Monthly Archives: April 2023

Reviewing A Violation Of The First Amendment

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On April 10, I posted an article about Walter Reed National Military Medical Center (WRNMMC) terminating a Catholic pastoral care contract with a community of Franciscan Catholic priests and friars during Holy Week. Evidently I was not the only one concerned about this move.

On April 12, The Daily Caller reported the following:

The Pentagon’s health agency said Tuesday it is reviewing a contract for chaplaincy services at Walter Reed Military Medical Center after facing backlash for sending a “cease and desist” letter to the Franciscan Friars at Holy Name College Friary in Silver Spring, Maryland, according to the Washington Times.

The Defense Health Agency (DHA) terminated a 20-year relationship with the Friars on March 31, just before Easter Sunday, instead awarding a contract to a private firm that Catholic authorities say cannot provide chaplain services according to their religious tradition, because chaplains must work for a bishop, not a private company.  Congressional Republicans sent a letter Tuesday to DHA calling the decision “unconscionable,” prompting a promise from Walter Reed to reevaluate the contract, the Washington Times reported.

The contract “is under review to ensure it adequately supports the religious needs of our patients and beneficiaries,” Walter Reed told the outlet in a statement Tuesday.

The article notes:

Senate and House GOP lawmakers, led by Florida Sen. Marco Rubio, said Mack Global LLC, the secular professional services company receiving the contract, lacks the ability to provide appropriate religious services to veterans and service members. Allowing Mack Global to proceed with the contract “deny service members and veterans the rights and abilities to practice their religion and participate in certain practices such as pastoral care and the sacraments which can only be carried out by an ordained Catholic priest,” the letter stated.

This was an attack on the religious freedom of the military members who were at Walter Reed Hospital. Hopefully, the reaction will be strong enough to end the contract of Mack Global, LLC, and give it back to the Catholic Church.

An Short Update

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On April 11, I posted an article about the shooting of a protester in Austin, Texas. Daniel Perry, who shot the protester because he saw an AK-47 pointed at him was found guilty of murder. The prosecution claimed that there was no actual evidence of the gun being pointed at Daniel Perry; Daniel Perry claimed that the gun was pointed at him. The video of the incident is fuzzy at best. It has recently been noted that Garret Foster, the protester who was killed, routinely carried his AK-47 in a manner that could easily be perceived as threatening. Evidently he had been advised by friends that if he was going to carry the weapon, he should carry it slung over his shoulder. Instead, Garret Foster chose to carry the weapon in a way that it could be easily fired. It has also been reported that both the shooter and the protester had made very questionable social  media posts before the incident. I have to be honest, if I were carrying a weapon and I saw an AK-47 held in a way that I might be shot, I would shoot. It is going to take the wisdom of Solomon to sort this mess out.

The Strange World Of The Liberal Left

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I am hoping for an honest presidential election in 2024. That may be a baseless hope, but I am hoping. We have come to a fork in the road–do Americans want to be governed by people who truly represent them or by people who only represent themselves? Are we going to vote for the man who wants us to be free or the man who wants to control us? Right now, California Governor Gavin Newsom is running around the country claiming that California represents freedom and Florida represents tyranny. That’s a very interesting campaign approach considering that California is losing population and Florida is gaining population.

Gavin Newsom became Governor of California in 2019. On April 11, Townhall reported that California has fallen in population for the third consecutive year, after having previously experienced nothing but population growth for its entire existence. According to the same article, Florida has gained more than 700,000 new residents since 2020. So Gavin Newsom, who is running for President, is giving Ron DeSantis advice on how to run his state?!

The article at Townhall reports:

If Biden eventually defies conventional wisdom and pulls the plug on 2024, Newsom conspicuously covets the Democratic nomination.  As a bonus, if he were to win the presidency, he’d get to join the many Californians who are flooding away from his state.  Like many other leftists, it appears as though he’s rooting rather openly for Trump to be the GOP nominee.  Notice that the clip of Newsom above was shared by a Trump fan, as the Trumpworld/Leftist alliance against DeSantis continues to take shape.  The original poster actually argued that Newsom isn’t rooting for Trump to be the Republican candidate, but was giving “honest advice” here.  And if there’s one thing Gavin Newsom is known for, it’s his unfailingly truthful and good-faith guidance to help Republicans be more politically successful.  If someone believes that, or expects others to believe that, I’m not even sure what to say.

It is going to be a very interesting election season. I am just hoping that the outcome of the presidential race has not already determined by someone sitting in a basement with a computer.

 

The Circus Continues

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The arraignment of President Trump was questionable at best, but Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg had to fulfill his campaign promise to ‘get Trump.’ The next step in the drama was Representative Jim Jordan looking for information on what role the federal government paid in the investigation. Obviously, Alvin Bragg does not want any information on that topic investigated or revealed, so he a entered a restraining order against Rep. Jim Jordan to stop Jim Jordan’s investigation.

On Wednesday, The Epoch Times reported the following:

Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s urgent request to enter a restraining order against Rep. Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) was rejected on April 11, the same day it was filed.

