America: The Virtues of Hard Power

U.S. Military MightArticle authored by Robert D. Kaplan of Stratfor Global Intelligence.  Article is courtesy of stratfor.com.

Hard power has not been in vogue since the Iraq War turned badly in about 2004. In foreign policy journals and at elite conferences, the talk for years has been about “soft power,” “the power of persuasion” and the need to revitalize the U.S. State Department as opposed to the Pentagon: didn’t you know, it’s about diplomacy, not military might! Except when it isn’t; except when members of this same elite argue for humanitarian intervention in places like Libya and Syria. Then soft power be damned. [Read more...]

The Real Voter Suppression of 2012 – National Review Online

VoteArticle was authored by John Fund and appeared on National Review Online.  Article is courtesy of nationalreview.com

The 2012 election season was filled with angry cries of “voter suppression,” almost all of them regarding attempts by states to require voter ID and otherwise improve ballot integrity. Bill Clinton warned that “there has never been — in my lifetime, since we got rid of the poll tax and all the other Jim Crow burdens on voting — the determined effort to limit the franchise that we see today.” Democratic-party chairwoman Debbie Wasserman Schultz said “photo-ID laws, we think, are very similar to a poll tax.” [Read more...]

Court Strikes Down Ban on Late-Term Abortion. But, Kill a Bald Eagle Egg…Go to Prison

week24-lanugo

Human Baby at 24 Weeks in the Womb

From the Los Angeles Times:

“Arizona’s ban on abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy except in a medical emergency was struck down by the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals on Tuesday.

A three-judge panel of the court said the law violated a woman’s constitutionally protected right to terminate a pregnancy before a fetus can survive outside the womb. “Viability” is generally considered to begin at 24 weeks. Normal pregnancies run about 40 weeks.

The judge wrote that “a woman has a constitutional right to choose to terminate her pregnancy before the fetus is viable.” [Read more...]

Study: White Americans More Likely to See Obama as Angry Than Non-White Americans – usnews.com

Obama angry-10Article authored by Elizabeth Flock and appeared in U.S News & World Report.  Article is courtesy of usnews.com

White Americans are more likely to see anger in the facial expressions of President Obama than non-white Americans are, according to a study from the University of Arkansas that will be published in the journal Political Psychology in July. [Read more...]

Strange Goings-On at the White House – National Review Online

Strange goings-on at the white house-1Article authored by John Fund and appeared on National Review Online.   Article is courtesy of nationalreview.com

A tight-knit inner circle plays all politics, all the time, while Obama remains disengaged.

The recent spate of Washington scandals has some liberals finally confessing in public what many of them have said privately for a long time. The Obama administration is arrogant, insular, prone to intimidation of adversaries, and slovenly when it comes to seeing that rules are followed. Indeed, the Obama White House is a strange place, and it’s good that its operational model is now likely to be finally dissected by the media. [Read more...]

The Embattled Obama Administration: Why These Are No Ordinary Scandals – WSJ.com

Obama ScandalsArticle authored by Peggy Noonan and appeared in The Wall Street Journal.  Article is courtesy of wsj.com

We are in the midst of the worst Washington scandal since Watergate. The reputation of the Obama White House has, among conservatives, gone from sketchy to sinister, and, among liberals, from unsatisfying to dangerous. No one likes what they’re seeing. The Justice Department assault on the Associated Press and the ugly politicization of the Internal Revenue Service have left the administration’s credibility deeply, probably irretrievably damaged. They don’t look jerky now, they look dirty. The patina of high-mindedness the president enjoyed is gone. [Read more...]

Obama, the Uninterested President – The Washington Post

Obama Bored-3Article authored by Dana Mibank and appeared in The Washington Post.  Article is courtesy of washingtonpost.com

President Passerby needs urgently to become a participant in his presidency.

Late Monday came the breathtaking news of a full-frontal assault on the First Amendment by his administration: word that the Justice Department had gone on a fishing expedition through months of phone records of Associated Press reporters. [Read more...]

Benghazi, IRS Create Perfect Storm Threatening Obama’s Credibility – National Journal

Obama frustrated-1Article authored by Ron Fournier and appeared in The National Journal.

When two storms collide, the weather gets hairy. For President Obama, the IRS and Benghazi stories converged this weekend for a self-inflicted tempest that threatens his credibility.

His people can’t get their stories straight. [Read more...]

Did Obama Release Embarrassing IRS Bombshell to Distract from Benghazi Hearing Crisis?

Benghazi HearingsArticle authored by Bob Unruh and appeared on WND.  Article is courtesy of wnd.com

The Internal Revenue Service under the Obama administration – described by Rep. Michele Bachmann, R-Minn., as the “most feared government agency” – admitted Friday it targeted conservative and tea-party groups during last year’s election because of their politics.

Bachmann, a former tax attorney, told WND in an interview the IRS admission means the credibility of the 2012 election is in doubt. [Read more...]

Website Apps