America and Israel's comparative borders.
I daresay, if we were faced with what Israelis are every day Trump would blow Mexico off the face of the earth. China would do the same to N Korea and Russia would do the same to every "Stan" and the U.N would not say a damn thing . Only misguided radicals in America would march with their stupid signs.(See 1, 1a and 1b below.)
When faced with radicals, assorted nut cases and their insane logic perhaps radical actions and solutions are appropriate. (See 1c below.)
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Larry Arn, President of Hillsdale College, wants you to take a survey. (See 2 below.)
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Will free riding now end? Will Democrat coffers be reduced? (See 3 below.)
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Harry Reid was no friend of freedom but he was a friend of The Republican Party. He outsmarted himself and his own do nothing party. (See 4 below.)
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America will soon be celebrating another birthday. You can conclude the nation is divided, politically coming apart at the seams, being challenged on many diplomatic fronts, swarming with illegal immigrants, deeply in debt and our youth do not have a clue about their country.
On the other hand, one can conclude all our problems and challenges are solvable because we are a free people and have the constitutional wherewithal to turn our nation around and head it back in the right direction and simply need the will.
You decide which camp you reside in and if it is the latter I suggest you get off your butt and do something about that of which you complain.
How do you do this? First, be informed, second vote and third get active politically and socially at the local level. Most important of all do not allow yourself to be intimidated and your voice stilled by the true bigots and radicals.
Here is to a Happy 4th: I went to the liquor store Monday afternoon on my bicycle, bought a bottle of Johnny Walker and put it in the bicycle basket.
As I was about to leave, I thought to myself that if I fell off the bicycle, the bottle would break. So I drank all the Johnny Walker before I cycled home.
It turned out to be a very good decision because I fell off my bicycle seven times on the way home.
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Dick
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1) Hamas terrorists launched between 13 and 17 rockets at communities in southern Israel early Wednesday morning, bringing a response from the IDF.
Hamas terrorists launched a barrage of rockets and mortar fire from the Gaza Strip at Israeli communities in the south in the wee hours of Wednesday morning.
There were no immediate reports of injuries or damage.
The attack was part of an ongoing, low-intensity military conflict initiated by Hamas.
An Israeli Air Force (IAF) aircraft and IDF tank late Tuesday night fired at a vehicle belonging to a Hamas field commander described by the Israeli military as “heavily involved” in launching arson kites and explosive balloons from the Gaza Strip into Israel.
Sources in Gaza reported that the car was empty and that no one was harmed in the strike. The car was completely destroyed.
Earlier in the evening, an IDF aircraft targeted a vehicle used by a group of Palestinians to launch arson balloons from the northern Gaza Strip into Israel.
On Tuesday, Hamas orchestrated the launching of another wave of firebomb-laden kites and balloons that sparked fires.
“Moments ago,” the IDF spokesman announced on twitter, “an IDF aircraft targeted a vehicle used by a group of Palestinians who launched arson balloons from the northern Gaza Strip into Israeli territory, as well as an observation post from which the balloons were launched.”
The Palestinian Information Center (PIC), a Hamas-affiliated news site, said that an Israeli drone fired at least one missile at a civilian car, causing it to burst into flames .
According to PIC, one Palestinian citizen was slightly injured from the explosion in Nuseirat, a town in central Gaza.
Sources in Gaza quoted by PIC said “the resistance” fired 17 projectiles at nearby settlements.
Sirens were heard in the Hof Ashkelon, Sha’ar HaNegev and Eshkol Regional Councils from approximately 1:45 a.m. to 4 a.m., sending thousands of Israelis running to bomb shelters.
The Iron Dome intercepted three projectiles.
Schools were set to remain open as usual on Wednesday. No special instructions were given to residents of the area.
1a) The Truth About Hamas and Israel and the “Peaceful” Demonstration
Sami Abu Zuhri is the spokesman for the extremist group Hamas, an internationally recognized terrorist organization funded by Iran. Hamas controls Gaza and has killed innocent Israeli, American, Brazilian, Kenyan, British, French and Chinese civilians.
As chief intelligence officer of the Israel Defense Forces’ Gaza division from 2012-14, I came to know Mr. Abu Zuhri and other Hamas spokesmen from a distance. Their modus operandi is simple: Lie. Their lies support the stated goal of Hamas: the delegitimization and destruction of Israel.
