OUR RIGHTS YESTERDAY, TODAY AND TOMORROW

OUR RIGHTS YESTERDAY, TODAY AND TOMORROW

BYRON MCCAULEY @byronmccauley

Eight days after the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor, half of all Americans tuned into an hour long radio broadcast to commemorate the 150th anniversary of the Bill of Rights.

I’m glad I heeded the advice of a wise friend who encouraged me to listen to it the other day, as we reflected on the 21st century political and social climate. I hope you will do the same.

“We Hold These Truths” was a theatrical production featuring some of the day’s most notable entertainers, including Jimmy Stewart, Orson Welles and Rudy Vallee, and it was broadcast on every major radio network. Writer Norman Corwin won a Peabody Award for the work. He was on a train to California when he heard about the attack on Pearl Harbor and wired President Franklin Roosevelt to ask if the show was still on. Reports said Corwin received a wire the next day: “The President thinks it’s more important now than ever to proceed with the program.”

Imagine that. An ironic confluence of events: America being officially drawn into World War II to fight against world tyranny, and the celebration of amendments to codify personal rights and freedoms. No wonder 63 million people tuned in that day.  Surely Americans, horrified and uncertain about the future needed reassurance that our Democracy remained strong. They needed to hear familiar voices in real time in the roles of representatives making their cases to cement liberty and freedom for future generations in all their diversity. They needed to know that their America stood for liberty and freedom.

Today, on the cusp of 225 years after those first 10 amendments were ratified, it is useful to be reminded of the power of the Bill of Rights, why the amendments exist and whom they protect – even as personal and religious freedoms appear threatened by those running for the nation’s highest office.

There are other, pressing social issues that have some people wondering whether the application of the Bill of Rights is fair in this modern-day world. These issues have become personified in street protests over law enforcement actions against citizens, angst over labor protection and government overreach.

Technology has made the world much smaller today than it was in 1941. Messages can travel fast and loud. And from where I sit, civility has been crowded by anger and obstinacy. Too many of us are too eager to demonize people over race, class and religion.

However, the ideals reflected in the Bill of Rights are among the reasons America remains a beacon on a hill.

More than 225 years ago, without benefit of a crystal ball, a group of men began to forge a document that cements liberty and freedom today. It shall endure.

You can listen to a YouTube version of “We Hold These Truths” at http://bit.ly/1UiFpBm

THE THREE BIG THREATS THE U.S. & THE WORLD MUST FACE

THE THREE BIG THREATS THE U.S. & THE WORLD MUST FACE

JOHN PEPPER

John Pepper is a former CEO and chairman of Procter & Gamble and also served as chairman of the Walt Disney Company.

Ian Kershaw’s magisterial new history of Europe from 1914-1949, To Hell and Back, reminds us that during the 40-year period from 1914 to 1945, Europe came close to self destruction in two world wars and an economic depression that cost over 50 million lives.

Yet, defying centuries of internecine warfare and history, Europe came together in the second half of the 20th century to form organizational constructs (NATO, ECM, etc.) that make the prospect of another war between the European nations inconceivable.Yes, tensions still exist: economically and socially. And will continue to. But the common interests were so clear and the bonds now so strong that war is not conceivable.

Today, in the early years of the 21st century, I believe our civilization faces a question not dissimilar to what was faced in the 20th century: “Will we allow civilization and the world as we know it and want it to be, to self-destruct?”

This may strike the reader as a needlessly draconian question. I do not think it is.

What are the risks to our civilization as we know it? I believe there are three.

One is the threat of fundamentalist driven terrorism seeking to expand its reach across borders and annihilate “non-believers” via a new caliphate.

The second is the threat of nuclear disaster. Let us not allow the half century which separates us from the first hand ravage of the hydrogen bomb to disguise the annihilation to civilization which will result from atomic warfare. To our knowledge, we are the only celestial body with life as we know it. The possibility of our ending it is in our hands.

The first and second threats are related for a doomsday scenario is having a nuclear device in the hands of terrorists.

