By John Shaffer For a topic that supposedly was “settled” back in 1973 when the US Supreme Court decided that the issue ultimately was a matter for the federal government (and not the states) to decide, abortion has knocked for a loop the campaigns of the front runners in both parties. First, Donald Trump, for whom no issue seemed important enough for him to have paid any attention to it prior to his campaign for the White House, agreed with an interviewer’s premise that “the woman” should face punishment for having an abortion. No credible pro-life candidate, spokesman, legislator or social critic holds that position. Therefore, and quite understandably, Mr. Trump’s ignorance allowed abortion rights advocates to use his words to club the entire pro-life movement. Mr. Trump realized how much damage he had done - not to the pro-life position (which he cares about, if at all, strictly for its political usefulness to him, rather than out of any profound objection to abortion) – but to his own candidacy, so he uncharacteristically backed down and tried to take it all back. His shallow grasp of the issue left him flummoxed; it should go without saying that any candidate should be alert to the near-certainty that his words are going to be studied and parsed and deconstructed and interpreted, so he should be darn sure that he doesn’t speak carelessly about matters he is unfamiliar with. Of course, that would restrict Mr. Trump’s words to reality TV, beauty pageants, the life of the rich and famous, and ways of enriching himself at someone else’s expense.
By John Shaffer We realize that we are so behind the times that we yearn for the days of Ronald Reagan, who championed America and the values it represented, and he did so in a way that did not denigrate our friends and allies although he had little truck for the sensibilities of America’s enemies. But boy, how we were yearning for a President of that stripe as we listened to President Obama in Argentina last week, saying this: “So often in the past there has been a division between left and right, between capitalists and communists or socialists, and especially in the Americas, that’s been a big debate. Oh, you know, you’re a capitalist Yankee dog, and oh, you know, you’re some crazy communist that’s going to take away everybody’s property. Those are interesting intellectual arguments, but I think for your generation, you should be practical and just choose from what works. You don’t have to worry about whether it really fits into socialist theory or capitalist theory. You should just decide what works.”
That sounds like something an adjunct lecturer at the University of Chicago might say in his classroom, one who believes that America is more a force for evil than for good, and one who doesn't know that Communism really does take away everyone's property, and their basic rights as well. It sounds nothing like what any American President should believe. And, based on the record of his time as State Senator, US Senator and US President, we can safely guess that the President’s idea of “what works” would be about 180 degrees away from what actually has worked in America for the past 240 years or so – and also would be more in tune with “what works” in Marxist theory or the wishful thinking of socialists everywhere, rather than the disasters produced by Communism and socialism in practice. By John Shaffer President Obama is the first American President to visit Cuba since 1928. Cuba is an economic basket case – and is one of the the poorest nations in the Hemisphere (it was much wealthier in 1959). Its human rights record is abysmal, and although the Batista government overthrown by Castro in 1959 was no paragon of political virtue, Cuba was a far freer place, with a vastly superior human rights record, far more honest legal system and far freer economy than Cuba has ever experienced since. President Obama recognized the Cuban government last year, in exchange for nothing; and this week made his historic visit to the Communist island. Again, the US got nothing in exchange – but to be fair, the President did not ask for anything. No release of political prisoners; no economic liberalization; no guarantees of human rights.
But, give President Obama his due. Did he stand silently by as Cuban leader Raul Castro blasted the American blockade and embargo of Cuba and our allegedly “illegal” possession of Guantanamo Bay (by the way, terrorists in detention at Guantanamo have more legal rights than the average person does in Cuba - in jail or not.) and claimed that America falls short of Cuban standards of compassion and welfare. No, the President did worse than stand by silently – he essentially agreed with Castro: “President Castro, I think, has pointed out that in his view making sure that everybody is getting a decent education or health care, has basic security in old age, that those things are human rights as well. I personally would not disagree with him.” Where to begin? Well, in the first place – there is no freedom in Cuba. Several hundred dissidents who had been released from incarceration over the past year have been rearrested and reimprisoned, and several dozen were rounded up in the week before the President dropped by. The President has not mentioned the several billions of dollars of wealth that the Castro government expropriated from American citizens or companies, to say nothing if the even greater wealth that it expropriated from Cuban citizens. President Castro’s assertion that Cuba provides health care and welfare and full larders of groceries is a sick lie. Even in the very week the President visited Cuba, boatloads of Cubans died trying to escape to America. By John Shaffer President Obama has promised to close the center at Guantanamo Bay that is being used to imprison detainees taken in the "war on terror." The President believes that Guantanamo Bay is a "recruiting tool," that is, its existence persuades people to take up arms against the United States; thus, goes the President's thinking, it must be closed.
