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Eric Braverman, Missing Former Clinton Foundation CEO, Sighted — Kind Of

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The Silicon Valley Business Journal reported today that former Clinton Foundation CEO Eric Braverman will be joining the Eric and Wendy Schmidt Group, a left-wing philanthropic organization. As I covered previously, no one has been able to get in touch with Braverman since October, when an email released from Wikileaks revealed that John Podesta had named him as a mole within the foundation.

Eric and Wendy Schmidt provided a statement to the paper, which said in part, “As we look to increase our impact, Eric Braverman’s insight into growing solutions that work and his experience with leaders in government, philanthropy, and business will be central to our efforts.” Wendy also tweeted a welcome to Braverman announcing the hire.

Braverman did not respond to her over Twitter. He still has not tweeted since October.

Eric Schmidt is a former CEO of Google, where he came under fire for illegally conspiring with Apple, Intel, and Adobe to refuse to hire each others’ tech engineers in order to avert a salary war. Employees filed a class-action lawsuit and were awarded $415 million, to be paid by the four companies. Last year, Schmidt invested in Groundwork, an organization that worked on Hillary Clinton’s presidential campaign, spending $500,000 as of May 2016. Schmidt is considered the 100th wealthiest person in the world, and through his organization contributes millions of dollars to environmental causes.

If He’s Not Missing, Where Is He?

Based on this announcement, it appears likely that Braverman is not missing or in hiding. But based on the fact that he has yet to respond publicly, speculation continues that he’s been told by someone — like the FBI — not to make any public statements or speak to anyone in the press or on social media.

One possible reason is that he might be a witness in any charges brought against the Clintons, their foundation, or its employees. This would be true especially if he was the source of the Wikileaked documents that so embarrassed the Clintons, as Wikileaks’ Julian Assange has hinted.

There’s another possible explanation for his long silence: is he staying silent to embarrass conservatives investigating his disappearance? Some of the sites covering his absence have made sloppy claims that discredited them, such as claiming he’d never shown up for his teaching position at Yale when he’s been teaching there for a couple years.

The class Braverman teaches at Yale resumes on January 27. If he shows up. (For more from the author of “Eric Braverman, Missing Former Clinton Foundation CEO, Sighted — Kind Of” please click HERE)

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While America Was Watching Football, the FBI Dropped These 300 Clinton-Related Docs

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While the rest of America was preoccupied with the NFL Wildcard Playoffs and the Golden Globes ceremony Sunday evening, the FBI released another batch of Hillary Clinton documents, completely unannounced. The 300 items contained information regarding the federal investigation into the form Democratic presidential candidate’s private email server and her questionable handling of classified material.

Wikileaks was the first to announce the news via Twitter:

According to Wikileaks, the documents were released at 22:37 p.m. UTC on the Bureau’s Vault website, where it publishes information regarding Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) requests. Sunday marked the fifth of such Clinton document dumps on behalf of the FBI.

The Daily Caller’s Chuck Ross conducted a preliminary perusal of the 300 documents, many of which appear to be emails between State Department officials and federal law enforcement disputing whether certain emails sent over Clinton’s private server contained “classified” information.

From the Daily Caller:

In one April 27, 2015 email, an FBI official wrote to other officials that they were “about to get drug into an issue on classification” of Clinton’s emails. The official, whose name is redacted, said that the State Department was “forum shopping,” or seeking a favorable opinion on the classification issue by asking different officials to rate emails as unclassified.

The emails also appear to show that State Department officials made multiple special requests for the FBI to reduce its classification of certain emails found on Clinton’s.

More from the Daily Caller:

The FBI release also includes an email from the attorney of Bryan Pagliano, the Hillary Clinton State Department aide who set up and managed her secret email server. In the email, Mark MacDougall, Pagliano’s lawyer, informed the FBI that Pagliano would decline the bureau’s request for an investigation. Pagliano would eventually meet with the FBI in December, but only after receiving limited immunity from the Department of Justice.

