Spain Brings 600 Mediterranean Migrants To Europe in 24 Hours in Busiest Day of 2017 So Far

Spain Brings 600 Mediterranean Migrants To Europe in 24 Hours in Busiest Day of 2017 So Far

17 Aug, 2017
17 Aug, 2017

MADRID (AP) – Spain’s maritime rescue service has saved more than 600 migrants trying to cross the Mediterranean Sea from Morocco in the past 24 hours, making it one of its busiest days so far this year.

The service said it rescued 16 migrants early Thursday in the Strait of Gibraltar, a narrow passage that separates Spain from Morocco. On Wednesday, its vessels rescued 601 migrants, including two in a canoe and six in a beach paddle boat.

The service said of the 601, 432 migrants were rescued in the Strait and 169 further east in the Mediterranean. Some 550 of the migrants were from Maghreb countries of northwest Africa and the rest from sub-Saharan African countries.

More than 9,000 migrants have reached Spain by sea so far this year, more than the total for all of 2016.

The International Organization for Migration said one reason for the increase could be that the Mediterranean Sea crossing from Libya to Italy is seen as increasingly dangerous, due to lawlessness in Libya and stepped-up patrols by the Libyan coast guard. More migrants also reach Spain during good summer weather.

Tens of thousands of migrants from Africa attempt the perilous sea crossing to Europe in smugglers’ boats each year, with many drowning along the way.

In Spain’s case, many also try to enter Europe by scaling border fences surrounding Ceuta and Melilla, the country’s two North African enclaves.

Read More Stories About:

Breitbart London, Immigration, Europe Migrant Crisis, Spain

P.S. DO YOU WANT MORE ARTICLES
LIKE THIS ONE DELIVERED RIGHT TO YOUR INBOX?
SIGN UP FOR THE DAILY BREITBART NEWSLETTER.

via Breitbart News

Enjoy this article? Read the full version at the authors website: http://ift.tt/uktKj3

U.S. Hiding Key Details of Mystery Attacks on American Diplomats in Cuba

U.S. Embassy in Havana

U.S. Embassy in Havana / Getty Images

BY:
August 17, 2017 12:25 pm

The number of U.S. government personnel targeted by a mysterious illness in Cuba last year is greater than the Trump administration has publicly acknowledged, according to multiple U.S. officials who told the Washington Free Beacon the Obama administration may have misled Congress about the full scope and nature of the attack.

U.S. officials disclosed earlier this month that six Americans were struck by a mystery illness believed to be caused by a covert sonic device in what many think was a clandestine operation targeting U.S. personnel stationed in the communist country.

The number of Americans impacted is greater than previously disclosed, according to multiple U.S. officials who told the Free Beacon that those suffering from symptoms of sonic damage appears to be more than 10.

“It’s definitely in the double digits,” one source told the Free Beacon.

The mysterious incident has roiled the relationship between the United States and Cuba and has raised more questions than answers in Congress, where lawmakers are finding their inquiries about the situation stymied.

Congress is scheduled to receive a brief on the matter Thursday afternoon and is seeking to have outstanding questions addressed, sources said.

In addition to the greater number of U.S. persons harmed by the sonic device, it is believed that some Americans stationed in Havana began experiencing symptoms months earlier than the State Department has publicly admitted, sources said.

While U.S. officials have publicly claimed the symptoms—which include severe hearing loss—began around December 2016, multiple sources told the Free Beacon some reported illness earlier. This raises new questions about the Obama administration’s handling of the incidents and whether they informed the required members of Congress about it in a timely manner, the sources said.

The symptoms associated with the sonic attack worsen with prolonged exposure, making it difficult to pinpoint exactly when the problems began and how many incidents may have occurred.

U.S. officials further confirmed to the Free Beacon that other Western diplomats suffered similar illnesses, prompting speculation the covert operation was not limited to targeting the United States. This includes Canadian diplomats and potentially others.

Many key lawmakers are concerned that the Obama administration delayed notifying Congress and may have downplayed the impact of the incidents in order to try to protect President Obama’s détente with Cuba.

The executive branch and the intelligence community are required to inform the so-called Gang of Eight—the top Republican and Democratic leaders in the House and Senate and the top Republicans and Democrats on the House and Senate Intelligence Committees—about developments with serious foreign policy or covert ramifications.

It’s unclear why the Trump administration waited until August to publicly acknowledge the illnesses. Key members of Congress were notified earlier this year, the State Department has said.

President Trump and his team spent the first half of the year evaluating Obama’s Cuba policy, and Trump announced revisions to it in mid-June that mostly included tighter travel restrictions, especially to hotels owned by the Cuban military. In May, Trump kicked two Cuban diplomats out of Washington over the incidents.

Key members of Congress and other critics want to know why the two diplomats Trump sent back to Cuba were junior members of the embassy team.

“If you wanted to send a real message you would ding the most senior members of their staff,” a source said.

Lawmakers also want answers to whether the Obama and Trump administrations accurately conveyed the incidents and the risk they posed to U.S. workers assigned to replace sick colleagues as part of their preparation for work in Havana and why the U.S. government never issued a travel warning to the U.S. public in response to the incidents.

One veteran foreign policy adviser who is close to the White House told the Free Beacon that the operation against the United States could have been run by any number of rogue actors operating in Cuba, though it is likely the Cuban government would be aware of such covert action.

“There’s no reason this has to be the Cubans,” the source said. “That place is a playground for some of the worst actors on the planet: Russia, Iran, Venezuela, and so on. U.S. adversaries and enemies have free rein there, which is one of the many reasons it was better to try to isolate Cuba than pretend they could be productively integrated into the international community.”

