Friday, March 3, 2017

Democrats, That Shameful Performance Proves Why Normal Americans Despise Your Party

President Trump delivered an impressive speech to a joint session of Congress on Tuesday night. He hammered on a lot of familiar Trump themes but did so in a more effective way than we’ve seen before. People will say it was a “presidential” speech, but of course any speech given by a president is, by definition, presidential. Better to say that it was a successful speech. Successful in communicating Trump’s core message in a clear, concise, and even eloquent way.

On the other hand, while Trump’s messaging was on point, Democrat messaging was somewhat less inspiring. Of course, we’re all familiar with how the Clapping Game is played during these speeches: The president’s party gives a standing ovation after every third syllable while the opposition party chooses its applause spots more carefully, usually electing to clap only when bipartisan platitudes are offered. But that changed last night.

Democrats remained seated with their hands in their laps even as Trump uttered the most non-controversial and universal of sentiments. They refused to applaud when Trump said we should put Americans first. The refused to applaud when Trump talked about fighting drug addiction in the inner city and corruption in Washington. They refused to applaud when Trump discussed the need to make sure certain blue collar Americans, like coal miners, still have jobs. They refused to applaud Trump’s vow to fight Islamic terrorism. They refused to applaud when Trump movingly stated that “we all salute the same flag and are made by the same God.” When the president highlighted the victims of illegal immigrant crime, many Democrats let out audible groans of disgust. And, most shameful of all, a number of top Democrats refused to stand and clap as the president honored the widow of a fallen Navy SEAL.

Disgusting. Truly disgusting.

If we were to judge their positions by the things they declined to applaud, we must arrive at the conclusion that Democrats are staunchly opposed to the flag, God, the law, job creation, and military widows, and enthusiastically in favor of drug addiction, terrorism, crime, unemployment, and murder. To those who’ve been paying attention, this is not much of revelation. They’ve given us a lot more than a lack of applause to indicate their positions on these topics. But it’s still somewhat surprising that Democrats are so eager to advertise the fact.

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A Confession on Meeting a Russian

Though now billed as a “spymaster,” Russian Ambassador Kislyak was well known as a social butterfly, meeting a wide range of Americans, including politicians, academics and activists, which led David Swanson to this “confession.” By David Swanson It was August…

Thursday, March 2, 2017

Keeping the Commander-in-Chief in Check

President Trump has surrounded himself with military generals who ironically may be the strongest bulwark against Trump’s own tough-guy tendencies, writes JP Sottile. By JP Sottile America’s generals are talking turkey. But we’re not talking about the well-known idiom for…

Wednesday, March 1, 2017

Trump Retreats on Detente with Russia

President Trump toned down his combative rhetoric in speaking to Congress but, more significantly, ditched his campaign promises about détente with Russia and a reduced military presence abroad, says Gilbert Doctorow. By Gilbert Doctorow Donald Trump’s speech on Tuesday to…

Christians, There Is No Room for Complacency or Despair in Our Faith

Complacency and despondency. I think these are the two great spiritual dangers faced by Christians in our culture, or any culture.

The spiritually complacent Christian is smug and overconfident before God. He does not repent, he does not actively seek God, he does not strive, through His grace, to serve Him more faithfully and follow Him more closely. The complacent Christian has no great love for God and no real consciousness of his own sin. He avoids dwelling on spiritual thoughts because he knows the truth will interfere with his comfortable way of life. The complacent Christian tells himself that he’s already completed the one single task required of Christians: that is, at some individual point in time, he verbally or mentally announced a belief in Him and an acceptance of all that stuff in the Bible — although he doesn’t really know what’s in the Bible, and in fact does not accept most of it.

The complacent Christian believes that he can be selfish, lustful, spiteful, vengeful, adulterous, disobedient, and prideful all he wants. In his mind, he’ll reap the rewards of salvation regardless, despite the fact that Scripture excludes such people from the Kingdom (1 Cor 6:9). He has determine that Christ was exaggerating when He prescribed keeping the commandments as a condition of the Christian life (John 14:15). All we need do, this Christian tells himself, is feel, think, and say that we believe. And not even every day. Just once. Nothing else is required. Sin is irrelevant. Repentance is a symbolic exercise at best, and not a very important one.

Of course, Scripture responds here with a loud rebuke: “If we say we have no sin, we deceive ourselves, and the truth is not in us.” And again: “If we deliberately keep on sinning after we have received the knowledge of the truth, there is no longer any sacrifice that will cover these sins.” And again: “If you keep my commandments, you will remain in my love.” And again: “My sheep listen to my voice; I know them, and they follow me. I give them eternal life, and they shall never perish.” And again: “If anyone would come after me, let him deny himself and take up his cross and follow me.”

All of these passages clearly indicate the necessity of actively following and listening to Christ, and making actual sacrifices for His sake. This is why the word “if” — the Big If — often appears when Scripture speaks of salvation. But the complacent Christian ignores the “if.” He concludes that following Christ and listening to Him and making sacrifices for Him is far too burdensome a proposition. He declines, therefore, to heed the call. Instead, he wraps himself in a small, random, out-of-context assortment of passages that seem to give him a license to live exactly as he wishes. He trusts, without basis, that he will never go to Hell no matter what he does or how he lives.

On the other hand, the despondent Christian — a category in which I am much more likely to find myself — does not share the complacent Christian’s fatal self-assuredness, but he ends up just as spiritually sedentary. He knows that he must follow Christ. He knows that his sins matter. He knows that repentance is required for salvation. He does not hide from these facts, but he feels he has already been damned by them. He looks at his life, his lengthy resume of sin and moral cowardice, his track record of failure and betrayal, and he feels that he’s dug himself into a spiritual hole from which he can never escape.

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How the Press Serves the Deep State

Exclusive: The mainstream U.S. media is proud to be the Deep State’s point of the spear pinning President Trump to the wall over unproven allegations about Russia and Trump’s calls for cooperation, one of the few areas where he makes sense,…

Israel’s Anti-Semitism Smears Backfire

Israel has often succeeded in silencing criticism of its mistreatment of Palestinians by smearing critics as anti-Semitic and scaring politicians into canceling public events, but the tactic is not only odious, it is now starting to backfire, writes retired U.S. diplomat Ann…