How Fences Star Denzel Washington Lives out His Faith in Hollywood

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Denzel Washington, one of Hollywood’s finest leading actors, has succeeded in the business by any standard. He’s received three Golden Globe awards, a Tony award and two Academy Awards. But as he recently told T.D. Jakes there are more important things in life than being a movie star.

From his relationship with God and his family, to the life he now wants to lead, Denzel spoke with Jakes about keeping his priorities straight. (See the full interview with Denzel and others from the cast of his new movie Fences below.)

Jakes was curious how Denzel and his wife of 34 years Pauletta have survived so many years in the spotlight. “By the grace of God. Really, I’m not taking credit,” he replied. “And a great wife. A strong, strong, strong (woman) … she has done the heavy lifting. She has been the consistent one. She has given daily religious instruction. She makes breakfast, she took them to school. I was out killing the lion, bringing home the meat, you know, providing.”

Even though the actor has a hectic schedule and is frequently shooting films far from home, he insists his family has always come first. “I don’t want that regret,” he said, when talking about raising his kids. “I don’t care how many Oscars and all that stuff, I don’t want to be that guy. I want to be the one that did the best I can for my children.”

Denzel not only stars in Fences, but directed as well. Mykelti Williamson, best known for his role as Bubba in Forrest Gump, plays Gabriel in the film and has nothing but praise for Denzel as a strong, Godly leader: “Everyday this leader, Denzel, brings the Word. On Broadway we would circle and have a word of prayer, we would cover one another, and he was serious about it, every single day. ‘Alright, we’re about to bring the Word,’ and Denzel was waiting for you and you’d better be on time.”

Denzel added, “When we’d have our circle — cause there’s a young girl in the film too — so the young girl, sometimes we’d let [her] lead. Of course, out of the mouths of babes, you know, so we’d go out there together unified with a purpose.”

It wasn’t just the cast members who prayed with Denzel during the movie shoot. Two neighborhood women who watched the filming from their homes each day became his “prayer warriors,” he said. According to Christian Today, these ladies touched Denzel’s heart. “A woman on the corner, she was watching me. She made her house a quiet place of prayer for me, and I’d go in there when things were getting overwhelming and just take a breath. Sometimes I’d just have a prayer with her.”

He explained how the second woman approached him. “Even before we started shooting I met her and I came and said, ‘Oh thank you for coming out.’ She said, ‘We’ve been watching you for a long time.’ I said ‘Well, pray for me.’ [And then] she said, ‘Denzel, I’ve been praying for you for 35 years, my family and I,’” he said. “‘We’ve been watching, we know how hard it is.’”

As this point in his life, Denzel says he’s content and ready to serve others. “You know, I’m in the service business now. I’m fine. I’ve done well. I don’t need anything else. I don’t need watches and jewelry and all that. So I’m here to serve. I’m here to serve God, I’m here to serve my family, I’m here to serve.”

Denzel Washington directs and acts in the movie Fences, which was released on Christmas Day.

Here’s the full interview on the T.D. Jakes Show:

(For more from the author of “How Fences Star Denzel Washington Lives out His Faith in Hollywood” please click HERE)

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Will the ‘Trump Effect’ Trickle down to Christian Conservatives?

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Like no one before him, Donald Trump has shaken our nation, and love him or loathe him, he has done what no one else has ever done. On his journey to the presidency, he has broken (and rewritten) the rules, he has defied the establishment, he has challenged the status quo, he has played both the bully and the victim, he has proved the pundits wrong, and he has emerged from every storm stronger than before.

Not only so, but the climate of the nation has changed (some say for better and some say for worse), to the point that what seemed inevitable just three months ago no longer seems so inevitable. Could it be that America is about to make a massive change in direction, a radical course correction?

This, to me, is an important aspect of what some are calling the “Trump effect” (often in pejorative terms; a Google search on January 12 yielded 1,160,000 for “Trump effect” in quotes): The inevitable can be challenged; the status quo can be changed; the bullies can be conquered.

Again, I’m aware that for many, President-elect Trump is the ultimate bully, hardly a model to follow, especially for followers of Jesus, and my goal here is not to call pastors and believers to emulate his tone or his style. Instead, I’m encouraging us to learn from his example that America’s course has not been inexorably set, that the seemingly impossible is very possible, that history is full of surprises, and that now is the time for fresh courage and commitment.

The Nation Turned on a Dime

For several years now, we conservatives have been told that we have lost the culture wars, that we should throw in the towel and concede, that we should consolidate our losses and move on to non-controversial, spiritual issues, that the tide of history is set against us. And those of who refused to go along with this narrative were mocked and ridiculed, told that we represented a dying breed that was about to be replaced by an enlightened generation, mocked as unfortunate relics of a bygone age, ridiculed as an endangered species soon to be obsolete.

Now, the tide of history has shifted suddenly, with the real possibility of a complete reversal in the expected makeup of the Supreme Court (under Hillary) and the equally real possibility of a wholesale repudiation of radical liberalism. And to think that on Election Day, even into early election evening, this was the exact opposite of what was widely expected to be. The direction of the nation literally turned on a dime, and with it, the sense that anything is possible. The very rules of engagement have changed.

