Newsman Leaves Crucial Detail Out Of Burglary Account

 

Dan Rather SC Newsman leaves crucial detail out of burglary account

Somehow, Dan Rather is still able to find an audience despite his very public ouster from CBS in 2004 after reporting falsified and unsubstantiated information about President George W. Bush.

Of course, his audience has been decreased exponentially; but the holdover from a bygone generation of news anchors continues to exercise his First Amendment rights via his own virtually unwatched program and as a guest on other leftist news networks.

Appearing on the Rachel Maddow Show recently, Rather was able to reach an audience likely in double digits. Unsurprisingly, he used the opportunity to decry Republican administrations of yore.

As three major scandals converge on the White House, MSNBC remained true to form; and the conversation between Maddow and Rather naturally navigated toward the topic of Richard Nixon.

Rather shared the personal account of a residential burglary he said was the work of “the notorious plumbers’ operation,” referring to the group Nixon used to halt White House information leaks.

“It was a long time figuring out who did it,” he said, adding, “this became common during the Nixon administration.”

His nostalgia was uneventful by MSNBC standards, though one detail included in his autobiographical account of the story was suspiciously missing from his on air narrative.

In his memoirs, Rather claimed he “did what any Texan would do,” describing that he “made sure the family was safe, then grabbed the shotgun.”

I must admit I’m surprised the detail about a gun even made it into his book, but he described the incident in detail through the written word.

On camera, though, looking into the wild eyes of Rachel Maddow, Rather neglected to mention that he pointed a loaded and chambered shotgun at a group of what he later learned were GOP operatives.

Honestly, that might be the one target for which Maddow and her deranged audience feel gunfire is warranted.

Click here to get B. Christopher Agee’s latest book for less than $5! Like his Facebook page for engaging, relevant conservative content daily.

Photo credit: Michael Foley Photography (Creative Commons)

Obama Charged With War Crimes

In 2008, the Left embraced the embodiment of the anti-war movement, Barack Hussein Obama. Obama’s anti-war shock troops put away their “Bush is a War Criminal” signs and replaced them with “Change You Can Believe In.” The Pied Piper blew into his flute, and his glassy-eyed supporters followed him into oblivion.

The result of a zombie nation voting for “Change You Can Believe In?”  The Middle East is seething with the Muslim Brotherhood vying with al-Qaeda for power. Our economy is about to collapse with an unsustainable $17 trillion national debt. Inflation is rampant. The Fed’s endless pumping is making the dollar worthless, and millions of people are out of work or have quit looking.

Obama is now embroiled in a huge coverup over Benghazi. He created a Tea Party enemies list through the IRS that makes Nixon look like a amateur. And last but not least, Obama’s chief apologist (the Associated Press) has discovered that their Pied Piper Obama used his magic flute not to charm them but to spy on them.

No problem. We’re just talking about failing to rescue Americans under attack, using Chicago thug tactics to silence your critics, and nullifying the First Amendment. It’s not that bad, is it?

Oh, but that’s not the half of it.

Obama has gone on a rampage by remote control, using drones to take out so-called “high-value” al-Qaeda targets. The only problem is that for every al-Qaeda target he takes out, scores of civiliansmostly women and children—are killed as “collateral damage.”

There are estimates as high as 98% of drone strike casualties being civilians (50 for every one “suspected terrorist”). The Bureau of Investigative Journalism issued a report detailing how the CIA is deliberately targeting those who show up after the sight of an attack, rescuers, and mourners at funerals as a part of a “double-tap” strategy eerily reminiscent of methods used by terrorist groups like Hamas.

Obama has killed thousands of civilians in order to prove to the American people that “al-Qaeda is on the run,” a fantasy only Obama and his minions believe.

Jeremy Scahill’s just-published blockbuster book, Dirty Wars, gives a laundry list of the “anti-war” Obama’s real record as a war-monger.

Just six months into his presidency, on June 23, 2009, Obama authorized the use of a drone to fire multiple hellfire missiles to take out a single high value target on a funeral procession!  According to Dirty Wars:

Scores of civilians— estimates ranged between eighteen and forty-five— were killed. “After the prayers ended people were asking each other to leave the area as drones were hovering,” said a man who lost his leg in the attack. “First two drones fired two missiles, it created a havoc, there was smoke and dust everywhere. Injured people were crying and asking for help…they fired the third missile after a minute, and I fell on the ground.”

