obama climate control cartoon

Huckabee: America needs a commander in chief, not a weather-obsessed meteorologist

President Obama’s national security priorities are dangerous. Two weeks after terrorist attacks rocked Paris, he is visiting France, not to focus on fighting global terrorism, but to tackle the global warming "security imperative." America needs a commander-in-chief, not a weather-obsessed meteorologist-in-chief.
The federal government cannot control the weather. Period. We can control borders, military assets, critical airspace, and American intelligence. We can also kill Islamic terrorists and radical ISIS murderers.  America needs a president focused on what we can control, not fixated on weather patterns which we cannot.
Even if we could control the weather, 95 percent of the world lives outside America, and we cannot control the behavior of seven billion people across the globe. Put another way, other countries refuse to tackle simple, dangerous threats like nuclear weapons proliferation. So how does Obama expect to persuade massive polluters like China, Russia and Pakistan to embrace expensive, job-killing global warming regulations?
Obama's obsession with global, utopian collaboration and building a personal climate change legacy has made him allergic to common sense. Meanwhile, the real "security imperative” keeps metastasizing.

Now more than ever, America needs a commander-in-chief focused on the global war on terrorism, instead we have a community organizer focused on global warming.

ISIS keeps swelling in size and power and Obama still has no strategy. In the Syrian city of Raqqa, which serves as the ISIS capital, Islamic radicals have established a treasury department with an elaborate system of taxes, public services and real estate rental agreements. Between oil production, smuggling, antiquity dealing and kidnapping, ISIS is building a comprehensive infrastructure.
What will it take for Obama to wake-up to this menace? Maybe he would take ISIS seriously if he discovered they didn’t recycle.
Homegrown terrorists and radicalized immigrants continue to pop-up across Europe. The Department of Homeland Security refuses to reform a dangerous travel program that allows unscreened foreign passengers from 38 countries, including France and Belgium, to enter the U.S. without a visa.
Illegal immigrants continue to cross our porous borders and thousands of immigrants overstay their visas each year. America’s cyber-defenses remain incredibly vulnerable and the White House has endless excuses for security breaches, intelligence failures and routine Washington incompetence.
Now more than ever, America needs a commander-in-chief focused on the global war on terrorism, instead we have a community organizer focused on global warming. Obama's blindness is beyond baffling, it’s dangerous. It shouldn’t take another Paris attack for this White House to open its eyes: radical Islamic terrorism is a much greater threat than a sunburn.
Former Arkansas Governor Mike Huckabee is a 2016 Republican candidate for president of the United States.

‘Saved us money’: Rubio wins conservative cred for ObamaCare change

Marco Rubio's Republican presidential bid is getting a surprisingly big boost from a little-known legislative tweak he helped tuck into last year's spending bill — one that ObamaCare critics are crediting with shielding taxpayers from jittery health insurance companies that may be eyeing shaky bottom lines.
The provision, similar to one he’s pushing this year, prohibits billion-dollar bailouts for private insurers under the Affordable Care Act.
It's now being touted by Rubio’s camp and others as a key factor that is protecting taxpayer dollars -- while also disrupting the law itself.
Rep. Darrell Issa, R-Calif., former chairman of the House oversight committee, cited the provision in announcing his endorsement of Rubio on Monday.
“He saved us money on ObamaCare where others have simply wanted to repeal it,” Issa told Fox News. “He has already saved $2.5 billion by eliminating an unreasonable backstop by the taxpayers for a failed program.”

Rep. Darrell Issa endorses Marco Rubio for president

The program Rubio targeted is known as “risk corridors” – pricy provisions that allow the government to use taxpayer dollars to compensate insurance companies for losses suffered during the first few years of ObamaCare.
In 2013, the senator pushed legislation to repeal the risk corridor provision. Though the standalone bill failed, he had a hand in getting a rider into the “must-pass” omnibus federal spending bill last year that prevents the government from making up shortfalls in the program by tapping other funds.
Last year, insurers asked for nearly $2.87 billion in government payments from the program; though the Department of Health and Human Services had only $362 million available. Issa and others say the rider, then, helped save $2.5 billion.
Concern about a backstop for losses has been renewed amid continuing financial uncertainty in the market -- which has led to more than a dozen folded co-ops and prompted UnitedHealth, the country’s largest insurer, to threaten to pull out of the exchanges next year.
Rubio's campaign is claiming some credit for the turmoil, sending out a recent tweet that said: “Q: Did Marco Kill Obamacare? A: You bet he did.”
UnitedHealth’s CEO announced $425 million in losses and warned it may walk away from the health care exchanges altogether. It’s a threat Rubio believes will resonate with other insurers who he thinks may follow suit.
“I think it’s only going to accelerate now, because once these companies can’t get bailed out, many of them are deciding they no longer want to participate in the ObamaCare exchange,” he said in an interview with Breibart News.
Rubio wants to keep his restrictions in place going forward, as they are set to expire if not renewed.
In a Nov. 24 letter to Republican leadership, he argued that ObamaCare might not be worth saving if such deep safety nets are needed to keep private insurers interested.
He added, “It is our responsibility to completely shield the U.S. taxpayer from a deal in the omnibus that might reimburse health insurers retroactively for these losses or any other future losses.”
America’s Health Insurance Plans President and CEO Marilyn Tavenner, who played a key role in launching the health care overhaul in the Obama administration, recently defended the risk corridors.
“Stable, affordable coverage for consumers depends on adequate funding of the risk corridor program,” she said in an October statement. “It’s essential that Congress and CMS act to ensure the program works as designed and consumers are protected.”
Dan Holler, vice president of communications at Heritage Action for America, disagrees.
Holler told FoxNews.com his organization strongly supports eliminating bailouts for insurance companies and believes a similarly worded measure by Rubio will easily pass this year.
While Rubio’s social media team is claiming credit for delivering a death blow to ObamaCare, others argue it only did surface-level damage to the program.
Still, most agree Rubio’s efforts have had some impact on ObamaCare.
“It did draw some blood,” Tim Jost, a health law professor at Washington and Lee University School of Law, told Bloomberg News. “The restriction on funding is probably the most effective thing Republicans have done so far to limit the Affordable Care Act, other than the Supreme Court decision and subsequent decisions by Republican states not to expand Medicaid.”

