Barack Obama’s $439 billion secret

Posted: July 21, 2008
1:00 am Eastern

By Joseph Farah
© 2008

It has been a week since I blew the whistle on Barack Obama’s secret $439 billion plan for a mysterious initiative called the “civilian national security force.”

We don’t know any more about this plan than we did when Obama announced it June 2 in a speech, with the relevant part covered by almost no media with the exception of the Chicago Tribune and Congressional Quarterly.

Thanks, however, to talk radio and legions of bloggers, Obama’s chilling call to create a “civilian national security force” with a price tag equaling that of the Defense Department is beginning to get more attention.

It was in the context of announcing a plan to expand rapidly and dramatically the size of the Peace Corps and AmeriCorps that Obama dropped this bombshell: “We cannot continue to rely on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives we’ve set. We’ve got to have a civilian national security force that’s just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded.”

A few have suggested, I am making too much of a benign proposal by Obama – one that merely calls for a greatly increased commitment to the Foreign Service.

If so, why is it that the Obama campaign has gone mum on this proposal? Why is it that operatives keep promising us clarification that is never forthcoming? And, furthermore, is an expansion of the Foreign Service to the size of the $439 billion Defense Department (in 2007 dollars) really such an innocent idea?

http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=70160

Academia to high schools: No God allowed

State rejects Christian education as valid for university admissions

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Posted: July 19, 2008
12:00 am Eastern

© 2008 WorldNetDaily

Arguments were heard today in a federal district court case to determine whether a state university system can dictate that private Christian schools in the state teach their college prep courses from exclusively secular, Bible- and God-free textbooks.

As WND reported earlier, the University of California system adopted a policy last year that basic science, history, and literature textbooks by major Christian book publishers wouldn’t qualify for core admissions requirements because of the inclusion of Christian perspectives.

Robert Tyler, who is representing Calvary Chapel Christian School and five students in the case against the University of California, told WND that the university’s discriminatory policy creates an ultimatum for Christian schools. “If you want courses to be approved in private education, so your students are qualified to attend (UC) institutions, you must teach from a secular point of view,” he said.

“Christian schools will have to decide: teach from a Christian worldview and eliminate your student’s ability to attend a UC school, or teach from a secular worldview, so that the kids can enter the UC school system,” he explained.

“Essentially what’s happening is the UC has to pre-approve courses taught in high school,” Tyler said. “It’s pretty shocking, because in depositions UC reps made it clear: whether it be English, history or science, the addition of a religious viewpoint makes it unacceptable.”

Tyler also told WND that though a decision from Federal District Court Judge Otero is expected in the next two to three weeks, he fully expects the case to be appealed to the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals, and perhaps even the U.S. Supreme Court, since both sides are firmly entrenched and likely to appeal if Otero decides against them.

“We believe that UC’s discrimination is clearly unconstitutional and violates the First Amendment, because UC is attempting to secularize Christian schools,” Tyler said.

“The UC is intent upon defending some ‘right’ to discriminate

http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=69997

Court says ‘gay’ rights trump Christian rights

Dismisses free-speech case filed by Philadelphia 11

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Posted: July 18, 2008
12:10 am Eastern

© 2008 WorldNetDaily

A federal appeals court dismissed a civil rights complaint by 11 Philadelphia Christians, ruling their First Amendment rights were trumped by the First Amendment rights of homosexuals at the city’s taxpayer-funded “Outfest” celebration in 2004.

“The city has an interest in ensuring that a permit-holder can use the permit for the purpose for which it was obtained,” this week’s opinion from the 3rd U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals said. “This interest necessarily includes the right of police officers to prevent counter-protestors from disrupting or interfering with the message of the permit-holder.”

The decision upheld a lower court’s dismissal of the civil action against the city of Philadelphia and its police filed by the “Philadelphia 11,” as they have come to be known

http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=69881

Major U.S. city officially condemns Catholic Church

Instructs members to defy ‘Holy Office of Inquisition’

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Posted: July 15, 2008
8:48 pm Eastern

© 2008 WorldNetDaily

San Francisco’s Golden Gate Bridge

A San Francisco city and county board resolution that officially labeled the Catholic church’s moral teachings on homosexuality as “insulting to all San Franciscans,” “hateful,” “defamatory,” “insensitive” and “ignorant” will be challenged tomorrow in court for violating the Constitution’s prohibition of government hostility toward religion.

