President Donald Trump’s administration is mulling designating the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps a terrorist organization, Reuters reports.
The IRGC is one military force of the Islamic Republic of Iran which reports directly to the supreme leader, Ayatollah Khamenei. The IRGC is charged with training and arming terrorist organizations like Hezbollah, and deploying troops to places like Syria or Iraq.
Trump’s order would not immediately designate the IRGC a terrorist organization, but would instead instruct the Department of State to review current policy. The Department of the Treasury in 2007 sanctioned elements of the IRGC “entities and individuals engaged in or supporting proliferation and terrorism.”
Trump’s order would likely rile Iran’s current ruling elite, further increasing tensions between the U.S. and Iran. Increased sanctions on Iran could even lead to Iran pulling out of the 2015 nuclear deal.
Trump also sanctioned Iran Friday for conducting missile tests in violation of United Nations sanctions in late January. Trump has repeatedly blamed the Obama administration for failing to curb Iran’s increasingly aggressive ballistic missile tests and nefarious activity after the signing of the 2015 nuclear deal. IRGC terrorist designation would also fit with National Security Advisor Mike Flynn’s warning that Iran is “on notice.” (Read more from “New Terror Sanctions Would Strike at the Heart of Iran’s War Machine” HERE)
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/Islamic-Republic-of-Iran-Flag-in-row.jpg25921944Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2017-02-09 20:16:062017-02-09 20:16:06New Terror Sanctions Would Strike at the Heart of Iran’s War Machine
Nelson Vargas’ father was an abusive man. He beat Nelson and his seven brothers and sisters. When Nelson was 13 years old, his father threw him out on the street.
The young teenager slept in cars and wherever he could find a place. The need to have a family led him into gangs and eventually into selling drugs. He ended up in prison for 7 years, but that didn’t keep him clean. When he got out, he picked up where he left off.
One night he met a girl in a club — the daughter of a strong Christian woman. When he went to meet his new girlfriend’s mother at her church, he also met Jesus. Years later, he would lean hard on the Lord when his son was killed, praying for his son’s killer to meet the Lord, too. That prayer was answered — with an unusual request.
Carlos’ Story
Carlos Colon was raised in Chicago, along with two half-brothers, by a single mom. Like Nelson, he was involved in a gang and drugs, which eventually led to prison for him as well. He was sentenced to 20 years in prison for a gang retaliation murder.
Ten years into his sentence, he found Jesus. “After I turned my life over to the Lord, I prayed on it, and I said, ‘Lord, I would love for you to restore that which the enemy has broken,’” said Carlos. “I wanted forgiveness.” He began to pray for an opportunity to meet the family of the man he killed so he could ask for their forgiveness.
“Of course, I had a big example of what it was to be forgiven because of what Christ did for us. I know my sins placed Him on the cross. And yet, I was still asking God, ‘I would love to reach out, I would love for You to make this possible where I could meet [the victim’s family].’”
Radical Time Out (RTO)
Shortly after leaving prison, Carlos began attending RTO, or Radical Time Out, a group that ministers to people who have been in prison and their families. He’d heard about a man who had given his testimony and asked about him. “Is his name Nelson Vargas?” He asked a friend. “Yes,” said the friend. “How did you know?” Carlos knew then that the man who gave the testimony was the father of the man he’d killed.
Carlos asked the ministry coordinator for RTO, Nephtali Matta, to set up a meeting between the men. Nephtali suggested that he and Carlos approach Nelson carefully. “He said … ‘Let’s see what God does. I’m going to set up a meeting with him and if the Lord wills it, I will ask him. I will mention you to him and tell him that you’re a part of RTO.’”
Who Am I Not to Forgive?
It wasn’t easy for Nelson. But after he thought about it, he explained to his wife that “’I’m coming from the same lifestyle, the same environment, and God forgave me. And I said then, ‘Who am I not to forgive?’”
The day the two men met Nelson was shaking and sweaty, the reality of meeting the man who killed his son hit him hard. Carlos drove around the church, scared of meeting Nelson, too. But they met in a small room upstairs. Nelson’s wife embraced Carlos, who cried and asked for her forgiveness. Then Nelson’s oldest son hugged Carlos. When Carlos asked Nelson for a hug, Nelson embraced him, telling Carlos that the man who killed his son was now his own son.
