or actions, or if they fly through the process, it doesn’t matter if it’s a bad rule,” Gattuso told The Daily Signal.

Regulations, he said, can be more tedious to overturn than executive orders or executive actions. However, the 1996 Congressional Review Act could be used to roll back many of those regulations, Gattuso said.

The law allows Congress, with the president’s signature, to scrap regulations it opposes, bypassing previous legal procedures in place, while forbidding bureaucrats from imposing rules that are substantially the same.

“No president is willing to sign a bill overturning their own regulation, but they are willing to overturn their predecessor’s regulations,” Gattuso said. “This is a once in a decade chance, really a once in several decades’’ opportunity, to roll back regulations.”

House Majority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif., and 21 House committee chairmen warned against a rush for regulations in a letter to agency heads, pledging to used the Congressional Review Act if need be. The Nov. 15 letter from House Republicans said:

As you are aware, such action often involves the exercise of substantial policymaking discretion and could have far-reaching impacts on the American people and the economy. Considering these potential consequences, we write to caution you against finalizing pending rules or regulations in the administration’s last days.

By refraining from acting with undue haste, you will ensure that agency staff may fully assess the costs and benefits of rules, making it less likely that unintended consequences will harm consumers and businesses.

Moreover, such forbearance is necessary to afford the recently elected administration and Congress the opportunity to review and give direction concerning pending rulemakings.

Should you ignore this counsel, please be aware that we will work with our colleagues to ensure that Congress scrutinizes your actions—and, if appropriate, overturns them—pursuant to the Congressional Review Act.

On Nov. 8, the Federal Register contained 78,300 pages, and as of Dec. 2, it had increased to 87,297 pages, Young said. Further, since Election Day, there were 144 new proposed regulations from federal agencies, and 243 regulations that were finalized.

“We could see a midnight rush the likes of which we haven’t seen before,” Young, of the Competitive Enterprise Institute, told The Daily Signal. (For more from the author of “Obama Administration Not Finished yet With Executive Actions, Regulations” please click HERE)

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The Next Brexit? Italy ‘No’ Vote Empowers Populist Revolt Against Establishment

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Daniel Hannan, a British politician and a leading campaigner of Brexit, recognizes the forces that he says inspired Sunday’s referendum result in Italy, where the center-left prime minister resigned after voters rejected his proposed reforms.

“The obvious parallel with these elections is you carry a tremendous handicap if you are associated with the old regime in any sense,” Hannan told The Daily Signal. “Voters understandably feel patronized and lied to and ignored and disdained and they responded in this way.”

In a year when Britons voted to leave the European Union and Americans chose Donald Trump as president, the global populist movement claimed its latest victim Sunday when Prime Minister Matteo Renzi resigned after Italian voters rejected constitutional changes backed by his government.

Renzi had proposed to reduce the power of the Senate, the upper house of Parliament, to streamline the political system, create more stability, and accelerate growth in Europe’s fourth-largest economy. Italy has had 63 governments in 70 years.

But critics, empowered by an opposition campaign waged by the upstart, euroskeptic Five Star Movement party, said Renzi’s plan would put too much power in the prime minister’s hands.

The opposition capitalized on similar discontent that fueled the results in Britain and the U.S.

Italy is plagued by low growth, and its banking system has been in crisis for a decade. The country’s youth unemployment rate is around 35 percent, and young people soundly rejected Renzi’s reforms.

Italy is also contending with a tide of refugees and migrants from North Africa (more than 170,000 people have arrived in Italy so far in 2016).

While Renzi’s fall will not lead to the immediate takeover of Italy by a populist figure or party like the Five Star Movement, experts say the result of the election will reverberate across a European Union already shaken by anti-establishment anger.

“I certainly think there are common elements here,” said Robert Kahn, a senior fellow for international economics at the Council on Foreign Relations, in an interview with The Daily Signal, adding:

This populist wave we are seeing—by which I mean frustration, alienation, and rejection of mainstream politicians and institutions—was certainly part of the ‘no’ vote. While there are a constellation of factors, part of this is Italians using the referendum to lodge a protest vote against their government and policies. In that sense, it does rhyme with Brexit.

Change in Italy will be slow in coming since Renzi’s center-left Democratic Party remains in control of Parliament and national elections do not have to be called until 2018.

Though the Five Star Movement—which leans left, not right—advocates a referendum to determine whether Italy should give up its eurozone membership, observers say it would be difficult for the party to gain the power to make that happen. That’s because Italy’s mainstream political parties may aim to change voting laws to make it tougher to rule without a wide coalition.

The Five Star Movement and its leader, Beppe Grillo, a comedian-turned-politician, have said they won’t govern in a coalition government with traditional political parties.

Yet even without an immediate shake-up in Italy, 2017 promises to be an important year in determining the future of the European concept of integration.

European Union members Germany, France, and the Netherlands have elections next year with euroskeptic and populist candidates in the running.

Last week, President Francois Hollande of France, a socialist, said he won’t seek re-election in 2017, opening up the race to succeed him, which will include Marine Le Pen of the rising far-right populist National Front party.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who has presided over Europe’s strongest economy since 2005, will run for a fourth term in next year’s election. But she and her Christian Democratic Union party are under siege because of her decision to accept almost 1 million refugees and migrants from Syria, Afghanistan, Iraq, and other countries.

