by Political Editors: From 2012 through 2016, labor unions donated roughly $765 million to political causes and groups, and a staggering 99% of those donations went to leftist political causes or candidates. Luka Ladan, communications director for the Center for Union Facts, stated, “For years, labor unions have hijacked member dues to fund Planned Parenthood, Emily’s List and other pro-abortion groups. Yet many union members oppose the abortion lobby. The Employee Rights Act would require union officials to obtain permission before spending dues dollars on left-wing political advocacy.” For example, in 2007 alone, labor unions donated $1.8 million to Planned Parenthood, $810,000 to Emily’s Choice and $45,000 to NARAL Pro-Choice America. Often a majority of union members do not know that their dues are funding the abortion lobby. “Big Labor doesn’t really want to publicize it,” Ladan said. Public unions are hardly better. In fact, the Supreme Court will soon hear a caseinvolving their political contributions.
Recognizing the massive imbalance in union spending on leftist political causes, Pennsylvania AFL-CIO President Rick Bloomingdale stated in July, “We may have gotten too close to one party. We should be for people who are for us, regardless of party label.”
Now there’s a novel concept, considering that roughly 40% of union household members vote Republican.
The Employee Rights Act, introduced in the House this past May, seeks to stop current unfair labor union practices by enabling workers the freedom to select or refrain from union representation, as well as require union officials to obtain permission from members before spending dues on causes they may oppose. There’s a reason why unions have steadily lost membership, much of it having to do with the fact that union leadership for years has been using member dues as slush funds for Democrats and leftist politics rather than truly advocating for workers’ rights. Hopefully, the Employee Rights Act passes, giving not only workers more choice in accepting union representation, but also giving union members the power to choose those political causes they wish to support. ~The Patriot Post
https://patriotpost.us/articles/51996
VIDEOS
by Political Editors: Last Thursday, White House Chief of Staff John Kelly sought to put to bed a week-long, Leftmedia-driven story of Donald Trump’s phone call to a grieving widow. Kelly rightly called out Rep. Frederica Wilson (D-FL) as an “empty barrel” for her self-promoting politicizing of a sacred, private event — separate from her criticism of Trump’s phone call and exploitation of a widow’s grief — even though he was inaccurate on the details. His point was that Wilson is a grandstanding narcissist who, in the words of White House Press Secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders, is “all hat, no cattle.” Kelly is exactly right. Ignoring his call for respecting American military personnel killed in action and their grieving loved ones, however, Wilson and her cohorts in the media labeled Kelly’s remarks as racist, demanded an apology for Kelly’s “character assassination,” and further churned an entire weekend’s worth of “news.” Meanwhile, having already once made this assertion, on Sunday Wilson tweeted that “Niger is [Trump’s] Benghazi. He needs to own it.” Like the good Demo/MSM propaganda outlet that it is, CNN and other Leftmedia outlets took the cue to search for the “massive intelligence failure” in Niger prior to the ambush killings of four Americans. CNN also sought to exploit other grieving Gold Star parents in an attempt to paint Trump as uncaring and un-presidential.
Mark Alexander explains, “CNN is doing everything possible to use the death of four Americans in Niger as political fodder to hack Trump. This time, it’s trotting out a grieving couple whose son was recently killed complete with subtext lines initially targeting Trump. But this family had no intention of letting their son’s death be used as fodder for CNN’s totally disgraceful political charade.”
In continuing to run with this story, CNN and the Leftmedia are not simply continuing their anti-Trump resistance campaign. They are seeking to sow division between military members and Trump, as well as divert attention away from, of all issues, Russia. The Mueller Special Counsel investigation into Russian election meddling has recently turned its focus onto several Democrats. There is also renewed interest being shown over the deal Barack liar-nObama and then-Secretary of State liar-Hillary Clinton made with the Russians to sell them uranium.
Back to that CNN interview — a tearful Sheila Murphy, the mother of a fallen soldier, told the host, “I have no hard feeling towards anyone, because it’s not about me. It’s about my child and all the other countless fallen heroes, and those who are still over there now and the families that are here grieving. … That’s what it’s all about. I don’t want it to be about me or a letter, I want it to be about my child. And what he stood for, and what they’re fighting for over there right now as I speak.” Wise words.
VIDEO: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CY0pu48d0B0
Addendum: Myeshia Johnson, the widow in Trump’s infamous phone call, broke her silence, saying, “What he said was — yes the president — said that he knew what [my husband, Sgt. La David Johnson] signed up for, but it hurts anyways. And I was — it made me cry because I was very angry at the tone of his voice and how he said it. He couldn’t remember my husband’s name.” She added, “Whatever Ms. Wilson said was not fabricated, what she said was 100 percent correct.”