But the miracle of forgiveness didn’t stop there. Nelson began praying for Carlos and asked God to bless Carlos’ family, marriage and his children. Then Nelson put his hand on Carlos’ shoulder and began to pray over him. When finished, he blessed him, saying “May the peace of God be upon you, and His face … shine upon you in the name of Jesus Christ … and I accept your apology.”
The men shared hugs and tears. Their meeting in itself a testament to the power of God in the lives of His children. Watch the video of the meeting below.
(For more from the author of “Former Prisoner Now Pastor Forgives and Asks God to Bless His Son’s Killer” please click HERE)
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/27680527941_62e7d1acc8_b.jpg7681024Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2017-02-09 20:07:482017-02-09 20:11:27Former Prisoner Now Pastor Forgives and Asks God to Bless His Son’s Killer
The rate of babies born addicted to opioids increased by 538 percent between 2006 and 2015 in Missouri, according to a disturbing new study warning the problem is rapidly getting worse.
At least eight in every 1,000 babies born will now suffer opioid withdrawals in the state, according to a report released by the Missouri Hospital Association Tuesday. Medical experts say the situation is rapidly deteriorating, driven by the national opioid epidemic and the continued over-prescribing of pain medication to expecting mothers, reports Fox 4.
Babies born with opioid dependence are more prone to seizures, will have trouble feeding and cry excessively in their first few days.
“I think it goes back to how we’ve been prescribing opioids to adults particularly to pregnant mothers,” Dr. Krishna Dummula, a neonatologist at the University of Kansas Hospital, told Fox 4. “The threshold to treat pain has dramatically gone down over the years, which is why you’ve seen a five-fold increase in the amount of expecting mothers being on opioid medications of some sort.”
Officials in some states are moving to place greater limits on the number of opioids doctors are allowed to prescribe and a stricter system for tracking patients, in an effort to limit doctor shopping. Republican Gov. Larry Hogan in Maryland is the latest to signal he will press the legislature for a bill placing limits on the number of opioid prescriptions a doctor can write. (Read more from “The Rate of Babies Born Addicted to Opioids Is Skyrocketing” HERE)
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/newborn-1399155_960_720.jpg640960Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2017-02-09 20:05:072017-02-09 20:05:07The Rate of Babies Born Addicted to Opioids Is Skyrocketing
A federal appeals court Thursday night kept a freeze on President Donald Trump’s executive order restricting refugee resettlement and other forms of legal immigration, meaning those previously blocked from traveling to the U.S. under the action can continue to enter the country as the case makes it way through the legal system.
A three-judge panel with the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 9th Circuit in San Francisco unanimously rejected the government’s assertion that the suspension of the order imperils national security, and ruled that the suing states would suffer “irreparable harms” if travel suspension could carry on.
“The states have offered ample evidence that if the executive order were reinstated even temporarily, it would substantially injure the states and multiple other parties interested in the proceeding,” the court’s ruling stated.
The judges on the Ninth Circuit panel were Judge Michelle T. Friedland, appointed by President Barack Obama; Judge William C. Canby Jr., appointed by President Jimmy Carter; and Judge Richard R. Clifton, appointed by President George W. Bush.
The ruling was focused on the narrow question of whether Trump’s executive order should be frozen while courts consider its lawfulness. The government could now ask the Supreme Court to lift the stay of the order, but the ideologically-split high court is down a member, and a 4-4 ruling would leave the appeals court decision in place.
Trump quickly turned to Twitter to denounce the decision, writing:
SEE YOU IN COURT, THE SECURITY OF OUR NATION IS AT STAKE!
Kellyanne Conway, a counselor to the president, later said in an interview with Fox News that the administration “is fully confident” they will ultimately win in court.
“This ruling does not affects the merits at all,” Conway said. “It is an interim ruling, and we are fully confident that now that we will get our day in court and have an opportunity to argue this on the merits that we will prevail.”
Trump’s executive order, signed Jan. 27, bans Syrian refugees from the U.S. indefinitely, imposes a four-month suspension on all refugee admissions from anywhere in the world, and bars for 90 days people from seven countries the Obama administration and Congress had designated as posing risks of terrorism.
Those countries are Iraq, Iran, Syria, Yemen, Sudan, Libya, and Somalia.
The Trump administration received widespread criticism early on for its seemingly chaotic and uneven implementation of the order.
