Watch Jon Tester Dodge Gun Control Questions for 3 Minutes

Prop-a-palooza: The Use and Abuse of Kiddie Human Shields

The president of the United States will release a binder full of new gun-control executive orders on Wednesday. Instead of standing alone, bearing full responsibility for the imperial actions he is about to take, President Obama will surround himself with an audience of kids who wrote to him after the Newtown, Conn., school massacre. This is the most cynical in Beltway theatrical staging -- a feckless attempt to invoke "For the Children" immunity by hiding behind them.

What has happened to the deliberative process in this country? Public debate in Washington has deteriorated into Sesame Street sing-a-longs. We are already inundated with logical fallacies: argumentum ad populum (it's popular, therefore it's true); argumentum ad nauseam (if you repeat it often enough, it'll become truth); argumentum ad hominem (sabotage the person, sabotage the truth); and argumentum ad verecundiam (if my favorite authority says it's true, it's true).

To that list we can now add "argumentum ad filium": If politicians appeal to the children, it's unassailably good and true. The Obama White House has shamelessly employed this kiddie human shield strategy at every turn to blunt substantive criticism and dissent.

During the legislative battle that rammed the federal health care takeover through Capitol Hill and down our throats, President Obama and the Democrats piled up youth props around them like bunker sandbags. Nancy Pelosi wore babies like Wonder Woman bracelets, one on each arm, to deflect troublesome questions about costs and constitutional concerns.

Obamacare stage managers paraded 11-year-old Marcelas Owens of Washington state in front of the cameras to make the case for the half-trillion-dollar tax hike plan. The boy's "qualifications"? Owens' mother, Tiffany, had died of pulmonary hypertension at the age of 27. A single mother of three, she lost her job as a fast-food manager and lost her insurance. She received emergency care and treatment throughout her illness, but died in 2007.

As I noted at the time, Washington state already offered a plethora of existing government assistance programs to laid-off and unemployed workers like Marcelas' mom. For some reason, unexplained by the family or its zealous exploiters, she didn't bother to enroll. Moreover, she died nine months after she reportedly lost her health insurance. By the time she lost her coverage through her employer, she was apparently already in dire health straits. It's not clear that additional doctor visits in the subsequent months would have prevented her death. Nor did Obamacare do anything to address very real flaws with our employer-sponsored health care system.

Young Marcelas admitted he didn't understand health insurance reform and didn't "think it's anyone's fault" that his mom died. No matter. Big government-by-anecdote doesn't need the anecdotes to be true or the solutions to do anything effective to solve our problems.

The intellectual infantilization of politics and public policy is nothing new, of course. The Clintons engaged in one of the most notorious examples of poster child abuse involving an ailing 7-year-old girl named Jennifer Bush. Her mother, Kathleen, wrote to the White House about the agonizing decision to "choose between purchasing groceries for the week to feed your family or buying needed medications for your chronically ill child." Her gall bladder, appendix and fragments of her intestines had been removed in a desperate attempt to diagnose her mystery sickness.

Coached by her overbearing mother, Jennifer gave the Clintons a lucky silver dollar "to bring you good luck so everyone can have good insurance." She dutifully told the press: "I pray every night that I can get better -- and that everyone can have insurance." Hillary trotted the family all over Capitol Hill for photo ops and press conferences on behalf of her health insurance mandate proposals.

Two hundred hospital visits, $2 million in medical bills later and two years after Hillary propped her up, doctors discovered that the only thing wrong with little Jennifer was that her mother had been starving and exploiting her while splurging on trips, motorcycles and home remodeling. Mrs. Bush was sentenced to five years in prison on two counts of aggravated child abuse and welfare fraud.