According to Dirty Wars, this was simply one of the dozens of attacks on civilians in order to take out a single or handful of al-Qaeda suspects. The thousands of civilians that Barack Hussein Obama has murdered amounts to genocide.

Oh, but that’s not the half of it.

A nonpartisan group, The Constitution Project, in their mammoth 600-page report, has concluded that Barack Hussein Obama, the 44th President of the United States, should be indicted for war crimes in the authorization or coverup of the use of torture during interrogation on detainees at Guantánamo and CIA “black sites.”

Buried in the mainstream media amid the Boston Marathon terror attack the day before, on April 16, the Constitution Project’s mammoth study, “Task Force on Detainee Treatment“, has come to the conclusion that Barack Hussein Obama, under international law, is guilty of crimes against humanity.

In countless court cases and testimony, former and current detainees and witnesses report extensive use of torture.

According to the Constitution Project report, page 369, describing the court case Abdah v. Obama, Barack Hussein Obama secretly authorized the use of torture that included the prisoner being:

  • Suspended from the ceiling
  • Repeatedly drugged
  • Whipped with electric cables
  • Kept awake for days while being interrogated
  • Shackled for days in complete darkness

This was only one of hundreds of instances of torture that Barack Hussein Obama either authorized or covered up.

Former naval captain and Deputy Assistant Secretary of State, Dr. Steve Pieczenik, along with countless others, have called for an internationally-led Nuremberg-style trial to begin immediately in order to indict and try Barack Hussein Obama for war crimes.

Step-by-step, America. First, we must impeach Obama for abandoning our brave Americans in Benghazi. First, we must impeach him for using the IRS to punish his enemies. First, we must impeach him for nullifying the First Amendment by spying on the press. And then the world can get on with finding Barack Hussein Obama guilty of war crimes.

The 3 Myths Of A Secular Government In America (Part 1)

Bible and Flag The 3 Myths of a Secular Government in America  (Part 1)

It is often said that religion and politics don’t mix. We are also told that our government (and accordingly, the public square) must be neutral on matters of religion. It cannot favor any one religion over another. Hearing these statements so often, one is greatly tempted to believe they are true.

There is one slight problem. These are meaningless statements.

People who use these expressions have a limited understanding of religion. They have particular religions in mind and particular doctrines of that religion that are subject to different interpretations. And politics and government (especially in a multi-cultural society), they contend, must be entirely separate from religion. And, of course, there are atheists and others with no religion whose views must be held with the same regard as everyone else.

But what exactly is a religion? In common usage, it is a set of beliefs and practices involving God. However, that is a far too limited view of what a religion is. A religion purports to describe reality, all of it. It offers its explanation of the origin of the world, the nature of human beings, the meaning of life, the rules of life, what is true, and what is false.

In other words, a religion is a worldview. Everyone has a worldview. It may not be thoroughly thought out. It may have inconsistencies, blatant falsehoods, and obvious distortions. But everyone has one.

People live out of what they believe about life, themselves, and other people. Some worldviews are called religion because God is a part of it. And some worldviews don’t include a God, but they are still worldviews. And just like people live out of their worldview, so do governments.

This is why so-called secular governments keep growing. There is no God for people to rely on, so government has to fill that void by being the great protector and provider for its people.

In older dictionaries, the idea of religion necessarily included a god. But not now. It can be simply “a cause, principle, or system of beliefs held to with ardor and faith.”

The most non-religious (atheistic) governments in the world are communistic. There is no god; but there is the government to see that everybody behaves and is taken care of, so to speak.

As countries become less religious, they become more communistic or socialistic. The common idea is collectivism. The void gets larger, and the government grows to fill that void.

Christians believe in a Trinity; that is, they believe that God exists in three persons, not as three separate Gods, but the three distinct personalities make up the one God. There is a secular trinity as well. The government is like God the Father, the provider, protector, and judge of the people. Science takes the place of the Son. The work of the Son makes the Christian life possible, and science is the servant of secularism energizing and supporting the cause.

