Wednesday Aternoon - The Front Page Cover

 The Front Page Cover 
"I pray that the eyes of your heart may be enlightened"
 
Featuring:
Hilly is the only thing holding Democrats together, and Bushes always
break the Republican Party
Peggy Noonan
 
"Rise up together as one voice"
"Be careful where you stand"
~~~lll~~~
 
 
 Battle Royale -   The alternative to a “Thelma and Louise” ending for nObama and dinky Reid is pretty interesting in its own right. If dinky Reid steps aside soon and leaves a vacuum, the fight between Schumer and other members of Team Hilly against liberals cranky about the direction of their party in the Clinton restoration would be quite telling about the depth of the divisions within the party.  -Fox News 
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 POLL: HILLY SEES BIG DROP IN FAVORABILITY 
On the eve of Hilly Clinton’s anticipated bid for the White House, a new poll finds a double-digit drop in the number of Americans who view her favorably. CBS News: “[Clinton’s] favorable views are 12 points lower than they were in the fall of 2013, just months after leaving her position as secretary of state…When asked to evaluate Hilly Clinton on some key characteristics, the public gives Clinton her most negative marks on honesty. Fewer than half - 42 percent- say she is honest and trustworthy, while more - 47 percent – don’t think she is…. More than six in 10 Americans do not think it was appropriate for Hilly Clinton to use a personal email address and server for work-related matters as secretary of state…. Members of Clinton’s own party - 65 percent - say her motivations for using a private email were about convenience, but 62 percent of Republicans think Clinton was trying to keep information from becoming public.”   -Fox News 
 
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 SENATE VOTES 100 TO 0 FOR IRAN SANCTIONS 
Reuters: “The U.S. Senate voted unanimously on Thursday for a non-binding amendment to a budget bill intended to make it easier to reimpose sanctions if Iran violates a nuclear deal. The vote was 100-0 for the amendment, sponsored by Republican Senator Mark Kirk, which would establish a fund to cover the cost of imposing sanctions if Tehran violated terms of an interim nuclear agreement now in effect, or the final agreement negotiators hope to reach before July. The Senate spent Thursday voting on dozens of amendments to a budget resolution. The votes are non-binding because the legislation will not become law, but many senators introduce amendments to send political messages.”
          [
Fox News: “The House Oversight and Government Reform Committee asked the nObama administration Thursday to turn over all reports and documents, including intelligence information, related to last year’s exchange of Army Sgt. Bowe Bergdahl for five members of the Taliban.]  -Fox News 
 
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 nObama opposes Pentagon hike without domestic spending bump  WashEx: “Defense Secretary Ashton Carter said Thursday that President nObama will oppose Republican budget plans to increase the Pentagon’s funding while maintaining steep cuts for other federal agencies. ‘The current proposal to shoehorn [the Defense Department’s] base budget into our contingency accounts would fail to solve the problem while also undermining basic principles of accountability and responsible long term planning,’ Carter said at a speech at the State Department.”  -Fox News 
 
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 Senate approves budget, delays ‘doc fix’ -   Roll Call: “The Senate adopted the GOP’s budget blueprint on a 52-46 vote following an epic vote-a-rama that featured dozens of test votes on everything from carbon taxes to Social Security benefits for same-sex marriages. Two Republicans eyeing the White House voted no: Ted Cruz of Texas and Rand Paul of Kentucky, but otherwise the vote was party line… With the budget resolution passing well after 3 a.m., the senators put off working on the House-passed ‘doc fix’ bill. That sweeping Medicare measure will be considered after the two-week break, [Senate Majority Leader Mitch McCon-nell said, and he expects it to pass with the Senate with overwhelming support.”
          [While the Senate passed the Republican budget plan, the tricky part is in the House and Senate reconciling the two resolutions through some politically tricky items. WashEx
breaks it down.]  -Fox News 
 
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1.
Image: Supreme Court Rejects Obamacare 'Death Panel' Challenge
 Supreme Court Rejects nObamacare 'Death Panel' Challenge  
(newsmax.com) - The Supreme Court on Monday declined to hear a new challenge to President Barack nObama's healthcare law that took aim at a bureaucratic board labeled by some as a "death panel" because it was designed to cut Medicare costs...The high court left intact a ruling by the San Francisco-based 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals that threw out the lawsuit. The court's action in an unsigned order was a victory for nObama administration, which has faced a barrage of legal challenges to the 2010 Affordable Care Act, often called nObamacare. The court is currently weighing a separate case challenging health insurance subsidies that are key to nObamacare's implementation.        http://www.newsmax.com/Newsfront/Obamacare-death-panel-Supreme-Court/2015/03/30/id/635232/?AID=7236
2.
