The TMI Election: We Know So Much About Both Candidates, so Why Are There Still So Many Undecided?

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As the world waits with bated breath to hear what Julian Assange, the founder of Wikileaks, may or may not have to say about Hillary Clinton’s emails, it’s a good idea to take a step back from October Surprise Fever and think about the wisdom of basing our political decisions on big, shocking revelations that might not even exist.

I get that secrets are exciting, but both Hillary Clinton and Donald Trump have been public figures for decades. They have enough public statements between them to fill a library. And they’ve both been angling for the job of president for what seems like forever. We know so much about both of their lives, more than we know about pretty much anyone besides our close friends and family. So the question is, what could possibly emerge at this late date that would change our opinion of either of these politicians?

Since Clinton is reportedly the subject of the leaks, let’s start with her. We know that Clinton spoke lightly about defending a rapist, we know that she is a habitual liar, not to mention her private email server and its contents. We know that a U.S. ambassador was killed on her watch as secretary of state, we know that her foundation has accepted millions in donations from foreign countries and big banks, the latter which she voted to bail out under TARP. We know that she has supported wars that have claimed a million lives. And we know that she wants to raise taxes, increase regulations, and further compromise our constitutional rights.

Is this not enough information? If all of the above is not enough to convince you that Hillary Clinton is unfit to be president, then what ever would be?

Trump is scarcely better. People are making hay about his tax returns, with the implication that the discovery of tax improprieties would somehow destroy his candidacy. But we already know things about Trump that are way worse than a little tax avoidance. In fact, there is a large portion of the GOP base (myself included) who regards keeping as much of your money from the government’s grasping hands as possible as more of a virtue than a vice. But even if you do frown on taking advantage of tax loopholes, would that revelation be more shocking than Trump’s public record?

We know that Trump has advocated killing the families of terrorists, that he regards immigrants broadly as rapists and murderers, that he has advocated shutting down portions of the internet, and that he thinks the proper role of the presidency is to bully individual companies over where they decide to build factories. We know that he has a short temper and is easily provoked. We know that he brags about taking advantage of crony subsidies at the expense of the taxpayer, and that he has tried to use eminent domain to force landowners off their property for his own benefit. We know that he habitually uses demeaning and offensive language towards women, and that personal insults are his rhetorical weapon of choice. We know that he has supported gun control and universal health care before claiming not to support those things. We know that he wants to strengthen libel laws, making it effectively illegal to criticize him. We know that, if elected, he would be fickle, capricious, and unpredictable, hardly desirable qualities in a commander in chief.

Come on, America. Stop pretending some October revelation is going to be a game changer. We know who these people are. We know their weaknesses and, to the extent they exist, their strengths. We have all the information we need to make an educated, well-informed vote. It may be an unattractive decision to have to make, but nothing Julian Assange or anyone else has to say is going to make it any easier. And hey, as much as the media may try to deny it, there are always third parties. (For more from the author of “The TMI Election: We Know So Much About Both Candidates, so Why Are There Still So Many Undecided?” please click HERE)

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We All Avoid Taxes

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Give Donald Trump credit for going big. When he wanted to declare a $915,729,293 loss on his 1995 tax returns, the software used by his accountant couldn’t accommodate anything higher than a seven-figure loss. The accountant had to add the first two digits, “91,” with a typewriter.

The improvisation gets to what is most noteworthy about Trump’s tax gambit, which is the sheer scale of it.

As reported by The New York Times from leaked Trump tax documents, the businessman declared the enormous loss to avoid paying federal income taxes in future years, perhaps for almost the next two decades. The report was quickly deemed a bombshell, but it didn’t reveal anything illegal or — besides the jaw-dropping number — even unusual.

The so-called net operating loss carryforward that Trump took advantage of is not an exotic loophole in the tax code. Many industrialized countries have similar provisions. In 2014, more than a million taxpayers declared net operating losses. The provision simply reflects that if you, say, lose $100,000 setting up a business and earn $50,000 the next year, it makes no sense for the government to tax the $50,000 as if it were the only part of the equation; the loss should be accounted for, too.

Whenever there is a story like this in the political news, liberals trot out the old chestnut from Supreme Court Justice Oliver Wendell Holmes Jr., “Taxes are what we pay for civilized society.” Never mind that civilized society existed on this continent long before the institution of the federal income tax as we know it in 1913. The rejoinder to those congratulating themselves on paying taxes is, Do you take deductions? Do you employ an accountant? Or, Do you pay taxes that you don’t technically owe?

Almost no one does the latter, of course, at least not intentionally. We all operate in keeping with another chestnut from another jurist, Judge Learned Hand. He wrote in a 1935 case: “Over and over again the Courts have said that there is nothing sinister in so arranging affairs as to keep taxes as low as possible. Everyone does it, rich and poor alike and all do right, for nobody owes any public duty to pay more than the law demands.”