U.S. District Judge Mary Kay Vyskocil, a Trump appointee, turned down Bragg’s emergency request for a temporary restraining order and preliminary injunction against Jordan.

“The Court declines to enter the proposed Temporary Restraining Order and Order to Show Cause,” Vyskocil said, noting that she had not yet received several documents that were referenced in Bragg’s filings.

…Jordan said on Fox News that Bragg is obstructing a legitimate congressional investigation.

“They’re obstructing our investigation,” Jordan said. “We have a constitutional duty to get to the facts, particularly when you have a district attorney interfering with the most important election we have, which is the election of the commander-in-chief; the president of the United States.”

Trump, who was president until early 2021, is running for a second term in 2024.

Bragg has asserted that Jordan and other members of Congress lack the authority to probe the Trump prosecution but Jordan disagreed, pointing to how federal funds were used to investigate Trump.

“First, they indict a president for no crime. Then, they sue to block congressional oversight when we ask questions about the federal funds they say they used to do it,” Jordan said in a statement.

Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg is engaging in election interference. Whether or not he will pay a price for that behavior remains to be seen.

 

Troubling, But Not Surprising

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On Tuesday, PJ Media reported the following:

New information is being uncovered regarding the Federal Bureau of Investigation’s unprecedented raid of President Donald Trump’s Mar-a-Lago home last year. According to America First Legal (AFL), a judicial watchdog, an investigation of the raid confirmed that the FBI gained access to NARA records through a “special access request” made by the Biden White House on behalf of the Department of Justice.

“On August 8, 2022, the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) conducted an unprecedented raid of Mar-a-Lago on the ground that potentially classified records existed there. According to press reports, Biden Administration aides were “stunned” to hear of this development,” AFL begins in a press release. “However, new NARA records obtained through America First Legal’s investigation into the circumstances surrounding the Mar-a-Lago raid further confirmed that the FBI obtained access to these records through a ‘special access request’ from the Biden White House on behalf of the Department of Justice (DOJ).”

According to AFL, it appears that “the Biden White House and DOJ coordinated to obtain the Trump records and perhaps create a pretext for the law enforcement raid by way of the ‘special access request.’”

In addition to confirming that the White House was involved in setting up Trump, AFL also proves that the National Archives misled Congress about the role the White House played in the raid.

Under President Obama and President Biden we have seen a lot of political use of the Department of Justice (DOJ) and the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). However, the raid on Mar-a-Lago was a new low in unbiased justice. Please follow the link and read the article for further details. If no one is held accountable, no one in America will be able to criticize the ruling party without having the judicial system investigate or intimidate them. We are not heading in a good direction.

Why Tik-Tok Will Not Be Banned

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On Tuesday, The Washington Free Beacon posted an article about the banning of Tik-Tok. It is generally acknowledged that Tik-Tok is a Chinese Communist Party vehicle for gathering information on Americans, it is doubtful that it will be banned in America. Recently, the RESTRICT Act was introduced in Congress.

The article notes:

But the RESTRICT Act never names TikTok, which has signaled its support for the law, and instead empowers the Commerce Department to prohibit any technology that “poses undue or unacceptable risk to national security.” The bill prompted criticism from Republicans for failing to ban TikTok immediately. RESTRICT Act critics such as Sen. Marco Rubio (R., Fla.), who has his own bill to outlaw TikTok, argue that the act could delay action against the tech company for years and relies on Biden administration officials who have voiced apprehensions about a ban, such as Commerce Secretary Gina Raimondo, to pull the trigger.

“There is no time for half-measures,” Rubio told the Washington Free Beacon.

Sen. J.D. Vance (R., Ohio), who supports a ban on TikTok, said last month that language in the RESTRICT Act is too broad. “You’re creating, effectively, a PATRIOT Act for the digital age,” Vance said.

The RESTRICT Act’s supporters have also botched its rollout, with cosponsor Sen. Lindsey Graham (R., S.C.) showing in a late March interview with Fox News that he was unfamiliar with the bill’s provisions. According to a senior Senate Republican staffer, the botched rollout means that “anti-TikTok legislation is currently dead.” Another senior Senate aide, who worked on the RESTRICT Act, pushed back against that characterization, saying that no other bill “has this broad base of bipartisan support.”

The article notes one major reason Tik-Tok may not be banned:

Meanwhile, the White House is leaning into using TikTok and similar apps as it gears up for 2024, raising questions about whether it sincerely views the company as a national security threat. Biden’s campaign plans to “lean on hundreds of social media ‘influencers’ who will tout Biden’s record,” according to a recent report. As Chew (TikTok CEO Shou Zi Chew) was testifying to Congress in March, the White House used an app owned by TikTok’s parent company to make an Instagram video.

The Biden administration is not going to ban one of the Democrat’s major weapons in the 2024 presidential campaign.

 

Taking Steps To Restore Fiscal Sanity

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On Tuesday, The Washington Examiner posted an article detailing the steps that the new Republican House of Representatives should take to restore fiscal sanity to America.

