P.C. – R.I.P.

Shield of political correctness protecting the Democrat Party can continue to be exposed, shattered, the GOP is likely to broaden its base, widen its majority, gain influence in the culture, foreign policy, defeat ISIS, Radical Islam

P.C. – R.I.P.

There should be no surprise that former Weather Underground terrorist Bill Ayers, who played a role in launching the political career of Barack Obama, was found among the street demonstrators in Chicago who succeeded in forcefully disrupting and shutting down Republican frontrunner Donald Trump’s campaign rally on March 11, injuring two police officers who were trying to maintain order.

When Trump proceeded to move to his next campaign stops in Ohio the following day, he came before crowds and naturally addressed the previous night’s unfortunate descent into violence, only to experience another attempt at disruption.  Four secret service agents raced to surround Trump after something was thrown and someone attempted to rush the stage.  What is going on?

With provocative and occasional unrestrained rhetoric, Trump can be polarizing—sometimes inviting raucous response. But the real problem that gave rise to Trump is intolerance and the soft tyranny of humorless political correctness that envelopes communication and culture in America.

No one wants to admit it, but the seeds of ideological control characteristic of totalitarian political regimes reside predominantly in the Democrat Party and in its liberal constituencies that dominate the knowledge, information and entertainment industries—the media, the universities and Hollywood.  And because of their leverage, these institutions have a disproportionately large effect on the population at large. Slowly, over the last few decades, but with accelerating pace in the Obama years, the soul of America has been silenced by political correctness.  And the nation is weaker and more divided than ever.

It’s time to connect the dots on the growing intolerance on the political left in America.  Recently, Forbes reported that at more than 400 of America’s largest and most prestigious colleges and universities 62% percent maintain policies that restrict a substantial amount of speech protected under the First Amendment.  Speech comes in many forms, but typically what is banned is student speech that “feels offensive” or “demeaning” toward groups and causes deemed politically correct.

On many campuses, students who question secular progressive orthodoxies—whether extreme environmentalism and climate change, socialist economics, multiculturalism and accommodation of illegal aliens or Islamists—fear grade penalties, harassment, and outright silencing.  In effect, speech codes chill freedom of expression and the competition of ideas.  Worse, it turns out that speech codes driven by political correctness foster coddled, weak-minded, and intolerant graduates—ill-equipped for employment and citizenship in the marketplace diversity of viewpoints that is the real world.

Intolerance and political correctness that has subliminally debilitated public discourse and debate has been working its way into government at an accelerated pace since Obama took office.  To “fundamentally transform America,” Obama’s stated goal at the inception of taking office, his administration undertook a concerted effort to institutionalize PC in the regulation of key areas of the economy.  Healthcare and banking were restructured following the passage of Obamacare and Dodd-Frank,  while the energy sector—which is nearly 80% fossil fuel reliant—was targeted by Obama executive orders, which were carried out by the EPA.

Even after two different court rulings slapping down Obama and halted EPA actions on emissions, U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch picked up the PC mantle on energy in an unprecedented assault on First Amendment protection of speech.  Two weeks ago, AG Lynch began actively exploring in conjunction with the FBI, the possibility of prosecuting so-called “climate change deniers.”

But political correctness has even more immediate and deadly consequences when it affects law enforcement, intelligence, defense and national security.

In spite of Islamists having established an unparalleled record of terrorism—some 20,000 assaults in the name of Islam since 9/11—the Defense Department has come under the grip of PC, which has forced military training to delink terrorism from Islam.  Even after self-described “soldier of Allah” Nidal Hassan killed 13 in the 2009 Fort Hood shooting spree, the Defense Department recorded this incident as “workplace violence.”  The DOD bureaucracy had almost no other choice as it was then in the midst of an ongoing purge at West Point and the Naval War College of all “vital references to Islamist ideology driving terrorism or conflating terrorism with Islam.”

The FBI followed suit in 2011 and systematically purged its counter-terrorism training manuals of some 900 pages that were considered offensive to Muslims.

The 2013 Islamist Boston Marathon bombers had high risk profiles known by law enforcement intelligence and could have been stopped, but for political correctness.  The December 2, 2015, ISIS-inspired San Bernardino massacre might also have been prevented.  A neighbor of the Islamist terrorist couple Tashfeen Malik and Syed Farook revealed that in the weeks before the terrorist killing spree, there had been a flurry of activity at their home—with a multitude of package deliveries and Middle Eastern individuals coming and going at all hours.  Yet that neighbor chose not to alert the police for fear of being labeled racist or Islamophobic.

There can be no doubt that political correctness puts lives in danger.  The wonder is that PC has been in ascendance for so long, and it is an irony of history that it took an unconventional presidential candidate, Donald Trump, to break the PC glass ceiling.

Regardless of who becomes the Republican nominee, if the shield of political correctness protecting the Democrat Party can continue to be exposed and shattered, the GOP is likely to broaden its base, widen its majority, gain influence in the culture, and be more successful in foreign policy and defeating ISIS and radical Islamist jihad.