From health care to gun control, the left has perfected this fallacious art of prop-a-palooza -- the well-being of the children and national discourse be damned. Political vultures in Washington refuse to do the one thing that might actually benefit the children they recklessly use and abuse as fodder: Grow up.

http://townhall.com/columnists/michellemalkin/2013/01/16/michelle-malkin-n1490147/page/full/

Obama Proposes Laws That Wouldn't Have Stopped Sandy Hook

In a press conference on guns filled bluster, unearned moral superiority, and exploitation of murder victims, President Obama did lay out a few specific policy proposals. Not a single one of those proposals would have stopped what happened in Newtown, Connecticut, Aurora, Colorado, or Virginia Tech. Each, however, has been a longtime goal of the anti-gun left:

Ban on new assault weapons: Dianne Feinstein tried this in her 1994 signature legislation. In 1999, Columbine occurred. Now, Obama is resurrecting this dead horse knowing full well it will not pass the Senate. The truth is that it shouldn’t – assault weapons are responsible for a tiny minority of all murders with guns in this nation, and mass shootings in Aurora and Sandy Hook would not have been stopped had the shooters not had so-called assault weapons. Virginia Tech was perpetrated with handguns.
Limits on high-capacity magazines: Of all the left’s proposals, this one makes the least sense. Generation of illegal magazines is a simple process – in fact, people are now able to print plastic magazines at home – and in any case, switching magazines is a simple process requiring no more than three seconds. There is no evidence that any lives would have been saved at any mass shooting by smaller magazines.
Expanded background checks for gun purchasers: Of Obama’s proposals, this one has the most public support. The truth is, however, that background checks would not have weeded out any of the mass shooters in the recent past – and that in cases where it would have, laws on the books already should have done the job (see Virginia Tech).
Tougher gun trafficking laws: Obama spelled this out in vague terms, so it is unclear what precisely he proposes. The problem was not gun trafficking in any of these cases.

As Sen. Marco Rubio (R-FL) says, “nothing the president is proposing would have stopped the massacre at Sandy Hook. President Obama is targeting the Second Amendment rights of law-abiding citizens instead of seriously addressing the real underlying causes of such violence.”

http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2013/01/16/Obama-legislation-proposal

The School Shooting You Haven't Heard About
By CJ Box

Very few people heard about the school shooting in gun-filled Wyoming that left three people dead late last year. Stick around, and you'll find out why.

Here’s what happened:

Chris Krumm, a troubled 25-year-old, traveled from Connecticut to Casper, Wyoming, to settle a score with his father, Jim Krumm, a popular junior college instructor. The motivation for his actions are unclear, but Chris Krumm appeared to be suffering from a mental illness.

On a Friday morning, November 30, Chris Krumm murdered his father’s female companion Heidi Arnold– also an instructor at the college -- and left her body in the street. He then drove to Casper College where his father Jim taught computer science in Room 325. Chris Krumm entered the room and -- in front of students -- shot his father in the head. Jim Krumm heroically wrestled his son to the floor before he died so the students could escape. Chris Krumm, like most of these cowards, committed suicide before police arrived.

It was a horrific incident, and it shook my hometown of Casper and the rest of our sparsely populated state to its core. Although Wyoming has one of the highest rates of gun ownership in the U.S., it also has one of the lowest murder rates. The incident was unusual and shocking and heavily covered locally but not nationally. Where were Michael Bloomberg and Bob Costas and Piers Morgan and Barack Obama?

So why, in the tragic shadow of Sandy Hook, haven’t you heard of this school shooting?

Because Chris Krumm killed Heidi Arnold with a knife. He shot his father through the head with a compound bow and arrow at a range of four feet. And he used a knife to end his own miserable existence.

Now you know why you haven’t heard about it.

http://ricochet.com/main-feed/The-School-Shooting-You-Haven-t-Heard-About

Reactions to the President’s debt limit comments

I worked on debt limit bills from both ends of Pennsylvania Avenue, helping enact eight of them during my time as an aide to Senate Majority Leader Trent Lott and as an advisor to President Bush.
Here are a few reactions to the President’s debt limit comments in yesterday’s press conference.