Sunday’s low-profile email dump proves that the Hillary Clinton email saga is far from over, and that the FBI has some explaining to do. (For more from the author of “While America Was Watching Football, the FBI Dropped These 300 Clinton-Related Docs” please click HERE)

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The Most Baffling and Shameful Clinton Endorsement You’ll Read All Year

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In one of the most absurd media endorsement of recent years, the Guardian’s Nigerian edition has named 2016 Democratic presidential nominee as the “Person of the Year” for 2016. Have they really forgotten about her role in the rise of Boko Haram during her time at the U.S. State Department?

The paper’s write-up is just as dubious as the honor. Starting with the failed “Love trumps hate” slogan, the explanation quickly devolves into a praise-only, slathering, tongue bath devoid of any meaningful evaluation of the candidate’s numerous faults and failures. It references her “uncommon dignity” while making no reference to the fact that she referred to a sizable chunk of the American electorate as “a basket or deplorables” or had a complete meltdown in the middle of a public video conference address, which were just two examples of the uninspiring, poorly run campaign that lost the election to Donald Trump.

Conspicuously absent from — and most perplexing about — the POY title is that while it glances across Clinton’s tenure as secretary of state, it says nothing about what her apparent cronyism in office did to Nigeria and the entire Lake Chad region. (There were similar instances throughout the rest of the continent, too, but I’m trying to stay focused here.)

As pointed out elsewhere on the site, as what has become the deadliest terror group on earth — Boko Haram — rose to prominence in the African nation’s northern region, Clinton and her subordinates did little more than twiddle their thumbs while the Clinton political machine made bank in foreign donations.

A two-part, investigative report from World Magazine published in July delves into the political wrangling that surrounded the years-long delay of Boko Haram’s designation as a Foreign Terrorist Organization, even after the administration obtained intelligence indicating Boko Haram’s ties to al Qaeda. Meanwhile, Clinton Foundation donors and others in the then-cabinet secretary’s political circle financially benefitted by making off with hefty political donations:

The Clintons’ long association with top suspect tycoons — and their refusal to answer questions about those associations—takes on greater significance considering the dramatic rise of Boko Haram violence while Hillary Clinton was secretary of state. Did some Clinton donors stand to gain from the State Department not taking action against the Islamic terrorist group?

Perhaps the most prominent Nigerian with ties to the Clintons is Houston-based Kase Lawal. The founder of CAMAC Energy, an oil exploration and energy consortium, Lawal had a long history with Bill Clinton before becoming a “bundler” for Hillary’s 2008 presidential bid […]

Today the Houston oil exec — who retired in May as CEO but continues as chairman of the board of CAMAC, now called Erin Energy — tops the list of wealthiest Nigerians living in North America. His firm reports about $2.5 billion in annual revenue, making it one of the top private companies in the United States.

The delays even prompted a congressional probe into Clinton’s Nigeria ties in September.

After Clinton’s resignation from the foundation, many of the hostages may have come home, but Boko Haram is still operating in the jungles of the Lake Chad region. Terror attacks in the country have slowed since the bloody summer of 2015, but now the nation is staring down a jihadism-precipitated famine that threatens the lives of tens of thousands of children. In recent news, one of its leaders proclaimed in New Year’s Eve that “the battle is just beginning.”

The delays even prompted a congressional probe into Clinton’s Nigeria ties in September.

After Clinton’s resignation from the foundation, many of the hostages may have come home, but Boko Haram is still operating in the jungles of the Lake Chad region. Terror attacks in the country have slowed since the bloody summer of 2015, but now the nation is staring down a jihadism-precipitated famine that threatens the lives of tens of thousands of children. In recent news, one of its leaders proclaimed in New Year’s Eve that “the battle is just beginning.”

“[Clinton] ran a campaign of ideas for the future,” the Guardian piece reads. “But her opponent was and is a misogynist, a demagogue whose own ideas, to the extent that he had any, were warped, racist and downright insulting of our collective humanity.”

