Obama Is Openly Colluding with the Enemy

Obama Is Openly Colluding with the Enemy

James Lewis

We are in the middle of a hot war in the Middle East, with constant terror attacks all over the world, including the United States, Europe, and Asia. The enemy is called violent Islam, or radical Islam, or fascist Islam, or reactionary Islam, or merely "orthodox Islam."

We constantly waste time quibbling about the name. But we know the enemy by now.

(And yes, there are plenty of Muslims who want peace, but who are too scared to speak out, with some brave exceptions I mention below. As long as the West colludes with violent Islam, peaceful Muslims will be too scared to speak out. As long as we fail to stand for freedom, we will be supporting the worst of the worst, who always terrorize their own populations first.

For fifty years, Muslims did not actively practice jihad against the West – until Jimmy Carter betrayed our ally the shah of Iran, and therefore empowered the first jihad-preaching Islamofascist regime in the world, the mullahcracy of Iran. Because Carter was the weak horse, millions of Muslims around the world sensed a change in the wind – and that is why jihad is now breaking out all over.)

The single most shocking fact today is that the U.S. government, under President Obama, is constantly colluding with the enemy.

Check out of the facts for yourself. Don't take anybody's word for it. Make your own informed decision. This is a question not of opinion, but of fact.

When a serving U.S. president has lost Foreign Policy magazine, the in-house trade union rag for the State Department, things have come to a bad pass. But here is Foreign Policy on Obama's "pivoting to Iran." 

Iran is now going nuclear, courtesy of Barack Hussein Obama.

But wait! Our good friend Recip Erdoğan of Turkey, "Obama's best friend in the Middle East" is now supporting ISIS – the worst mass murdering would-be regime on the Sunni side of the street.

Turkey has openly established recruiting stations for ISIS, called "IS consulates," and Obama's next "best friend" Qatar is feeding billions of dollars to ISIS. Meanwhile, the Muslim Brotherhood, Obama's biggest ideological ally, is also backing ISIS. Don't believe the cover story that ISIS just mushroomed up by a miraculous dispensation from on high.

You may not remember the name of Mohammed Elibiary, a top advisor to our Homeland Security folks. Mr. Elibiary is a big name among the Moobs (naturally). Patrick Poole has a nice summary of Mr. Elibiary's thoughts here. In a sane world, this man should be on our terrorist suspect list, but instead he is "advising" our Department of Homeland Security.

(And you remember Huma Abedin, another Moober loyalist, walking with Hillary with their heads devoutly covered over? Muslim Brotherhood money goes to the Clintons, the Carters, and the Obamas, and they all give real value for that money.)

The Moobers are a Muslim fascist cult going back to 1928, when the Mufti of Jerusalem was in an open alliance with Hitler, helping to send Arabs troops to fight for the Nazis.

In 1981 the Moobs assassinated Egypt's president, Anwar Sadat, for making peace with Israel.

In 2011 they were complicit in the overthrow of Hosni Mubarak, who was also trying to keep the Egypt-Israel peace treaty alive.

And today, in collusion with Obama, the Moobers are in open rebellion against the government of President El Sisi, the biggest peace advocate in the Arab world. (See below.)

All the signs therefore point to Obama as a major backer of ISIS on the one side, and of the Khomeinist nuclear-going tyranny on the other.

If they're really unspeakably evil, you can expect Obama to support them.

Obama's half-brother Malik Obama is a big Muslim Brotherhood money man. The MBs have espoused jihad against the modern world since 1928, when their organization was founded. Malik "oversees Muslim Brotherhood investments worldwide," and that means buying up politicians, like you-know-who. Malik is also a funder of Hamas, which has an identical war theology to ISIS's.

The Muslim Brotherhood assassinated President Anwar Sadat of Egypt forty years ago for making peace with Israel. After Obama pressured Egypt's longest-lasting peace-keeping president, Hosni Mubarak, into leaving office, at the beginning of the completely fraudulent "Arab Spring," a Muslim Brotherhood thug was "elected" president and started to purge the judiciary and military in Egypt.

Egypt's political elites revolted, and with the help of Saudi Arabia, they overthrew the Islamic fascists in favor of General El Sisi.

This administration still hates El Sisi and is still plotting with the Muslim Brotherhood against El Sisi.

Every single time, Obama backs the worst criminals against more civilized forces. Just look at the facts.