Hillary Clinton may rend her garments over Trump’s minimization of his tax liability, yet the Clintons surely aren’t maximizing their own. As tax expert Ryan Ellis points out in a Forbes column, the Clintons realized a capital loss of $700,000 in 2015, which they can use to offset future capital gains.

The damage to Trump of the Times story is probably not his tax strategy. The candidate had all but admitted to it during the first debate, when he called avoiding taxes “smart.” Rather, the vulnerability for Trump is the fact — stated in black and white in his own filings — that he lost nearly a billion dollars by recklessly overextending himself in the 1990s. This will be thrown back at him every time he touts his business acumen. In other words, all the time.

Trump is also done no favors by his overzealous surrogates, Rudy Giuliani and Chris Christie. They were out on the Sunday shows calling him a “genius” for his tax avoidance. This is not only over-the-top (were “shrewd” and “canny” deemed insufficient descriptors?), it implies that there was some complex manipulation at work. It would have been much better to emphasize the pedestrian nature of Trump’s tax maneuver, rather than blowing it up into an unsurpassed triumph of a master at gaming the tax code.

If Trump had released his taxes or even some of them, he wouldn’t have been vulnerable to a leak that, coincidentally, hit the news as the campaign enters the homestretch. He has enough enemies that he could be certain that information about his taxes would get out, and there may be yet more to come. He teed up this October Surprise. (For more from the author of “We All Avoid Taxes” please click HERE)

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First Look at the Hillary 2024 Campaign Poster

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It would appear that the lack of excitement among Democrats (and the nominee’s insults of both Democrats and Republicans alike) has led to a reset by her advisers.

After eight years of President Trump (and what about my proposed campaign slogan of America needs a Trump Card?), no matter what the increasingly skewed polling results say, Hillary’s campaign is doomed. With that said, word on the street is that she wants to run again.

By that time, of course, the bloated catlady’s failing body won’t be around for the campaign (in spite of all the “yoga”), so what better way to keep her plugging away than this?

161001-hillary-brain2

(For more from the author of “First Look at the Hillary 2024 Campaign Poster” please click HERE)

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An American Horror Story: Vignettes From Hillary’s First Hundred Days

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On Friday, January 20, 2017, a woman with time-worn features raises her right hand on the steps of the U.S. Capitol. She places her left hand flat on a book of law as she stands in front of Supreme Court Chief Justice John Roberts and takes the oath of the Presidency. Roberts’ presence chafes her. She’d voted against his nomination, considering him too conservative to fit her radical views on judicial interpretation. Today, though, she’ll overlook it. Vindication proves curative enough for past ills.

The years as First Lady, her time as the Democratic Senator from New York, and later, as Secretary of State — they have all culminated here, in the office of which she’d been in steely-eyed pursuit of for so long. She had survived the Benghazi debacle, and the classified email leaks. The puerile public had even overlooked those phones smashed with hammers. She’d finally crushed the noxious right-wing conspiracy that had hounded her every move. She would gut the system from the inside out just as she’d promised Saul Alinsky she would.

There was only the fight, and she’d won. He’d have been proud.

In rural Ohio a few weeks later on a day of waning winter, Susan Frazier and her husband Tom sit anxiously in front of a family counselor at the faith-based Agape Adoption agency. Unable to conceive, they have waited three years to adopt an infant. But with a heavy sigh, the counselor explains that the baby promised to them will instead go to a lesbian couple in Columbus. When asked why, she says that a recent law prohibits the agency from exhibiting a preference for married couples over LGBTQ individuals seeking adoption. Seeing the pain on both of their faces, she reveals that threatened with impossible fines and so many children needing homes, they felt pressured to comply despite their religious beliefs. Religion, the counselor reminds them, is no longer good for anything but church.

The next day, Susan and Tom flip on the news. An image of Chicago O’Hare flickers on the screen. The airport’s glass wall gapes like a wound, smoke spiraling heavenward. Bodies draped with white sheets lay in rows on the concrete. Susan grabs Tom’s hand. Two Syrian refugees with ties to ISIS have driven a construction vehicle through a barrier, into the main terminal and opened fire with AK 47s. In a display of force, the President quickly announces she has temporarily suspended the Second Amendment right to keep and carry a firearm. Not only will all gun sales be immediately suspended, the Democratic Congress has also approved her order for a federal weapon registry. Failure to register any and all firearms with the federal government will result in confiscation and forfeiture of the firearm(s) and any property or assets related to the transporting or housing of those firearm(s).

Susan and Tom look at each other, unsettled by the idea of “suspending” a constitutional right. Tom’s hunting rifle is used only to put venison on the table in winter. But this was a special circumstance, right? Susan reaches for a stack of mail during the commercial break, and an envelope catches her eye. It’s a tax liability statement from the Internal Revenue Service. They haven’t paid enough. Her confusion bleeds to anger as she shoves the statement toward her husband. Didn’t this President promise them lower taxes?