The Canadian government last week acknowledged that at least one of its diplomats also suffered from similar symptoms and experienced hearing loss, leading to speculation that Russia, instead of Cuba, was responsible for the sonic damage. Cuba doesn’t have an adversarial relationship with Canada but tensions are rising between Ottawa and Moscow over recent Canadian sanctions.

Cuba experts say the Castro government keeps such a close watch on foreigners on the island that it’s highly unlikely that Russians could act without the knowledge and even consent of the Cuban government.

The State Department so far has released only limited information about the incidents, with officials saying their investigation into exactly what took place and why is still ongoing. Last week, Secretary of State Rex Tillerson described the incidents as “health attacks.”

“We’ve not been able to determine who’s to blame,” he said.

State Department spokeswoman Heather Nauert last week said the United States is still assessing the situation and “can’t blame any one country.”

“We have spoken extensively with the Cubans, as you know. The reason we had [the diplomats] leave is we said this is the agreement that the U.S. has with the Cuban government. They are responsible for the safety and security of our [diplomats]. They are not safe, they are not secure because something happened to them.”

She said the U.S. embassy in Havana, however, is “fully operational, fully staffed” but would not elaborate if all the posts have been filled for those diplomats who left in the wake of the incidents.

via Washington Free Beacon

Enjoy this article? Read the full version at the authors website: http://freebeacon.com

Journalism? CNN Promotes SPLC’s Dangerous and Discredited ‘Hate Map’

In the aftermath of Charlottesville, when the term “hate group” is used, images of the KKK and neo-nazis immediately come to mind.

However, according to CNN, the real hate groups to watch out for are the conservative organizations, specifically Alliance Defending Freedom (ADF), the Family Research Council (FRC), American Family Association and ACT for America.

CNN copied the Southern Poverty Law Center’s (SPLC) controversial and dangerous hate map, and posted a list organized by state and alphabetical order. At the top of the list for Arizona are ACT for America and the ADF. Later, at 12:43 pm, CNN took the list down but left the story and the link to SPLC up. Previously, they had a sentence that said, "Scroll down to see the hate groups that operate out of your state." 

CNN essentially reinforced the SPLC’s longstanding attacks against conservative groups. The SPLC hate map actually led to a shooting and an act of domestic terrorism.

The Family Research Council, described by the SPLC as “defaming gays and lesbians,” was attacked by Floyd Lee Corkins on August 15, 2012, who “wanted to kill as many people as possible” because the organization was listed as an anti-LGBTQ hate group on the SPLC map.

CNN reported this in February of 2013.

“Corkins — who had chosen the research council as his target after finding it listed as an anti-gay group on the website of the Southern Poverty Law Center — had planned to stride into the building and open fire on the people inside in an effort to kill as many as possible, he told investigators, according to the court documents.”

CBS News described the resolution of the case in 2013: “Corkins pleaded guilty to three charges: interstate transportation of a firearm and ammunition, assault with intent to kill while armed and act of terrorism while armed, a charge based on the shooting being intended to intimidate anyone who is associated with or supports the Family Research Council and other organizations that oppose gay marriage.”

It’s not just about the SPLC’s campaign against FRC. The ADF has been attacked by the mainstream media networks again and again as an anti-LGBTQ hate group, specifically by ABC News in July. In a statement given to Newsbusters in July, Alliance Defending Freedom Legal Counsel and Director of Communications Kerri Kupec said:

“Alliance Defending Freedom is one of the most respected and successful Supreme Court advocates in the legal profession, having won seven cases at the high court in the last seven years.

Southern Poverty Law Center spends its time and money attacking veterans, nuns, Muslims who oppose terrorism, Catholics, Evangelicals, and anyone else who dares disagree with its far-left ideology.

Meanwhile, ADF works every day to preserve and affirm free speech and the free exercise of religion for people from all walks of life and all backgrounds because we believe freedom is for everyone.”

There is a clear difference between the Alliance Defending Freedom and the American Nazi Party. These two groups should not be side by side on a hate map.

The ADF, founded in 1994, has been advocating for the right to freely practice Christian values in American society. Their website states, “Alliance Defending Freedom defends religious freedom and opposes all attempts to compel people to compromise their beliefs or retreat from civil and political life as the price for following their faith.”

That’s the hate speech aimed directly at the LGBTQ community, if you believe SPLC and CNN.

Even CNN acknowledged that the “hate map” was at the very least, controversial. “Some critics of the SPLC say the group’s activism biases how it categorizes certain groups. But since the FBI doesn’t keep track of domestic hate groups, the SPLC’s tally is the widely accepted one.”

By advocating for the SPLC and re-publishing its “hate group” map, CNN could be accused of encouraging the kind of violence and fear caused by the foiled Corkins attack. The New York Times and The Washington Post accepted a full page ad for the SPLC today.

                                           

In addition, ACT for America is also targeted on this list. SPLC calls ACT for America “the largest grassroots anti-Muslim group in America.” Nowhere on ACT for America’s site are Muslims mentioned. The real hate that SPLC feared is the fact that ACT for America calls themselves “the NRA of national security.”

As a thin veneer for balance, the list also includes the Nation of Islam and the Black Panthers Groups. However, where these groups have been involved in violent incidents, the ADF, FRC, and ACT for America have not.

And even liberal media have recently attacked the SPLC as too extreme. POLITICO recently asked whether or not the group has pushed it’s civil rights credibility too far. Writer Ben Schreckinger actually called the founder of the SPLC “a little Trumpian,” the ultimate liberal insult. HBO talk show host Bill Maher admitted recently that he would join in a crowd-funded lawsuit against SPLC, according to the Washington Examiner.

