Week in Review: 5.2016

Del Tackett

Jan 31, 2016

A survey of teenagers released this week reveals they average eleven hours per day in front of a screen: smartphone, television, gaming. Most of the television time is spent streaming via Netflix. Top apps are Instagram and Twitter. Top presidential pick: Bernie Sanders.
Hard to imagine how the Hillary Hoax could get worse. Now the FBI says that there are emails so classified and so damaging that they cannot be released even with redacting. This is most likely because the information is coming from human agents and releasing the emails would endanger not only their lives and others lives, but it would damage the methods, means, and infrastructure we use to gather that intelligence. Again, any mere mortal would have been cuffed and either in jail or facing charges. But, again, we are not dealing with a mere red mortal, but a blue mortal which Blue Media will protect until it appears they will damage themselves if they do not act. How deeply unfortunate that we have lost the media as an unbiased watchdog.
News out of Maryland reveals that a public high school forced students to profess the Islamic statement of faith. When a father learned that his Christian child was being forced to acknowledge that there is no God but Allah and Mohammed is Allah’s messenger, he called to “opt” his child out. The vice-principal called back and told him that not only could his daughter not opt out but she would also receive zeroes if she didn’t do the assignments, even if they violated their family’s religious beliefs. The father, a Marine veteran, was then banned him from the school property. It’s possible that the Marine may have said something a little blunt, which I might of as well, but he contends he never threatened any physical harm to anyone. This is all now in the stage of a lawsuit filed on behalf of the parents by Thomas More Law Center. When the State takes control of the schools, it usually doesn’t bode well for freedom.
President-King Obama has issued another royal decree that the federal government will demand male/female pay-scale data from a hundred thousand of the largest U.S. businesses. This decree carries the ominous threat of federal investigation if they aren’t paying their employees according to how the federal government wants them to be paid. The Federal Arm is getting longer and stronger by the day.
The Obama Federal Health decree has reached the end of its patience. Your time has run out. If you don’t have health insurance, even if you don’t want health insurance and would prefer to pay as you go, the Kingdom is going to punish you. The “conform or else” deadline is midnight tonight. It actually would have been so much more dramatic and appropriate if it had been “high noon” for you to surrender and buy into the federal plan. If not, you are going to be fined $695 per adult and $347 per child. A family of four, therefore, will get fined $2084 OR 2.5% of their “household” income, whichever is “greater”. If you are in the upper-middle income bracket, it could be $3000 or more. So, even though you might think that it is a better deal for you to “self-insure”, the Kingdom has decreed you will be punished unless you bow down and pay into the “system”. Worse, if you are a lower income family but in conscience believe this is wrong, your family will still have to come up with the 2 grand fine for your failure to bow the knee. For those who are still familiar with the Founders, take the time to craft a short "letter to the editor" that might have come from their quills on this.
Bernie Sanders answered the “God” question this week, although he hasn’t been mum on it in the past. He response was “I think everyone believes in God in their own way. To me, it means that all of us are connected, all of life is connected, and that we are all tied together.” This actually falls way short of The Force. It is more like the Hollywood grab a hand, pass a Coke, and sing ‘we are the world’ kind of thing. But, it is much more honest that Donald Trump trying to convince evangelicals that he is one of them by holding up a Bible that his mom gave him when he was a little boy.
As most people expected, Iran went on a “giga” buying spree after we set them lose from sanctions and opened access to their gold vaults via Obama’s unconstitutional treaty. They bought 118 Airbus aircraft and a lot of contracts for steel, energy and shipbuilding. When you bring such big money, even the Romans capitulate. They covered up the their statue’s “immodest” parts so as not to be “offensive” to the guys with the gold. The biggest deal, however, was made with energy giant Total to guarantee purchase of 200,000 barrels of Iranian crude oil per day. Keep your eye out for a further collapse in oil prices and big damage to the U.S. oil industry...and, worst of all, the eventual nuclear capability of Iran. In my estimation, this is going to be one of the greatest foreign policy blunders in the history of the U.S. A Senate with any backbone would have called the President-King on the carpet for this. It was a law-breaking deal.
Russia is testing the waters again. Friday they sent a fighter-bomber (SU-34) into Turkey’s airspace. This is similar to what they did two months ago when Turkey shot it down. These are win-win actions by the Russians. If Turkey and NATO do nothing, then the Russians learn something valuable. If Turkey shoots or even brings it down, they gain further justification for military advances in Syria and elsewhere. The telltale is that Putin didn’t respond to either Turkey’s President Erdogan or NATO’s Secretary General Stoltenberg. It is in his best interest not to engage in a conversation with either. He is too busy moving his pieces into place.