Hillary Rodham Clinton
 Journalist who Unveiled Hillary Spy Network  
(Robert Wilde) - In what Breitbart Executive Chairman, Stephen K. Bannon, referred to as a “stunning” and “breath-taking” course of events, Jeff Gerth of Propublica came on Breitbart News Sunday to discuss his recent article detailing how an ex-Hilly Clinton aide crafted a secret spying network in the lead up to the Benghazi terror attack...and corresponded with Clinton via her private email account. Longtime Clinton advisor Sidney Blumenthal’s hacked emails exposed the massive spy network, Breitbart News reported on Sunday. Bannon asked Gerth, “Have you ever in your investigations, and you’re stretch as a two time Pulitzer Prize winner investigative journalist for the paper of record in this country, have you ever seen anything in your professional career like this?” Gerth answered by reminding Bannon that he has been doing this for forty years and that there were two instances in which this reminds him.
3.
 Assad: Americans Sugarcoating ISIS  
(DANIEL HALPER) - Bashar al-Assad told Charlie Rose that some Americans are sugarcoating ISIS. Moreover, the Syrian dictator claimed, ISIS has expanded since the beginning of the strikes."...Rose asked Assad, "How much of a benefit are you getting from American airstrikes in Syria reducing the power of ISIS?" "President Assad: Sometimes you could have local benefit but in general if you want to talk in terms of ISIS actually ISIS has expanded since the beginning of the strikes," answered Assad, in an interview that aired Sunday on 60 Minutes.       http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/assad-americans-sugarcoating-isis_902871.html
4.
 Unholy Assault on the Hoosier State  
(Cliff Kincaid) - Although shocked at first by her blatant hostility toward Christian America, a little digging discovered that Swisher is a major player in the gay community and CNBC is a major outlet for homosexual propaganda...Swisher, who has interviewed President nObama and Hilly Clinton, had been a featured speaker at the “Lesbians Who Tech” summit, where she used the “F” word quite liberally and declared: “I’m often confrontational, so F— you.” The group “Lesbians Who Tech” describes itself as “a Community of Queer Women in or around tech.” The American people might be interested to know that the sponsors of the “Lesbians Who Tech” event included Google, ebay, Wells Fargo, Intel, Walmart, Target and Amazon, among other corporations.       http://www.aim.org/aim-column/unholy-assault-on-the-hoosier-state/?utm_source=AIM+-+Daily+Email&utm_campaign=email033115&utm_medium=email
5.
 Leftist politicians and the media try to blacklist scientists  
(Jim Lakely and James M. Taylor) - Leftist politicians and the media try to blacklist scientists who are skeptical about Global Warming...If you thought science involves scientists challenging each other’s ideas and struggling to see who can best explain the facts, you were wrong—according to a cabal of left-wing activists, politicians, and their media friends. They have launched a crusade to intimidate scientists who dissent from conventional alarmism over Global Warming. Apparently, science should now focus on maintaining an orthodox set of beliefs dictated by the political class, and troubling facts like the failure of global temperatures to rise as predicted must be ignored.       http://capitalresearch.org/2015/03/green-watch-april-2015-witch-hunt-2015-leftist-politicians-and-the-media-try-to-blacklist-scientists-who-are-skeptical-about-global-warming/
6.
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 The Left’s Ted Cruz Freakout  
(Matthew Vadum) - Much of the political world went into full freakout mode yesterday as crusading conservative Ted Cruz became the first candidate from either of the major parties to formally announce he is running for president in 2016...The ritual denunciations of Cruz, the junior Republican senator representing Texas, from all across the fruited plain quickly piled up. Since he assumed office in January 2013, Cruz has come under intense fire from the Left and from a few corners in the GOP. Some of the criticism is well thought out but much of it doesn’t rise above the level of schoolyard taunts. Some consider it a negative that Cruz, like Barack nObama, began running for president soon after becoming a U.S. senator.       http://www.frontpagemag.com/2015/matthew-vadum/the-lefts-ted-cruz-freakout
7.
