ActRight

One of the most stirring …

Literally at 1001 local time, as soon as Trump said, "So help me God." That Anti-Semitic POS came off the wall. The military was disgraced for 8 years under ...

Wow!

The Twitterverse is piling on Barron—a 10-year-old—with the vilest insults imaginable.

Josef Stalin’s grandson Yevgeny Dzhugashvili had died.

‘David Gelernter, fiercely anti-intellectual computer scientist, is being eyed for Trump’s science adviser.” — Washington Post, January 18 Um. Well, huh. For those unfamiliar with David Gelernter, he essentially created parallel computing, which sounds like witchcraft to me, but I’m told it’s a really big deal. He was also one of the first people to see the Internet coming, in his 1991 book Mirror Worlds. Bill Joy, the co-founder of Sun Microsystems, described Gelernter as “one of the most brilliant and visionary computer scientists of our time.” Ted Kaczynski — aka “the Unabomber” — agreed, which is why he maimed Gelernter with a letter bomb in a 1993 assassination attempt. Gelernter, who teaches computer science at Yale and has degrees in classical Hebrew, has written books and articles on history, culture, religion, artificial intelligence, and philosophy. His acclaimed paintings don’t do too much for me, but that’s probably because I’m a bit of Philistine about these things. Regardless, saying that Gelernter is “fiercely anti-intellectual” is a bit like saying Tiger Woods is fiercely anti-golf. So what on earth could the Washington Post mean with that headline? Science reporter Sarah Kaplan gives a few clues. First, Gelernter is a fierce detractor of Barack Obama and has “made a name for himself as a vehement critic of modern academia.” True enough, I guess. Also, he has “expressed doubt about the reality of man-made climate change.” The evidence provided for this assertion is a bit tendentious, but we’ll let it pass because I don’t think this is primarily about climate change. It has to do more with two things: liberal tribalism and the guild mentality of a certain subset of the scientific community. There’s a long progressive tradition in America to think that intellectuals must be liberal, and therefore intellectualism equals liberalism. Indeed, Kaplan seems a bit bedeviled by this point. The headline of her story says Gelernter is anti-intellectual. The first sentence notes that Gelernter has “decried the influence of liberal intellectuals on college campuses.” A few paragraphs later, Kaplan suddenly informs us that his “anti-intellectualism makes him an outlier among scientists.” If you believe that intellectualism requires being loyal to a certain political agenda, this all makes some sense. The problem is that decrying the influence of liberal intellectuals is hardly synonymous with rejecting intellectualism itself. What Kaplan really seems to be getting at is that Gelernter is one of the few major intellectuals out there today who is critical of the intellectual establishment, which acts as a class or guild. She reports that “Andrew Rosenberg, director of the Center for Science and Democracy at the Union of Concerned Scientists, said he hadn’t heard of Gelernter until Tuesday.” The horror! Rosenberg adds that Gelernter is “certainly not mainstream in the science community or particularly well known. . . . His views even on most of the key science questions aren’t known. Considering the huge range of issues the White House needs to consider, I don’t know if he has that kind of capability.” Translation: If I don’t know him, he just can’t be that important — or smart. Decrying the influence of liberal intellectuals is hardly synonymous with rejecting intellectualism itself. There are scientists whom science reporters know and go to for quotes. The Union of Concerned Scientists, historically a very politicized outfit, is a rich source of such pithy scientists. More broadly, the world of scientists involved in public policy is a very small subset of the world of science, and — as with almost every other profession and industry — a certain guild mentality develops among its members. As a result, they become inclined to say, in effect, “Back off, this is our turf.” It was this phenomenon that my old boss (and thoroughgoing intellectual) William F. Buckley had in mind when he said he’d rather be governed by the first 2,000 names in the Boston phone book than the faculty of Harvard Law School. Nassim Nicholas Taleb, a polymath and best-selling author, is another maverick intellectual who has little use for what he calls the “Intellectual Yet Idiot” class that trades on its elite credentials to impose a kind of groupthink on what is permissible to say or believe. It takes a lot of intellectual firepower and self-confidence to declare that the intellectual emperors have no clothes, so it’s no surprise that neither Gelernter nor Taleb has been accused of being excessively humble. Their brashness can be off-putting to some and threatening to those invested in the monopoly of authority held by certain groups. But that doesn’t make them wrong — or anti-intellectual. — Jonah Goldberg is a fellow at the American Enterprise Institute and a senior editor of National Review. © 2017 Tribune Content Agency, LLC.  

The United States national debt will have grown by about $9 trillion to over $19.6 trillion under President Barack Obama, according to the website USdebtclock.org.

While the Democratic Party has a long history of utilizing violence as a political tool, this past election cycle saw a significant increase of coercive intimidation tactics from the Left when compared to recent history. Over the course of the past few decades violent rhetoric and intimidation tactics have certainly been on the increase from grassroots leftist circles (which they too have a long history of), but this election saw the Democratic Party itself embracing, encouraging, and even financing widespread violence directed at American voters.