Who says that we have to cower before the cultural bullies? Who says that we have to apologize for our convictions? Who says that the mainstream media sets the agenda and establishes the talking points? Who says that the defeat of conservative values is inevitable?

Again, I am not saying that we emulate the style of our president-elect (in terms of the negative aspects of his style) or that we take on the posture of bullies. Instead, I’m urging us to learn from what he has accomplished, to change our way of thinking, and to seize the day and take back the ground that has been pulled from under our feet.

Just three months ago, it appeared that Planned Parenthood would be firmly ensconced and generously funded for a generation or more. Now, the abortion giant stands on the verge of national defunding.

Just three months ago, it appeared that Roe v. Wade would not be overturned in our lifetimes or perhaps even in the lifetimes of our children. Now, talk of its possible reversal is anything but fantasy.

Just three months ago, it appeared that LGBT rights would push religious rights into the closet. Now, an unlikely champion of religious rights has arisen (and oddly enough, he fashions himself a friend of LGBT rights as well).

This is not just the tables turning. This is the floor becoming the ceiling and the ceiling becoming the floor. This is nothing less than upheaval.

Rise Up, Stand Tall!

Of course, we have no way of knowing how President Trump will govern and how far the Republican-led Congress will go in terms of making positive, necessary changes.

But what’s clear is this: Donald Trump, in the past more famous for hedonism than for heroics, has declared war on a sacrosanct, PC world, and it’s high time for others who call themselves overcomers and world changers and who fashion themselves to be countercultural Christians — I’m speaking about the born-again Church of America — to rise up, stand tall, and speak the truth in love.

After all, if a thrice-married, formerly-playboy, billionaire businessman can shake the nation, why can’t we as the Lord’s people — in the power of the Spirit and in the footsteps of Jesus, overcoming evil with good?

Enough with our compromise and cowardice. It’s time for courage and conviction. It’s time we led the way. (For more from the author of “Will the ‘Trump Effect’ Trickle down to Christian Conservatives?” please click HERE)

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Rex Tillerson’s Moral Indecision

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President-elect Trump has nominated a number of outstanding men and women for top foreign policy positions in his administration. Marine Corps Gent. (Ret) James Mattis for Secretary of Defense. South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley for U.N. Ambassador. My one-time boss, former Senator Dan Coats, for Director of National Intelligence. Marine Corps Gen. (Ret) John Kelly for Director of Homeland Security. Congressman Mike Pompeo for CIA Director. Great choices, all.

Then there’s Rex Tillerson.

Former head of Exxon-Mobil, Mr. Tillerson has extensive experience in corporate management, international trade, and building a strong professional team. He is reputed to be an effective negotiator and his ability to lead a sprawling bureaucracy is not in question. No doubt he is a patriot and a highly capable individual.

Sadly, he also seems to be completely ill-suited to be Secretary of State. Listening to Mr. Tillerson at his Senate hearing was like hearing an awkward teenager talking to his girlfriend’s father.

The Tillerson Eqivocation

His refusal to acknowledge the moral ugliness of Vladimir Putin was striking. An impassioned and probing Sen. Marco Rubio asked Mr. Tillerson about Putin’s responsibility for the deaths of up to 300,000 Chechens, his murder of political opponents, his military backing of Syrian mass murder Bashir al-Assad (including missile strikes against civilians), and his invasion of the Ukraine to regain Russian control of the Crimea.

Mr. Tillerson’s equivocation was astonishing. Not just in his refusal to call Vladimir Putin a war criminal but in his insistence he needed more information to comment. As a rightly exasperated Sen. Rubio said, the information about Putin’s campaign of death is in the public domain — it is not classified.

It is one thing for a national leader to be temperate, to refuse to surrender to the pressure of the moment, and to maintain an even keel in the face of intense questioning. It is quite another to abandon moral outrage and persist in not calling evil, whether committed by the governments of Russia, Saudi Arabia, the Philippines, or anywhere else, what it is. This latter characterized Mr. Tillerson’s responses to Sen. Rubio.

Volatility is not what America needs in the chief representative of her foreign policy. In this, the steady Mr. Tillerson acquitted himself well. But an unwillingness to characterize mass murder and thuggish aggression as the brutality and moral horror they are does not indicate prudence. Rather, it is a disturbing display of weakness.

Tillerson and Religious Persecution

Concerns about Mr. Tillerson’s potential conduct as our chief diplomat extend to the growing pattern of religious persecution in many corners of the world. Reading the just-issued 2017 Open Doors’ World Watch List, the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom’s Annual Report, or the State Department’s International Religious Freedom annual report gives one a sobering, arresting sense of the extent of religious persecution, much of it against Christians, throughout the world.

Defending the persecuted should be a cornerstone of American foreign policy, not only because of our nation’s founding conviction that one’s submission to God takes precedence over allegiance to the state, but because standing with those suffering for their religious beliefs is in our national interest.

