The President and the Pope, as told by the White House

Chip Bok; Pope and President 

 

"The pope gave the president a copy of Evangelii Gaudium (Joy of the Gospel)."....

Obama surely loved the publication's opinion of free markets, but these next words, well, not so much:

 

Among the vulnerable for whom the Church wishes to care with particular love and concern are unborn children, the most defenceless and innocent among us. Nowadays efforts are made to deny them their human dignity and to do with them whatever one pleases, taking their lives and passing laws preventing anyone from standing in the way of this. Frequently, as a way of ridiculing the Church’s effort to defend their lives, attempts are made to present her position as ideological, obscurantist and conservative. Yet this defence of unborn life is closely linked to the defence of each and every other human right. ...  Full article

Thomas Sowell; How Foreign Is Our Policy?

The American Spectator  "Drawing red lines in disappearing ink."

Excerpts below:

Drawing red lines in disappearing ink makes an international mockery of not only this president’s credibility, but also the credibility of future American presidents’ commitments.

... "Many who are disappointed with what seem to be multiple fiascoes in President Obama’s foreign policy question his competence and blame his inexperience. Such critics may be right, but it is by no means certain that they are.
"Like those who are disappointed with Barack Obama’s domestic policies, critics of his foreign policy may be ignoring the fact that you cannot know whether someone is failing or succeeding without knowing what he is trying to do.
"Whether Obamacare, for example, is a success or a failure, depends on whether you think the president’s goal is to improve the medical treatment of Americans or to leave as his permanent legacy a system of income redistribution, through Obamacare, and tight government control of the medical profession."

The painful irony is that Jeremiah Wright was just one in a series of Obama’s mentors hostile to America, resentful of successful Americans, and convinced that America had too much power internationally, and needed to be brought down a peg.

Sowell's most poignant words come at the close of the article:

...Virtually every major move of the Obama administration has reduced the power, security, and influence of America and its allies. Cutbacks in military spending, while our adversaries have increased their military buildups, ensure that these changes to our detriment will continue, even after Barack Obama has left the White House.

Is that failure or success?

Sebelius Speechless After Reporter Tells Her How Unpopular ACA Is

Newsmax   "Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius was forthcoming in response to an Oklahoma City news reporter's questions about Obamacare on the last day for sign-ups — until he told her how unpopular President Barack Obama's healthcare plan is with people in his own state.

"Then she was speechless.

"The awkward pause occurred Monday morning during an interview with CBS affiliate KWTV reporter Stan Miller in which Sebelius gave several last-minute details for those who had not met the March 31 open enrollment deadline.

"The interview was almost over when Miller told her that "at last check, 64 percent of Oklahomans aren't buying into the health care plan, they don't like Obamacare, and they've been pretty vocal about it. Now that's going to be — still continues to be — a tough sell, but we'll see how that plays out over the coming months.' "

The Joke's on Us

Heritage

 

"You can’t make this stuff up. On the health law’s pseudo-deadline day, following a huge push for people to visit the website, HealthCare.gov went down. Politico summed it up:

HealthCare.gov was down for six hours early Monday morning. Then it was up. Then it activated its “virtual waiting room.” Then it blocked newcomers trying to create accounts. Then it was working again…

"Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.) says Obamacare is having problems getting off the ground because “people are not educated on how to use the Internet.” Rep. Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) says Obamacare is a “political winner,” while “Saturday Night Live” lampoons the administration’s attempts to connect with young Americans through any celebrity and social network available." ....

The eyes are the window to the soul

http://legalinsurrection.com/2014/03/branco-cartoon-windows-to-their-soul/

Delta Airlines brings a fallen soldier home with honor

Delta Honor Guard

Hat tip to Janie Sanford, Santa Maria, CA

Christians should get more involved in politics?

Consider Again   "At the moment, the reputation of Christians in public life is disastrous. Religious people are often seen as fanatical fundamentalists, leading massive hate campaigns complete with picket signs and boycotts.

"This projection is not representative of most Christians. Yes, there are those who use religion as a weapon, perceiving a divine backing of their actions though they intend only to attack and insult."
....
"A Christian that engages in firestorm attacks, offensive insults, or unfounded accusations reflects poorly on the whole faith community. We have a duty to glorify God by striving to maintain kindness and understanding in all of our actions.

“ 'We need Christians in politics who believe in conversation and reasoned discourse,” Judge Ken Starr, president of Baylor University, told me in an interview. “What we don’t need, regardless of faith journey, is people who simply yell at one another or shout the other side down. To my mind, that’s not a very Christ-like attitude.' ”

Via Danny Huizinga at Conservative Bloggers on Facebook

Local couple upset after receiving pre-marked voter registration card from Covered California

ABC10 News  "LA MESA, Calif. - A local couple called 10News concerned after they received an envelope from the state's Obamacare website, Covered California. Inside was a letter discussing voter registration and a registration card pre-marked with an "x" in the box next to Democratic Party.
The couple – who did not want their identity revealed – received the letter and voter registration card from their health insurance provider Covered California, the state-run agency that implements President Obama's Affordable Care Act."

