Ben Carson Just Made a Major Announcement About VP

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Retired neurosurgeon Dr. Ben Carson left the door open on Tuesday to serving as vice president in a Trump administration.

Fox Business host Neil Cavuto, interviewing Carson from New Hampshire, pressed him on this issue as primary voters began casting ballots. The Republican hopeful recently settled for a fourth-place finish in the Iowa caucus and has polled at the bottom of the pack in the Granite State.

“Would you ever be open to a VP spot [with Trump]?” asked Cavuto, Mediaite reported.

“I would have to have major philosophical alignment with whoever it was. I would have to have guarantees that I could do some substantial things,” replied Carson. “I certainly would sit down and discuss it” . . .

“Rather than get into that, let’s say as long as there is significant philosophical alignment, I wouldn’t have any problem. … I’m aiming to really change this country in the same way that I came up with new ways to do very complex things that people have been trying to do for a long period of time. That’s what I want to do with this country,” said Carson. (Read more from “Ben Carson Just Made a Major Announcement About VP” HERE)

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Cruz Demonstrates Why Senators Hate Him: A Bad Thing?

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The biggest attack on Ted Cruz lodged by his detractors is that he is loathed inside Washington, especially in the Senate. One often hears this refrain from mainstream media: We understand you are looking for an anti-establishment figure, but this man is absolutely detested by everyone. There must be something legitimate to this universal hatred for Cruz.

In reality there is no enigma as to why Cruz is so hated. There is a quintessential example from yesterday that perfectly demonstrates why he is held in such low esteem by his colleagues. Judge for yourself whether this is a good thing or a bad thing.

Despite being embroiled in the heat of the most important weeks of this presidential campaign, Cruz sent word to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell that he was placing a hold on all State Department nominees until Obama comes clean on the Iran deal. Consequently, McConnell was obliged to block the unanimous consent request from Sen. Amy Klobuchar (D-MN) to confirm Obama’s choices for ambassadorships to Norway and Sweden. Cruz has placed a blockade on all State Department nominees and has been enforcing it throughout the past few months.

Now ask yourself this question: What do you think Sen. Klobuchar and her colleagues think of Ted Cruz?

We all know that every Republican runs as an intrepid conservative:

“I’m pro-life.”

“I’m for traditional marriage.”

“We need to secure the border.”

“Government is too large.”

“Isn’t the Iran deal terrible?”

These are the platitudes you will hear from every Republican. But with a belligerent Democrat Party that will fight to the death in defense of their positions on those issues, what good is it to “align” with the conservative side if you will not do what it takes to advance the cause?

Think of it this way: Is it possible for an intellectually conservative member to be liked by fellow senators? Of course. As long as he stays in the corner and keeps his conservatism to himself. He can even vote his conscience as long as it doesn’t alter the outcome. They might even allow him to hold some policy briefings and draft some white papers about reform conservatism. That is where the conservatism of most elected conservatives ends; but it’s where Ted Cruz’s begins. Cruz understood from day one that as a senator you are not just a vote but a voice for a cause and can use legitimate tools to leverage against harmful policies.

In the case of the Iran deal, Republicans passed the Corker-Cardin bill signing off on it and then declined to defund it in the budget bill. The only tool left in the Article I arsenal of Congress is to hold up confirmation of executive and judicial nominees. Unfortunately, the other senators refused to join Cruz in enforcing the blockade and extracting concessions from Obama after he violated the conditions of his own deal. And that’s the way they like it. Unlike Cruz, they want to be respected, smart, serious, and productive conservatives. “Productive” in the sense that their principles are never actually converted into action — at least not enough to derail liberal policies in a meaningful way.

A president doesn’t vote at all. A president is only a voice for a cause. Much like a senator has tools in his arsenal to protect the Constitution and play legislative hardball against the powers that be, a president can use his Article II leverage to defend the Constitution as well. A president’s personal views on the issues are meaningless if he is unwilling to play hardball using all legal channels to enact and defend his agenda.