School district bans the word 'Christmas' from flyer

The school superintendent in Marlborough, New Hampshire issued a Yuletide edict to the local American Legion post: you can’t call a Christmas tree a Christmas tree.
John Fletcher, the commander of the local American Legion post, said he was banned from using the word “Christmas” to promote the town’s upcoming Christmas tree lighting.
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The event is sponsored by the American Legion and the Monadnock Lions Club.

Superintendent Robert Malay’s decision went over about as well as replacing Santa’s milk and cookies with tofu and a shot of wheatgrass.

“He wanted to change it to say ‘holiday tree lighting’ instead,” Mr. Fletcher told FOX25 in Boston.
Needless to say, Supt. Robert Malay’s decision went over about as well as replacing Santa’s milk and cookies with tofu and a shot of wheatgrass.
“It’s not a holiday tree, it’s a Christmas tree,” said Mr. Fletcher.
For years the American Legion commander, who also portrays Santa Claus, had been allowed to post flyers in the public school to promote the annual Christmas event.
But this year, Mr. Fletcher said the superintendent called to tell him he would need to “revise” the flyer and remove the word “Christmas.”
“I was very upset, I really was,” he told the television station.
He was so upset he wrote a letter to the Sentinel Source – the newspaper of record in that neck of the woods.
“As commander of the American Legion it offends me,” he wrote. “I respect all rights; always have. But do not take away our rights because you may offend someone else.”
Still, Mr. Fletcher followed the superintendent’s directive – well sort of.
Armed with a bottle of white-out, he and his wife blotted out the offending word – Christmas. However, he did not include the word “holiday.”
“In this case, this political correctness has just gone too far,” he said. “It’s just getting out of hand.”
I called Superintendent Malay to find out why the word “Christmas” needed to be deleted, but he did not return my message.
Folks, I chatted with at the local school are pretty upset at how Mr. Fletcher was treated. They say the superintendent really ruffled some feathers.
No doubt.
If they can’t call Christmas, Christmas, I wonder what the school district will call Ramadan or Hanukkah or Kwanzaa?

US announces more special ops forces to fight ISIS, Iraqi PM says 'no need'

The U.S. is sending more special operations forces to help Iraqi and Kurdish forces battling ISIS, as well as capture or kill senior leaders of the terror network in Iraq and Syria. 
A U.S. official told Fox News that approximately 200 troops would be sent to Iraq within the next few weeks part of a "specialized expeditionary targeting force" announced by Defense Secretary Ash Carter in testimony before the House Armed Services Committee Tuesday.
The official said the force's remit would include targeted assassinations of senior ISIS if their specific mission requires. A second U.S. official told Fox News that capturing senior ISIS leaders would be an important component of the new assault force’s mission to learn more about the group's structure and any affiliates.
"This intel gathering mission is just as important, if not more important, than killing bad guys," said the official, who added that the number of troops "could grow" beyond 200.
The U.S. military conducted similar operations in Iraq to take out senior Al Qaeda leadership, such as the mission led by Gen. Stanley McChrystal which killed Al Qaeda in Iraq leader Abu Musab al-Zarqawi in June 2006.
Iraqi Prime Minister Haider Al-Abadi reacted to Carter's announcement with a statement saying in part, "there is no need for foreign ground combat troops" in Iraq.
Abadi's statement did call for more weapons, training and support for Iraq's military from Baghdad's international partners. He also warned that any special operations against ISIS in Iraq "can only be deployed subject to the approval of the Iraqi Government and in coordination with the Iraqi forces and with full respect to Iraqi sovereignty."

"The raids in Iraq will be done at the invitation of the Iraqi government and focused on defending its borders and building the Iraqi security force's own capacity," Carter said in his testimony Tuesday. "This force will also be in a position to conduct unilateral operations into Syria."
"This is an important capability because it takes advantage of what we're good at," Carter added later in the hearing. "We're good at intelligence, we're good at mobility, we're good at surprise. We have the long reach that no one else has. And it puts everybody on notice in Syria. You don't know at night who's going to be coming in the window. And that's the sensation that we want all of ISIL's leadership and followers to have."
A U.S. official familiar with the composition of special operations forces told Fox News that approximately 75 percent of the group bound for Iraq would provide support. The latest force includes intelligence personnel, aircraft pilots and mechanics in addition to a quick reaction force. The official added that the group was separate from the 50 special operations forces that will be sent to Syria.
There currently are about 3,500 U.S. troops in Iraq.
At the same hearing, Gen. Joseph Dunford, chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, raised eyebrows when he said that ISIS had not been contained by the U.S.-led coalition, contrary to President Obama's assessment earlier this month.
"What is true is that from the start our goal has been first to contain, and we have contained them. They have not gained ground in Iraq. And in Syria, they'll come in, they'll leave, but you don't see this systematic march by ISIL across the terrain," Obama said in an interview with ABC, using another acronym for the group.
The remarks were aired a day before ISIS militants carried out a series of coordinated attacks in Paris, killing 130 people and injuring more than 350 others.
"We have not contained ISIL currently," Dunford said in response to a question from Rep. Randy Forbes, R-Va.