For weeks the international media has reported on violence on the border between Gaza and Israel. Hamas has continued to lie to the world, which is why their rare acknowledgments of truth are especially revealing. Hamas spokesmen raced to the press last week to lament the death of innocent civilians. But a senior Hamas leader, Salah Bardawil, said in a May 16 interview with a Palestinian TV station: “In the last round of confrontations, if 62 people were martyred, 50 of them were Hamas.”
Hamas itself has confirmed that 80% of those killed in their violent riots last Monday were members of a terrorist group, not innocent civilians. Several more of the fatalities were claimed by Palestinian Islamic Jihad.
On May 13, Mahmoud Al-Zahar, a co-founder of Hamas, said in an interview with Al Jazeera: “When we talk about ‘peaceful resistance,’ we are deceiving the public.” You can trust Hamas only when they admit to their lies.
The Hamas spokesmen orchestrated a well-funded terrorist propaganda operation. Behind the theatrics was a plan that threatened Israel’s border and civilians. Hamas provided free transportation from throughout the Gaza Strip to the border for innocent civilians, including women and children.
Hamas hired them as extras, paying $14 a person or $100 a family for attendance—and $500 if they managed to get injured. Hamas forced all of their commanders and operatives to go to the border dressed as civilians, each serving as a director of an area—as if to direct their own stage of the operation.
The audience was the international media. Hamas gave anyone with a video camera front-row access to the show and free Wi-Fi. The IDF had precise intelligence that the violent riots were masking a plan of mass infiltration into Israel in order to carry out a massacre against Israeli civilians. Hamas called it a “peaceful protest,” and much of the world simply fell for it.
The idea that this was a peaceful protest is the biggest lie of all, because the basic tenets required for a protest in a democracy like the U.S. or Israel do not exist in Gaza. Under Hamas’s control, there is no freedom of speech, no freedom of assembly, no freedom of religion, no freedom of the press. There can be no such thing as a peaceful protest in Gaza, only gatherings organized, sanctioned and funded by Hamas. Calling this a protest isn’t fake news, just fake.
In multiple assaults on the border this spring, Hamas has used machine guns, Molotov cocktails, airborne improvised explosive devices and grenades. Hundreds of Gazans have tried to blow up or tear down the fence between Gaza and Israel, with the intention of infiltrating our sovereign territory and reaching innocent Israelis who live minutes from the border.
On April 6 the Hamas political leader, Yahya Sinwar, stated: “We will take down the border [with Israel] and we will tear their hearts from their bodies.” On Facebook Hamas posted maps for their operatives showing the quickest routes from the border with Israel to Israelis’ homes, schools, and day-care centers near the border. Does that sound like a peaceful protest to you?
Facing the dangers posed by cowardly terrorists who disguise themselves as civilians, IDF soldiers acted with courage and restraint, following strict rules of engagement to ensure minimum civilian injury and loss of life while still protecting the border.
As part of Hamas’s propaganda operation, hundreds of Gazans were injured last week and several dozen died, most of whom were Hamas operatives. None of this violence had to occur, but it was the violence that Hamas instigated and orchestrated so that the headlines and pictures would reinforce the lies that the Hamas spokesmen had planned.
Hamas can lie—to the world, to Palestinians and to their own commanders and operatives—but I am proud that the IDF will never lie or use Israeli civilians or soldiers as pawns.
Some of Israel’s greatest friends might have preferred that we had looked better in the media this past week, but between vanity and truth, the IDF always chooses truth. It is that morality that sustains the IDF. The uniformed professional soldiers of the IDF may not photograph well compared with terrorists disguised as civilians—but we are honest about what we are and what we say. As the IDF spokesman, if I cannot source and cite material, I will not allow it to be published. I will not release any statement if the facts are in doubt.
Some in the media helped Hamas by publishing its lies rather than the facts. Hamas achieved negative media coverage about Israel after their first violent riot, on March 30, the first day of this propaganda operation. Hamas could have then claimed a propaganda victory, stopped the violence, and prevented many deaths. But for Hamas, lies are more important than lives.
