THE FOUNDATION

“Each State, in ratifying the Constitution, is considered as a sovereign body, independent of all others, and only to be bound by its own voluntary act. In this relation, then, the new Constitution will, if established, be a FEDERAL, and not a NATIONAL constitution.” –James Madison, Federalist No. 39, 1788

TOP 5 RIGHT HOOKS

National Consensus Worked for Gun Control – Why Not Ebola?

The White House may be politicizing its Ebola response, but the Pentagon is treating the disease with appropriate caution. “Thirty soldiers until recently stationed in West Africa will be quarantined in Italy when they arrive Wednesday after leaving the Ebola-stricken region this morning,” CNNreports. “The soldiers will join Army Major General Darryl A. Williams, commander of U.S. Army Africa, and approximately 10 other personnel who are now in ‘controlled monitoring’ in Italy.” Meanwhile, the CDC says medical workers returning from West Africa need not be quarantined. If these workers were stuck with an infected needle, for example, they would be advised not to leave their homes, CDC says – other than maybe to take a jog around their neighborhood. A final note: As political analyst Charles Krauthammer observed, “There is now a national consensus … that if you return from [West Africa] … you can be in quarantine.” A “national consensus” was all it took for Barack Obama to push Second Amendment-infringing gun control. Why won’t he implement a simple quarantine for public health?

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Opposing Obama’s Mass Amnesty

The Republican Party is setting the stage for a knock-down, drag-out fight on immigration after the election. Peter Kirsanow, a Republican who sits on the U.S. Commission on Civil Rights,wrote a letter to Barack Obama and the Congressional Black Caucus saying mass amnesty will “devastate the black community” because both groups will compete for the same, low-skilled jobs. Republican National Committee Chair Reince Priebus said, “While I can’t speak for the legislature, I’m very confident we will stop that. We will do everything we can to make sure it doesn’t happen: Defunding, going to court, injunction. You name it. It’s wrong. It’s illegal. And for so many reasons, and just the basic fabric of this country, we can’t allow it to happen and we won’t let it happen.” Meanwhile, United States Citizenship and Immigration Services union made a statement calling the American people to petition the government to not allow mass amnesty if they value security. This is why the resistance to Obama’s move is so powerful: It’s coming from all sides.

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America Packing to Leave Afghanistan

American troops are coming home from Afghanistan. U.S. Marines and British troops handed over control of Camp Leatherneck and Camp Bastion to the Afghanis on Sunday, officially bringing the Afghanistan campaign to a close. But, among other things, the resurgence of poppy fields threatens to undo much of the hard-fought gains. John Sopko, Special Inspector General for Afghanistan Reconstruction, told the Senate in January, “All of the fragile gains we have made over the last 12 years on women’s issues, health, education, Rule of Law and governance are now, more than ever, in jeopardy of being wiped out by the narcotics trade which not only supports the insurgency, but also feeds organized crime and corruption.” American commanders express confidence that the Afghani military can protect its own country. However, with ISIL rampaging across Iraq, it’s highly probable the Obama administration is only repeating its mistakes.

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Liberal States Have Confusing and Biased Tax Policies

Wyoming, South Dakota and Nevada have better tax climates than the rest of the nation, according to a study released by the Tax Foundation. In the 2015 State Business Tax Climate Index, the foundation found California, New York and New Jersey to be the worst states in terms of taxes – incidentally, all heavily Democrat states. “The absence of a major tax is a common factor among many of the top ten states,” the study said. “Property taxes and unemployment insurance taxes are levied in every state, but there are several states that do without one or more of the major taxes: the corporate tax, the individual income tax, or the sales tax. … The states in the bottom ten suffer from the same afflictions: complex, non-neutral taxes with comparatively high rates.” While the only inevitable things in life are death and taxes, clearly low-tax policy is linked to economic freedom and prosperity. More…

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GOP Hasn’t Actually Sued the President

