Lies, damn lies, and America’s astonishingly partisan, corrupt media.

Shawn Mitchell/ Townhall Columnist
 

The disgracefully slanted coverage of the trial of George Zimmerman is only the latest, prominent example of liberal media bias. Since the 2012 presidential election, America’s national media hasn’t let up. It’s pushing harder on its pro-liberal Democrat and anti-conservative Republican slant.

Consider Obamacare.

In recent days, organized labor turned harshly and vocally against the so called “Affordable Care Act.” Three leaders of America’s largest unions, including Jimmy Hoffa, wrote a jaw-dropping letter to Harry Reid and Nancy Pelosi. Excerpts of their arguments sound like a Republican opposition brief:

“When you and the President sought oursupport for the Affordable Care Act (ACA), you pledged that if we liked the health plans we have now, we could keep them. Sadly, that promise is under threat.

Right now, unless you and the Obama Administration enact an equitable fix, the ACA will shatter not only our hard-earned health benefits, but destroy the foundation of the 40 hour work week that is the backbone of the American middle class.”

“We have been strong supporters of you. In campaign after campaign we have put boots on the ground, gone door-to-door to get out the vote, run phone banks and raised money to secure this vision. Now this vision has come back to haunt us.”

“Time is running out: Congress wrote this law; we voted for you. We have a problem; you need to fix it. The unintended consequences of the ACA are severe. Perverse incentives are already creating nightmare scenarios.”

“The law creates an incentive for employers to keep employees’ work hours below 30 hours a week.

 Numerous employers have begun to cut workers’ hours to avoid this obligation, and many of them are doing so openly. The impact is two-fold: fewer hours means less pay while also losing our current health benefits”

“As you both know first-hand, our persuasive arguments have been disregarded and met with a stone wall by the White House and the pertinent agencies.”

“On behalf of the millions of working men and women we represent and the families they support, we can no longer stand silent in the face of elements of the Affordable Care Act that will destroy the very health and wellbeing of our members along with millions of other hardworking Americans.”

Days later, the Laborers International Union of North America (“International of North America?

Gee, do they consider themselves American? But I digress) followed up with a letter to President Obama, warning of “the destructive consequences” of Obamacare if it weren’t drastically modified.

Scathing criticisms of the president’s signature achievement from bulwarks of the liberal Democratic establishment should register high on America’s political Richter scale. Instead, they’re practically tree-fall in an empty forest, because the corrupt broadcast networks aren’t reporting them. Consider if America’s biggest business leaders had delivered comparable blasts at the economic policies of Presidents Bush, Bush, or Reagan. The network amplifiers would have blown their fuses, prolongedly.

The deception reaches deep into new media, as well. This weekend, AOL News informed its millions of viewers that Republicans are “still attacking Obamacare.” Yes, Republicans like Jimmy Hoffa and the Teamsters. The kids online don’t have a clue.

From Big Labor’s pains to the IRS’s depredations, the media con game shifts from silence to farce.

Congressional hearings last week revealed the scheme to target conservative groups was directed out of the Office of the IRS Chief Counsel. The Chief Counsel is one of only two agency employees who are appointed by Barack Obama! That bombshell might do more damage than all the explosions in “White House Down,” Hollywood’s flop valentine to Obama.

But it’s not the story from our leading talking heads, who, if they deigned to cover the story at all, either mocked Republicans’ clumsy questioning, or gave heroic, spotlight treatment to Ranking Member and Court-Distractor Elijah Cummings’ idiotic queries whether any witness had discovered a murder weapon with the president’s fingerprints on it, or something like that.

The script is universal and firm: Play stories that help Democrats hard, thoroughly, repeatedly. Stories that help Republicans, if they can’t be ignored, should be delivered quietly and, especially if they hurt the president, for no more than two news cycles at most.

Thus, a recent study by Obama’s own Justice Department concluding that gun control laws are ineffective in reducing gun violence likely will never cross the silky lips of Brian Williams.