CNN also promoted an SPLC map on Wednesday.

via NewsBusters – Exposing Liberal Media Bias

Enjoy this article? Read the full version at the authors website: http://ift.tt/2vylnxx

Atlanta Monument Meant to Champion Unity Desecrated by Protesters

Atlanta’s Peace Monument was damaged by protesters Sunday night, though it was erected in 1911 to urge reconciliation after the Civil War, not to celebrate the Confederacy.

The sculpture features an angel standing above a Confederate soldier, guiding him to lay down his weapon. Protesters traveled in Atlanta from Woodruff Park to Piedmont Park, where the Peace Monument is located, and some desecrated it, according to the Atlanta Journal-Constitution.

The scene was only protected by one police officer, who was surrounded by black-clad Antifa protesters shouting "pig."

"I completely understand what happened," Thornton Kennedy, a sixth generation Atlantan who has taken his children to visit the monument many times to explain Atlanta’s history, told the Journal-Constitution. "It’s a statue that, to the observer, looks like a Confederate memorial."

Atlanta author Goldie Taylor tweeted, "The Peace Monument is NOT a Confederate memorial. It was erected to honor those who worked to reunify the country after Reconstruction."

The Journal-Constitution also reported that Atlanta Police Chief Erika Shields expressed regret about how her officers dealt with protesters Sunday who defaced the statue.

"I feel like that we should have identified, removed, and arrested a couple of people earlier in the march, absolutely," Shields said in an interview with Channel 2 Action News.

Shields said that by the time it was clear arrests were necessary, "We couldn’t identify them. And that’s not acceptable. We have the intelligence, we have the probable cause, we need to take action."

The post Atlanta Monument Meant to Champion Unity Desecrated by Protesters appeared first on Washington Free Beacon.

via Washington Free Beacon

Enjoy this article? Read the full version at the authors website: http://freebeacon.com

CNN’s Rye Calls for Washington, Jefferson Monuments to Come Down

As the left mobilizes mobs to tear down confederate statues (and peace monuments) from city-to-city, it was only a matter of time before they would be going after our Founding Fathers. On CNN Thursday morning, liberal analyst Angela Rye argued that our nation’s first president was as detestable as Robert E. Lee because he was a slave owner. “To me, I don’t care if it’s a George Washington statue or Thomas Jefferson, they all need to come down,” she said before ranting about America’s “very violent past.”

In a panel discussion with the Daily Beast’s John Avlon, journalist Farai Chideya and analysts Amanda Carpenter and Angela Rye, host Kate Bolduan asked her guests about Trump’s tweets, which questioned who was “next” on the left’s list of objectionable historical figures. Carpenter lamented that Trump was dividing the country into “choosing sides” over this confederate monument issue, and leaving a political dynamic that left “no room for moderation.”

Bolduan then asked Avlon if the comparison of George Washington to Robert E.Lee was valid.

It’s an idiotic comparison. I think it scratches an itch we have seen throughout a lot of American history,” Avlon began. “It falls apart on the fundamental level that George Washington devoted his life to trying to unite our nation. Confederate generals made a fateful decision to try to tear apart our nation and 6 million people died,” he said, before dismissing that Lee and Washington were on the same plane of moral equivalency.

Bolduan then went slightly off-topic with guest Farai Chideya, asking her about white nationalist’s beliefs that America needed to be taken back to the days of white supremacy, which Chideya dismissed as an inaccurate belief. “When they talk about the original America, it was already multicultural. There were already Latinos. There were already black people. If we are going to relitigate history, let’s start with that,” she said.

Coming back to the monuments debate, Bolduan asked Rye,“Is it about statues and monuments?”

Rye, the former executive director of the Congressional Black Caucus, brought the issue back to racism and America’s “very violent past that that resulted in the death and the raping and the killing of my ancestors,” which she said, was “protected” by George Washington:

 

 

RYE: We have to get to the heart of the problem here. The heart of the problem is the way many of us were taught American history. American history is not all glorious. I love John to death, I couldn’t disagree more about George Washington. George Washington was a slave owner. We need to call slave owners out for what they are. Whether we think they were protecting American freedom or not. He wasn’t protecting my freedom. I wasn’t someone–my ancestors weren’t deemed human beings to him. To me, I don’t care if it’s a George Washington statue or a Thomas Jefferson statue or a Robert E. Lee statue, they all need to come down. There is a way to recognize–I’m not — I’m not — no, no, no, but I’m not — I’m going to finish my point. I’m going to finish my point. I’m not feeding into white supremacy. I’m calling out white supremacy for what it is. And sometimes, what it is John, are blind spots. Sometimes what it is, is not acknowledging this country was built upon a very violent past that resulted in the death and the raping and the killing of my ancestors. I’m not going to allow us to say it’s okay for Robert E. Lee but not a George Washington. We need to call it what it is.

Rye then warned that we had to keep “teaching” about Washington because we were “very close” to being a nation of slavery again:

RYE: I don’t say they don’t deserve to be taught about, learn about it so we don’t repeat it because we are very close to repeating it right now. I’m not giving deference to George Washington or Robert E. Lee.

AVLON: Look. We have to be real careful here. What we are doing here is polarizing the conversation exactly in the direction that Donald Trump wants. We can obviously, the founding fathers were slave owners. The larger point is the perspective is key in American politics. While George Washington released his slaves upon his death bed, which was definitely too late,cold comfort for everybody and slavery is the original sin in our country that we’ve been dealing with fitfully– we need to confront more correctly. If you all of a sudden buy into the slippery slope argument that Donald Trump is presenting—

RYE: I don’t.

AVLON: That the Founding Fathers were the moral equivalent of confederate generals

RYE: I didn’t.

AVLON: I believe you just did.