On the television, the President is now shaking hands with Xi Jinping, the Communist leader of the People’s Republic of China. With practiced ease, she promises the press corps that under her administration, trivialities like human rights won’t interfere with more important issues like global warming. She says nothing of the imprisonments and executions ordered by the smiling Chinese dictator standing to her left. But she is keen to apologize for America’s previous hostility toward communism.

Tom Frazier is deployed the next week. An Army air defense artillery officer, he is on his way to Aleppo to fight a war he does not understand and never seems to end. His command at Wright-Patterson Air Force Base has been subjected to hours of training on transgender sensitivity and “white privilege,” but no instruction on code of conduct or law of land warfare. When he finally boards the plane for the 14-hour flight to Syria he feels acutely unprepared to fight a hidden enemy. His seat mate remarks with acid in his voice that this President doesn’t know when to quit. She is, he reminds Tom, the one who sends people in but doesn’t bring them home.

Within a few months of the President’s taking the oath, Paul Watford — an appellate judge from the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals and former clerk to far-left Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg — is confirmed for the U.S. Supreme Court. Within a matter of weeks, he essentially codifies the president’s gun grab by ruling with the majority in nullifying the Second Amendment right to carry a fire arm. Shortly thereafter, he denies a church’s Equal Protection claim.

The President calls a press conference, praising both decisions as the none-too-soon death knell of conservatism. She explains that in particular, religion has been given “special treatment” for too long. In matters of Equal Protection and Free Exercise, churches have used religious freedom as code for discrimination, intolerance, racism, sexism, homophobia, Islamophobia and Christian supremacy for too long. The President promises that religious freedom will no longer be used to deny others equality.

Susan flips off the radio in her car. She touches the cross around her neck and ignores the rising knot in her throat.

The Ohio leaves return to green. Susan is still without her husband, and she’s received no promise of his return. Today, she flips the towel she’s using for the dishes over her shoulder, and clicks on the television, where the President sits at her desk in the Oval Office, pen mid-signature, flanked by Senator Elizabeth Warren and Planned Parenthood president Cecile Richards. This is a common sight, Susan thinks, this President and her many bills. The trio of well-dressed women exchange beaming smiles and congratulatory hugs. The President has signed the Freedom of Choice Act, a bill that legalizes abortion-on-demand, while simultaneously repealing the Hyde Amendment prohibiting federal funding for abortion. All taxpayers will now be forced into partnership with Planned Parenthood, the nation’s largest abortion provider. The towel falls from Susan’s shoulder. She realizes that the baby for which she so desperately longs is now simply another woman’s temporary mistake. A mistake she is being forced to pay for.

Susan is gnawed by a growing regret as she remembers the snaking lines at the polling place last year. She remembers driving by, muttering that some people were just too consumed with politics. She recalls the campaign signs and the heated rhetoric and the televised debates. She remembers trying to ignore it all, trusting it would work out. That she was just one person, and even without her vote, it would all work out.

Wouldn’t it? (For more from the author of “An American Horror Story: Vignettes From Hillary’s First Hundred Days” please click HERE)

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3 Ways to Use the Vice Presidential Debate to Talk About Religious Liberty

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Since both candidates in Tuesday night’s vice presidential debate have a record when it comes to religious liberty, you can bet the topic will come up—giving you the opportunity to talk with the people in your life about a deeply important issue.

Unsurprisingly, religious liberty is a tricky topic to navigate because it’s personal. People feel strongly about the ability to live life as they want, but some betray the concept of tolerance by crying “intolerant!” if others want to live life through the lens of their faith.

So, how do you talk about religious liberty with someone who thinks the government can force people to violate their beliefs? Here are some guidelines that allow you to tread lightly and expertly discuss the issue without fear and trembling.

Common Ground

We’ve talked in the past about how common ground is disarming, and we’re going to make that case again.

Liberals frequently cry “intolerant!” when conservatives start to talk about religious liberty. Don’t let them.

Though it’s become a dirty word, tolerance is important—we should be able to disagree with each other and then live side-by-side in peace. Tolerance doesn’t mean defeat, but it does require kindness and respect from both parties.

Acknowledging the common ground of tolerance creates a safe space to examine, discuss, and disagree. And addressing the elephant in the room—“we disagree on this issue, but it’s ok. I’ll maybe kinda sorta still like you when this is over. Now let’s talk about it”—frees you up to make your case and rightly frames your motivation.

The liberal on the other side of the conversation can’t claim you’re intolerant if you just said you believe we should be able to disagree, discuss, and then live in peace side-by-side.

Goodbye, argument of intolerance. Hello, civil discussion.

Examples

Unfortunately, there are numerous examples of folks trying to run businesses, practice medicine, or simply move up the corporate ladder but have been punished for not wanting to violate their beliefs.

Here is the latest from The Daily Signal on the Oregon bakers who refused to bake a wedding cake for a same-sex ceremony in January 2013. Nearly four years later, the bakery is closed and the case is still moving through the court system (think of those hefty legal bills).