An EPA study that failed to link fracking—hydraulic fracturing—with environmental contamination will not see the broadcast big screen.

Coverage of abortion must emphasize that pro-life is extreme and pro-choice is reasonable. You will never hear the network big-hairs try to pin down Democratic politicians on extreme positions or defying public opinion on things like late term abortion, partial birth abortion, parental consent, or many other vulnerabilities of the NARAL Democrats. It’s not in the script.

No, they’ll stalk and bait and quiz pro-life Republicans, eagerly hunting the next gaffe that can go big time.

The cynical, despicable thing about all this is that even though the public knows it’s being played by cosmopolitan liberals, the game still works. Average  Americans might not trust the media further than Barack Obama can throw a game-opening pitch, but the networks still set the agenda and control the subject.

Partisans of right and left seek their favored outlets. But the consciousness of the non-political middle is shaped by the legacy media, and the legacy media is a corrupt PR arm for the Democratic Party.

Boehner: Immigration Debate 'Not About Me'

Newsmax

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House of Representatives Speaker John Boehner refused on Sunday to say whether a comprehensive immigration overhaul should include a path to citizenship for undocumented immigrants, declaring that the House debate is "not about me."

Boehner, appearing on CBS's "Face the Nation," dodged repeated attempts to get him to spell out his personal views on a path to citizenship for up to 11 million illegal immigrants now in the United States, a major point of contention between the House and the Democratic-led Senate.

"It's not about me, it's not about what I want," said Boehner, an Ohio Republican. "This about allowing the House to work its will."

The Senate has passed a sweeping, bipartisan immigration bill that includes a pathway to citizenship, which Republican opponents have called an "amnesty" that would reward lawbreakers and attract more illegal immigrants.

Boehner said taking a personal stand on the issue would make it harder for him to find consensus on immigration in the House.

"If I come out and say, 'I'm for this and I'm for that,' all I'm doing is making my job harder," Boehner said. "My job in this process is to facilitate a discussion and to facilitate a process."

Boehner said the sweeping Senate bill would not pass the House and reiterated that the House would tackle the issue in smaller "chunks" that would include stricter provisions on border protection.

"We want to deal with this in chunks, chunks that the members can deal with and grapple with, and frankly chunks that the American people can get their arms around," he said.

With polls showing public approval of Congress at near record lows, Boehner was asked how he felt to have presided over the least productive and one of the least popular Congresses.

"We should not be judged by how many new laws we create. We ought to be judged on how many laws we repeal," Boehner said.

Republicans have made repeal of President Barack Obama's healthcare overhaul one of the party's top priorities.

Op-ed: 
'Stand Your Ground' discussions...fronts against the Second Amendment
By: Diane Sori

Because the ‘Gang of Black Racists’ (you know who they are) and the ‘small but vocal black militant minority’ did NOT get the verdict they wanted in the George Zimmerman case, charter member Jesse Jackson is now calling for a total economic boycott of Florida if we don’t get rid of our ‘Stand Your Ground’ laws. I call that blackmail and that is an arrestable offense as blackmail encompasses more than just the extortion of money, it also means to try and force or coerce someone into a particular action or to force someone to make a particular statement.

And that's just what Jackson is doing by demanding that Florida repeal ‘Stand Your Ground’ or else…he’s blackmailing the state…just wonder if he’ll pull this blackmail on the other 22 states that have some form of ‘Stand Your Ground’ in place.

Thankfully, our Governor Rick Scott (finally he did something right) did NOT agree to a special legislative session to consider “The Trayvon Martin Civil Rights Act,” an act which includes an end to police profiling and the repeal of our ‘Stand Your Ground’ laws…laws put on the books in 2005. This action was demanded by the group Dream Defenders, an activist group that has literally ‘occupied’ Governor Scott’s office since last Tuesday.