RYE: I didn’t. I don’t think you liked what I said but that’s not what I said.

Chideya then tried to make the point that our heroes are “nuanced” and complex, and no one has to have led a perfect life to be considered a figure worthy of respect:

CHIDEYA: Can I throw one more thing in there. In my house, I have a portrait of George Washington and family. In that portrait is a man named William Lee. He is a black man who was — who worked with George Washington. He is depicted in the painting Washington crossing the Delaware. Yet, George Washington, this same man who I believe was a hero, also pursued his runaway slave, Ona. There’s a new book out called "Never Caught." George Washington was a complex man who was a hero, who validated William Lee, who served beside him and yet who pursued a runaway slave across America. I’m someone who can believe in the nuance of heroes. There are no people who are heroic who don’t have lead feet. So, I perhaps triangulating between both of you. I am obsessed with history. Let’s just dig into it. Let’s at least know now our history. I don’t think George Washington is a Robert E. Lee and I don’t think President Trump knows anything about history, he is using it as a blunt instrument for talking points to please white supremacists. That’s what I believe.

Rye is unfortunately not alone. What was once a fringe view is being embraced by the mainstream left, with more renewed calls for the takedown of anything erected to Washington or Jefferson. Celebrities are even equating any figure who owned slaves in our nation’s history to Osama Bin Laden.

 

 

via NewsBusters – Exposing Liberal Media Bias

Enjoy this article? Read the full version at the authors website: http://ift.tt/2vylnxx

Virginia State Police Say They Didn’t Find Weapons Caches in Charlottesville Despite McAuliffe Claim

Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe (D.) was contradicted by the Virginia State Police again on Wednesday after he claimed weapons were hidden around Charlottesville during a white supremacist rally turned riot.

During an interview with Black Lives Matter activist DeRay Mckesson, McAuliffe explained why police were often hesitant to try and break up violent altercations between white supremacists, neo-Nazis, and Antifa factions. He said the white supremacists and neo-Nazis were heavily armed and prepared to commit violent acts from the start, and police were trying to avoid escalating the violence. He then claimed police had discovered weapons caches throughout the city.

"They had battering rams and, you know, we had picked up different weapons they had stashed around the city," McAuliffe told Mckesson. "This was a powder keg. This was a very volatile situation. And I’ll once again say, I am very proud of our team on the ground. Nobody hurt except for those people hit by the car and you couldn’t stop that."

However, Virginia State Police spokesperson Corinne Geller told Reason magazine that no such weapons caches were discovered.

"The governor was referring to the briefing provided him in advance of Saturday’s rally and the extra security measures being taken by local and state police," Geller said. "As a safety precaution in advance of August 12, such searches were conducted in and around Emancipation and McIntire Parks. No weapons were located as a result of those searches."

The contradiction represents the second time this week that Gov. McAuliffe has been at odds with Virginia State Police. On Monday, Virginia State Police said they were not outgunned by any of the Charlottesville protesters and were well prepared to handle the event.

"No, the State Police did not have inferior equipment," Geller told the Free Beacon on Monday. "Our personnel are equipped, and were equipped, with the necessary protective and tactical gear for their safety and, obviously, to protect those that were in attendance of the event."

The State Police wouldn’t release details on exactly what kind of equipment they deployed at the protests but said they were appropriate for the conditions.

"We don’t release our tactical gear or anything of that nature for the protective purposes of our law enforcement," Geller said. "They had the necessary inventory and gear that they needed for this event. There were no shots fired at the event or anything of that nature but our folks had the proper gear and tactical equipment they needed in order to safeguard themselves and everybody in attendance."

Despite the public comments from the State Police, McAuliffe repeated his claim that police weren’t as well equipped as the protesters to Mckesson on Monday—adding that the Virginia National Guard was also outclassed.

"If you see people yesterday walking down the street yesterday with semi-automatic rifles strapped to their body," he said. "I mean, they had better armor than my State Police and National Guard had."

McAuliffe went on to say that, except for the maiming of dozens of protesters and the murder of Heather Heyer by a white supremacist sympathizer, he was proud of the lack of violence at the event.

"I’m very proud, except for, put the car incident aside, no one went to the hospital," McAuliffe said. "Except for those 20 people, 19 people and the person who died from the car incident, not one single person went to the hospital. Not one shot was fired. And, believe it or not, not one ounce of property damage."

The governor’s office did not immediately respond to questions on why the governor and the State Police are at odds on what happened in Charlottesville.

The post Virginia State Police Say They Didn’t Find Weapons Caches in Charlottesville Despite McAuliffe Claim appeared first on Washington Free Beacon.

via Washington Free Beacon

Enjoy this article? Read the full version at the authors website: http://freebeacon.com

Take Down the Statues of Robert Byrd

President Trump had it right when, during his press conference on infrastructure he addressed the nonstop questions on Charlottesville, he asked if those obsessed with fears of white nationalism if they would also remove statues and monuments to George Washington and Thomas Jefferson, both slaveowners, in addition to the statue of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee.

Trump’s critics responded that while Washington and Jefferson were slaveowners, they did not go to war to defend slavery. True enough, but also true is the fact that white nationalism had its roots in the Democratic post-Civil War south and that the KKK was founded by Democrats to suppress blacks liberated by the Republican administration of President Abraham Lincoln.

The alt-left movement, which shares the blame along with arguably racist groups such as Black Lives Matter and Antifa, hate America so much that they want to erase all vestiges of American history and throw them down an Orwellian memory hole to be supplanted by alt-left politically correct ideology.