What about the humanity of those who have been blown to bits, kidnapped, displaced and starved by the terror organization she enabled? Not a drop of digital ‘ink’ to be found.

For any news outlet based out of Nigeria — even if it is an affiliate of a European daily (though it might explain the detachment from reality) — to laud Clinton so one-sidedly while ignoring her role in Nigeria’s dismal and oft-ignored situation is at best baffling, and at worst downright shameful. (For more from the author of “The Most Baffling and Shameful Clinton Endorsement You’ll Read All Year” please click HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

Christianophobia Cost Clinton the Campaign

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There’s no shortage of explanations for why Hillary Clinton lost to Donald Trump in November: the failure of Clinton’s own political machine, the actions of F.B.I. director James Comey, interference from Russia, and voter desire for a “change” from tiresome establishment politicians.

None of these tells the whole story. It took a combination of factors to bring about the greatest political upset since Harry S. Truman beat Thomas E. Dewey in 1948. But there’s one more factor that has been left mostly undiscussed: Christianophobia in the ranks of the Clinton campaign.

Inattention To Evangelicals Cost Her the Election

Much has justifiably been made of the fact that 81 percent of white evangelicals voted for Trump and only 16 percent voted for Clinton. In 2012 Romney won 78 percent of the white evangelical vote, while Obama won 21 percent of that vote. According to my calculations, if the same percentages of white evangelicals had voted Democrat and Republican in 2016 as they did in 2012, Clinton would have won Ohio, Michigan and Florida. (I was not able to find enough data to calculate what would have happened in Pennsylvania.). In other words, if Clinton had simply done no worse with white evangelicals in those states than Obama did in 2012, today she would be our president-elect.

Why then did she do so much worse with those voters than Obama did, despite their similar political positions on social and religious liberty issues? For one thing, she did not even take the time to ask for their vote — which is surprising, given that this group makes up about one fourth of the voting population. At least Barack Obama tried to court the white evangelical vote.

Voters notice these things. If a candidate is uninterested in you or what you have to say before an election, you can be sure she is not going to be interested afterward. White evangelicals had no reason to believe that Clinton respected either them or their issues of concern.

Why Did She Overlook Them? Christianophobia

It’s odd that a presidential candidate would ignore and dismiss such a large voting population as Clinton did. Why would she be so hesitant to treat white conservative Christians with respect? I believe that Christianophobia is the best explanation.

I have been studying Christianophobia — a highly intolerant form of antagonism toward Christians and Christianity — from the perspective of a sociologist for the past few years, and while I do not know if Clinton herself has Christianophobia, I am confident that many people in her political circle do. Those with this type of bigotry tend to be white, highly educated, politically progressive and wealthy — characteristics that are probably describe Clinton’s team.

Christianophobia Dehumanizes

Christianophobia dehumanizes Christians. In my academic research on this topic I encountered too many opinions from my respondents like, “I want them all to die in a fire” and “Would like to give them all a frontal lobotomy.” That kind of thinking represents a tendency not to see conservative Christians as fully human, and it’s one likely factor in Clinton’s choosing to ignore Christians.

Beyond this dehumanization, my research also uncovered a Christianophobic belief, held by many, that conservative Christians should not be allowed to participate in the public square. One respondent spoke for many by saying that “Christian Right people can do what they want in their churches and homes, but not in the public arena.” Couple that with other respondents’ opinions that Christians are irrational, bigoted, ignorant, childish, anti-science and backward thinking, and we have a strong case that people with Christianophobia want to keep conservative Christians locked out of serious political conversation.

From my research I think it’s safe to assume Clinton was surrounded by individuals who hold such beliefs about conservative Christians. It is little surprise, then, that she did almost nothing to court them. It’s easy to overlook those whom you think have nothing worthwhile to say. It’s also likely that Clinton and those around her did not want to be beholden to persons they considered so unworthy.