If in order to win the international propaganda war I need to lie like Hamas, then I prefer to tell the truth and lose. The IDF will win where it matters—protecting our civilians in the face of terror. The soldiers of the IDF won this week by keeping Israeli families safe and by stopping Hamas from accomplishing its stated goals.
Even more than the lying, the true difference between Mr. Abu Zuhri and me is that he goes to sleep every night wishing for the destruction of my country and the death of my children. I go to sleep at night hoping for a better life for his children as well as mine. And that’s the truth.
Brig. Gen. Manelis is the spokesman for the Israel Defense Forces.
1b) Israel's Syria dilemma
With little or no commentary, various external news outlets reported missile attacks carried out on Monday close to Damascus airport. The missiles fired from planes flying outside Syrian airspace targeted weapons depots and warehouses belonging to non-Syrian militias, most likely Hezbollah.
The Guardian (UK) quoting the Syrian Observatory for Human Rights war monitor, based in Britain, said Israeli jets have reportedly bombed an area near the Damascus international airport in the third attack in as many weeks.The observatory also said that Syrian air defence systems failed to intercept the missiles fired by Israeli planes from the direction of the Golan Heights.A Russian military source confirmed the direction of the attack and the identity of the aircraft that fired the missiles.
Almost without exception, Israeli military spokesmen neither confirm nor deny responsibility for these attacks.
Israeli news media outlets mentioned the missile attack, but mainly in passing. After all, the Israeli public is familiar with the IDF's modus operandi regarding what it broadly describes as Iranian encroachment in Syria.
Emil Avdaliani who teaches history and international relations at Tbilisi State University, Georgia, claims these intermittent Israeli strikes against Iranian positions in Syria have alarmed Russia, which is trying to consolidate its military gains there. It fears Israeli attacks on Iranian and Hezbollah military installations are liable to destabilise the alliance forged against the rebel forces in Syria. ” Moscow must balance between its ally Iran, and Israel, an important regional player – two states with radically different geopolitical objectives."
A few months ago I wrote, “It appears that Vladimir Putin regards the Iranian presence in Syria with a degree of ambivalence. While Iranian forces are fighting and dying for Assad he is content to maintain the status quo. However, the ever increasing number of Iranian and Shiite mercenaries in Syria threatens his influence on Assad’s regime.”
Avdaliani claims that at a time when the Syrian battlefield is becoming more crowded Russia is finding it increasingly difficult to maintain its position as the dominant player. Despite declarations to the contrary, the US is unlikely to withdraw its military forces. The Turks are operating in Afrin, in the north of the country. Powerful Iranian proxy forces are advancing close to the Israeli border, and little success has been achieved at Russian sponsored peace conferences. The last thing Russia wants is to have Israel drawn into the conflict militarily.This could explain why Russia has conceded several crucial points concerning Israel’s security.”
From time to time Russia announces that it is about to supply Syria with advanced S-300 air-defence missile systems. Syria has been trying to buy these missiles from Russia for a long time, and the Iranians have been willing to fund the deal, but Russia has avoided selling the missiles to Syria due to Israeli and American pressure. Russian foreign minister Sergei Lavrov said that in view of the attacks carried out by the western allies on Assad’s military installations in April this year, Russia no longer had any moral obligation to refrain from transferring the missiles to Syria. Russia’s prominent daily Kommersant quoted unnamed military sources as saying deliveries might begin in the near future.However, following Benyamin Netanyahu’s visit to Russia in early May another prominent Russia daily, Izvestia, quoted top Kremlin aide Vladimir Kozhin as saying that Moscow was not negotiating with the Syrian government about the supply of the S-300 systems.
At that time I commented, “While the S-300 would be a formidable addition to Syria’s air defence weaponry, Russia fears that sooner or later IDF technology will develop a means to confound the S-300’s radar and tracking systems. The Russians know that if that happens the S-300 will be hard to sell.”
Recently Israel Aerospace Industries (IAI) and IMI Systems unveiled a jointly-developed supersonic, long-range air-to-ground missile named “Rampage.”Developed as a stand-off weapon, the Rampage consists of a warhead, rocket engine and advanced navigation suite which allow precision striking of high-quality, well-protected targets.
