Thanksgiving Turkey Day Cartoons

Erick Erickson: This Thanksgiving, we should all be thankful for Trump. I know I am

For more reasons that you might expect, I think we should all be thankful for the President. I know I am thankful.

President Trump is not perfect. He was not my choice to be President. But I am thankful for him in many ways.
I appreciate that President Trump has brought about the great sorting of the conservative movement. Though disappointing to see, it has confirmed for me that the nation is not as conservative as I once thought and also that there are a lot of people who have made a lot of money in the conservative movement who do not really believe in the ideals of conservatism.
President Trump has made me recommit to my faith. I could be distracted by politics for the longest time, but seeing the country headed toward the darkness with many so called conservatives cheering on the dark, I have been forced to reprioritize things. I have realized how much of my politics and faith do not align and how many Christian conservatives have worked very hard to conform their faith to their politics instead of the other way around.

The richest reward in the age of Donald Trump is a clearer vision of the country and a greater appreciation for the necessity of relying on God, not men.

I am thankful he put Neil Gorsuch on the bench. I am thankful for many of the President's policies and stellar personnel appointments like Ajit Pai, Justice Willett, Nikki Haley, Rick Perry, General Mattis, etc.
Though it has not happened to the extent I would like, President Trump's election has forced some Democrats to finally realize what conservatives were talking about when they said character counted. It has not been good on the GOP side now, but some Democrats are finally having to recognize it. Likewise, Democrats are starting to realize that defending President Obama's legacy at the expense of reality may not be the greatest thing. It will take further time for this to shake out, but from Iran to Russia to North Korea, at least privately Democrats are starting to acknowledge Barack Obama's failures.
Though not an exhaustive list, there is one last thing I am thankful of because of President Trump. There are people in the old center-right coalition who I may not see eye to eye with at times, but I have a new appreciation for their willingness to stand up. Even now, we do not always agree on things, but it has been nice to see people make it through the great sorting with their integrity intact. I have always had respect and rare disagreement with people like Jonah Goldberg and Bill Kristol, but add into mix with them people like Charlie Sykes and others it is refreshing to see people focus on ideas on the right, not just the cult of personality.
The richest reward in the age of Donald Trump is a clearer vision of the country and a greater appreciation for the necessity of relying on God, not men. This clarifying moment would not have come except for Donald Trump's election and it is clear the turmoil, problems, and opportunism of many were always there festering.
Erick Erickson is a Fox News contributor. He is founder/editor of The Resurgent. His new book is "Before You Wake: Life Lessons From a Father to His Children”. Follow him on Twitter @EWErickson.

NFL national anthem protests are teaching our children to NOT be thankful for America

The continuing protests by multimillionaire NFL players who refuse to stand for our national anthem – disrespecting our flag and the brave patriots in our armed forces – are setting a terrible example for America’s children as Thanksgiving approaches.

The message?  Don't be thankful for the many blessings America has given you. Instead, act ungratefully, disrespectfully and unpatriotically

