Jack Kemp

Now the military is using prisoners to make body armor, after their helmet-making failure:

https://www.wired.com/2011/03/prisoners-body-armor/

Army Recruits Prisoners to Make Body Armor

Building parts for Patriot missile systems was just a warm-up, apparently, for a government-owned company that relies on federal inmates making as little as 23 cents an hour. On Wednesday, the U.S. Army announced that it handed Federal Prison Industries a no-bid, nearly $20 million contract to build body armor.

It’s the latest in a decades-long string of military deals for FPI, also known as Unicor. Over the years, the company has supplied parts for F-15 and F-16 fighter jets, the Cobra atta

ck helicopter, and the iconic Patriot interceptor system. (More about that in a second.)
But this deal is particularly odd, because FPI’s track record with protective equipment is, to put it generously, uneven. In May of last year, the Army recalled 44,000 FPI-made protective helmets after they failed ballistic testing. FPI then promptly got out of the helmet business.

That rather serious blemish on FPI’s record hasn’t stopped the Army from going back to the firm for $19,767,468’s worth of bulletproof "Outer Tactical Vests.” According to the Army’s contract announcement, the gear is supposed to be "for Pakistan” — presumably, for the Pakistani military. (Although a State Department told suppliers Wednesday that it wants 1,000 vests in Pakistan, too.)

Read the rest!

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Jack Kemp

I bet some of these helmets are still around. And these helmets could have been made in private factories which would have given veterans job opportunities.

http://www.businessinsider.com/federal-inmates-made-over-100000-faulty-helmets-us-military-2016-8
Federal inmates were hired to make combat helmets for the US military, but it did not go well


Federal-prison inmates in Beaumont, Texas, manufactured more than 100,000 defective helmets for the US military, even hiding some from inspection and sending others directly to the battlefield, according to a federal report by the US Department of Justice that was released on Wednesday.

The report, a joint effort by the Office of Inspector General (OIG) and the Defense Criminal Investigative Service (DCIS), found multiple instances of fraud in the manufacturing and sale of Advanced Combat Helmets (ACH) and Lightweight Marine Corps Helmets (LMCH) produced through the program between 2006 and 2009.

The helmets had a slew of defects, "including serious ballistic failures...blisters and improper mounting-hole placement and dimensions, as well as helmets being repressed," according to the report.

The helmets were also found to have been made using "degraded or unauthorized ballistic materials, expired paint, and unauthorized manufacturing methods."

More than 126,000 ACHs were recalled by the end of the program, costing the government more than $19 million.

The inmates were hired by ArmorSource, a private corporation that was the official manufacturer of the ACH, and Federal Prison Industries (FPI), a government-backed organization established to educate inmates and help them find work.

Read the whole thing.

SEE ALSO http://tbirdnow.mee.nu/army_recruits_prisoners_to_make_body_armor

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Dana Mathewson, with a hat tip to David Dickinson

We're constantly told that we have three equal branches of government: Legislative, Executive, and Judiciary. But is the Judiciary really equal to the others? I mean, in the way it is set up? True, the Supreme Court supposedly is, but how about all the other courts, including the courts that have just been shooting down the President's "Travel Bans?"

Michael Walsh has a great article in Pajamas Media that sheds a lot of light on the situation, and suggests a remedy.

Once again, a lawful executive order on "immigration" has been blocked by a couple of federal judges. To the Left, of course, this is a triumph of "representative democracy" but to the rest of us it's anything but. The idea that a single federal judge, anywhere, can -- for any reason, or no reason at all -- frustrate the legitimate functioning of the Executive branch makes absolutely no sense, except in the political sense.

So this battle over Trump's "Muslim ban" offers us a handy occasion to school the federal judiciary in the constitution, and to remind it that it's skating on very thin ice indeed if it continues down its partisan path. Because, far from being a "co-equal" branch of government, almost the entirety of the federal court system is a creature of Congress, and can be restructured or abolished at any time. Don't believe me? Take a look at Article III, here presented in its entirety.

Section 1.

The judicial power of the United States, shall be vested in one Supreme Court, and in such inferior courts as the Congress may from time to time ordain and establish. The judges, both of the supreme and inferior courts, shall hold their offices during good behaviour, and shall, at stated times, receive for their services, a compensation, which shall not be diminished during their continuance in office.

Section 2.

The judicial power shall extend to all cases, in law and equity, arising under this Constitution, the laws of the United States, and treaties made, or which shall be made, under their authority;--to all cases affecting ambassadors, other public ministers and consuls;--to all cases of admiralty and maritime jurisdiction;--to controversies to which the United States shall be a party;--to controversies between two or more states;--between a state and citizens of another state;--between citizens of different states;--between citizens of the same state claiming lands under grants of different states, and between a state, or the citizens thereof, and foreign states, citizens or subjects.

In all cases affecting ambassadors, other public ministers and consuls, and those in which a state shall be party, the Supreme Court shall have original jurisdiction. In all the other cases before mentioned, the Supreme Court shall have appellate jurisdiction, both as to law and fact, with such exceptions, and under such regulations as the Congress shall make.