Remember when Republicans promised to sue the president over his unconstitutional delay of the ObamaCare employer mandate? Good times. Seems they’ve forgotten about it themselves. Politico reports, “House Speaker John Boehner came out swinging hard last June when he announced that his chamber would take President Barack Obama to court. The suit, charging that the president grossly exceeded his constitutional authority by failing to implement portions of the Obamacare law, was billed as an election-season rallying point for aggrieved Republicans. But days before the midterms, the House’s legal guns seem to have fallen silent. Lawyers close to the process said they originally expected the legal challenge to be filed in September, but now they don’t expect any action before the elections.” By the time Republicans get around to filing –if they get around to it – the employer mandate will be in effect and the entire issue a moot point. Republicans are possibly riding a wave to an election win, signaling that their incompetence is outdone only by that of Democrats. More…

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RIGHT ANALYSIS

Clinton Says Businesses Don’t Create Jobs

While campaigning in Massachusetts for gubernatorial candidate Martha Coakley, Hillary Clinton inadvertently revealed exactly how she views American free enterprise. During the rally, the soon-to-be presidential candidate declared, “Don’t let anybody tell you that, uh, you know, it’s corporations and businesses that create jobs.”

Oh how wrong she is.

After catching heat for sounding eerily reminiscent of Barak Obama and his infamous “you didn’t build that” line, Clinton clarified her comment. According to one of her aides, she had meant to “talk about tax breaks for corporations and businesses in that sentence, which led into a line about how trickle-down economics had ‘failed spectacularly’ – a sentiment she has long held.”

Despite that “clarification,” Clinton’s rhetoric on economic policy is in line with what the Left wants to hear. Supposing that Clinton will seek the Democrat nomination for president in 2016, she might have to contend with a challenge from her left by progressive populist Elizabeth Warren. According to columnist Timothy Carney, “Clinton is a corporatist,” while “Warren is a populist.” In order to head off Warren’s challenge, Clinton will have to say populist things.

In the same speech, Clinton derided the economic policies of Ronald Reagan, which were the main reason for the economic boom and prosperity enjoyed during her husband’s tenure. “Trickle-down economics,” she sneered, “failed rather spectacularly.”

The truth is just the opposite. Reagan successfully reversed Jimmy Carter’s economic malaise. Reagan wanted government to get out of the way so companies and individuals could prosper. To do that, he implemented massive tax reductions, deregulation and anti-inflation monetary policies, which brought inflation down to 3.2% by 1983 and unleashed a historic period of economic growth.

Instead of learning from the economic success during the Reagan years, however, Clinton advocates the opposite. If she wins the Democrat nomination and, heaven forbid, is elected president, we can expect a continuance of Obama’s failed economic policy. Yet she’ll no doubt say one of her goals will be to “fix” the economy, which has suffered immensely under Obama. That will require more skillful navigation than she has so far shown ability to accomplish.

She and her leftist cronies believe that one way to create jobs is by increasing the minimum wage. Clinton asserted, “Don’t let anybody tell you that raising the minimum wage will kill jobs. They always say that. My husband gave working families a raise in the 1990’s … and millions of jobs were created or paid better and more families were more secure.”

But the facts show otherwise. James Pethokoukis of the American Enterprise Institute notes, “From 1981 through 2007, the US economy created 50 million jobs. (Also the jobless rate fell from a high of 10.6% to 4.4%). Over that same time span, the minimum wage declined in value – using the consumer price index – by 30% since it only rose to $5.35 an hour from $3.35, while to stay even with CPI inflation it needed to rise to $8.43.” He further notes that, while the minimum wage was declining, there was an incredible surge of job growth, and median incomes rose by 40%.

Furthermore, the Congressional Budget Office released a report earlier this year projecting that Democrats' desired 40% minimum wage hike would kill 500,000 jobs.