A Golden Opportunity, Missed

They missed a golden opportunity. This could have been an ideal time for Democrats to make inroads into the white evangelical vote. The Republican candidate was known for breaking up two marriages and having had numerous affairs. He demonstrated a lack of knowledge about the Christian faith (“Two Corinthians,” anyone?) and we had that video of him bragging about his exploits with women. Some Christians may not have liked Mitt Romney’s Mormonism, but no one questioned that he was a good moral man. This was a great chance for Democrats to play on Christian morality and win over a few white evangelical voters — they did not need many — to cinch the election.

But they blew it. I suspect the idea of appealing to white evangelicals was so distasteful to members of Clinton’s political team, they couldn’t bring themselves to take the necessary steps to get there. And thus it is that a thrice married, known adulterer with relatively little Bible knowledge received the largest percentage of the white evangelical vote in history. If Democrats and progressives do not want to hear “President Trump has been re-elected” four years from now, then perhaps they should recognize it’s time to purge the Christianophobic intolerance from among their leadership. (For more from the author of “Christianophobia Cost Clinton the Campaign” please click HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

Most of the ‘Faithless Electors’ Were Democrats Who Didn’t Vote for Clinton

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The “faithless elector” story took a surprising turn Monday when at least five Democratic members of the Electoral College did not vote for their party’s nominee, Hillary Clinton, surpassing the number of Republicans who did not back Donald Trump.

Clinton supporters had been hoping to get at least 37 Republican electors to defect and vote for the former secretary of state or at least someone other than Trump.

Trump surpassed the threshold of 270 Electoral College votes needed to secure the presidency Monday afternoon.

Four Democratic electors from Washington state and one from Maine broke ranks and did not vote for Clinton.

Reuters reported, “It appeared to be the largest number of electors not supporting their party’s nominee since 1872, when 63 Democratic electors did not vote for party nominee Horace Greeley, who had died after the election but before the Electoral College convened, according to Fairvote.org. Republican Ulysses S. Grant had won re-election in a landslide.”

Maine elector David Bright justified his vote for Vermont Sen. Bernie Sanders by saying he was not a Clinton elector but a Democratic one.

“I cast my vote for Bernie Sanders not out of spite, or malice, or anger, or as an act of civil disobedience. I mean no disrespect to our nominee. I cast my vote to represent thousands of Democratic Maine voters — many less than a third my age — who came into Maine politics for the first time this year because of Bernie Sanders,” he wrote in a statement.

The Seattle Times reported that only eight of the state’s 12 Democrat electors voted for Clinton. “In an act of symbolic protest, three electors voted for former Secretary of State Colin Powell, and one cast a vote for Faith Spotted Eagle, a Native American elder from South Dakota” involved in the Dakota Access pipeline protest, according to the news outlet.

According to TheBlaze, there were two other instances of faithless electors, in Minnesota and in Colorado, who refused to vote for Clinton, but due to state law they were replaced by alternates who did.

In Texas, two Republican electors broke ranks and did not vote for Trump. One chose Ohio Gov. John Kasich while another chose former Texas congressman and presidential candidate Ron Paul.

None the less, Texas was the state where Trump went over the 270 mark, with 36 casting their ballots for the GOP nominee.

The official Electoral College tally of all the states’ certified results will be completed by Congress in January when the body reconvenes. (For more from the author of “Most of the ‘Faithless Electors’ Were Democrats Who Didn’t Vote for Clinton” please click HERE)

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Wisconsin Recount Confirms Trump Victory, Increases His Margin over Clinton

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On Monday, Wisconsin’s vote recount ended any controversy surrounding President-elect Donald Trump’s victory in the traditionally blue state.

The Associated Press reported that Trump’s margin of victory actually increased in the recount, whose results were certified Monday.

The Republican nominee picked up an additional 162 votes in the state, according to the report. Trump earned approximately 22,000 more votes than Democrat opponent Hillary Clinton.