This article explains why a 70-year-old florist is facing seven figures in legal fees for refusing to make flower arrangements for a same-sex wedding.

Illinois signed into law a bill that forces doctors to tell their patients about the benefits of abortion and refer them to abortion providers, even if the doctor is pro-life.

These are powerful examples to use when arguing for religious liberty. Not only do you have plenty to choose from, but the person you’re talking to will more quickly recognize the person you’re defending.

Words

Be inclusive. Don’t point fingers. Go on offense, not defense.

When you talk about religious liberty, you’re not only making a case for your beliefs, but also for the beliefs of those you disagree with. If you’re going to argue for tolerance, that means both sides are able to live and let live. So come at this conversation with an attitude of “I care deeply about my beliefs, but also about yours.”

Words and phrases like “tolerance,” “live and let live,” and “no one should be forced by government” go a long way in illustrating what we have in common despite party affiliation—that this country was founded so that people could live free from burdensome government interference.

Here’s hoping you’re able to make a case for religious liberty that emphasizes its importance for both sides. Religious liberty doesn’t just protect those who identify as “religious,” it also benefits those that don’t. It’s an argument for all, and that’s an easy argument to make. (For more from the author of “3 Ways to Use the Vice Presidential Debate to Talk About Religious Liberty” please click HERE)

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This Refugee Bill Could Win Republicans the Election … If They Cared to Pass It

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House Speaker Paul Ryan, R-Wisc. (F, 53%) has made it clear that if voters reelect his party, he will promote jailbreak legislation, the biggest priority of George Soros. Imagine if his party would instead run on protecting the security and sovereignty of the people by returning to the states the power over refugee resettlement?

Now, Rep. Scott Perry, R-Pa. (C, 76%) has a bill to do just that. Sadly, his bill — a reflection of amazing policy and a winning political strategy — is not as much of a priority as George Soros and creating a permanent Democratic majority.

Perry’s bill, similar to a plan I outlined in Stolen Sovereignty, would require that states affirmatively sign off on refugee resettlement proposals before the federal government and private [taxpayer-funded] refugee resettlement contractors can seed their communities with refugees. Under this legislation, the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) would have to first submit a plan to the relevant state legislature that includes all of the information concerning costs, criminal history, and health records of prospective refugees. They would also have to provide information regarding said refugee’s affiliation with any Muslim Brotherhood group named as an unindicted co-conspirator in the Holy Land Foundation case. Most importantly, any plan for resettlement must be ratified by the state legislature and signed by the governor, otherwise no refugees can be settled in that state.

While immigration in general is a national policy and was designed to be dealt with at a federal level, as I explain in chapter eight of Stolen Sovereignty, refugee resettlement is different:

In some respect, refugee resettlement is a more destructive form of social transformation for local communities than any other form of immigration. Unlike other categories of immigration, refugees by definition do not go through the organic process of becoming immigrants. They are brought over and resettled, often in large numbers concentrated in specific localities, with no acclimation to American culture or the ability to support themselves. Despite the plethora of resettlement assistance programs run by the State Department, HHS’s Office of Refugee Resettlement, and taxpayer-funded NGOs, most refugees wind up on the full array of welfare programs. Most important, they strain the public services and public education of the local jurisdictions that are forced to accept them.

Thus, communities are transformed in a matter of a few years (just look at Minneapolis), all at the behest of international officials, unelected State Department, and HHS bureaucrats, and parasitic contractors that have everything to gain and nothing to lose by endangering the communities and saddling them with a fiscal burden. The states and the taxpayers have no say in the matter.

As Congressman Perry said in a press release:

Instead of appeasing international organizations like the United Nations, however, this Administration should spend more time listening to the justifiable concerns of our state governments when it comes to refugee resettlement. At a time when political candidates are talking more and more about transparency, states and local communities are told simply to accept refugees from some pretty dangerous places – with no information about financial ramifications or assurances that these refugees have been properly vetted or vaccinated. Our communities are sick and tired of being dictated to from Washington and this legislation reflects that.

As we’ve noted before, the original law was never designed to function this way, but now it has placed this most pernicious form of social transformation without representation on autopilot. States were supposed to have input at every stage of the process, but unfortunately there is no hard-trigger written into law to grant states a veto power. While courts are granting refugee contractors standing to sue for more refugees, states are denied standing to sue President Obama for violating the advanced consultation clause of the Refugee Act.

No legal body in this country — from Congress to state legislatures — would approve the resettlement of tens of thousands of Somali refugees if they had to affirmatively approve it today. Unfortunately, in the most grotesque violation of the social contract and consent-based citizenship, the most radical forms of cultural transformation are in the hands of unelected entities. Scott Perry’s bill would right this ship and empower the people.