And in the other 22 states (Alabama, Alaska, Arizona, Georgia, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Michigan, Mississippi, Montana, Nevada, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Pennsylvania, South Carolina, Tennessee, Texas, Utah, and West Virginia) with ‘Stand Your Ground’ laws there does NOT appear to be any intention by their state legislatures to repeal or change the laws already on the books…laws which simply eliminate a person’s so-called ‘duty’ to retreat in the face of a serious physical threat. In fact, some states are actually trying to add some form of ‘Stand Your Ground’ to their state’s laws because their residents are demanding it as crime statistics increase.

And certain statistics do increase with ‘Stand Your Ground’ but with a caveat. Since the law was enacted here in Florida, justifiable homicides have increased from a yearly average of 13.2 between 2001 and 2005 to an average of 42 between 2006 and 2012, including a record 66 in 2012, according to figures recently released by the Florida Department of Law Enforcement. But…and this is very important…if ‘Stand Your Ground’ was NOT in place those justifiable homicides would have instead resulted in the MURDERS of those who now became the survivors of violent crime…became survivors because of ‘Stand Your Ground’.

And, whether Obama and crew like it or NOT in states with ‘Stand Your Ground’ laws public consensus is towards greater gun rights NOT lesser gun rights. And the states that have ‘castle doctrine’ laws…the right to defend one’s self with deadly force in the home…want to expand those laws to apply to businesses as well.

Now add into Jackson’s bloviations the bloviations of AG Eric Holder, who said last week at an NAACP convention in Orlando that ‘Stand your Ground’ “senselessly expands the concept of self-defense and increases the possibility of deadly confrontations” and you just know where his allegiances lie for Eric Holder does NOT get that self-defense in any form is just the act of defending one’s person when physically attacked…and that means the use of deadly force is allowed if need arises. He doesn’t get that it’s either the assailant who survives or the intended victim who survives, and I sure hope it’s the intended victim who survives…but I’m NOT sure Holder and his ilk wish the same.

As Chris W. Cox, executive director of the NRA’s Institute for Legislative Action says, “self-defense is not a concept, it’s a fundamental human right,” and how right he is.

In fact, even according to the Holy Bible it is NOT murder to defend oneself or one’s loved ones or property, for self-defense is a God-given right that God allows and encourages. In the Scriptures, while God does NOT outwardly encourage people to be either ‘hawks’ or ‘doves’ per se, when dealing with self-defense God just asks that they be reasonable. For example, Genesis 9:5-6 states, “…Whoever sheds the blood of man, by man shall his blood be shed...” which some Biblical scholars interpret to mean that self-defense is indeed allowed, and the Zimmerman case fits these words perfectly for Trayvon Martin pounded George Zimmerman’s head into the pavement drawing blood allowing Zimmerman to draw Trayvon's blood in self-defense.

And Proverbs 25:26 states that “A righteous man who falters before the wicked is like a murky spring and a polluted well.” And wouldn’t he (Zimmerman) be faltering before the wicked (Trayvon because he was anything but the sweet innocent child the media purported him to be) if he chose to be unarmed and unable to resist the assault threatening his life.

So simply put, ‘Stand Your Ground’ is in reality people defending their own lives when the police are NOT around to do so…and that is a very good thing as ‘We the People’ will NOT allow ourselves to be victims anymore…at least in 22 states we won’t. Nor will we allow ourselves to be dictated to by 13% of the population (blacks make up but 13% of America’s population and the ‘small but vocal militant black minority’ make up but a small percentage of that 13%) who expect the other 87% to cater to and bend to their will simply because they do NOT like a verdict reached according to the rule of law, and because they refuse to accept the fact that 93% of the murders of young black men are committed NOT by white men but are committed by other young black men themselves.

But NO matter if one looks at ‘Stand Your Ground’ laws in secular terms, statistical terms, or in religious terms, the bottom line remains that the ‘Gang of Black Racists’ and the ‘small but vocal militant black minority’ who are pushing this unwanted national debate over ‘Stand Your Ground’ is NOT doing so because of ‘Stand Your Ground’ as written, but is doing so to push their leftist agenda of taking our guns away as Barack HUSSEIN Obama’s ultimate political goal is the repealing of our Second Amendment right to keep and bear arms.

