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DECEMBER 25,  2016

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – AT 7:31 P.M. ET: 

CHRISTMAS IN IRAQ – FROM REUTERS:   This is the third Christmas that Staff Sergeant Magdiel Asencio is spending in Iraq. For Sergeant First Class Noel Alvarado, it is number four. And so it is with many U.S. troops stationed less than a hour's drive from the front line with Islamic State.  Few thought they would be back nearly 14 years after the U.S.-led invasion that toppled Saddam Hussein... They can thank the diplomatic genius and military competence of Barack Obama for their plight.  He got out of Iraq in the worst possible way, to satisfy the hard left of his party, leaving a vacuum that insurgents filled.  Think about our troops today, and what they do for us.  And think about the incompetence that put them there.

HOW DISGRACEFUL – FROM THE DAILY MAIL:   Last minute holiday shoppers have been filmed brawling with each other in New Jersey, Alabama and Georgia shopping malls ahead of Christmas.
A fight broke out at Jersey City's Newport Center Mall on Friday night when two people started punching each other in the middle of a huge crowd.  As onlookers gathered around while several people hit each other, a separate fight broke out off to the side.  Multiple security guards tried to intervene and were punched in the process.   Video shot by a witness captured the ordeal, which happened right near where a line of children were waiting to meet the mall's Santa.  It is unclear exactly how many people were involved in the fight.  We should note that the overwhelming majority of Americans don't behave this way and respect the spirit of the holiday.  Those who don't will declare themselves as victims.

MOST ABSURD CHRISTMAS STORY – FROM THE NEW YORK POST:   Kim Jong-un is the Grinch who stole Christmas.  North Korea’s tubby tyrant wants the few Christians in the hermit state to spread cheer only to celebrate his grandma, Kim Jong-suk – not the birth of Jesus.  Jong-suk — who was born on Christmas Eve in 1919 — was an anti-Japanese guerrilla and Communist activist, wife of North Korea’s first dictator, Kim Il-sung, and former leader Kim Jong-il’s mother.  Many pay homage to the “Sacred Mother of the Revolution,” who died under mysterious circumstances in 1949, by visiting her tomb.  The daffy dictator is so obsessed with banning Christmas that he even flipped out in 2014 when he found out that South Korea planned to erect a huge Christmas tree along the border. Amid threats of all-out war, the tree was never put up.  Despite his hatred for Christmas trees, they can be found in the capital of Pyongyang — especially in upscale shops and restaurants – but are largely stripped of religious symbols.  This nutbag has nuclear weapons, thanks largely to appeasement by the West.  He hates us, and he hates Christmas.

December 25, 2016       Permalink

THE PRESIDENT-ELECT – AT 12:56 P.M. ET:  From the Palm Beach Post:   

President-elect Donald Trump attended a Christmas Eve church service at a historic church just a short drive from his Palm Beach estate Saturday night.

Trump and his wife Melania and an entourage of Secret Service agents and Palm Beach County Sheriff’s Office deputies made the trip from Trump’s Mar-a-Lago Club to attend the 10:30 p.m. service at the Episcopal Church of Bethesda-by-the-Sea, which sits about 400 yards from the Atlantic Ocean. They received a standing ovation from the congregation when they arrived.

COMMENT:  I'm delighted by the ovation, a change from the usual rudeness that greets the Trump family.

December 25, 2016       Permalink

GOOD FOR HER – AT 12:32 P.M. ET:   Sometimes passion and hard work win.  From the Conservative Tribune: 

When atheists managed to get a Nativity scene banned from the lawn of the Baxter County Courthouse in Arkansas, they probably thought they had struck a blow for secularity.

Instead, one year later, the area now has 61 Nativity scenes on lawns instead of just one. And it’s all thanks to 81-year-old Sue Chrisco.

According to USA Today, Judge Timothy L. Brooks ruled in November of 2015 that the Nativity scene violated the establishment clause of the First Amendment. A suit against the display had been filed by the American Humanist Association and resident Dessa Blackthorn, who had been denied permission to put a sign saying “Happy Winter Solstice” on the lawn of the courthouse. (What, no Flying Spaghetti Monster? I’m disappointed.)

COMMENT:  These disputes often arise from misunderstandings of the Constitution.  The First Amendment does not bar Nativity scenes or other religious displays from public property as long as no preference is shown for a particular religion.  The First Amendment bars establishment of religion, not religion. 

The First Amendment reads:  Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the Government for a redress of grievances.

December 25, 2016       Permalink

TOP STORIES OF THE YEAR – AT 11:56 A.M. ET:  From the AP:

The turbulent U.S. election, featuring Donald Trump's unexpected victory over Hillary Clinton in the presidential race, was the overwhelming pick for the top news story of 2016, according to The Associated Press' annual poll of U.S. editors and news directors.