Well, we don't know if Guantanamo is used by the recruiters or not, but we don't believe that if those detained at Guantanamo suddenly were granted freedom or transferred to prison or detention in other countries or perhaps in places in the United States, that the stream of terrorists would dry up or the attacks against America would stop. We doubt if the President believes it either. Many attacks took place before there even was a detention center at Guantanamo, and many attacks have occurred against targets in Europe, Africa, the Mid-East or Australia - and none of those places have their own "Guantanamos." By John Shaffer One of the fundamental choices that citizens can make in a free society is (in the words of Benjamin Franklin) between liberty and safety. The current controversy over Apple refusing to obey a court order to break the code on an iPhone used by one of the San Bernardino terrorists highlights brings this to the forefront.
This is not a simple issue, cut and dried. In the first place, one wonders why the government ever made public its inability to crack the encryption of the phone. The wiser course of action would have been to have let the terrorists believe the phone was yielding mounds of important information. Maybe ISIS would have figured it was a bluff; maybe not; but better to plant seeds of doubt in your enemy's mind than to let him know his secrets are secure. Or perhaps they should not even have mentioned the phone - again, it can throw an enemy for a loop if he doesn't know what you do know about his plans. Second, the government should have asked for Apple's help quietly and behind the scenes. Perhaps turned the phone over to them, asked them to open it and then taken it back once the task was accomplished. This would have removed questions of public pressure and might have allowed the code to be broken, which is all the government should have wanted, anyway; to find out if the terrorist had been in contact with others and had been involved in any other potential plots. The constitutional questions are important, perhaps central, but are not the immediate concern here. Protecting Americans from future attacks is. Better to do that than to be distracted by weightier but less immediate matters. By John Shaffer Not only is the 2016 presidential election year madcap, unpredictable, topsy-turvy and stranger-than-fiction, but the issues the candidates are talking about are many and contentious. Not satisfied with illegal (or undocumented, if you prefer) immigration; an $18.5 trillion debt; scandals in the EPA, VA, IRS; America’s deteriorating position in the world, illustrated by looming collapses in Iraq and Afghanistan- both of which the present administration assured us would be bright spots in its legacy; and on and on – now there is a new issue, brought about by the untimely and unexpected death of Antonin Scalia, at the time of his death the longest-serving Justice on the current US Supreme Court.
His death means a vacancy, and as everyone knows, the President gets to nominate someone to fill that vacancy, and to appoint that person with the advice and consent of the Senate. It does not say in the Constitution that the Senate must automatically approve whatever nominee the President makes – the Founders created a Senate, not a rubber stamp. If you want actual illustrations of how this has played out over recent years, look at the list of nominees to the Court rejected by the Senate: In 1968 (a presidential election year), President Johnson tried to elevate Justice Abe Fortas (an old Johnson crony) to be Chief Justice, and simultaneously named another old crony, Homer Thornberry, to the vacancy. The nominations were controversial, and for a variety of very good reasons, both were withdrawn less than four months later. President Nixon saw the Senate reject two of his nominations, Clement Haynsworth and G. Harrold Carswell; Nixon then named a more “moderate” choice, Harry Blackmun, who was unanimously confirmed; By Guest Editorial by Dr. John A. Sparks Justice Antonin Scalia’s death leaves the Supreme Court without one of its most courageous and colorful conservative legal minds.
