Syria Strikes Signal an End of ‘Leading From Behind’

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With his surprise, 180-degree decision to avenge innocents in Syria, President Donald Trump entered the particle accelerator that is foreign affairs.

The barrage of urgencies—inhumanity, chemical weapons, Syrian civil war, North Korean missiles, Russian warships, truck bombings, ISIS—has streamed his focus into a statesmanship that impresses even his detractors. This reminds us of Trump’s speech to Congress in February where he grew visibly into his presidential shoes.

Taking decisive action in Syria indeed was in the U.S. national interest, not only an understandable human response to a human atrocity. How is it in the national interest? Chemical weapons cannot be tolerated a bit. No excuse exists. Any shadow of their acceptability would quickly become a black cloud over a world cowed into suspicion and fear. Our national interest depends upon a world open to itself and to the future.

How else was this in the U.S. national interest? Well, it also re-establishes U.S. credibility abroad. For friends and foes alike the bombing is a North Star reference point to White House foreign policies still in formulation. And certainly, that point is not a line, red or other. That point? No more “leading from behind.”

From military giants to lone wolves, today’s range of actors has expanded up, down, and sideways. And with their real-time access to global affairs, they are weaponizing most anything, be it information, chemicals, national debt, online data, or delivery trucks.

With his action in Syria, Trump chose to weaponize leadership. And he showed that the United States will use it to its best effect. (For more from the author of “Syria Strikes Signal an End of ‘Leading From Behind'” please click HERE)

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Trump’s First Big Foreign Policy Move a Departure From Stump Speeches

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In what will almost certainly be the defining foreign policy decision of President Donald Trump’s first 100 days seems to be a significant shift from his noninterventionist rhetoric on the campaign trail in facing down Syrian dictator Bashar Assad.

Republican Sens. John McCain of Arizona and Lindsey Graham of South Carolina, longtime critics of the president, praised Trump’s decision to launch 59 Tomahawk missiles at the Syrian government’s Shayrat airfield, where a chemical weapons attack was launched that killed more than 70 Syrian civilians, including children.

Conversely, Republican Sens. Rand Paul of Kentucky and Mike Lee of Utah stressed that Trump should have sought congressional approval before the strikes. Meanwhile, conservative talk radio host Laura Ingraham noted the major policy shift.

While some Trump supporters on the pundit side might have been surprised by the strikes, it’s not likely to hurt the president with his supporters throughout the country, said Richard Benedetto, an adjunct professor of government at American University.

“Some Trump folks will be disappointed,” Benedetto told The Daily Signal. “Many of the so-called blue-collar Trump supporters backed him because they did not like to see America get pushed around.”

As a candidate, Trump heavily criticized George W. Bush, a former president of his own party, for launching the Iraq War, while in 2013, he tweeted that President Barack Obama shouldn’t intervene in Syria.

This doesn’t necessarily mean Trump has shifted away from a cautious attitude toward foreign entanglements, said Benedetto, a former White House correspondent for USA Today.

“He could still be a noninterventionist compared to Bush, but at the same time, wants to make it clear he is not Obama,” Benedetto said. “It doesn’t mean he will be an interventionist in other things. But this means he takes chemical weapons seriously and he believes he had to do something.”

During a Rose Garden press conference Wednesday, the president telegraphed a shift before the strike, stating he is flexible.

I don’t have to have one specific way, and if the world changes, I go the same way … I do change and I am flexible and I’m proud of that flexibility, and I will tell you that attack on children yesterday had a big impact on me, big impact. That was a horrible, horrible thing and I’ve been watching it and seeing it, and it doesn’t get any worse than that. And I have that flexibility and it’s very, very possible, and I will tell you it’s already happened that my attitude toward Syria and Assad has changed very much.

The New York Times ran a story with the headline “Trump’s Far-Right Supporters Turn on Him Over Syria Strike.” However, the story focused mostly on more extreme elements rather than the general Trump supporter or conservatives.

The expectations of Trump as a “restrictionist, realist, or isolationist” during the presidential campaign were miscalculated from the beginning, said Emma Ashford, a research fellow for defense and foreign policy at the libertarian Cato Institute.