The President did not threaten to veto a debt limit bill. He substituted insults of Congressional Republicans for formal legislative threats. It’s easy to get distracted by the insults, but the absence of a formal threat is more important.
This reinforces my view that the President views the debt limit as a must-pass bill, and that anyone in Congress who can attach other legislation to it has a good chance of it becoming law. The debt limit can only carry so much additional legislative weight, so the smart strategy is for House Republican leaders to attach something that is modest, closely related to deficits and debt, and difficult for Democrats to reject. Speaker Boehner and Senator Sessions both have good ideas that meet these criteria.
Without a veto threat the President must rely on Leader Reid and Senate Democrats to water down or even remove spending cuts or other fiscal reforms that House Republicans may attach. In a strange way this is good for spending cutters, who should prefer to negotiate with Senate Democrats to negotiating with the President.
The President is trying to frame the issue as “Me responsible, them reckless.” But setting aside the fringes of each party, this is not a debate about whether to increase the debt limit, but about for how long and how much spending should be cut at the same time. It is also a struggle for control of the legislative agenda for at least the next two years.
The President is on weak ground when he tries to argue that a debt limit bill should be clean. He has signed four debt limit increases into law, only one of which was clean. The first was attached to the $800+ B stimulus bill, the second to a set of PAYGO reforms that Democrats supported and Republicans opposed, and the fourth was attached to the summer 2011 Budget Control Act that cut spending, set up the deficit reduction Super Committee, and created the sequester. Debt limit increases are often attached to fiscal policy legislation, and usually to bills that reduce the deficit. Kudos go to Major Garrett of CBS News for a tough question yesterday that highlighted this point.
The President is also on weak ground when he argues that short-term debt limit increases are unusual or radical. Modern history includes both short-term and long-term extensions. President Obama signed a four-month extension, and the U.S. has spent more than seven of the last 30 years operating under extensions that lasted less than a year. The median increase in that timeframe lasted about four and a half months.
He argues there is no good policy reason to do a small, short-term increase, but makes it clear that he does not expect to reach agreement with Congress on future spending cuts. In doing so he makes the clearest possible case for the benefit of small, short-term debt limit increases. That’s the only way spending-cutters in Congress will be able to keep unsustainable government spending front-and-center on the agenda. They should not expect to make tremendous progress in solving that issue with this President, but it’s better to revisit the issue a couple times a year, even unsuccessfully, than to return quietly to the unsustainable spending status quo.
He is pretending to frame this as “be responsible and increase the debt limit now, and we’ll reduce the deficit later,” but by saying repeatedly only that he is willing to engage in a “vigorous debate” rather than to “negotiate” or “work toward a bipartisan solution,” he is signaling that he has no intention of compromising and no expectations for legislative success in enacting future deficit reduction. His strategy is to raise the debt limit now for as long as possible, then reject Republican demands to cut spending and move on to other issues. Usually a President says “vigorous debate” at the beginning of an election year. It is dispiriting but not surprising that he is saying it right after being reelected.
He is afraid of getting jammed by small short-term debt limit increases (as I have recommended). Really afraid. This path would keep fiscal issues front-and-center when he wants to punt them, and it would force him to pay a price every few months. Just as in 2011 his top priority was to get a debt limit increase that lasted past the election so he would not have to negotiate again, his top priority is to make certain he isn’t forced to do this often. The primary leverage Congressional Republicans have on this bill is the size and duration of an increase, not the ability to deny any increase. The President will pay to do this infrequently.

http://keithhennessey.com/2013/01/15/reactions-to-the-presidents-debt-limit-comments/

The True Scandal of Lance Armstrong: Enough Free Passes for Role Models

Another day. Another scandal. Another high-profile celebrity headed to Oprah’s couch to express contrition and try to resuscitate his image. Today it’s Lance Armstrong, but tomorrow it will be someone else -- which is why I believe it’s time to say enough is enough. No more free passes for our children’s role models.

I don’t know Lance Armstrong and apparently nobody else really did either. What I knew was the same cynically constructed fairy tale that he sold all of us: the inspirational story of a young cyclist who nearly died from cancer and was resurrected through the miracles of modern medicine and his own indomitable spirit. The dedicated, focused, gifted and meticulous athlete who pushed himself beyond all barriers of pain to achieve an unprecedented seven Tour de France victories.

But now the truth is finally coming out and the magical tale has lost its luster -- it turns out that his critics were right all along. Lance Armstrong was actually a doper; a cheat who betrayed his sport, his fans, the cancer survivors who looked up to him as a modern-day superman. So recently he sat with Oprah to tape an interview and we all must now wait for Thursday’s airing to judge for ourselves the sincerity of his “confession.”

