In the GOP’s ongoing establishment vs. grassroots saga, chalk one up for the establishment.
Since Mitt Romney’s loss, the Rand Paul wing of the party has been on the ascendency. But libertarians hit a roadblock Friday as the Republican National Committee opted at its spring meeting to keep in place a host of rules rammed through by the Romney campaign at last year’s national convention.
The move represents at least a small setback to Rand Paul’s 2016 hopes, potentially making it more difficult for him or another candidate with strong grassroots support to pick up delegates. Had the rules been in effect last year — they were adopted after Mitt Romney secured the nomination — the former Massachusetts governor would likely have wrapped up the nomination much earlier and avoided the drawn-out warfare that weakened him heading into the general election against Barack Obama.
One plank that was maintained, for example, allows more states to award delegates on a winner-take-all basis, instead of proportionally. An attempt to overturn another rule that bounds a state delegation to support whoever won a statewide vote received only 49 votes; 107 committee members voted to keep it in place.
The vote followed a heated debate. Paul backers argued that the Romney rules favor big-money candidates at the expense of contenders with devoted followings among activists.
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.png00Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2013-04-13 02:52:282013-04-13 02:52:28GOP Establishment Keeps RNC Rules Rammed Through by Romney Campaign Last Year
Students in some Albany High School English classes were asked to participate in the unthinkable this week as part of a persuasive writing assignment. The objective? Prove why Jews are evil and convince the teacher of their loyalty to the Third Reich in five paragraphs or less.
“You must argue that Jews are evil, and use solid rationale from government propaganda to convince me of your loyalty to the Third Reich!” read the description on the assignment, which the school superintendent said reflects the kind of sophisticated writing expected of students under the new Common Core standards and was meant to hone students’ persuasive argument abilities.
The TimesUnion reports that students were asked to digest Nazi propaganda material, then imagine that their teacher was an SS officer who needed to be persuaded of their loyalty by arguing that Jews are the root of all the world’s ills.
“I would apologize to our families,” Albany Superintendent Marguerite Vanden Wyngaard said. “I don’t believe there was malice or intent to cause any insensitivities to our families of Jewish faith.”
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.png00Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2013-04-13 02:25:232013-04-13 02:25:23Students Asked to 'Argue that Jews are Evil' and Prove Nazi Loyalty in Assignment Linked to Common Core
As you have read here before, illegal aliens are streaming into Texas like no time since 1986 – trying to get in on the Obama-Schumer-McCain-Rubio amnesty for 20 million (and counting) illegal aliens. And DHS’ own data of a massive increase in border crossings are making a mockery of claims that “the border is secure” by everyone from Obama to Napolitano to Schumer…
Ranchers in South Texas – already under siege by violent cartels – are bearing much of the brunt of the tens of thousands of new arrivals.
Linda Vickers, who owns a ranch in Brooks County, which is Ground Zero for the immigration debate, pins the blame directly on talk of ‘amnesty’ and a ‘path to citizenship’ for people who entered the U.S. illegally.
She recalls one man being arrested on her ranch not long ago:
The Border Patrol agent was loading one man up, and he told the officer in Spanish, “Obama’s gonna let me go.”
Border Patrol agents report that immigrants are crossing the border, and in some cases surrendering while asking, “Where do I go for my amnesty?”
When you have amnesty waving in the wind, you’re going to get an increase.
A federal bankruptcy judge denied American Airlines’ plan to give its CEO a $20 million severance package, saying bankruptcy law prevents such rich “golden parachutes.”
But the airline says it will continue to push for CEO Tom Horton to get the payoff. And the judge left the door open to reconsider the request in future, or for the company to approve the windfall for Horton once its merger with US Airways (LCC, Fortune 500) is complete.
Horton is losing his CEO position when American and US Airways merge, which is expected to take place later this year. US Airways CEO Doug Parker, who pushed for the deal that Horton initially opposed, will get the corner office instead, although Horton will hold the position as non-executive chairman for a year.
Horton became CEO the day American parent AMR (AAMRQ, Fortune 500) filed for bankruptcy in November 2011, having served as president of the Dallas-based airline before then.