True science is just the principle of observing and measuring and experimenting to determine how nature works. But science becomes and has become a religion when it says that only what can be measured and observed is real and objective truth. There is nothing beyond or outside the observed universe. This is a religious statement just as much as “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth.” Christian dogma has been replaced with naturalist dogma.

The third part of the secular trinity is relativism. This is the spirit of the age. There is no Lawgiver outside of nature, and that involves simply physical laws. So anything called truth beyond that is individualistic. If it works for you, who is to say that it is wrong? Cultures have formed, and they are all equal expressions of individual initiative.

But new dogmas have come into being, and the government is the enforcer of these new beliefs. The beliefs (rules) are simple and few: Tolerance and fairness (or equality). Tolerance allows individuals to live their own truth within their own world, and fairness mediates among the masses because it is only inequality that promotes division and hostility between people.

So secularism is a worldview and essentially a religion, a religion without a god, but a religion nonetheless. It doesn’t require weekly worship services. Political rallies every election year are enough.

So to say that a government can be secular is just semantics. It just means naturalism, or practical atheism. It’s not a matter of religion or no religion, but what religion. A religion with a god or one without? There is no middle ground.

The second myth is that our government was intended to be a secular government. There are two problems here.

One is that we have forgotten our history and reinterpreted it and our historical documents. When the First Amendment was written, the issue before them was the idea of a national church as was common in Europe. This was rejected, but individual states had state churches; and that was written into the various state Constitutions.

A common quote from one of the Founding Fathers was that “Our Constitution was made only for a moral and religious people. It is wholly inadequate to the government of any other.”

Our government and our nation requires a religious and moral people to exist simply because the majority can vote for anything they want, and they will and they have. It is human nature to seek power and influence and to live beyond one’s means, and those are two of our government’s biggest problems. Those who are in power do what they can to stay in power, and they spend other people’s money beyond their means to do it.

Our founders knew that if the people lost their religious and moral foundation, this form of government would not last. It would die a slow death through massive government debt.

A Filmmaker On Obama’s Enemies List?

Barack Obama 6 SC A Filmmaker on Obama’s Enemies List?

The revelations about the IRS targeting voices opposed to Barack Obama’s political agenda came of no surprise to filmmaker Joel Gilbert. His private financial accounts were hacked into, and the information was used by a George Soros-linked journalist (Seth Rosenfeld) before the presidential election. Gilbert wants to know who provided Rosenfeld with his private bank records. Was it someone at the IRS?  Or at the White House?

Gilbert directed the blockbuster film “Dreams from My Real Father,” which was heavily criticized by the left before the November 2012 presidential election because of the Obama campaign’s fear it could alert voters to Obama’s communist connections and Marxist philosophy. The film featured evidence that Obama’s real father was Frank Marshall Davis, a Communist Party USA operative who indoctrinated Obama into a Marxist ideology during his formative years in Hawaii.

Gilbert was interviewed extensively on radio and television, as well as by major newspapers such as The New York Times, which apparently feared the film would have an impact on the election outcome. His announcement of a promotional campaign to send millions of DVDs for free to various states was of major concern to Obama’s backers in the media.

We noted in our pre-election story, Last Minute Anti-Romney Dirty Tricks Target Filmmaker, that the invasion of Gilbert’s privacy seemed to be an attack on donors to Mitt Romney’s presidential campaign, since some of them had also contributed to the distribution of Gilbert’s film.

In addition to the scrutiny of his donors, Gilbert tells AIM that in early 2012, the IRS reopened his 2009 tax return and simply denied all of his business expenses, even though they were well-documented. “My accountant said he had never seen anything like it in 30 years of experience with the IRS,” he told AIM. “To resolve the issue, my accountant met the IRS auditor in Los Angeles, and reported that she had a print-out of the home page of the ‘Dreams from My Real Father’ official film website on her desk. Despite the re-submission of the 2009 expenses, the IRS has still not closed the case, and my accountant continues to meet with them every few months. The next meeting is set for May 19th.”

He says, “I believe I have been illegally targeted by the IRS because my films and interviews have run contrary to President Obama’s official narrative of who he is and what his policies really are for America. The fact that the IRS targeted me indicates they were afraid of me and the information in my film.”