“He talked in the campaign about staying out of stupid Middle East wars, but he also talked about Iraq and how we should have taken their oil, and how he would bomb the hell out of ISIS,” Ashford told The Daily Signal. “People tend to focus on whether he is a neocon or like Ron or Rand Paul. They ignore the third way, which is being a restrictionist on humanitarian matters but interventionist in other areas.”

Ashford noted that military presence in the Middle East has increased since Trump became president.

Ashford said that Obama’s decision not to strike Syria in 2013 was sound.

“It worked in that Assad did not use chemical weapons again while Obama was president,” Ashford said.

The change between campaign rhetoric and international affairs isn’t unusual for presidents. Woodrow Wilson campaigned on staying out of World War I. Franklin Roosevelt campaigned on staying out of World War II. Richard Nixon campaigned on exiting the Vietnam War, and George W. Bush shunned nation building, experts said.

“Campaign rhetoric is just designed to get votes,” James Carafano, a national security expert at The Heritage Foundation, told The Daily Signal. “Look at John McCain and Barack Obama in 2008, and they sounded almost identical. There was no way anyone could have predicted Barack Obama’s foreign policy over the next eight years.”

He continued that this is what one should expect from Trump as a businessman.

“This is who Trump is. He deals with what he is dealt,” Carafano said. “If profits are down, he doesn’t hold a press conference to pretend they are not. He deals with it.” (For more from the author of “Trump’s First Big Foreign Policy Move a Departure From Stump Speeches” please click HERE)

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Claremont University Students Shut Down Conservative Speaker

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Protesters at the Claremont Colleges successfully prevented conservative commentator Heather Mac Donald from speaking on their campus.

Students at the Claremont Colleges, a consortium of undergraduate and graduate liberal arts colleges in Claremont, California, blocked entrances to the building that Mac Donald was scheduled to speak in.

Mac Donald, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute, a conservative think tank, was giving a speech titled “The War on Police,” a reference to her 2016 book about how political rhetoric against police makes America less safe.

Mac Donald was forced to livestream her speech after protesters blocked students and professors from entering the building.

According to the school’s newspaper, The Forum, 250 students watched Mac Donald speak. Students had to submit questions via email.

“Among other chants, protesters yelled ‘Black Lives Matter’ and ‘How do you spell fascism? CMC!’ while banging on windows of the [Athenaeum],” according to The Forum.

Mac Donald was a guest of the Rose Institute of State and Local Government, a research institute on the campus of Claremont McKenna College, a member of the Claremont Consortium.

Peter Uvin, vice president of academic affairs for Claremont McKenna College, said in an email to students after the incident: “I fully understand that people have strong opinions and different—often painful—experiences with the issues Heather Mac Donald discusses. I also understand that words can hurt.”

Uvin went on to condemn the students’ behavior, saying, “What we face here is not an attempt to demonstrate, or to ask tough questions of our speaker, all of which are both protected and cherished on this campus, but rather to make it impossible for her to speak, for you to listen, and for all of us to debate. This we could not accept.”

Many conservative speakers have been protested on college campuses in recent months.

In March, students protested Charles Murray, a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute, while he was giving a speech at Middlebury College. Milo Yiannopoulos, a former editor at Breitbart, was also violently protested when he attempted to speak at Berkeley this past February.

Murray was able to give his speech, talking over screaming demonstrators, while Yiannopoulos was forced to cancel his speech and leave campus, thanks to a police escort.

Mary Clare Reim, an education policy analyst at The Heritage Foundation, cited a pattern, telling The Daily Signal in an email:

We can now add Heather Mac Donald to the long list of experts whose voices have been shut down on college campuses. From Middlebury to Berkeley, college students and administrators continue to treat conservative viewpoints with hostility and sometimes violence.

Reim went on to encourage institutions to re-evaluate their purpose, writing, “Universities have an obligation to protect First Amendment rights on campus. Unfortunately, recent events suggest that many universities no longer take that obligation seriously.” (For more from the author of “Claremont University Students Shut Down Conservative Speaker” please click HERE)

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Who Gassed the Syrians?