But I don’t need to see crocodile tears or listen to words carefully constructed by crisis PR experts. Enough is enough. Lance Armstrong should be held fully accountable and we shouldn’t be so quick to forgive the horrible offenses that he committed. He can only look skyward for true forgiveness.

We owe it to today’s youth not to so quickly forgive Lance Armstrong and not to just sweep this whole sordid saga under the rug and let him move on with his life. Americans are a remarkably forgiving society and everyone makes mistakes, but this is something altogether different. A lie of this magnitude cannot be permitted to be trivialized.

Lance is just the last in a string of public figures that let us all down -- and then are given a free pass. Bill Clinton violated one of the ten10 commandments, inside the Oval Office and then lied under oath and to the public about it. Today he has been redeemed, and is revered by the Democratic Party. Tiger Woods admitted to a series of infidelities and, while his golf name has never returned to the same stratospheric levels, has largely moved on.

If we give Lance Armstrong a pass then the real message we send our children is that you can make hundreds of millions of dollars in sponsorships and achieve world-wide fame by cheating -- you just have to make sure that you don’t get caught or you might be embarrassed.

http://townhall.com/columnists/armstrongwilliams/2013/01/16/the-true-scandal-of-lance-armstrong-enough-free-passes-for-role-models-n1490206

The Islamists Strike

American hostages taken in Algeria by Qaeda affiliate as Middle East tumult spreads

United States officials confirmed Wednesday that Americans have been taken hostage following a terrorist attack on a British Petroleum gas field site in Algeria.

“We condemn in strongest terms the terrorist attack on British Petroleum personnel and facilities at the In Amenas Algeria earlier today,” spokesperson Victoria Nuland said at a Wednesday State Department press briefing.

Citing safety concerns, Nuland did not specify the identities of the Americans or the number of hostages taken. Reuters reported Wednesday that an al Qaeda-affiliated group claims to have kidnapped 41 foreigners, including seven Americans.

Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta also confirmed the hostage situation and labeled the event a “terrorist attack.”

Panetta said “all necessary and proper steps” will be taken regarding the Algerian attack.

Some have speculated the attack was in response to French military action against Islamic extremists in Mali. U.S. forces are providing the French intelligence support; Panetta said Tuesday there is no consideration of putting U.S. troops on the ground.

The Algeria terrorist attack comes as the United States is addressing a number of hot spots in the region.
U.S. government officials this week have condemned comments made in 2010 by now Egyptian President Mohamed Morsi that included anti-Semitic slurs and a call to “nurse our children and our grandchildren on hatred” for Jews.

White House Press Secretary Jay Carney said Tuesday the administration has confronted the Egyptian government about the remarks.

“We strongly condemn the remarks that then Muslim Brotherhood leader Morsi made in 2010,” Carney said at a Tuesday press briefing. “The language that we have seen is deeply offensive. We completely reject these statements, as we do any language that espouses religious hate … This kind of discourse has been acceptable in the region for far too long.”

A delegation of U.S. officials met Wednesday with Morsi in Egypt.

“He responded that he is not someone who harbors hatred or ill feeling toward Judaism or the Jewish people,” Sen. Chris Coons (D., Del.) said of the meeting. “But I really think the burden is on him to further explain and to put into context not just his statements but also his actions.”

“Obviously, his statements and our grave concerns about them were at the outset of the meeting,” Coons went on to say. “His responses were satisfactory enough that we then went on to talk about some of the other vital regional specific issues.”

A Foreign Policy report published Tuesday indicated Syrian authorities had used hallucinogenic chemical weapons against rebels. That information originated in a State Department cable.

State said Wednesday they do not believe chemical weapons were used.

“At the time we looked into the incident, and we found no credible evidence that chemical weapons were used,” Nuland said Wednesday.

The events come on the heels of a turbulent 2012 in the region for American interests. Islamists carried out a terrorist attack on the U.S. mission in Benghazi, Libya, leaving four Americans dead. Sec. of State Hillary Clinton will testify on that attack later this month.

A number of U.S. Embassies, however, were the site of massive and at times violent protests that day—including the U.S. Embassy in Cairo, where demonstrators removed the American flag and replaced with it a black Islamist flag.

http://freebeacon.com/the-islamists-strike/

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