The trial of all crimes, except in cases of impeachment, shall be by jury; and such trial shall be held in the state where the said crimes shall have been committed; but when not committed within any state, the trial shall be at such place or places as the Congress may by law have directed.

So the purview of the Supreme Court is remarkably limited constitutionally -- and still subject to Congressional regulation and oversight. Congress, in fact, can strip the court of any of its non-constitutionally arrogated jurisdictions.

Section 3.

Treason against the United States, shall consist only in levying war against them, or in adhering to their enemies, giving them aid and comfort. No person shall be convicted of treason unless on the testimony of two witnesses to the same overt act, or on confession in open court.

The Congress shall have power to declare the punishment of treason, but no attainder of treason shall work corruption of blood, or forfeiture except during the life of the person attainted.

And that's it. Doesn't sound very "co-equal," does it?

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Dana Mathewson

I'm sure you all remember receiving a few years ago, via e-mail, a bracing quote from the then-Prime Minister of Australia to the effect that "Australia will not change to accommodate demands of Muslims to recognize sharia law, Muslim dietary requirements, etc." And we all said "Why can't we be as gutsy?"

It appears Australia herself needs a dose of the ex-Prime Minister's steel. Because things are deteriorating. I found this on Urgent Agenda, quoted from Heatstreet:

Teachers at a primary school in Sydney, Australia have been threatened with beheading and other violence from young Islamic students, prompting one of them to quit her job.

Students as young as those in Year 5, according to the Daily Telegraph, are making the violent threats and pressuring others to read the Koran at Punchbowl Public School in Sydney.

Documents given to the newspaper allege that three staff members have taken a leave of absence owing to stress, received counselling and been awarded compensation after bullying from Islamic students.

One female teacher reportedly quit her job after it got too much for her. She claims she quit after receiving death threats to her family from her year 5 and 6 students, with some saying they would behead her.

The teacher also said she made numerous complaints back in 2014 about the extraordinary behavior in the class. For example, she said, she was abused by students after she stopped them from hanging a Syrian flag in the classroom.

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Dana Mathewson

Kurt's on a roll here, guns blazing from both hands.

http://www.townhallmail.com/ebhlrcktllzfrtltftrykfvhhqfhhtqkppycwrzqhqhqtq_myqqnqybytw.html?a=&b=

Over the top, as always, but fun to read.

Jack Kemp repllies:

Dana, I don't know what's all caving in on them leftists, as the Schlichter article claims. The right has its victories (such as the Trump election), but...

Today Amer. Thinker had a piece on a 6'5" young thug hitting radio talk show host Michel Savage near Savage's hom, in a restaurant.
http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2017/03/michael_savage_violently_assaulted_outside_restaurant_in_marin_county.html

There was also an article about liberal Jews shocked at the antisemitism rise in America, yet tells how they ignored the teaching in Palestinain schools of hatred of Jews and the leftist Jews encouraging Muslim immigration into the U.S., with its many virulent antisemites. http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2017/03/living_with_antisemitism_in_america.html

Amer. Thinker also has an article on the left's ability to hold two contradicory positons at the same time. The article calls it cognative dissonance but it could easily be also called stupidity or hypocrisy.
http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2017/03/where_is_the_lefts_cognitive_dissonance.html

And there is one on the UN's radical feminist attempts to control everyone in the world.
http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2017/03/the_uns_role_in_exporting_the_feminists_agenda.html

I would not be in such a hurry to claim "Mission Accomplished." I think the war is ongoing - and it started over one hundred years ago in America.

DANA REPLIES:

Well, you could say that the guy hitting Savage is a matter of frustration, although Savage might disagree. It's a matter of certainty that the Left has declared all-out war on everybody else, whether or not they realize they are losing it. And your other points are very good. One might almost think cognitive dissonance was invented by liberals, who, after all, have no "center" to guide them

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Timothy Birdnow

The Chinese are planning to cut back on their use of coal in an effort to support the price thereof.

According to Mining.com:

'The Chinese leader also said China would cut 150 million tonnes of coal capacity this year, about half of the 290 million tonnes cut in 2016.

China may also soon reinstate coal production curbs in an effort to avoid the return of an oversupply and improve the profitability of its heavily indebted coal industry. The curbs would come in the form of limiting mines' operations to 276 days a year, from the current 330 days.

Coal, particularly the steelmaking kind, rocketed last year after Beijing introduced production restrictions."

End excerpt.

Now is the time to reinvigorate the U.S. coal market. If the Chinese are going to cut production we should ramp it up, force them to sell for less. Not only is that good business but it also hamstrings their efforts to displace America and assume superpower status. The Chinese are not our friends and the more money they have the more mischief they can make (like building artificial islands in the sea to encroach on Japanese territory.)

Americans continue to look at foreign affairs through the prism of Barney the Dinosaur. Not everyone is a friend. It's time we start acting like leaders and stop pretending we are in Mr. Roger's neighborhood.