And that is something ‘We the People’ will most assuredly NOT sit idly by and let happen.

***************************
Here's another article of interest on this subject:
http://www.examiner.com/article/gun-rights-advocate-obama-said-people-shouldn-t-be-able-to-own-guns

Remember The Riots When This Black Community Watch Member Was Acquitted Of Shooting A Teenage White Boy? ME EITHER!

 

By: SJ Husak At Large - CONSERVATIVE SPOKEN HERE -https://www.facebook.com/s.j.hUSAk

The Trayvon Martin case reminds me of Roderick Scott. In both cases, a man claiming to be protecting his neighborhood notifies police about an unarmed 17-year-old boy he thinks is causing trouble and minutes later shoots him dead, sparking debate about guns and self-defense.

Scott shot Christopher Cervini in 2009 in Greece, NY on a windy and rainy night. Scott saw Cervini and his friends rifling through neighbors’ cars. He went outside with a gun as his girlfriend called police. Scott confronted Cervini and said the youth ran at him. Scott shot Cervini dead.

A grand jury charged him manslaughter. Scott testified in his own defense. A jury acquitted him. Self defense. The year was 2009. Eric Holder saw no need to investigate whether Cervini's civil rights were violated and there was no national TV coverage. Not a word from President Obama was uttered. Blacks celebrated the acquittal. Whites did not riot or march.

Scott is black and Cervini was white. Zimmerman is hispanic and was raised in an interracial home and Martin was black. People think race was a factor in each case. Race was not a factor in either verdict. I believe in each case the jury found the verdict within the parameters of the law, and both cases are tragic.

N.C. Senate strikes a blow for freedom, passes anti-Sharia bill
From Jihad Watch / Posted by Robert Spencer

The original Oklahoma anti-Sharia law that passed with 70% of the vote in November 2010 was poorly written, and Hamas-linked CAIR and other Islamic supremacists immediately argued before a Leftist judge that the law would infringe upon Muslims' religious rights. They still make headway using that argument with judges and lawmakers who are ignorant of the nature of Sharia.

In reality, no one cares about individual Muslim religious practice or wants to restrict it. The purpose of anti-Sharia laws is not to stop Muslims from getting married in Islamic religious ceremonies or to restrict their religious practice in other ways, but to stop the political and supremacist aspects of Islam that infringe upon the rights and freedoms of non-Muslims, denying the freedom of speech, the freedom of conscience, and the equality of rights of all people before the law. This is the case that must be made. Let's hope this law fares better.

"NC Senate passes ‘Sharia law’ bill," by Annalise Frank for the Raleigh News & Observer, July 19:

RALEIGH — The state Senate on Friday passed a bill that would keep courts from recognizing Sharia law. 

While proponents of the legislation said it would keep people safe from foreign laws, critics derided the bill as sending a message of intolerance and bigotry to followers of Islam.

The Senate had already approved the measure when it was attached to a controversial measure that would impose stricter regulations on abortion providers in the state. But the foreign law provision wasn’t sufficiently critiqued because abortion overwhelmed the floor debate, said Sen. Floyd McKissick, a Democrat from Durham.

Now called House Bill 522, the provision’s contents haven’t changed. It reminds judges that the U.S. and N.C. constitutions are the law of the land and no foreign law can supersede them. Sometimes international laws are used in court as evidence before a judge, or in written opinions. But this bill would stop judges from considering foreign law when it violates a citizen’s constitutional rights.

“Unfortunately we have judges from time to time … that sometimes seem to forget what the supreme law of the land is, and sometimes make improper rulings,” said Sen. E.S. “Buck” Newton, a Wilson Republican and the legislation’s Senate sponsor.

Though the bill doesn’t specifically mention it, Newton was clear during Friday’s session that the legislation targets Sharia law, a legal system based on the religious and moral tenants of Islam. Few Muslim countries apply the entire body of rules, instead choosing measures relevant to them. More than 60 countries use at least part of Sharia law in their governance.