First, he was a staunch defender of the separation of powers, which, like the American founders, Justice Scalia saw as a bulwark against government tyranny. It made no difference to Scalia which branch’s powers were being threatened by the encroachment of another branch. He relied upon the clear language of separation in the Constitution. The founders vested legislative power in Congress (Article I), executive power in the president (Article II), and judicial power in the Supreme Court (Article III). That unequivocal proclamation of separation is found in the first sentences of each article and Justice Scalia refused to allow it to be ignored. Examples of Scalia’s unrelenting defense of the separation of powers are numerous. But, perhaps, the most erudite were his arguments against the Ethics in Government Act, dubbed the “independent counsel act” in the 1988 case of Morrison v. Olson. There, Scalia, the sole dissenter from the majority, maintained that by passing the independent counsel legislation Congress “does deprive the president of substantial control over the prosecutory functions performed by the independent counsel … and it does substantially affect the balance of power.” The dissent is typical of Scalia. Most of the five-part opinion would be required reading in an upper-level political science class. However, the acerbic thrusts that characterize his style inevitably appear. He says that sometimes efforts to claim power from another branch “come before the Court clad, so to speak, in sheep’s clothing … But this wolf comes as a wolf.” In the end, Scalia stood upon what the founders put in the text of the Constitution: “I prefer to rely upon the judgment of the wise men who constructed our system, and of the people who approved it, and two centuries of history that have shown it to be sound.” Secondly, Scalia was a defender of classical federalism—the recognition that certain powers were intended by the framers to remain with state governments and not be denied to the states by any branch of the federal government, especially the judiciary. The 2016 Iowa caucus is over, and the pundits are reading the entrails. On the Democrat side, Hillary Clinton eked out a win by almost the thinnest possible of margins. She polled 49.8% to 49.6% for Vermont Socialist Senator Bernie Sanders. She won five more delegates that Sanders, thanks to her “good luck” in going six-for-six in coin flips, which the Democrats use to break ties. Had Sanders won three of the flips, he would have won the race. Let’s see – Hillary Clinton has been one of the “most admired” people since 1992 – a “President-in-Waiting” whose ambition for the White House has not been a secret. She has behind her the biggest, richest, most powerful and most feared political machine the US since Tammany Hall. She has served as a US Senator, as Secretary of State, has been on the covers of a myriad of magazines. She has been the subject of countless newspaper articles, and is easily the best-known political figure in America today.
By John Shaffer The local area received no snow in the “Jonas Storm,” as the Weather Service dubbed last week’s event, but plenty of other places received plenty of snow. Two feet of the white stuff fell in many places, and there were locations in western Pennsylvania with over three feet of snow, and some in West Virginia with 42 inches (that’s three and a half feet!) New York City and Washington DC had snowfall totals that ranked in the top three or four highest totals recorded in those places.
Of course, the proponents of man-caused (anthropogenic) “global warming” or anthropogenic “climate change” (AGW or ACC for short) keep churning out their opinions, no matter what the weather may be. It was less than two years ago some ACC-ers were warning about “the end of snow.” Whenever anyone who is not a believer in ACC argues that the current conditions do not support the climate change theory, the believers in ACC sneer that “climate and weather are not the same thing.” We couldn’t agree more – but it does seem that every time there is an “extreme” weather event (not necessarily the same thing as a “climate” event), the believers in ACC tout it as proof of the theory. It is “settled science” (another phrase they employ frequently) we are told – as they cut off discussion and demean those who disagree with ACC. By John Shaffer One of the first principles of commerce is that “something is worth what someone is willing to pay for it.” Esau was hungry that day he swapped his birthright for some pottage, and, perhaps from his viewpoint if he had not obtained any food he wouldn’t have been around to enjoy that birthright, anyway. People overpay for things everyday – buying something at retail one can get elsewhere at a discount, or, more to the point, giving too much to gain something very valuable.