The third threat, while less immediate is no less real: climate change which would cripple life as we know it on earth.

It is clear that confronting and curtailing these threats will require nations to work together as they have not before. Without trying to identify an exhaustive list, these nations must include the United States, Russia, China, Western Europe, Japan, Saudi Arabia and India.

There are those who will object to Russia and China being included, attributing to these nations the intent to expand their geographic reach. The evidence that this is their intent is frail, defies what their leaders assert and what is in their own best interest.

Neither  China or Russia are driven today by a mission which seeks to convert other nations to a given ideology (unlike Germany under the Nazis or ISIS today). Neither have a need for more land. Like the United States and Western Europe, they are threatened by ISIS. Yes, their values, their economic and judicial systems will not be identical to ours. Corruption may exist at higher levels. And they will look for good relations with neighboring countries just as we in the United States always have with countries near our own.

But the commonalities of their interests – preserving peace and safety for their citizens, being treated with respect – will be far greater than the differences.

Just as world leaders following World War II had the wisdom to bring together organizational coalitions to normalize cooperation and the creation of stronger bonds so must the world leaders do that today.

With regard to Russia, we had the opportunity to create an organizational construct which would have bound its interests those of the West post glasnost and perestroika in the early 1990’s.

We missed that opportunity. We have the opportunity again, confronted by the greatest threats we have had since that of Nazi Germany in the 20th century.

Today’s leaders will be judged by how well they seize this opportunity. I believe the future of civilization as we know it depends on it.

Scalia points to how colleges are misleading blacks:The perversion of higher education

Scalia points to how colleges are misleading blacks

By Walter Williams

Supreme Court Justice Antonin Scalia ran headlong into the leftist meat grinder by questioning whether college admission of blacks with academic achievement levels significantly lower than the rest of the student body is beneficial to blacks. His question came up during oral arguments in Fisher v. University of Texas, wherein the court will rule whether the use of race in college admission decisions violates the 14th Amendment’s guarantee of “equal protection of the laws” to all citizens.

Justice Scalia’s questions generated news headlines such as “Justice Scalia Suggests Blacks Belong at ‘Slower’ Colleges,” “Scalia questions place of some black students in elite colleges” and “Scalia and the misguided ‘mismatch’ theory.” Senate Minority Leader Harry Reid said, “It is deeply disturbing to hear a Supreme Court justice endorse racist ideas from the bench of the nation’s highest court.”

The issue for black parents is not whether their sons and daughters should be admitted to an elite college or one that is lower-ranked. The issue is whether their sons and daughters should be admitted to a college where they would not be admitted if they were white. The question for black parents and black people is: Which better serves our interests, a black student’s being admitted to an elite college and winding up in the bottom of his class or flunking out or a black student’s being admitted to a less prestigious college and performing just as well as his white peers? I would opt for a black student’s doing well and graduating from a less prestigious college. Think of it this way. Suppose you asked, “Williams, would you teach my son how to box?” I say yes, and after your son wins a few amateur matches, I set him up against an elite boxer like Mike Tyson or Lennox Lewis.

Your son may have the potential to be a world-class boxer, but he is going to have his career ended before he learns how to bob and weave.

It’s the same with any student – black or white. Pupils are less likely to succeed if they are placed in a fast-paced academic environment where their academic achievement levels do not begin to match those of their peers. Such students would have a greater chance of success in a slower- paced, less competitive environment, one more in tune with their preparation and where they might receive more personal help.

My recommendation to black parents is: Do not enroll your children in a college where their SAT score is 200 or more points below the average of that college. Keep in mind that students are not qualified or unqualified in any absolute sense. The nation has more than 4,800 colleges, meaning there’s a college for most anybody.

There are beneficiaries from admitting black students with little chance of performing at the level of other students. They are college presidents, administrators and campus liberals. Whether blacks graduate or have been steered into useless “Mickey Mouse” courses is irrelevant. Government race overseers are only counting colors. College administrators win kudos for achieving and celebrating “diversity,” not to mention the fact that they can keep government higher-education handouts.