The $20 million payday, which would be half in cash and half in stock in the new merged airline, was opposed by the bankruptcy court trustee, who is appointed to protect the interests of creditors in the case.
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.png00Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2013-04-13 02:08:332013-04-13 02:08:33Judge Denies American Airlines' CEO's $20M Severance – For Now
This story seems to have managed to stay in the local NY media until now.
According to a report from Albany Watch, Despite concerns from local officials and residents that the Remington Arms plant in the Mohawk Valley could close or move because of New York’s tough gun-control law, the company is actually looking to expand its existing plant, the Associated Press reported, citing local media reports.
Local lawmakers apparently talked to Remington about its $20 million expansion. The company has received $5.5 million in state incentives over the past five years.
NY Congressman Richard Hanna released the following statement on his website:
UTICA, N.Y. – U.S. Representative Richard Hanna today announced that Remington Arms has been awarded a nearly $80 million contract to produce more than 5,000 sniper rifles for the U.S. military. The work will be done in Ilion by Mohawk Valley employees.
The federal contract comes from the Special Operations Command (USSOCOM), a division of the U.S. Department of Defense. The contract will be awarded over the course of 10 years.
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.png00Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2013-04-13 01:59:362013-04-13 01:59:36Remington Opts to Stay in New York and Expand Operations After Getting $80m Gov't Contract
The words are written in crayon, in the haphazard bumpiness of a child’s scrawl.
“I am willing to give up some of my constitutional rights in order to be safer or more secure.”
They’re the words that Florida father Aaron Harvey was stunned to find his fourth-grade son had written, after a lesson in school about the Constitution.
Harvey’s son attends Cedar Hills Elementary in Jacksonville, Fla. Back in January, a local attorney came in to teach the students about the Bill of Rights. But after the attorney left, fourth-grade teacher Cheryl Sabb dictated the sentence to part of the class and had them copy it down, he said.
The paper sat unnoticed in Harvey’s son’s backpack for several months until last week, when his son’s mother almost threw it away. The words caught her eye in the trash, and she showed it to Harvey, who said he was at a loss for words. He asked his son, who said Sabb had spoken the sentence out loud and told them to write it down. Harvey said he asked some of his son’s classmates and got a similar answer.
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.png00Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2013-04-13 01:50:182013-04-13 01:50:18Teacher Tells Fourth Graders to Write, 'I am Willing to Give up Some of my Constitutional Rights…to be Safer'
President Barack Obama has asked a mother whose 6-year-old son was killed in the Newtown, Connecticut massacre to deliver his weekly radio address, an unusual move expected to turn up the pressure on Congress to pass tougher gun control laws.
Francine Wheeler, whose son Ben was one of the 26 people killed by a gunman at an elementary school on December 14, will deliver the Saturday radio address, White House spokesman Jay Carney said.
Obama brought families of the Newtown victims to Washington on Air Force One on Monday, and they have been meeting with senators to urge them to support new laws that, among other measures, would require more background checks for gun sales.
“He believes their voices and resolve have been critical to the continued progress we’ve seen in the Senate,” Carney said.
Vice President Joe Biden has occasionally delivered the weekly address, but the short message to Americans is traditionally given by the president himself.
Last night, Wisconsin Congressman and former vice presidential candidate Paul Ryan energized pro-life advocates with a rousing speech against abortion that provided hope for ending the travesty someday.
In his speech at the Susan B. Anthony List gala, Ryan urged pro-lifers to be active in the battle to change hearts and minds — setting up political change down the road.
“Here’s my thinking: We need to articulate a vision — one that can attract a broad coalition,” Ryan said. “To advance the pro-life cause, we need to work with people who consider themselves pro-choice — because our task isn’t to purge our ranks. It’s to grow them.”
He urged pro-life advocates to never abandon the cause of life or accept and political truce on the issue of abortion and protecting unborn children under law.