The article reports:

The 118th Congress has been in session for three months, and the new House majority is already moving ahead on legislation that would reduce regulations, begin to restore energy independence, and prevent some of the worst policies that were enacted in the last Congress from taking effect. House committees have been holding oversight hearings to increase accountability and transparency, both of which have been severely lacking over the past two years. Members should use this momentum to spring into action and do even more to protect taxpayers.

The top priority for the 118th Congress should be to cut wasteful government spending and stop new spending, which happens to be the best way to fight inflation. The last Congress pushed through a record-breaking amount of spending, from the COVID-19 “relief” bills such as the American Rescue Plan Act, the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act, and the so-called Inflation Reduction Act, all of which added up to more than $5 trillion. This massive spending spree is the reason the United States is suffering from the highest inflation rates it has seen in 40 years and staring down an impending recession.

Congress can stop unnecessary government spending by rejecting the new taxes and pet projects that litter President Joe Biden’s $6.8 trillion fiscal 2024 budget . The budget includes many unnecessary, liberal policies that the president has used to advance political objectives. It would also violate the president’s campaign pledge not to raise taxes on those making under $400,000.

The article concludes:

Congress must also push back against the restrictive policies and rules being pushed by the Federal Trade Commission. FTC Chairwoman Lina Khan has used her post at the agency to stall or prevent nearly every possible merger, including an attempt to block Meta’s acquisition of Within, which was struck down by a federal court in California. Khan is also trying to prevent Microsoft from acquiring video game producer Activision, setting privacy rules for the entire country, and banning all noncompete clauses. As Citizens Against Government Waste President Tom Schatz wrote , “The FTC has become one of the biggest obstacles to competition and consumer welfare.”

The 118th Congress has made progress during its first three months. But members must spring into action and enact policies that would make the federal government more effective and accountable rather than more wasteful and intrusive.

Please follow the link to read the entire article. There is hope. There is a light at the end of the tunnel–a small light, but a light.

Will The Democrats Survive Their 2024 Convention?

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This is the summary of the yearly murders in Chicago from The Chicago Tribune:

That is roughly 58 murders a month. That is an improvement from 2021, but it is still a high number. To put this in perspective, in March 2023, New York City had 35 murders according to the New York City Police Department crime statistics. So where am I going with this?

On Tuesday, Breitbart reported that the Democrats will hold their 2024 Convention in Chicago. I guess they have forgotten the mess the 1968 Democrat convention was in Chicago.

The article reports:

Nothing says “look at what Democrats can do!” quite like a city ravaged by crime and run by Lori Lightfoot who was such a successful Democrat leader that her overwhelmingly Democrat constituents fired her unceremoniously and chose an even more radical Democrat.

…Chicago won out over other finalist cities including New York, Atlanta — Guy explained that irony earlier — and Houston. According to the DNC, Chicago was the right choice because it demonstrates “the formidable coalition that will help re-elect President Biden and Vice President Harris, and elect Democrats up-and-down the ticket” and the region “will showcase President Biden’s economic agenda that is rebuilding our roads and bridges, unleashing a manufacturing boom, and creating good-paying middle-class jobs.” 

President Joe Biden called Chicago a “great choice” for the 2024 convention at which the Democrat nominee will be finalized, even though Biden still hasn’t announced whether he’s running for reelection. Biden promised that “Democrats will gather to showcase our historic progress including building an economy from the middle out and bottom up,” though it’s unclear how real wage-crushing inflation has accomplished that or kept his 2020 promise to “build back better.”

The article also notes:

To be clear, any positive experience DNC attendees have in Chicago will be due not to the city’s failed leaders, but because the convention experience will take place within a walled-off, patrolled by armed security perimeter to provide security and safety that Windy City residents have been stripped of by Democrat policies.

Walls and photo identification requirements for me, but not for thee.

Misleading Media Happens On Both Ends Of The Political Spectrum

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The mainstream media does not have a monopoly on biased news. Many Americans, myself included, have reached the point where if we didn’t see it with our own eyes, we are not convinced in happened. Unfortunately, the bias can go both ways. Right now we see the political left working to undermine the Second Amendment. Unfortunately they have some serious ammunition–some deeply troubled people with guns have behaved very badly lately. However, that is no excuse to take guns away from honest, hard-working people who own them for self-defense.

Recently there was a case in Texas where Daniel Perry was found guilty of murder after Soros-backed District Attorney Jose Garza sought murder charges for an act of self defense during the 2020 George Floyd riots. The words underlined are from an article posted at The Gateway Pundit on April 10. Note that the article includes the fact that the District Attorney had a connection to George Soros and that the article states self-defense as a given.

The article reports:

This weekend the lead detective in the case, David Fugitt, filed an affidavit following the shocking verdict in the case.

According to Fugitt, District Attorney Joze Garza and his office had him remove 100 pages of exculpatory evidence in the case. The DA’s office had him shorten his presentation from 158 slides to 56 slides.

Fugitt added that this was likely criminal behavior.

On April 9, Legal Insurrection posted an article about the same murder and verdict.