Another group of beneficiaries is composed of black staff and faculty who are hired and create campus fiefdoms with big budgets based on the presence of black students. The number of black students enrolled is the key, not the number who graduate or wind up in useless “Mickey Mouse” courses or in the bottom of their classes. In fact, there is an element of perversity. The greater the number of blacks who are on academic probation or do not graduate the more justified are calls for greater budgets for academic support and student retention programs.

I have been asked: If elite colleges do not create lower admission standards, how are they going to have enough black students? My response is: That’s their problem. Black people cannot afford to have our youngsters turned into failures in order to support the agendas of diversity race hustlers and to lessen the guilt of white liberals.

Black people cannot afford to have our youngsters turned into failures in order to support the agendas of diversity race hustlers and to lessen the guilt of white liberals.

Crisis of Misinformation: Too much government breeds distrust

Crisis of Misinformation: Too much government breeds distrust

By Daily Bell Staff

The Misinformation Mess ... As Americans approach Election Year 2016, the crisis of misinformation is growing more and more dangerous. On issues from foreign policy to the economy, almost none of the candidates in the race appear to be addressing the real world, writes Robert Parry.

Dominant Social Theme: False flags? Nothing to see here. Let's move along.

Free-Market Analysis: Who is Robert Parry? He is editor of Consortiumnews.com, an online independent investigative journalism magazine founded in 1995, and an investigative reporter. We learn from his bio he "broke many of the Iran-Contra stories for The Associated Press and Newsweek in the 1980s." His latest book is America's Stolen Narrative.

This article was picked up from Consortium news, like many of Parry's articles, by Common Dreams, a well-known left-leaning site that publishes often about "the misinformation mess."

Our position has always been that the Internet Reformation (our term) was unstoppable in the short- and medium-term. We expected when exposed regarding perfervid implementations of directed history that the elites in some sense would take a "step back."

Instead, they have forged ahead like Ronda Rousey when she lost her title. Toward the end of the fight, she was leading with her face to get it over with.

In fact, the elites we cover regularly seem kinda, well ... punch-drunk. We've suggested that the growing mass of Internet exposés would reach a critical point eventually and that seems to be happening.

Robert Parry's article adds significantly to the accumulation of material leading readers on both left and right ends of the spectrum to question the official narrative. Bear in mind Parry comes from AP. Given what he's been through professionally, this article is remarkable.

Let's examine some excerpts.

Is it really possible to expect that the American people (as propagandized and misinformed as they are) could affect significant change through the electoral process, which is itself deeply compromised by vast sums of dark money from American oligarchs, while other super-rich Americans own the major media companies?

Good point about the current oligarchical structure.

As part of all this reassessment, there needs to be a coming-clean with the American people regarding what U.S. intelligence knows about a variety of key events, including but not limited to the Aug. 21, 2013 sarin attack outside Damascus, Syria; the Feb. 20, 2014 sniper attack in Kiev, Ukraine, which set the stage for the coup; and the July 17, 2014 shoot-down of the Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 over eastern Ukraine.

The fact that such events have been exploited for propaganda reasons – to blame U.S. "adversaries" – while the detailed knowledge of the U.S. intelligence agencies is hidden from the American people has deprived the public of an ability to make rational assessments about the larger policies. U.S. positions are driven by false or faulty perceptions, not reality.

These two gafs above are perhaps the most remarkable. When intelligence agency narratives are confronted to this extent, something is changing. The last time this happened was in the mid-20th century, and it provoked some convulsive changes.

One more astonishing statement: "Along with bringing rationality and reason back to U.S. foreign policy, a similar process of truth-telling could take place domestically."

He makes economic points, too, writing that the "core problem" of the US's shrinking middle class has to do with super profits from the new digital economy that should have been disbursed to everyone but have only gone to the "super rich."

This is where Parry begins to go wrong. Like most reporters, he doesn't seem to know enough about central banking or the dollar reserve currency to appreciate the US's true monetary manipulation.