Notice that no one has demanded that statues of former senator and KKK icon Robert Byrd be removed, statues honoring the hard-core former white nationalist whom Hillary Clinton once called her friend and mentor, including one prominently displayed in the West Virginia state capitol:

With the tearing down of confederate statues, removal of confederate flags, and the destruction of anything from America’s past that is controversial or downright deplorable, one statue has managed to escape scrutiny from protesters.

It involves a U.S. Senator from West Virginia. A prominent, highly successful member of the Democrat party. And a mentor to the woman who almost became President of the United States.

He also happens to be a former card-carrying member of the KKK. In fact, he created his own chapter along with 150 of his friends and colleagues.

Where is the outrage and destruction of this statue?

That is former Senator Robert Byrd who was once elected a top officer – the Exalted Cyclops, whatever the hell that is – in the local Klan unit in the early 1940s.

He is a man who once vowed never to fight in the military along with “race mongrels” or “with a negro by my side.”

After his passing, Hillary Clinton eulogized Byrd in a 2010 video in which she called him “my friend and mentor.”

The alt-left seems very selective in its righteous indignation, ignoring the historical record of a Democratic Party which embraced white nationalism, founded the KKK, and honored one of the great bigots of modern times — Robert Byrd.

The alt-left’s historical amnesia omits the fact that it was Senator Robert Byrd, Democrat of West Virginia and former “Grand Kleagle” with the Ku Klux Klan, who holds the distinction of being the only senator to have opposed the only two black nominees to the Supreme Court, Thurgood Marshall and Clarence Thomas, and led a 52-day filibuster against civil rights legislation.

Sen. Al Gore, father of the former vice president, voted against the act, as did Sen. J. William Fulbright, to whom Bill Clinton dedicated a memorial, current senior Senator from South Carolina Ernest Hollings, Sen. Richard Russell and, of course, Sen. Strom Thurmond, who was a Democrat at that time.

Cory Booker, among others, forgets that it was Democrats who unleashed the dogs and turned on the fire hoses on civil rights marchers. It was Democrats who stood in the schoolhouse door and are still standing there by opposing school choice and trapping minority children in failing schools. It was Democrats who blocked the bridge in Selma.

Booker’s amnesia omits the fact that the Civil Rights Act of 1964 would never have been possible without Republican leadership. Not only was that legislation a personal victory for Illinois Republican Sen. Everett Dirksen, then Senate Minority leader, Republicans in both the House and Senate supported the measure in far greater percentages than Democrats. Only six GOP Senators voted against the act, compared with 21 Democrats. The party of Abraham Lincoln beat back the fire hoses and dogs of the party of Robert Byrd.

As one pundit put it, the Democrats should know a lot about Jim Crow laws, since they are the ones who wrote them. Condoleezza Rice, President George W. Bush’s national security advisor, explained at the 2000 GOP national convention why a black college professor would be a Republican:

“The first Republican I knew was my father John Rice. And he is still the Republican I admire the most. My father joined our party because the Democrats in Jim Crow Alabama of 1952 would not register him to vote. The Republicans did. I want you to know that my father has never forgotten that day, and neither have I.”

President Trump has been roundly and unjustly vilified for allegedly not being forceful enough quickly enough in his condemnation of racism in Charlottesville. Compare this to the free pass given to President Barack Hussein Obama after the murder of five Dallas police officers when he used a memorial, not to condemn the racially motivated shooter, but rather racist cops. As the Washington Times reported:

 President Obama defended the Black Lives Matter movement Tuesday at a memorial service for five slain Dallas police officers, saying bigotry remains a problem in police departments across the U.S.

While paying tribute to the fallen officers for sacrificing their lives to protect anti-police protesters from a sniper, Mr. Obama also called on law enforcement agencies to root out bias that he said is contributing to violence on the streets of America.

“We have all seen this bigotry in our lives at some point,” Mr. Obama told an audience of about 2,500 at a concert hall in Dallas. “None of us is entirely innocent. No institution is entirely immune. And that includes our police departments. We know this.”

The officers — Michael Smith, Lorne Ahrens, Michael Krol, Brent Thompson and Patrick Zamarripa — were killed during a Black Lives Matter protest Thursday night by a black sniper who told police he targeted white officers….

Fox News commentator Katie Pavlich added: “Worst part of Obama’s lecture about racial bias today? He did it at a memorial for 5 officers who were killed because they were white.”

The alt-left and the media — apologies for being redundant — are attempting to rewrite some history and make us forget the rest. It is the Democrats who are historically the party of white nationalism, a party that honors racist Klan members, and which ignores a sitting president who glosses over a black nationalist out to kill white cops

The alt-left talks of white nationalism but ignores the true character of movements like Black Lives Matter. As the Daily Caller reported and a video showed:

Black Lives Matter protesters marching on the Minnesota state fair on Saturday spewed violent anti-cop rhetoric just hours after a Harris County, Tex. sheriff’s deputy was ambushed and executed at a Houston-area gas station.

“Pigs in a blanket, fry ’em like bacon,” activists with the St. Paul, Minn. branch of Black Lives Matter chanted while marching behind a group of police officers down a highway just south of the state fair grounds.

We saw their bloodlust in New York as “protesters” of police brutality chanted their lust for dead cops. As Heather MacDonald writes in her new book, The War On Cops (Encounter Books, 2016):

In the summer of 2014, as we have seen, a lie overtook significant parts of the country and grew into a kind of mass hysteria. That lie holds that the police pose a mortal threat to black Americans — indeed, that the police are the greatest threat facing black Americans today. Several subsidiary untruths buttress that central myth: that the criminal-justice system is biased against blacks; that there is no such thing as a black underclass; and that crime rates are comparable between blacks and whites, so that disproportionate police action in minority neighborhoods cannot be explained without reference to racism. The poisonous effect of these lies manifested itself in the cold-blooded assassination of two NYPD officers in December that year. The highest reaches of American society promulgated those untruths and participated in the mass hysteria. President Barack Obama, speaking after a grand jury decided not to indict the police officer who fatally shot Michael Brown, declared that blacks were right to believe that the criminal-justice system was often stacked against them. Obama repeated that message as he traveled around the country subsequently. Eric Holder escalated a long-running theme of his tenure as U.S. attorney general: that the police routinely engaged in racial profiling and needed federal intervention to police properly….

