Ted Cruz: One of the Few Left Standing for Freedom, Pens a Scathing Op-Ed on Egypt

Ted Cruz, one of the few left standing for America, pens a great op-ed on how Egypt unfolded, how Obama failed us again, and what will happen next.  God Bless Ted Cruz.

On Sunday, June 30, millions of Egyptians turned out to protest President Mohamed Morsy and his Muslim Brotherhood-dominated regime. Fed up with his disastrous economic mismanagement and systematic disregard for constitutional freedoms, the Egyptian people took to the streets to demand his resignation. “Leave! Leave!” they chanted in what may have been the largest demonstration in the history of the Middle East — if not the world.

It was a breathtaking scene — and potentially a watershed moment. Unlike the angry, disaffected youth who raged through the Arab Spring in 2011, these crowds, like those in the recent protests in Turkey, were made up of middle-class citizens protesting against a regime with an unpleasant tendency to trample on the rights of women, Christians, and Jews — and to stifle the independence of the press and judiciary, ruining the economy in the process. While there has been some unfortunate violence, the Tamarod (“Rebel”) movement is also organizing demonstrations, gathering signatures of no confidence in Morsy’s government (it has gathered 22 million already), and threatening additional civil disobedience in the form of strikes if Morsy does not step down.

One would expect to find the United States standing firmly with these people. Surely, after our long and lonely search for secular and democratic partners in the Arab world, we could find some common ground with them. Surely, we could see the value of an administration in Egypt that could act as both a southern bulwark for Israel and a much-needed partner in countering the terrorist outposts in the Sinai and Horn of Africa. And surely, we could help support a government that could stand as an example for struggling states like Libya and Iran — one that proves Muslim-majority countries in the Middle East are not predestined to live in oppressive theocracies.

Tragically, America has been relegated to the sidelines. The number of U.S. Embassy personnel has been reduced, and a travel warning has been issued for Americans in Egypt — and for good reason. The people protesting in the streets were not only carrying anti-Morsy signs. They were also carrying signs with slogans like “Obama Supports Terrorism” and “Obama Supports Morsy,” as well as pictures of the American ambassador to Egypt, Anne Patterson, with a large red “X” through her face. Some of these were set on fire. On Friday, Andrew Driscoll Pochter, an American college student who was in Egypt to teach English to schoolchildren, was stabbed to death as he took pictures of the protesters.

In what has to be one of the most stunning diplomatic failures in recent memory, the United States is — in both perception and reality — entrenched as the partner of a repressive, Islamist regime and the enemy of the secular, pro-democracy opposition.

It did not have to be this way.

When Morsy was elected a little more than a year ago, President Barack Obama could have expressed strong reservations about a member of the Muslim Brotherhood taking control of the country. He should have also been more aggressive about using American aid to extract concessions from the Egyptian government on human rights, as well as economic and political reform. Instead, Obama made a personal call to congratulate Morsy, characterized his election as a “milestone” in Egypt’s progress toward democracy, and pledged $1 billion in U.S. taxpayer-funded aid. In the ensuing months, Morsy received a steady stream of assistance from the United States in the form of arms sales, unconditional financial aid, and visits from high-level officials such as Secretary of State John Kerry — all of which enhanced the strength and legitimacy of his regime.

Emboldened by U.S. support, Morsy consolidated his power — removing the traditionally pro-American military leadership, imposing an Islamist constitution, marginalizing the judiciary, and turning a blind eye to brutal attacks against religious minorities, including Coptic Christians and Shiite Muslims. Morsy also began to agitate for the release of the “blind sheik” Omar Abdel Rahman, who orchestrated the 1993 World Trade Center bombing. Offensive remarks describing Jews as “bloodsuckers” and “the descendants of apes and pigs” soon came to light. Still, the United States continued to place its resources at his disposal — apparently on the grounds that a budding Islamist dictator with a healthy hatred of Israel and America was the appropriate recipient of Abrams tanks and B-16 bombers.

More recently, as opposition to Morsy coalesced around the Tamarod movement, the Obama administration missed the opportunity to support its efforts and further the vital interests of the United States without firing a shot. Instead, the sole priority seems to be to defuse the situation and preserve the status quo. Ambassador Patterson has assumed the leading role in implementing this policy, meeting with members of the opposition not to encourage them to pursue a true secular democracy in Egypt but to try to persuade them to tone things down. Patterson has said she is “deeply skeptical” of their movement.

Obama, traveling in Africa on the eve of the protests, offered no words of support. Instead, he admonished the demonstrators to remain peaceful and made the tepid recommendation that Morsy engage in a “constructive conversation” about reform, since the president of the United States could not take a side in this debate.