“In France and even in Germany, you have alternative parties that have extremely different visions of what Europe should be,” Kahn said. “It’s dramatic, it’s scary, and it’s threatening to the current union.”

Some say there are limits to the influence of anti-establishment anger.

They point to another election result on Sunday, where a center-left presidential candidate in Austria easily defeated his far-right challenger.

Andrea Montanino, director of the Global Business and Economics Program at the Atlantic Council and a former board member of the International Monetary Fund, says talk of Italy leaving the euro and the downfall of the union is premature.

“It’s important to differentiate this event from the rest,” Montanino told The Daily Signal in an interview. “This is part of the Italian normal legislative process. It will of course impose some instability for a while, but this is not a Brexit.”

On Monday, the day after the referendum in Italy, financial markets recovered from an initial scare that Renzi’s departure would lead to political stability, with stocks and the euro both rebounding in value.

Hannan, one of the architects of Brexit, said “there are too many uncertainties” to predict Italy will leave the euro.

But he said voters, like in Britain, sent a powerful message.

“The lesson is if you give people a choice between corporatist euro technocrats and angry populists, you aren’t going to like their verdict,” Hannan said. (For more from the author of “The Next Brexit? Italy ‘No’ Vote Empowers Populist Revolt Against Establishment” please click HERE)

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Can Donald Trump and Betsy DeVos Really End Common Core?

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On the campaign trail, President-elect Donald Trump made big promises about getting rid of Common Core. “We’re going to end Common Core, we’re going to have education an absolute priority,” he said in a campaign video.

Upon being nominated secretary of the Department of Education, Betsy DeVos made clear her stance against the national education standards. “I am not a supporter—period,” she wrote.

But what can Trump and DeVos really do to dismantle the national education standards? The Daily Signal explains. (For more from the author of “Can Donald Trump and Betsy DeVos Really End Common Core?” please click HERE)

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Early Christmas! No Draft for Women and Philosopher Warfighter Nominated for SecDef

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One could almost feel sorry for President Obama. Practically moments after confirmation that there wasn’t enough Senate support on either side of the aisle for drafting women, we see headlines that “White House announces support for adding women to military draft.”

Obama can do nothing to make this so. Only Congress can, and their decision is already made. The statement was little more than a head-pat to his base. America’s daughters will not be drafted for combat with ISIS, Syria, Iran, Afghanistan, or any other woman-stoning, gay-murdering enemies.

No Military Draft for Women

This is a victory for our military’s combat readiness and America’s young, able-bodied women, who should not be forced into being infantry replacements — the stated purpose of the draft during a large-scale war. Drafting them would require signing up equal numbers of women in all jobs — anything else wouldn’t be “equitable.” Only a tiny portion of the female population qualifies for the military as it is, and they, even having made the cut to join up, suffer an average of 2-10 times the injuries of their male counterparts.

It would be a bureaucratic nightmare for nearly no return to sift through millions of young women in order to find one or two who might be able to make men’s infantry unit standards but would still be at a stark disadvantage for survival in combat. Doing the same number of pull-ups also won’t mitigate the higher rates of injury, the fact that women are higher-value targets to our current enemies, or the other disproportionate risks women face.

Having equal rights under the law does not mean that men and women have the same obligations for the nation’s defense. Drafting women would mean more casualties, more coming home in body bags, and more missions lost. It would compromise our country’s security.

Now Congress can get back to hashing out other provisions in the military appropriations bill like the categorization of the sage grouse. In a world where this is in the spending bill for our national defense, it’s a wonder that common sense prevailed.

Secretary of Defense Mattis

Another early Christmas gift is the news that President-Elect Trump has chosen Marine Gen. James Mattis to serve as Secretary of Defense. Those who know the legendary general couldn’t be happier, and enemies of freedom the world over have every reason to fear. Mattis is a bold and plain-spoken warfighter, but also a well-read and philosophical student of history and warfare.

He is for American engagement around the world, but not endless military engagements with no clear plan for victory. He has a keen understanding of foreign policy and a deep affection for those who serve in America’s defense. He has not hesitated to name the enemy and believes in confronting even the most complicated military and foreign policy problems head on, rather than letting them fester for the next generation to handle.

Though some are concerned over his opposition to women in combat units, and his rejection of the idea that combat deployed troops are victims broken by their service, those who care about our military’s readiness to fight our merciless enemies and the welfare of those who do so know there is no better choice than James Mattis. He takes war extremely seriously and won’t be frivolous in recommending military operations.

He cares deeply for those who, as he puts it, close in on the last 600 yards of foreign policy, and their families that support them and endure their loss, injury and sacrifice. He believes in reason over impulse, in not repeating the mistakes of the past that have been learned in blood, and working with our friends and allies across the globe to ensure that savages like ISIS don’t prevail.

Making America great again includes restoring a credible military able to withstand any test — and we will be tested, probably sooner than later. For reversing the decline of the military and her material, and making her combat ready again, there’s no better man for the job. Indeed, we have much to be grateful for this holiday season. (For more from the author of “Early Christmas! No Draft for Women and Philosopher Warfighter Nominated for SecDef” please click HERE)

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