After facing legal challenges, the government clarified the order does not apply to green-card holders — or legal permanent residents — and it granted waivers to Iraqis who assisted the U.S. military, and refugees who had already been screened prior to the order being signed.
The courts usually defer to the executive branch on issues of national security and immigration policy.
Indeed, federal immigration law states that if the president finds “the entry of any aliens” would be “detrimental” to the country’s interests, he can impose restrictions.
But the appeals court asserted in its ruling that there are checks on these powers. The judges said the government had not provided enough evidence to support a need for the travel restrictions.
“The government does not merely argue that courts owe substantial deference to the immigration and national security policy determinations of the political branches — an uncontroversial principle that is well-grounded in our jurisprudence,” the judges wrote. “Instead, the government has taken the position that the president’s decisions about immigration policy, particularly when motivated by national security concerns, are unreviewable, even if those actions potentially contravene constitutional rights and protections … There is no precedent to support this claimed unreviewability, which runs contrary to the fundamental structure of our constitutional democracy.”
Hans van Spakovksy, a senior legal fellow at The Heritage Foundation, contended that the court overstepped its bounds.
“This decision has as little basis in the law as the original decision by the district court judge,” van Spakovsky said. “The federal courts are in essence refusing to recognize or acknowledge the authority given to the president by Congress to suspend the entry of aliens into the U.S. The very idea that any foreigner has any constitutional or statutory right to be admitted to the U.S. is absurd. This is just another sign of overbearing federal courts grabbing power from the legislative and executive branches in violation of basic separation of powers principles.”
Other legal experts agreed with the court that Trump’s order went too far.
True. Our nation's security, liberty, and constitutional form of govt are at stake. That's why we'll keep seeing YOU in court, Mr. Pres. https://t.co/N03snHJMRP
Lawsuits around the country have alleged that Trump’s order violates the constitution by intentionally punishing Muslims, and many trial courts blocked aspects of the president’s order.
The Trump administration rejected charges of religious intent, noting that most Muslim-majority countries were not included in the order.
The 9th Circuit appeals court was ruling on a decision issued in the broadest of the trial court rulings. On Feb. 3, Judge James Robart, a federal judge in Seattle appointed by President George W. Bush, issued a temporary restraining order requiring a nationwide halt to Trump’s order — prohibiting federal employees from enforcing it — in a decision that contained little reasoning.
The states of Washington and Minnesota had brought the suit, arguing the executive order harms the state’s residents in areas of employment, education, business, and family relations.
Hundreds of travelers who are citizens of the seven targeted countries have come to the U.S. since Robart issued his order, and those that have been screened can continue to travel here at least until the courts rule on the legality of Trump’s order.
Full court proceedings on the legality of Trump’s order are expected to take months, and with multiple appeals it could take more than year before the courts make a final decision. (For more from the author of “Appeals Court Keeps Freeze on Trump’s Refugee Order” please click HERE)
When President Donald Trump took office, repeal of Obamacare seemed like a guarantee—and then the timeline started slipping.
All the elements are in place: A Republican-controlled Congress and a Republican president, all elected after promising to repeal Obamacare. But once the celebration and ceremonies died away, Congress started to do what it does best. Nothing.
“Nothing” may be a bit strong given the historic levels of obstruction from Democrats in the Senate, but House Republicans have no such excuse. In fact, they even have a blueprint.
Last year, the House and Senate passed an Obamacare repeal using the budget reconciliation process. That measure was ultimately vetoed by then-President Barack Obama, but that same legislation can be reintroduced and sent to Trump’s desk to be signed into law.
There is no reason to delay. The slipping of the Obamacare repeal timeline is creating cascading problems for the American people.
Delaying Repeal Prolongs the Current Health Care Crisis
No one needs reminding that Obamacare takes away choice, erodes the value of health care, and puts additional burden on the pockets of the American taxpayer. The unsustainable nature of Obamacare is creating massive uncertainty and causing insurers to leave the marketplace, causing individual premiums to increase.
Additionally, once repeal is signed into law and real health care reforms begin moving forward, private insurers will need time to adjust to the new market. Continuing to delay repeal shortens the time insurers will be able to adjust and provide the best solution for the insured.
Most importantly, we don’t want Americans living under the current failing health care system any longer.
Obamacare is bad, and only getting worse. Average premiums are going up by 25 percent this year, deductibles are blowing past $10,000 for a family, and 70 percent of U.S. counties have no insurer choice, or a choice between only two insurers.