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Jack Kemp

This American Thinker story below is about the woman Marines who posed for erotic videos thinking they were in a no-risk situation and the results of their documenting their fun and games were everyone else's fault and bad judgement. It recalls a short argument I once got into with a woman photographer. She was was one of a bunch of media people staked out a few years ago in front of former Congressman Anthony Weiner's previous residence during his sexting and Twitter photo sending scandals. Weiner was my Congressman and he lived at that time near me in an apartment with his address being at the appropriately named Ascan Avenue (pronounced "ass-can avenue").

There I was, out on the street in front of Weiner's building, passing the time talking and kidding with journalists and photographers who have real paying job press jobs from CNN, the NY Daily News, etc., with real NY City Police Dept.-issued Press Passes. One woman photographer with a Germanic accent said to me, "Why do you men take such photos of yourselves?" Apparently she never heard of Playboy Magazine or the pornographic film business - or she wanted to pretend she hadn't. I replied to her by saying, "I've never taken a nude photo of myself in my life," a statement that implied that she was condemning all men for the actions of one exhibitionist jerk named Anthony Weiner. She dropped her argument at that point.

Now on to the current not so surprising young Marine hormonally driven scandal.

http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2017/03/female_marines_outraged_that_others_watched_their_sex_videos.html

March 16, 2017

Female Marines outraged that others watched their sex videos

What do you do if you're a woman in the Marines, and you make a sex video, and your fellow Marines see it?  Claim you're being sexually harassed, of course!

It seems that a number of female Marines are having sex with male Marines and filming it, and then, when they break up, the male Marines share the sex videos with their comrades.  This is said to have provoked a major crisis in the Marines.

Marine officials on Sunday said the branch was looking into a number of Marines, as well as current and former service members, who shared naked and compromising photos of their female colleagues on social media through a shared drive on a Facebook group called Marines United.

"It's Marine Corps wide," said Marine Pvt. Kally Wayne, 22, who joined in 2013 and was removed from the service three years later for disciplinary problems. In early 2016, her ex-boyfriend, a Marine, posted a sex tape they had made in 2013 to a Marines Facebook group, which quickly spread, eventually getting posted on Marines United, which has 30,000 members, where it appeared sporadically.

I guess you could said that her sex tape went viral.  I think they should change her rank from Pvt. to Non-Pvt.

"I went to the police to get them to take it down and they told me because I didn't live in North Carolina they couldn't do anything," Wayne said. "I went to his command and they said, 'Why don't you not make sex tapes?'"

Exactly.

Wayne said she knows at least 10 other women who have endured online sexual harassment.

How is it sexual harassment for other people to view your sex video?

There are more stories like this.  The New York Times has the story of a brave Marine who has to endure her comrades watching her striptease video.

"I wanted to make sure I could do anything male Marines could," she said. "I didn't want anyone to hold me to a lower standard."

Later, she was dating a Marine, and when he was stationed outside of Arizona, she sent him a short strip tease video.

The video was soon added to the cache of hundreds of photos and videos of active-duty Marines and veterans – filed with the subject's name, rank and place of duty – that is being circulated by Marines United and other groups. 

Herein lies the problem.  The problem is not male Marines watching striptease videos of female Marines.  The problem is women in the Marines.

Women and men can and do work together in the workplace.  But the armed forces are different.  Soldiers are stationed in close quarters 24 hours a day.  They are often cut off from their husbands and wives, who keep them happy in that special way.  In such a situation, you have the perfect recipe for sexual tension that can disrupt unit cohesion.

What happens when sergeants start dating privates and corporals start dating captains?  What happens when officers are perceived to be showing favoritism to subordinates they are having sex with, or subordinates are attempting to seduce their superior officers?

This is why having women in the military is problematic at best.  The reason these videos were circulated is because female Marines were dating male Marines in their own ranks.  It has enormous potential to disrupt unit cohesion.

The viewers of the videos are blameless.  The only ones to blame are the unhappy boyfriends who disseminated the videos and the female Marines who made them in the first place.  If the worst thing male Marines have done is to view nude videos made by their female comrades on a Facebook page, then I would say the problem of real sexual harassment in the military is close to zero.  The problem of unit cohesion, however, is very real.

But instead of having a discussion about the proper role of women in the military, the military is now on a hunt for homemade porn that got on the wrong Facebook page.

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Timothy Birdnow

The Boss Hog of OPEC is trying to get American oil producers to collude with his price-fixing cartel in order to drive up market prices for oil.

From the article:

"OPEC Secretary General, Mohammad Sanusi Barkindo, appears to be pressing his idea for the U.S. producers to join OPEC in cutting production this week at an oil industry conference in Houston. But according to guidelines (see below) issued by the Federal Trade Commission and U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ), "agreements of a type that always or almost always tends to raise price or to reduce output are per se illegal….The Department of Justice prosecutes participants in hard-core cartel agreements criminally." Therefore, I believe his efforts will fail.

In addition to suggesting U.S. producers collude with OPEC, he also has met secretly with oil traders and banks to get feedback on OPEC's market manipulation, denied there was ever a price war, and blamed the current glut on American shale oil producers. His meetings with hedge funds and banks might be helpful to OPEC, and I wonder how OPEC will reciprocate if it gets help."