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While world leaders are pointing fingers at several possible groups responsible for the recent chemical attacks in Syria, at least one man says a definitive answer on who perpetrated the crime is unknowable.

Who is Responsible for the Chemical Strike?

In an interview with The Stream, Johannes de Jong, director of the Christian Political Foundation for Europe, said people may never know which of the possible perpetrators gassed the city of Khan Scheichun. De Jong cooperates with the Syriac-Assyrians in Iraq and Syria to “support a political solution of the communities in both countries in order to secure their free and safe future.” The chemical weapons killed 86 people, including children, reported The Associated Press. De Jong said that both Assad and Turkey-backed rebels have access to chemical weapons. Either party could have committed the massacre. “At this point, you simply can’t know.”

And it’s because of that de Jong said the world leaders must not react hastily. “The last thing a big actor should do is take action. … The U.S. should be careful regardless of the chatter everywhere,” he said. But there are at least three possibilities that could have happened.

Assad.

“But why?” asked de Jong. “There’s no obvious gain [to Assad]. … The scale of the attack would suggest that he did it.” But we just don’t know for certain, he added.

Infighting.

De Jong explains that there are multiple factions of fighting parties in the area. The area has been taken over by Al-Nusra, a terrorist group. The area has experienced a lot of unrest, particularly in the last few months, he said. It’s possible that rebel factions are using captured chemical weapons against each other.

Turkey-backed rebels.

This group has been producing and using chemical weapons. “We know they’ve committed chemical attacks,” de Jong explained, “When it happened in Aleppo the media wouldn’t cover it.” The group did operate a chemical lab in Aleppo, he said.

Another possibility is that Assad accidentally hit a chemical deposit. “That’s not completely impossible,” De Jong said. “We simply cannot know.”

Partisan Reporting

Part of the problem is that the information coming out of the area is highly partisan. Western journalists who could report nonpartisan information won’t take the chance of getting kidnapped, he said, and the chance of getting kidnapped in that area is very high. Even the churches in the area are not reliable because they depend heavily on the “good will” of the Assad regime. De Jong said they’ve decided, “Let’s go with the devil [we] know.”

The Blame Game … Russia?

But the charges of guilt are flying in every direction. President Trump lays the blame squarely on Assad. In a press conference at the White House on Wednesday, President Trump said that “heinous actions by the Assad regime cannot be tolerated.” U.S. Ambassador Nikki Haley suggested that the U.S. may take action, so confident was the Trump administration in Assad’s guilt. Secretary of State Rex Tillerson connected Syrian allies to the chemical attack. “Russia and Iran also bear great moral responsibility for these deaths.”

U.K. Prime Minister Theresa May called for an investigation by the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons, The Guardian reported yesterday. May said there cannot be a future for Assad in a “stable Syria.” She added, “I call on all the third parties involved to ensure that we have a transition away from Assad. We cannot allow this suffering to continue.”

U.K. Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson also blamed Assad. “All the evidence I have seen suggests that it was the Assad regime who did it, in full knowledge they were using illegal weapons in a barbaric attack on their own people,” he said at a meeting on Syria in Belgium.

The Russian Defense Ministry posted on Facebook that a Syrian airstrike hit rebel workshops, which produced the gas attack. They also allege that terrorists had been moving the chemicals to Iraq. For its part, Russia said its planes were not in the area at the time of the attack. But this theory was quickly shot down by doctors and experts, who agree that the gas was made up of more than just chlorine. A chemical expert, Hamish de Bretton Gordon, said that Russia’s scenario is “completely untrue.” He said that Russia is trying to protect their allies. “…I think this [claim] is pretty fanciful,” he said. …if you blow up sarin, you destroy it.”

Nerve Gas?

Chemical weapons specialist Dan Kaszeta told CNN that Russia’s story is “highly implausible.” “Nerve agents are the result of a very expensive, exotic, industrial chemical process … it’s much more plausible that Assad, who’s used nerve agents in the past, is using them again.”

The World Health Organization said that victims had symptoms consistent with a nerve agent exposure, reported the BBC.