And sadly, some children are now following that example.
To cite just a few examples of protests around the country:
Four high school football players from Michigan were benched when they said they planned a kneeling protest. In Texas, two high school players were kicked off their team after protesting during the anthem. Good decisions in both cases.
And football players on a team made up of boys 8 and younger were joined by their coach in kneeling during the playing of our anthem in Illinois, after the coach told them about the protests started by former San Francisco 49ers quarterback Colin Kaepernick. Unbelievably, the coach said: “I felt like it was a good teaching moment for me.”
Teaching what? Hatred of America?
Schools are hyper-vigilant nowadays about not tolerating student expressions that might offend anyone. For example, a school in Texas shut down a voluntary Bible discussion during the lunch hour. God – oops, pardon that expression – forbid that any atheist child should be offended.
If students banded together in a planned show of disrespect for a rainbow flag – the symbol of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender pride – you’d better believe they’d be punished for intolerance.
And if students held a protest objecting to radical political Islam, there’s no doubt they’d be disciplined for bigotry. The same would happen if students denounced and disrespected any country on Earth – with one exception.
When student football players disrespect America, our anthem and our flag, what happens? They get applauded by the left. That’s because the left hugs First Amendment language like an endangered tree when it comes to disrespecting the American flag and our anthem.
In 2010 the Department of Justice began studying bullying in school based upon “national origin” and other differences. That’s no surprise. There’s been a federally recognized prohibition against discriminating against national origin since the 1964 Civil Rights Act.
The federal government’s website dedicated to eradicating direct and indirect bullying noted this example of prohibited conduct from North Carolina: "Bullying or harassing behavior includes … acts ... motivated by any actual or perceived differentiating characteristic, such as race, color, religion, ancestry, national origin.”
Bullying of this kind is frequent. A New York survey this year of middle and high school students showed that 65 percent of respondents said bullying occurred because of “race, religion, ethnicity, national origin, or citizenship/immigration status.”
So what does the federal government do with a local bullying incident in the United States? The Justice Department, explaining on its website about an LGBT student it helped, said it intervenes:
“The School District knew of the harassment ... neither fully investigated the allegations, nor followed its anti-harassment policies and procedures. The failure to address and prevent this kind of bullying from occurring violates Title IX of the Civil Rights Act of 1964.”
Let’s examine how a recent real-life incident of anthem kneeling could still play out.
On Sept. 28, football players at Monroe Township High School in New Jersey knelt during the national anthem. Two referees walked off in protest, leaving the legitimacy of the game in doubt. Only the refs were punished, being suspended for the rest of the season.
Monroe has a bullying policy. In pertinent part it defines and prohibits as follows:
“Harassment, intimidation, or bullying means any gesture ...  motivated by either any actual or perceived characteristic, such as race, color, religion, ancestry, national origin, gender, sexual orientation, gender identity and expression; that ... has the effect of insulting or demeaning any student or group of students.”
What should happen next is that a parent of any American student insulted by the disrespect for America should demand that the school enforce Monroe’s bullying policy and discipline the kneelers.
If the school doesn’t act, the parent has a private right of action to sue the school under Title IX. The parent can have the Justice Department intervene to enforce their child’s rights.
Normally I don’t encourage making a federal case out of school disciplinary matters, but if the left keeps jumping us with culture rumbles, we have to take their own weapons to use on them.

Presenting your 2017 Turkey Bowl winners

America has much to be grateful for this Thanksgiving: Peace, prosperity and what Abraham Lincoln called the “inestimable blessings” of “the Great Disposer of Events.”
But if you really want to talk about inestimable blessings this year, just ask a political journalist. Hoo, boy…
In a profession where we are accustomed to scrounging for news, especially in electoral off years, we are operating in a time of unparalleled abundance with scandals, leaks, partisan fratricide, shutdown threats and on and on and on.
The Time of Cofeve may not be very good for the republic, but it is most certainly fascinating to cover. When we think back to days in Novembers past spent trying to scrape together stories on legislative markups and midterm look-aheads, we are truly grateful for the abundance, even at the occasional risk to our sanity and our appetites.
It is in the spirit of this horn of plenty of astonishing stories that we offer this year’s edition of the Halftime Report Turkey Bowl, recognizing the individuals and organizations that have found ways, even in these imbecilic times, to stand out for their lapses.
To our winners, we say thank you for making it easy. To our readers, we offer our apologies in advance.
WORST BOOK TOUR: HILLARY CLINTON (REPEAT WINNER)
The 2016 Democratic nominee has had a rough decade, professionally speaking. And one would have thought that losing a second presidential campaign to a candidate even more unlikely than the first one might have been enough to cure Hillary Clinton of politics for good. But, alas...
Determined to reshape a fast-hardening narrative about her campaign (incompetent, overpriced and disconnected) and herself (scandal-soaked and entitled), Clinton has been grinding it out on the book circuit for months like someone whose family didn’t profit to the tune of more than $100 million in the 16 years since they left the White House.
But a defeated presidential candidate looking to re-write history isn’t a brand new idea. What makes Clinton’s book tour stand out are mostly events beyond her control.   
Clinton could not have known that just about the time she was warming up for her book signings and radio interviews that her longtime friend and benefactor, Harvey Weinstein, was about the immolated in a napalm bath of sexual misconduct accusations.
That could have been icky, but what made it a debacle was the fact that the Weinstein allegations kicked off a whole new round of accusations and, ultimately, a reconsideration of her husband’s own misconduct. Democrats who had once tolerated or ignored her husband’s alleged mistreatment of women moved unambiguously toward blame and denunciation. And all the while, Clinton was on camera.
She hit the road hoping to cover her offenses as a candidate. She will come home with her and her husband’s roles in opening the way for the Roy Moores of the world an accepted part of political conventional wisdom.