Meanwhile, protests and riots against the police were gathering force across the country, all of them steeped in anti-cop vitriol and the ubiquitous lie that “black lives” don’t “matter” to the police. “What do we want? Dead cops,” chanted participants in a New York anti-cop protest….

The racial hatred spawned by the alt-left and the Democrats goes ignored as chants of “white nationalism” drown out the diminishing mantra of “Russia, Russia, Russia”. The racial insensitivity and hypocrisy of Obama, Holder, and the race-based Democratic Party feed off of identity politics.

Think a statue of Robert E. Lee honors white nationalism and racism? Then what, pray tell, does a statue honoring the likes of KKK leader Robert Byrd represent. If one warrants taking down, then so does the other.

Daniel John Sobieski is a freelance writer whose pieces have appeared in Investor’s Business Daily, Human Events, Reason Magazine and the Chicago Sun-Times among other publications.           

President Trump had it right when, during his press conference on infrastructure he addressed the nonstop questions on Charlottesville, he asked if those obsessed with fears of white nationalism if they would also remove statues and monuments to George Washington and Thomas Jefferson, both slaveowners, in addition to the statue of Confederate Gen. Robert E. Lee.

Trump’s critics responded that while Washington and Jefferson were slaveowners, they did not go to war to defend slavery. True enough, but also true is the fact that white nationalism had its roots in the Democratic post-Civil War south and that the KKK was founded by Democrats to suppress blacks liberated by the Republican administration of President Abraham Lincoln.

The alt-left movement, which shares the blame along with arguably racist groups such as Black Lives Matter and Antifa, hate America so much that they want to erase all vestiges of American history and throw them down an Orwellian memory hole to be supplanted by alt-left politically correct ideology.

Notice that no one has demanded that statues of former senator and KKK icon Robert Byrd be removed, statues honoring the hard-core former white nationalist whom Hillary Clinton once called her friend and mentor, including one prominently displayed in the West Virginia state capitol:

With the tearing down of confederate statues, removal of confederate flags, and the destruction of anything from America’s past that is controversial or downright deplorable, one statue has managed to escape scrutiny from protesters.

It involves a U.S. Senator from West Virginia. A prominent, highly successful member of the Democrat party. And a mentor to the woman who almost became President of the United States.

He also happens to be a former card-carrying member of the KKK. In fact, he created his own chapter along with 150 of his friends and colleagues.

Where is the outrage and destruction of this statue?

That is former Senator Robert Byrd who was once elected a top officer – the Exalted Cyclops, whatever the hell that is – in the local Klan unit in the early 1940s.

He is a man who once vowed never to fight in the military along with “race mongrels” or “with a negro by my side.”

After his passing, Hillary Clinton eulogized Byrd in a 2010 video in which she called him “my friend and mentor.”

The alt-left seems very selective in its righteous indignation, ignoring the historical record of a Democratic Party which embraced white nationalism, founded the KKK, and honored one of the great bigots of modern times — Robert Byrd.

The alt-left’s historical amnesia omits the fact that it was Senator Robert Byrd, Democrat of West Virginia and former “Grand Kleagle” with the Ku Klux Klan, who holds the distinction of being the only senator to have opposed the only two black nominees to the Supreme Court, Thurgood Marshall and Clarence Thomas, and led a 52-day filibuster against civil rights legislation.

Sen. Al Gore, father of the former vice president, voted against the act, as did Sen. J. William Fulbright, to whom Bill Clinton dedicated a memorial, current senior Senator from South Carolina Ernest Hollings, Sen. Richard Russell and, of course, Sen. Strom Thurmond, who was a Democrat at that time.

Cory Booker, among others, forgets that it was Democrats who unleashed the dogs and turned on the fire hoses on civil rights marchers. It was Democrats who stood in the schoolhouse door and are still standing there by opposing school choice and trapping minority children in failing schools. It was Democrats who blocked the bridge in Selma.

Booker’s amnesia omits the fact that the Civil Rights Act of 1964 would never have been possible without Republican leadership. Not only was that legislation a personal victory for Illinois Republican Sen. Everett Dirksen, then Senate Minority leader, Republicans in both the House and Senate supported the measure in far greater percentages than Democrats. Only six GOP Senators voted against the act, compared with 21 Democrats. The party of Abraham Lincoln beat back the fire hoses and dogs of the party of Robert Byrd.

As one pundit put it, the Democrats should know a lot about Jim Crow laws, since they are the ones who wrote them. Condoleezza Rice, President George W. Bush’s national security advisor, explained at the 2000 GOP national convention why a black college professor would be a Republican:

“The first Republican I knew was my father John Rice. And he is still the Republican I admire the most. My father joined our party because the Democrats in Jim Crow Alabama of 1952 would not register him to vote. The Republicans did. I want you to know that my father has never forgotten that day, and neither have I.”

President Trump has been roundly and unjustly vilified for allegedly not being forceful enough quickly enough in his condemnation of racism in Charlottesville. Compare this to the free pass given to President Barack Hussein Obama after the murder of five Dallas police officers when he used a memorial, not to condemn the racially motivated shooter, but rather racist cops. As the Washington Times reported:

 President Obama defended the Black Lives Matter movement Tuesday at a memorial service for five slain Dallas police officers, saying bigotry remains a problem in police departments across the U.S.