Don't think the Egyptians don't know what Obama is doing. In the Middle East, in Moscow and Paris, everybody knows what Obama is doing. Only the victims of media propaganda are still in denial.

Obama's collusion with undeniable evil is especially hard for Americans to believe, because it's emotionally painful to see your own president colluding with the worst mass murderers since the Nazis. Just keep looking at the facts.

The White House just lied its head off again, this time about the Taliban, who now are "not really terrorists." The Taliban knowingly protected Osama bin Laden while he was planning the 9/11/01 attacks on New York City, but they are "not terrorists." The Taliban tried to assassinate Malala Yousafzai (now winner of a Nobel Peace Prize) for advocating education for girls and women in Afghanistan, but they are "not terrorists." To Obama it's only Republicans who are terrorists. 

What Mr. Obama does not support is Muslims who want peace, and who are willing to risk their lives to say so.

The most prominent example of a pro-peace leader today is President El Sisi of Egypt, who just told his religious establishment at Al Azhar University in Cairo that Islam "needs a religious revolution."

Obama said nothing. Instead, he just keeps backing the most barbaric and disgusting ideology in the world.

Now the Iranian caliphate is on the march, just as surely as the Third Reich was on the march in Hitler's time.

Three high-ranking Iranian officers were just caught in a planning meeting with three Hezb'allah terrorist leaders, on the Syrian border just north of Israel. The Israelis caught wind of the meeting and bombed them to smithereens. Now the mullahcracy are boiling over with rage, but they are still afraid of Israel's nuclear arms and effective military. That is the role the United States should be playing: keeping a clear moral compass and destroying mass-murdering barbarians in a true alliance of civilized peoples. Millions of Muslims will rise up against their terror masters as soon as the United States signals a recovery of its moral center.

Israel defends itself like a pit bull. It will use nuclear weapons if it must. The Iranians know that, and in spite of all their glorification of martyrdom, they will not risk Israel's nuclear retaliation until they have overwhelming superiority.

Instead, they are going after Sunni apostates against the will of Allah, especially the Saudis and Egypt.

What is emerging today is a ferocious Shi'a-Sunni civil war, with Israel taking the side of Egypt and Saudi Arabia. Obama is supporting truly evil forces, those who kill women and children for the fun of it, like Boko Haram, the Islamofascist monsters who are now trying to conquer Nigeria.

The Iranians now surround Israel on two of three sides, and ISIS is attacking in the Sinai Desert. But if you look at the map, you can see the real strategic targets of the Iranians, now with Obama's collusion. Iran's real target is the two holy cities of Mecca and Medina. Those were Ayatollah Khomeini's real target when he tried to stir up a rebellion against the Saudis during the Hajj, when Iranian pilgrims attacked the Saudis forty years ago. The Islamic "Republic" is a war theocracy, and its aims are always conquest of the infidels and the apostates. To Iran, Saudi Arabia is worse than Israel and the West, since the Sunni Muslims abandoned the true way of Allah.

(Naturally, ISIS and the Saudis say the same thing about the Iranians.)

So even Israel and America are only secondary targets. Each half of the Muslim world considers the other half to be betraying Allah. Once the Iranians control Mecca and Medina, they believe that all Muslims will fall under their control.

From the actions of this administration, Obama agrees with them.

ICE: Transgender Illegals Guaranteed ‘Right to Hormone Therapy’ in Detention

ICE: Transgender Illegals Guaranteed ‘Right to Hormone Therapy’ in Detention

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Illegal immigrants at a detention facility in Los Angeles, Calif. (AP Photo)

(CNSNews.com) – An official with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement testified Friday during a discussion on immigration detention facilities, hosted by the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights, that transgender individuals are guaranteed “a right to hormone therapy.”

“With respect to treatment while in detention - the medical care standard - the standards guarantees a right to hormone therapy for individuals who need it for treatment, and even in facilities that are not covered by that standard. Our ICE House Service Corps is very vigilant on that issue to ensuring that individuals receive necessary hormone therapy,” said Kevin Landy, assistant director of the ICE office of detention policy and planning.

According to Commission Chairman Martin Castro, the Department of Homeland Security is the “largest agency that has custody of transgender individuals.”

As CNSNews.com previously reported, the 2011 Operations Manual ICE Performance-Based National Detention Standards – ICE’s operations manual for its detention facilities – offers guidelines for transgender illegal immigrants who have been receiving hormone therapy before they are apprehended.