Clinton didn’t touch on the issue of extending unemployment benefits. Perhaps she heard about a recent study showing that after extended jobless benefits were ended, “The number of new jobs that came open each month exploded by 20 percent to 4.7 million by June.”

One thing is certain from Clinton’s comments: She is a statist uninterested in laissez-faire economics. She advocates higher but job-killing wages coupled with higher taxes that will likewise kill jobs, all in service to the expanding power of the government. And, as yesterday marked the50th anniversary of Reagan’s ‘A Time for Choosing’ speech, it’s clear another such time is upon us.

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Election Day Is One Week Away

A number of national polls and on-the-ground reports in key races indicate that the GOP may be headed for big gains in next week’s midterm elections. Sunday’s Wall Street Journal/NBC/Annenberg survey found that registered voters prefer a Republican-controlled Congress to a Democrat one 46% to 42%. The GOP also held an 11-point advantage among likely voters in the same poll. Can Republicans capitalize on Election Day?

The GOP is so emboldened by this recent trend that the party is expanding its investment into additional House races. Optimistic analysts believe Republicans are within striking distance of a 12-seat gain, which would match Republicans' post-World War II record of 246 seats.

Democrats long believed they would face tough prospects in 2014, but now their plight is nothing short of dire. Republican expansion into soft Democrat districts in Nevada, Iowa and Texas, among other states, has forced Democrats to shift resources to districts where they need to protect incumbents.

The reason is simple: Barack Obama’s popularity continues to shrink as his administration proves increasingly incompetent over the handling of the economy, ISIL, Ebola, immigration and a host of other issues. He is a weight around Democrats' necks.

Economist Thomas Sowell observes, “The great boxing champion Joe Louis once said about one of his opponents, who was known for his speed: ‘He can run but he can’t hide.’ In the Congressional elections this year, many Democrats are running away from Barack Obama, but they can’t hide their record of voting for Obama’s agenda more than 90 percent of the time.”

Indeed, running away from the president hasn’t helped. As Sen. Jeanne Shaheen (D-NH) pointed out, every Democrat cast the “deciding vote” for ObamaCare. If she’s going down, she’s taking some colleagues with her.

Likewise, Democrats share the blame for bad economic policy that hampered recovery. Heck, even Joe Biden says, “The middle class has been left behind” over the last few years. That’s Obamanomics for you.

And their traditionally poor showing on the national security front is even more obvious with ISIL on the rise.

Obama’s policies, he helpfully reminded us all, “are on the ballot – every single one of them.”

The overall fundraising advantage Democrats held, gleefully reported by the Leftmedia in the last few months, is now of little consequence. Ads in the days leading up to the election are expensive, and those fundraising dollars aren’t going as far as they did in the summer – or even in September.

Prospects for Democrats in the Senate aren’t much better. Signs still point to a GOP takeover of the upper chamber, though pollsters and pundits aren’t as confident about what such a victory might look like. Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell is locked in a tight contest with Alison Lundergan Grimes, and Kansas incumbent Pat Roberts is still fighting a tough race against “Independent” Greg Orman, but Republicans look poised otherwise for solid gains.

A big issue of concern for Senate Democrats is the loss of women voters. Democrats depend on women to counter men, who largely vote Republican. This year, however, women are drifting away from the Democrat Party in key Senate races like Iowa, Arkansas and Colorado. Losing that voting bloc would be more than an embarrassment – it would be a devastating blow.

The rabid Left has endeavored to mobilize unmarried and minority women by ginning up issues like abortion, birth control, equal pay and other such phony elements of the so-called “war on women” plank. But success in these efforts may be hard to come by because these groups don’t often vote in large numbers in off-year elections.

Republicans may be enjoying an unusual advantage among women in some key Senate races, but they still face an upward climb to win the support of black voters. There are currently 39 states with no black Republican lawmaker on the state or federal level, and according to the National Black Caucus of State Legislators, of 671 black state legislators nationwide, only 13 are Republican.