What good is a health care plan that you can’t choose and can’t afford to use? Congress must repeal it as soon as possible to put better health care choices back in the hands of the American people.
Delaying Repeal Hurts Public Support for Congress
Nearly every single congressional Republican campaigned on the promise to repeal Obamacare. The unfortunate consequence of the delay is that the American people are losing faith in the people whose job it is to represent them.
Recent Heritage Foundation research shows 72 percent of Americans will take the promises of Congress less seriously if they wait to fulfill their promise to repeal Obamacare. And 70 percent of Americans believe the longer Congress waits to fulfill their promises to repeal Obamacare, the less likely they will be successful.
There is no doubt that lawmakers will be held accountable to their promises.
Delaying Repeal Keeps the Focus Off Other Priorities
The surest way to repeal Obamacare is through the reconciliation process. However, that option has an expiration date. The reconciliation package is part of the budget process for fiscal year 2017 and it has to be completed before the fiscal year 2018 budget process begins.
In addition to creating a time crunch, the fight over when and how to repeal Obamacare is delaying action on other critical fights.
There is no doubt that Obamacare repeal is and should be the first priority, but Trump and congressional Republicans have made major promises to Americans that must also be considered.
Tax reform. Border security. Regulatory reform. Those priorities cannot move forward until Obamacare repeal is finalized.
What’s Next?
Republicans campaigned on repealing Obamacare in 2010, 2014, and 2016. Now it is time to step up to the plate and use the budget reconciliation process to deliver on those promises.
Congress needs to send a full repeal of Obamacare to the president for his signature. Americans cannot afford any further delays. (For more from the author of “Why Delaying Obamacare Repeal Is Hurting the American People” please click HERE)
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/doctor-medical-medicine-health-42273-1-1.jpeg20003000Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2017-02-09 19:56:262017-02-09 19:56:26Why Delaying Obamacare Repeal Is Hurting the American People
As President Donald Trump’s nominee for treasury secretary continues to wait for Senate confirmation, an architect of the Obama administration’s Iran nuclear deal is currently running the agency.
Acting Treasury Secretary Adam Szubin—who had been a career department employee—previously served as the acting undersecretary for terrorism and financial crimes in the Obama administration. The Senate never confirmed Szubin.
A White House spokesman told The Daily Signal this week there are no announcements planned as to whether Szubin will remain in the Treasury Department after Trump’s nominee, Steven Mnuchin, is confirmed as treasury secretary. Mnuchin is expected to get a Senate vote Saturday.
Since Jan. 20, and until Mnuchin is confirmed, Szubin is running the agency. It’s the same type of role that Sally Yates had at the Department of Justice before she was fired Jan. 30 for refusing to defend Trump’s immigration executive order.
The Treasury Department is charged with implementing the Trump administration’s new Iran sanctions. White House press secretary Sean Spicer told The Daily Signal during a press briefing this week those sanctions were applied and “went off without a hitch.”
The Trump administration last week announced new economic sanctions on 13 Iranian individuals and 12 Iranian companies in response to the country’s missile test in support of Houthi rebels in Yemen. The sanctions do not affect the Obama administration’s negotiated multilateral nuclear deal with Iran, known as the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action.
The Treasury Department did not respond to questions from The Daily Signal.
Keeping former Obama administration officials on board could threaten the effectiveness of the new sanctions, said Fred Fleitz, a former chief of staff for arms control and international security at the State Department, working under then-undersecretary John Bolton.
“I would be concerned about implementation and enforcement of Iran sanctions with Obama holdovers in place,” Fleitz, now the senior vice president for policy and programs at the Center for Security Policy, a national security think tank, told The Daily Signal in a phone interview. “Having a confirmed treasury secretary in fast should be a priority.”
Fleitz said he is more concerned with State Department officials in the arms control bureaus, who are hostile to Trump and strongly support the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action, being in charge of the deal.
Szubin’s time is limited at this point, and it could be too early to pre-judge what he will do, said Mark Dubowitz, a CEO of the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, a national security think tank.
“Adam Szubin is a strong believer in the Iran deal, but he is a consummate professional who is extraordinarily talented at finding innovative ways to squeeze the Iranian regime. But he is leaving soon,” Dubowitz told The Daily Signal in an email.