It can operate in all weather conditions, both day and night. It offers simplified operation, with no need for a “man in the loop” and can be carried on a broad range of aircraft..One of the directors of IAI claims it is cheaper than other long-range air-to-ground missiles and although it can be detected, it is very difficult to intercept.Of course the Rampage doesn’t quite make the S-300 system obsolete, but it might cause Russia to withhold supplying it to Syria in the future.Emil Avdaliani says Russia’s concessions to Israeli interests in Syria do not preclude a further strengthening of the Iran-Russia partnership..The Russians understand that Israel will continue targeting Iranian and Hezbollah military installations in Syria. They know that Israel will almost certainly respond again, even if the Golan Heights are not directly threatened. The Iranians, on the other hand, are unlikely to make concessions in Syria due to their geopolitical aspirations and military interests. These different perspectives are bound to clash from time to time.
Russia has to perform a difficult balancing act between Israel and Iran as it tries to position itself as the primary player in mitigating conflict between the two geopolitical enemies.”.
As the Syrian civil war draws to a close Israel has made clear that it is deeply concerned by a "day after” scenario involving an expanded Iranian and Hezbollah presence on its northern border.
Now it appears that the day before the day after has arrived.Haaretz military affairs correspondent Amos Harel wrote in his column yesterday,” The Syrian civil war is apparently entering a new phase In the wake of victories in the Greater Damascus area and consolidation of gains in the north, the Syrian regime has set its sights on the south. Assad’s forces, with Russian air support, are preparing to retake the country’s southwest. This is an area with symbolic importance (the uprising against Syrian President Bashar Assad began in Daraa in 2011), but it is also important strategically since it borders both Jordan and Israel.
Nevertheless, the main battlefield in Syria is diplomatic, not military. While the regime was preparing its southern offensive, Russia was trying to persuade the United States to sign off on a diplomatic deal.
Moscow wants an agreement under which some of the rebels would voluntarily evacuate parts of the south and be replaced by Assad’s forces. (Assad would also commit to removing Iranian troops and Shi’ite militias from those areas.) It also wants America to abandon the Al-Tanf base near the Iraqi border, which the Trump administration has so far refused to do.
Israel and the Syrian rebels near the Golan enjoyed relatively amicable relations over the years, with thousands of wounded Syrians, many of them civilians, coming to Israel for treatment. All that is now at risk as thousands flee the fighting and seek shelter near the Israeli border, knowing that the regime and Russian airplanes will not operate close to the border.The Assad regime claims its offensive in the south aims to rid the area of terrorist forces. However, the predominant opposition force in the area is the Free Syrian Army, not terrorists and not a permitted target designated by the U.N.The Russian-backed offensive aims to recapture one of the final pockets of opposition-held territory in Syria. But its location along the Jordanian and Israeli borders has effectively turned it into a geopolitical tinderbox.A cease-fire brokered by the United States, Jordan and Russia had largely kept the peace for more than a year as the Syrian army focused on clearing opposition groups from territory closer to Damascus. But now Washington is watching anxiously as new refugees flood toward closed borders and as pro-Assad forces deploy Iranian-backed militiamen alongside the Syrian army close to the Israeli frontier.
Amos Harel believes Assad’s attacks in southern Syria are more like military overtures and declarations of intent than a large-scale military offensive.Last weekend, Reuters reported that Washington had told rebels in southern Syria not to count on its assistance if the regime attacked them. Harel wonders how Israel will react now.
1c) How to Humanely Reduce Unlawful Immigration and Shut Down Open-Borders Democrats“Israel wants stability on its border. It has also frequently denounced the Assad regime for slaughtering its own citizens and using chemical weapons. But would it necessarily oppose the Syrian Army’s return to its border in the Golan Heights, if the Iranians were removed from the area?”
Today's lesson on morality and human rights comes from the probable (according to polls) next president of our crime-infested and corrupt neighbor to the south (emphases added):
Mexican presidential candidate Andrés Manuel López Obrador (AMLO) called for mass immigration to the United States[,] ... declaring it a "human right" for all North Americans.
"[W]e will defend all the migrants in the American continent and all the migrants in the world," Obrador said, adding that immigrants "must leave their towns and find a life in the United States."
Apparently, the U.S. must welcome an unlimited number of these unwanted, by their own president, Mexicans, because the U.S. is morally obligated to serve as Mexico's social-dysfunction safety valve and ATM.