Its improper use has “worked to deprive” U.S. citizens and immigrants of their constitutional rights, Newton said. There have been 27 reported cases around the country in which Sharia law has been used, he added.

More than 20 states have introduced legislation banning Sharia law or foreign law in state courts. Many bills – including North Carolina’s – would apply only to cases in which the application of foreign law would violate a person’s constitutional rights.

That means that the Jewish groups that oppose this law are being short-sighted. It really wouldn't affect them at all.

Sen. Ellie Kinnaird of Chapel Hill, a Democrat, said she thinks the bill’s sponsors don’t truly mean to inform judges that foreign law is unacceptable, but rather the people of North Carolina.

“I think the audience is really wider,” Kinnaird said.

The N.C. Bar Association opposed the bill in its former incarnation, House Bill 695. The American Bar Association said in a resolution that the passage of such bills will have a “widespread negative impact on business, adversely affecting … economic development in the states in which such a law is passed and in U.S. foreign commerce generally.”

The danger doesn’t come from the legislation’s exact wording, said Omid Safi, a professor of religious studies at UNC-Chapel Hill. He contends this wave of anti-foreign-law legislation comes from a fundamental misunderstanding of Sharia law and a “bigoted” perception of Muslims.

“We would be delighted to have a conversation about what Sharia law actually is and what it is not,” he said. “It would be important, if we’re passing legislation on the topic, for (lawmakers who support the bill) to actually benefit from the expertise of people who might actually know something about the subject.”

That would be a good idea indeed. People do need to know what Sharia really is. But are they going to find out from Omid Safi? Omid Safi is an extremely dishonest pseudo-academic of extraordinarily low character. He peddles soothing nonsense to the easy marks at the Huffington Post about respecting other people, but elsewhere he shows his true colors: he has falsely claimed that I threatened to kill him and his family, after I dared to challenge his smear of me with the manipulative Muslim Brotherhood neologism of "Islamophobe" and offered to come to the class where he was defaming me and engage in discussion and debate with him and his students. Somehow I doubt that the likes of Omid Safi are going to tell the truth about Sharia.

The bill wouldn’t affect only Sharia law. Jewish organizations have spoken out against anti-foreign-law legislation across the United States because the measures could negate the common Jewish practice of resolving disputes according to their religious laws, Halacha.

It shouldn't. If it does, it is poorly written, and needs to be revised.

Ros-Lehtinen: No Time for 'Niceties' With Cuba After Weapons Discovery

By Todd Beamon and Kathleen Walter

 / Newsmax

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Cuba should be sanctioned for the recent discovery of weapons on a freighter bound for North Korea — not rewarded with resumed migration talks with the Obama administration, Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen tells Newsmax TV.

"This is unbelievable that the very week it is uncovered that Cuba is violating a U.N. Security Council resolution, what does the United States do?” the Florida Republican asks Newsmax in an exclusive interview. "They reward the Castro regime by sitting down and talking about migration talks — and, in fact, they congratulate the Cuban regime for safe and orderly migration. This is unbelievable.

"Out of this case with the North Korean ship, the Obama administration might be congratulating the Cuban regime for a safe and orderly passage of transportation of arms to North Korea. Who knows? They're looking to reward the Castro regime for anything.

"This is not the time for normal niceties," Ros-Lehtinen adds. "This is a time to get tough on our enemies. These guys are state sponsors of terrorism, and North Korea should be put back on that list of state sponsors of terrorism."

The United States and Cuba held migration talks on Wednesday, despite news that Panama had impounded a North Korean freighter earlier in the week carrying Cuban missile equipment.

The talks centered on such issues as how visas for immigrants are processed for people from Cuba, the Americas' only communist-ruled nation.

The United States grants Cubans immigrant visas.

But it also grants every Cuban who reaches U.S. soil permanent residency and the ability to work, something the United States does not do for nationals of any other country.