Read rest of article on Foreign Policy.

Obama’s Latest Scandal: Welcome to TrayvonGate, The Latest Scandal That is 17 Months Old

Just when you thought Obama has enough scandals on his plate, another hits a little closer to home.  It appears the Obama administration had their grubby little hands in the Zimmerman case from the beginning.

Breitbart reports: The newest Obama scandal is seventeen months old.

Welcome to Trayvongate, where the President of the United States used both the bully pulpit, the Department of Justice and sly media manipulation to gin up charges of racism in the George Zimmerman/Trayvon Martin shooting. Now that the trial is almost finished and the only act of racism mentioned so far came from the victim–Martin called Zimmerman ‘a creepy ass cracker’ according to testimony–the cynical and repeated use of the race card by the White house is even more abhorrent.

Judicial Watch revealed documents today that proved what Breitbart News reported in April, 2012: that Eric Holder’s Department of Justice took an active role in racially charged rallies in Sanford, Florida and that the Community Relations Service helped force the temporary resignation of Sheriff Bill Lee. That resignation made it appear that Sanford authorities were suspect and possibly complicit in covering up something.

Some of my reporting at the time was based on interviews with numerous public officials in Sanford who wanted to remain anonymous out of fear of retribution from the Obama administration. They described a situation where the CRS team took over and forced decisions while clearing a path for protests and rallies that heightened the appearence of racial tensions.

The CRS is a small unit within the Department of Justice and ostensibly it serves a legitimate purpose; attempting to cool down tense situation. As its website says:

The Community Relations Service is the Department’s “peacemaker” for community conflicts and tensions arising from differences of race, color, and national origin. Created by the Civil Rights Act of 1964, CRS is the only Federal agency dedicated to assist State and local units of government, private and public organizations, and community groups with preventing and resolving racial and ethnic tensions, incidents, and civil disorders, and in restoring racial stability and harmony.

However, under the highly politicized Holder Department of Justice, the CRS has acted as ‘spies and muscle’ according to a source familiar with the unit. In the Zimmerman case, they ended up as doing nothing to facilitate ‘racial stability and harmony ‘, instead acting a heavy thumb on the scales of justice and helping to force events that gave the nation an impression that Martin’s death was racially motivated.

Not just George Zimmerman, but the police and the entire town were targeted in rallies that saw people being bused-in for protests. We now have proof via the Judicial Watch release that these rallies were facilitated by the Obama administration. They were also highly racially charged. Close Obama ally Al Sharpton, along with Jesse Jackson, led the charge. As CBS Miami reported:

“We live in the middle of an American paradox,” Rev. Sharpton told the crowd. “We can put a black man in the White House but we cannot walk a black child through a gated neighborhood. We are not selling out, bowing out or backing down until there is justice for Trayvon.”

“This is not about a hoodie, it’s about racial profiling,” Jackson said. “We will use our marching feet, civil disobedience and every weapon in our non-violent arsenal until justice is served.”

However, much of the rhetoric surrounding the Zimmerman story was violent. Many will remember that the New Black Panther party actually offered a $10,000 bounty for the ‘capture’ of George Zimmerman. As the Orlando Sentinal reported:

New Black Panther leader Mikhail Muhammad announced the reward during a protest in Sanford Saturday. And when asked whether he was inciting violence, Muhammad replied defiantly: “An eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth.”

The bounty announcement came moments after members of the group called for the mobilization of 10,000 black men to capture Zimmerman, who shot Trayvon in a gated Sanford community on Feb. 26.

Muhammad said members of his group would search for Zimmerman themselves in Maitland — where the 28-year old worked before the shooting, employees there told the Orlando Sentinel. He declined to say when the group would begin their search.

J. Christian Adams knows the New Black Panther Party well; he resigned his position at the DOJ over the refusal to prosecute the Panthers for the now infamous Philadephia voter intimidation actions during the 2008 election. Adams outlined the crimes committed by the NBPP in Sanford:

Let’s start with solicitation to kidnap. In announcing a reward for the seizure of Zimmerman, the New Black Panthers may have violated Florida Code 787.01. It makes it a felony to “by threat, confining or abducting, or imprisoning another person against his . . . will without lawful authority with intent to . . . terrorize.”

Merely soliciting someone else to do this is also a felony in Florida under Florida Code 777.04. “A person who solicits another to commit an offense prohibited by law and in the course of such solicitation commands, encourages, hires, or requests another person to engage in specific conduct which would constitute such offense or an attempt to commit such offense commits the offense of criminal solicitation.”