End excerpt.

So now the Thanksgiving Turkey is trying to recruit the barnyard chickens into joining them on the table. If American oil producers have good sense they will reject this devil's pact. Oh, and it's illegal. In 2008 Donald Trump stated:

"The biggest problem I never hear anybody talk about. I told you about it once. Every time they lower interest rates, the cartel, because I call it a cartel - the illegal monopoly - raises oil prices. So the monopoly, because that's what it is, a total illegal monopoly. If businesses ever formed OPEC, everybody would be put in jail."

Indeed they would.

But constraint of trade is always good where the Democrats are concerned, and I suspect Barack Obama would have encouraged U.S. producers to join so he could drive prices up and push renewables (which is a will-o-the-wisp intended to drive up prices and reduce our "carbon footprint" through economic backsliding and poverty.) Trump is, hopefully, made of better stuff.

Let us reason together; a production cut would mean more money for oil producers and is a tempting thing to shale producers, as it is more expensive to frack than to drill normally. That would mean more profits. However, it would ultimately mean closing viable new fields and the OPEC countries could restart any time they liked. This would mean ultimately that the new American producers would be at the mercy of our barefoot Islamic Caliphs in the oily sands of Arabia and whatnot. The Arabs know this, which is why they are so keen to get us to cut production. It is much more expensive to develop American oil than to just suck it out of the ground Bedouin style.

And ultimately it is geopolitically vital for them to get us out of the game. There would be no rising Islam worldwide were it not for the oil revenues which have allowed them to fund and finance Jihad across the globe. A total collapse of oil prices would be great for consumers but would put the Arab countries back in the Middle Ages from whence they came. It would also destroy what is left of the communist Venezuelan dictatorship, and bankrupt the eeevvvilll Russkies. All of this is to the good from an American perspective - not so good from the perspective of our enemies. Naturally, the internationalists and the Leftist cadre see common cause with the Death to America oil derrick crowd.

Oil is the lynchpin of modern post-industrial civilization, and cheap oil is the key to not just prosperity but the eventual overthrow of despotism worldwide. Most of the world's current despots are oil tycoons, or at least survive because of the idiotic efforts to restrict the flow of energy. Energy is called power for a reason. It isn't just something to power your car or your smart phone; it's what powers the political classes. THAT is why they want to restrict it - and why we MUST make it as cheap and available as possible. Anything designed to contain it is antithetical to our principles of freedom and justice.

Competition in an industry is always good. It is vital in this business. Let's run those drills and push those despotic sheiks and Russian oligarchs back into the slimy holes they climbed out of!

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Dana Mathewson

Something else we heard a flap over, few weeks ago. Glad it has not been swept under the rug!

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2017/03/14/plot-thickens-in-probe-house-it-contractors.html

Plot thickens in probe of House IT contractors .

A criminal investigation into Muslim IT contractors employed by dozens of House Democrats is sparking broader concerns about continuing access to sensitive government emails, amid new allegations of illicit activity beyond Capitol Hill.

A QUICK WORD FROM JACK KEMP:

http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2017/03/14/plot-thickens-in-probe-house-it-contractors.html

I am not surprised the Democrats hired Muslim IT contractors. They are totally out of touch with reality. They would have hired Muammar Gadaffi if he were still alive. I hope enough people lean on the Trump and the GOP to stop this insanity.

AND A WORD FROM TIM BIRDNOW:

Who hacked the Democrats? The Russians? Seems they were giving access to other enemies of this country all on their own.

Also from the article:

"According to LegiStorm.com, which tracks congressional pay, the contractors’ Capitol Hill work started in 2004 with at least two making six-figure salaries, including Abid Awan last year earning $166,944.

But Awan also had money troubles, contributing to concerns about the contractors' access to sensitive emails and how that could be used. Awan declared bankruptcy in 2012 with more than $1.1 million in debt.

Court documents show the debt included roughly $51,150 to the Congressional Credit Union, for two cars and a credit line. And Virginia court records show he has had 19 violations since 2009, mostly traffic-related offenses."

End excerpt.

And these guys had physical access to top level Dem conputer systems. Hmmm.

If the GOP had any brains about politics they would announce this with much fanfare and press for investigations into Muslim connections to the "election hack". There is as much reason to suspect Muslims as Russians, after all. It may explain, too, why the Donkeys wouldn't let the FBI examine their server and paid for their own private firm; didn't want the Feds to know who was tinkering in there.




more...

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Dana Mathewson

... and why you should too.

How's this for a quote? "It goes without saying that Exxon, like Shell, like most Big Oil companies, like Secretary of State Rex Tillerson is now using its influence to try to prevent President Trump to fulfil his campaign trail promise to withdraw the U.S. from the UN Paris Climate Agreement." It's all in the article.

http://www.breitbart.com/big-government/2017/03/14/delingpole-why-i-totally-hate-big-oil-and-why-you-should-too/

A NOTE FROM JACK KEMP:


This Delingpole article fits perfectly with one of my short written pieces.