Legal Insurrection reports:

This past Friday, April 7, 2023, Daniel Perry was found guilty in the 2020 murder of Garret Foster during a Black Lives Matter protest in Austin.

The confrontation between the two men occurred as Perry was driving his Uber vehicle amongst a crowd of protestors in the street, and while Foster was among the protestors carrying an AK-47 on a sling. The rifle-armed Foster approached the driver’s side door of Perry’s car, Perry rolled down his window, and shot at Foster five times with a pistol, striking him with three rounds, effectively killing Foster instantly.

…From the start Perry would be arguing that he shot Foster in self-defense, and only after Foster had pointed his rifle at Perry.

And right there we have the key issue in this murder trial. Certainly, if the jury believed that Perry fired only after Foster pointed his rifle at him, there could hardly be a clearer case of self-defense. Indeed, as someone who personally carries a firearm for self-defense on a regular basis, anyone who unlawfully points a rifle at me ought to have a high expectation of getting shot in self-defense.

Social media was outraged at the conviction of Daniel Perry. However, there is more to the story:

The problem with this outrage, however, is that it presumes as an indisputable fact that Foster initiated the deadly force confrontation by pointing his rifle at Perry.

That “fact,” however, is not indisputable. Indeed, that fact was aggressively disputed by the prosecution, which argued to the jury that Foster never pointed his rifle at Perry, and so Perry’s claimed legal grounds for shooting Foster in self-defense simply doesn’t exist.

In support of this narrative of guilt the prosecution presented the testimony of multiple witnesses who told the jury that Foster never pointed his rifle at Perry. The confrontation itself was captured on poor quality video, from which screen captures were secured, and neither video nor stills ever show Foster pointing his gun at Perry.

My point is this. If we are going to argue for the Second Amendment and the idea that a man has a right to defend himself, we should be careful to check our facts. Both sides of the argument are very capable of stretching the truth to achieve a goal.

It’s Finally Over!

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On Monday, Townhall reported that after the Easter Egg Roll, President Biden signed the bill ending the Covid national emergency.

The article reports:

“On Monday, April 10, 2023, the President signed into law: H.J.Res. 7, which terminates the national emergency related to the COVID-19 pandemic,” the White House released in a memo.

…Originally Biden planned to officially end the emergency in May after saying months ago the pandemic was over. Republicans on Capitol Hill forced his hand to do it now by authoring H.J. Res. 7.

The article notes:

Meanwhile, the Department of Justice is still fighting in federal court to reimplement mask mandates on public transportation and maintain the government’s pandemic power.  

On April 18, 2022 U.S. District Judge Kathryn Kimball Mizelle struck down President Joe Biden’s mask mandate for air and rail transportation. The Department of Justice quickly appealed the decision after a request from the Centers for Disease Control. 

Nearly a year later, federal attorneys are still working to force masking on transportation.

DOJ continues this fight despite President Joe Biden declaring the pandemic is over and after a recent admission from White House COVID Response Coordinator Dr. Ashish Jha that masks don’t work to mitigate the spread of COVID-19.

The Washington swamp does not release power easily.

While We Were All Wondering About President Trump’s Campaign Spending Violations…

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On Thursday, Newsbusters reported:

ABC, CBS and NBC took a stand on a potential scandal involving tens of millions in reportedly stolen money and former President Barack Obama’s 2012 campaign: We won’t report on this.

Hollywood actor Leonardo DiCaprio testified on April 3 that Jho Low —a Malaysian financier tied to the Communist Chinese Party— plotted a scheme to funnel between $20-$30 million to Obama’s 2012 re-election campaign, according to the New York Post April 3. Low, a close friend of DiCaprio and now fugitive, allegedly recruited 90s rapper Prakazrel “Pras” Michel to “funnel the money to Obama’s reelection bid as foreigners cannot donate to US campaigns under federal election law.” 

According to the Post, “Much of the money was reportedly stolen. Low is accused of embezzling a whopping $4.5 billion from Malaysia’s” state investment fund. “‘It was a significant sum — something to the tune of $20-30 million,’ DiCaprio testified. ‘I said, “Wow that’s a lot of money!”’”

ABC’s World News Tonight, CBS Evening News and NBC Nightly News however, treated the story like it didn’t exist during their April 3, April 4 and April 5 evening broadcasts, perhaps because it would involve making their darling former president look bad.

The article concludes:

Additional witnesses reportedly testified after DiCaprio’s testimony “that Michel had wired them thousands and asked them to make shadow donations to the [Obama] campaign.” Apparently, none of this damning information was worth any coverage by the Big Three.

We will not be able to elect people who will do their jobs until the mainstream media supplies the information Americans need to vote intelligently.

Can We Please Get Back To Merit-Based Promotions?

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You have to admit that the Biden administration is diverse. There are people in high positions representing all sectors of society. However, there seems to be a lack of people qualified to do their job. We have had supply chain problems, airline problems, train problems, etc., while the Transportation Secretary tells us that highways are racist. Was he appointed because he was the most qualified person or because he represented a minority sexual orientation? Actually some highways are racist. The parkways on Long Island were specifically built with bridges too low for buses from New York City to go through. The people who lived on Long Island did not want the city residents taking buses to the beaches there. That is racist, but that is also the1950’s–before the civil rights movement. There are other examples of questionable cabinet appointments in the Biden administration, but I am sure you get my point.