As Georgetown University’s Dr. Thomas Farr, the first director of the State Department’s Office for International Religious Freedom, said recently, by upholding the right of all people to believe according to their consciences and live out their faiths freely, America fosters “stable self-governance, economic development, and the defeat of religion-based terror. If we act to rediscover those reasons ourselves, and overcome our contemporary skepticism about engaging religious ideas and actors in American diplomacy, we can avert the momentous consequences of rising religious persecution and declining global religious freedom.”

By fighting for the persecuted, America also lets them know they have a friend who cares about their dignity and liberty. This will bear great fruit over time. As many former prisoners of Cold War Communism have testified, understanding that Ronald Reagan and his team were raising their incarceration and treatment at the highest levels of their oppressive governments inspired them to carry on. And this brave allegiance to religious freedom created a loyalty to our country among the former prisoners and their fellow freedom-lovers that remains strong today.

As the eloquent closing comments of Sen. Rubio make, clear, the stakes could not be higher:

We can’t achieve moral clarity with rhetorical ambiguity … For those 1,400 people in jail in China, those dissidents in Cuba, the girls that want to drive and go to school (In Saudi Arabia), they look to the United States; they look to us, often to the Secretary of State … When they see the United States is not prepared to stand up … it demoralizes these people all over the world. And it leads people to conclude this, which is damaging and it hurt us during the Cold War and that is this: America cares about democracy and freedom as along as it is not being violated by someone that they need for something else. That cannot be who we are in the twenty-first century.

Mr. Tillerson has no background in standing against tyrants, brutes, and, yes, criminals like Vladimir Putin or Kim Jong-Il. At a time of rising international tension, America needs a Secretary of State who has a deft hand as well as a spine of steel. Dealing with dictators, cagey adversaries, and outright enemies is not like negotiating with a potential business partner. It is about standing firmly, sometimes stonily, for America’s national security and vital interests.

Our opponents appreciate resolve, strength, and courage, not sweet reason or a rather pathetic desire to be liked. The Obama foreign policy too often has been typified by a desperate eagerness for other countries to approve of us. The consequences — a newly emergent Russia, an emboldened China, a militaristic North Korea, and an uncertain NATO alliance — pose an increasingly imminent danger to the United States.

Donald Trump appreciates toughness, forthrightness, and candor. In his performance before the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, Rex Tillerson showed none of these. (For more from the author of “Rex Tillerson’s Moral Indecision” please click HERE)

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Why Obamacare’s ’20 Million’ Number Is Fake

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Liberals are notorious for caring about “groups” of people, but when it gets down to individual persons, not so much. You’re about to see this play out in spades as Democrats cry crocodile tears over the coming repeal of Obamacare.

You hear it over and over again: “This will be catastrophic for the 20 million people who were previously uninsured but now have coverage! You can’t take away their health care!”

First of all, no one is talking about doing that. Any repeal legislation will have a transition period for those who got coverage through Obamacare to move to new plans. And second, they will have more choices and better options. Win. Win.

But liberals would rather focus on quantity, how many millions we’ve given something to, versus quality, what does that “gift” mean for individual people.

The Obama administration claims 20 million more Americans today have health care due to Obamacare. The reality is that when you look at the actual net gains over the past two years since the program was fully implemented, the number is 14 million, and of that, 11.8 million (84 percent) were people given the “gift” of Medicaid.

And new research shows that even fewer people will be left without insurance after the repeal of Obamacare. Numbers are still being crunched, but between statistics released by the Congressional Budget Office and one of the infamous architects of Obamacare, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Jonathan Gruber, it’s estimated that anywhere from 2 to 7 million people now on Medicaid would have qualified for the program even without Obamacare.

That further discredits the administration’s claim of 20 million more Americans having health insurance because of Obamacare.

Multiple studies have also shown that even those who are uninsured often have better outcomes than those with Medicaid. A University of Virginia study found that for eight different surgical procedures, Medicaid patients were more likely to die than privately insured or uninsured patients. They were also more likely to suffer complications.

And it is important to note that this study focused on procedures done from 2003-2007, prior to the geniuses in Washington deciding it was a good idea to put even more people on the already overburdened Medicaid system.

Additionally, despite what proponents of the law promised, there is little evidence to show that the use of emergency rooms, which have a higher level of medical errors, has decreased due to Obamacare.

Then there is this reality: While Obamacare has handed out millions of new Medicaid cards, that does not mean the recipients now have quality health care. In fact, it doesn’t ensure they have health care at all. That’s because increasing numbers of doctors aren’t accepting Medicaid.

As a Louisiana woman told The New York Times, “My Medicaid card is useless for me right now. It’s a useless piece of plastic. I can’t find an orthopedic surgeon or a pain management doctor who will accept Medicaid.”

Keep that in mind every time liberal Democratic senators pull out the Kleenex boxes bemoaning the fact Republicans are the ones trying to take people’s health care away.

Speaking of which, a much underreported fact of Obamacare is how many truly needy and disabled Americans are NOT getting the services they need because of the expansion of Medicaid for able-bodied adults (aka healthy) of prime working age, 19-54.

So while the left talks about all the new people Obamacare is helping, it neglects to mention that over half a million disabled people, from those with developmental disabilities to traumatic brain injuries, are on waiting lists for care.