“Transgender detainees who were already receiving hormone therapy when taken into ICE custody shall have continued access,” the reportsaid. “All transgender detainees shall have access to mental health care, and other transgender-related health care and medication based on medical need. Treatment shall follow accepted guidelines regarding medically necessary transition-related care.”

Obama Budget Creates Second Death Tax

Obama Budget Creates Second Death Tax

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The Obama budget calls for a stealth increase in the death tax rate from 40% to nearly 60%. Here's how it works:

Under current law, when you inherit an asset your basis in the asset is the higher of the fair market value at the time of death or the descendant's original basis. Almost always, the fair market value is higher.

Under the Obama proposal, when you inherit an asset your basis will simply be the descendant's original basis.

Example: Dad buys a house for $10,000.  He dies and leaves it to you. The fair market value on the date of death is $100,000. You sell it for $120,000. Under current law, you have a capital gain of $20,000 (sales price of $120,000 less step up in basis of $100,000). Under the Obama plan, you have a capital gain of $110,000 (sales price of $120,000 less original basis of $10,000).

There are exemptions for most households, but this misses the larger point: the whole reason we have step up in basis is because we have a death tax. If you are going to hold an estate liable for tax, you can't then hold the estate liable for tax again when the inheritor sells it. This adds yet another redundant layer of tax on savings and investment. It's a huge tax hike on family farms and small businesses.  

It's like a second death tax (the first one has a top tax rate of 40% and a standard deduction of $5.3 million/$10.6 million for surviving spouses). Conceivably, an accumulated capital gain could face a 40% death tax levy and then a 28% capital gains tax on what is left. Do the math, and that's an integrated federal tax of just under 60% on inherited capital gains.

"The national death tax dates to World War I. Most states have abolished their state death tax. They know the death tax is simply yet another layer of taxation on the life savings of Americans," said Grover Norquist, president of Americans for Tax Reform. "Heck, Sweden abolished its death tax a decade ago. The world has learned from failure and moved on. Obama thinks he is being left-wing.  He is just showing his age."

Federal Government Issued Nearly 5.5 Million Work Permits to Foreign Nationals Since 2009

Report: Federal Government Issued Nearly 5.5 Million Work Permits to Foreign Nationals Since 2009, by Ryan Lovelace, National Review

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More than 5.46 million foreign nationals received work permits from the federal government since 2009, according to a new reportfrom the Center for Immigration Studies. Data uncovered from the U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services agency reveal that approximately 982,000 work permits were given to illegal immigrants and other foreign nationals unqualified for admission, most of whom crossed the border without inspection. USCIS is the agency within the Department of Homeland Security responsible for issuing work permits and processing applications related to President Obama’s executive action on immigration. On Tuesday, the Senate is scheduled to vote on a bill that funds DHS, while blocking funding that would allow USCIS to implement the president’s executive action. 

The remarkable number of work permits granted by the federal government to law-breaking aliens better explains how all net jobs growth since 2007 has gone to immigrants. The government issued approximately 1.7 million work permits since 2009 to aliens whose status was not known, not recorded, or not disclosed by USCIS, according to the report. The report says employment is not authorized by law for approximately 1.2 million immigrants who collected work permits while having a temporary visa status. And the data show that approximately 1,200 new work permits went to unlawful entrants who were denied asylum, were suspected of using fraudulent documentation, were stowaways, or were refused at a port of entry. 

Approximately 1.1 million legal immigrants and 700,000 guest workers enter the country every year along with the millions of foreign nationals that have received work permits from the federal government, according to a statement from CIS. “I was astonished at the huge number of work permits that are being issued by the Obama administration outside the legal immigration system through executive discretion, especially at a time of high unemployment and stagnant wages,” said Jessica Vaughan the director of policy studies at CIS in a statement. “Besides the effect on the American worker, it encourages and rewards more illegal immigration.”

THE EMERGING REPUBLICAN ADVANTAGE

The idea of an enduring Democratic majority was a mirage. How the GOP gained an edge in American politics—and why it’s likely to last.

BY JOHN B. JUDIS

Ever since the Republican triumph in November, Democrats have been casting around for rationalizations. One theory, espoused by President Obama, blamed the party's dramatic loss on the simple fact that too many Senate races had taken place in conservative states. "This is probably the worst possible group of states for Democrats since Dwight Eisenhower," Obama remarked on Election Day. Other analysts pointed to the "six-year itch"—which often condemns the party of a second-term president to defeat during the midterm elections. Still others chalked up the results to the fact that midterm elections (with their low turnout) inherently favor Republicans, while presidential elections (with their high turnout) inherently favor Democrats. "We have two separate Americas voting every two years," wrote Markos Moulitsas Zuniga, the founder of Daily Kos. "And Democrats can win easily with the one, and Republicans can win easily with the other."