The Wall Street Journal reported last month that Trump chose to keep Szubin at the Treasury Department for now to maintain continuity, but that report regarded his acting undersecretary role. It could also be a sign of the new administration’s policy, said Jim Phillips, senior research fellow for Middle Eastern affairs at The Heritage Foundation.
“I think it is one more sign that the Trump administration is in no hurry to tear up the deal and is still reviewing its options,” Phillips told The Daily Signal in an email.
Szubin’s job as acting undersecretary for terrorism and financial intelligence was to disrupt financial support to international terrorist organizations, proliferators of weapons of mass destruction, and narcotics traffickers. President Barack Obama nominated Szubin to this political position in 2015 in an acting role, though the Senate never confirmed him.
Before the Iran deal, Szubin also helped to draft tough sanctions against Iran, which he later said helped force the country to negotiate.
Speaking at the Atlantic Council and the Iran Project Symposium on Dec. 17, 2015, Szubin said:
Our sanctions worked as intended. Iran would not have come to the table as seriously as it did were it not for the powerful array of sanctions robustly enforced by the U.S. and our allies around the world. And once Iran came to the table, we reached a strong, comprehensive deal that closes every pathway to an Iranian nuclear weapon.
While serving as acting undersecretary in the summer of 2015, Szubin traveled to Israel to lobby government officials to support the Iran nuclear deal, Foreign Policy reported.
Sen. Tom Cotton, R-Ark., blocked the Szubin nomination for undersecretary from coming to the Senate floor last year. He said Szubin is “well respected on both sides of the aisle,” but his key objection was to the Iran policy pushed by Obama, Secretary of State John Kerry, and Treasury Secretary Jack Lew.
“Until President Obama, and Secretary Kerry, and Secretary Lew publicly and conclusively renounce any intent to allow Iran to dollarize a foreign transaction, I will object to this nomination,” Cotton said, according to The Hill.
Cotton’s office did not respond to inquiries from The Daily Signal for this story.
Szubin began working in the Treasury Department under President George W. Bush as a career employee, serving as director of the department’s Office of Foreign Assets Control, a position he held from 2006 to 2015. Before that, Szubin worked in the Justice Department. From 1999 to 2000 he clerked for Judge Ronald Gilman, a President Bill Clinton appointee on the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 6th Circuit. (For more from the author of “Trump’s Acting Treasury Secretary, an Obama Holdover, Helped Craft Iran Nuclear Deal” please click HERE)
A popular book chronicling the story of abortionist Kermit Gosnell, who was convicted for murdering several infants, was left off of The New York Times best-seller list.
Since its release on Jan. 24, “Gosnell: The Untold Story of America’s Most Prolific Serial Killer” quickly reached Amazon’s best-seller list, but was left off The New York Times’ hardcover nonfiction best-seller list.
It should have been the “fourth best-selling nonfiction title,” according to a press release by Regnery Publishing, the book’s publisher.
“Gosnell” authors Ann McElhinney and Phelim McAleer covered the detailed story of the prolific abortion doctor and convicted murderer. The book includes an exposé of Gosnell’s practices, including a description of “his collection of severed baby feet and heads in his basement,” according to the Conservative Book Club.
According to Publishers Weekly, McElhinney and McAleer’s book was the ninth best-selling on the hardcover nonfiction best-seller list last week, and currently sits at No. 22 on the list.
When released, the book quickly sold out at both Amazon and Barnes & Noble and reached the top spot on Amazon’s “Hot New Release” list on the first day of its release.
“This book rose to No. 4 on Amazon without any coverage from the mainstream media,” McAleer told The Daily Signal in a phone interview. “The irony is that the book is about how the mainstream media refused to cover Gosnell’s murder trial. And even today, they’re still being shamefully dishonest.”
McElhinney and McAleer recently spoke at a Heritage Foundation event about their decision to write the book and produce a movie about Gosnell.
McAleer said that if the book had been published on the best-seller list, it would have been the first time the book was even mentioned by The New York Times.
“New York Times readers would’ve said, ‘What’s this book I’ve never heard of?’” McAleer said.
The book, however, is listed at No. 13 on the Feb. 12 edition of The New York Times’ combined print and e-book nonfiction list, Danielle Rhoades Ha, New York Times vice president of communications, told The Daily Signal in an email last week.
According to Rhoades Ha, the list was manufactured based on “confidential” sales records provided by retailers.