A few years ago, I wrote a piece at the Aviary about my attending a conservative announcement and protest against the Northeast Regional Carbon (Tax) Exchange that was held on courthouse steps in Foley Square in Lower Manhattan. Some 20-something kid came up to me and started talking about climate change and gave me his business card and I dismissed him and his global warming words, upsetting him. I immediately noticed that the street address of his "nonprofit" was 30 Broad Street in Manhattan, a very expensive address in the heart of Manhattan's financial district. No real climate change nonprofit could not afford such rents. In fact, months later I went to Broad Street to get the exact location of this kid's nonprofit's offices. Get this. The nonprofit was located in an office building across the street and twenty feet due south of the New York Stock Exchange itself!

So I wonder if his organization was getting funding from some big business or foreign government. As they used to say, is the Pope Catholic? This kid was not ashamed to hand me his card with such an address, assuming I would be too dumb to know what the rents were on the entire length of Broad Street. Of course, having rich friends to pay his organization's rent must have also boosted his chutpa and his confidence in his organizaiton's power. I wish I would have called him out about Broad Street rents in general and told him he was a phony.

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Dana mathewson

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Dana Mathewson

For those who may still be confused about Net Neutrality (granted, we hear little about it these days), this article -- although it doesn't actually discuss it -- explains why the government should not be messing with such a thing. https://townhall.com/columnists/setonmotley/2017/03/13/the-constitution-protects-us-from-government-and-only-from-government-n2298150?utm_source=thdaily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nl&newsletterad=

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Dana Mathewson

I certainly see this man as a viable candidate for president one of these days. He makes some great points here. Unlike our current president (whom I am not denigrating), he is and always has been a true conservative.

https://townhall.com/columnists/allenwest/2017/03/13/be-bold-n2298154?utm_source=thdaily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=nl&newsletterad=

"I for one have grown tired of the incessant lexicon of failure and submission when I hear GOP leaders whine that we have a binary choice. Or that this is the best we can do, that was not Reagan’s calling card, he set forth a bold constitutional conservative policy agenda that made Carter’s four years of malaise a distant memory, irrelevant. When GOP leaders speak of "perfection being the enemy of good enough”, well, in my former Battalion where we proudly proclaimed "Be Bold”, that would have never been an acceptable mentality.

"It is time the GOP stop seeking to be all things to all people. It is time they present a clear delineation between who they are, what they stand for, and that for which they are willing to fight. The GOP need not create insidious labels like "compassionate conservatism” which masked an expansive growth in government and spending. The GOP must ask itself the hard question, are we a constitutional conservative party that truly believes in the founding principles of governance for this Republic? Those principles are limited government, fiscal responsibility, individual sovereignty, and a free market/free enterprise economy. If the answer is no, then stop pretending to be in order to gain electoral support, only to disappoint.

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Brian Birdnow

As all Aviary readers, and everyone else in the world know right now, the USA had an election last November. The results of which still reverberate and are manifested in shock waves. The winning candidate had never held public office and showed little patience for the minutiae of public policy, especially in foreign affairs. The losing candidate, however, proudly displayed her foreign policy credentials like a set of tail feathers, trying to draw a contrast between her own overhyped expertise and the challengers supposed learning curve. Donald Trump, of course, defeated the former Secretary of State, and is now the president, and last week we saw potential foreign problems, if not potential disasters, just ahead as North Korea continues to rattle the nuclear sabre, Sweden proposes reinstituting conscription because of Russian provocations in the Baltic Sea, the specter of famine once again stalks Somalia, and the American-Mexican standoff over the border continues. So, foreign policy remains a great concern, and will remain so for the foreseeable future. Where a Donald Trump foreign policy will take the country remains an open question, and the country awaits an answer.

During the campaign Mr. Trump suggested a largely non-interventionist foreign policy, one reminiscent of the policy suggested by then-candidate George W. Bush in 2000, before the World Trade Center calumny changed everything. Trump tapped into a vein of fatigue among the people, and an understandable desire for a break from the rigors of world leadership, if only for a short rest period. Still, it would be a mistake to underestimate this urge as a natural human desire for a "vacation” from the cares of the world, as Charles Krauthammer sometimes refers to the 1990s. The non-interventionist school of foreign policy has deep and honorable roots in America, and Trump may be aligning himself with that foreign policy viewpoint.
CARTOONS | Gary Varvel
View Cartoon

Back in 1940 the non-interventionists of both parties, and all political stripes, agree on the need to stay out of the new European war that had begun the previous year. The result was the America First Committee, a so-called isolationist pressure group, that worked to preserve American neutrality in the early stages of World War II. The interventionists, particularly those in the White House, denounced the America Firsters as anti-Semites, bigots, ignorant yahoos, and general numbskulls (dare we say a basket of undesirables?) The facts of the matter are quite different. The group was bankrolled by General Robert Wood of Sears-Roebuck and Sterling Morton of the Morton Salt Company, assisted by Robert McCormick, the publisher of the Chicago Tribune. Among the political leaders associated with the committee were Democratic Senators Gerald Nye of North Dakota and Burton Wheeler of Montana, along with Norman Thomas, the Socialist Party leader. Among other public figures involved in the movement were Joseph Kennedy and Charles Lindbergh. Among those involved in student chapters at prominent schools were Gore Vidal, and future Presidents John F. Kennedy, and Gerald R. Ford. The members of the group represented a veritable cross-section of successful Americans, not the racist, bigoted, Know-Nothings of liberal mythmaking. This type of informed non-interventionism would be similar to the Trump foreign policy, at least in the nominal sense.