Did you know that "chutzpah" is the same in Hebrew and Spanish? On the other hand, everyone knows that Obrador can count on a large cohort of Democrats, who share his view:
The reaction among immigration advocates has gone from outrage about family separations to consternation about family detention, because their ultimate goal is to let the migrants come into the United States and stay.
Lest anyone misunderstand, when Democrats say "the," they mean "all." Today, it's "family separations"; tomorrow, who knows? But whatever the Dems' démagogie du jour, most Americans want illegal immigration greatly reduced and, ideally, eliminated. The latter, most likely, is a pipe dream. But not only can the former be done. It can be done using methods already tried and proven.
First, yes, we need a wall. If the tooth-and-nail opposition of our open-border Democratic friends is insufficient evidence that a wall would work, consider, as President Trump has, Israel's wall. Israel had an illegal alien problem, too – or she did, until she built a wall, as a February 2017 Senate report confirmed:
The number of illegal crossers on the Israel-Egypt border dropped after the construction of the fence, from more than 16,000 in 2011 to less than 20 in 2016 – a 99 percent decrease.
One can argue, as some do, that other Israeli measures contributed to the decrease. But there can be no doubt that the wall was the primary, and a major, factor.
So a wall – and ending chain migration, and ending the visa lottery, and mandatory E‑Verify – will greatly reduce unlawful immigration. But there is one more thing government can do.
Allow the writer, whose father immigrated to America as a refugee, in 1948, to elucidate:
When the writer's dad got off the boat, he did not simply disembark in Manhattan, casually stroll streets paved with gold and buy the Brooklyn Bridge. First, he had to stop here:
In the first half of the 19th century, most immigrants arriving in New York City landed at docks on the east side of the tip of Manhattan, around South Street. On August 1, 1855, Castle Clinton became the Emigrant Landing Depot[.] ... [W]hen the U.S. government assumed control of immigration processing, [it moved] the center to the larger, more isolated Ellis Island facility on January 2, 1892 ... because immigrants were known to carry diseases, which led to epidemics of cholera and smallpox.
The key word in the above quote is "isolated," as in no physical route for unlawful aliens on to the mainland.
Then, the dangers were cholera and smallpox. Today, the dangers are MS-13 violence, lack of education and marketable skills, and the threat of someday becoming citizens and voting for Democrats. In both cases, the problem was a threat to the population from foreign immigration. And in both cases, the solution was to isolate new arrivals until they could be properly vetted and admitted into the mainland U.S. lawfully.
The writer lives in New York City, and last time he checked, Ellis Island was still there, repurposed as a museum. So how about making so-called catch-and-release unnecessary by returning Ellis Island to its original use and supplementing or replacing the current buildings with one or more new, modern dormitories, where illegals seized at the border could be housed comfortably, for as long as required, and with no need to separate families?
On the other hand, Ellis Island is on the opposite side of the country from the Mexican border, where the main problem is. Alcatraz Island is not. What about the Virgin Islands, Guam, or any number of U.S. island possessions, where the climate is both comfortable and similar to that of Mexico and Central America? The specific location is less important than that there be no physical access to the mainland, nor would the housing need to be overly expensive – Quonset huts if space allows, or easily convertible, and stackable, cargo containers.
Or even tents, as the Navy is already planning:
The U.S. Navy drafting plans to house up to 25,000 immigrants on its bases and other facilities, at an estimated cost of about $233 million over six months, as the Trump administration seeks to ease a mounting crisis on the Mexican border[.] ...
[T]he draft document ... also says that a Navy base in California could house up to a further 47,000 people.
Problem solved...almost. It's a good plan, but with one major flaw: perhaps the writer is mistaken, but it seems that all of the proposed military bases are on the mainland U.S. Again, the locations should be isolated, with no physical connection to the mainland. There is also the issue of cost and not just the $233 million for six months (so $466 billion per year); one company has a $162-million contract "to fly immigrant children to shelters across the United States."
There is a better, and possibly cheaper, solution. It's staring the Navy right in the face.
Surely, most readers know that the Navy maintains a reserve, or "mothball," fleet of decommissioned ships anchored in various parts of the country, including California.
Your typical aircraft carrier houses about 6,000 sailors. But think of all that extra space on the (unused) flight deck. Aircraft carriers also have kitchens specifically designed to feed thousands of people.