It is easy to blame Wall Street but the real problem in the US and abroad is monopoly money printing and the judicial decisions that have created corporate bigness. He can't mention this because it will conflict with his less well-considered narrative about government activism.

By the end, Parry has gone off the rails completely. Here's his conclusion:

What prevents us from making the sensible move – i.e., dramatically increase taxes on the rich and put that money to use putting people to work on worthy projects – is Ronald Reagan's propaganda message that "government is the problem."

Such articles as Parry's, even if they get the solution wrong, are evidence of an evolving, Internet-related conversation. There are those in the libertarian and patriot community that doubt the efficacy of "talk."

We've never accepted this point of view. Enough "talk" can sink a culture's formative narrative. That's why David Cameron is currently trying to censor the Internet. China is trying to do the same thing. The operative word is "trying."

Hollow out the culture and the society itself collapses. That's why top Eurocrats are encouraging Islamic migration. Cultures change when narratives change.

The trouble our leaders are having today is overexposure. Already, too many people understand the manipulations that billions are subject to. Rather than bleed to death, some elites have decided to implement their longed-for internationalism rapidly now rather than slowly.

But what do you make of this, originally from Pakistani Samaa TV?

Pakistan TV Exposes Osama bin Laden Killing Hoax (Video) Posted on December 28, 2015 by Sean Adl-Tabatabai in Middle East, News ... Mohammad Bashir, an Abbottabad resident and neighbour to the bin Laden "compound", gives an extraordinary eyewitness account of what he says happened on 2 May 2011, when – according to the official story – US Navy SEALs assassinated Osama bin Laden.

In this rare interview, a Pakistan TV station talks to Bashir who gives an explosive account of what actually happened which completely contradicts the official story. This interview offers compelling evidence that the Obama administration's story about killing Osama is a complete hoax.

We wrote about this eyewitness testimony years ago, and while our report was consigned to the memory hole, here it is again.

Is it true? You decide. The larger point is that it is problematic. How much of this can the mainstream narrative stand? Russia claims forcefully that the US helped create and support ISIS, and those reports have circulated widely. It is well known that under the second Bush presidency, the US attacked Iraq for no reason, and there's so much more. And it never goes away. Not really.

It is, of course, possible that given current narrative difficulties, elites intend to induce maximum chaos. If you destroy one social narrative without letting another take its place, you can certainly make it more difficult for people to emerge from the morass of misinformation. They begin to mistrust everything.

Conclusion: 

But there are solutions. Contrary to Parry, we would argue those solutions begin with LESS government – not more. 

Immorality & contempt for liberty at root of U.S. woes: Myth of Democratic Socialism

Immorality & contempt for liberty at root of U.S. woes: Myth of Democratic Socialism

BY WALTER E. WILLIAMS

American immorality and contempt for liberty lie at the root of most of the political economic problems our nation faces.

They explain the fiscal problems we face, such as growing national debt and budget deficits at the federal, state and local levels of government.

Our immorality and contempt for liberty are reflected most in our widespread belief that government ought to forcibly use one American to serve the purposes of another American. Let’s examine it.

Suppose there is an elderly widow in your neighborhood. She does not have the strength to mow her lawn, clean her windows and perform other household tasks. Plus she does not have the financial means to hire someone to perform them. Here is my question: Would you support a government mandate that forces one of your neighbors to mow the widow’s lawn, clean her windows and perform other household tasks? Moreover, if the person so ordered failed to obey the government mandate, would you approve of some sort of sanction, such as a fine, property confiscation or imprisonment? I believe and hope that most of my fellow Americans would find such a mandate repulsive.

They would rightfully condemn it as a form of slavery, which can also be described as the forcible use of one person to serve the purposes of another.