And many of them are on waiting lists because Obamacare gives states more money to enroll able-bodied adults than it does to take care of disabled children and adults who qualified for Medicaid prior to Obamacare.

If you think that doesn’t have a real-world perverse impact, note this. Since Arkansas expanded its Medicaid program under Obamacare, it’s rolls have grown by 25 percent. During that same time, 79 people on the Medicaid waiting list who suffered from developmental disabilities have died. I would encourage you to read my former Heritage Foundation colleague Chris Jacob’s full piece on this.

Finally, it’s not just those enrolled in Medicaid that are finding fewer health care provider options. For people who now have health plans through the Obamacare exchanges, new Heritage Foundation research shows that this year, in 70 percent of counties across the country, those consumers will have only one or two insurers to choose from.

Add to that the millions of people who lost the doctors and health plans they liked and are now paying higher premiums for less coverage, and you can see that quality health care and anything resembling “choice” has quickly disappeared for an increasing number of Americans due to Obamacare.

So the next time a defender of Obamacare tries to take the moral high ground about the millions of people the law has helped, ask them to define what “help” looks like. (For more from the author of “Why Obamacare’s ’20 Million’ Number Is Fake” please click HERE)

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How a Jeff Sessions Justice Department Can Change Course on Crime

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Alabama Sen. Jeff Sessions’ two-day marathon confirmation hearing left Americans with many takeaways—some on his many qualifications for the office of United States attorney general to which President-elect Donald Trump has nominated him, and others on the merit, or lack thereof, of his opposition.

In the weeks leading up to this hearing, opponents in Congress and the media grossly misrepresented Sessions’ record on several issues, including crime and criminal justice.

There were consistent themes throughout the testimonies at Sessions’ hearing that touch upon criminal justice issues and how the next attorney general might approach these matters differently from the current administration. These include support for law enforcement, respect for the rule of law, enforcement of immigrations laws, and punishing bad actors, not innocent third-parties, for white-collar crime.

Support for Law Enforcement

Sessions captured in his opening remarks the reality for law enforcement under President Barack Obama’s leadership:

[I]n the last several years, law enforcement as a whole has been unfairly maligned and blamed for the unacceptable actions of a few bad actors. They believe the political leadership of this country abandoned them.

Sessions showed concern for police deaths and a commitment to reducing them, noting that “last year, while under intense public criticism, the number of police officers killed in the line of duty increased 10 percent” from 2015. He said that “this must not continue.

Sessions’ supportive stance toward police is bolstered by the words of Chuck Canterbury, national president of the Fraternal Order of Police, who called Sessions “a true partner to law enforcement” whose record demonstrates his commitment to “officer safety.”

In particular, Sessions remarks on the importance of community policing, the building of trust between law enforcement officers and the communities they serve, and the need for law enforcement officers to protect all communities could signal a strong approach for addressing increased crime rates in certain cities, including Chicago.

Respect for the Rule of Law

Sessions also testified, as Heritage Foundation scholars have long observed, that “we have eroded respect for law and the whole constitutional structure where Congress makes the laws, not the executive branch.”

The Obama administration consistently took unilateral action to change the law—from refusing to defend the Defense of Marriage Act or enforce federal drug laws, to enforcing agency guidance documents (e.g. on private employment practices, or the sale of non-Affordable Care Act compliant health policies)—rather than the law as passed by Congress.

In a positive break from the Obama administration, Sessions noted that a guidance document is not an “amendment of the law” and that “department and agency attorneys don’t have the ability to rewrite the law to make it say what they would like it to say.”

Sessions consistently professed reverence for the Constitution and separation of powers, stating that regardless of whether he supported legislation as a senator, once he becomes attorney general he will ensure that the laws as passed by Congress are “properly and fairly enforced.”

As part of his pledge to “never have a political dispute turn into a criminal dispute,” Sessions vowed to recuse himself in any future investigations involving former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton.

Such clear respect for the rule of law would greatly reduce the partisan culture that has built up within the Justice Department under Obama.

Enforcing Immigration Laws

The topic of immigration also loomed large throughout the hearing, and here Sessions also showed dedication to the separation of powers and the rule of law. Heritage scholars have noted how the Obama administration wrongly claimed “that its authority to set priorities and exercise prosecutorial discretion allowed it to institute an amnesty scheme without congressional action, despite the laws against illegal immigration.”

Sessions was spot on when he stated that “this country has every right to deport persons who are here unlawfully; who violate our criminal laws … and they should indeed be promptly deported.”

“If you continue to go through a cycle of amnesty,” he went on, “you undermine respect for the law and you encourage more illegal immigration into America.” Sessions’ statements indicate that as attorney general, he will leave immigration and deportation policy as a matter for Congress to decide rather than trying to set immigration policy through the back door.

Cracking Down on White-Collar Crime

Sessions’ testimony indicated disagreement with the Obama Justice Department on the issue of white-collar crime, another area where the current Justice Department has occasionally pursued dubious enforcement policies.

Although Obama’s Justice Department promised to hold individual wrongdoers criminally accountable for white-collar crime, it would far more often hold the corporate entity accountable.