Blacks accounted for 13% of the electorate in 2012, and, believe it or not, 37% self-identify as conservative, while 33% self-identify as liberal. Additionally, many black voters have expressed extreme disappointment in Obama. It seems all too clear that Republicans have an opportunity to bring more blacks into the ranks.

Last year, the Republican National Committee began a committed outreach to blacks, hoping to build a base of support in a non-election year rather than repeat the mistake of waiting until a few months before the election. RNC Chairman Reince Priebus made inroads, but there’s a long way to go. There are 17 black Republicans running for Congress this year, but only Utah’s Mia Love is likely to win.

Whatever successes Republicans can count in November, they and the country will be facing an executive onslaught from Obama that will test the very fabric of the Constitution.

The president has shifted a number of executive actions and decisions until after the midterm elections to try to limit the electoral damage for his party. But the scope and breadth of his plans are meant to do nothing less than relegate a Republican-led Congress to the back burner while he continues his plan to fundamentally transform America. Just to name a few, the nomination of Eric Holder’s replacement, amnesty for millions of illegal immigrants, new EPA regulations that will cripple the energy industry, and a steep increase in health insurance rates all silently wait around the corner from Nov. 4.

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For more, visit Right Analysis.

TOP 5 RIGHT OPINION COLUMNS

• Dennis Prager: If It Damages America, It’s Good for Democrats
• Thomas Sowell: Random Thoughts
• Mona Charen: Voter ID Myth Crashes
• Ed Feulner: The Facts Behind ObamaCare’s Numbers
• William Murchison: Government as the Great Equalizer – and Other Absurdities

For more, visit Right Opinion.

OPINION IN BRIEF

Nobel laureate Friedrich August von Hayek (1899-1992): “From the fact that people are very different it follows that, if we treat them equally, the result must be inequality in their actual position, and that the only way to place them in an equal position would be to treat them differently. Equality before the law and material equality are therefore not only different but are in conflict with each other; and we can achieve either one or the other, but not both at the same time.”

Columnist Dennis Prager: “The Democratic Party cultivates singlehood, black anger at America, Latino separatism, victimhood, group grievance and dependency on government. Nor is this the only way in which Democrats do terrible damage to America. They are also tearing America apart, setting women against men (with such falsehoods as ‘the war on women,’ ‘the rape culture’ at American colleges, and the nonsense that ‘women are paid less for the same work’), blacks against whites, and Latinos against other Americans. They do this because the less women see men as an enemy, the less blacks regard whites as an enemy, and the more Latinos see themselves as Americans, the worse it is for Democrats. The Democratic Party has been become a wholly destructive force in this country. Even though you may not intend to, if you vote for any Democrat, you contribute to that damage.”

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Columnist Thomas Sowell: “Too many intellectuals are too impressed with the fact that they know more than other people. Even if an intellectual knows more than anybody else, that is not the same as saying that he knows more than everybody else put together – which is what would be needed to justify substituting his judgment for that expressed by millions of others through the market or through the ballot box.”

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Fred Thompson: “A new report shows that illegal poppy farming in Afghanistan is at an ‘all time high,’ despite the U.S. spending $7.6 billion trying to stop it. Maybe we should subsidize it instead. Stopped Solyndra cold.”

Semper Vigilo, Fortis, Paratus et Fidelis!

Join us in daily prayer for our Patriots in uniform – Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines and Coast Guardsmen – standing in harm’s way in defense of Liberty, and for their families.