That’s only part of the list. The New Black Panther’s outrageous, illegal call for vigilante justice happened on March 24th. According the records obtained by Judicial Watch, the Department of Justice deployed to Sanford the next day: March 25th, 2012. However, the DOJ did not go to Sanford to make arrests against the New Black Panthers. Instead, according the the written record, obtained by Judicial Watch, they “deployed to Sanford, FL, to work marches, demonstrations, and rallies related to the shooting and death of an African-American teen by a neighborhood watch captain.”

Once again, the Holder Department of Justice failed to prosecute the New Black Panther Party. They actually helped facilitate mass rallies against Zimmerman and the City of Sanford.

These actions are made even more scandalous by the direct insertion of the President of the United States into the story. President Obama made his famous “If I had a son, he’d look like Trayvon” remark at the White House, but what got considerably less press was the fact that Obama had a prior relationship with Martin’s attorney Benjamin Crump. Obama worked with him on another racially charged case when he was a Senator.

Breitbart News reported on the Obama connection to the 2006 story of Martin Lee Anderson. Attorney Crump said publicly that he was following the same media ‘playbook’ as the Anderson case. Tactics included using a photo of Anderson as a child, the same way the media used the Crump-supplied photo of Trayvon Martin as child. This story from 2006 shows the involvement of Senator Obama (who did not end up appearing at the rally), Sharpton and Jackson as well as other usual suspects from the far left.

A rally will be taking place in Tallahassee Friday, April 21 regarding the ongoing investigation into the death of 14-year-old Martin Lee Anderson. Anderson died Jan. 6 at a Panhandle boot camp after being kneed and punched by Bay County Sheriff’s boot camp guards.

Students from Florida State University, Tallahassee Community College and Florida A&M University have been involved in the planning and organization of the event at which Rev. Jesse Jackson and Al Sharpton will be making appearances.

Charlie and Martin Sheen, who donated $10,000 to the cause, are also reportedly planning to attend Friday, along with former TLC member Tionne “T-Boz” Watkins and Afeni Shakur, mother of the murdered rapper Tupac Shakur. According Samantha Greer, an FSU student and volunteer for the Coalition for Justice for Martin Lee Anderson, Sen. Barack Obama of Illinois may also make an appearance. Greer stressed that the Coalition is still looking for volunteers and that anyone is welcome to join the cause.

What we saw in 2012 was the Obama administration using taxpayer resources to ratchet up racial tensions in a local crime case and literally creating key story points in the narrative, such as forcing the sheriff to temporarily resign. At the same time, the President himself made an emotional statement about the victim with direct reference to his race, without revealing that he had worked with the victim’s attorney a few years earlier in a similar case. At the same time, Obama media ally (and Sharpton employer) NBC outrageously edited the Zimmerman audio to make Zimmerman appear racist. All these manipulative and deceptive uses of the race card–pushed along by the Holder DOJ at taxpayer expense–happened just months before the 2012 presidential election.

The only reason this isn’t a major scandal already is the media hasn’t ever done its job and declared it one.

Zimmerman Case: Judge Overreaches, Confronts Zimmerman and Overrules Don West

Today, the Judge ‘cornered’ George Zimmerman and disallowed, and disallowed what seemed, just protection from his attorney. Was the Judge wrong by overruling attorney Don West and forcing an answer from George Zimmerman?

King Obama: Hails Muslim Holiday as Symbol of Tolerance for ‘Other Faiths’

King Obama didn’t miss the opportunity to glorify the Muslim faith and their Holiday Ramidan.

Red Flag News reports: With the start of the sacred month of Ramadan, Michelle and I extend our best wishes to Muslim communities here in the United States and around the world.

For the world’s 1.5 billion Muslims, Ramadan is a time for thoughtful reflection, fasting and devotion.

It is also an opportunity for family and friends to come together and celebrate the principles that bind people of different faiths — a commitment to peace, justice, equality and compassion towards our fellow human beings. These bonds are far stronger than the differences that too often drive us apart.

This month also reminds us that freedom, dignity and opportunity are the undeniable rights of all mankind. We reflect on these universal values at a time when many citizens across the Middle East and North Africa continue to strive for these basic rights and as millions of refugees mark Ramadan far from their homes.

The United States stands with those who are working to build a world where all people can write their own future and practice their faith freely, without fear of violence.

In the United States, Ramadan is a reminder that millions of Muslim Americans enrich our nation each day—serving in our government, leading scientific breakthroughs, generating jobs and caring for our neighbors in need.

I have been honored to host an iftar dinner at the White House each of the past four years, and this year I look forward to welcoming Muslim Americans who are contributing to our country as entrepreneurs, activists and artists.