The No. 2 story also was a dramatic upset — Britons' vote to leave the European Union. Most of the other stories among the Top 10 reflected a year marked by political upheaval, terror attacks and racial divisions.

Last year, developments related to the Islamic State group were voted as the top story — the far-flung attacks claimed by the group, and the intensifying global effort to crush it.

The first AP top-stories poll was conducted in 1936, when editors chose the abdication of Britain's King Edward VIII.

COMMENT:  The top ten stories were:  1)  The U.S. election, 2) Brexit, 3) Black men killed by police, 4) Pulse nightclub massacre, 5) Worldwide terror attacks, 6) Attacks on police, 7) Democratic Party email leaks, 8) Syria, 9) Supreme Court, 10) Hillary Clinton's emails. 

Hmm.  No global warming?  I wonder why not.

December 25,  2016     Permalink

DECEMBER 24,  2016

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – AT 11:56 P.M. ET: 

GOODNESS – FROM NPR:    Most restaurants close their doors for Christmas day, but one is leaving theirs wide open: Shish Restaurant in southeast London.  On Dec. 25, they will be serving free, three-course meals to the homeless and elderly.  The idea came after an emotional encounter between two of the managers and an elderly woman.  "What she said was, 'On Christmas day, I'm going to be alone,' " Manager Irfan Can Genc tells NPR's Allison Aubrey on All Things Considered. "When [the other manager] told me about this I was like, 'Look, we need to sit down. No one should be alone on a special day like this.' "  So they took a piece of paper and wrote a simple sign saying, "No one eats alone on a Christmas Day! We are here to sit with you."  A great spirit. 

ABSURD – FROM COLLEGE FIX:   Sometimes it seems the word “Christmas” is like poison to universities. This latest example is no exception.  The University of California Riverside recently hosted a “Staff Assembly Holiday Hoedown,” and pictures posted on the institution’s website show organizers bent over backward to make sure it could not be accused of being a Christmas party.  “Handkerchiefs, boots, and cowboy hats set the stage for the 2016 Staff Assembly Holiday Hoedown, which treated about 400 employees to an afternoon of games, food, dancing, and prizes,” reports Inside UCR. “This year’s holiday party — featuring live music by Gold Rush Country — took place on Dec. 16 at the HUB.”  The tables were decked with red and white handkerchiefs and some straw. Many guests wore cowboy hats and flannel shirts. A photo opportunity area was adorned with haystacks. The only thing that denoted Christmas were a few white strands of lights and some small wreaths, but they were carefully flanked by Texas Longhorn skulls.  How intellectual.  How deep.  These universities have the intellectual maturity of eight-year-olds.

A GREAT CHRISTMAS STORY – FROM CBS:  Much too long to repeat here, but do read it.  One of the best Christmas stories I've read.

December 24, 2016        Permalink

OBAMA'S POLITICAL LEGACY – AT 1:32 P.M. ET:  If you want to assign a name to the political destruction of the Democratic Party, that name would be Barack Obama.  The facts of Obama's political legacy are staggering.  From AP:   

WASHINGTON (AP) — In boasting about his tenure in the White House, President Barack Obama often cites numbers like these: 15 million new jobs, a 4.9 percent unemployment rate and 74 months of consecutive job growth.

There's one number you will almost never hear: More than 1,030 seats.

That's the number of spots in state legislatures, governor's mansions and Congress lost by Democrats during Obama's presidency.

It's a statistic that reveals an unexpected twist of the Obama years: The leadership of the one-time community organizer and champion of ground-up politics was rough on the grassroots of his own party. When Obama exits the White House, he'll leave behind a Democratic Party that languished in his shadow for years and is searching for itself.

"What's happened on the ground is that voters have been punishing Democrats for eight solid years — it's been exhausting," said South Carolina state Sen. Vincent Sheheen, who lost two gubernatorial campaigns to Nikki Haley, President-elect Donald Trump's pick for ambassador to the U.N. "If I was talking about a local or state issue, voters would always lapse back into a national topic: Barack Obama."

When Obama won the presidency, his election was heralded as a moment of Democratic dominance — the crashing of a conservative wave that had swept the country since the dawn of the Reagan era.

Democrats believed that the coalition of young, minority and female voters who swept Obama into the White House would usher in something new: an ascendant Democratic majority that would ensure party gains for decades to come.

The coalition, it turns out, was Obama's alone.

After this year's elections, Democrats hold the governor's office and both legislative chambers in just five coastal states: Oregon, California, Connecticut, Rhode Island and Delaware. Republicans have the trifecta in 25, giving them control of a broad swath of the middle of the country.