Heritage legal scholar Paul Larkin has explained how corporate criminal liability can be problematic. For starters, it is less efficient than tort liability to redress corporate wrongdoing, writes Larkin, and it is “unfair to innocent employees, retirees, and stockholders.” Imposing heavy fines and penalties on the corporate entity, after all, punishes those individuals for someone else’s misconduct.

At Sessions’ confirmation hearing, Sen. Mazie Hirono, D-Hawaii., asked Sessions whether he would continue investigations into white-collar crime and corporate wrongdoing and hold “individual corporate office holders” accountable for violating the law.

Sessions answered that “corporations are subject as an entity to fines and punishment for violating the law, and so are the corporate officers. And sometimes it seems to me … that the corporate officers who caused a problem should be subjected to more severe punishment than stockholders of the company who didn’t know anything about it.”

As Heritage scholars have written elsewhere, Sessions’ view is correct: “Just as ‘a corporation can only commit crimes through flesh-and-blood people,’ a criminal punishment, if it is to serve any special purpose not already accomplished by a civil fine, must inflict pain on one or more corporate directors, officers, or employees” who violated the law.

Sessions also pledged to seek transparency in the department’s distribution of settlement funds—funds the Obama administration occasionally abused in handouts to politically favored third-party organizations.

Despite opposition from some Democratic senators, it seems clear that Sessions will be confirmed. His hearing also made clear that on issues from civil rights to criminal sentencing, as Heritage legal scholar Hans A. von Spakovsky writes, “[e]xpect Jeff Sessions to ensure that the department is once again run on a professional, ethical, objective, and nonpolitical basis—one that respects the Constitution, the rule of law, and the best interests of justice.” (For more from the author of “How a Jeff Sessions Justice Department Can Change Course on Crime” please click HERE)

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Obama’s Strange Pattern of Concessions to Cuba’s Communists

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There seems to be something about Cuba’s military dictators that really fascinates our 44th president. Cuba was the first item President Barack Obama mentioned when he enumerated his foreign policy “achievements” in his farewell address; and with just a week to go, he has rushed anew to make concessions to the communists in Havana.

The concessions this time was to end what has been inelegantly known as “wet-foot, dry-foot.” This was a Clinton era amendment to LBJ’s 1966 Cuban Adjustment Act that allowed Cuban escapees who touched U.S. dry land to stay, but turned back to Havana those caught at sea.

Ending wet-foot, dry-foot doesn’t end the Adjustment Act, but it does renders it moot in most ways. The Act allows Cubans who have been in the U.S. for a year to receive permanent residency, while the Clinton amendment granted those who arrived through rafts or by crossing border a one-year temporary parole to wait for the Act to kick in.

Absent the one-year parole, it is harder for the special concession granted those who escaped from the communist island to kick in.

Wet-foot, dry-foot was ripe for reform. It was replete with perverse incentives. For example, it enticed thousands of Cubans to take to rafts to Central America, undertake a perilous journey through unstable countries, and then be smuggled across the U.S.-Mexico border.

Such is the desire to leave Castro’s “Socialist Paradise” that over 46,500 made across the Rio Grande in the last fiscal year, which ended September 30. A smaller number undertook a dangerous voyage across the shark-filled 95-mile Florida isthmus on rafts sometimes even made out mattresses.

But the blanket approach that Obama took, as well as his decision to once again deal in secret with Havana, most probably through his deputy national security advisor Ben Rhodes, a Svengali-like figure at the White House, once again disappoints.

The fact of the matter is that the 85-year-old dictator Raul Castro knew more about this policy change just as it was about to be announced that members of Congress or of Obama’s own State Department.

Obama also terminated the Cuban Medical Professional Parole Program, which allowed Cuban doctors sent overseas to apply for U.S. asylum in these third countries. Havana exploits its doctors and nurses, sending them abroad so the communist government can collect convertible currency on their behalf, a practice that has long been deplored.

But Castro hated it, because it gave his doctors a chance at freedom, so Obama obliged him. And that’s the thing about Obama: his apparent desire to please the octogenarian American-hater in Havana is only matched by his obvious disregard for the Cuban people’s legitimate desire for freedom.

He seems to forget that they are trapped inside an authoritarian military dictatorship. In his announcement he once again said that “the future of Cuba should be in the hands of the Cuban people”—as if they lived in Ohio or the south of France.

There doesn’t seem to be any clear way that those persecuted for their political or religious beliefs can find a haven here.

Everything regarding Cuba that Obama announced not just Thursday but for the past two years can be rescinded come this Friday by President Donald Trump—along with much of the Obama legacy.

Sen. Marco Rubio of Florida, who poured scorn on Obama with his reaction to the announcement, made that clear by stating:

I had the opportunity to discuss this issue with Vice President-elect [Mike] Pence this evening, and I am heartened by the fact that in a week we will have a new administration committed to discarding the failed Cuba policy of the last two years.

(For more from the author of “Obama’s Strange Pattern of Concessions to Cuba’s Communists” please click HERE)

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See Where Fencing Has yet to Be Built along Mexico Border

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The U.S. government has built fencing along roughly one-third of the 1,933-mile southern border with Mexico.

The border state with the longest boundary—Texas, at about 1,241 miles—is covered by only 115 miles of fencing.