The astute reader probably can see where this is headed. A while back, the Obama Administration gained the release of US Army Sgt. Bo Bergdahl. It is a wonderful thing that this American soldier was released from Taliban captivity; but there are a great many who think that the price paid, which was in case you have forgotten, five Taliban “generals” released from US detention at Guantanamo, was too high. A similar “bargain” was struck this week, when the Obama Administration secured the release of some Americans who were being held by Iran. We haven’t heard anyone say that their release was wrong, but there are plenty of people who think that the price paid was excessive. Well, that depends on how the deal is reported. The Administration prefers we view it as a straight swap for four Americans (later five) for seven Iranians. They don’t emphasize the fact that the Americans were not “prisoners” except in the broadest possible interpretation. “Hostages” is a more accurate term. They were arrested on concocted charges and were imprisoned in very harsh conditions, The seven Iranians were arrested for actual crimes, were given due process and were tried in independent courts of law, and once convicted, they were incarcerated not in dungeons or filthy jails with substandard conditions but in modern institutions. So on the basic level we traded seven convicted felons (guilty of violating sanctions that prevented Iran from trading with western nations) for five people who committed no actual crime and should never have been imprisoned in the first place. By John Shaffer President Obama recently announced some executive actions on "guns," and then took part in a CNN town hall meeting on the same subject. Many of the premises that the President considers to be "facts” aren't true, so how could his solutions be effective?
For instance, the President believes there are "internet loopholes" and "gun show loopholes." He claims that "violent felons can buy… a weapon over the internet with no background check.” His contention is wrong, and what he describes already is illegal. Sales over the internet through licensed dealers must be shipped to a licensed dealer, and the buyer must pass a background check. The background checks apply to gun shows as well. The President claims to be in favor of "the right to keep and bear arms." Maybe he is, but he supported local laws prohibiting handguns in the possession of private citizens, and came out in favor of a ban on the "manufacture, sale and possession of handguns." The President uses the term "gun violence" without pointing out that suicides account for roughly two-thirds of the number and that justified self-defense, accidents and "line-of-duty" shootings by police account make up a good part of the remainder. He also didn't note that The Institute of Medicine and the National Research Council estimates that there are somewhere between 500,000 to more than 3 million defensive gun uses per year. We suspect that is an underestimate, and that the presence of guns indirectly prevents many more crimes than that. Guns, obviously, are used to thwart, prevent or deter criminals in staggering numbers each year, leading us to infer that if private citizens were not able to protect themselves with guns, a great many more of us would be victims of crime. By John Shaffer The more we learn about the San Bernardino terrorists the more we come to realize that this horrible crime could have been averted. Simple checks into the background of the female terrorist – checks that would routinely have been performed during America’s past conflicts; checks not with expensive high-tech methods of gathering intelligence but instead by using open sources, interviews, routine background checks - would have disclosed so much about her that she never would have been admitted into America. Had a neighbor or a family member provided information to authorities, other suspicious activity would have been made known, and the male terrorist also could have been thwarted.
President Obama declares that we must not do things that provide Muslims with excuses to hate us. We agree that we should be protective of sensibilities of our friends (and those we want to be our friends). That goes for Canada and Mexico and Europe as well as the Arab world. It makes no sense to take offensive actions or make insulting statements. But the President seems to believe that everything we do somehow is a provocation. The prison at Guantanamo is a provocation, he says. But Guantanamo is not a prison for Muslims, but a prison created to incarcerate the “worst of the worst” terrorists, those who in many cases killed dozens of Muslims for every Christian or Jew they had killed. Odd, isn’t it, that by the administration’s way of thinking, our negativity towards Muslims somehow transforms them from peaceful people into vengeful killers. The administration thinks American “Islamophobia” (a word they define so broadly as to include normal steps to keep Jihadi terrorists from entering this country) is a provocation. Our war in Iraq was a provocation, and of course, they think (although they seldom say it aloud) that the biggest provocation is America’s support for Israel. By John Shaffer This week, the United States suffered its bloodiest terrorist act since September 11, 2001. Fourteen people were killed and another seventeen injured when a husband/wife team of Jihadi terrorists attacked a room full of county employees at a Christmas lunch. The attack has sparked reactions across the spectrum, from Donald Trump’s “keep all Muslims out” to insistence from some progressives that the attack had nothing to do with Islam.