Green Party presidential nominee Jill Stein has been the driving force behind recount efforts, challenging vote totals in Wisconsin, Pennsylvania and Michigan. She has alleged that voting machines in those states are susceptible to fraud, with no evidence save for those states usually voting Democrat.

Stein raised enough money to initiate the recount in Wisconsin, though courts denied her efforts in Pennsylvania and Michigan.

In Pennsylvania, U.S. District Judge Paul Diamond said he rejected the Green Party’s lawsuit on numerous grounds. The state’s attorney general also opposed the effort.

Suspicion of a hacked Pennsylvania election “borders on the irrational,” Diamond wrote in his review of the case, while granting the Green Party’s recount bid could “ensure that no Pennsylvania vote counts” given Tuesday’s federal deadline to certify the vote for the Electoral College.

“Most importantly, there is no credible evidence that any ‘hack’ occurred, and compelling evidence that Pennsylvania’s voting system was not in any way compromised,” Diamond wrote.

He also pointed to the lawsuit’s lack of legitimate standing, calling the four-week delay in its filing “unexplained” and “highly prejudicial.”

Thus far, Wisconsin’s recount uncovered no widespread voter fraud or hacking. Stein has, however, raised almost $10 million, which is more than she was able to raise throughout her campaign.

Critics also have wondered where that money will go if not toward recount efforts. Some have even said the recount effort is equivalent to “burning money.”

Stein’s campaign doesn’t anticipate any leftover funds, though its website indicates that any extra funds will go toward “election integrity efforts.”

Usually, Federal Election Commission guidelines require campaigns to ask donors if they’re willing to have their donations transferred to another fund. Stein’s campaign may not have to do so since it initially specified that leftover funds will go toward those efforts.

Other critics said Stein’s calls for a recount were the result of a nudge from the Clinton campaign, but Stein’s website says Stein is not seeking the recounts to help Clinton. Rather, the site says, “These recounts are part of an election integrity movement to attempt to shine a light on just how untrustworthy the U.S. election system is.”

Her recounts, like the 27 that have preceded them since 2000, have thus far shown the opposite, as the final results changed just 0.06 percent. (For more from the author of “Wisconsin Recount Confirms Trump Victory, Increases His Margin over Clinton” please click HERE)

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Team Clinton Can’t Stop Whining, and It’s Getting Embarrassing

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When Barack Obama won the presidency in 2008, you didn’t see Republicans whining. Quite the contrary: They got to work and launched the Tea Party wave. Unsurprisingly, after spending the year insulated in their Brooklyn safe space, the Clinton team has perfected the art of whining since voters rebuked them in early November. They are blaming everyone and everything but themselves and their horrible candidate for their loss. It’s really starting to get embarrassing.

While it is hard to select just one whine as the whiniest, there seems to be a winner.

Drumroll, please …

And the award for whiniest Clinton team whine goes to … Jennifer Palmieri, communications director for Clinton’s campaign. You know the person most responsible — after Clinton herself — for the tone-deafness of the campaign.

Palmieri got into a verbal altercation with Trump campaign manager Kellyanne Conway last week at Harvard University. The disdain was palpable.

Palmieri started the fireworks by stating that she was “more proud of Hillary Clinton’s alt-‘Right’ speech than any other moment of the campaign.” This statement elicited an audible, “Wow” from Conway. It got more heated from there when Conway asked Palmieri to explain, “How exactly did we win?” after Palmieri said she would “rather lose” than “win the way you did.”

Conway got the better of the altercation.

Now Palmieri is taking another shot at Conway this time in a Washington Post op-ed. She pats herself on the back, with both hands, for “standing up” to Conway. Then goes off on a diatribe about how Clinton really won, and basically the Trump administration has no mandate.

But it’s also important for the winners of this campaign to think long and hard about the voters who rejected them. I haven’t seen much evidence of such introspection from the Trump side. That’s concerning.