Perry is right to be upset from his vantage point. Pennsylvania has been seeded with 3,200 refugees this year, one of the highest per capita. Relatively small cities like Harrisburg and Lancaster have been flooded with Somalis, Syrians, Bhutanese, Congolese, and Iraqis. Would even a small minority of the people in these cities support such a transformation if they had a say in their future? And this is just from one year, Obama plans to bring in another 110,000 beginning in October. Thanks to the GOP budget capitulation, this resentment is signed, sealed, and delivered.

Individual conservatives who are caught in the tortured trap between Democrats, Trump’s antics, and the perfidious party leadership would be wise to run on Perry’s state empowerment bill. It fuses together a major national security issue that has captured the attention of the public with the principles of federalism and state and popular sovereignty. If the Left thinks turning middle America into the Middle East is so popular, why not let the states decide? (For more from the author of “This Refugee Bill Could Win Republicans the Election … If They Cared to Pass It” please click HERE)

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5 Things That Prove This Was the Most 2016 Week Ever

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On March 11, 2016 the asteroid 2016 EF195 passed within satellite distance of Earth. The asteroid was “twice as big as the asteroid” that crashed in Russia in 2013. Having avoided the sweet meteor of death, the United States has had to endure the 2016 election without a celestial savior. A 2016 without SMOD has blown past the absurd. This week was no different. Here are five things that prove this was the most 2016 week ever.

1. Candidate suggests you look at porn.

It is pretty safe to say that this week marked the first time a major party presidential candidate suggested that Americans watch a specific piece of porn, or porn in general for that matter. Donald Trump did not disappoint. Here’s his tweet.

This would be absurd in a normal election year. Alas, in 2016 it is more of the same.

2. A former governor cannot name ONE foreign leader.

I once chided unserious candidate Evan McMullin for saying former New Mexico Governor Gary Johnson was an unserious candidate. Well, I may need to find a recipe for grilled crow, because Johnson once again proved how unserious he is this week. When asked to name a foreign leader, Johnson went blank. Here, watch:

3. The FBI director said Hillary Clinton wasn’t given special treatment.

With a straight face, and a touch of anger, FBI Director James Comey bristled at suggestions that the special treatment his agency gave to Hillary Clinton was, in fact, special. Politico has the report.

‘You can call us wrong, but don’t call us weasels. We are not weasels,’ Comey declared Wednesday at a House Judiciary Committee hearing. ‘We are honest people and … whether or not you agree with the result, this was done the way you want it to be done.’

The normally stoic FBI chief grew emotional and emphatic as he rejected claims from Republican lawmakers that the FBI was essentially in the tank for Clinton when it recommended that neither she nor any of her aides be prosecuted in connection with the presence of classified information on Clinton’s private email server. He acknowledged he has ‘no patience’ for such allegations.

‘I knew there were going to be all kinds of rocks thrown, but this organization and the people who did this are honest, independent people. We do not carry water for one side or the other. That’s hard for people to see because so much of our country, we see things through sides,’ Comey said. ‘We are not on anybody’s side.’

Not quite sure Comey will be able to “weasel” his way out of this one anytime soon.

4. Trump cites internet polls to say he won the debate.

For most of the summer, the daily, almost patented Trump poll tweets all but disappeared. After the debate, Trump tweeted the poll tweet to end all Trump poll tweets. You see, he used the completely unscientific results of internet polling to say he won the debate. It doesn’t matter if it is true, Trump just needs it to be true.

President Ron Paul could not be reached to offer his opinion on internet polling. But the Fox News senior leadership was available, and they told their on-air hosts that online polls “do not meet our editorial standards.”

5. We are about to find out what happens when the last exchange health insurer turns out the lights.

Some of the absurdity of 2016 has real world consequences. Insurers in at least two state marketplaces have decided to leave the Obamacare exchanges. This furthers a trend that began earlier this year. Their main reason for their leaving is that Congress has not appropriated money to pay them for the losses they have endured being in the exchange. Obamacare was designed with a built-in yearly bail out. Not only did Democrats set out to fine you for not buying the insurance industry’s products, they also gave the insurance companies a yearly bailout.

Sensing a problem, the Obama administration is deciding to spend money not appropriated for the payments to pay off these insurers. You may be wondering how that can be, when the Constitution gives Congress, and only Congress, the right to approve spending. The Washington Post explains.

Justice Department officials have privately told several health plans suing over the unpaid money that they are eager to negotiate a broad settlement, which could end up offering payments to about 175 health plans selling coverage on ACA marketplaces, according to insurance executives and lawyers familiar with the talks.

The payments most likely would draw from an obscure Treasury Department fund intended to cover federal legal claims, the executives and lawyers said. This approach would get around a recent congressional ban on the use of Health and Human Services money to pay the insurers.

The start of negotiations came amid an exodus of health plans from the insurance exchanges that are at the heart of the law. More than 10 million Americans have gained coverage through the marketplaces since they opened in 2014.

Those are just five stories that confirm this past week was the most 2016 week ever. Chances are next week will ratchet up the stakes and take the prize.