WORST SOCIAL MEDIA MOMENT: SENATOR CRUZ ‘LIKES’
Back in September, a late-night “like” from Sen. Ted Cruz’s account appeared for a tweet containing fetish porn. Cruz later pointed a finger at a member of his staff for the unfortunate like, but didn’t throw the Twitter lurker under the bus. Cruz also tried to be a good sport, saying that they should have “done something like this during the Indiana primary.” But, to be fair, Cruz also had a pretty epic win back in January. After Politico ran a piece that mentioned that the senator played basketball on a weekly basis, the sports website Deadspin called him out wanting proof. In turn, Cruz tweeted a photo of his younger doppelgangers, Duke guard Grayson Allen writing with it, “What do I win?”  The Twitterverse erupted in praise for Cruz, claiming him the winner of this small yet mighty Twitter war. Deadspin didn’t take the loss lightly, responding back with a simple, “Go eat s–t.”
WORST LAUNDRY BILL: STEVE BANNON
Fashion forward or a fashion faux pas? President Trump’s former chief strategist Steve Bannon likes to layer. Why dies a man leading a populist revolt want to dress like a villain from a John Hughes movie? There’s no clear answer. Some say he picked up the trend from his time at military prep school and others say he calls it “beach fashion.” His spokesperson made it very clear, however, that’s it never just one and rarely just two shirts. Three is Bannon’s lucky number... truly a “layering extremist.” He always has extra shirts on hand, specifically at Breitbart’s headquarters.
WORST OUTERWEAR DEPLOYMENT: GEORGE W. BUSH
The 43^rd president of the United States stole the show of the inauguration with and his costar: his rain poncho. Former president George W. Bush struggled with the plastic sheet for several minutes until he ultimately gave up and simply wrapped it around his head. But, he wasn’t the only one to struggle with his rain poncho. Looking closer at photos from the event one will notice that his mother, former first lady Barbara Bush, also seemed confused by the rain protector. Maybe it’s a genetic thing? The takeaway: 43 should stay away from ponchos. Vanity Fair noted that this isn’t the first time the former president struggled with this article of clothing. In 2009, while in Lima, he was caught on camera having similar struggles while sporting a traditional Peruvian poncho.
WORST RELOCATION: JAVANKA
Jared Kushner and Ivanka Trump made it no secret that they were house hunting in the nation’s capital after Election Day. They were poised to become a power couple par excellence and take Washington by storm. Instead, missteps and scandals have, ten months after inauguration, left the couple labeled as the “exiles on Pennsylvania Ave.” Kushner has reportedly told friends that he and his wife debate going back to New York every few months.

WORST ASTRONOMICAL TOURISM: STEVEN MNUCHIN
Many Americans traveled from their homes to be able to watch the historic moment of this summer’s eclipse at its peak. But how about Secretary of the Treasury Steven Mnuchin and his wife, Louise Linton? Reports show the couple flew to Kentucky on a government plane that day, ostensibly to visit Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, who just happens to live right along the path of the totality of the eclipse. Mnuchin claimed he had no interest in the eclipse because he’s a New Yorker. According to Politico he said, “You know, people in Kentucky took this stuff very serious,” followed by, “Being a New Yorker... I was like, the eclipse? Really? I don’t have any interest in watching the eclipse.” Despite his expressed Northeastern blasé, though, the picture told the tale.
Further compounding the error: The secretary’s wife posted a photo of herself on Instagram, including hashtags of all of the expensive articles of clothing she was sporting on their day trip to Kentucky. Unable to take the heat from an Instagram user’s comment, Ms. Linton lost her cool and replied with a condescending remark, belittling the user. Linton got a big thumbs down from everyone else for that one.
But the real loser of the Mnuchin-Linton eclipse outing: Former Health Secretary Tom Price. The hubbub over the Treasury trip got reporters checking on cabinet members’ private jet usage and Price turned out to be a serial offender. After that, the doctor was out.  
WORST BEACH DAY: CHRIS CHRISTIE
Let’s go to the beach… oh wait. New Jersians couldn’t because Gov. Chris Christie shut it down. Amid the state government shutdown, Christie was able to catch some rays at the Island Beach State Park over the Fourth of July holiday weekend. Christie was asked about a rumored outing and scoffed at the notion. “I didn't get any sun today.” Ruh-roh. He got busted in the act when aerial photos revealed Christie, his wife and other family members lounging on the beach. Christie’s defense: “He did not get any sun. He had a baseball hat on,” said communications director Brian Murray.
WORST HAPPY HOUR: HOUSE REPUBLICANS 
Let’s go back to May, to the “beginning of the end of ObamaCare” as Vice President Mike Pence called it. And Republicans were ready to party like it was officially repealed. Cases of beer were rolled through the halls of the capitol building heading toward a GOP conference meeting. Later that day in the White House Rose Garden, President Trump beamed with pride, soaking in what he deemed as his accomplishment. Yet here we are six months later...