THE FOUNDATION

“[America’s] glory is not dominion, but liberty. Her march is the march of the mind. She has a spear and a shield: but the motto upon her shield is Freedom, Independence, Peace. This has been her declaration: this has been, as far as her necessary intercourse with the rest of mankind would permit, her practice.” –John Quincy Adams, Speech to the House of Representatives, 1821

TOP 5 RIGHT HOOKS

Political Fight Over Ebola Quarantine

In the wake of the doctor in New York City testing positive for Ebola, the governors of New York and New Jersey imposed mandatory quarantine policies for health workers who had contact with Ebola patients. Facing public backlash coupled with pressure from the White House (because the quarantine “doesn’t comport with science”), however, New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo backed off. Not surprisingly, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie held firm. Of course, the reason the governors placed strict requirements on those coming in from Ebola-plagued countries is not because of the threat of additional infections, which is minimal, but because the fear generated by all the media hype over Ebola can result in significant disruption. The new state measures are designed to negate that disruption. And, as The Wall Street Journal put it in an editorial, “[I]f it weren’t for the Administration’s incompetence in handling Ebola risks on U.S. soil, maybe the state leaders wouldn’t have felt they had to take matters into their own hands.”

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Washington School Shooter Broke Law When Picking Up Gun

Like so many other school shootings that make national headlines, we don’t know why the shooter at the Marysville Washington High School killed two people and severely injured three more on Oct. 24. Also like other shootings, the killer turned his weapon on himself. We do know that when the 14-year-old picked up his father’s Beretta .40-caliber handgun, he broke the lawbecause it’s illegal for him to possess the gun and ammunition, carry the gun to school and, of course, open fire. As always, the Left’s pundits point to the gun and label it the source of all social ills. As Hot Air’s Jazz Shaw says, it took all of three minutes for a Huffington Post reporter to tweet, “By the way, there are two background check measures on the ballot in Washington this year.” What no one can understand is the freshman’s mental state, why the homecoming princedescended to murder. But one thing is clear: The gun didn’t make him do it. More…

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You Didn’t Build That, Part II

At a Boston rally for Democrat gubernatorial candidate Martha Coakley, Hillary Clinton echoed Barack Obama’s famous “you didn’t build that” line in reference to businesses and jobs. Only she was perhaps even more explicit. “Don’t let anybody tell you that, uh, you know, it’s corporations and businesses that create jobs,” Clinton said. “You know that old theory, ‘trickle-down economics,’” she sneered. “That has been tried, that has failed. It has failed rather spectacularly.” For good measure, she added, “You know, one of the things my husband says when people say, ‘Well, what did you bring to Washington?’ [is], ‘Well, I brought arithmetic.’” Clinton is clearly trying to move left to head off a challenge from Elizabeth Warren. But it’s also interesting to note that her husband benefitted from what we call “Reaganomics” – supply and demand economics that gets government out of the way and lets people keep more of their hard-earned money. Reagan’s policies set off a two-decade economic boom. Clinton is suggesting we continue Obama’s policies of taxing and spending, and that’s hardly a reason to vote for her.

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FEC to Study Regulating Political Speech on Internet

The liberals on the Federal Election Commission are eyeing political speech. First, they wanted to regulate books. Now, they want to go after the videos, blogs and websites of the Internet. Ann Ravel, vice chair of the FEC, announced that the commission will look into regulating the Internet because “a reexamination of the commission’s approach to the internet and other emerging technologies is long over due.” Ravel wants to go after a “loophole” exempting political groups who distribute political ads for free across the Internet, insisting these ads must be disclosed to the FEC. But Lee Goodman, the FEC chairman, says these proposed regulations could entangle news sites, blogs or web forums. The Internet has been to political speech like ridesharing service Uber has been to the taxi industry – disruptive to the heavily regulated systems of the past. Doesn’t the FEC have more important things to do, like discouraging voter fraud and ensuring the reliability of voting technology, than tampering with the freedom of speech? More…

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Idaho Wedding Chapel Doesn’t Have to Perform Same-Sex Marriages