Jerry Smith, leader of the team that oversaw the 2013 removal of Syria’s sarin stockpiles, said yesterday’s film footage shows no physical or trauma injuries. “There is foaming and pinpointed pupils, in particular. This appears to be some kind of organo-phosphate poison. In theory, a nerve agent. What is striking is that it would appear to be more than chlorine. The toxicity of chlorine does not lend itself to the sort of injuries and numbers that we have seen.”

Syria’s Denial

The Syrian government vehemently denied gassing the residents of Khan Scheichun. Syria’s deputy ambassador to the U.N. blame “terrorist groups” for the massacre. Mounzer Mounzer added that “Syria also reaffirms that the Syrian Arab Army does not have any form or type of chemical weapons. We have never used them, and we will never use them.” ABC News reported that Syria’s military denied it used chemical weapons against civilians because the military is too “honorable” to carry out the “heinous” crimes.

They’ve Done It Before

If it was sarin gas, it wouldn’t be the first time Assad used it on his own people. Smith said that the attack “…absolutely reeks of 2013 all over again,” referring to the gas attacks in Damascus that year. The Washington Times reported that victims of the 2013 attack believed rebels were responsible. Following that attack, Smith’s U.N. team oversaw the removal of sarin from Syria. Many believed that Assad had not declared or surrendered all of the chemical weapon. Tuesday’s strike was the largest chemical attack in Syria since the August 2013 attack.

Rebels Aren’t Capable

Even though Assad denies attacking his own people with chemical weapons, many believe the rebels in the area do not have the capability to either produce the deadly chemicals or drop a bomb. British Ambassador Matthew Rycroft said that the U.K. doesn’t believe that rebels have weapons that could cause yesterday’s symptoms, reported The Associated Press. However, in a civil war, rebels often capture government weapons and use them themselves.

Planes Dropped the Bombs

Witnesses and victims believe they saw a chemical attack perpetrated by Assad’s regime. Many claimed to have seen gas bombs dropping from military planes. One hospitalized woman told CNN that she “saw blue and yellow after the plane dropped a … bomb.” Another victim described being overcome with the gas “carried by three rockets.” A teenage girl saw a bomb drop from a plane and land on a building nearby. There was an explosion, then what appeared to be a yellow mushroom cloud. “It was like a winter fog,” she said in an interview with The New York Times. Hasan Haj Ali, commander of the Free Idlib Army rebel group, told Reuters, “Everyone saw the plane while it was bombing with gas.”

‘My Son Died Yesterday’

Still, residents of the area aren’t holding out much hope that the latest chemical attack will alter anything. “If the world wanted to stop this, they would have done so by now,” a woman said to The Washington Post. “One more chemical attack in a town the world hasn’t heard of won’t change anything.” She added, “I’m sorry. My son died yesterday. I have nothing left to say to the world.”

Now What?

President Trump, along with leaders from Britain and France, drafted a resolution Tuesday night for the U.N. Security Council. The resolution would condemn the attack and order the Syrian government to “provide all flight logs, flight plans and names of commanders in charge of air operations to … international investigators.”

Just today, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson said that “steps are underway” with an international coalition to remove Assad from power. Fox News reported that President Trump will be briefed Friday in Florida by Defense Secretary Jim Mattis and National Security Adviser H.R. McMaster on retaliatory options for the chemical strikes. (For more from the author of “Who Gassed the Syrians?” please click HERE)

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Is the Trump-Putin Bromance Over for Good?

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President Trump appears to be following the lead of his predecessors in eventually recognizing that Russian dictator Vladimir Putin is no friend to America.

Throughout his campaign for president, Trump entertained the idea that America could partner with Moscow’s leadership to work on mutual goals such as targeting the Islamic State terror group.

On the campaign trail, Trump praised Putin as a strong leader and someone he could possibly “get along” with. “You know that, if Putin wants to knock the hell out of ISIS, I’m all for it 100 percent and I can’t understand how anybody would be against that,” Trump opined.

Upon becoming president, Trump still held Putin as a man who he could partner with, holding off on harsh labels and denouncing the Russian dictator. Moreover, choosing Rex Tillerson — who had very close business ties to Russia as CEO of ExxonMobil — as secretary of state seemed to amplify his commitment to making things work with Moscow.