“Our critics say we should abandon our pro-life beliefs. But that would only demoralize our voters,” he told the audience. “It’s an odd strategy, I think: the cynical ploy followed by the thumping defeat. Besides, you’re proving the critics wrong. You’re helping pro-life leaders win races across the country. You’re showing that “what convinces is conviction,” he will say.
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.png00Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2013-04-13 01:00:502013-04-13 01:00:50Paul Ryan Energizes Pro-Life Advocates with Speech Against Abortion
With no debate, the Republican National Committee voted unanimously here Friday to reiterate the party’s opposition to gay marriage.
The push from social conservatives came after last month’s “autopsy” report called for more GOP outreach to gays and said the party must change its tone on the issue to appeal to younger voters.
Some party leaders were frustrated by the optics of passing such a resolution at a spring meeting in the heart of one of the country’s most gay-friendly enclaves, and there was a clear effort to avoid a public back-and-forth over the measure. The resolutions committee passed it during a private Wednesday session that was closed to the press.
The language of the resolution affirms the party’s “support for marriage as the union of one man and one woman” — a position that was already in the platform that passed at last August’s Republican convention.
A Wall Street Journal/NBC poll released earlier in the day found that 53 percent of registered voters now favor allowing gay and lesbian couples to marry, with 40 percent in opposition. The poll found that 54 percent of independents back gay marriage, but 66 percent of Republicans oppose it.
A combat battalion commander assigned to the 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault) at Fort Campbell, Kentucky, sent an email out to several dozen subordinate officers and senior noncommissioned officers describing conservatives as members of hate groups.
The senior officer, seen in the YouTube below, apparently decided that his ignorant soldiers needed some political indoctrination regarding the Army’s new values, as decreed by Obama.
Using the subject line of ‘Domestic Hate Groups,’ LTC Jack Rich warned his subordinate leaders that,
Many events have been taking place across the country – just want to ensure everyone is somewhat educated on some of the groups out there that do not share our Army Values.
When we see behaviors that are inconsistent with Army Values – don’t just walk by – do the right thing and address the concern before it becomes a problem.
In other words, this misguided Army ‘leader’ is telling his junior officers that they are to actively intervene with any of their troops that they suspect has ‘hateful’ beliefs.
Once identified, the hater presumably will be forced to recant such beliefs.
Sound familiar? Turn back the clock to the Cold War years and you might mistake LTC Rich with a political commissar, the Soviet ideological officer who guarded military units against “harmful” beliefs.
• members of the Christian right (like Focus on the Family’s former leader, James Dobson)
• anti-gay groups (those who oppose the “so-called homosexual agenda”)
• members of Patriot organizations (those “opposed to the ‘New World Order'”; those who believe that the “‘New World Order’ is imposing a global plan, called Agenda 21, to take away citizens’ property rights”; those who “believe that being well armed is a must”; those who fear “impending gun control or weapons confiscations, either by the government or international agencies”)
• anti-Muslim groups (those who “broadly defame Islam”; those who believe the “inherent danger to America posed by its Muslim-American community”, that Muslims are a “fifth column intent on undermining and eventually replacing American democracy and Western civilization with Islamic despotism”; those who “allege that Muslims are trying to subvert the rule of law by imposing on Americans their own Islamic legal system, Shariah law”)
• anti-illegal alien groups
Commissar Rich identifies the Family Research Council, American Family Association, United States Justice Foundation, Atlas Shrugs, Sharia Awareness Network, Bare Naked Islam, and many other organizations as hate groups.
Yes, the thought police have infected the U.S. Military. Never mind that troublesome First Amendment. Obama must be proud.
Here’s a video of Commissar Rich at a live fire exercise at Fort Campbell. Let’s pray he doesn’t make it beyond O-5:
https://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.png00Joe Millerhttps://joemiller.us/wp-content/uploads/logotext.pngJoe Miller2013-04-12 03:24:552013-04-12 03:24:55Declaration of War on American Values: Battalion Commander Tells Troops that Patriots, Christians belong to Hate Groups
A combat battalion commander assigned to the 101st Airborne Division (Air Assault) at Fort Campbell, Kentucky, sent an