Trump, naturally, punched back on Twitter, saying, “I had a very respectful conversation with the widow of Sgt. La David Johnson, and spoke his name from beginning, without hesitation!”
Memo to Trump: Posting anything about this on Twitter cheapens ALL of it. ~The Patriot Post
https://patriotpost.us/articles/51990
As their U.S. allies watched, the Kurdish peshmerga fighters were run out of Kirkuk and all the territory they had captured fighting ISIS alongside the Americans. The Iraqi army that ran them out was trained and armed by the United States.
The U.S. had warned the Kurds against holding the referendum on independence on Sept. 25, which carried with 92 percent. Iran and Turkey had warned against an independent Kurdistan that could be a magnet for Kurdish minorities in their own countries.
But the Iraqi Kurds went ahead. Now they have lost Kirkuk and its oil, and their dream of independence is all but dead.
More troubling for America is the new reality revealed by the rout of the peshmerga. Iraq, which George W. Bush and the neocons were going to fashion into a pro-Western democracy and American ally, appears to be as close to Iran as it is to the United States.
After 4,500 U.S. dead, scores of thousands wounded and a trillion dollars sunk, our 15-year war in Iraq could end with a Shiite-dominated Baghdad aligned with Tehran.
With that grim prospect in mind, Secretary Rex Tillerson said Sunday, “Iranian militias that are in Iraq, now that the fight against … ISIS is coming to a close … need to go home. Any foreign fighters in Iraq need to go home.”
Tillerson meant Iran’s Quds Force in Iraq should go home, and the Shiite militia in Iraq should be conscripted into the army.
But what if the Baghdad regime of Haider al-Abadi does not agree? What if the Quds Force does not go home to Iran and the Shiite militias that helped retake Kirkuk refuse to enlist in the Iraqi army?
Who then enforces Tillerson’s demands?
Consider what is happening in Syria.
The U.S.-backed Syrian Democratic Forces, largely Kurdish, just annihilated ISIS in Raqqa and drove 60 miles to seize Syria’s largest oil field, al-Omar, from ISIS. The race is now on between the SDF and Bashar Assad’s army to secure the border with Iraq.
Bottom line: The U.S. goal of crushing the ISIS caliphate is almost attained. But if our victory in the war against ISIS leaves Iran in the catbird seat in Baghdad and Damascus, and its corridor from Tehran to Baghdad, Damascus and Beirut secure, is that really a victory?
Do we accept that outcome, pack up and go home? Or do we leave our forces in Syria and Iraq and defy any demand from Assad to vacate his country?
Sunday’s editorial in the Washington Post, “The Next Mideast Wars,” raises the crucial questions now before us.
Would President Trump be willing to fight a new war to keep Iran from consolidating its position in Iraq and Syria? Would the American people support such a war with U.S. troops?
Would Congress, apparently clueless to the presence of 800 U.S. troops in Niger, authorize a new U.S. war in Syria or Iraq?
If Trump and his generals felt our vital interests could not allow Syria and Iraq to drift into the orbit of Iran, where would we find allies for such a fight?
If we rely on the Kurds in Syria, we lose NATO ally Turkey, which regards Syria’s Kurds as collaborators of the PKK in Turkey, which even the U.S. designates a terrorist organization.
The decision as to whether this country should engage in new post-ISIS wars in the Mideast, however, may be taken out of our hands.
Saturday, Israel launched new air strikes against gun positions in Syria in retaliation for shells fired into the Golan Heights.
Damascus claims that Israel’s “terrorist” allies inside Syria fired the shells, to give the IDF an excuse to attack.
Why would Israel wish to provoke a war with Syria?
Because the Israelis see the outcome of the six-year Syrian civil war as a strategic disaster.
Hezbollah, stronger than ever, was part of Assad’s victorious coalition. Iran may have secured its land corridor from Tehran to Beirut. Its presence in Syria could now be permanent.
And only one force in the region has the power to reverse the present outcome of Syria’s civil war – the United States.
Bibi Netanyahu knows that if war with Syria breaks out, a clamor will arise in Congress to have the U.S. rush to Israel’s aid.
Closing its Sunday editorial, the Post instructed the president:
“A failure by the United States to defend its allies or promote new political arrangements for Syria and Iraq will lead only to more war, the rise of new terrorist threats, and, ultimately, the necessity of more U.S. intervention.”
The interventionist Post is saying: The situation is intolerable. Confront Assad and Iran now, or fight them later.
Trump is being led to the Rubicon. If he crosses, he joins Bush II in the history books.
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