A city in Idaho decided the religious beliefs of business owners are enough to prevent the city from slapping a non-discrimination charge against the business. Last week, the owners of the Hitching Post, a wedding chapel in Coeur d'Alene, sued the city because they would have faced a misdemeanor charge if they refused to marry same-sex couples. “But now the city is backing off and has determined the Knapps can say no,” writes Scott Shackford at Reason Magazine. “Unfortunately the reason is not because a wedding ceremony is not a right and nobody of any race, sexual orientation, or religion should be able to demand that somebody must bless (in any definition of the word) their relationship. Rather, the city’s anti-discrimination ordinance doesn’t specify that a business has to be a non-profit in order to claim a religious-based exemption from the law.” The city, of course, danced a legal two-step to avoid litigation, so the problem of same-sex non-discrimination laws hunting those practicing religious freedom will still be decided.More…

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RIGHT ANALYSIS

‘Lone Wolf Attack’? Wrong!

By Mark Alexander

If they're alone, why are there so many?

After the latest Islamist assault in New York, let us reiterate the proper interpretation of such attacks.

As noted in my recent column, Islamic Jihad – Target USA, the most likely near-term form of attack against military and civilian personnel on our turf will be similar to the conventional Islamist assaults in the Middle East – homicidal bombings or mass shootings. This type of attack is low tech but effective in terms of achieving instilling public fear with the long-term goal of extorting policy change. However, a note of caution about the predictable “analysis” that will follow these attacks. Government and media analysts alike will assert there is “no known connection between the assailant and Islamist terrorist groups.” That assertion is patently false.

Recall that in 2009, after Nidal Malik Hasan, yelling “Allahu Akbar,” killed 14 people (including an unborn child) and wounded 30 others at Ft. Hood, The New York Times opined: “[It is] important to avoid drawing prejudicial conclusions from the fact that Major Hasan is an American Muslim whose parents came from the Middle East. President Obama was right when he told Americans, ‘we don’t know all the answers yet’ and cautioned everyone against ‘jumping to conclusions.’”

Well, we do “know all the answers” now, and the conclusion is that these acts are directly tied to Islam. Yet the Obama administration and its media outlets insist the Ft. Hood attack, like the 2013 Boston Marathon bombings, were not tied to established Islamic terrorist groups. They offer the same errant analysis of the 2009 murder of two American soldiers outside a military recruiting center in Little Rock, Arkansas, and conspiracies to detonate bombs in Times Square and the NYC subway system. The result is that Islamist ideology is allowed to propagate and flourish across our nation unabated.

However, these attacks and those to come were and will be directly tied to worldwide Jihad by way of the Qur'an, the foundational fabric linking all Islamist violence. Fact is, American Islamists, such as Louis Farrakhan, Anwar al-Awlaki, Sheikh Ibrahim and other self-appointed clerics, have galvanized their following by preaching hatred for America. And other American Muslin leaders, who would like to be perceived as legitimate representatives of Islam, offer little condemnation of Islamic violence. Their silence is deafening.

Describing Islamist assailants as “lone wolf” actors or “radicalized” constitutes a lethal misunderstanding of the Jihadi threat. Describing their attacks as “criminal activity” or “workplace violence” is asinine.

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The Real Racists Oppose Voter ID

There is no intellectually sound argument against having proper ID to vote – which is quite predictably why the American Left must resort to emotional demagoguery to fight it. Equally unsurprising, playing the race card is their most reliable vehicle for doing so. Yet stunning testimony against North Carolina’s election laws reveal that it is leftists themselves who are willing to disparage black Americans and Hispanics to pursue their agenda.

According to expert witnesses retained by the Justice Department (DOJ) and, yes, the NAACP, it is racist to assume minorities can be treated like everyone else – because they are “less sophisticated.”

Read the rest here.

A Tale of Excused Abuse at the IRS

As we consider the political and legal implications of the IRS’s targeting of Tea Party and Patriot groups, it’s worth taking a trip down memory lane. Watergate offers worthwhile comparisons.