The defeats have all but wiped out a generation of young Democrats, leaving the party with limited power in statehouses and a thin bench to challenge an ascendant GOP majority eager to undo many of the president's policies. To be sure, the president's party almost always loses seats in midterm elections. But, say experts, Obama's tenure has marked the greatest number of losses under any president in decades.

COMMENT:  That's the best summary of the Democratic dilemma that I've read.  The story is in the numbers.  It will take decades for the Democrats to rebuild, if in fact their party survives the 2018 midterms.  I would not be shocked to see a new party, actually run by grown-ups.

December 24, 2016       Permalink

HOORAY FOR? – AT 11:46 A.M. ET:   Could it be?  Is it true?  According to The New York Times, reportedly a newspaper, Hollywood is reaching out to the faithful.  I hope there's some accuracy here: 

On the surface, Hollywood is a land of loose morals, where materialism rules, sex and drugs are celebrated on screen (and off), and power players can have a distant relationship with the truth. But movie studios and their partners have quietly — very quietly, sometimes to the degree of a black ops endeavor — been building deep connections to Christian filmgoers who dwell elsewhere on the spectrum of politics and social values. In doing so, they have tapped churches, military groups, right-leaning bloggers and, particularly, a fraternity of marketing specialists who cut their teeth on overtly religious movies but now put their influence behind mainstream works like “Frozen,” “The Conjuring,” “Sully” and “Hidden Figures.”

The marketers are writing bullet points for sermons, providing footage for television screens mounted in sanctuaries and proposing Sunday school lesson plans. In some cases, studios are even flying actors, costume designers and producers to megachurch discussion groups.

Hollywood’s awareness of its need to pay better attention to flyover-state audiences has grown even more urgent of late, as ultraliberal movie executives, shocked to see a celebrity-encircled Hillary Clinton lose the presidential election to Donald J. Trump, have realized the degree to which they are out of touch with a vast pool of Americans. Tens of millions of voters did not care what stars had to say in support of Mrs. Clinton.

Are those voters also ignoring the likes of Leonardo DiCaprio and Meryl Streep when they promote movies? Would they listen if it were a church leader telling them to buy a ticket instead?

Film companies can no longer afford to take any audience for granted. Despite a growing population, North America’s moviegoing has been more or less flat — not exactly what investors want to hear. Last year, 1.32 billion tickets were sold, up from the year before but down from the 10-year high of 1.42 billion in 2009, according to the Motion Picture Association of America. More troubling, cheaper and more convenient in-home entertainment options are threatening the grip that multiplexes have long had on young adults; the number of frequent moviegoers ages 12 to 24 has fallen for three consecutive years.

Hollywood is under pressure to reverse that trend. Churches may seem like an unusual path toward young people, but 41 percent of millennials engage in some form of daily prayer, according to a 2010 Pew Research paper. To reach them, many ministers have built vast social media networks. The Rev. Jamal H. Bryant, a megachurch pastor in Baltimore, has 250,000 followers on Twitter. (His church also has a smartphone app.)

COMMENT:  There was a time when Hollywood, including the TV component, was sensitive to religious tradition and "family values."  I don't want a return to the days of extreme censorship or the absurd barring of words like "pregnant" from the screen.  But a decent respect would be nice, and maybe we'll start to see it.

December 24, 2016       Permalink

A WARNING – AT 11:27 A.M. ET:  It's sad that warnings like this have to be issued on Christmas Eve, but that's the world we have.  From CBS local: 

WASHINGTON (CBS) — Federal authorities warned Friday that Islamic State of Iraq and Syria sympathizers “continue aspirational calls for attacks on holiday gatherings, including targeting churches.”

The bulletin was issued by the FBI and Department of Homeland Security and issued to law enforcement agencies and private security companies around the U.S.

There are no known specific, credible threats, U.S. law enforcement officials say. The bulletin was issued out of an abundance of caution given the public nature of the posted threats and the holiday season.

The bulletin was sent Friday to law enforcement after pro-ISIS websites had published a publicly-available list of churches in the United States.

The bulletin also describes the different signs of suspicious activity law enforcement should be aware of.

In the past, public threats by ISIS supporters have focused on military and law enforcement targets. The more recent threats have expanded to include the type of attacks we saw in Berlin, Nice, France, and Columbus, Ohio.

COMMENT:  I would take these warnings seriously.  In Europe and Australia some serious holiday plots have been broken up.  We are very vulnerable here during a presidential transition, and the current president is on another of his extended Hawaiian vacations, presumably resting up for the resting up that will follow January 20th. 

Eternal vigilance.

December 24,  2016     Permalink