WORST LEAKER: ANTHONY SCARAMUCCI
It’s funny how much of a difference the three simple words “off the record” make. What a ten days Anthony Scaramucci had working in the White House. The New Yorker’s Ryan Lizza recorded a phone call he had with the then-White House communications director. Initiating the call, Mooch went on to dish to Lizza about White House leakers, telling him he wasn’t afraid to “eliminate everyone in the comms team and [we’ll] start over.” He particularly aimed blame at then-White House Chief of Staff Reince Priebus. He also said that Trump adviser Steve Bannon engaged in a physiological impossibility… But what he never said to Lizza was those three magic words, so Lizza did what any good journalist would do and he wrote an article. What has the Mooch been up to since his White House ten day tenure? He’s keeping busy showing off his vocal cords.
[Ed. note: You may remember newspapers. As my son explained to his little brother, “It’s like they printed out the Internet so you can read it.” I got my start writing nighttime sports for my hometown paper when I was 17. I was a goner from the first. Part of what I loved about newspapering was the continuity – the musty old files of clips that reached back generations, making a record of who we were and how we became what we are. “Older than the state itself,” read the banner at the top of Page One. My favorite Thanksgiving newspaper tradition has for decades been that paper’s annual republishing of the same perfect column about the holiday by the late Adam Kelly, known to his readers as “the country editor.” I was privileged to have his son, Bob, a great newsman himself, as my mentor when I later learned my way around politics in Charleston, W.Va. They talk about Washington being a swamp. But trust me, if you can wrestle the political gators on the Kanawha River, you can cover politics anywhere in the world. Bob, who was taken from us far too young, taught a generation of newspapermen and newspaperwomen how to take our jobs seriously without taking ourselves seriously – to be skeptics without becoming cynics. It’s no mean feat when the world entices you always to see the story in first person rather than keeping the proper sense of first doing your duty to your country and your readers. The key to that, I’ve learned through hard-bought wisdom, is to begin with gratitude. If I count the blessings in my life, I can start to see how much more I have than I deserve. Understanding that makes us kinder, more gracious and, most importantly, less selfish. Bob’s father’s column, offered here by another newspaper, is properly called a litany, which is a kind of prayer where congregants respond to the preacher in the pulpit. The word “litany” descends from Greek, where its root “litaneia” means “entreaty.” My entreaty to you is that you read Adam Kelly’s good, old words and meditate on your blessings. I know I don’t enjoy today every blessing its author did; nor do you, probably. But we can all claim many of them as Americans. And if we could really all count our blessings, one suspects that we would be a people more inclined to mercy, more given to self-sacrifice and more committed to building up than tearing down. Fox News Halftime Report is pausing for the holiday and will resume publication Monday. In the meantime, I wish you and your families bounty and blessings, but most of all, the gift of gratitude, especially in the face of adversity.]

Phoenix homeowner pulls plug on Christmas lights after city crackdown

Christmas light display before it was taken down due to a Phoenix crackdown.

For the past 30 years, Lee Sepanek and his wife Patricia have celebrated the holidays by festooning their Phoenix home with 250,000 festive lights. The couple's annual display draws visitors from all over.

But this year, their house will be dark.

The reason: City officials have raised concerns about noise, traffic and parking issues, as well as with the Sepaneks' sales of cocoa and baked goods to offset costs, the Arizona Republic reported.
"I even bought a whole bunch of new stuff," Lee Sepanek, 66, told Phoenix's Fox 10. "I was gonna add stuff to my windows. I was going to increase my displays, my window displays. Now they're in storage."

MORE: Here’s the @gofundme link to “Save the Arcadia Christmas House” - the group is looking to save the tradition that thousands of Valley residents come to see every year for more than 30 years. https://t.co/6cr1yYMTwb

— Matt Rodewald FOX 10 (@Matt_Fox10) November 14, 2017

He said he was “disheartened” by a meeting with city officials, who advised him on changes intended to address complaints and possible violations. But Sepanek decided to pull the plug instead.
“They’re going to shut me down, so why would I put in the energy?," he told the Republic.
Sepanek said he never heard complaints from his neighbors about the light display.
"My whole neighborhood is supportive," he told Fox 10.
But Phoenix City Councilman Sal DiCiccio is reportedly working with the Sepaneks to resolve the issues so the lights can be back on full display next year.
Meantime, because the display costs roughly $10,000 a year, and because the couple won't be selling cocoa and baked goods this year, they've started a GoFundMe page to help meet next year's expenses -- if the light show resumes.
"This is my hobby. I have nothing else.," Sepanek told the Republic. " ...  For 30 years, I’ve not had nothing to do Thanksgiving to New Year's but Christmas lights and sit outside and talk to people.”