Right Opinion
The best of conservative opinion and commentary, updated daily.
Wednesday, August 24, 2016
As the Cultural War Rages, Can We Live Together?
Religious liberty concerns continue to weigh heavily on church-going Americans. In a recent survey from Pew Research, 40 percent of those who reported attending church in the last few months said that clergy spoke about religious liberty. No other issue received more attention from clergy. And not surprisingly so. The aggressive growth of secularism in our nation, along with the natural outgrowth of this, the tendency of secularists to turn to big government to define and implement what they perceive as fair, is on a collision course with religious liberty. Traditional church-going Americans have always taken comfort in the first amendment — “Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof...” — as government protection from outside aggression into their space.
Hillary Clinton’s Cakewalk With the Press
The media coverage of the presidential race is so tilted to the Democrats that even liberal analysts feel obliged to declare it. USA Today media columnist Michael Wolff asserted that this campaign isn’t between Trump and Clinton. It’s between Trump and the media that have turned against him in a big way. During the Republican primaries they were initially bemused, and then they acknowledged Trump as a serious populist challenge to the status quo. Their coverage wasn’t positive, but it was voluminous, crowding out everyone else. He hit back, and they let him, marveling at his brass knuckles. The media aimed to drive a serious wedge into the conservative base of the GOP, and they succeeded.
Secure Borders Matter
The Trump phenomenon in the U.S. and the various populist movements sweeping Europe have forced the globalists to become more open about their agenda. The latest example comes from Jean-Claude Juncker, leader of the European Union. [Monday], Mr. Juncker told a group of aspiring young journalists, “Borders are the worst invention ever made by politicians.” In that revealing comment, Juncker was echoing George Soros, who last year referred to national borders as “the obstacle.” Most people, no matter where they live, are astonished when they hear comments like that. Everyone knows that you don’t have a nation if you don’t have defined and defensible borders. When it comes to preserving your country, secure borders matter!
Hypocrisy on Presidential Golf Is Out of Bounds
One of the most exhausting things about politics is a mindset that says “scandal for thee, but not for me.” Consider the perennial (alleged) scandal of presidential golf. When George W. Bush was commander in chief, he played a lot of golf, and his critics were outraged — or at least pretended to be. Whether it was the political pressure or his own conscience, President Bush ultimately decided to stop golfing. “I don’t want some mom whose son may have recently died to see the commander in chief playing golf,” Bush told Politico in 2008. “I feel I owe it to the families to be in solidarity as best as I can with them.”
Hillary’s Corruption Is Overwhelming
After over two decades in the heart of America’s spotlight, Hillary Clinton is still an unknown quantity for most Americans. That’s thanks to one factor and one factor only: the love and worship of the mainstream media. Over the weekend, no less than six terrible stories broke that would have crippled anyone else’s campaign. First, we learned that Clinton aide and confidante Huma Abedin acted as assistant editor on the radical Journal of Muslim Minority Affairs, where she greenlit pieces that stated that “pushing (mothers) out into the open labor market is a clear demonstration of a lack of respect of womanhood and motherhood,” among other things. Next, we found out that Clinton had blamed former Secretary of State Colin Powell for giving her the idea to set up a private email server at a dinner party, and that Powell not only denied giving her the idea but also denied ever having a dinner conversation with her on the topic. Former Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, who Clinton claimed was present for the conversation, has also denied the story.
College Campus Lunacy
As the fall semester begins, parents, students, taxpayers and donors should be made aware of official college practices that should disgust us all. Hampshire College will offer some of its students what the school euphemistically calls “identity-based housing.” That’s segregated housing for students who — because of their race, culture, gender or sexual orientation — have “historically experienced oppression.” I’d bet the rent money that Hampshire College will not offer Jewish, Irish, Polish, Chinese or Catholic students segregated housing. Because there is no group of people who have not faced oppression, Hampshire College is guilty of religious and ethnic discrimination in its housing segregation policy.