But now, it appears as if Trump’s attempt for détente with Russia has run into inevitable geopolitical realities. Putin refuses to back away from his support of the Assad regime in Syria and the nuclear weapon-seeking mullahs who rule Iran. On the domestic front, the Russian president’s behavior hasn’t changed, either. (And Putin’s critics continue to end up dead under unusual circumstances.)

This week, Bashar Assad reportedly committed a massive chemical weapons attack against his own people, killing dozens of civilians with weapons of mass destruction. Images and videos emerged showing the horrific aftermath, with bodies of tortured innocents lining the streets. Without Putin’s backing of Assad, such a crime against humanity probably would not have happened. Assad’s staying power in Damascus is largely thanks to boots-on-the-ground military support from Russia and Iran.

Now, it appears as if President Trump has come to the realization that he can no longer bear to entertain an alliance with a man who could support the genocidal campaign against an entire citizenry. Regime forces are responsible for the vast majority of the Syrian civil war body count, which has already killed hundreds of thousands. The chemical weapons attack may have been the straw that broke the camel’s back.

President Trump described the attack as an “affront to humanity,” noting that it had a “big impact” on him personally.

“My attitude toward Syria and Assad has changed very much,” the president added.

Trump has unleashed U.N. Ambassador Nikki Haley, who on Wednesday tore into the Russian regime for their silence on the Syria massacre. Russia “cannot escape responsibility,” Haley said, adding that Russia has “no interest in peace.”

Secretary of State Rex Tillerson followed suit, claiming Russia and Iran “bear moral responsibility” for the WMD attack.

President Trump follows his predecessors George W. Bush and Barack Obama in their initial outreach to Putin, only to renege on the idea in the end.

Bush infamously once said of Putin: “I looked the man in the eye. I found him to be very straightforward and trustworthy. I was able to get a sense of his soul.” Bush would later completely change course due to Putin’s domestic power grab, his reaffirming of alliances with enemies of America, and his military aggression against our allies.

President Obama utilized the services of his Secretary of State Hillary Clinton to offer the Russians an actual “reset” in an attempt to set aside differences. Obama personally pledged “more flexibility” to work with the Russians on various issues. This did not change Putin’s behavior. Russia invaded Ukraine (an American ally), continued committing domestic atrocities, and united his country by spewing rally-around-the-flag, anti-American propaganda.

Donald Trump, too, has come to understand that Vladimir Putin is a tyrant. Any illusions Trump had that Putin would possibly come to see the United States as anything other than an enemy nation appear to be over for good. (For more from the author of “Is the Trump-Putin Bromance Over for Good?” please click HERE)

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Trump Must Not Repeat Iraq War Fiasco, Leave Al Qaeda in Control of Syria

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Remember that tragic picture of a drowned Syrian refugee? It broke hearts all around the world. Never mind the story behind it, which soon fell apart. (The family had been living safely in Turkey.)

That photo overwhelmed rational argument. It ended debate. It helped sway Angela Merkel to admit a million Syrian refugees into Europe, via Germany. The continent is still reeling from the results: A rape epidemic in Sweden, “refugees” committing terror strikes in Paris, mass attacks on women in Germany … the list of appalling outcomes goes on and on. Turkey now threatens to send 2 or 3 million more “refugees” from the safety of camps in that country — if the E.U. won’t cave in to Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan’s demands.

It All Happened Before in Iraq

Remember the warnings that Saddam Hussein was preparing nuclear weapons? How about the promise that “Iraqi democrats” like Ahmed Chalabi would set up a pro-American regime in that country and guarantee religious freedom?

Fast forward past the missing WMDs, and the absolute chaos that erupted in that country when we removed its secular strongman. What’s Iraq like now? It’s a firm ally of Iran, with large swathes of the country devastated (or still controlled) by ISIS. One million Christians whose families had lived there since the age of the Apostles are huddling in refugee camps. And the nation still can’t pump its oil.