Resolution 168-08, passed unanimously by the City and County of San Francisco Board of Supervisors two years ago, also accused the Vatican of being a “foreign country” meddling with and attempting to “negatively influence (San Francisco’s) existing and established customs.”

It said of the church’s teaching on homosexuality, “Such hateful and discriminatory rhetoric is both insulting and callous, and shows a level of insensitivity and ignorance which has seldom been encountered by this Board of Supervisors.”

As WND reported, Resolution 168-08 was an official response to the Catholic Church’s ban on adoption placements into homosexual couple households, issued by Cardinal William Levada of the Congregation for the Doctrine of the Faith at the Vatican.

The board’s resolution urged the city’s local archbishop and the Catholic Charities of the Archdiocese of San Francisco to defy the Vatican’s instructions, concluding with a spiteful reminder that the church authority that issued the ban was known 100 years ago as “The Holy Office of the Inquisition.”

The resolution also took a shot at Levada, the former archbishop of San Francisco, saying, “Cardinal Levada is a decidedly unqualified representative of his former home city, and of the people of San Francisco and the values they hold dear.”

http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=69693

A phony crisis – and a real one

Posted: July 15, 2008
1:00 am Eastern

© 2008

WASHINGTON – Last week, the front pages of the world press blossomed with photos of four Iranian rockets, fired in salvo, heading skyward.

The image was powerful and the message reinforced by the head of the Iranian Revolutionary Guard. Should Israel attack Iran, said Ali Shira, Tel Aviv will be “set on fire.”

U.S. reaction was swift and bristling. “Rice Says U.S. Will Defend Gulf,” declared the headline over the AP story that began:

“Condoleezza Rice flexed America’s muscles in the Middle East Thursday, forcefully warning Iran the U.S. won’t ignore threats and will take any action necessary to defend friends and interests in the Persian Gulf. …

“Rice said Iran’s leaders should understand that Washington won’t dismiss provocations from Tehran and has the ability to counter them. ‘I don’t think the Iranians are too confused, either, about the capability and the power of the United States to do exactly that.’”

And what were the results of last week’s missile crisis in the Gulf? Tensions rose, strengthening Tehran’s embattled Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. And oil prices shot from $136 a barrel to a record $147.
That $11-a-barrel spike alone translates into $25 million a day in fresh revenue for Ahmadinejad and Co. And as the United States imports 13 million of the 20 million barrels we daily consume, that $11 spike in price translates into $143 million more sucked out of the U.S. economy every day – into the coffers of Canada, Mexico, Venezuela, Saudi Arabia and OPEC.

Can we not see who benefits and who pays for this war talk?

Every day the war drums beat, the mullahs get richer and we get poorer. Which raises the question: Was this mini-missile crisis cooked up by the mullahs to rip off Uncle Sam? For by week’s end it appeared the Americans had been had, big-time.

Saturday’s New York Times reported that that photo of the four Iranian missiles fired in salvo had been doctored.

http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=69665

On interracial and same-sex marriage

The most effective of all morality-based arguments for same-sex marriage, the one that persuades more people than any other argument, is the one that equates opposition to same-sex marriage with the old opposition to interracial marriage.

The argument, repeated so often that it sounds incontestable, is this: Just as parts of American society once had immoral laws that forbade whites and blacks from marrying, so, today, society continues to have immoral laws forbidding men from marrying men and women from marrying women. And just as decent people overthrew the former, decent people must overthrow the latter.

Thanks in large part to widespread higher education – the higher the educational level, the more one is likely to hold this view – vast numbers of Americans believe in this equation of sex (gender) and race.

But the equation is false.

http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=69659

Obama: Immigration enforcement equals terror

Decries raids with ‘nursing mothers torn from babies’

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Posted: July 14, 2008
10:02 pm Eastern

© 2008 WorldNetDaily

Sen. Barack Obama, speaking to the annual conference of the National Council of La Raza yesterday, pumped up the crowd by describing how Hispanic communities are “terrorized” by government immigration officers.

“When communities are terrorized by ICE immigration raids,” Obama said, “when nursing mothers are torn from their babies, when children come home from school to find their parents missing, when people are detained without access to legal counsel, when all that is happening, the system just isn’t working, and we need to change it.”