Despair not, valued reader, for there are at least 80 asteroids within the Moon’s orbit projected to pass Earth between now and the election. Perhaps one of these will be the SMOD you are hoping for. Oh, and Tom Brady is returning to the New England Patriots after tomorrow’s game against the Bills. Perhaps he can save this year yet. (For more from the author of “5 Things That Prove This Was the Most 2016 Week Ever” please click HERE)

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The Left Is Fascist. Its War on Free Speech Proves That.

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LifeSiteNews has reported on the most recent effort by leftist elites to silence free speech. To mark the festive, traditional French holiday, the “Global Day of Action for Access to Safe and Legal Abortion,” France’s minister for “Families, Childhood and Women’s Rights” Laurence Rossignol

unveiled plans to criminalize those [web]sites that aim to dissuade women from obtaining a “voluntary interruption of pregnancy,” a procedure that is 100 percent state-funded in France during the first 12 weeks of gestation. Offenders will incur prison sentences of up to two years and fines up to 30,000 euro (about $33,650) when the plan becomes law.

Arrested for “Maligning Islam”

It isn’t just Frenchmen who want to save babies from abortionists who are feeling the leftist cork stuffed into the mouths. It’s also Austrian women who want to protect themselves from sexually aggressive and violent Muslim colonists. As The Daily Caller reports:

When the migrant crisis transformed ordinary life in Austria, Elisabeth Sabaditsch-Wolff — a self-described housewife in Austria — held innocuous citizen seminars teaching about Islam. An aspiring young journalist secretly taped her remarks, leading to Sabaditsch-Wolff’s prosecution for impugning Islam. [emphasis added]

Here’s an sample of the “hate speech” which landed Sabaditsch-Wolff in court, drawn from her recent remarks in Dallas:

For the past nine months Austria and the rest of Western Europe have undergone a profound transformation, one that will inevitably change the face of Europe permanently. I refer, of course, to the migration crisis, which began in earnest last summer, and is continuing as I speak to you. As the weather warms up and spring gives way to summer, we may expect the crisis to intensify even further. More than a million immigrants arrived in Austria and Germany via the “Balkan route” last year, and at least as many are expected to come this year — probably significantly more.

These migrants are generally referred to by our political leaders and the media as “refugees,” but this is hardly the case. Not only are most of them from countries where there is no war to flee from, but they are also overwhelmingly young Muslim men, of fighting age. In other words, the current crisis is actually an instance of Islamic hijra, or migration into infidel lands to advance the cause of Islam. The hijra goes hand in hand with jihad — once enough Muslim migrants have settled in the target country, violent jihad can begin.

Does that sound like incitement to violence to you? Doesn’t matter. We’re way, way past arguments about shouting “Fire!” in a crowded theater. This is more like outlawing fire extinguishers because they might be offensive to arsonists. The left wants to make it impossible even to express any dissent to its increasingly unhinged program of social transformation.

The Left No Longer Even Pretends to Value Freedom

That’s the only possible explanation for a law like New York City’s, which forces employers to use made-up transgender pronouns like “ze” and “hir” or face “civil penalties up to $125,000 for violations, and up to $250,000 for violations that are the result of willful, wanton, or malicious conduct,” according to the Washington Post.

Progressives around the world are dropping the pretense that they care about freedom of speech, expression, or association. You will hear academics in humanities departments — as I did, while finishing my Ph.D. in English lit — denounce ideas such as “pluralism” and “free debate” as the tools of the “privileged” to keep their hold on power. Such “bourgeois” relics of a bygone era must be unmasked and discarded, in favor of paternalist efforts by institutions to aggressively reshape the beliefs of students and citizens. You know, along the lines that Hillary Clinton had in mind, when in 2015 she claimed that women’s reproductive rights required that Christians be brainwashed into favoring abortion. Or as she put it, according to LifeNews:

“Far too many women are still denied critical access to reproductive health care and safe childbirth. All the laws we’ve passed don’t count for much if they’re not enforced,” Clinton said, using the euphemism for abortion.

“Rights have to exist in practice — not just on paper,” Clinton argued. “Laws have to be backed up with resources and political will. And deep-seated cultural codes, religious beliefs and structural biases have to be changed.”

Leftists rarely even talk about “freedom” anymore, except now and then in a ritualistic sense. Or else they take the word and turn it inside out, to mean its exact opposite — as when they promise to keep a college campus “free” of “offensive” speech that might serve as a “microaggression” that violates the “safe space” of their students.

Fighting Thoughtcrime on Campus

That was the pretext used by “Catholic” DePaul University to ban from campus the calm, rational conservative speaker Ben Shapiro — treating him as if he were some violent thug with a bullhorn shouting threats at passersby. Of course, violent thugs shouting threats at passersby are entirely welcome on campus, so long as they serve leftist causes that meet elite approval. So Black Lives Matter can terrorize passersby caught wearing Trump hats. While public outcry forced the University of Missouri to fire Melissa Click — a journalism professor who was filmed calling for “muscle” to terrorize student journalists — have no fear! The Jesuit-run Gonzaga University has honored Click’s sacrifice by stepping up and hiring her. The Jesuits, you will recall, are the religious order that vice-presidential candidate Tim Kaine volunteered to help, as they ran guns to Communist terrorists in Honduras from the totalitarian Sandinista regime in Nicaragua. At least we know the kind of government whose idea of freedom meets their approval.