She then says that Trump’s words hurt people. It is basically a rehash of their entire campaign. That Trump’s a mean bully who won’t be the president, even if he got elected. Because as Palmieri likes “to note, Clinton received more votes for president than any white man in U.S. history.”

You can just feel the condescension with those words. Of course, they are meaningless because Trump actually won where it mattered. As far as a mandate goes, Trump has a pretty strong one. Conway explained to Chuck Todd after the encounter about the mandate:

People open up their mailboxes and fire up their computers and see these premium increases. But, you know, the idea that he doesn’t have a mandate, when on President Obama’s watch they now lost the White House, 60 seats in the House, over a dozen Senate seats, over a dozen governorships, and over 1,000 state legislative seats, this Democratic party is having an identity crisis in a circular firing squad, and what I heard at Harvard is the same thing I hear all the time, “It’s Jim Comey’s fault, it’s Bernie Sanders’ fault.”

There is most definitely a Republican-governing mandate. When folks like Palmieri claim there is none, they are trying to delegitimize a Trump presidency like they did to George W. Bush. Trump and his team seem willing to fight back hard against that.

Almost daily you hear another Democrat, or media analyst, talking about how Trump’s picks for his administration are going to destroy the country — or most laughably the environment. Take for example Dan Pfeiffer, a former member of the Obama administration.

That’s right. Up until the end, global warming is a bigger threat than terrorism.

These folks wonder why Trump can’t be gracious and consensus building like — make sure you have no fluids in your mouth for this — Barack Obama. (If you did a spit take, I warned you.) That’s right. They still can’t see that to many everyday Americans, Obama was worse and more divisive than their wildest fantasies about Donald Trump.

So maybe they should just take what Obama said after the 2008 election to heart. I’ve slightly edited it for them, “Elections have consequences and …” Donald Trump “… won.” (For more from the author of “Team Clinton Can’t Stop Whining, and It’s Getting Embarrassing” please click HERE)

Follow Joe Miller on Twitter HERE and Facebook HERE.

WHAT’S IN HILLARY’S FUTURE? Latest Moves Indicate She Won’t Fade Away Quietly After Election Loss

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Hillary Clinton’s election defeat had many pundits declaring the Clinton era finally over. But a series of meetings with key Democratic donors and leaders – combined with still-fawning press coverage and even a quirky social media project driven by a longtime aide – are raising questions about what’s next.

A return to the speaking circuit? Advocacy work? Assuming the role of elder stateswoman? Or even, a 2020 presidential run?

“I think if she wants to run again, and my guess is she probably does, because they always do, then yes I think she’s doing a good job laying the groundwork,” Brad Bannon, Democratic strategist and CEO of Bannon Communications Research, told FoxNews.com.

A third presidential run — after two grueling campaigns that both ended in defeat to a rival political sensation who captured the imagination of voters — could be a stretch for the former secretary of state, senator and first lady.

But after a brief period of reclusion, Clinton is slowly but surely appearing more in public, and in ways that indicate a political and public future of some sort. (Read more from “WHAT’S IN HILLARY’S FUTURE? Latest Moves Indicate She Won’t Fade Away Quietly After Election Loss” HERE)

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What Happens When False Gods Fail: The Christian Response to Political Idolatry

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The scene being played out by followers of Hillary Clinton across the country has been a spectacle of fury and despair such that calm, reasoned folks can only shake their heads in wonder. You really can’t make this stuff up.

Rioters have taken to the streets to destroy vehicles and property, set fires, block freeways, burn President-elect Donald Trump in effigy, raise signs calling for Melania Trump to be raped, and in general behaved like thugs having a colossal, violent temper tantrum.

College students have had cry-ins, asked to be excused from classes and tests, been provided with therapy dogs, Play-doh, crayons and coloring books, warm beverages to calm and comfort them in their fear, and in general have behaved like crybabies who should be grounded and made to do menial labor until they can grow up.