We Handed Iran to Khomeni

Think back a little further in history, and recall the tragic reports from Iran in the 1970s. I grew up hearing horror stories about what happened to Islamists and Communists at the hands of the Shah’s secret police. (The Shah, while a dictator, protected the rights of women, Christians, and Jews, and was a firm American and Israeli ally.) Those stories are what moved Jimmy Carter to yank out U.S. support.

So we handed that vast country over to the most hidebound Shi’ite extremists. They promptly took U.S. hostages. The threat they posed to their neighbors goaded Iraq into a war of aggression. More than a million people died in the war that resulted. Christians are hunted there now. The Iranian government lowered the age of consent for girls to 9. There is no more freedom now than existed under the Shah. And the country is rolling steadily toward building nuclear weapons that can menace every U.S. ally from Israel to Italy.

We Don’t Know the Culprit, and it Doesn’t Matter

As The Stream has reported, it’s uncertain whether the government of Syria in fact used chemical weapons against al Qaeda-linked Islamist rebels. Remember that in 2013, a U.N. official claimed that Syrian rebels were using captured chemical weapons against the government. Johannes de Jong, who is in close touch with Christian militias in Syria, told The Stream that the Turkish military has used chemical weapons against the Kurds near Aleppo — a fact which most media refused to cover. ISIS has used chemical weapons too. It seems that every major faction except the Kurds and their Christian allies has crossed the “red line” and used chemical weapons. So with whom should we side?

If Assad chose this moment to start using chemical weapons again, it was a political blunder of historic proportions. The U.S. had just agreed to set aside his removal from power as a precondition for peace. The “moderate rebels” whom neoconservatives fantasized would transform Syria into a liberal democracy with U.S. aid have turned out to be rarer than hen’s teeth. The weapons the U.S. gave them mostly ended up with al Qaeda factions.

Syria Needs Partition, Not U.S. Occupation

The possible outcomes in Syria have narrowed, and a tolerant, pro-American regime is not an option. It never really was one. Much more likely, and probably desirable, is a decentralized, de facto partitioned Syria. Crush ISIS, and let the rest of the country devolve into reasonably homogenous regions, according to who controls what today (minus, of course, ISIS).

One for Alawites and Christians, composed of the portion now controlled by Assad. (A good deal would require Assad himself to resign and go into exile, and replace him with an Alawite whose hands are comparatively clean of civilian blood.)

One for Arab Sunnis, composed of what’s controlled now by Turkey and its allies linked to al Qaeda.
One for Kurds, Christians, and Arabs opposed to al Qaeda, composed of what’s now controlled by the tolerant, democratically governed Federation of Northern Syria. (Turkey will fight this outcome, however — it opposes any territory for the Kurds, whose cousins it fiercely represses at home.)
There is no realistic prospect, even with Russian help and Trump in office, for Assad to reconquer the country. Nor could he hold it. So why would he do the one thing that would guarantee his ouster from power? Which might force Trump to break his campaign promise to keep U.S. forces out of the Syrian quagmire?

What If Assad Dropped Chemical Bombs?

But let’s allow that it’s possible, even likely that Assad’s forces were the culprit. Assad is a ham-fisted dictator, fighting desperately to protect his own power base and his ethnic group: the Alawites, a minority religious group that is persecuted in virtually every other Muslim country. So are Christians, who likewise are safe in the regions of Syria he still rules.

If we use force to knock out Assad and his government, who will fill the vacuum? The “moderate rebels” beloved of Senators John McCain and Lindsey Graham can’t do it. They can’t even hold on to the weapons the U.S. gives them. The Turks won’t permit the Kurds and Syriac Christians to expand into that region. We won’t give it to ISIS.

So the most likely beneficiary of a U.S. attack on the Syrian government will be the powerful coalition of al Qaeda-linked radical Islamists, who are backed by Turkey and Saudi Arabia. If they take over the region with millions of Alawites and Christians, what will these jihadists do to them? Christians on the ground in Syria report that they were “cleansed” by these militias, whom they fear as much as ISIS. Indeed, the worldviews of al Qaeda and ISIS are not fundamentally different. As a native New Yorker who was present for 9/11, I am somehow biased against this outcome.

Should the U.S. Give al Qaeda a Country?