Tuesday, August 23, 2016
Like Katrina and the Non-Named Flood, Nightmare in Louisiana NOT the Worst of What Can Happen
I wrote this at *The Patriot Post* back on July 26: “Sandy may have changed the course of history given the actions and reactions of the people involved as a nation. It’s one of those events in history that, years from now, people may look at like the sinking of the Spanish Armada in a storm off England. Or the weather for D-Day. History favors the bold, and I would suggest a bold response be at the ready for whatever comes out of this hurricane season. The why before the what is not in the hands of any party, but nature. Those who know how to use it to educate the public as to the reasons are the ones that could win the hearts and minds of people in this pivotal time in our nation’s history. And the weather could certainly be a player!” A couple of things. I don’t know if Donald Trump read this, but he certainly at least reacted to the non-named disaster in a way that at least showed concern. No matter what you thought of his motive, I saw a man who dropped what he was doing and went to where the problem was.
Ole Miss Dumps ‘Dixie’ From Football Games
The University of Mississippi has officially dumped “Dixie” so it can be more inclusive. I fear old times there will soon be forgotten, folks. The athletic department released a statement Friday announcing that the beloved southern song will no longer be played at home football games, ending yet another long-held tradition. “The newly expanded and renovated Vaught-Hemingway Stadium will further highlight our best traditions and create new ones that give the Ole Miss Rebels the best home field advantage in college football,” the statement reads. “Dixie” was first played by the Ole Miss band around 1948, Mississippi Today reports.
The Hypocrisy of BLM and SPLC
The Black Lives Matter (BLM) movement has many allies within the Progressive movement. Funded largely by the most liberal elements of the Left, especially those within the George Soros network, like his Center for American Progress, BLM has been a major motivator for the attacks on police officers all over the country. With chants like “Pigs in a blanket, fry-em like bacon” and “What do we want? Dead Cops!” the simple fact is that BLM has created an atmosphere of anger and hatred and has incited violence against law enforcement officers across the country. In no way has the killing and wounding of law enforcement officers dampened the enthusiasm of the BLM. It would seem that no reasonable person or group, regardless of how liberal, would want to be associated with any organization that advocates the killing of anyone, especially police.
The Republican Turncoats
I asked a successful businessman the other day what he thought about Donald Trump. He turned his thumb down. Wow. “Are you going to vote for Hillary?” I asked with trepidation. “Of course not,” he replied, almost insulted by the question. “I understand the concept of a binary decision.” I got a similar response when I asked oil magnate T. Boone Pickens whether he would vote for Trump. He looked at me with a quizzical expression and replied: “Well, who else is there to vote for?” Right. Who else is there? Yet, amazingly, a caucus of lifelong Republican politicos in Washington are announcing to the world with defiance and self-righteousness that they will vote for Hillary Clinton.
Big Media Moves On
Most fair observers agree that last week was a good week for Donald Trump, featuring major policy speeches with unifying themes and repeated appeals to minority voters. As we noted Friday, the polls were already starting to show some movement in Trump’s favor. The Los Angeles Times daily tracking poll had Clinton leading Trump by two points last week. Now he’s ahead. We’ll have to see whether additional polling confirms this momentum.
Sympathy for Victims Can Be Misdirected — and Backfire
Victims aren’t always virtuous. That’s a sad lesson that people learn from life. Human beings have a benign instinct to help those who are hurt through no cause of their own. But those they help don’t always turn out to be very grateful. And sometimes it’s hard to be sure just who the victim is. The most heavily publicized and violence-prompting police killings of young black men — in Ferguson, Missouri, in 2014, and Milwaukee this month — appeared to be, as the facts became known, justifiable responses to felons’ assaults. Such incidents are, unhappily, frequent, because young black men, again unhappily, commit a wildly disproportionate number of violent crimes. The real victims of this are, again unhappily and disproportionately, law-abiding black people.
To ID or Not to ID?
Every election cycle we must endure challenges and allegations about fraud (conservatives) and discrimination (liberals) when it comes to voter ID laws. This year is no different. A federal court ruled that the Texas Voter ID law passed in 2011, requiring voters to present official photo identification, discriminated again poor, minority and disabled voters and ordered a judge to approve new interim rules for the Nov. 8 election. The new rules will broaden the list of acceptable forms of ID. Voters will now be able to present, among other things, an expired ID, a government check or a current utility bill. “Supporting documents don’t have to have a photo, reports The Austin Chronicle, “but if they happen to, then voters will need to present the original. Otherwise, they can present a copy.”