But this paean of homage takes the cake:

We don’t have to wait until she dies to act. Hillary Clinton’s name belongs on ships, and airports, and tattoos. She deserves straight-up hagiographies and a sold-out Broadway show called RODHAM … Maybe she is more than a president. Maybe she is an idea, a world-historical heroine, light itself. The presidency is too small for her.

This is probably the single best (and most unbelievable) encapsulation I’ve seen of the idol worship of Hillary Clinton and by extension, the progressive Left. No ordinary mortal, Hillary, but a transcendent figure whose power and mission reaches beyond any political office; a female Messiah who is “light itself.”

You really can’t make this stuff up. (Ms. Heffernan would be wise to recall what happened to the last creature named “Light.”)

This irrational, slobbering idol worship illustrates in vivid color what happens when people misplace their deepest desire for the love of God, and pursue instead the gods of their choosing. The result is despair, anger, incoherence and total collapse when those gods fail, as they always will.

Hillary the Great lost the election she was supposed to have been handed as her due, merely because she is Hillary. The mighty Queen failed to ascend to the throne as her loyal servants had been promised she would. The golden calf turned out to be mere metal after all, and people are coming unhinged.

Jesus Christ: The Only Light, the Only Hope

What’s the Christian response to this? Let’s start at the beginning.

“In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God; all things were made through him, and without him was not anything made that was made. In him was life, and the life was the light of men. The light shines in the darkness, and the darkness has not overcome it.” John 1:1-5

Neither Hillary Clinton, nor Barack Obama, nor Donald Trump, nor any other politician or world leader, celebrity, pastor, Pope, nor any man on earth is “light itself.” That power belongs only to Jesus Christ.

“I am the light of the world; he who follows me will not walk in darkness, but will have the light of life.” John 8:12

Woe to us if we make saviors of those fashioned in our image. It’s all too easy to get swept up in the emotional current, and dance when our chosen hero wins the day, or wail and moan if he or she goes down in defeat. As if omnipotent power were held in mortal hands, and the earth turns at our command.

We will always falter when we put our trust in princes. “Put not your trust in princes, in a son of man, in whom there is no help. When his breath departs he returns to his earth; on that very day his plans perish.” Psalm 146:3-4

“Some boast of chariots, and some of horses; but we boast of the name of the Lord our God. They will collapse and fall; but we shall rise and stand upright.” Psalm 20:7-8

If we rise as a nation or if we fall; if we know blessing or ruin, it will be for only one reason: we have either returned to the Lord with humble hearts, or we have forsaken Him and worshiped our idols. That is the message our culture needs to hear, whether it’s a welcome message or not.

True Peace is Found in The One True God

This is the Christian response: “Who has directed the Spirit of the Lord, or as his counselor has instructed him? Whom did he consult for his enlightenment, and who taught him the path of justice, and taught him knowledge, and showed him the way of understanding? Behold, the nations are like a drop from a bucket, and are accounted as the dust on the scales … All the nations are as nothing before him, they are accounted by him as less than nothing and emptiness.” Isaiah 40: 13-15,17

It is Almighty, Omnipotent God who holds our every breath in His hands. He alone is worthy of our worship.

The Season of Giving’s first gift to us is Advent itself. Advent provides a timely respite from our political noise and discontent. We are dust before the Lord, and all the universe is a speck in His hand, and yet, we are beloved to Him. He wrapped His glory in our human flesh, and then spilled His own blood to pay our ransom. Dust was bought back at an incalculable price.

Take advantage of the silence and expectation of Advent, the hope we are called to dwell on. If we raise our minds for a moment to something— Someone — higher; if we will be quiet for once, then perhaps peace will come to us. (For more from the author of “What Happens When False Gods Fail: The Christian Response to Political Idolatry” please click HERE)

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Why the Mainstream Media Is Responsible for Fake News

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Liberal elites are running out of excuses for why Hillary Clinton lost.