It was in late October of 2012 that the scrutiny of his customers came to light. He says, “…unknown parties illegally acquired private company bank information, and it was passed on to left-wing journalist Seth Rosenfeld, who began targeting my customers who purchased large quantities of the “Dreams from My Real Father” DVD, as well as a limited partner.”

Rosenfeld works for the Center for Investigative Reporting (CIR), funded by the pro-Marxist billionaire George Soros. Accuracy in Media named the CIR as being among an extensive network of Soros-supported media organizations in our 2004 report, The Hidden Soros Agenda: Drugs, Money, the Media, and Political Power.

Rosenfeld denied that he engaged in any improper or illegal conduct.

But Gilbert says, “The bank information could only be accessed by the IRS or from my corporate bank account with a confidential user ID and password. On October 26th, Seth Rosenfeld called me directly and began citing bank deposit amounts that he purported to be bank wire transfers received in my company bank account, and asked what they were used for. I was so shocked that he claimed to have confidential bank information, I asked him to send an email and hung up, but no email was received.”

Gilbert goes on: “Next, Rosenfeld called a company limited partner on his private number and fraudulently introduced himself as being with the Romney campaign and asked for a donation. When the partner said he wasn’t interested, Rosenfeld admitted to being a reporter and began citing the partner’s confidential bank wiring history. The partner hung up. Next, Rosenfeld called the elderly mother of a customer who had purchased a large quantity of DVDs by check. Rosenfeld tricked the woman into giving out her son’s home phone number by pretending to be an old friend. When Rosenfeld called the customer, Rosenfeld cited the amount of the check, and asked about his political beliefs, and asked by name whether he knew others who made purchases from my company.”

Finally, Gilbert says that a major buyer of DVDs was contacted by Rosenfeld on his private unlisted cell phone number. “Again, Rosenfeld cited the customer’s transfer amount to  my company, asked what it was for, and asked him to detail his political opinions and any donations to Republican campaigns, including Romney’s,” he says. “Finally, Rosenfeld called my DVD replicator on her private number, but she hung up, as I had forewarned her that Rosenfeld’s campaign might be coming her way.”

“Dreams from My Real Father” was Gilbert’s most recent film on Obama. He also produced the 2010 award winning “Atomic Jihad: Ahmadinejad’s Coming War and Obama’s Politics of Defeat.”

Based on the evidence in his and other cases coming to light, Gilbert says he believes there is a “criminal conspiracy” that used the IRS “to target the First Amendment rights of Americans,” and that President Obama and other high-level officials should be targets of the investigation into the admitted wrongdoing.

 

This article originally appeared at AIM.org and is reprinted here with permission. 

Obama Media Group (OMG): The Spin Starts Here

Obama Media Strike Tone SC Obama Media Group (OMG): The Spin Starts Here

For the past five or so years now, all we have received from the Obama regime is lies and deceit. Many thought that the mainstream media was just giving him a pass because he is the first black President, but now it has been revealed that the media’s love for him is far deeper than that. It has become a family affair, so to speak.

Take Obama’s propaganda minister and chief spin doctor Jay Carney for instance. He is married to Claire Shipman, a reporter for ABC news. Then there is CBS president David Rhodes; his brother Ben works in the Obama regime and is most likely the one who edited the Benghazi talking points. Let us not forget about ABC president Ben Sherwood, whose sister, Dr. Elizabeth Sherwood- Randall, is Obama’s special assistant. Lets not leave out good ol’ David Axelrod, who ran both of Obama’s campaigns and is now gainfully employed by MSNBC. And Virginia Mosely of CNN is married to Hillary Clinton’s assistant, Tom Nides.

I won’t leave FOX News out of this either. We all know that Obama has a special relationship with the Saudi royal family, and it just so happens that the Saudi prince owns a stake in Newscorp (the parent company of FOX News.) I hope you are now asking yourself if you are really getting the truth.

