“When both parties agree, grab your wallet.”
John Stossel, February 19, 2016
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John Stossel
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The Big Week
Beginning on Feb. 20, 1944, and lasting through Feb. 25, 1944, the United States Strategic Air Forces (USSTAF) launched a series of missions against the Third Reich that became known as “Big Week.” In six days, the Eighth Air Force bombers based in England flew more than 3,000 sorties and the Fifteenth Air Force based in Italy more than 500. Together they dropped roughly 10,000 tons of bombs. The daylight bombing campaign was also supported by RAF Bomber Command operating against the same targets at night. The campaign helped the Allies achieve air superiority, so the invasion of Europe could proceed. While U.S. industrial might could entirely replace losses during the “Big Week,” Germany was unable to do so.
Are Republican presidential candidates getting the NFL draft and the military draft confused?
Get drafted by the NFL and you’re a millionaire. Participation is voluntary. Get “chosen” by the Selective Service System for the military draft and you could wind up in combat. Participation is involuntary.
Last Sunday at Townhall, I wondered why Republican presidential candidates keep talking about registering young females for a future draft like they are bestowing some great benefit, as if women are clamoring for the equal chance to be conscripted.
Sen. Marco Rubio first agreed that draft registration should be expanded to women. He then elaborated, “I’m open to Selective Service being opened up to women that want to be a part of it.”
Wait a second . . . the current male-only draft registration isn’t optional. It’s mandatory — under the threat of five years in prison and a $250,000 fine. This I know first-hand.
After Sen. Ted Cruz suggested Rubio and other presidential contenders were “nuts” to support forcing women to register, Rubio tried to explain on Fox News Sunday: “What I’ve never said and I don’t support is that we are going to draft women and force them into combat roles. That’s absurd.”
The senator volunteered that he did not “believe anyone ever will” be drafted, because “that’s not the nature of modern warfare.”
“I’m actually in favor of a volunteer armed forces,” he told host Chris Wallace. “I’m not even sure we need Selective Service anymore.”
Calling it “just a registry of names for a draft that’s never going to happen,” Rubio added, “I don’t know why we still have Selective Service.”
Me neither.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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U. S. Military Zones
February 19, 1942, was a sad day for constitutional rights, with President Franklin D. Roosevelt signing Executive Order 9066, authorizing the Secretary of War to prescribe certain areas of the country as military zones. These zones were used to incarcerate Japanese Americans in internment camps.
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Kevin Gutzman
There weren’t ever hearings on any judicial nomination until the 1930s.
Kevin Gutzman, February 17, 2016
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Georgia O’Keeffe
I do not like the idea of happyness — it is too momentary — I would say that I was always busy and interested in something — interest has more meaning to me than the idea of happyness.
Georgia O’Keeffe, a corrective note marked in Anita Pollitzer’s mss. biography of the artist.
The latest Gallup public approval rating for our so-called “representatives” on Capitol Hill stands at 11 percent — two whole percentage points higher than 2013’s worst-ever 9 percent measure.
But what if Congress changed? What if our representatives did something dramatic? You know, to show Americans that they get it, that they’ll start representing us, that they’re about doing the job and not just riding the gravy train of power, high pay, lavish pensions, special exemption from Obamacare, etc.?
No, I don’t envision a majority of the 535 House and Senate members jumping into a phone booth and coming out with Super Solon capes. My fantasy actually has its roots in reality.
Neither Obama nor congressional Democrats dare stop Republicans in Congress from passing The Fiscal Responsibility Act of 2016, introduced by Rep. Rod Blum (R-Iowa). The legislation presents a straightforward incentive: do your job, balance the budget or . . . your pay will be cut.
Okay, disincentive.
Until the deficit is closed, and budget balanced, Blum’s law would reduce each congressman’s salary by 5 percent the first year, then 10 percent each year thereafter. Once Congress balances the budget, their full pay will be restored.
“For the sake of our children and grandchildren who will be stuck paying off our $19 trillion debt,” Rep. Blum argues, “it’s time we make our politicians face the reality of our fiscal crisis by hitting them where it counts: their own pocketbook.”
If the Republican-controlled Congress passed The Fiscal Responsibility Act, cutting their own pay until they get our country’s finances in order, the elections this November would be a rout.
Just a dream?
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
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If you enjoyed this article, please consider showing your appreciation by dropping something in our tip jar (this link will take you to the Citizens in Charge donation page… and your contribution will go to the support of the Common Sense website). Maintaining this site takes time and money. Your help in spreading the message of common sense and liberty is very much appreciated!
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White Rose
On Feb. 18, 1943, Hans and Sophie Scholl, a brother and sister, were arrested at the University of Munich for secretly (or not so secretly) putting out leaflets calling on Germans to revolt against Adolf Hitler and the Nazi regime.
In the previous year Hans had founded a group of students, who called themselves “The White Rose.” The group wrote and distributed six leaflets aimed at educated Germans. The leaflets made their way across Germany and to several other occupied countries. The Allies later dropped them all over the Third Reich.
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Thomas Jefferson
Resolved, That the several States composing the United States of America, are not united under the principle of unlimited submission to their general government; but that, by a compact under the style and title of a Constitution for the United States, and of amendments thereto, they constituted a general government for special purposes — delegated to that government certain definite powers, reserving, each State to itself, the residuary mass of right to their own self-government, and that whensoever the general government assumes undelegated powers, its acts are unauthoritative, void, and of no force. . . .
Thomas Jefferson, Kentucky Resolutions (November 1798).
According to poll after poll, Donald Trump is winning. He’s a winner.
. . . of a plurality, anyway.
Admittedly, he lost the Iowa caucuses to Sen. Ted Cruz. But he rebounded with a sizeable plurality victory in New Hampshire. Now Trump leads in South Carolina polls.
Among Republican primary voters, that is.
It is a different story in the public and private polls I’ve seen, ones surveying the entire electorate — Republicans, Democrats and independents. Consider the new poll of swing-state Virginia voters by the Judy Ford Wason Center for Public Policy at Christopher Newport University.
Again, Trump garners a plurality of Old Dominion Republicans, leading next closest contender, Sen. Marco Rubio, 28 to 22 percent. On the other hand, among the entire voting population, a disquieting 64 percent — nearly two out of three voters — view The Donald unfavorably.
Put another way, Trump’s winning in un-favorability. Only Jeb Bush and Hillary Clinton are seen anywhere near as negatively, at 58 and 59 percent, respectively.
Can Trump turn that around? Not likely. Folks already know him. He has the highest name recognition of any candidate — higher than Hillary Clinton.
“Almost all the voters have an opinion about Donald Trump,” explained the Wason Center’s Dr. Quentin Kidd, “and twice as many see him in an unfavorable light as view him favorably.”
Trump starts at a “disadvantage,” according to Nate Silver at FiveThirtyEight, because “Most Americans just really don’t like the guy.”
To appoint future Supreme Court justices, one must win the General Election with all the people voting, not merely the GOP nomination.
According to poll after poll, that candidate is not Donald Trump.
This is Common Sense. I’m Paul Jacob.