Months of congressional hearings, investigations, resignations, firings and blatant lies ended with the U.S. House Judiciary Committee passing articles of impeachment, resulting in the first and only resignation of a U.S. president on Aug. 8, 1974. The American people watched despicable acts of political maneuvering, criminal activity and absolute corrupt leadership end with a bi-partisan show of rebuke and remedy.

Until recently, history would’ve likely reserved the caption “most corrupt U.S. president” for Richard Nixon. But Barack Obama seems determined to take over that mantle.

Read the rest here.

Obfuscation Reaches Fast and Furious Levels

Since the murder of Border Patrol agent Brian Terry in late 2010 showed that Operation Fast and Furious was far worse than completely botched, the Justice Department under Attorney General Eric Holder has been plotting to cover its tracks and limit the negative political ramifications. The “most transparent administration in history” has been so opaque that several people and groups, including former CBS reporter Sheryl Attkisson and Judicial Watch, have filed Freedom of Information Act requests for documents regarding the scandal just to get to the bottom of it.

Needless to say, the Holder Justice Department was not forthcoming with these documents.

Read the rest here.

For more, visit Right Analysis.

TOP 5 RIGHT OPINION COLUMNS

• Peggy Noonan: Can Obama Find Thumpin' to Say?
• Larry Kudlow: The Optimistic GOP Story Everyone Is Missing
• George Will: Done in by John Doe
• Stephen Moore: Meet the New Class Warrior in Chief
• Tony Perkins: California ups the Abortion Ante

For more, visit Right Opinion.

OPINION IN BRIEF

The Gipper: “A friend of mine was asked to a costume ball a short time ago. He slapped some egg on his face and went as a liberal economist.”

Columnist Peggy Noonan: “We have criticized Republican lack of a higher meaning. Strangely absent this cycle are candidates who make us believe the one thing every American wants to believe, is desperate to believe: We can come back. America can pump out jobs again, boom again, be a beacon. Here’s the plan, here’s the policy, ‘Let’s do this thing.’ Republicans fail to connect their own dots. But Democrats this year – what a rhetorical, emotional and policy disaster. In ‘08 they were on fire with hope, in '12 they were keep the faith, stay the course. This year they are surly. They are unloving and unlovable. It’s race and gender politics, it’s wheelchairs, it’s endless defensiveness about voting for or with the president. Republicans may have failed to unite, but the Democrats divide. … On Nov. 5, Mr. Obama will have to say something that shows he gets it. That shows without saying that he’s humbled, that he isn’t living in a bubble. Here’s the problem. The qualities required of such a statement – humility, self-awareness, sensitivity to the public mood – are sort of the opposite of what the president brings to the table.”

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Economist Larry Kudlow: “Let me weigh in on the first two bills that the GOP should put on Obama’s desk. The Republicans should start with energy by legislating a Keystone Pipeline Authorization Act … and include energy reforms that would open federal lands to development and drilling and remove all restrictions to energy exports. … Who loses? Our enemy Vladimir Putin and his client state Iran. And if Obama kowtows again to the left-wing enviros, so be it. It’s a 2016 GOP agenda item. Second would be a business tax-reform plan that would slash the corporate tax rate to 20 percent, stop the double taxation of foreign profits and allow small business S-corps (including unborn start-ups, which are America’s real job creators) to take advantage of the new lower corporate tax rate. … A new Republican Congress should message that they’re tired of obsessing about Obama’s mistakes. Everybody knows about those. The trick now is to focus on solutions. On change. On saying, 'We can do this. We can fix this.’”

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Twitter satirist @weknowwhatsbest: “Hillary told a crowd, ‘Businesses and corporations don’t create jobs.’ She forgot to add, ‘…when Democrats control the economy.’”

Semper Vigilo, Fortis, Paratus et Fidelis!

Join us in daily prayer for our Patriots in uniform – Soldiers, Sailors, Airmen, Marines and Coast Guardsmen – standing in harm’s way in defense of Liberty, and for their families.