One of these connections to the Obama regime could be considered a coincidence, but this many connections is a CONSPIRACY.  This is an abomination to the Constitutional first amendment right of a free press as well as a tenant of communism. But, what else would you expect from a communist/muslim plant? American journalism has been dead for very many years now,but, just hasn’t been laid down yet. It’s time that “We The People” help put modern main stream journalism where it belongs. In it’s grave! Remember, if one can control the media, he controls the message, and hence, controls the masses. As always, fellow Patriots, stay safe and be aware of your surroundings.

Photo credit: terrellaftermath

 

RNC Chairman Says Holder Should Resign

Eric Holder 3 SC RNC chairman says Holder should resign

WASHINGTON — The chairman of the Republican National Committee says Attorney General Eric Holder should resign over the decision by the Justice Department to secretly obtain two months of telephone records of reporters and editors for The Associated Press.

RNC chairman Reince Priebus (ryns PREE’-bus) says Holder has “trampled on the First Amendment” by allowing the Justice Department to issue secret subpoenas to “spy” on The AP.

Read More at OfficialWire . By Ken Thomas.

Mad Video Game Science

Videogame SC Mad Video Game Science

You wouldn’t know it from watching the news, but instances of violence in American society have fallen precipitously over the past decade. At the same time, more Americans than ever are playing video games. Yet, a bipartisan group of members of Congress continue to insist that video games might be responsible for random acts of violence, despite overwhelming evidence and facts showing they are wrong.

Vice-President Joe Biden, Sen. Jay Rockefeller (D-WV), Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IW) and Rep. Frank Wolf (R-VA) are among the leading proponents of the belief that there is a link between violence and video games. And they believe that taxpayer dollars should foot the bill for studies to attempt to prove it. But trying to prove causation is folly.

A few months ago, Congressman Wolf, an Appropriations Committee cardinal responsible for doling out billions of taxpayer dollars to the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS) and hundreds of other government agencies, demanded that the National Science Foundation (of which he oversees funding) conduct a study proving his point. The Foundation hired Communication Professor Brad J. Bushman of Ohio State University to do the study. Bushman was the obvious choice; for he once did a study that concluded that the Bible could be used to incite violence. If the Bible induces violence, perhaps so does Grand Theft Auto. Low and behold, the professor found the link! The professor concluded that there are theoretical reasons to believe that violent video games are even more harmful than violent TV programs or films. Rep. Wolf was happy, as were the bureaucrats who want more funding from Mr. Wolf. A Washington win-win, as they say, except for the taxpayers.

There is just one problem — the facts. More Americans play video games today than ever before. While the sales of video games have expanded exponentially, violence in the United States has fallen. Youth violence has fallen. Incidents of bullying have fallen. Even violent crimes by juveniles have fallen. In short, the taxpayers are left holding the bill for a theoretical study with no basis in reality.

But in Washington, one study is never enough. Sen. Charles Grassley wants his own study. Even the National Rifle Association (NRA) is happy to blame the video game industry to shift attention away from gun control. There have been over 130 studies on video games over the past decade, with most finding no link.

Chris Ferguson, a psychologist at Texas A&M International University, has conducted similar experiments and finds studies linking video games and violence to be trivial. “You know most of the debate now is really on to these minor acts of aggressiveness,” he said. “You know we’re talking about little children sticking their tongues out at each other and that sort of thing.” Ferguson says it’s easy to think that senseless video game violence can lead to senseless violence in the real world. But he says that’s mixing up two separate things. “Many of the games do have morally objectionable material, and I think that is where a lot of the debate on this issue went off the rails,” he said. “We kind of mistook our moral concerns about some of these video games, which are very valid — I find many of the games to be morally objectionable — and then assumed that what is morally objectionable is harmful.”

It will be interesting to see if Mr. Ferguson stands up to those (like Bushman) who seem to be in search of data to validate what they are already spouting as true. A bit of intellectual independence would be refreshing in today’s world.

The last thing the taxpayers need is mountains of money being spent on mountains of politically-driven studies to support the political agendas of those who wish to abridge the First Amendment.

Photo credit: dominicotine (Creative Commons)

“Master Bedroom” Latest Victim Of PC Police

 

Master Bedroom SC1 Master Bedroom latest victim of PC police

In a continuing effort to scrub any potentially offensive phrase from the American experience, residential construction companies are waging a war on the commonly used “master bedroom” designation.