A Clash of Police Policies
Amid the rioting in Milwaukee, there is also a clash between two leading lawmen there — Milwaukee County Sheriff David Clarke and the city of Milwaukee’s Chief of Police Edward Flynn. They have very different opinions about how law enforcement should be carried out. Chief Edward Flynn expresses the view long prevalent among those who emphasize the social “root causes” of crime, such as income disparities and educational disparities, as well as the larger society’s neglect of black communities. Chief Flynn puts less emphasis on aggressive police action and more on community outreach and gun control.
Monday, August 22, 2016
More Alarmist Tactics From The New York Times
The last three summers have been cool in the nation’s midsection. Weatherbell.com *in February* called for the hottest summer in the U.S. since 2012 based on sound physical realities confronting us. It’s not brain surgery — most post El Niño summers are hot in the U.S. We emphasized that for the Northeast it would be an “endless” summer well into September and even October. And after the heat, hurricanes would be a threat for the end game. That of course is still to be determined. As far as summer 2016 being so warm, we’ve been there, done that. *We forecasted it to be.* Again, it wasn’t brain surgery given the El Niño coming on.
University Recommends ‘Man’ Ban
If the progressive academic radicals at Princeton University have their way, the New Jersey school will soon be “man-free.” Dude. The Ivy League university wants to eradicate the word “man” from its vocabulary. It’s all part of an effort to get folks to start using “gender inclusive language.” Our friends at The College Fix first exposed this gender-neutral load of hooey in a fine story written by Jeremy Beaman. Staffers at the Ivy League school have been advised to no longer say “man.” Instead, they should use words like “individual,” “person,” or “people.” Remember George Washington and Benjamin Franklin? Don’t call them our forefathers. Princeton says we should refer to them as our ancestors.
Almost Everything the Media Tell You About Sexual Orientation and Gender Identity Is Wrong
A major new report, published today in the journal The New Atlantis, challenges the leading narratives that the media has pushed regarding sexual orientation and gender identity. Co-authored by two of the nation’s leading scholars on mental health and sexuality, the 143-page report discusses over 200 peer-reviewed studies in the biological, psychological, and social sciences, painstakingly documenting what scientific research shows *and does not show* about sexuality and gender. The major takeaway, as the editor of the journal explains, is that “some of the most frequently heard claims about sexuality and gender are not supported by scientific evidence.”
Voters Trump Drives From the GOP Aren’t Likely to Return
Of all the ways in which Donald Trump’s effect on the Republican Party is unlike Ronald Reagan’s, this may be the most telling: Younger voters were overwhelmingly attracted to the Reagan GOP, while the Republican Party led by Trump overwhelmingly repels them. According to a poll of 18- to 34-year-old voters released Monday by USA Today and Rock the Vote, only 18 percent of millennials say they would vote for Trump if the presidential election were held today, compared with 50 percent who express support for Hillary Clinton. (Libertarian Gary Johnson drew 11 percent, and the Green Party’s Jill Stein was at 4 percent.) When asked about their party loyalties, just 21 percent of the millennial voters said they identify with the GOP; 50 percent — almost three times as many — put themselves in the Democratic camp.
The Olympics & Other Annoyances
I can’t pretend to understand a lot of things that other people do. For instance, I don’t get why people carry on as if a turkey dinner is the cat’s pajamas at Thanksgiving, but then rarely order it the rest of the year. Then there’s the Olympics. At every possible level, I find its popularity confounding. For years, especially under the stewardship of Avery Brundidge, it engaged in anti-Semitic shenanigans. It was he, after all, who showed his true colors by deciding that Nazi Germany would be allowed to host the 1936 Games, providing Hitler with the recognition he craved for the Third Reich. Fortunately, Jesse Owens showed up to give the lie to der Fuhrer’s claims to Aryan superiority.
Sunday, August 21, 2016
SHOCK! School Makes Kids Take Personal Responsibility!
Let’s say your tenth-grader forgets his lunch. So you receive a telephone call at work. “Mom, I left my baloney sandwich on the kitchen counter,” he tells you. “Can you bring it to me, pretty please?” So, what would you do? I’d be willing to bet a Moonpie that many parents would drop everything and rush to the school to personally deliver their little snowflake’s brown bag lunch. But that sort of coddling is not allowed at Catholic High School for Boys in Little Rock, Arkansas. As a matter of fact, it’s outright banned. Catholic High School prides itself on teaching reading, writing, arithmetic and problem-solving.