Still, Donald Trump will be confronted, beyond the campaign rallies and speeches, with the inescapable fact that the USA is the great power of the world. As the modern Romans, for better or worse, we must take an active role in the world. The question confronting Trump, his foreign policy team, and all Americans is: What is the American our role in the world? There are three recent precedents that Trump might employ when fashioning his foreign policy. He might choose to "go it alone”, as critics, somewhat mistakenly, labeled the George W. Bush policy. He might bury his head in the sand, or worse, he might simply run as we saw in the eight years from 2008-16. Finally, Mr. Trump might find that it is most prudent to pursue a cautious multilateralism, assembling partners to work with us in areas of mutual interest, in the mode of the Reagan-Bush 41 era.

Each of these three general policies carries some dangers. We must not allow the Obama policy of "leading from behind” to become the official position of the United States of America. The Obama Administration sought, as a secondary policy objective, the diminution of American power around the world, and largely succeeded. The American people see the lack of respect for our nation around the world, and this brings uncomfortable flashbacks to the glory days of Jimmy Carter. Do we really want to return to those thrilling days of yesteryear? As far as a "go it alone” policy, we may have to do that on matters of vital interest that are no concern of the world, in general. Border security, immigration law enforcement, and refugee control (i.e. building a wall) would fall under this heading. However, when dealing with potentially explosive situations and potentially dangerous adversaries it is imperative that our leaders show prudence, good judgement, and careful deliberation with allies before we make irrevocable decisions.

There is nothing particularly earth shaking about this declaration, as readers will no doubt recognize. General common sense comes into play when we realize that we cannot confront the increasingly aggressive Russians alone. Sweden, last week announced a possible draft of all eighteen-year-olds next year in response to Russian pressures against the Baltic states. They see the danger and would welcome American support. Likewise, we are dealing with an unstable and bombastic dictatorship in North Korea. If that country posed no threat to its neighbors it would, and should, be left alone. The North Koreans, have, unfortunately, turned to developing a nuclear weapon capable of reaching Seattle and Portland, in addition to most of the population centers of East Asia. Since this is matter of grave importance to South Korea, Japan, China and Canada we should invite these nations into a joint venture.

This thumbnail sketch neglects many areas of foreign policy, and due to space limitations cannot cover all of them. The Trump foreign policy will evolve slowly over the next few months. He does seem sincere in his non-interventionist views, but it is unlikely that Trump will succumb to a head-in-the sand approach, or the headlong retreat from power of the Obama years. That would be the antithesis of making America great again. A prudent multilateralism would serve the country well. The fate of the world may hinge on these decisions.

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Timothy Birdnow

I am always a bit reluctant to post things from Natural News; it tends to be a bit, well, nutty on occasion. But I just found this interesting article that I want to pass along. Entitled "The top 10 most outrageous science hoaxes of 2016" it goes on to delineate, well, faux science that masqueraded as infallible last year.

The author identifies ten top "hoaxes". They are:

Science Hoax #1: "Scientific” political polling

Science Hoax #2: The Zika virus terror campaign

Science Hoax #3: The Flint Michigan lead poisoning cover-up

Science Hoax #4: The banning of GMO labeling nationwide by scientifically illiterate Republicans

Science Hoax #5: Climate change data fraud

Science Hoax #6: Abortion organ harvesting for "scientific research”

Science Hoax #7: The California vaccine mandate

Science Hoax #8: Janet Yellen’s libtardtopia economics "science”

Science Hoax #9: Transgenderism and the lunatic liberal "theory of spontaneous genetic transmutation”

Science Hoax #10: Every science "journalist” working for the fakestream media

I agree in most but not all cases; certainly "fraud" #4 - the business about labeling GMO foods - is hardly a hoax as the altered food is no different than the "natural" food that was genetically manipulated. I also question the vaccination "fraud" although I don't know enough of the details about the argument to really weigh in on the subject. But author Mike Adams is correct about the rest, and he makes the very important point that science has become superstitiion in many ways, a tool of liberalism. Also, the claim that science journalists would be better writing for the food section or about traffic issues is spot-on; most science writers understand virtually nothing about their chosen subject.

(On the topic of genetically modified foods - gmo - I would like to point out that yes, there are dangers in doing what we are doing but not at the consumer end. GMO foods are patented and often have a kill gene making the crops produce sterile seeds. This is a big deal in that an emergency - a real emergency - would make it impossible for farmers to produce food for a starving public. If America were hit by an EMP, say, farmers would be not only unable to produce large crops but any at all. And there is the danger of creating new crop diseases that come with the modifications. That is a terrible danger of all genetic manipulation, and one we ignore at our peril.)