Sixty percent of homebuilders surveyed recently around the nation’s capital reported not using the term, opting instead for “owner’s suite” or some variation thereof.

One industry official called the new description “a more politically correct term of art,” while another said that young real estate brokers use the trending language because they “want to be more politically correct.”

According to a source at one company that – for now – continues to sporadically identify a “master suite” in floor plans, the pressure to change is “just working through the industry and finally, bingo, we got it.”

The constantly-offended left feels that the word “master” is both sexist and racist, conjuring images of white, male slave owners.

In real terms, I cannot distinguish the difference between “master” and “owner” as they relate to slavery. In my attempt to rationalize the argument, though, I merely give credence to the fact such nonsense is an issue in the first place.

Changing the national lexicon does nothing to address any residual racism, whatever its source or target. Such restrictive language only serves to falsely paint individuals as bigots and misogynists simply for uttering a set of extraordinarily common words.

Many on the left seek to restrict the First Amendment – as is their goal for the Second and Tenth, among others – because they truly believe such regulation is necessary for the betterment of our society.

These individuals suffer from an overabundance of emotion and a critical lack of cognitive ability, but they are truly pursuing what they believe to be a lofty goal.

A significant portion of these activists, in my estimation, does not believe that banning any particular word will have a positive effect on our culture; but they support this type of action nonetheless.

By preemptively demonizing anyone using “offensive” terms, any further information provided can be completely disregarded. Silencing dissent is a highly effective tactic among leftists who realize, if presented with objective opposition, that the general public will reject their policies.

Since this ploy is one of precious few arrows within the progressive quiver, the left shows no sign of slowing down its predictable pursuit of creating outrage from whole cloth.
Click here to get B. Christopher Agee’s latest book for less than $5! Like his Facebook page for engaging, relevant conservative content daily.

Photo credit: Orlando Rob (Creative Commons)

What Happened To “Never Again”?

Never Again SC What Happened to “Never Again”?

Human Rights activist Pamela Geller was scheduled to speak at the Great Neck Synagogue on April 14th until the synagogue’s officials caved to the bully tactics of Islamic bigot Habeeb Ahmed and others who relentlessly threatened and browbeat them should they go through with her speaking engagement.  Ahmed’s kind loath open dialogue and ruthlessly vilify anyone who speaks the truth about the violence and extremism so prevalent in Islam.  They vilified Geller and threatened among other things to march against the synagogue.  The GNS’s officials could have resisted these threats; they could have championed free speech loudly.  They could have weathered that storm and stood courageously and righteously against these present-day Nazis who were trying to deny their First Amendment rights.  Instead, they acquiesced; and now they will never be able to live down their utter spinelessness.  As Steve Goldberg so aptly put it, “They have disgraced their congregation, their families, and the entire Jewish community.”

Here is the Great Neck Synagogue Executive Committee’s statement:

As the notoriety and media exposure of the planned program this Sunday have increased, so has the legal liability and potential security exposure of our institution and it’s [sic] member families. In an era of heightened security concerns it is irresponsible to jeopardize the safety of those who call Great Neck Synagogue home, especially our children, even at the risk of diverting attention from a potentially important voice in the ongoing debate. Accordingly, the Great Neck Synagogue Men’s Club will no longer be sponsoring the appearance of Pamela Geller this coming Sunday, and no event will be taking place in our facility.

The Great Neck Synagogue could have dealt with the harassment and intimidation in any number of ways.  Notably, they could have widely publicized it; but instead, Geller herself was the one to expose it on her website Atlas Shruggs along with Tom Trento of The United West.  In the face of threats to march on the synagogue, they could have rallied the community to band together and stand firmly against the oppression of free speech.  They could have counter-protested.  If they indeed felt their children were threatened, they could have requested police protection and, again, exposed those (illegal) threats publicly.

Robert Spencer of Jihad Watch writes:

[T]he precedent is reinforced that smear campaigns work, and that all the foes of freedom have to do in order to shut down any voices opposed to them is mount a campaign simultaneously vilifying and demonizing their targeted speaker and showing the host the price he will have to pay for featuring the target.