America is not suffering from a shortage of decommissioned ships. Why pay hundreds of millions of dollars to fly apprehended illegals to multiple locations around the continental U.S. when the Navy can move the ships to the immigrants, anchoring as close to the problem as possible but far enough from shore to keep illegals from accessing the mainland? Other mothballed ships could ferry large numbers of illegals to and from the offshore ships far more cheaply than flying them all over the country.
Additional ships could even return rejected aliens to their home countries – preferably, as Eisenhower did, on the side of the home country farthest from the U.S.
Should any liberal open-borders Democrat complain, just casually mention, preferably publicly, that American sailors lived on those same ships, for much longer, and make popcorn while Democrats explain why what was good enough for American sailors is not good enough for foreigners, who have done nothing for America and who have no legal right even to be here.
Let all potential trespassers know that should they manage to violate our border, the only part of America they will ever see is the part of America they can see from the deck of a ship before being transported on a slow boat back to their home countries, and unlawful immigration will drop. Like a rock.
Gene Schwimmer is a New York- and New Jersey-licensed real estate broker and author of The Christian
State.
State.
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2)
Fellow American,
I'm sure you've seen it in the national news, but I'd like to reiterate: There is serious hostility
towards the founding principles of liberty on college campuses.
Many college students are not taught the true meaning of terms like "Freedom" and
"Equality." They are accepting false promises of free college and health care and voting for candidates who wish to embrace that fantasy. This is evidenced by the voting records of millennials in the last election, where many more voted for Bernie Sanders in the primaries than both Clinton and Trump combined.
Worst of all, students on college campuses refuse to engage with those whom they disagree.
Instead, many resort to intimidation, threats, and rioting in a manner that incites violence.
I'm curious to know what you think about the state of higher education in America. If you
have a few minutes, I'd love to ask you a few questions about the state of America's education system, and whether the damage to it can be repaired.
Warm Regards,
Larry P. Arnn
President, Hillsdale College
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3) Government Employee Who BeatUnions at Supreme Court Sees Endto Their ‘Free Ride’Labor unions no longer get a free ride on the backs of government employees who are forced to pay for political activism they disagree with, the man who successfully challenged the practice at the Supreme Court told The Daily Signal in an interview.
For decades, Illinois state government worker Mark Janus said, union leaders had argued that nonunion employees should pay “fair share” fees so that those workers wouldn’t be “free riders” who enjoyed the benefits of collective bargaining on their behalf without cost.
In 1977, the Supreme Court accepted that argument in its unanimous ruling in a case known as Abood v. Detroit Board of Education.
But on Wednesday, in a 5-4 ruling, the high court reversed that decision in Janus v. AFSCME Council 31, finding that its Abood opinion was “poorly reasoned” and that mandatory union fees violate the First Amendment rights of government employees.
The liberal Left continue to push their radical agenda against American values. The good news is there is a solution. Find out more;
Janus, a child support specialist at the Illinois Department of Healthcare and Family Services who became the lead plaintiff in the case, turned the tables on the unions’ “free rider” argument in a phone interview with The Daily Signal a few hours after the high court released its decision.
“There are two arguments on this point of free riders that need to be made,” Janus said. “No. 1, it was the unions that asked for and received the ability to collectively bargain for everyone, both union and nonunion members.”
“No. 2,” he said, “the way I look at this is it is the unions that have been free-riding on me and 5 million public-sector workers across the country. They have been getting our money in order to do their bidding. And so therefore they have been free-riding on us, since many of us don’t agree with what they are doing.”
The Janus ruling affects about 5 million government employees in 22 states who no longer will be required either to join a union or pay related fees as a condition of employment.
Writing for the majority, Justice Samuel Alito said that “factual and legal” developments since the time of the Abood decision had “eroded” its “underpinnings” and left it as “an outlier among the court’s First Amendment cases.”
Chief Justice John Roberts and Justices Clarence Thomas, Neil Gorsuch, and Anthony Kennedy joined Alito in the majority. Dissenting were Justices Sonia Sotomayor, Elena Kagan, Stephen Breyer, and Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
Alito wrote in the opinion:
Alito also made the point that, over the years, it has become harder to distinguish between what union activity was political and therefore not chargeable to nonmembers and what was chargeable under the collective bargaining process.