“The Times’s best-seller lists are based on a detailed analysis of book sales from a wide range of retailers who provide us with specific and confidential context of their sales each week,” she said. “These standards are applied consistently, across the board in order to provide Times readers our best assessment of what books are the most broadly popular at that time.”
This is not the first time The New York Times has snubbed a conservative author, according to NewsBusters.
“The Intimidation Game: How the Left Is Silencing Free Speech,” written by a Wall Street Journal editorial board member Kimberley Strassel was left off of the top 20 hardcover best-seller list when it was released in June 2016, despite selling more copies than some of the books on the list.
Similar instances have occurred to other conservative authors, including Dinesh D’Souza, Ted Cruz, and David Limbaugh, according to NewsBusters. (For more from the author of “Book Detailing the Story of Infamous Abortionist Left off New York Times Best-Seller List” please click HERE)
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A popular talking point on the left is that Donald Trump has things in common with Hitler.
But is this the case? Independent Journal Review decided to speak to a woman born in Nazi Germany about the comparison . . .
[Inga] Andrews said:
“What is going on in this country is giving me chills. Trump is not like Hitler. Just because a leader wants order doesn’t mean they’re like a dictator.
What reminds me more of Hitler than anything else isn’t Trump, it’s the destruction of freedom of speech on the college campuses — the agendas fueled by the professors.”
(Read more from “You’ve Heard People Compare Trump to Hitler. So We Asked a Woman Who Was Born in Nazi Germany…” HERE)
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/29381357345_27b53e0902_b-4.jpg6831024Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2017-02-09 18:27:152017-02-11 20:50:57You’ve Heard People Compare Trump to Hitler. So We Asked a Woman Who Was Born in Nazi Germany…
Vladimir Kara-Murza Jr., a high-profile Russian critic of President Vladimir Putin, has fallen extremely ill for the second time in two years under mysterious circumstances. He appears to have been poisoned by an unknown substance, his wife said this week, per Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty.
This is the second time that an advanced toxin has allegedly entered his system. In 2015, Kara-Murza was rushed to the hospital with major organ failure. He recovered enough to be discharged, but with permanent nerve damage. However, this time, he has again suffered sudden organ failure and has been placed in a medically induced coma.
Only 35 years old, Kara-Murzo has been active in reformist politics in Russia as a member of the People’s Freedom Party. In the past few years, he has become an outspoken critic of Vladimir Putin’s policies.
In 2014, he highlighted the Kremlin’s return, under Putin, to the “Soviet practice” of taking away citizenship from political dissidents. That same year, in an op-ed for The Wall Street Journal, he exposed Putin’s post-Olympics crackdown on political opposition groups.
Kara-Murzo is known for his close ties to members of the U.S. Congress, according to Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty. The Russian opposition leader has lobbied for sanctions against Russian state-media and senior officials under Putin. He was also a strong proponent of the Magnitsky Act sanctions, a 2012 bipartisan bill that sought to punish Russian leaders who were deemed responsible for the killing of Russian lawyer and whistleblower Sergei Magnitsky.
Vladimir Kara-Murza is far from the first Kremlin critic to fall ill under mysterious circumstances. Numerous opponents of Vladimir Putin have suddenly become extremely ill and/or were killed by rare forms of poison. Many suspect that Putin has tasked the FSB, the successor spy agency to the Soviet-era KGB, with carrying out the assassinations.
Kara-Murza was also a long-time adviser and friend to Boris Nemtsov, another prominent Putin critic who was assassinated in February 2015.
The news of another prominent Putin critic falling extremely ill under mysterious circumstances comes on the heels of President Donald Trump refusing to condemn the authoritarian Russian president. In a recent interview with Fox News host Bill O’Reilly, which aired on Super Bowl Sunday, Trump refused to label Putin as a “killer.”
“There are a lot of killers. We’ve got a lot of killers. What do you think — our country’s so innocent?” Trump said.
Throughout his presidential campaign and subsequent move to the nation’s highest office, Pres. Trump has time and time again refused to condemn Putin’s barbarity. Will Vladimir Kara-Murza’s case force Trump to finally speak out and condemn the human rights abuses perpetrated by Putin? Or, will the president again remain silent on the Russian leader’s tyrannical behavior? (For more from the author of “Another Putin Critic Mysteriously Poisoned — When Will Trump Speak Out?” please click HERE)
The Left’s persistent denialism over the relationship between Islam, jihadism, and our national security is, to somewhat-paraphrase Thomas Hobbes, brutish and nasty without the decency of being solitary or short. Some recent polling shows the cold hard data on just how unhinged from reality this persistent denialism is.
