Four More Years,The Intolerant Left, Obama's Secret Speech

Tuesday, February 27, 2018

Four More Years

 
President Trump made a surprising announcement today -- he is running for reelection and has already chosen his campaign manager.  Trump's reelection announcement is the earliest ever by a sitting president.
 
It's not entirely clear what prompted today's 2020 statement, well before the 2018 mid-term elections. But the president could be making it clear to his left-wing critics screaming for impeachment and the #NeverTrumpers that he isn't going anywhere, and that he plans to forcefully fight for his agenda as well as four more years.
 
 
 
The Intolerant Left
 
In recent days, we have told you about the growing number of businesses that are cutting off the NRA and treating its supporters like lepers.  Once again, our corporate elites are out of touch with reality.
 
A new Rasmussen poll finds that most Americans (54%) blame government failures for the Parkland shootings, while just 33% blame the deaths on inadequate gun control laws.  Among Americans with school-age children, 61% blame government failures, and only 23% blame inadequate gun control.
 
Here's a point many people are missing:  The intolerant left is using big business to punish conservatives and to force its radical agenda on the American people, an agenda the left has been unable to win with at the ballot box. 
 
Perhaps the clearest sign that the left had gained a critical mass among our corporate elites occurred when then-Governor Mike Pence signed legislation to protect religious liberty in Indiana. 
 
The legislation was modeled on existing federal law that upholds the First Amendment, yet Pence was viciously attacked by left-wing groups.  Then, to the surprise of many, major Fortune 500 companies joined the assault.  Big Sports jumped on the left's bandwagon with the NFL, the NBA and the NCAA threatening to cancel events in Indiana. 
 
Keep in mind that this controversy erupted simply because Indiana's elected officials did not want religious business owners to be forced to participate in ceremonies that went against the teachings of their faith.  The same thing happened in North Carolina when legislators attempted to keep men out of women's restrooms.
 
What is happening now to the NRA is just another reminder that the left's real goal is not to have a "national conversation" about anything.  Its goal is to make conservatism unspeakable, if not illegal.
 
And don't think the left's intolerance won't affect you.  Remember the Google employee who wrote a memo about the suffocating left-wing indoctrination at that company?  He was fired. 
 
Liberal commentators demanded his name be released, as one CNBC host said, "So he will never work again."  How's that for tolerance of differing opinions?
 
It's not that far of a leap from Delta saying it will no longer give discounts to NRA members to Delta declaring that it will not hire NRA members. 
 
 
 
Court News
 
The Supreme Court heard arguments yesterday on a big case involving compulsory union dues.  The justices split four-to-four in a similar case in 2016 after Antonin Scalia died, and that divide was on full display yesterday. 
 
Scalia's successor, Justice Neil Gorsuch, did not tip his hand during the hour-long hearing, but he is expected to be on the side of individual liberty.
 
For all the hyperventilating right now about the NRA's influence, unions gave more than $1 billion to left-wing causes and liberal candidates in recent years, much of it from forced dues.  (Just another example of the left forcing people to do what it demands.)
 
Unfortunately, the justices turned down the Administration's request to hear a case on DACA, Barack Obama's quasi-amnesty program.  President Trump wants to terminate the program, but lower courts have ordered him to keep it in effect. 
 
There is already one court ruling that Obama lacked the authority to create executive amnesty programs.  But the justices punted yesterday saying they wanted the lower courts to fully evaluate the constitutional issues at stake.  
 
I don't understand how there can be any debate over whether the president is exercising his authority to repeal a program that his predecessor created by overstepping his.
 
Meanwhile, 20 states are taking aim at Obamacare again.  You may recall that the only way the Supreme Court upheld Obamacare in 2012 was because the individual mandate was a tax that raised revenue for the government. 
 
Well, Congress just repealed the individual mandate, so these states are asking the courts to repeal the rest of Obamacare too.
 
 
 
Trump's Courage
 
President Trump met yesterday with many of the nation's governors.  While discussing the Parkland school shooting, he said, "You don't know until you test it, but . . . I really believe I'd run in there, even if I didn't have a weapon, and I think most of the people in this room would have done that too."
 
A lot of armchair critics in the media are mocking the idea that Donald Trump would do something brave.  His efforts to reverse the left-wing agenda and resist political correctness certainly are brave. 
 
But on physical bravery, there is some evidence of that too.  Trump once confronted a thug who was attacking another man with a baseball bat.
 
 
 
Obama's Secret Speech
 
Barack Obama gave a speech last week to the Sloan Sports Analytics Conference at MIT.  Yet his remarks came with a ground rule that no one was allowed to quote him on anything.  Violators would be expelled and banned from future conferences.

Incredibly, that rule was observed for several days until the speech was leaked last night.  Obama said nothing particularly noteworthy.  But one of the things he did say was, "We didn't have a scandal that embarrassed us."

 
The former president is clearly in the late stages of the disease known as "Progressivism," in which sufferers begin to lose touch with reality. 
 
Just as a friendly reminder to the former president, a lot of us were embarrassed by:
 
The Benghazi scandal. . .
 
The IRS scandal. . .
 
The VA scandal. . .
 
The Fast & Furious scandal. . .
 
Hillary's email scandal. . .
 
Obama's scandalous collusion with Iran, and. . .
 
The abuse of our intelligence agencies to spy on political rivals.

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