There are those in the conservative intelligentsia who say they personally like Ted Cruz but desire a nominee who will push conservatism in a way that does not elicit such hatred from others in Washington. These people need to learn there is no such thing as lukewarm hell. Modern-day Democrats are not willing to compromise on anything. As such, the only way to move forward and restore our republic is with brute force, harnessing the power of the outside against the inside, not working with the insiders who got us into this mess in the first place.

Sadly, we’ve reached a point where congeniality works inversely with effectiveness. That is not the fault of Ted Cruz. It’s the fault of years of complacency from other conservatives who have legitimized anti-constitutional policies of the Democrat Party and emboldened them to take nothing less than a full loaf of bread. (For more from the author of “Cruz Demonstrates Why Senators Hate Him: A Bad Thing?” please click HERE)

Watch a recent interview with the author below:

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Supreme Court Just Brought Obama’s Big Plan to a Halt, He’s Going to Be Livid…

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President Barack Obama’s plan to impose strict new regulations on U.S. power plants hit a significant legal snag on Tuesday with a split decision by the nation’s highest court. According to news reports, the 5 to 4 U.S. Supreme Court ruling put up an immediate roadblock, blocking the implementation of carbon emission caps favored by the Obama administration.

As Fox News reported this week, Obama has defended his plan to slash power plant emissions by insisting it would help stave off the effects of global warming. Under his proposal, each state would be required to submit a proposal by this September to the Environmental Protection Agency, detailing how power plants located within its borders would cut carbon dioxide emissions by roughly 33 percent before 2030. (Read more from “Supreme Court Just Brought Obama’s Big Plan to a Halt, He’s Going to Be Livid…” HERE)

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Iranian-Backed Militia Seen With US Tank in Iraq [+video]

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Kata’ib Sayyid al Shuhada (KSS), an Iranian-backed Shia militia which operates in both Syria and Iraq, has been spotted using a US-made M1 Abrams tank in a recently released video. The video, which is a montage of different militias within the Popular Mobilization Units (PMU’s), a Shia-led collection of militias in Iraq, has been shared on several PMU social media outlets.

Around the 16 second mark of the video, a KSS flag can clearly be seen atop an Abrams. It is unclear exactly where the militia is located during this clip, but it is likely within Iraq’s central Salahadin province, where KSS has done a considerable amount of fighting against the Islamic State. It is also unclear when the footage was taken, however, the footage is likely recent since the montage was released two days ago. It is also likely the tank is from the Iraqi Army, as the militias operate with and alongside the Iraqi security forces.

KSS is not the first Shiite militia to publicize its use of an M1 Abrams. The Hezbollah Brigades, a US-designated foreign terrorist organization, showed an Abrams flying the Hezbollah Brigades flag earlier last year. Additionally, the group has also published two videos from Iraq’s Anbar province in which several US-made vehicles are used by its forces. [See LWJ report, Video shows Hezbollah Brigades convoy transporting American M1 tank, and Threat Matrix report, Hezbollah Brigades flaunts US equipment in Anbar operation.] (Read more from “Iranian-Backed Militia Seen With US Tank in Iraq” HERE)

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Major US City Now Bans ‘Founding Fathers’; UPDATE: City Walks It Back

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The city of San Diego is being charged with taking political correctness to “a whole new extreme” by banishing the phrase “Founding Fathers” from the vocabulary of city employees.

“This brings it to a new level, without question,” said Brad Dacus, the chief of Pacific Justice Institute, which raised questions about the issue with the city and is challenging its censorship.

“When you can’t utter the phrase ‘Founding Fathers’ without possibly losing your job and you work for government, that is a sad day for free speech,” he told WND.

In a letter to San Diego Mayor Kevin Faulconer, PJI Senior Staff Attorney Matthew B. McReynolds explained the city’s new “Visual and Correspondence Style Guidelines” held a number of novel demands for city employees . . .