Indeed, in the wake of the midterms, the Center for American Progress optimistically predicted that, if 2016 voting patterns resemble those from 2012, the rising number of voters of color "will not only make it easier for Democrats to win states that they previously won in 2012. These demographic changes are also creating an opportunity for Democrats to win back states they lost in 2012."

None of these observations are wrong, as far as they go. It is undeniable, for instance, that the current Democratic coalition does better in presidential years than it does in midterm elections. Yet all of these explanations have a common problem: They obscure the possibility that 2014 was not an isolated event but rather the latest manifestation of a resurgent Republican coalition.

American parties routinely go through periods of ascendancy, decline, and deadlock. From 1896 to 1930, the Republican Party reigned supreme; from 1932 to 1968, the New Deal Democrats dominated; following a period of deadlock, the Reagan Republicans held sway during the 1980s. After the parties exchanged the White House, Democrats appeared to take command of American politics in 2008. In that election, Obama and the Democrats won not only the White House but also large majorities in the Senate and House, plus a decided edge in governor's mansions and state legislatures.

At the time, some commentators, including me, hailed the onset of an enduring Democratic majority. And the arguments in defense of this view did seem to be backed by persuasive evidence. Obama and the Democrats appeared to have captured the youngest generation of voters, whereas Republicans were relying disproportionately on an aging coalition. The electorate's growing ethnic diversity also seemed likely to help the Democrats going forward.

These advantages remain partially in place for Democrats today, but they are being severely undermined by two trends that have emerged in the past few elections—one surprising, the other less so. The less surprising trend is that Democrats have continued to hemorrhage support among white working-class voters—a group that generally works in blue-collar and lower-income service jobs and that is roughly identifiable in exit polls as those whites who have not graduated from a four-year college. These voters, and particularly those well above the poverty line, began to shift toward the GOP decades ago, but in recent years that shift has become progressively more pronounced.

The more surprising trend is that Republicans are gaining dramatically among a group that had tilted toward Democrats in 2006 and 2008: Call them middle-class Americans. These are voters who generally work in what economist Stephen Rose has called "the office economy." In exit polling, they can roughly be identified as those who have college—but not postgraduate—degrees and those whose household incomes are between $50,000 and $100,000. (Obviously, the overlap here is imperfect, but there is a broad congruence between these polling categories.)

The defection of these voters—who, unlike the white working class, are a growing part of the electorate—is genuinely bad news for Democrats, and very good news indeed for Republicans. The question, of course, is whether it is going to continue. It's tough to say for sure, but I think there is a case to be made that it will.

AMERICAN POLITICAL parties are informal coalitions of interest groups, social and economic classes, nationalities, and regions. When a voting bloc shifts from one party to another—or when a voting bloc within a party changes in size—it can often spell the beginning or end of a party's dominance. The GOP's success in the 1980s, for instance, was driven in large part by the movement of white working-class voters out of the Democratic Party and into the Republican Party—in the North as well as the South. Meanwhile, the success of the Democrats in the 1990s and in 2006 and 2008 was based on the growth of the minority vote (from 13 percent of the electorate in 1992 to 26 percent in 2008); the continuing movement of women, particularly single women, into the Democratic column; and the support of professionals, who were once the most Republican of occupational groupings. (Professionals range from nurses and teachers to doctors and architects; in exit polls, they can be identified roughly as voters who possess postgraduate degrees.)

But the Democratic success of recent decades was not based only on shifts among minorities, women, and professionals. To win elections, Democrats have still needed between 36 and 40 percent nationally of the white working-class vote—which, in practice, meant totals in the twenties or even the teens in the South, and near-majorities in many Northern and Western states. At one time, unions had provided a link between many of these voters and the Democratic Party. This advantage started to dwindle in the 1970s as private-sector unions began to shrink. Nevertheless, on a promise of prosperity, Bill Clinton got about 40 percent of the white working-class vote in 1992 and 1996, and Obama got 40 percent in 2008.