 Cover-ups work  
(Dr. Steven J. Allen) - William Safire, who once worked for Richard Nixon and became a New York Times columnist, observed that it’s not the crime that does you in; it’s the cover-up. But that’s not really true...The vast majority of the time, cover-ups work. That’s why politicians commit cover-ups. Hilly Clinton stole tens of thousands of e-mails during her time as secretary of state—diverting them to a server in her house—and destroyed the ones she didn’t want investigators to see. When investigators sought access to her server, to see if any trace might remain of the stolen-and-erased messages, she apparently had the server wiped clean. Gone are any e-mails that might have, say, explained why foreign power-brokers and governments, including major violators of human rights, funneled money to the Clinton machine. Gone are any e-mails that might have explained why and how Secretary Clinton and her cohorts framed a YouTube poster for the 9/11/12 attacks that, among other things, killed the U.S. ambassador to Libya and three other brave Americans.       http://capitalresearch.org/2015/03/cover-ups-work/
8.
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 Hilly Email Reflects Business Mixed On Multiple Devices  
(theconservativetreehouse.com) - Hilly Clinton said the construct of her secret communication network was specifically because she only wanted to carry one device – obviously she lied right out of the gate...The Associated Press has gained a total of FOUR emails from a FOIA request regarding correspondence between Hilly Clinton and her personal aide Huma Abedin search term “drone strikes”.       http://theconservativetreehouse.com/2015/03/31/hillary-clinton-email-reflects-business-mixed-with-personal-use-on-multiple-devices-email-pdf-included
9.
Hillary Rodham Clinton
 State Department found 4 emails about drones sent by Clinton  
(JACK GILLUM) - The State Department says it can find only four emails sent between former Secretary Hilly Rodham Clinton and her staff concerning drone strikes and certain U.S. surveillance programs, and those notes have little to do with either subject...She asks for a phone call in one, a phone number in another. She seeks advice on how best to condemn information leaks, and accidentally replies to one work email with questions apparently about decorations. The messages also reveal Clinton used an iPad to email while secretary of state in addition to her BlackBerry, despite her explanation she set up a private email account and homebrew server while she was the nation's top diplomat so that she could carry a single device.       http://bigstory.ap.org/article/64f85b3a72184bd1b4604d5e1870116d/clinton-also-used-ipad-email-mixed-personal-work-chats
10.
 Iranian-backed Shiite militias still operating in Tikrit  
(Caleb Weiss) - Despite claims by the US government to the contrary, several Iranian-backed Shiite militias are still operating in Tikrit. The US has said that airstrikes in the central Iraqi city would only come if these militias withdrew from leading the battle... “Preconditions for us to provide support were that the Iraqi government had to be in charge of this operation. We had to know exactly who was on the ground,” General Lloyd Austin, the commander of US Central Command, told Congress on March 26, according to Military Times. Austin continued by saying, “The Shiite militias that were there have pulled back from that area.” Pentagon spokesman Colonel Steve Warren said the next day in a press conference that most of these militias left the fighting.  “These are primarily the Shia militia units that we had no interest in being on the battlefield in the first place,” Warren continued, “These are the Shia militia that are clearly linked or often infiltrated by Iran, so their departure from the battlefield is welcome.”       http://www.longwarjournal.org/archives/2015/03/%d9%8diranian-backed-shiite-militias-still-operating-in-tikrit.php?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+LongWarJournalSiteWide+%28The+Long+War+Journal+%28Site-Wide%29%29
Hilly is the only thing holding Democrats together, and Bushes always
break the Republican Party
Peggy Noonan

     (peggynoonan.com) - The 2016 presidential campaign is here, pushed up prematurely by the Hilly Clinton email controversy. When a major candidate of a major party has major trouble, the election moves more sharply into focus.

Apart from Mrs. Clinton, small stories have begun to shoot up like flares.

     Wisconsin Gov. Scott Walker shied away from the accomplished and interesting Liz Mair, who had agreed to be digital strategist in his social media operation. She had tweeted some indiscreet, funny and provocative things about Iowans—the word “morons” was involved—and is also moderate or liberal on various social issues. She was not signing on as a domestic or foreign-policy adviser, but even campaign staffers now, in political oppo culture, are the target of full Internet body frisks.