“Many Americans, including city employees, will no doubt be surprised to learn that the city considers them biased for merely mentioning ordinary words and phrases like ‘the common man,’ ‘mankind,’ ‘manmade’ and ‘man up,’ to name a few of the manual’s parade of horribles,” McReynolds wrote. (Read more from “Major US City Now Bans ‘Founding Fathers'” HERE)

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UPDATE: City Walks Back its “Founding Fathers” Ban

By Bob Unruh. Officials in San Diego are walking back a directive in a new “Visual and Correspondence Style Guidelines” publication that had been issued to employees to not reference the “Founding Fathers.”
Read more at https://www.wnd.com/2016/02/u-s-city-walks-back-ban-on-founding-fathers/#QIpy5ry79dZXEB4Q.99

The instructions, as WND reported on Tuesday, warned against the use of “a number of words and phrases widely accepted in the English language,” according to a critic.

“Many Americans, including city employees, will no doubt be surprised to learn that the city considers them biased for merely mentioning ordinary words and phrases like ‘the common man,’ ‘mankind,’ ‘manmade’ and ‘man up,’ to name a few of the manual’s parade of horribles,” Matthew McReynolds, a staff attorney for Pacific Justice Institute, told city officials in a letter asking them to reverse their course.

They did a short time later, following WND’s report on the dispute.

“Suggesting that our Founding Fathers should be referred to as ‘Founders’ is political correctness run amuck. We are proud of our nation’s history and there is nothing wrong with referring to the Founding Fathers. Once the mayor became aware of this yesterday he directed the ‘Founders’ example to be removed from the document,” Matt Awbrey, the mayor’s chief of communications, told WND in an email. (Read more about the Founding Father’s controversy in San Diego HERE)

Read more at https://www.wnd.com/2016/02/u-s-city-walks-back-ban-on-founding-fathers/#QIpy5ry79dZXEB4Q.99

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Alaska Has a Bigger Problem Than Low Oil Prices

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As anyone who’s filled up their tank lately can attest, oil prices are down – way down. Inexpensive trips to the gas station may put a smile on the average driver’s face, but the ramifications are significant for economies dependent on oil. Few states are feeling this more acutely than Alaska. With oil prices and oil production in decline, the state lacks two-thirds of the revenue needed to cover this year’s $5.2 billion budget.

Unfortunately, Alaska Governor Bill Walker is proposing a quick-fix solution that could do long-term damage: the imposition of a state income tax. As analysis in An Inquiry into the Nature and Causes of the Wealth of States shows, adopting an income tax spells disaster. Each and every state (there are eleven in total) that introduced the income tax since 1960 has experienced decline across a broad array of metrics. In terms of population, all eleven states have declined in comparison to the remaining 39 states (West Virginia is the unenviable “leader” of this pack, with a relative population decline of a full 50%). In terms of state gross domestic product, all eleven states also declined as a share of the remaining 39 states (Michigan took a particularly precipitous plunge, with a relative fall in gross state product of 57%).

As my Wealth of States co-authors and I write: “The lesson is pretty basic – if you don’t currently have an income tax, do not adopt one.” No place should understand this better than Alaska, which in 1980 eliminated the state income tax for individuals. Under Governor Walker’s proposed plan, which would turn the clock back on more than 35 years of economic progress . . . (Read more from “Alaska Has a Bigger Problem Than Low Oil Prices” HERE)

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This Year’s Super Bowl: A Pro-Life Tipping Point?

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It is rare for the wise and powerful to admit that they are ignorant. But that is what the majority of Supreme Court justices did in Roe v. Wade, claiming that science offered no answer to the fundamental question of when human life began. Citing debates among biologists and physicians, the justices said that there had never been a consensus about the moral and legal status of unborn children. So the justices stepped in to fill this alleged gap with an invention of its own: a “right of privacy” spun from subtle inferences they found between the lines of the actual words in the Constitution.