Abood’s “line between chargeable and nonchargeable expenditures has proved to be impossible to draw with precision, as even respondents recognize,” Alito wrote, adding:
A big part of what brought Janus into the case was how much the local chapter of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees was asking in the collective bargaining process, he told The Daily Signal.
“The fact that Illinois is in such terrible financial shape and the union continues to advocate for higher salaries, bigger pensions, and more health care that the state can’t afford motivated me to get involved,” Janus said. “And because the state couldn’t afford this, the union advocated for a higher state income tax. My question is, if they don’t want to hurt the middle class why did they lobby to get this tax increase?”
What It Means to Unions
Since government workers no longer can be forced either to join a union or pay union fees under the ruling, the onus is on union leaders to be more responsive to the concerns of rank-and-file government workers if they want new members, Janus suggested.
“I think unions are going to have to step up their game,” he said. “They are going to have to produce a product people will want to buy, and they are going to have to be a bit more transparent about where the money is going and what they are doing with it.”
Public-sector unions could lose more than 700,000 members across the country if Janus prevailed, according to a study released in May by the Illinois Economic Policy Institute, a nonprofit organization that says it aims “to empower individuals, policymakers, and lawmakers to make informed choices on questions of public policy.”
Mike Thulen, president of AFSCME Local 3790 in Lakewood, New Jersey, told The Daily Signal in a phone interview a few days before the court’s decision that 25 percent of public employees in New Jersey could decide to opt out of their union in response to a favorable ruling for Janus.
Thulen said he based that estimate on conversations with his own members and presidents of other local AFSCME affiliates.
Thulen, a building inspector in Lakewood’s Inspection and Construction Department, said he opposed much of the union’s politics but decided to join and become active since the difference between paying full union dues and nonmember union fees was only a few dollars.
“If a significant amount of local workers do not want to be represented by the union, they can actually yank the union out of town all together,” he said. “With a favorable ruling for Janus, unions would not have as much political clout. But as an individual, you can have your own political clout and associate with whoever you want to.”
Different Kinds of Unions
Illinois Gov. Bruce Rauner, a Republican who faces a re-election challenge from Democrat J.B. Pritzker in November, has his own history with the court case against AFSCME Council 31.
A few weeks after he was sworn into office in January 2015, Rauner issued an executive order prohibiting collection of union fees from state government employees who aren’t members.
The governor also filed a federal lawsuit challenging collection of the fees as a violation of free speech. Janus stepped up to become the lead plaintiff in the case when a federal judge ruled that Rauner had no standing since he didn’t pay union dues or fees.
“This decision is a huge victory for freedom of speech, the freedom of affiliation, and the freedom of political activity,” Rauner said in a phone interview with The Daily Signal. “America is built on the right of being free to choose when and how to speak, and the ruling in Janus restores the freedom that was incorrectly denied for more than 40 years.”
The Supreme Court’s Abood ruling in 1977 was “fundamentally flawed” because it didn’t account for the vast differences between government unions and private-sector trade unions, Rauner said.
“Trade unions and government unions are fundamentally different,” Rauner said. “Trade unions in the private sector compete in the marketplace and they negotiate with one employer, and their activity does not impact taxpayers and government policy. But with government unions, all of their activity and advocacy impacts government, public policy, and the taxpayers.”
In deciding Janus, the justices “correctly viewed all the activity of government unions, including collective bargaining, as political,” the Illinois governor said:
‘Opt In’ as Critical to Free Speech
Rebecca Friedrichs, an elementary school teacher who worked for 28 years in the Savanna School District in Anaheim, California, was the lead plaintiff in a case before the Supreme Court in 2016 that raised the same First Amendment argument against mandatory union fees.
In her case, Friedrichs asked the court to strike down “opt-out schemes” that government employees must navigate to avoid subsidizing a union’s political activities.
She submitted a friend-of-the-court brief in the Janus case arguing in favor of a system allowing workers to opt in rather than opt out of paying union fees. Alito’s opinion delivered on this arrangement when the justice wrote that employees must “affirmatively consent” before a union may withhold fees from their paychecks.