Toss the Deplorables’ Heads Into a Basket

The best, most comprehensive look at the left’s war on personal freedom can be found in Angelo Codevilla’s recent essay, “After the Republic,” where he notes:

A commission in the Commonwealth of Massachusetts reported that even a church may be forced to operate its bathrooms according to gender self-identification because it “could be seen as a place of public accommodation if it holds a secular event, such as a spaghetti supper, that is open to the general public.” California came very close to mandating that Catholic schools admit homosexual and transgender students or close down. The Justice Department is studying how to prosecute on-line transactions such as vacation home rental site Airbnb, Inc., that fall afoul of its evolving anti-discrimination standards.

Codevilla unflinchingly pinpoints exactly why progressives are willing to toss Constitutional protections and individual rights onto the ash-heap. Progressives believe, and are increasingly willing to say, that

America’s constitutional republic had given the American people too much latitude to be who they are, that is: religiously and socially reactionary, ignorant, even pathological, barriers to Progress. Thankfully, an enlightened minority exists with the expertise and the duty to disperse the religious obscurantism, the hypocritical talk of piety, freedom, and equality, which excuses Americans’ racism, sexism, greed, and rape of the environment. As we progressives take up our proper responsibilities, Americans will no longer live politically according to their prejudices; they will be ruled administratively according to scientific knowledge.

Progressivism’s programs have changed over time. But its disdain for how other Americans live and think has remained fundamental. More than any commitment to principles, programs, or way of life, this is its paramount feature. The media reacted to Hillary Clinton’s remark that “half of Trump’s supporters could be put into a ‘basket of deplorables’” as if these sentiments were novel and peculiar to her. In fact, these are unremarkable restatements of our ruling class’s perennial creed.

(For more from the author of “The Left Is Fascist. Its War on Free Speech Proves That.” please click HERE)

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Sloppy Words, Sloppy Thoughts, and Modern Politics

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“All issues are political issues, and politics itself is a mass of lies, evasions, folly, hatred, and schizophrenia.” So wrote George Orwell seventy years ago in his still-timely essay, “Politics and the English Language.”

“When the general atmosphere is bad,” he went on, “language must suffer.” And so it has.

We discussed the essay in the recent All-School Seminar here at Wyoming Catholic College and so it was fresh in my mind as I watched Monday’s presidential debate.

In the essay, Orwell addressed two problems. The first is the downward spiral of sloppy writing and sloppy thinking reinforcing each other. The English language, he said, “becomes ugly and inaccurate because our thoughts are foolish, but the slovenliness of our language makes it easier for us to have foolish thoughts.”

His evidence for this includes:

Metaphors that have lost any evocative power. (Remember Al Gore’s eminently forgettable “Bridge to the future”?)

Hackneyed phrases snapped together like Legos to save the writer the trouble of thinking clearly and choosing appropriate nouns and verbs as in Hillary Clinton opening statement Monday night: “The central question in this election is really what kind of country we want to be and what kind of future we’ll build together.” No doubt.

Pretentious diction: words that “dress up simple statements and give an air of scientific impartiality to biased judgments.” As relentlessly partisan Washington Post columnist E. J. Dionne commented on the debate, “Trump has campaigned as a populist paladin of the working class. But the Trump that Clinton described was a plutocrat who walked away from debts and obligations to his own employees.”

Meaningless words. To those who can’t resist comparing Donald Trump to Adolph Hitler, Orwell wrote the year after World War II ended, “Fascism has now no meaning except in so far as it signifies ‘something not desirable.’”

“The attraction of this way of writing,” Orwell commented, “is that it’s easy.” And that is a perfect match for sloppy thinking, which is also easy.

Orwell didn’t stop with criticizing inept writing. His concern included those who use sloppy language to express sloppy ideas in order to deceive. “Things like the continuance of British rule in India, the Russian purges and deportations, the dropping of the atom bombs on Japan, can indeed be defended, but only by arguments which are too brutal for most people to face, and which do not square with the professed aims of the political parties. Thus political language has to consist largely of euphemism, question-begging, and sheer cloudy vagueness.” Again, refer to Monday’s “Debate of the Century.”

As Cherie Harder, president of The Trinity Forum recently commented on the essay, confusion in our language and thinking “in turn provides fertile ground for the growth of would-be strong men, who offer glib answers, easy scapegoats, and tough talk to reassure and make sense of the world for those muddled in their thinking. Orwell offers simple, straightforward suggestions for sharpening and refining one’s thinking and writing — and holds out hope that doing so makes possible a more free and flourishing society.”