Data obtained by The Daily Signal shows there is plenty of space for President-elect Donald Trump to make good on his campaign promise to build a wall between the U.S. and Mexico.

But according to experts, physical barriers are only one component of border security, and Trump could encounter similar challenges to his predecessors in trying to construct a wall—or more likely, additional fencing—across complicated, unpredictable terrain.

170110_border-length-fence_v3

Trump and congressional Republicans say they could use a 2006 law signed by President George W. Bush called the Secure Fence Act that mandated a minimum of 700 miles of “physical barrier” on the southern border without specifying any particular location where fencing must be built.

The law was never fully implemented, and it did not set a deadline for the fencing to be built, meaning Trump could pick up where Bush left off.

The incoming administration just needs money from Congress to do it.

“We’re going to build a wall,” Trump reiterated in his first press conference as president-elect on Wednesday. “I don’t feel like waiting a year or a year and a half. We’re going to start building.”

According to Customs and Border Protection, an agency of the Department of Homeland Security, there is currently about 654 miles of fencing along the border. Christiana Coleman, a spokeswoman for Customs and Border Protection, told The Daily Signal 36 miles of that fencing is double-layered and 14 miles have three layers.

Coleman said the fencing consists of roughly 350 miles of single-layer pedestrian fences, most which stand about 18 feet, and 300 miles of low-level vehicle barriers that can be easily bypassed by pedestrians. The fencing is not continuous. The last segment of the fencing was built in 2014, she said.

170110_fencing-levels

The government is obligated by statute to reach the 700-mile floor, meaning it must still build nearly 50 additional miles of fencing at minimum.

A recent report by the Congressional Research Service stated that under the law, the government can build beyond the required 700 miles.

Trump has said that he would not seek to build a wall, or fencing, across the entirety of the nearly 2,000-mile border. He said he envisions the wall covering about half the border because of “natural barriers.”

Trump has estimated the cost of the wall to be from $8 billion to $12 billion. Other estimates have put the cost at $25 billion.

Coleman noted that challenging terrain and other considerations require alternative border security tools, such as “virtual fence” technology using towers, manned and unmanned aircraft, and surveillance sensors.

Building a wall or fence in Texas is especially difficult because U.S. citizens privately own about two-thirds of the border in the state, according to a Government Accountability Office report.

The government would have to purchase land from Texans to build on it.

During his confirmation hearing this week, John F. Kelly, a retired Marine Corps general who is Trump’s nominee to lead the Department of Homeland Security, emphasized these constraints, saying that “a physical barrier in and of itself will not do the job,” and added, “it has to be really a layered defense.” (For more from the author of “See Where Fencing Has yet to Be Built along Mexico Border” please click HERE)

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The False Narrative Of “Repeal and Replace” Is Preserving Obamacare

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What is the GOP plan to replace Obamacare? That is the question vexing all of the Republican beard strokers in Washington these days. But it is the wrong question to ask and it is built upon an erroneous premise. Along with false information about Senate procedures, it is contributing to the reluctance to repeal this disaster.

The real questions that should be on the GOP’s mind are: what is wrong with our health care system, how did Obamacare exacerbate all of its existing vices, and how we can roll back not just the Obama-era anti-market interventions, but reform even some destructive policies that existed prior to Obamacare?

The entire mantra of “repeal and replace” was flawed from day one because it accepted the Democrat premise that Obamacare actually served a semi-useful function, albeit with some glaring flaws, and therefore, must be replaced with something similar. It presupposes a solution without understanding the problem. It’s like the mindless calls for “immigration reform” and “criminal justice reform” without specifying what is wrong to begin with and which problem is being solved with the “reform.”

Health care reform is no different, although much more complex by its very nature.

Much like immigration reform, conservatives should absolutely have a contrasting plan on health care, but not because of Obamacare. Obamacare needs to be repealed, period. Not replaced. Conservatives should have been supporting true free market health care long before Obamacare. Rather than replacing Obamacare in pursuit of similar goals, the plan should be rooted in diametrically opposite premises, guiding principles, and goals.

The root problem with Obamacare

In pursuit of the utopian goal of universal coverage for every last American, liberals have created a living hell of unsustainable crushing costs for everyone. At its core, this is what government has been doing for decades with mandates, regulations, and subsidies. This has created a death spiral of government-induced rising costs, a need for subsidization, and a further self-fulfilling increase in prices in health care and health insurance due to the circuitous cycle of government market distortions. Obamacare merely took all of those liberal health care policies and stepped on the gas pedal, making the price of health care and insurance astronomically high, inducing a need for well over $1 trillion in combined federal and state subsidies and spending on health care overall.

To be clear, while the tax hikes, extra spending, and unconstitutional requirement to purchase insurance or for employers to offer health insurance are onerous, by far the worst elements of Obamacare are the actuarially insolvent insurance coverage regulations. Those regulations, most prominently guaranteed issue (must cover all pre-existing conditions, even if they never had any insurance) and community rating (charge everyone the same unsustainable price), have driven the cost of insurance into a death spiral. The second worst elements are the massive subsidies and the Medicaid expansion, which not only drive up the government’s budget in order to cover the self-inflicted high costs, but indirectly create an even greater inflationary pressure on consumer prices.