While paying tribute to the fallen officers for sacrificing their lives to protect anti-police protesters from a sniper, Mr. Obama also called on law enforcement agencies to root out bias that he said is contributing to violence on the streets of America.

“We have all seen this bigotry in our lives at some point,” Mr. Obama told an audience of about 2,500 at a concert hall in Dallas. “None of us is entirely innocent. No institution is entirely immune. And that includes our police departments. We know this.”

The officers — Michael Smith, Lorne Ahrens, Michael Krol, Brent Thompson and Patrick Zamarripa — were killed during a Black Lives Matter protest Thursday night by a black sniper who told police he targeted white officers….

Fox News commentator Katie Pavlich added: “Worst part of Obama’s lecture about racial bias today? He did it at a memorial for 5 officers who were killed because they were white.”

The alt-left and the media — apologies for being redundant — are attempting to rewrite some history and make us forget the rest. It is the Democrats who are historically the party of white nationalism, a party that honors racist Klan members, and which ignores a sitting president who glosses over a black nationalist out to kill white cops

The alt-left talks of white nationalism but ignores the true character of movements like Black Lives Matter. As the Daily Caller reported and a video showed:

Black Lives Matter protesters marching on the Minnesota state fair on Saturday spewed violent anti-cop rhetoric just hours after a Harris County, Tex. sheriff’s deputy was ambushed and executed at a Houston-area gas station.

“Pigs in a blanket, fry ’em like bacon,” activists with the St. Paul, Minn. branch of Black Lives Matter chanted while marching behind a group of police officers down a highway just south of the state fair grounds.

We saw their bloodlust in New York as “protesters” of police brutality chanted their lust for dead cops. As Heather MacDonald writes in her new book, The War On Cops (Encounter Books, 2016):

In the summer of 2014, as we have seen, a lie overtook significant parts of the country and grew into a kind of mass hysteria. That lie holds that the police pose a mortal threat to black Americans — indeed, that the police are the greatest threat facing black Americans today. Several subsidiary untruths buttress that central myth: that the criminal-justice system is biased against blacks; that there is no such thing as a black underclass; and that crime rates are comparable between blacks and whites, so that disproportionate police action in minority neighborhoods cannot be explained without reference to racism. The poisonous effect of these lies manifested itself in the cold-blooded assassination of two NYPD officers in December that year. The highest reaches of American society promulgated those untruths and participated in the mass hysteria. President Barack Obama, speaking after a grand jury decided not to indict the police officer who fatally shot Michael Brown, declared that blacks were right to believe that the criminal-justice system was often stacked against them. Obama repeated that message as he traveled around the country subsequently. Eric Holder escalated a long-running theme of his tenure as U.S. attorney general: that the police routinely engaged in racial profiling and needed federal intervention to police properly….

Meanwhile, protests and riots against the police were gathering force across the country, all of them steeped in anti-cop vitriol and the ubiquitous lie that “black lives” don’t “matter” to the police. “What do we want? Dead cops,” chanted participants in a New York anti-cop protest….

The racial hatred spawned by the alt-left and the Democrats goes ignored as chants of “white nationalism” drown out the diminishing mantra of “Russia, Russia, Russia”. The racial insensitivity and hypocrisy of Obama, Holder, and the race-based Democratic Party feed off of identity politics.

Think a statue of Robert E. Lee honors white nationalism and racism? Then what, pray tell, does a statue honoring the likes of KKK leader Robert Byrd represent. If one warrants taking down, then so does the other.

Daniel John Sobieski is a freelance writer whose pieces have appeared in Investor’s Business Daily, Human Events, Reason Magazine and the Chicago Sun-Times among other publications.           

via American Thinker

Enjoy this article? Read the full version at the authors website: http://ift.tt/TYiPDP

Really Chuck? MSNBC’s Todd Aids in Promotion of Antifa Violence

President Trump drew tremendous criticism from the liberal media when he noted that there was violence in Charlottesville, Virginia “on all sides.” But despite its own hammering of the President, MSNBC brought on a staunch supporter of Antifa during MTP Daily to champion their violent approach to stopping opponents, as they displayed in Charlottesville. Host Chuck Todd, a self-proclaimed political referee, offered little to no push back against his violently radical guest.

The MSNBC host welcomed his guest with open arms, asking: “Mark Bray, you are writing this book Antifa, the Anti-Fascist Handbook. Explain this movement and its roots.

So anti-fascism goes back to the beginning of the 20th century when leftists of all stripes fought back against Mussolini and Hitler,” Dartmouth “lecturer” Mark Bray claimed. “The main perspective of Antifa is essentially that rather than simply waiting for the threat to materialize, you stop it from the beginning.” He even admitted that what they did in Charlottesville was try to deny a platform.

After confirming that Bray followed the radical beliefs of Antifa, Todd’s next question wasn’t about the legality or morality of using violence to shut down free speech. It was concerning Antifa making the neo-Nazi’s look good. “What do you say to those that are concerned that: ‘Hey, you’re handing — you’re allowing this — these white supremacists to claim victim hood here,’” Todd probed. What do you say to that criticism since the President is trying to essentially create a false equivalency here?

 

 

Chuck Todd never questioned his guest’s romanticized explanation about what Antifa stood for or their own anti-semitic streak. He failed to do his due diligence and mention that Antifa promoted communism, a bloody ideology responsible for the deaths of roughly 100 million people.