“We filed a brief asking the court for opt-in rights because the unions bully us when we try to opt out,” Friedrichs said in a phone interview with The Daily Signal. “Thank God the justices heard our plea and granted opt-in. It’s my hope that opt-in rights will make unions more accountable and protect teachers from more union abuse.”
“State and national teachers unions have controlled teachers in a culture of fear and used our dues for their social and political agenda for decades, bringing untold damage to America’s schools and kids,” she said. “Finally, teachers are free to pay them nothing.”
‘Attack on Working People’
Not everyone is pleased with the ruling, of course.
Michael Keegan, president of People for the American Way, a progressive advocacy organization, criticized the Supreme Court majority for overturning a long-standing precedent.
“This decision is a political attack on working people and on labor unions dressed up in legal language,” Keegan said in a press statement. “It will take years to repair the damage being done by the narrow right-wing majority sitting on the Supreme Court. And the only way we can do that is through the ballot box.”
Democracy for America, a progressive political action committee, issued a similar statement:
But Rauner, the Illinois governor, said he sees a conflict of interest in which government unions and the politicians they help elect end up putting taxpayers at a disadvantage. He said he intends to push for additional reforms.
“Mark Janus is a hero, and he deserves our deepest gratitude for what he has done for people all across the country,” Rauner said. “I thank him for his courage, for the strength of his convictions.”
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4)
Harry Reid, Republican MastermindDemocrats can blame themselves for blowing up the judicial filibuster.
Schadenfreude is overrated, but it is amusing to see Democrats apoplectic that Republicans might confirm a Supreme Court Justice with 51 Senate votes. Let’s review the tape on the Sage of Searchlight, Nevada, because Harry Reid made this moment possible by blowing up the filibuster for judicial nominees.
Democrats are in various stages of grief about the retirement of Justice Anthony Kennedy but
the prevailing mood is rage. Democrats are insisting that the Senate not confirm a replacement until after the November election. The left is still furious that GOP Leader Mitch McConnell barred until after the 2016 election a vote on Merrick Garland, President Obama’s nominee to replace Antonin Scalia. They think Mr. McConnell should be “consistent” now. But that Court opening came amid a presidential election, when Americans decide who willdetermine the direction of the courts for four years. No less than a quarter of Donald Trump’svoters said their reason was the Supreme Court. Hillary Clinton would have had her pick ofnominees, and Mr. Garland or a more radical jurist would be on the Court. The real Democraticgrievance as ever should be with Mrs. Clinton for losing.
Supreme Court confirmations ahead of a midterm election are routine. The Senate confirmed
Justice Elena Kagan in August 2010, Justice Samuel Alito in 2006, Justice Stephen Breyer in 1994, and David Souter a month before midterms in 1990. The Great Scalia was confirmed in September 1986.
If Democrats are unable to stop Republicans from confirming a new Justice, they can also
thank Mr. Reid. In 2013 the Democratic Majority Leader changed Senate rules on a party-line vote and ended the filibuster on appellate court and executive nominees. That allowed Democrats to pack the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals and win some favorable rulings on Mr. Obama’s regulatory agenda.
A few on the left worried about eliminating the filibuster for Supreme Court nominees,
particularly abortion groups that view Roe v. Wade as divinely inspired. But the precedent assured that the 60-vote check on High Court nominees would disappear; the only question was when. Mr. McConnell said on the Senate floor: “You’ll regret this, and you may regret this a lot sooner than you think.”
Democrats compounded the blunder when they united to oppose Mr. Trump’s first nominee,
Neil Gorsuch. Replacing Scalia with Mr. Gorsuch didn’t alter the ideological composition of the Court. Democrats could have lent 60 votes to confirm Mr. Gorsuch and kept their powder dry for a filibuster fight for a replacement for Justice Kennedy, who everyone knew might retire.
The political pressure on the GOP to preserve the filibuster would have been intense, not
least because conservatives are sympathetic to conventions that prevent change passed by narrow majorities. But no. Senate Democrats tried to block Mr. Gorsuch, and Senate Republicans responded by cashiering the filibuster for the Supreme Court too.
At the time of the Reid gambit we wrote that the “next GOP President should line up
Federalist Society alumni for judicial nominations like planes waiting to take off at O’Hare International Airport.” The left apparently thought a Republican would never again
be President.
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