Bill Clinton won a narrow plurality of middle-class voters in 1992 and 1996. (Dirck Halstead/The LIFE Images Collection/Getty Images)

Democrats also needed to hold their own among middle-class voters. Reagan and George W. Bush handily won this demographic, but Clinton won a plurality of these voters in 1992 and 1996, and Obama won voters with college (but not postgrad) degrees by 50 percent to 48 percent in 2008. In House races in 2006, Democrats split these voters, then carried them 49 percent to 47 percent in 2008.

From the 2008 to the 2012 presidential elections, Democrats maintained their core coalition—the Hispanic vote for Obama even went up 4 percentage points in 2012—but their support among both white working-class and middle-class voters began to shrink. After getting 40 percent of the white working-class vote in 2008, Obama got only 36 percent in 2012. And after winning college-but-not-postgrad voters and middle-income voters in 2008, he lost both groups to Mitt Romney, by 51 percent to 47 percent and 52 percent to 46 percent, respectively.

The drop in midterm House races was even more precipitous. Democrats slid from 44 percent of the white working-class vote nationally in 2006 to only 34 percent in 2014, and from a 49-percent-49-percent split among college-educated voters in 2006 to a 54-percent-44-percent loss among these voters in 2014. They also dropped from a 50-percent-48-percent advantage among middle-income voters in 2006 to a 54-percent-44-percent deficit in 2014. Of course, Republicans have benefited from redistricting and from the concentration of Democratic voters in metro areas, but the Democratic losses among white working-class and middle-class voters are a prime reason that Democrats have had, and will continue to have, difficulty retaking the House.

The shift of these voters played a role in some of 2014's more surprising Senate races. In Colorado, where Democrat Mark Udall was upended by Cory Gardner, Udall lost 7 percentage points among white working-class voters from his 2008 victory over Robert Schaffer; 8 points among college-educated voters; and 11 points among voters making between $50,000 and $100,000. You might be tempted to write that off as the difference between running for the Senate in a presidential election year (2008) and in a midterm year (2014)—but consider that, from 2008 to 2012, Obama lost 8 points in Colorado among college-educated voters.

In Virginia, where highly favored Democrat Mark Warner eked out a win over underfunded lobbyist Ed Gillespie, Warner's totals among white working-class and middle-class voters plummeted between 2008 and 2014. He lost 25 points among white working-class voters, 16 among college-educated voters, and 24 among middle-income voters. Here again, these results can't be dismissed entirely as a presidential-versus-midterm phenomenon. In 2008, Obama won college-educated voters in Virginia by 50 percent to 49 percent and middle-income voters by 54 percent to 46 percent. He lost both groups in 2012.

In governor's races, the Republican edge among middle-class voters helped explain several surprisingly easy victories. In Wisconsin, incumbent Republican Scott Walker increased his advantage among middle-income voters from 56-percent-44-percent in 2010 to 57-percent-42-percent in 2014. In Ohio, incumbent Republican John Kasich increased his edge among voters with college, but not postgrad, education from 59-percent-38-percent in 2010 to 64-percent-32-percent. In Illinois, a dependably blue state, the shift of middle-class voters was a key factor in Republican Bruce Rauner's win over incumbent Democrat Pat Quinn. Rauner won college-educated voters by 60 percent to 36 percent—a 12-point shift from Quinn's margin in 2010.

Overall, Democrats have continued to get a lower percentage of the vote among white working-class voters than among middle-class voters. But during the Obama years, middle-class voters have moved away from the Democrats at a comparable—and, in a few instances, such as the Senate race in Colorado, a higher—rate than white working-class voters.

And while the white working-class vote has steadily shrunk as a percentage of the electorate, middle-class voters—as defined by education and income—have grown. In the 1980 presidential election, the white working class made up about 65 percent of the electorate; by 1988, it was 54 percent; by the 2008 election, it was just 39 percent. Ruy Teixeira and John Halpin estimate that by 2020, it'll be 30 percent of the electorate. On the other hand, voters with college degrees but not postgraduate degrees went from 26 percent of the electorate in 2004, to 29 percent in 2012, to 31 percent in the last election. And according to census estimates, turnout among middle-class voters is 10 percentage points or more higher than among working-class voters. So middle-class voters are a force to be reckoned with.