“Repeal and Replace” accepts the premise of that root problem

When Republicans refer to “repeal and replace” they really mean bait-and-switch because they are accepting the premise that we need to keep the pre-existing condition coverage mandates that are responsible for unsustainable costs along with refundable tax credits (which are subsidies in all but name only) in order to sustain the higher prices. Accordingly, when they say they are concerned we must not repeal Obamacare unless we have a replacement plan in place, they mean we must not repeal the coverage regulations until we have similar regulations in place. Likewise, they mean we must not repeal the subsidies until we have a pale-pastel version of the subsidies in place.

This entire approach is rooted in ignorance of free markets but also in a broken political barometer. Even though Republicans are in their strongest electoral position since the Civil War precisely because of the crushing Obamacare premiums, they still believe that on net they will somehow lose by repealing what they were asked to repeal. The loss of coverage and unaffordable costs are on Democrats, not Republicans. The number of people who would somehow lose coverage by getting rid of the mandates (remember, there was always guaranteed issue for those who already had some form of insurance beforehand) and would not be eligible for any other program is very small relative to the number of those who would see relief and the benefit to the broader market.

As for the subsidies and Medicaid expansion, everyone already agrees that we would have a two-year transition to give us plenty of time to lower costs both through repeal of the insurance mandates and through further free market reforms. But that decline in prices will never be actualized if Republicans don’t use budget reconciliation to get rid of the insurance regulations, particularly guaranteed issue and community rating. With the wide perception that Republicans repealed Obamacare, they will get blamed from premiums not decreasing as promised because the media and the public will not realize that the insurance regulations remained in place.

Affordable health care: repeal, reform, and restore

The central goal of any conservative health care plan, on the other hand, should be reducing market costs of health care and health insurance, not expanding access or universal coverage as an ends to itself. The essential guiding principle of achieving that goal is eliminating as many of the government regulations and interventions that have driven up the costs of health care. Simultaneously, reform must foster as much opportunity for flexibility, portability, personal responsibility for individuals; innovation, and competition in the market place for health insurance, as well as fixing anti-market forces on the supply side of health care itself. The end result will not be utopia. Rather, it will provide the largest array of choices at the lowest costs for the broadest number of people — the best outcome we can ever aim for.

The primary focus of conservative health care reform should therefore be centered on countermanding those odious price-hiking regulations and interventions, while keeping government spending on health care to as little as politically feasible.

The absolute worst thing for Republicans to do is to maintain the pre-existing condition mandate, in effect, “replacing Obamacare with Obamacare.” This is what makes insurance so costly for everyone.

Instead, Republicans should be focused on reforming the entire system and restoring the free market. Republicans should work on lowering the costs for those who want to purchase insurance on their own, and that will help expand coverage. Also, equal tax treatment for the individual and employment markets, eliminating the anti-trust exemption for insurance, coupled with expanded HSAs and breaking down cross-state insurance barriers, will make insurance portable, affordable, and foster more options and competition. It will further incentivize healthy consumers to take responsibility for their own health insurance, shop wisely, not over utilize and distort pricing, which in itself will reduce the inflationary pressure and create numerous cheaper options for a variety of coverage plans. This will limit the scope of the pre-existing condition problem and shore up more funds to deal with the minimized scope of the problem.

Coupled with numerous supply side fixes, such as tort reform, breaking down onerous FDA regulations on drugs and devices, cutting regulations on telemedicine and scope of practice for health care extenders, updating rules on medical accreditation, allowing doctors to write off the cost of indigent care, and giving hospitals authority to turn away illegal immigrants with non-urgent care will go a long way in reducing the actual cost of health care. This, in turn, will take pressure off the need for third and fourth party payer and help restore insurance to its original purpose.

Rather than a death spiral of self-fulfilling price hikes and bankrupting subsidies, restoring the free market will create a self-fulfilling momentum of price decreases, efficiency, portability, and personal responsibility.

However, each one of these ideas needs to be ironed out and passed through regular order. Unlike Democrats, we don’t believe in throwing in 10 disparate ideas into one bill. In the meantime, Obamacare — with its core regulations — can and must be repealed immediately. If Republicans truly understood health care, they would see that is the only viable option on the table. (For more from the author of “The False Narrative Of “Repeal and Replace” Is Preserving Obamacare” please click HERE)

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HILARIOUS: Pencil-Neck, Anti-Gun Leftists Want To “Stop the Peaceful Transition of Power” Tweet

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This story is really better suited as an SNL short than an actual news article. Oh, and I have a protip for these, errr, activists, below the fold.

#DisruptJ20 organizer Legba Carrefour said Thursday that #DisruptJ20 members were “not in favor of the peaceful transition of power.”

The left-wing protest organization, #DisruptJ20, met Thursday to announce its intentions and plans to obstruct the presidential inauguration of Donald Trump on January 20. The group’s website reads: “We call on all people of good conscience to join in disrupting the ceremonies. If Trump is to be inaugurated at all, let it happen behind closed doors, showing the true face of the security state Trump will preside over.”