The crowd, quietly listening before Obama began his tirade, reacted immediately to the sentiment that U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement officials are terrorizing communities. Applause, shouts and cheering swelled through the audience as Obama characterized atrocities allegedly committed by government officials.

The segment of the speech that contains the inflammatory comments can be seen below:

http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=69612

Obama’s ‘civilian national security force’

Posted: July 15, 2008
1:00 am Eastern

© 2008

With all the reporters covering the major presidential candidates, it amazes me no one ever seems to ask the right questions.

For several days now, WND has been hounding Barack Obama’s campaign about a statement he made July 2 in Colorado Springs – a statement that blew my mind, one that has had me scratching my head ever since.

In talking about his plans to double the size of the Peace Corps and nearly quadruple the size of AmeriCorps and the size of the nation’s military services, he made this rather shocking (and chilling) pledge: “We cannot continue to rely on our military in order to achieve the national security objectives we’ve set. We’ve got to have a civilian national security force that’s just as powerful, just as strong, just as well-funded.”

Now, since I’ve never heard anyone inside or out of government use the phrase “civilian national security force” before, I was more than a little curious about what he has in mind.

(Column continues below)

Is it possible I am the only journalist in America who sought clarification on this campaign promise?

What does it mean?

If we’re going to create some kind of national police force as big, powerful and well-funded as our combined U.S. military forces, isn’t this rather a big deal?

I thought Democrats generally believed the U.S. spent too much on the military. How is it possible their candidate is seeking to create some kind of massive but secret national police force that will be even bigger than the Army, Navy, Marines and Air Force put together?

Now, maybe he was misquoted by the Congressional Quarterly and the Chicago Tribune. I guess it’s possible. If so, you would think he would want to set the record straight. Maybe he misspoke. That has certainly happened before. Again, why wouldn’t the rest of my colleagues show some curiosity about such a major and, frankly, bone-chilling proposition?

Are we talking about creating a police state here?

http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=69601

‘Gay’ McDonald’s prompts boycott

AFA urges millions to shun fast-food giant over its promotion of same-sex marriage

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Posted: July 03, 2008
4:29 pm Eastern

© 2008 WorldNetDaily

 

Following a link from the National Gay and Lesbian Chamber of Commerce’s website leads to a promotional for children’s Happy Meals at the McDonalds website

The American Family Association, whose earlier boycott of Ford Motor Co. over its promotion of homosexuality was dropped after company sales fell 8 percent per month for two years, now is asking consumers to stop buying Big Macs and Happy Meals at McDonald’s.

In a brief announcement today, AFA, whose constituents number in the millions, said it is “asking its supporters to boycott the restaurant chain.”

“This boycott is not about hiring homosexuals, or homosexuals eating at McDonald’s or how homosexual employees are treated. It is about McDonald’s, as a corporation, choosing to put the full weight of their organization behind promoting the homosexual agenda, including homosexual marriage,” said AFA chairman Donald E. Wildmon.

AFA pointed out McDonald’s donated $20,000 to the National Gay and Lesbian Chamber of Commerce in exchange for membership in the NGLCC and a seat on the group’s board of directors. The NGLCC lobbies Congress on a wide range of issues, including the promotion of same-sex marriage.

http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=68672

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New Mexico accused of violating ‘free exercise’ of religion

Appeal contests $6,600 fine for photographers who refused to perform ‘gay’ ceremony

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Posted: July 03, 2008
11:00 pm Eastern

© 2008 WorldNetDaily

 

The state of New Mexico is being accused of violating the U.S. Constitution’s guarantee of “free exercise” of religion because of a ruling that a Christian husband-and-wife photography team must pay a $6,600 penalty for refusing to shoot pictures at a same-sex “commitment” ceremony.

The accusation comes in legal action brought by the Alliance Defense Fund over the penalty announced for Elane Photography.

“Christians in the marketplace should not be penalized for abiding by their beliefs any more than anyone else should,” Jordan Lorence, a senior counsel for the organization, said. “The Constitution prohibits the state from forcing unwilling people to promote a message they disagree with and thereby violate their conscience. The commission’s decision demonstrates stunning disregard for our client’s First Amendment rights.”

The “commission” to which he was referring was the New Mexico Civil Rights Commission, which targeted Elane Photography with its state authority and ordered the penalty of $6,600 after a one-day “trial” over the beliefs of the Christian-owned business.

http://www.wnd.com/index.php?fa=PAGE.view&pageId=68693