On Sunday, The Daily Caller reported that General Mark Milley is retiring as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff later this year.

The article reports:

  • Air Force chief of staff Gen. Charles Q. “C.Q.” Brown and Marine Corps commandant Gen. David Berger have emerged as the top contenders to replace Gen. Mark Milley as President Joe Biden’s top adviser on military issues after Milley’s retirement in October.
  • The Biden administration’s perception of China’s military designs will dictate his decision more than anything else, experts said.
  • “I think General Berger would be more unflappable but that General Brown might be more inspirational,” Patrick Cronin, Asia-Pacific security chair at Hudson Institute, told the Daily Caller News Foundation.

Both contenders to replace Gen. Mark Milley as chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff later this year are focused on change to counter China, but one is prone to radical changes while the other affirms the administration’s ideological priorities, experts told the Daily Caller News Foundation.

With Milley, a Trump appointee, set to retire by October, President Joe Biden is expected to announce his pick to replace the outgoing Army four-star soon between top prospects Air Force chief of staff Gen. Charles Q. “C.Q.” Brown and Marine Corps commandant Gen. David Berger, according to The New York Times. Both would differ from Milley’s gregarious leadership style, but while Brown has experience in a key area of operations and satisfies the Biden administration’s focus on Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) in public service, Berger has shown the grit to make radical, if difficult, changes necessary for coming great power conflict, according to defense experts and media

Is it racist to point out that one of the candidates is black? Does that give him an edge? If he is appointed, will it be because he is the best man for the job or because of the Biden administration’s focus on diversity? The problem with the Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) agenda is that you never know if the person you are dealing with got the job because he was qualified or because of some other factor. That is unfair to the person who got the job and unfair to the people who did not get the job. DEI is racism disguised as equality.

 

 

 

Dangers of Digital Currency

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Author: R. Alan Harrop, Ph.D

Given the harsh reality that today’s Democrat Party follows Marxist principles which will destroy this country as we have known it, the best starting point is to oppose any new initiative coming from the Biden regime. Their newest, and arguably, the most destructive of their many destructive policies is that of a digital currency. They are currently “testing the waters” so to speak and we must not allow them to implement this
idea. There are many reasons to oppose a digital dollar; here are a few of them.

According to the Biden regime, a digital form of currency (Central Bank Digital Currency, CBDC) would be issued and controlled by the Federal Reserve and replace paper money in most if not all transactions. To a great number of people, myself included, who rely very heavily on their credit cards for most financial transactions this may seem to be a logical step. But it is much more. First, a digital currency would be totally
controlled by the Federal Reserve which is an agency frought with many problems since its inception in 1913, but most importantly the people do not control or select its members. We cannot vote them out of office if we so desired, consequently we lose control over our money system. Very bad idea. Second, digital currency
is not backed by any tangible asset that has inherent value such as gold, silver, oil, etc. Third, and this is critical, the government would not only be able to track all your expenditures but would be able to stop or limit you from purchasing items they do not think you should have. Like gasoline powered cars, meat, gas stoves, guns, ammunition to name just a few.. Why in the name of all that is holy, would any sane person want to give the government total control over your finances? Without the ability to spend what you want on whatever you want, you have lost your freedom. Period. No wonder Marxist governments like China are moving towards digital currency. Fourth, the money you have accumulated can be lost if the system is either hacked or is compromised by an attack on the electrical grid. We all know how totally preventing this type of hacking is already not possible. Fifth, say you wanted to go to a local bank (most of which will be eliminated) and withdraw some cash. Sorry, you will no longer be able to do so.

You must stay abreast of what is going on with digital currency and let your elected officials know that you are opposed and want it stopped. Like all destructive Marxist social programs (e.g. Medicaid) the Democrats will try to sell this idea with phony advantages. Do not be fooled. This is one of the most, if not the most destructive Marxist ideas and the Republican controlled U.S. House of Representatives must block
digital currency, if our country is to survive

 

Religious Freedom?

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On Saturday, American Greatness reported the following:

Walter Reed National Military Medical Center (WRNMMC) terminated a Catholic pastoral care contract with a community of Franciscan Catholic priests and friars during Holy Week, barring them from providing religious services to the faithful throughout the most sacred days of the Christian calendar.  In a statement Friday, the Archdiocese for the Military Services (AMS) decried the move as a violation of First Amendment Right to Free Exercise of Religion.

The naval hospital has issued a “cease and desist order” to Holy Name College, directing their Catholic priests and brothers to cease any religious services at Walter Reed Bethesda. Holy Name College has provided pastoral care to service members and veterans at Walter Reed for nearly two decades.