Covered California Confusion ... " Behind the statistics are the actual experiences of individuals and families who have applied for healthcare insurance through Covered California.  Their stories offer insight into the realities of the application process and also help explain why more Californians are not applying for healthcare coverage." ... 

The miserable experience of a D-Day rehearsal

WW2 Today; March 30, 1944

 

"Commandos, Britain’s shock troops, practising assault tactics at the Combined Operations School at Dundonald Camp. Here they are landing from a dummy landing craft into a shallow pit filled with water so as to simulate a true amphibious landing."

Archaeologist at Treblinka Nazi death camp finds evidence of gas chambers

Jerusalem Post   "Documentary TV series "One is Treblinka: Hitler’s Killing Machine" features tile with Star of David said to be affixed to chamber."  

 

" LOS ANGELES – An archaeologist featured on a TV documentary series unearthed what may be some of the only physical evidence of the gas chambers at the death camp.

"In the series "One is Treblinka: Hitler’s Killing Machine" Caroline Sturdy Colls, a forensic archaeologist from Staffordshire University in the UK, uncovers new scientific evidence on the existence and mechanism of the death camp.

"While Auschwitz has become shorthand for the Holocaust and a pilgrimage site for more than a million visitors each year, very few pay homage to the victims at the other death factory, Treblinka.

"The reason is simple.

"The complex, 65 miles northeast of Warsaw, consisted of Treblinka I, primarily a forced labor camp, and Treblinka II, the site of the killing machine, closed in 1943 after 24 months of operation.

"During that timespan, its 10 gas chambers asphyxiated 900,000 men, women, and children. The grisly work done, the Nazis went to extraordinary lengths to erase every trace of the camp’s existence."....

BBC: Treblinka: Revealing the hidden graves of the Holocaust 

"When the Nazis left Treblinka in 1943 they thought they had destroyed it. They had knocked down the buildings and levelled the earth. They had built a farmhouse and installed a Ukrainian "farmer". They had planted trees, and - contemporary reports suggest - lupins.

"But if they thought they had removed all evidence of their crime, they hadn't. For a forensic archaeologist, there is a vast amount to study.

"The destruction of buildings rarely results in the complete removal of all traces of them. And even on the surface there are still artefacts and other subtle clues that point to the real purpose of the site." ...

 

 

The floor was covered with orange terra cotta tiles. 

 

(Left) Aerial photo of the remains of the Treblinka Death camp taken in September 1944

*11 months after the dismantling of the camp and attempts at disguising the site as a farm.

A whole lotta Democrat corruption going on

Michelle Malkin    "Has Nancy Pelosi seen a newspaper lately? (Pro tip, hon: Like the Obamacare monstrosity, you have to read it to find out what’s in it.) I’d love to see her face in the wake of the veritable epidemic of Democratic corruption now sweeping the country. Pelosi’s blink count must be off the charts.

"I’m going to make it easy on Pelosi and put all of the latest cases in one handy rogue’s gallery reference list. But let’s not be naive. It’s clear to me that the Barack Obama/Eric Holder DOJ is clearing the decks before the midterms. Prediction: The FBI’s GOP corruption shoe will drop right before the elections for maximum distraction and damage. For now, let’s take stock of the jackassery:
....
"Remember: Nancy Pelosi famously promised to “drain the moral swamp” and end the “culture of corruption.” She cast herself and her minions as America’s political clean-up crew. But once again, the culture of corruption boomerang has swung back around to smack Democrats in their smug mugs.

"The cynical Swamp Drainers just hope you forget it all by election time. Don’t."

International Women's Day -- why America's politically correct feminists dishonor human rights

Phyllis Chesler

 

"As a young bride, I once lived in a harem in Afghanistan. It was a nearly fatal adventure but I survived, escaped, and learned about gender and religious apartheid long before the Taliban.  My firebrand American feminism was probably forged in purdah in the early 1960s. However, something called me Eastward and I have remained involved with the Islamic world.

"Today, decades later, I work with Muslim and ex-Muslim dissidents and feminists. They do not understand why Western feminists do not stand with them as they oppose normalized honor based violence, extreme state violence (think Iran, Saudi Arabia), and utter lawlessness when it comes to the torture and murder of girls and women.
....
"But feminists have been taken in by the false campaign against “Islamophobia,” (which does not really exist), and have backed President Obama’s approach to the Muslim world: Appeasement, flattery, a refusal to back the bravest Muslim dissidents who are fighting against barbaric totalitarian regimes, and a wholesale acceptance of Muslim women’s subordinate status in the United States."