Nietzche predicted the decline of Science back in the 19th century and for the very reasons we now see; science would begin questioning the fundamental beliefs that propel it, and in the end it would become a farce. He is correct; there is an ever-increasing disbelief in the nature of reality as a concrete, inescapable thing. More and more we are to believe reality is subjective, and increasingly we are treated to the spectacle of science whores, researchers who sell their services to the liberals who run the government for funding. If there is not a jealous defense of reality in the minds of scientists then it is no big deal to fudge research results to get a few extra bucks. And if reality is subjective then there is nothing really wrong with using science to manipulate things in the direction you want it to go.

To most Americans we are at the pinnacle of scientific discovery and in many ways we are, but I would argue it is a residual effect, the momentum of a bygone golden age of science. In time our discoveries will slow, our advances will decline, and the West at least will cease to be the torch-bearer but will instead become the backwater. It's a matter of time.

And as Americans continue to lose their grips on reality, living inside social media and other artificial realities that alienate them from the perceptual universe, science will continue to decline in favor of wishful thinking and illusion. We are skipping merrily down the road to disaster.

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Jack Kemp

http://www.investors.com/politics/editorials/disagreeing-with-democrats-is-now-considered-un-american/
Disagreeing With Democrats Is Now Considered Un-American

Patriotism: Democrats have become so fond of attacking Republicans and their policies as "un-American" that we wouldn't be surprised if they call for a congressional committee to investigate them. It wouldn't be the first time Democrats have done so.
Although wrongly attached to Republican Sen. Joe McCarthy, the House Committee on Un-American Activities (also known as HUAC) was entirely a Democratic creation.
The committee got its start in 1938, when Democrats outnumbered Republicans in the House by a margin of 334 to 88. And over the course of HUAC's entire 37-year existence, Republicans controlled the House — and chaired the committee — for all of four years. Whatever sins HUAC allegedly committed were done so almost entirely under the committee's Democratic leadership.
Of course, "un-American" for the purposes of that committee's investigations meant actually doing things in service of the nation's enemies, whether it was the Nazis in World War II or the Soviet Union during the Cold War.
These days, however, all that's required to be called un-American by a Democrat is to disagree with their liberal world view.

END OF EXCERPT

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Jack Kemp

And she's Nigerian. Couldn't she just cashed her Nigerian lottery ticket winnings?

http://dailycaller.com/2017/03/12/wife-of-dc-lawyer-worth-1-5-arrested-for-taking-food-stamps-welfare/?utm_campaign=atdailycaller&utm_source=Twitter&utm_medium=Social

Wife Of DC Lawyer Worth $1.5 Million Arrested For Taking Food Stamps, Welfare.


An Arlington, Va., woman allegedly falsified welfare applications to receive more than $100,000 in benefits while her husband raked in $1.5 million salary.

Police say Helen Agbapuruonwu, mother of four, collected food stamps and Medicaid benefits from 2010 to 2016, while here husband, Fidelis Agbapuruonwu, was earning $1.5 million as a lawyer in Washington, D.C., NBC News 4 reports.

BOB REDMOND MAKES THE FOLLOWING POINT:

A headline and opening paragraph and my comment.

States pile pressure on new Trump travel ban

http://www.breitbart.com/news/states-pile-pressure-on-new-trump-travel-ban/

"Washington (AFP) - Several US states run by Democrats on Monday stepped up the pressure in federal court for the suspension of Republican President Donald Trump's amended travel ban, if possible before it takes effect Thursday."

My Comment:
The same Anti-Semitic Democrat Party that rejected Jews fleeing Nazism in the 1930's, is now welcoming with open arms Muslim migrants who will gladly participate in a "new final solution".

MR KEMP REPLIES:

But these so called refugees (really invaders) would not limit themselves to killing Jews. They would also kill and rape Christians. No, there is a more complex explanation needed, one involving white guilt and a feminized culture. And that explanation is, ironically, well stated by a married North American woman (her husband is a veteran) on Youtube who calls herself Wife With a Purpose. Here is her 27 min. internet video about Europe and their refugees. Her insights into the nature of men, women and politically correct culture are profound.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bTp1Pq6koQs

Posted by: Timothy Birdnow at 10:22 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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Wil Wirtanen

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/Articles/Article.aspx/20268

"The revelation making the rounds again about Obama, how he sneaked through $221 million to his terrorist friends the Palestinian Authority during the last hours of his presidency, makes it elaborately clear that he was always in it for himself and for his pals.

For eight years Israel was betrayed and America was duped by a charmer."

End excerpt.

A NOTE FROM TIM:

The author makes a factual error in the next few paragraphs, confusing The Talented Mr. Ripley with Catch Me if You Can. While Ripley was a fraud too he was not the guy who pretended to be an airline pilot or doctor.