Would there be the same condemnation if instead of forcing one of your neighbors to actually perform the household tasks, your neighbor were forced to fork over $50 of his weekly earnings to the widow? That way, she could hire someone to perform the tasks that she is unable to do. Would that mandate differ from one under which your neighbor is forced to actually perform the household tasks? I’d answer no. Just the mechanism differs for forcibly using one person to serve the purposes of another.

Most Americans would want to help this widow, but they would find anything that openly smacks of servitude or slavery deeply offensive.

They would have a clearer conscience if government would use its taxing authority; say an income tax or property tax. A government agency could then send the widow a $50 check to hire someone to mow her lawn and perform other household tasks. This collective mechanism would make the servitude invisible, but it wouldn’t change the fact that people are being forcibly used to serve the purposes of others. Putting the money into a government pot simply conceals an act that would otherwise be deemed morally repulsive.

Some might misleadingly argue that we are a democracy, in which the majority rules. But a majority consensus does not make acts that would otherwise be deemed immoral moral.

In other words, if the neighbors got a majority vote to force one of their number, under pain of punishment, to perform household tasks for the elderly widow, it would still be immoral. People like to give immoral acts an aura of moral legitimacy by noble sounding expressions, such as “spreading the wealth,” “income redistribution,” “caring for the less fortunate” and “the will of the majority.”

If one American can use government to force another to serve his purpose, what is the basis for denying another American the right to do the same thing? For example, if farmers are able to use Congress to give them cash for crop subsidies, why should toymakers be denied the right for Congress to give them cash subsidies when their sales slump?

Congress has completely succumbed to the pressure to use one American to serve the purposes of another. As a result, spending grows.

Today’s federal budget is about $3.8 trillion. At least two-thirds of it can be described as Congress taking the earnings of one American to give to another.

I personally believe in helping one’s fellow man in need. Doing so by reaching into one’s own pockets is laudable and praiseworthy. Doing so by reaching into another’s pockets is evil and worthy of condemnation.

Democrats false claim of the “Republican War on Women”, while supporting Islam & Sharia Law.

Democrats false claim of the “Republican War on Women”, while supporting Islam & Sharia Law.

Women's Rights Under Sharia Law

Overview

Sharia law is an Islamic legal system which provides an Islamic alternative to secular models of governance. Women in societies governed by sharia have far fewer rights than women in the West.

Muslim-majority societies have varying degrees of sharia integrated into their law codes, but almost all use sharia to govern family affairs. Sharia courts also exist in a number of Western countries, particularly to adjudicate family law for Muslim citizens.

Marital Rights

• A man is entitled to up to four wives, but a woman may only have one husband. In Western societies, a man typically only takes one wife.
• The husband (or his family) pays a “bride price” or "dower" (mahr, which is money or property paid to the bride) which she is entitled to keep. This “mahr” is in exchange for sexual submission (tamkin). Sexual submission is traditionally regarded as unconditional consent for the remainder of the marriage.
• A man can divorce his wife by making a declaration (talaq) in front of an Islamic judge irrespective of the woman's consent. Even her presence is not required. For a woman to divorce a man (khula), his consent is required.
• The husband is responsible for the financial upkeep of home (nafaqa).
• Wife beating permitted according to some scholars.
• There is no joint property; the man owns all property, (except for what the woman owned before the marriage).
• There is no specific minimum age for marriage, but most agree a woman must have reached puberty. Marriage as young as 12 or 13 is not uncommon in Muslim-majority countries, "Nearly 14 percent of Yemeni girls [are] married before the age of 15 and 52 percent before the age of 18."
• Muslim Feminists such as Dr. Elham Manea argue that the interpretation of sharia in the area of marriage amounts to discrimination, the type of which is prohibited under Western legal systems.

Public Rights

Most Muslim-majority countries are not democracies, so issues of who can vote do not apply. Nevertheless, women still have a significantly reduced role in the public sphere in these countries compared to men.

Conservative ideas of gender roles are taken very seriously in Islamic societies. Even in the West, where Muslim women have the same legal rights as men, they have been prevented from exercising those rights by their male relatives.