Below is part of the statement released by the Archdiocese for the Military Services:

The Franciscans’ contract for Catholic Pastoral Care was terminated on March 31, 2023, and awarded to a secular defense contracting firm that cannot fulfill the statement of work in the contract. As a result, adequate pastoral care is not available for service members and veterans in the United States’ largest Defense Health Agency medical center either during Holy Week or beyond. There is one Catholic Army chaplain assigned to Walter Reed Medical Center, but he is in the process of separating from the Army.

His Excellency, the Most Reverend Timothy P. Broglio, J.C.D., Archbishop for the Military Services, condemned the move as an encroachment on the First Amendment guarantee of the Free Exercise of Religion. Archbishop Broglio said: “It is incomprehensible that essential pastoral care is taken away from the sick and the aged when it was so readily available. This is a classic case where the adage ‘if it is not broken, do not fix it’ applies. I fear that giving a contract to the lowest bidder overlooked the fact that the bidder cannot provide the necessary service. I earnestly hope that this disdain for the sick will be remedied at once and their First Amendment rights will be respected.”

Ms. Elizabeth A. Tomlin, Esq., General Counsel of the Archdiocese for the Military Services, USA (AMS), has reached out to the contracting officers at Walter Reed numerous times throughout Holy Week asking for the Franciscans’ Catholic ministry to be reinstated at least through Easter. Walter Reed National Military Medical Center has not responded to these requests from the Archdiocese.

While Walter Reed’s chaplain office claims Catholic care is being provided during Holy Week, the AMS maintains that without Catholic priests present at the medical center, service members and veterans are being denied the constitutional right to practice their religion.

Walter Reed National Military Medical Center is one of many medical centers within the Department of Defense and Defense Health Agency whose pastoral care lies within AMS jurisdiction. The refusal to provide adequate pastoral care while awarding a contract for Catholic ministry to a for-profit company that has no way of providing Catholic priests to the medical center is a glaring violation of service members’ and veterans’ Right to the Free Exercise of Religion. Especially, during Holy Week, the lack of adequate Catholic pastoral care causes untold and irreparable harm to Catholics who are hospitalized and therefore a captive population whose religious rights the government has a constitutional duty to provide for and protect.

This is an obvious violation of both the First Amendment and of basic American customs. The North Carolina legislature passed a law that prevented hospitals from prohibiting pastors and priests from ministering to patients in the hospital (even during the pandemic). This should NOT stand.

The Charges Against Justice Clarence Thomas

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Justice Thomas has been a problem for the political left since he was nominated. The trumped-up charges against him did not work, and the Democrats were not able to deny him a seat on the Supreme Court as they had done to Robert Bork in 1987. Now, the Democrats want him investigated for vacationing with a friend and Representative Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez wants him impeached. So what exactly is going on?

On Friday, The Epoch Times reported:

After a news report highlighted luxurious vacations Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas allegedly accepted from a wealthy friend, Thomas said he was advised he didn’t have to report the trips. In a new statement, Thomas denied any wrongdoing and vowed to follow new reporting requirements imposed on the federal judiciary.

Thomas’s critics in Congress promptly seized on the report last week of the vacations, suggesting it raised the appearance of impropriety.

Rep. Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.) demanded that the justice be impeached, saying his actions evidenced an “almost cartoonish” level of corruption. Sen. Sheldon Whitehouse (D-R.I.), who chairs the Senate Judiciary Committee’s panel on federal courts, called for an independent investigation of the justice, who has long been a target of the left.

Whitehouse and other critics also say that justices whose spouses are involved in political activism, like Thomas, whose wife, Ginni Thomas, a supporter of former President Donald Trump, is active in conservative politics, should have to recuse themselves from involvement in cases related to that activism. Despite pressure, the justice declined to recuse himself from the various challenges to the disputed 2020 presidential election that made it to the Supreme Court.

Billionaire businessman and Republican Party donor Harlan Crow, who made the gifts to Thomas, has reportedly not had any business before the Supreme Court, so any allegation of a conflict of interest rests on weak grounds.

Nor is it clear if Thomas violated the judicial ethics code by not declaring the vacations. Legal experts say the code does not apply to the Supreme Court. The court has said in the past that the justices voluntarily adhere to the ethics guidelines.

Crow reportedly said the trips with Thomas and his wife were “no different from the hospitality that we have extended to many other dear friends.”

The article notes that he probably was not required to report the vacations:

“As friends do, we have joined them on a number of family trips during the more than quarter century we have known them,” the justice said.

“Early in my tenure at the Court, I sought guidance from my colleagues and others in the judiciary, and was advised that this sort of personal hospitality from close personal friends, who did not have business before the Court, was not reportable.

“I have endeavored to follow that counsel throughout my tenure, and have always sought to comply with the disclosure guidelines. These guidelines are now being changed, as the committee of the Judicial Conference responsible for financial disclosure for the entire federal judiciary just this past month announced new guidance.

“And, it is, of course, my intent to follow this guidance in the future,” Thomas said.

Just another Democrat witch-hunt.