“We need to stop the peaceful transition of power,” Carrefour said at a press conference at St. Stephen’s Church in Washington, DC. “We need to stop this kind of fascist government from coming to power.”

Carrefour also rejected the calls of Democratic leaders to calm the anti-Trump protests.

“You saw Democratic luminaries from Obama to Hillary Clinton say, ‘Tamp this down, please stop this. The peaceful transition of power is of the upmost importance to the core element of democracy.’”

Fellow #DisruptJ20 organizer Lacy MacAuley backed up Carrefour, saying: “We absolutely are opposed to the transition” of power to Trump.

My advice?

Bring guns. Bring lots of guns.

Oh wait, you idiots believe that guns shouldn’t exist. Like, you can get in a time machine and, say, un-invent them.

So without guns, I guess the transition to President Trump will indeed be peaceful. Orderly.

And you schmucks will be very, very docile.

Guessing here: the only weapon you have to use on regular Americans is your breath, which probably smells of farts and elderberries — best case. (For more from the author of “HILARIOUS: Pencil-Neck, Anti-Gun Leftists Want To “Stop the Peaceful Transition of Power” Tweet” please click HERE)

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Some Constructive Criticism for Jeff Sessions

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The confirmation hearing of Sen. Jeff Sessions, R-Ala. (C, 78%) earlier this week is the perfect occasion to discuss something we conservatives must be better at.

We almost always set aside the level of self-assessment and introspection necessary to achieve political victory, if the opportunity to rip on progressives distracts us like a cat infatuated with a spool of yarn. Sure, go ahead and have a little fun at their expense every now and then. I’ve been known to indulge myself a time or two, so who am I to judge? But if we’re not careful, we’ll descend into self-deception that amounts to little more than “four legs good, two legs bad” trolling.

Like when Sessions was hazed during his hearings by Code Pink protestors dressed up as members of the Ku Klux Klan, it was right and just to point out the Left’s undying penchant for Trump-electing self-destruction.

Or when MTV News writer Ira Madison III mocked Sessions’ Asian-American grandchildren by calling them “props,” and telling Sessions to “return this Asian baby to the Toys ‘R’ Us you stole her from.” You bet it was a moral imperative to demonstrate how modern-day progressives are Sith-level bigots.

However, when in the midst of defending your guy he wets the bed a bit, it requires a clean-up of your own mess. Otherwise, you will come to learn the hard way that it ain’t no fun when the rabbit’s got the gun.

While there was no end to our hot pursuit of Sessions’ enemies both during and after the confirmation hearing, I saw almost no discussion of merit about his own need to heal thyself on a matter of moral certainty. When confronted during his confirmation hearing on the merits of Roe v. Wade, Sessions went a wee bit wobbly. And that might actually be giving the prospective attorney general — who is also one of the best cabinet appointments Donald Trump has made for conservatives — the benefit of the doubt.

Sessions said that while he believed Roe v. Wade violated the Constitution, he went on to say that “it is the law of the land…and I would respect it and follow it.”

Now, I am on record as saying that Sessions was a strong pick to undo the damage done to our rule of law by the Holder/Lynch cabal. Yet in this instance the best case scenario is he missed a grand opportunity here. At worst, he has forsaken the very rule of law he’s long been known to champion.

For how on earth can the actual law of the land — the Constitution — be violated and yet the violation itself can somehow still be raised to the level of holy writ? To point out the fallacy here is not pedantic nor a distinction without a difference. If the Constitution is indeed the law of the land, then that which violates it by very definition illegal.

As in “forbidden by law or statute” according to the dictionary definition of the term. And since judges neither have the power to make laws or sign statutes into law, their opinions cannot unto themselves have the force of law. Let alone the power to become an unelected and permanent constitutional convention. Able to amend the Constitution on a whim outside the will of the people, whenever the new tolerance which tolerates no dissent demands.

This is the very progressive scam which the Holders and Lynches of the world have foisted upon us, so that they may impose their Leftists fantasies by fiat rather than risk rejection by the voters at the ballot box. In other words, this is anathema to the very rule of law we’re expecting Sessions to protect and defend as attorney general.

Now, maybe Sessions was just rope-a-doping or doing his best Rahab-the-harlot impression. As in smile and wave during the dog and pony show. Or living to fight another day by simply telling the lynch mob what it wants to hear at the time. All the while you’ve already aligned yourself with the righteous side, which will be revealed at the opportune time.

I could be convinced of that on some level. But clearly there must be some middle ground somewhere between taking a bullet to the face, and regurgitating our opponent’s statist talking points on the world’s biggest stage? If there is no clever rhetorical sleight of hand for such an occasion, then that is yet another failure of our movement to prepare our champions for such a time as this.

Besides, hasn’t Trump himself shown there is an audience for throwing out red meat to drive progressives and the media (but I repeat myself) bonkers by destroying their most cherished flawed premises?

Here’s hoping that going forward Attorney General Sessions will prove respecting and following that which violates the Constitution, like he says of Roe v. Wade, doesn’t mean what the Left thinks it means. (For more from the author of “Some Constructive Criticism for Jeff Sessions” please click HERE)

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