 Scott Powell

Free American FightersMost voters take no interest in the various “‘isms” that figure prominently in the discussion of politics. On account of Bernie Sanders’ effort to get the Democrats to nominate him for president, “socialism” currently saturates the energy waves – air, electronic and light. Ben Carson’s decision to wipe cheeks of Trump’s contemptuous spittle and endorse him puts openly on display the coition (from the Latin, coire, meaning “to go together”) of unprincipled pragmatism (which sees the primordial issues of God-endowed unalienable right as “barnacles on the hull” of the sinking ship of state) and unscrupulous capitalism (which thinks it is “a small thing” to lure money-hungry “little people” to pay for a fake “University” education with no purpose but to defraud them of what little they do have).Such are the fruits of the licentious political intercourse that has infected the GOP with a politically transmitted disease. It’s major symptom: the inability to represent its members as issues come to a climax in Congress. It reflects what all the aforementioned “isms” have in common, which is a concern with achieving results (and therefore power) with no regard for the way they are achieved. Tragically, voters with no interest in thinking the “isms” through will never perceive this, their common characteristic.They hear Ben Carson mouth pious phrases in respect of God and His precious gift of life, but never ponder the significance of the fact that Mr. Carson thinks “getting things done” (the be all and end all of “pragmatism”) trumps the imperative of conformity with right as God has made us to see it.They hear Bernie Sanders talk about justice and equality, but never ponder the significance of the fact that socialism actually sees politics exclusively in terms of power. It rejects the notion that there is any way of judging the historic outcomes of the history of power but to determine who ends up controlling it.They experience Donald Trump’s performance of their anger and frustration. They respond with a standing ovation at the polls, expressing their relief that they have finally been allowed an outlet for their sincere outrage against the elitist faction’s betrayal of the rights, including liberty, which their government is supposed to secure.They never ponder the significant fact that the man through whom that outlet is offered has spent his whole life entirely in the company and service of those who have engineered and benefited from that betrayal. They don’t think through the fact that, aside from hollow promises of “greatness,” undefined, he offers, even now, nothing but what will continue, in a slightly altered disguise, the arrogant abuse of power that has rightly outraged their patriot love of right, including rightful liberty.The “isms” used to mask the elitist faction’s ancient, self-obsessed ambition, are all of them at odds with the Constitution that was intended to be the vehicle through which we, the people of the United States, expressed our patriotic love in action. Here again, many Americans have seen and understood the fact that the Democratic and Republican parties, two wings of the same elitist faction, have repeatedly perpetrated, approved or tolerated violations of the clear, plain language of the Constitution. They have even refused to reject executive and judicial actions that simply discard its provisions altogether.Thanks to the personality-driven obsessions encouraged by the elitist faction sham, outraged voters act without regard for the true source of these betrayals, which transcends personalities. It lies in the assumption that what happens is all that matters, regardless of the way in which it happens. But constitutional self-government is all about making sure that what is done conforms to the premises of justice and right that are supposed to inform and substantiate the rightfulness of what is done.The American creed, articulated in the words of the Declaration of Independence, speaks of the just powers derived from the consent of the government. It does so because injustice, however powerful, is permanently at odds with the God-endowed unalienable rights that human government is instituted to secure. This is why, through all the years of its existence, the people most sincerely loyal to the United States, and most determined to preserve its Constitution of liberty, have not spoken or acted only to defend our lives. They have spoken and acted, even at the risk of their lives, to preserve the American “way of life.”This phrase makes clear that the true American patriots are not those who offer to sacrifice liberty for safety as the GOP’s purblind anti-terrorists have done. They are not those who dig the foundations of their supposedly benevolent “welfare state” by excavating the rights made known to us by our Creator, as the socialists do. They are not those who play us with false promises of “greatness,” while promoting the establishment of elitist faction rule; or who assert pre-eminent dominion over our choices and our lives, without regard to the justice we owe to our humanity. They are not those who invite us to forget the respect we owe to “the laws of nature and of nature’s God,” even when we go to war with the bloodthirsty fanatics who attack our innocent lives.However, the present sham two-party system isn’t bad simply because it offers us no choice but between one bad candidate and another. Rather, it offers us “a choice of evils” because the elitist faction that controls it stands united in rejecting the premises of good and bad, right and wrong, justice and injustice, on which the institutions of our self-government are wholly erected.Because of this fundamental rejection, even the “best” bad choice the elitist faction’s sham politics allows us refuses to apply the standard, endowed by our Creator, God, in light of which we claim the authority, as a people, to exercise our rightful liberty. Sometimes abusing the name of God, but with no true respect for His power, this implicit rejection of America’s creed tempts hearts sincerely seeking to restore our nation’s soul to remain within the precincts of its impending doom.Though they profess the Name that frees all who believe on it from that doom, they lack even the “little faith” required to activate its power. While they hoard that power within the compass of their worldly fears and calculations, will “even that which they have … be taken away”? Or will they finally listen to the trumpet, certain and true, which they by Name profess to hear, and eject themselves from darkness in time to preserve themselves a nation, God endowed, that is the only one we have worth saving?
Posted by Joseph F Barber on Saturday, March 19, 2016