When The Article Has No Relationship To The Truth

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On Friday, Hot Air posted a story about a recent article in the Miami Herald that totally mislead readers regarding an arrest. The article in the Herald claims that the 13-year-old son of Rebekah Jones was arrested over memes he posted. That is totally misleading. Ms. Jones claimed that her son was kidnapped by the police, yet the article contains a video of her sitting in the police station as her son is arrested by a Santa Rosa County Sheriff’s Deputy for threatening to shoot up a middle school.

The article includes a screen shot of the case. The screenshot includes the following:

This is obviously a disturbed child. His arrest may have prevented a school shooting. He is not a victim. He is suffering the consequences of his actions.

If is a safe bet that if this child had shot up the school, the media would blame the gun. This is one of many reasons the mainstream media is never to be believed.

Please follow the link above for the rest of the story.

 

 

A Very Unsurprising Statistic

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On Wednesday, Breitbart reported the following totally unsurprising information:

Felony suspects released without bail thanks to New York’s bail reform law are more likely to be rearrested for more felonies, including violent crimes, than suspects who were given bail before the law went into effect.

A study by researchers at John Jay College of Criminal Justice reviewed cases prior to the New York law taking effect and cases after the law was implemented where most suspects arrested for crimes are not required to pay any bail to be released from jail.

Overall, the study found that 47 percent of New York City suspects previously charged with felonies were rearrested for crimes — including more than 31 percent of whom were rearrested for felonies, more than 17 percent rearrested for violent crimes, and almost four percent rearrested for firearm charges.

…Of the more than 1,000 violent crime suspects reviewed by researchers, more than 72 percent were rearrested compared to fewer than 62 percent who were rearrested before the bail reform law.

Similarly, these violent crime suspects were rearrested for felonies at a more than 50 percent rate after being released without bail and rearrested for violent crimes at an almost 36 percent rate. Compare that to before the law when these suspects were rearrested for felonies at a 38 percent rate and a 24 percent rate for violent crimes.

The research on New York’s bail reform law echoes research in other states and cities that have nearly identical bail policies.

In Yolo County, California, for instance, 70 percent of suspects released without bail went on to be rearrested for additional crimes. Many of those suspects were rearrested for violent crimes like homicide, rape, kidnapping, robbery, carjacking, attempted homicide, assault with a deadly weapon, and domestic violence.

Who would have thought that letting criminals out of jail results in more crime?

The Current Investigation Into The Events Of January 6th

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On Thursday, Townhall reported the following:

Law enforcement agencies had at least 40 undercover FBI informants participating in surveillance work among defendants during the January 6 Capitol Hill protests.

Roger Roots, the lawyer for defendant American Proud Boys member Dominic Pezzola, filed a motion to reveal all undercover informants related to the January 6 case.

According to the filed document, several undercover law enforcement officers were at the Capitol that day, with at least 40 undercover informants or agents walking among them, which Roots claims were instigating trouble.

…On Tuesday, the government admitted that eight FBI confidential agents were embedded among the Proud Boys on January 6. Roots allege that the Homeland Security Investigations (HIS) agency had about 19 informants active at the time. In addition, at least 13 undercover plain-clothes DC Metro police agents were among the Proud Boys.

“When added to the 8 FBI CHSs now acknowledged by the prosecutors, this means that there were at least 40 undercover informants or agents doing surveillance among defendants on January 6,” Roots said, adding that the defense would have been “much more aggressive” in the initial trial if they would have known “the scope and scale” of January 6 undercover government scheme.

How many undercover agents does it take to incite a riot?

Some Highlights From The April 6 White House Press Briefing

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It’s good to know that creative fiction lives. It’s not so good to know that it lives in the White House Press Briefing Room.

Below are parts of the transcript from the April 6 briefing:

…But while it was always the President’s intent to end that war, it is also undeniable that decisions made and the lack of planning done by the previous administration significantly limited options available to him.

President Biden inherited a force presence in Afghanistan of some 2,500 troops. That was the lowest since 2001. He inherited a Special Immigrant Visa program that had been starved of resources. And he inherited a deal struck between the previous administration and the Taliban that called for the complete removal of all U.S. troops by May of 2021 — or else the Taliban, which had stopped its attacks while the deal was in place, would go back to war against the United States.

…And just to remind: We continue to facilitate the safe departures of Americans from Afghanistan when they tell us they are ready to leave. And we have proudly welcomed nearly 100,000 of our Afghan partners and their family members to the United States. Many of these families left Afghanistan after the withdrawal, and they continue to arrive on a regular basis.

Scott Johnson at Power Line Blog also posted an article about the briefing. That article included two Twitter screen shots:

I am amazed.

Time to Unite

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Author: R. Alan Harrop, Ph.D

The indictment of former President Donald Trump in New York (as well as several other potential indictments) represents a grave constitutional threat to America that must be answered in a way that crushes the Marxist Democrats. Anything less is not acceptable. Time to use a sledge hammer. The idea that one political party would use a fake criminal charge to destroy a political opponent from running for president, threatens our democracy and is right out of the Marxist play book. Any clear thinking American patriot should see this for what it is.