I have lived and worked in Great Neck, and family of mine lived there for nearly their whole lives.  It is a very strong community.  I can’t help but remember on 9-11 the train station parking lots filled with cars that would never be retrieved by those who worked in the Twin Towers.  Great Neck, like many New York City suburbs, was devastated by that terrorist attack.  It is shocking that they would capitulate to the terrorist tactic of threatening violence and protest to stifle free speech.  On second thought, maybe it isn’t so shocking.  Great Neck is also a very liberal community, prone to the fake clichés of diversity, tolerance, and Islam as a religion of peace.  Perhaps it is more surprising that they stood against the threats as long as they did.  But by surrendering, they have betrayed themselves, each other, and Jews the world over.  They have betrayed everyone who has fought to protect and defend their First Amendment rights, and they have paved the way for more such intimidation to take place.

As Hitler was gathering power in 1930’s Germany, the Jews and others kept giving their oppressors the benefit of the doubt.  They let the Nazis take their weapons, close their businesses, and shove them into ghettos.  They told themselves it was just temporary.  So many didn’t fight back and didn’t realize the mortal threat against them until the camp gates slammed home.  Anti-Semitism is more prevalent today than ever.  Muslim extremists all over the world proclaim their hatred of the Jews and all freedom-loving peoples; they call daily for the destruction of Israel and the Jews.  They teach their children to hate, not to live in peace with their neighbors.  They thrash the right to speak freely worldwide; they demand the slaughter of anyone who disagrees with them or speaks out against them.  We know their aim.  Stopping free speech and open dialog is just the beginning of subjugation.  Yielding to their threats while we are still in a free America is reprehensible.  Shame on the officials of the Great Neck Synagogue.

You can write to the Great Neck Synagogue at 26 Old Mill Rd. Great Neck, NY 11023

Photo credit: Lauren Manning (Creative Commons)

California’s Attack On Boy Scouts Continue

Boy Scouts of America SC Californias Attack on Boy Scouts Continue

SACRAMENTO, Calif., April 11, 2013 /Christian Newswire/ — Senate Bill 323 came one step closer to becoming California law as the bill easily passed out of the California Senate Governance and Finance Committee on a party-line vote. Should SB 323 become law, it would break new ground in using the tax system to punish those who are disliked by LGBT activists.

SB 323 would remove certain State tax exemptions for public charity youth organizations that discriminate on the basis of gender identity, race, sexual orientation, nationality, religion, or religious affiliation.

While the target of this bill is the Boy Scouts (the Committee’s official analysis says “it is clearly aimed at them”), its effects are much wider than that.

According to Karen England, Executive Director of the Capitol Resource Institute, “SB 323 requires that youth sports leagues allow children of any gender to participate on any team. But the State intends to reach beyond the playing field and into locker rooms, showers and bathrooms also. This bill’s prohibition on gender identity discrimination means that a boy claiming gender confusion is permitted to share those facilities with girls. Any attempt at segregation risks a fine in the form of taxes.”

At the Committee hearing, proponents of the new law seemed genuinely angry that California’s various pronouncements about sexuality are not being observed by certain youth organizations. “They seem to believe that the Legislature’s labeling of so many things as discrimination should settle the issue,” said England. “Of course they are wrong on the law and they have misjudged public opinion.”

In the landmark case of Boy Scouts of America, et al. v. Dale, the United States Supreme Court determined that the First Amendment right of “expressive association” trumped the laws of a state dealing with this same type of discrimination. The Boy Scouts were allowed to deny an openly homosexual man a leadership position in a local Scout troop, even though the laws of the State declared such a denial to be impermissible discrimination.

According to England, “The public seems to agree with the Supreme Court. If a mother says she wants to choose the role models for her 12 year-old when sending him to a voluntary club, most of us do not equate her with the racist bent on bringing back segregation. We get it that tolerance is a two way street. And we are a little unnerved by the idea that those who currently hold political power in our State might now use that power to bankrupt any organization that does not agree with them.”

“It is ironic that so many of those who are demanding that individuals be able to marry the one they choose would at the same time deny the right of the individual to simply choose his Scout leader,” said England.

Christian Newswire

 

Contact: Karen England,
Capitol Resource Institute,
916-212-5607,
Kengland@capitolresource.org

Photo Credit: Hoffman Estates, IL