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Jack Kemp forwards this:

http://www.investors.com/politics/commentary/the-2-words-that-spell-doom-for-the-gops-obamacare-replacement-plan/
2 Words That Spell Doom For The GOP's ObamaCare Replacement Plan

When selling the House Republican's health care bill, Speaker Paul Ryan says that ObamaCare is failing and must be replaced. He also promises that the GOP bill will "ensure vital protections for patients with pre-existing conditions."
There is just one problem with this formula. ObamaCare is failing precisely because of those very "vital protections" Ryan wants to preserve.

What Ryan is talking about goes by the technical name of "guaranteed issue." This law bans insurance companies on the individual market from denying coverage or charging people more because of their health status.
It's a reasonable goal, and one that health reformers have struggled to achieve for decades. And not surprisingly, "guaranteed issue" polls well with the public.

But "guaranteed issue" does not work.

That's not an ideological statement or a partisan one. It's a fact documented by many states that already tried this reform in the individual insurance market decades ago, and then largely abandoned it after it failed in exactly the way ObamaCare is failing now.

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Jack Kemp

The following information comes from Chapter Nine of the bestselling book "For Love of Coutnry."

Before I get into Chapter Nine, titled "Still Fighting for His Troops," I can not totally ignore the background story about the book's co-author, the Starbucks CEO Schultz. Howard Schultz has been written about on the internet as someone who may want to run for political office, maybe even the Presidency in 2020. Ironically, businessman Trump's Presidential election inspired Schultz, a Democrat, to possibly seek public office. Anyway, let's get away from the partisan politics - as best we can - and go on to the findings in "For Love of Country" about the latest attempts to manage and solve brain injury problems.

Chapter Nine, starting on page 164, is a most important chapter to read because it details the work done for veterans by retired four star U.S. Army General Peter Chiarelli. Before he left the service, he was much involved, as Chief of Staff, in getting veterans better treatment for Post Traumatic Stress and Traumatic Brain Injuries - and in stopping veterans' suicides. In fact, the authors speculate - quite plausibly - that many veteran suicides are the result of extreme physical pain from TBI or emotional pain in connection with PTS (he prefers not calling it a disease but just Post Traumatic Stress).

Among the things talked about in this chapter, are Gen. Chiarelli's championing of the use of brain scans to document PTS. He states that the level of cures today are really not that much better than the ones available in WWII. The General discussed the problems with brain researchers at UCLA's Brain Injury Research Center. After retirement, he contacted the brain researchers at the U. of Pittsburgh's sports medicine center because football head injuries, car accidents and military TBI have many, many similarities.

Gen. Chiarelli could have gotten a high paying corporate job upon his retirement, helping defense contractors negotiate deals with the Pentagon, but he chose instead to to form a non-profit brain research charity called One Mind on the West Coast. Their website is http://onemind.org ; His approach is to bring all efforts together in a concerted effort to fight the problem, such as happens in the military in war planning - and even has happened in medicine with cancer research and treatments.

In following up on the issues of a veteran Chiarelli knew who was on given "off label" (experimental) drugs while on active duty, Chiiarelli found out that one of the big problems was that the VA wouldn't allow usage or payment for many of such experimental drugs. And he even found out that doctors were doing a scientific study on one drug that was finding it was more harmful than helpful to veterans with TBI. When Chiarelli asked for the name of this dangerous drug, the doctors actually told him that they weren't allowed to announce its name until the scientific research was formally published in a journal three months later. Chiarellli got quite angry over this because if something didn't work in the military, they'd stop using it RIGHT WAY, on the spot, and do not wait for any hidebound regulations to become a barrier to getting immediate action. Chiarelli also had to look for and find the few doctors that worked together as a team to solve these problems (such as the UCLA and U. of Pittsburgh people) rather than what many others did, namely fight over their small territories and personal recognitions. A big part of the problem, the General concluded, is the essentially  Nineteenth Century conventional methods doctors use to conduct their work. Those veterans taking those worthless drugs are, once again, more likely to be the ones who commit suicide - or suffer needlessly while still living.

In one conference, because he had learned so much over recent years, a medical doctor addressed him as "Doctor Chiarelli." The General then told him he was not a physician. That's what happens when one learns to attack a problem using the knowledge of multiple disciplines, including military generalship, business management skills, scientific research and medical patient management analysis skills to improve services at both regular hospitals and Department of Veterans Affairs facilities.

The first part of "For Love of Country" book tell some great stories of military service men and women. And the second part tells of efforts mostly on the home front. Chapter Eight tells of the origins of the Semper Fi Fund - www.semperfifund.org - a charity started by wives of Marines but now helps veterans of all branches of the services with vital additional services while working with other veterans' charities run by both women and men. The coauthors are, as mentioned, Howard Schultz,CEO of Starbucks, and Rajiv Chandrasekaran, a National Book Award finalist. They have written an outstanding book whose full title  is "For Love of Country: What Our Veterans Can Teach Us About Citizenship, Heroism, and Sacrifice." And the contents live up to that title.

 

Posted by: Timothy Birdnow at 04:16 AM | No Comments | Add Comment
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