The question becomes what do we do about it? We must unite and fight back in a way that the Democrats will regret and reasserts the principles inherent to our Republic. How? We currently have Donald Trump leading in the polls for the Republican nomination by 20 to 30 percentage points over his nearest potential rival. The hammer blow will be struck when all current and potential candidates withdraw from challenging Donald Trump for the nomination. Ron DeSantis should agree to run as Trump’s Vice President. The other candidates should agree to take positions in the next Trump administration. A ticket with Trump and DeSantis will not only offer an unbeatable combination but will keep Republicans from fighting amongst each other in the primaries. There will also be a considerable saving of campaign funds which can then be used to fight the Marxist Democrats in the general election.

It is time for Republican politicians to stand up and recognize that our country is in extreme peril which is going to require extreme measures. The days of normal politics are over. We can only win if we fight as a team and put aside personal interests. DeSantis is the key. Trump has proven that he loves this country and has been willing to endure constant attacks from the Marxist Democrats, since he first came
down the elevator in Trump Towers in 2016.. He did not run for president for personal ambition but rather due to his unremitting love of this country. It is time for Ron DeSantis to demonstrate whether his love for America is strong enough to put aside his personal ambition for four years and be part of the team that saves our country. He could still go on and serve eight years as president in his own rite and go down in history as a true patriot.

What a blow this would be to the Marxist Democrats. Wishful thinking? Perhaps…

 

Chutzpah At Its Best

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On Tuesday, The Federalist posted an article about the mantra we have been hearing recently by members of the Democrat party–the claim that “no one is above the law.” Really?

The article notes:

Lock Donald Trump up, or don’t lock him up, but don’t tell me that “no one is above the law.” It’s one of the most ludicrous fantasies peddled by the left.

Plenty of people are “above the law.” James Clapper, who lied under oath to Congress about spying on the American people, is above the law. John Brennan, who lied about a domestic spying operation on Senate staffers, is above the law. Unlike Trump advisor Peter Navarro, Obama’s Attorney General Eric Holder was never going to be handcuffed and thrown in prison for ignoring a congressional subpoena. He is above the law.

Trump’s 2016 opponent, Hillary Clinton, is also above the law. The then-Secretary of State set up a private server in her home to circumvent transparency surrounding her slush-fund foundation. She sent 110 emails containing marked classified information, and 36 of those emails contained secret information. Eight of the email chains contained “top secret” information. Every one of those instances was a potential felony punishable with up to ten years in prison.

…When Hillary’s husband, also above the law, perjured himself under oath, Democrats argued that puritanical conservatives were only pursuing Bill because of some trumped-up charge over “sex.” Using that logic, Trump’s campaign finance charges related to Stormy Daniels’ “hush money” are also about sex. This is different because Trump is the boogeyman, and everyone knows he’s guilty of something. The important thing is getting that mug shot.

Don’t worry, though; former House Speaker Nancy Pelosi says, “Everyone has the right to a trial to prove innocence.” By “everyone,” she means Republicans.

Please follow the link above to read the entire article. We have become like the frog in the pot of warm water. While we are enjoying the warm water, the heat is being turned up. By the time we realize that the water is too hot, we will be cooked. It’s time for even those who have Trump Derangement Syndrome to wake up and see what is happening.

This Is Actually A Game-Changer

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Many of us were disappointed at the mid-term elections in North Carolina. Governor Cooper has been very free with his veto pen, and things that needed to be done were routinely vetoed. It was hoped that the Republicans would achieve a veto-proof majority in the state legislature, but that didn’t happen. Well, never give up.

On Wednesday, American Greatness reported the following:

In North Carolina, a Democratic state lawmaker officially switched her party affiliation to Republican, thus giving the GOP a supermajority in the lower chamber of the state’s legislature.

According to RedState, State Representative Tricia Cotham (D-N.C.), who was first elected to the North Carolina House of Representatives last November from the newly-created District 112, is expected to formally announce her switch to the Republican Party on Wednesday. Her switch will give the GOP control of 72 seats in the 120-seat chamber, exactly 60 percent of all seats, thus putting the party over the threshold of a supermajority that they fell one seat short of in the 2022 elections. The party currently holds a similar 60 percent majority in the State Senate, with 30 out of 50 seats in the upper chamber.

As Axios further reports, Cotham’s switch would give the North Carolina GOP “a veto-proof majority in the middle of the legislative session and a clear runway to enact their agenda despite opposition from Democratic Gov. Roy Cooper.”

The article reports some of the political changes in North  Carolina in recent years:

Then, in 2022, the GOP picked up two seats in the state house and another two seats in the state senate. Most crucially, last November saw Trump-endorsed Congressman Ted Budd (R-N.C.) win the open race for the state’s U.S. Senate seat, by a margin of 3.2 percent against Democrat Cheri Beasley.

While the North Carolina GOP has enacted its veto override against Governor Cooper before, Cotham’s switch solidifies their majority and now all but guarantees that the party can pass laws without Cooper’s signature.

According to North Carolina Public Radio, part of the reason for Ms. Cotham’s switch to the Republican party was the fact that she felt as if she were treated unfairly by the Democrats. That should be a reminder to all of us to treat each other with the respect and care that we ourselves expect.