The core swing voters within the middle class are whites, who make up 70 to 75 percent of this group; but the voting patterns of minorities in this income bracket don't necessarily mirror the overall minority vote. The two most rapidly growing minority groups are Hispanics and Asians. According to a Pew study of the 2012 elections, Hispanic support for Obama was 13 percentage points lower among those with a college degree than among those without a college degree; and it was 23 points lower among those making more than $50,000 than among those making less than $50,000. (There is no comparable polling among Asian voters, but they are more likely to be college-educated and have higher incomes than other minorities—and than white voters. They recoiled against Romney in 2012, probably due to his anti-immigration rhetoric, but split their vote evenly in 2014 House races.)

Some Democrats believe that the party's support among millennial voters—the 18-to-29-year-olds who first went to the polls in the 2000s—and their successors can mitigate any losses among other groups. It is true that these voters were an important part of the original Obama coalition, but they are not quite as enthusiastic about the Democrats as they once were. In 2006, 60 percent of young voters backed Democrats in House races; that number hit 65 percent in 2008, fell to 60 percent in 2012, and slid to 54 percent in 2014. Moreover, an ongoing study by the Harvard Institute of Politics has found a steady deterioration in young voters' support for Democrats since its peak in 2008. "Our recent polling," the study wrote last fall, "shows that on a wide range of issues and questions, young voters ... now look very much like the electorate at large—pessimistic, untrusting, lacking confidence in government."

If Republicans are smart, they will nominate for president someone in the mold of George W. Bush in 2000.

TO MAKE AN educated guess about whether these trends will continue, it helps to look at how the white working class and middle class have behaved historically. White working-class voters began defecting from the Democratic Party in 1968. Initially, this was in response to civil-rights legislation and Lyndon Johnson's War on Poverty. But soon their opposition to government action on behalf of blacks had crystallized into a general opposition to government spending and taxes. According to a Democracy Corps study, white working-class voters overwhelmingly agree—by 12 percentage points more than the average voter—with the statement: "When something is run by the government, it is usually inefficient and wasteful."

For their part, middle-class voters have long been mistrustful of government. In a 2010 study based on the extensive General Social Survey conducted semiannually by the National Opinion Research Center, political sociologists Leslie McCall and Jeff Manza found that those with college but not postgrad degrees exhibited more marked opposition than any other educational grouping to government spending, and to policies that promised to redistribute income from the rich to the poor.

Before the Great Depression, middle-class voters had been a stalwart Republican constituency, and they moved back toward the Republican fold after World War II. They supported Reagan in 1980 in the wake of Carter-era stagflation and the tax revolt that began in California in 1978. Reacting to the 1991 recession, a plurality narrowly favored Bill Clinton in 1992 and 1996, but they began drifting to the Republicans in 2000 and favored Bush by 58 percent to 42 percent in 2004. In 2008, in the wake of the Iraq War and the Great Recession, they supported Obama; but in 2010—angry about Obama's stimulus program and believing that the Affordable Care Act had cost too much without truly benefiting them—they once again began returning to the Republican camp.

Middle-class voters tend, on average, to be more socially liberal than white working-class voters, and they have punished Republicans for taking harshly conservative stands on social issues. In the 2012 Senate race in Missouri, for instance, Democrat Claire McCaskill, running against antiabortion crusader Todd Akin, was able to win college-educated voters by 50 percent to 44 percent after losing them by 53 percent to 43 percent to Republican Jim Talent in 2006. She edged Akin among voters with household incomes between $50,000 and $100,000 after losing them, too, in 2006. (Perhaps some of this was due to the difference between a midterm electorate and a presidential-year electorate; but some of it was almost certainly due to Akin's infamous comments about "legitimate rape," which caused him to go from leading to trailing in the polls.)

Yet while middle-class voters are generally socially liberal, they oppose candidates on this basis only when those candidates take extreme positions. And so, when Republican politicians have soft-pedaled their views on abortion or guns or immigration, middle-class voters have largely ignored these issues in deciding whom to back—reverting to their natural tendency to focus on topics like taxes, spending, and the size of government. In 2014, Democrats in Arkansas, Colorado, Maryland, Ohio, and Virginia learned this the hard way when they centered their campaigns on their opponents' opposition to abortion rights or gun control—and lost.

America’s Anti-Israeli President

America’s Anti-Israeli President

01.29.15 - 5:55 PM | 

Peter Wehner

I wanted to add to Jonathan’s post on President Obama and Israel, but perhaps sharpen some points just a bit.

The Obama administration is unusually petty and sophomoric. The attacks leveled against Israel’s ambassador to the United States, Ron Dermer, are part of a troubling pattern in which officials in the Israeli government–including and especially Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu–are vilified.