Do we want to send U.S. troops to Syria, which would likely put al Qaeda in control of a major country? To cause the ethnic cleansing of another million Christians, as we made possible in Iraq? To remove the last safe country for Christians in the region, apart from Israel? And all to accomplish what?

To salve our consciences? Because we read an article about an atrocity? Atrocities abound in the region, from the Saudis’ war on civilians in Yemen to the chaos still reigning in Libya after our last humanitarian intervention. Boosters of war always say that “inaction is not an option.” But if every likely or feasible course of action carries the risk of costing more lives and causing more chaos, prudent restraint isn’t just feasible. It’s the only moral option. (For more from the author of “Trump Must Not Repeat Iraq War Fiasco, Leave Al Qaeda in Control of Syria” please click HERE)

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Did a Texting Driver Kill 13 Christian Seniors?

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The news of the crash was horrifying enough. Thirteen Christian seniors, most in their 80s, were returning from a three-day retreat when their church bus crashed into a pickup truck. The bus driver, along with 12 of the passengers, died. The truck driver survived.

All 13 victims were members of the same Baptist church. Some of them sang in the choir. They were parents and grandparents and great-grandparents, with deep roots in their community. Now, in a moment of time, they were gone. Can you imagine the trauma this community is experiencing?

But there’s more to the story that adds to the horror.

Pickup Truck Driver’s Texting Cost 13 Lives

According to reliable reports, the pickup truck swerved into oncoming traffic, so the crash was entirely his fault. And an eyewitness who spoke to the driver claims that the reason he swerved was because he was texting.

How deadly texting can be.

The witness, Jody Kuchler, said he was driving back to his home with his girlfriend “when he came across a truck that was driving erratically across the road.”

Kuchler stated, “He kept going off the road and into oncoming traffic and he just kept doing that.”

While following the truck for “at least 15 minutes,” Kuchler called two different sheriff’s offices “and told them ‘they needed to get him off the road before he hit somebody.’”

Kuchler then witnessed the crash, then went to check on both vehicles, finding the pickup truck driver alive: “He said, ‘I’m sorry, I’m sorry. I was texting.’ I said, ‘Son, do you know what you just did?’ He said, ‘I’m sorry. I’m sorry.’”

A Resolution: No More Texting and Driving

So far the police have not confirmed this report, only saying that they are considering “distracted” driving as a potential cause of the crash. But if in fact Kuchler’s account is correct, the whole story is even more tragic and jarring.

How many times have you and I been distracted while driving because of texts and emails? How many times have we endangered the lives of others, along with our own?

I confess that I have been guilty. I have texted or emailed many a time, all the while knowing that I should not be doing it, fully aware that, no matter how careful I tried to be, what I was doing was reckless.

But I am determined to do so no more, and I am writing this article to help reinforce this determination, along with warning others. (I waited a few days to write this to allow things to sink in more deeply and to adjust my habits.)

Texting and driving is not only dangerous. It can be deadly and disfiguring.

Liz Marks: Hear Her Story

On November 2, 2014, the Daily Mail carried this headline: “Popular teen disfigured by wreck after texting at the wheel warns other young drivers how distraction destroyed her life and how her so-called friends abandoned her because she was disabled.”

Liz Marks, now in her 20s, “was left blind in one eye and severely disabled after crashing her car while texting at the wheel” at the age of 17.

She had been “driving her Mazda 3 along a road in St Michaels, Maryland, when she received a text from her mother, Betty. Without thinking, she looked down at her phone to read the message.”

Again, I wonder: How many times have you and I done the exact same thing? We are almost programmed to respond to messages on our phones.

“Seconds later, she crashed into a tow truck driven by 25-year-old Roy Dixon that was stopped on St Michaels Road waiting to turn left on to Wales Lane. The truck had its left signal turned on.”

She “was airlifted to the University of Baltimore Shock Trauma Center with serious brain and facial injuries, where she remained in intensive care for nearly a month.”

In subsequent weeks, she was forced to undergo a number of surgeries, including an 11-hour procedure on her brain, according to The Star Democrat in Maryland.