     There was something sad in the story. Now of all times you want to see candidates include a wide variety of voices, including irreverent and especially creative ones. A diverse party with everyone in on the fight, no loyalty oaths or litmus tests, is what is needed. But that kind of decision probably wouldn’t come from a candidate whose breakout plan begins with the word Iowa.

     Mike Huckabee has, amazingly, been revealed by the New York Times as hawking, for money, an unorthodox diabetes cure in an Internet infomercial. I watched it. He comes across as a smooth, friendly huckster or a teddy-bearish snake-oil salesman, which is not how a presidential candidate would normally want to look. Once a young journalist, looking at a photo of Paul Ryan in gym shorts and sleeveless T-shirt with his cap on backward and lifting barbells, said, musingly, “That’s a real congressman move.” Hawking magical elixirs is a real Arkansas governor move.

     The president has jumped into the strangeness fray by musing aloud that mandatory voting in the United States would be a good idea. “It would be transformative if everybody voted,” he told an audience in Cleveland. Yes, it would. It would mean a lot of people who aren’t interested in public policy and choose not to follow it would suddenly be deciding it.

     The way it is now, if you aren’t interested—and you have the right not to be interested—you don’t have to vote. If you are interested, you pay attention, develop political views, and vote. Making those who don’t care about voting vote will only dilute the votes of those who are serious and have done their democratic homework.

     Most of us are moved by the sight of citizens lined up at the polls on Election Day. We should urge everyone to care enough to stand in that line. But we should not harass or bother those who, with modesty and even generosity, say they are happy to leave the privilege of the ballot to those who are engaged. Mandatory voting is, so far, the worst and most mischievous political idea of the year, and deeply eccentric.

     I detect more than the usual amount of uncertainty and angst among the leadership of both parties this year, and it is due to doubts about their putative front-runners.

     Democratic establishment angst is composed of obvious and less obvious elements. Obvious: They worry Mrs. Clinton’s email-gate will linger, and they’re afraid of more scandals tumbling out of the Clinton Foundation closet. They fear the constant regurgitation of old scandals. They’re afraid they’ll have no sway when future embarrassments and controversies come. She’s Hilly, she does it her way, she keeps it close, it’s a tight circle.

Less obvious: She’s all they have.

     By that I don’t mean there is no one else who can run. It’s a shallow bench, but a bench. I mean that for all her flaws Hilly Clinton is the only major Democrat who can keep the Democratic Party together in this cycle.

     Without Hilly the party will probably lurch left. And if it lurches left it’ll probably lose the general election. Democrats will break up into left-progressives, way-left-progressives, populists of different stripe, older moderates and centrists. The left is no longer passionate about Mr. nObama because he is not left-wing enough. Hilly Clinton holds the party together with her Hillyness—her popularity with the base, her connection to the Clinton years, her sex. The idea of the first female president in a party increasingly preoccupied with identity and gender politics is a powerful ideological glue.

     Hilly, to the general public, comes across as centrist. In part this is because she is associated with her husband’s ultimate moderation, and in part because she has grown more moderate over the years, at least in the sense of playing ball with various entrenched powers. She is certainly hawkish. Her popularity and persona will keep her party seeming centrist, even if she inches to the left to appease sizable parts of the base, and to show her heart is still with them.

     But I think an untold story of 2016 is that the Democratic establishment is desperate when Mrs. Clinton is in trouble because without her they see a fracturing of their party.

     We focus on the GOP and its dramas with what is called the far right. We pay no heed to the Democrats and their dramas and challenges from what is never called their far left.

     There’s a balancing angst among many Republicans. It is connected to the fact that Jeb Bush is broadly considered a front-runner, if not the front-runner. And at the end of the day Bushes always break the party.

     George H.W. Bush didn’t mean to but he did, in 1990, when he gambled that the economy would rise and its rise would justify his rescinding of his no-new-taxes pledge. Instead he got a recession. Thus was born Pat Buchanan’s candidacy for the presidency and what in retrospect was the first iteration of the tea party. Mr. Bush lost the election.

     George W. Bush broke his party after his 2004 re-election, in part with his immigration proposals and the way he advanced them, with aides insulting his GOP opponents—“nativist,” they said—and, in the end, by two unwon wars. Add the crash and the presidency was closed to the Republicans for at least eight years. Mr. Bush gambled that the wars would be victorious, that the party that loved him would march to the banner of an immigrat

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