The President has used the attack as another opportunity to plump for more gun control. Frequently has he done this, but all of a sudden the President has latched on to the “no-fly/no-buy” connection, and he thinks (finally) he has a winner. “What could possibly be the argument for allowing a terrorist suspect to buy a semi-automatic weapon?,” he asked in his address to the American people last Sunday night. Of course, no one wants to allow a “terrorist suspect” to buy any type of firearm, so let’s ask the President some questions: “Why are we not detaining or arresting every ‘terrorist suspect’?” Or, “What could possibly be the argument for allowing a terrorist suspect to enter the country in the first place?”The President made his point about gun control, but in doing so he missed the main point. The President seems to have a puzzling scant regard for due process and Constitutional rights. The jarring truth is that neither of the San Bernardino killers were on the no-fly list. Another jarring truth is that the no-fly list is not limited to “terrorists,” is notoriously filled with names of people who should not be on it, and (obviously) misses many who should be on it. By John Shaffer Let’s see. Thousands of terrorist acts (bombings, shootings, stabbings) are perpetrated by Jihadi individuals who commit them in the name of their Muslim faith, and typically shout “Allahu Akbar” as they commit those acts. Certainly no one should condemn an entire faith for the acts of a relative few (and we do not believe that any responsible person has done so); but despite the undeniable connection of the perpetrators to radical mosques and madrassas and clerics, (who never seem to denounce the atrocities), the progressive establishment and the Obama administration assure us that these killers do not represent Islam. Those acts have taken the lives of thousands of people around the world. BUT... when one person of indistinct beliefs shoots three people dead at or in a Planned Parenthood clinic in Colorado, and the history, politics, and motivation of the shooter are still undeciphered several days later –and yet, and yet...the progressive establishment and the Obama administration have no trouble connecting the crime to (in no particular order): gun rights advocates, anti-abortion or pro-life activists, Republicans, Christians; well, you get the idea. Why do they refuse to make the obvious connection common in thousands of cases claiming thousands of lives – and yet insist on making a connection in a single case where the facts are unclear, where the shooter has no apparent close connection to any of the groups being blamed – and those groups have denounced the crime?
By John Shaffer One of the truisms of progressive thought is that any “reaction” by conservatives is “an overreaction.” For example: When the Irving, Texas school officials detained “The Muslim Clock Kid” because he brought a “hoax bomb” to school. After giving confusing and evasive answers to questions, the youth was handcuffed, for a brief period of time (long enough for his sister to snap a cell-phone picture). The Progressives are certain this was “an overreaction.” Well, maybe it was – but let’s see. . . a student brought a strange device in a pencil case, with wires sticking out from it, and declared the thing to be “a clock,” even though it did not resemble a clock. Can one so assuredly condemn the school administrators for treating the device as a “hoax bomb” and, therefore, its maker as a “hoax bomber?” What happened to the clock-maker? Well, he was invited to and visited the White House and met the President; he was lionized as a “genius” by a “Who’s Who” of America’s progressive high-tech computer/internet community, had an audience with the President of Sudan, and then was invited to Qatar, and he won a scholarship to a school there. And what did not happen to the youth. Well, he was not arrested; he was not expelled; he was not deported. But he self-deported, moving with his family to Qatar.
Now, perhaps the handcuffs weren’t necessary, but the youth’s family hopes to be enriched by $15 million dollars because of it, as they are threatening to sue the school district and the city. Before you say, “right on,” please remember that it will be the taxpayers who will have to pony up the money, and that is money that the school district won’t be able to use to educate the other 35,000 or so students in the district. $15 million for a few minutes of handcuffed detention - Seems a bit of an “overreaction” on the part of the clockmaker’s family, does it not? Not to mention the priceless benefit the youth got from the Presidents of the US and Sudan and the techno-nerds and the government of Qatar. |
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