Cuba opposes this, saying it encourages dangerous illegal migration attempts in the shark-infested Florida Straits.

First elected in 1989, Ros-Lehtinen is the senior woman Republican in the House of Representatives. She was chairwoman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, and currently is chairwoman of the House Foreign Affairs Subcommittee on Middle East and South Asia.

She tells Newsmax that the discovery of Cuban weaponry on the North Korean ship trying to enter the Panama Canal should have prompted the U.S. to scrap the migration talks.

Cuba has said the weapons were obsolete missiles and spare parts from the last century, which were being sent to North Korea for repairs.

But diplomats have said that the shipment may have violated tough U.N. sanctions on Pyongyang aimed at curbing its nuclear-weapons program.

"As always, the Obama administration is late to the dance — and they're very weak and they're so ineffective," Ros-Lehtinen says. "Has [Secretary of State John] Kerry sent inspectors to Panama to look at it from the U.S.? No. Has Secretary Kerry asked the U.N. to take matters into their hands and send inspectors to Panama? No. Nothing has happened.

"If they thought that these were obsolete small arms, which is still a fabrication, why did they hide them under tons of sugar?" she adds. "They were hiding the cargo. These are enlisted arms. They're not obsolete and they were violating sanctions."

Turning her attention to other world hotspots, Ros-Lehtinen says the Obama administration should not become militarily involved in helping the Syrian rebels battle President Bashir al-Assad.

"Yes, it's a horrid situation. It's a humanitarian crisis, but there are a lot of countries in this world. We are one country. Why is it always up to the United States to take these tasks and then have these other countries say they'll help us and then, in the end, they don’t?

"What we should do is pressure countries like Russia," she adds. "Russia continues to send arms to Assad — and then Assad uses them to kill his own people. Let's use what leverage we have over Russia and tell them to stop that. And China, as well, is helping Russia aid the Syrian government.

"This is a dastardly regime that kills its own people. I don’t favor sending arms to the rebels, because these arms could end up in anyone's hands. We saw that in Libya. What happened in Benghazi? These are folks that we trusted with our security — and then four Americans end up being killed.

"It's time to stop giving arms to people we can't rely on 100 percent," Ros-Lehtinen says. "There's no military role for the United States. There's a role for other countries to get involved and help that situation."

Turning to economic aid in Egypt, Ros-Lehtinen believes the United States shouldn't be sending aid following the ouster of President Mohammed Morsi.

"When Morsi took over, he promised a lot to the people of Egypt," Ros-Lehtinen begins. "He did not fulfill any promises and he harassed and intimidated Christians. He harassed and intimidated opposition and human-rights activists.

"We shouldn’t have sent aid when Morsi was in power. We certainly shouldn’t send it now, when we don’t know what's going to happen and what the next government is.

"But still, the Obama administration is pushing not millions, but billions of your dollars. The Obama plan is to send over $1 billion to Egypt when we don’t know who's ruling Egypt — and we don’t know who will be there tomorrow. It's a mistake. We should cut off aid."

And the White House is making yet another foreign-policy blunder by working to broker peace between the Israelis and Palestinians, Ros-Lehtinen tells Newsmax.

"The Israelis have always wanted peace. They want to negotiate, but they don’t have a true partner for peace. What we've seen is a corrupt Palestinian Authority government, where we don’t know where our tax dollars have gone. There's no transparency, there's no accountability.

"It's up to the Palestinians to say: 'Yes, we want peace. We're going to negotiate with Israel,'" Ros-Lehtinen adds. "It is not up to the United States to further induce the Palestinians with our tax dollars to get them to negotiate to a peace treaty with Israel.

"And with all of the problems that are going on in the world, for the administration to keep sending Secretary Kerry there again and again while the world is just blowing up is wrongheaded and misguided".

Op-ed: The Zimmerman trial and verdict in a cartoon nutshell

Sometimes a few political cartoons speak the truth 

like nothing else can...