Two-and-a-half years on, she remains blind in one eye, has lost her sense of smell, cannot hear properly, is unable to create tears due to damaged tear ducts and cannot fall asleep naturally.

No Life is Worth It

Her before and after pictures are jarring, giving a small glimpse into her sufferings. Adding to her pain, most of her friends left her, moving on with their lives while she remained behind.

All this for a momentary, innocent glance at her phone.

And now, 13 elderly lives have been snuffed out, apparently because a driver just had to text — and text, and text.

May we take all this to heart, not just for ourselves, but for others. No life is worth forfeiting — or maiming or destroying — for a text. (For more from the author of “Did a Texting Driver Kill 13 Christian Seniors?” please click HERE)

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Russia Warns of ‘Negative Consequences’ If U.S. Targets Syria

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Russia’s deputy U.N. envoy, Vladimir Safronkov, warned on Thursday of “negative consequences” if the United States carries out military strikes on Syria over a deadly toxic gas attack.

“We have to think about negative consequences, negative consequences, and all the responsibility if military action occurred will be on shoulders of those who initiated such doubtful and tragic enterprise,” Safronkov told reporters when asked about possible U.S. strikes.

When asked what those negative consequences could be, he said: “Look at Iraq, look at Libya.” (Read more from “Russia Warns of ‘Negative Consequences’ If U.S. Targets Syria” HERE)

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Obama Gave $68 Million to Pro-Abortion UN Population Control Agency, Here’s How Much Trump Is Giving

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The Trump Administration reinstated a policy Monday evening directing United States foreign assistance dollars away from the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) on the basis that its activities in China are complicit with that nation’s coercive population control program, the implementation of which includes forced abortion and involuntary sterilization. United States funding will be directed instead to other family planning and health programs not involved in China’s population control program.

“We congratulate President Trump and his administration for making it abundantly clear the United States will not support a United Nations agency that cooperates in China’s brutally repressive population control policies,” said National Right to Life President Carol Tobias. “I heartily applaud what we at National Right to Life are seeing from this pro-life administration.”

The State Department memorandum issued Monday determined that the UNFPA was in violation of the Kemp-Kasten anti-coercion law. The amendment prohibits giving U.S. “population assistance” funds to “any organization or program which, as determined by the President of the United States, supports or participates in the management of a program of coercive abortion or involuntary sterilization.”

As the memo states:

The Chinese Government’s Population and Family Planning Law, even as amended in 2015, and related regulations and practices at the central and Provincial levels, clearly constitute a “program of coercive abortion or involuntary sterilization,” and are an integral part of the comprehensive population-control program the Chinese Government advances. While there is no evidence that UNFPA directly engages in coercive abortions or involuntary sterilizations in China, the agency continues to partner with the [National Health and Family Planning Commission] on family planning, and thus can be found to support, or participate in the management of China’s coercive policies for purposes of the Kemp-Kasten Amendment. (Read more from “Obama Gave $68 Million to Pro-Abortion UN Population Control Agency, Here’s How Much Trump Is Giving” HERE)

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Ivanka Trump Secretly Met With Planned Parenthood Boss

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Ivanka Trump initiated a meeting with Planned Parenthood President Cecile Richards after her father was inaugurated as U.S. president, a new report revealed.

The first daughter and Cecile Richards met to talk about the nation’s largest abortion chain at Ivanka Trump’s request, in what Politico called an “under-the-radar meeting.”

A representative from the abortion giant said Ivanka Trump wanted “to know more about the facts of Planned Parenthood,” according to the political news outlet.

Planned Parenthood Federation of America (PPFA) Executive Vice President Dawn Laguens called it “an explainer meeting” . . .

“The purpose of the meeting, from Cecile’s point of view, was to make sure that Ivanka fully understood what Planned Parenthood does, how it is funded, and why it would be a terrible idea for Planned Parenthood to be removed from being able to see Medicaid patients,” said Laguens. “The main thing that Cecile Richards was doing was explaining that the money doesn’t actually go to abortions — we get reimbursed the same way a hospital does. We were clearing up misinformation about how this works.” (Read more from “Ivanka Trump Secretly Met With Planned Parenthood Boss” HERE)

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