One recent CBS News poll found that 66 percent of Democrats believe that other world religions are just as violent as Islam, while Rasmussen found that Democrats are more likely to believe that Muslims are mistreated in the U.S. than to think Christians are in Muslim-majority countries.
These, of course, raise the eternal question: What color is the sky in the Democrat Party’s world?
The first assumption – that all religions are somehow equally violent – runs parallel to the equally ludicrous assertion of many on the Left that “right-wing extremism” poses a larger threat to the American people than jihadist terror.
Is there a concerted conspiracy of militant Christians all over the world to topple sovereign governments and institute a global theocracy? When was the last time it struck? How many Baptists have been radicalized into shooting up a gay nightclub or their office building for the glory of Jesus Christ lately? And please, if Catholic or Mormon extremists ever tried to lay waste to the Milwaukee Art Museum for that grotesque depiction of Pope Benedict XVI, please let me know; I can’t find it.
Of the world’s 1.6 billion Muslims, the vast majority are peaceful. But whether or not there is a liberty-loving American patriot within each remains a rightfully debated point, given the prevalence of Sharia-supremacist attitudes throughout the Muslim world (as well as in Muslim-heavy Western populations).
Such an assumption, however, would seem to be common creed and shibboleth among Democratic policymakers who would have their fellow citizens look the other way, pretending that not all worldviews are created equal. They’re clearly not. The distinction that needs to be made here is that Islam has a problem, rather than necessarily being the problem itself. But it’s a bigger, more violent problem than any other major religion.
Then, as illustrated by the Rasmussen survey, we have Democrats’ belief that Muslims in the United States are treated worse than Christians in Muslim-majority countries. That makes you wonder whether people are still confusing that part of the world with Agrabah, the fictional city from Disney’s “Aladdin.”
Yes, let’s hold up the United States — where the First Amendment and supporting legislation have defended Muslim citizens’ rights to abstain from transporting alcohol at work, pray in public schools, and maintain beards as first responders, and even as prisoners — to some helpful case studies in the Muslim-majority world.
The abuses visited on Christians and rarely-persecuted mob violence in the Middle East are so well documented, it barely merits response. One need only look at the horrors Christians face under ISIS, the state of the underground church in Iran, the ongoing trial of Asia Bibi and others in Pakistan, and attacks on Christians by Muslims even in refugee camps to know that even a one-to-one comparison with Muslims’ wellbeing in America would be sheer lunacy.
In addition to the cases mentioned above, it’s also important to remember that Muslims in America are free to convert to other religions, profess atheistic views, or to openly question the teachings of their own faith without government coercion to the contrary.
A quick survey of Muslim-majority countries like Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Sudan, and others with apostasy and blasphemy laws show that this is not the case for millions of their foreign counterparts, many of whom can face death for such activities.
Some will say that the real persecution doesn’t necessarily come from the state, but rather intolerance in the population. This is equally overblown.
Regardless of what you think of hate crime legislation, Muslims in the United States are protected by a justice system — bound by our laws and Constitution — that tracks, prosecutes, aggregates, and publicly reports incidents of religiously motivated hate crimes. An examination of that report shows that incidents against Muslims significantly trail behind those of Jews (with nary a word from the media, academia, and Hollywood).
While vigilante persecution of any religion is an anathema to who we are as Americans, it’s also important to keep proportion and frequency in mind. This message doubly applies to the post-election hijab hoaxers and their deceptive ilk.
Following President Trump’s travel suspension and the error-laden legal battle surrounding it, the breathless dungeon of public discussion involving Islam, terrorism, national security, and religious freedom has only gotten more hostile and dysfunctional.
It’s not because one side of the debate is pushing an agenda that oversteps the limits of power prescribed by the Constitution, thereby ushering in some sort of fascist dystopia — it’s because the other side, as the polls show, is completely detached from reality. (For more from the author of “Democrats’ Warped View of Islam Is the Reason Our National Security Debate Is So Screwed Up” please click HERE)
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/Quran_cover.jpg19442592Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2017-02-08 21:44:332017-02-08 21:44:33Democrats’ Warped View of Islam Is the Reason Our National Security Debate Is So Screwed Up