From that legal fiction, they and subsequent majorities wove the seamless shroud of abortion on demand, in 50 states for nine months of pregnancy, and in practice, for any reason at all — among the laxest, most ethically vacuous abortion laws in the world, outside of Communist China.

But the veil of ignorance has been lifted. Forty years of advancing medical technology have answered the factual question, if it ever really existed: A human being is genetically distinct and explosively alive from the moment of conception. Its DNA is human, and it reproduces independently of its mother, upon whom it relies only for nutrients and protection. It meets every test that scientists regularly use for determining whether something is a) alive and b) human.

We can watch tiny unborn children move around and adjust themselves in the womb to get more comfortable. We know that they feel pain. Doctors can take them on as patients and perform subtle surgeries inside the womb. We have witnessed on ultrasounds something our ancestors never could have: unborn twins engaged in horseplay. And now thanks to Doritos, we have seen that unborn boys crave some of their dads’ tortilla chips.

I can’t tell you how delighted I was to see, in the middle of the Super Bowl, a snack-chip company buy one of the most expensive ad slots available on television to show us a goofy, glorious spectacle like this one:

Of course, abortion lobbyists reacted with outrage:

The misanthropes at NARAL were outraged for a reason. Doritos was calling them on the lie that butters their bread. How dare a maker of tortilla chips engage in “humanizing” human fetuses, which we all know are really… what, exactly? Clumps of cells? Parasites? Tadpoles?

Too many couples have taken those grainy ultrasounds and pasted them on their fridges and Facebook profiles for such crude lies to last much longer. But this year’s Super Bowl was the gift that kept on giving, because the NFL itself offered us another commercial with a clear pro-life message. This one wasn’t funny, but genuinely uplifting:

The message of this ad was straightforward and delightful: loving couples who watch their teams win the Superbowl take to bed and celebrate, and the result is … human life. These human lives, who are singing now in front of us on the television. And the invitation is clear, in the ad that ends with the slogan “Football Is Family”: Go ye therefore and do likewise.

Of course not everyone was inspired. Here’s a sampling of the blowback from people who don’t necessarily like being reminded where babies come from:

What these ads and other recent events tell me is that we’re winning. In fact, if we keep pushing forward, we are about to win. In the most recent Republican debate, every single candidate on stage was someone who takes a pro-life stance—from the insurgent voice of the GOP base, Ted Cruz, to the angry populist Donald Trump. In fact, the candidate whom the party establishment regards as most electable, Marco Rubio. took a brave and principled stand favoring protection for every unborn child, even those fathered in the appalling crime of rape — insisting that he would rather lose an election than be wrong about human life.

Keep in mind this is the same party which before Ronald Reagan was loudly neutral about abortion — an issue which party mandarins claimed put Reagan outside the American mainstream.

Where’s your mainstream flowing now? Popular music stars like Justin Bieber are outspokenly pro-life. On the hit show The Blacklist, the hard-bitten female FBI agent is agonizing over a pregnancy — over whether to raise the child or put it up for adoption. Pop films depicting the abortion issue honestly keep getting made and making money, from Bella to Knocked Up to Juno. People are plainly tired of pretending not to know the plainest facts of human life: We are woven inside our mothers, and alive from the beginning. Whether or not we were conceived after the Super Bowl, or craved our dad’s Doritos, we were us, real human beings, not protoplasm or euphemisms (such as the “products of conception”).

Even the tragic facts of the Planned Parenthood videos are leaking through the media’s shoddy filters: Before Congress and on TV, defenders of that organization are being forced to insist that their traffic in eyes and lungs and livers was technically legal. Just think how many Americans are hearing about that on the news and thinking: “Eyes, lungs, and livers? I thought they were blobs of tissue….” Those facts, which the Supreme Court didn’t want to hear and NARAL doesn’t want you to learn, will take on a life of their own. They’ll divide, and reproduce, and sooner than we expect they will emerge with an ear-splitting cry.