No world leader has been treated by President Obama and his administration with the contempt they have shown Prime Minister Netanyahu–from this snub in 2010 to being called a “coward” and “chickens*** prime minister” by senior administration officials.

But the problem goes much deeper than a personality clash. President Obama is, quite simply, anti-Israel. In every conceivable situation and circumstance, the president and his aides give the benefit of the doubt not to Israel but to its enemies. This despite the fact that Israel is among America’s longest and best allies, democratic, lawful, takes exquisite steps to prevent civilian deaths in nations committed to destroying it, and has made extraordinary sacrifices for peace. No matter; the pressure that’s applied is always applied most against Israel–even when, as in last year’s conflict with Hamas, Israel was the victim of lethal attacks.

This is morally shameful. In a world filled with despotic leaders and sadistic and ruthless regimes–North Korea, Iran, Syria, Cuba, Eritrea, Sudan, Somalia, and on and on–which nation alone does Mr. Obama become “enraged” at? Which is the object of his disdain? Which provokes his white-hot anger?

Answer: Israel. Has it struck you, as it has struck me, that with every other nation, including the most repressive and anti-American on earth, Mr. Obama is careful never to give offense, to always extend the olive branch, and to treat their leaders with unusual deference and respect? Except for the Jewish State of Israel. It always seems to be in the Obama crosshair.

Because this attitude is so detached from objective circumstances and the actions of Israel and the actions of the adversaries of Israel, something else–and something rather disquieting–is going on here. Mr. Obama wouldn’t be the first world leader to have an irrational animus against Israel. He’s not even the first American president to have an irrational animus against Israel. (See: Jimmy Carter.) But it is fair to say, I think, that no American president has been this consistently hostile to Israel while in office or shown such palpable anger and scorn for it and for Israel’s leader.

Perhaps given President Obama’s history–including his intimate, 20-year relationship with the anti-Semitic minister Jeremiah Wright–this shouldn’t come as a surprise. But that doesn’t make it any less disturbing.

THE ONLY WAY OUT: A Pocket Guide to the Liberty Amendments

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While electing a President who is a Constitutional Conservative would be a great start, it is unlikely to reverse a century-long march of progressive radicals bent on centralization of power in Washington.

An Article V Convention process is, in my opinion, the only way out short of civil unrest. I will not explain it here, though you can find an excellent overview here.

In his bestselling book The Liberty Amendments, Mark Levin describes 11 Constitutional Amendments that devolve power from the increasingly authoritarian, central government back to the states that gave it birth. Hans A. von Spakovsky summarized Levin's amendments in a concise form, which are handy to use for reference purposes.

• Establish twelve-year term limits for members of Congress and the Supreme Court;
• Repeal the 17th Amendment;
• Allow either Congress or the states to overturn a Supreme Court decision within 24 months with a three fifths vote of the members of both houses or the states;
• Require a federal budget to be enacted by May or impose an automatic across-the-board 5 percent cut, and the budget may not exceed total tax receipts or 17.5 percent of GDP;
• Place a 15 percent limit on the amount of income taxes collected from natural and legal persons, change the tax-return filing date to the day before federal elections, and ban federal estate, value-added, or sales taxes;
• Require every federal agency to be reauthorized every three years in a stand-alone bill or else expire, and require a seven-member House committee to approve all regulations with an economic burden greater than $100 million within six months or cancel implementation of the regulation;
• Limit the Commerce Clause to preventing states from impeding commerce and trade between the states, and specify that it does not extend to activity within states (whether or not it affects interstate commerce) or to compelling an individual to participate in commerce;
• Extend the protection against seizure of private property to require compensation for regulations that reduce market value or interfere with the use of property in an amount exceeding $10,000;
• Change Article V so that any constitutional amendment, proposed by anyone, will be adopted if it is ratified by two thirds of the states;
• Require a 30-day waiting period between agreement upon the final version of any congressional bill (engrossment) and the final vote to approve it, and allow three fifths of the states to override any federal statute or any federal regulation with a cost exceeding $100 million within 24 months of passage or approval; and
• Require valid photo ID and proof of citizenship to register and vote in all federal elections, in person or by mail, and limit early voting to 30 days before the election (except for active-duty military personnel).

As of this writing, at least 30 states have initiated an Article V process. Your involvement with state politics can strengthen this initiative.

You can track national activities on the Convention of States front at ConventionOfStates.com. It's the only way out.