Under sharia, women have:

• Lesser inheritance rights compared to men
• Lesser status as witnesses

In Saudi Arabia, women are not allowed to drive.

Modesty Laws

Many Muslim women respect the requirement to dress modestly and choose to do so. However, in Muslim-majority countries, women do not necessarily have the choice not to do so. Failure to comply with modesty laws has been known to elicit extreme violence from police in places like Iran, Afghanistan and Sudan.

Garments women are required to wear range from a hijab (a scarf covering the hair and neck), an abaya (a cloak-like, loose-fitting overgarment), a niqab (a face veil worn in addition to the hijab and abaya) to a burqa (a full-body and head cloak which includes a netted rectangle over the eyes).

Violations of modesty laws are frequently met with violence in Muslim countries. Western women visiting Muslim-majority countries – for example, Saudi Arabia -- are advised to dress modestly and not to travel unaccompanied by a man.

Male Guardianship

Male Guardianship applies to all women whether married or not according to strict interpretations of sharia. In the event of the deaths of male relatives, it can result in mothers being legally subservient to their sons. Under sharia:

• A woman becomes subservient to her husband and needs his permission to: "leave the house, take up employment, or to engage in fasting or forms of worship other than what is obligatory."
• An unmarried woman is under the guardianship of her nearest male relative.

Human Rights Watch has issued a 50-page report condemning the situation of women in Saudi Arabia alone.

Who Is Affected by Sharia?

Any Muslim woman who undertakes to be married under Islam is bound to a greater or lesser extent by sharia, depending on where they live. Muslim women living in Western countries are bound by the laws of the countries in which they live as well, whereas women living in countries such as Saudi Arabia are bound by sharia alone. In case where sharia and the law of the land conflict, a woman is bound by sharia law.

Glossary of Terms Used in Sharia Law

Ghairah – Male sexual honor and jealousy.

Hayah – Female sexual modesty and shyness.

Khula – Female Initiated divorce. This is very difficult to obtain, and requires the consent of the husband. Technically a woman can appeal to an Islamic court to force the husband into a divorce, but in practice this rarely ever happens.

Mahr – Bride-price paid by the groom's family to the bride. This money becomes legally her property.

Nafaqa – Maintenance, the woman's right to be financially supported by her husband.

Nushuz – A legal state of disobedience if a wife does not obey her husband.

Talaq – 'Repudiation of the wife.' Male initiated divorce. This is extremely easy to obtain. The husband's declaration of talaq causes the divorce to come into effect.

Tamkin – Sexual submission of the wife to her husband. 

The malice of Lucifer joining FOX

The malice of Lucifer is such that he has always wanted to be not only known, but worshiped as God is worshiped, by angels and men. He even tempted Our Lord to worship him!

     Our words and efforts should echo the response of Christ Himself: "Be gone, Satan: the Lord thy God shalt thou adore, and Him alone shalt thou serve!" (Matt. 4:10)

     Now, see how Fox TV seems to plan to help Lucifer appeal to weak modern humanity in their scheduled series "Lucifer" for January, 2016.

• Fox's online "About The Show" presents the devil as "charming, charismatic and devilishly handsome."
• In the show - Lucifer refers to God like this: "Hey, he's my father, not yours. I can say whatever I want about the guy. I quit Hell because I was sick and tired of playing a part in Dad's plan. I believe in free will, not the tyranny of all his predestination hoo-ha."
• Lucifer continues: "Thank you! But I've been doing a fair amount of thinking. Do you think I'm the devil because I'm inherently evil or simply because dear ol' Dad decided I was? Is this a classic case of labeling? What do you think?"
• The film is quite demonic in its subtlety. In a nightclub, clips show plenty of gyrating, scantily clad dancers, sexual innuendos, glorify a party lifestyle, and portray Lucifer as a fun loving young man while God and his angel Amenadiel are no fun at all and don't relate to modern man.

         Like St. Michael, make no compromises with evil.  PROTEST To FOX NOW


 We must not allow Fox TV or anyone to get our children used to Lucifer.