That last part is critical we are not facing a lost cause. Orwell insisted that we can revive clear language and with it clear thinking if we set our minds to do it.

Don’t expect the politicians and talking heads to help. The change, if it comes at all, will come from us. To that end he included six questions and six rules for good, clear, thoughtful writing. Put off writing, he wrote, until you think the issue through. “Afterwards one can choose — not simply accept — the phrases that will best convey the meaning, and then switch round and decide what impressions one’s words are likely to make on another person.”

To put it another way, Orwell urged his readers to think and write deliberately while cutting through the weeds that obscure the meaning — or lack of meaning — in our political discourse.

As Cherie Harder notes, “In the midst of a presidential campaign characterized by hackneyed insults, obvious falsehoods, and invective, and against a popular entertainment culture that grabs eyeballs with violence and spectacle, a movement to cultivate precision, clarity, truth and beauty in our use of language would be truly counter-cultural — and wonderfully appealing.”

She and I both recommend Orwell’s essay as a good beginning and, while you can grab an online copy, if you order The Trinity Forum’s edition you get the added benefit of an introduction by columnist and scholar Peter Wehner.

Words and thoughts fell on hard times years ago. Those seeking to improve the state of our literary and intellectual life are, for the most part, Christians — the people devoted to both the Incarnate Word and the written Word. We can succeed, but it will take each of us doing our part. (For more from the author of “Sloppy Words, Sloppy Thoughts, and Modern Politics” please click HERE)

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No, Mainstream Media, Hillary Did Not Win the First Debate

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Immediately after the first presidential debate between Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton ended Monday night, liberal media pundits began gloating abuot how poorly Trump performed. Many Republicans piled on. I felt like we had watched two different debates.

Were they right? No.

Trump’s Higher Hurdle

Trump had to jump higher hurdles than Clinton to get a favorable report from the mainstream media, who favor Clinton and see the world the way she does. He faced other disadvantages.

The moderator, Lester Holt of NBC Nightly News, is being called “the third debater” by HeatStreet for his biased role. He asked six follow-up questions of Trump but none of Clinton. Holt asked Clinton nothing about her emails, Benghazi or the Clinton Foundation. Instead, he “grilled Trump on stop-and-frisk, the birther story, his comments about women, his many bankruptcies, why he hasn’t released his tax returns — and a host of other issues the media sees as unfriendly to the Republican candidate.”

Holt’s fact-checking follow-ups were directed at Trump, not Clinton. Todd Starnes, a contributor to The Stream, tweeted, “Lester Holt should’ve moderated — instead of auditioning to be Hillary’s press secretary.” (For other examples of the media’s unfair use of fact-checking against Trump, see The Washington Times‘ article “Eight examples where ‘fact-checking’ became opinion journalism.”)

Journalists evaluating the debate kept up the claim that Trump made many mistakes and false claims. Compared to Clinton, he is vulnerable to this criticism. Clinton is a lawyer, with years of experience nitpicking details, which showed when she got bogged down on details several times during the debate. In contrast, Trump is a creative innovator, who has focused on the big picture throughout his entire career.

Now, it is true that Trump made a few mistakes, but his misstatements were generally not material. One “error” some jumped on was his saying Clinton has “been fighting ISIS [her] entire adult life.”

Yes, ISIS began in 1999, when Clinton was 52. She hasn’t been fighting ISIS her entire adult life. But as a public figure, she has always been a strong supporter of aggressive military action against such groups. Trump exaggerated to make a point about her consistent support for military intervention. It’s called “hyperbole” and it’s a legitimate way of making a point. Nevertheless, some “fact-checkers” declared that Trump was wrong again.

Clinton Performed Even Worse

What the media is leaving out is that Clinton performed even worse than Trump. Equally missing is any praise for the clever things Trump said.

Stylistically, Clinton was a disaster. It may not be fair to judge candidates on this, but style does influence voters — remember the Nixon-Kennedy debate. She marched out in a glaringly bright red pantsuit, the type of outfit she is ridiculed for, since the harsh colors are unforgiving to her body shape. She reverted to her nasally, harsh “schoolmarm” voice throughout the length of the debate, perhaps to keep from coughing.

She came across as arrogant and condescending, unlikable, particularly when she gloated while boasting about her accomplishments. Since few voters know anything about her tenure as secretary of state other than the Benghazi terror attack and her email scandal, the bragging felt fake.

Trump cleverly interjected short comments while Clinton was speaking, refuting her. Even if a critic disagrees with him, the critic should credit him with an effective debating strategy. Of course, his critics complain that he only did that because she’s a woman — though if Clinton had done the same to him they would have been silent.

Professional political observers can argue about who did better in the debate. I think Trump did better than Clinton, but liberal journalists usually think Clinton did better than Trump. The real test is what effect the debates have on undecided voters, and that is something we won’t know for a long time. (For more from the author of “No, Mainstream Media, Hillary Did Not Win the First Debate” please click HERE)

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