They have now gotten around to blaming an upsurge of “fake news” sites and headlines. To hear them tell it, we are now living in a “post-truth” age of politics. Surely, this is not Hillary’s fault. And surely the liberal media itself cannot be blamed for being desperately out of touch with the country it so badly seeks to control.

The fake news defense is particularly exasperating. There is nothing new, or specific to this election, in terms of dramatized click-bait or untrustworthy publications. And there is no credible evidence that one party benefits from it more than the other. But perhaps we are asking the wrong question. Perhaps we should wonder not what effect these sites have had on the election — likely minimal when compared with countless other factors — but rather why so many people believe, or continue to visit, these fake news sites. Why are they working?

In the barrage of WikiLeaks’ Clinton campaign emails, Americans saw yet additional examples of what they have long suspected: The mainstream media itself is a fake.

For years, our major news outlets have tried hard to maintain the facade of objectivity. It is, of course, easier for them to look disinterested and nonpartisan when it costs their party very little. But when tensions rise and ideological victories are on the line — as in, say, election season —the veneer of honest journalism comes tumbling down. And in its place comes the corruption of ethics, collusion with political players, and unsubtle agenda peddling.

People so long ago caught on to this dynamic that it is hardly a wonder how markets for alternative journalism sprung up across the net. In many ways, this explains the demand for conservative media emissaries — not to alter, misreport or even tint the news; simply to tell the other side of the story, the only viewpoint people are being systematically denied. There would be no need, and indeed no demand, for Conservative Review or CRTV if the media did not leave such a monumental gap in its coverage of American life. An astonishing portion of this country — and the way that portion thinks about and experiences the world — is simply disregarded in the ivory tower broadcast stations and newsrooms of the elite.

But when liberals now lament the rise of fake news, they unknowingly lament their own partisan allegiance. Do they not see that people have stopped distinguishing between mainstream integrity and the integrity of that which they find on their Facebook feed?

Take a look at your standard Buzzfeed, Times or network website headlines. Then click and read the article, and the source material on which it was based. Did the headline give you any true sense of the reality your own investigation revealed?

Here is the Washington Post roster of “news” as of 4 p.m. ET on November 18:

Sessions is known for his hard line views on immigration

CIA pick fiercely partisan on national security

Trump’s national security adviser has said incendiary things online

Flynn – “Make up makes women look more attractive”

Put simply: No one believes it anymore. Just like with obscure internet sources, reading these headlines induces the same automatic eye-roll at the blatant hyperbole and lack of context. Hypersensitivity and liberal orthodoxy have been so factored in to the American psyche that people simply assume (correctly!) that the real story is not as stark, troubling, or evil.

The media of our time has gone way beyond the sensationalism of yore. It is not merely a matter of accounting for embellishment anymore; we also add to every header the salt-grain of progressive outrage.

It seems unlikely that our journalistic betters are going to come to any sort of self-awareness on this score, especially if they haven’t yet, in the face of a national referendum on their “fact-based” coverage. But while broad change is unlikely, you can see whispers of the truth starting to creep into the media discussion.

On some level, the elite pundits know that even when they do their absolute best to elect the most well-funded candidate in history, they are no match for a people disgusted by the centers of power in this country, the press high among them.

Perhaps that knowledge belies some of the recent demands upon Google and Facebook to “do something” about these alt-news sources. It is not difficult to see where this may be headed. If history is any indication, liberals will have a slew of helpful prescriptions for how organizations can help us weed out sites we ought not be seeing! How the powers that be really ought to start labeling information that should not be confused with the real “official” news. Wouldn’t this process be just the thing to help elites succeed where they have too recently failed: in silencing opposing views.

The media industrial complex created the conditions for a revolution. Now that the revolution has arrived, they would like you to believe that fake news is responsible.

They have arrived at a truth greater than they realize. (For more from the author of “Why the Mainstream Media Is Responsible for Fake News” please click HERE)

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