It’s the cry of life, for life, and no one will be able to silence it. (For more from the author of “This Year’s Super Bowl: A Pro-Life Tipping Point?” please click HERE)

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Obama Sends Congress Record $4.1T Budget Plan

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It didn’t take Republicans long to respond to President Obama’s record $4.1 trillion budget proposal – labeling it “a progressive manual for growing the federal government at the expense of hardworking Americans,” as House Speaker Paul Ryan put it.

The fiscal 2017 budget plan, Obama’s eighth and final spending blueprint, is being met with a dead-on-arrival mentality on Capitol Hill after it was released late Tuesday morning.

As the president proposes a raft of new taxes, though, he’s also looking to drive the debate on cybersecurity and other big issues. One of the largest items is a request for $19 billion to combat cyber threats, an increase of $5 billion from last time.

Cybersecurity funding is an issue that has won bipartisan support from lawmakers in the past, and the appeal for funds comes amid mounting threats from China, Russia and beyond. After meeting with his national security team and cybersecurity advisers, Obama told reporters one of the biggest gaps between the government and private sector is information technology “and it makes everyone’s security vulnerable.”

But Republicans described the overall plan as a bid to grow government even bigger. In all, Obama’s budget would increase taxes by $2.6 trillion over the coming decade, nearly double the $1.4 trillion in new taxes Obama sought and failed to achieve in last year’s budget. (Read more from “Obama Sends Congress Record $4.1T Budget Plan” HERE)

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Rubio: Babies Have ‘Right to Live Irrespective of Circumstances by Which They Were Conceived’ [+video]

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Clarifying his position against abortion even in cases of rape, GOP presidential candidate Marco Rubio told ABC This Week, “I believe a human being, an unborn child, has a right to live irrespective of the circumstances by which they were conceived.”

This Week host George Stephanopoulos asked Rubio about his lack of support for rape exceptions in abortion legislation, quoting Jeb Bush’s statement to CNN that, “It’s a tough sell to tell a pro-life mother that her daughter has been raped, that she would just have to accept that as a sad fact. This is not an easy decision. But Marco will have to explain that position.”

Rubio told Stephanopoulos, “Abortion to me is not a political issue, it’s a human rights issue. I have supported laws that have exceptions, the 20-week abortion ban.”

“I do require an exception for life of the mother because I’m pro-life,” Rubio continued. “If they pass a law in Congress that has exceptions, I’ll sign it because I want to save lives.”

“The broader point I’ve made, however, is I believe all human life is worthy of the protection of our laws,” said Rubio. “That’s what I deeply and personally believe. And I’m not going to change my position on something of — that is so deep in me in order to win an election.” (Read more from “Rubio: Babies Have ‘Right to Live Irrespective of Circumstances by Which They Were Conceived'” HERE)

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US Intelligence Chief: We Might Use the Internet of Things to Spy on You

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The US intelligence chief has acknowledged for the first time that agencies might use a new generation of smart household devices to increase their surveillance capabilities.

As increasing numbers of devices connect to the internet and to one another, the so-called internet of things promises consumers increased convenience – the remotely operated thermostat from Google-owned Nest is a leading example. But as home computing migrates away from the laptop, the tablet and the smartphone, experts warn that the security features on the coming wave of automobiles, dishwashers and alarm systems lag far behind.

In an appearance at a Washington thinktank last month, the director of the National Security Agency, Adm Michael Rogers, said that it was time to consider making the home devices “more defensible”, but did not address the opportunities that increased numbers and even categories of connected devices provide to his surveillance agency.

However, James Clapper, the US director of national intelligence, was more direct in testimony submitted to the Senate on Tuesday as part of an assessment of threats facing the United States. (Read more from “US Intelligence Chief: We Might Use the Internet of Things to Spy on You” HERE)

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