There was also no mention from Todd of the fact that Antifa’s definition of fascism only applies to those they say it applies too, regardless of whether or not they’re actually fascist, a neo-Nazi, or a white nationalist. It often just applies to those who don’t take the liberal position on any particular issue. Their violence was even felt at world economic summits like the G20 where they’ve clashed with police.

Richard Cohen, president of the Southern Poverty Law Center, was the only one on the panel that appeared to find Antifa’s methods abhorrent. “I think fighting fire with fire under the circumstances is going to lead to what we saw in Charlottesville,” Cohen said. “We don’t need the Antifa to come and make a spectacle out of it, to embolden these people. They love it.”

Unbelievably, Todd actually pushed back on Cohen’s criticism of using violence instead of debate. He even made the Antifa argument for his guest: “The historical aspect of fascism has only been defeated with violence. I assume this the argument you’d make, right, Mark?” Cohen seriously had to remind everyone that in the United States people had the freedom of speech:

<<< Please support MRC’s NewsBusters team with a tax-deductible contribution today. >>>

These people have a right to espouse their ideas. No one – Hate is not illegal in this country. Hurting people is illegal, and we have first amendment rights and we can’t squelch them by having people show up at rallies with clubs.

The Antifa advocate’s response was chilling as he denounced the First Amendment. “So, I mean, if no one is praising the Weimar Republic for giving Nazis the right to assemble. No one is really lauding that,” Bray said coldly. “And I’d rather have people confronting them than sitting idly. There are no great memoirs written of people who sat idling by and watch Nazism rise to power.

Todd was unfazed by Bray; only half-heartedly asking if his guest if he was concerned about violence leading to more violence.

Antifa’s fluid definition of fascism, coupled with their love of violence, makes them a legitimate threat to anyone unlucky enough to attract their ire. And now Chuck Todd just gave them a platform to elevate and promote themselves.

Transcript below:

MSNBC
MTP Daily
August 16, 2017
5:40:06 PM Eastern

CHUCK TODD: Well, speaking of that fight, let’s go to that issue there. Mark Bray, you are writing this book Antifa, the Anti-Fascist Handbook. Explain this movement and its roots.

MARK: Right. Right. So anti-fascism goes back to the beginning of the 20th century when leftists of all stripes fought back against Mussolini and Hitler. Most people think of Nazism as something that died with WWII, but it really rebranded itself, grew again in a lot of European countries, in the United States.

And so the modern Antifa movement grows out of the 70s and 80s in Great Britain and Germany when a lot of immigrants, when a lot of leftists, punk rockers had to physically defend themselves from neo-Nazi attacks, predominantly through skinheads. And that’s where it grew and that’s where we can trace its lineage from today.

The main perspective of Antifa is essentially that rather than simply waiting for the threat to materialize, you stop it from the beginning. You say no platform for fascism and that’s what we’re seeing with the attempts in Charlottesville and elsewhere.

TODD: I’m curious, first of all, are you an advocate of this sort of confrontation?

BRAY: Yes, I am. Yes.

TODD: What do you say to those that are concerned that: “Hey, you’re handing — you’re allowing this — these white supremacists to claim victimhood here?” What do you say to that criticism since the President is trying to essentially create a false equivalency here?

BRAY: Well, I think there’s two parts of it. One is how does — how do far right movements grow? I say they grow by becoming normalized, by not being confronted, by being able to present themselves as family friendly and respectable. So part of the reason why the alt-right called themselves alt-right is to present that mainstream image.

And the opposition that people showed in Charlottesville really marred and tainted that. So I think that by showing up and confronting it, it prevents the ability of being able to be presented as mainstream and connect to that, I think, really you need to be able to prevent them from being able to organize. People who are involved in politics know that for movements to expand, they need to be able to organize and grow, and if you stop that, it prevents it.

Historically we can see that Nazism and fascism were not stopped by polite dialogue and reasonable debate. It had to be stopped by force and unfortunately, self-defense is necessitated in the context that we’re seeing today.

TODD: Mark, you didn’t see this, but Richard was shaking his head no. Why do you say that is not the right way to confront these white supremacists groups?

RICHARD COHEN: I think fighting fire with fire under the circumstances is going to lead to what we saw in Charlottesville.

Sign Up for MRC Newsletters!

We don’t need the Antifa to come and make a spectacle out of it, to embolden these people. They love it. That’s why they came with helmets on and shields, because they want to portray themselves as martyrs. They want to portray the white race as being embattled. The idea that we want to encourage the Antifa to come with clubs, you know, in all due respect it seems crazy to me.

TODD: But address Mark’s other point here. Well, mark, you go ahead. I was going to get him to respond to your other point, which is the historical aspect of fascism has only been defeated with violence. I assume this is the argument you’d make, right, Mark?

COHEN: Well, I guess what I would say is we have the police, we have law enforcement, and if, you know, if the neo-Nazis act violently, we can depend upon them shut them down. These people have a right to espouse their ideas. No one – Hate is not illegal in this country. Hurting people is illegal, and we have first amendment rights and we can’t squelch them by having people show up at rallies with clubs.

TODD: Mark, I’ll go ahead and give you the last word.

BRAY: So, I mean, if no one is praising the Weimar Republic for giving Nazis the right to assemble. No one is really lauding that. We’re looking back and saying isn’t it unfortunate that this threat was not taken seriously earlier and stamped out before millions of people could be killed. That’s the historical argument that I make. And I’d rather have people confronting them than sitting idly. There are no great memoirs written of people who sat idling by and watch Nazism rise to power.

TODD: Are you at all concerned about the rise violence begets violence begets violence? Mark.

BRAY: Self-defense is important.

via NewsBusters – Exposing Liberal Media Bias

Enjoy this article? Read the full version at the authors website: http://ift.tt/2vylnxx