Is the vocal left rationalizing and legitimizing violent social disobedience simply because it tangentially fits their narrative? Where is the voice that has been for months lashing out at every se…

Barack Obama did not go out quietly. His unquiet final acts were overshadowed, in part by a successor who refused to come in quietly, and in part by Obama’s own endless, sentimental farewell tour. But there was nothing nostalgic or sentimental about Obama’s last acts. Two of them were simply shocking. Perhaps we should have known. At the 2015 White House Correspondents’ Dinner, he joked about whether he had a bucket list: “Well, I have something that rhymes with bucket list.” Turns out, he wasn’t kidding. Commuting the sentence of Chelsea Manning, one of the great traitors of our time, is finger-in-the-eye willfulness. Obama took 28 years off the sentence of a soldier who stole and then released through WikiLeaks almost half a million military reports plus another quarter-million State Department documents. The cables were embarrassing; the military secrets were almost certainly deadly. They jeopardized the lives not just of American soldiers on two active fronts — Iraq and Afghanistan — but of locals who were, at great peril, secretly aiding and abetting us. After Manning’s documents release, the Taliban “went on a killing spree” (according to intelligence sources quoted by Fox News) of those who fit the description of individuals working with the United States. Moreover, we will be involved in many shadowy conflicts throughout the world. Locals will have to choose between us and our enemies. Would you choose a side that is so forgiving of a leaker who betrays her country — and you? Even the word “leaker” is misleading. Leak makes it sound like a piece of information a whistleblower gives Woodward and Bernstein to expose misdeeds in high office. This was nothing of the sort. It was the indiscriminate dumping of a mountain of national-security secrets certain to bring harm to American troops, allies, and interests. Obama considered Manning’s 35-year sentence excessive. On the contrary. It was lenient. Manning could have been — and in previous ages, might well have been — hanged for such treason. Now she walks after seven years. What makes this commutation so spectacularly in-your-face is its hypocrisy. Here is a president who spent weeks banging the drums over the harm inflicted by WikiLeaks with its release of stolen materials and e-mails during the election campaign. He demanded a report immediately. He imposed sanctions on Russia. He preened about the sanctity of the American political process. Over what? What exactly was released? A campaign chairman’s private e-mails and Democratic National Committee chatter, i.e. campaign gossip, backbiting, indiscretions, and cynicism. The usual stuff, embarrassing but not dangerous. No national-security secrets, no classified material, no exposure of anyone to harm, just to ridicule and opprobrium. What better demonstration of bona fides than a gratuitous attack on Israel? Or the about-face on Manning and WikiLeaks? The other last-minute Obama bombshell occurred four weeks earlier when, for the first time in nearly a half-century, the United States abandoned Israel on a crucial Security Council resolution, allowing the passage of a condemnation that will plague both Israel and its citizens for years to come. After eight years of reassurance, Obama seized the chance — free of political accountability for himself and his potential Democratic successor — to do permanent damage to Israel. (The U.S. has no power to reverse the Security Council resolution.) Daniel Patrick Moynihan, the U.S. ambassador to the U.N. who went on to be a great Democratic senator, once argued passionately that in the anti-American, anti-democratic swamp of the U.N., America should act unwaveringly in opposition and never give in to the jackals. Obama joined the jackals. Why? To curry favor with the international Left? After all, Obama leaves office as a relatively young man of 55. His next chapter could very well be as a leader on the international stage, perhaps at the U.N. (secretary-general?) or some transnational (ostensibly) human-rights organization. What better demonstration of bona fides than a gratuitous attack on Israel? Or the about-face on Manning and WikiLeaks? Or the freeing of a still-unrepentant Puerto Rican terrorist, Oscar Lopez Rivera, also pulled off with three days remaining in his presidency? A more likely explanation, however, is that these are acts not of calculation but of authenticity. This is Obama being Obama. He leaves office as he came in: a man of the Left, but possessing the intelligence and discipline to suppress his more radical instincts. As of November 9, 2016, suppression was no longer necessary. We’ve just gotten a glimpse of his real self. From now on, we shall see much more of it. — Charles Krauthammer’s e-mail address is [email protected]. © 2017, The Washington Post Writers Group

Mattis is likely to oversee growth in the U.S. military.

President Donald Trump's inauguration speech was not meant to bridge political divides. Instead, it was a declaration of war against the ruling class.

Obama’s transgender bathroom decree violates the precedent of major social reforms following only long public debate.

Trump Offers Father Down on His Luck $10,000 Check at Inaugural Event

The Senate confirmed retired Gen. John Kelly as Homeland Security secretary, helping President Donald Trump fill out his national security team on his first day in office.

In the midst of a clash between a few dozen anti-Trump protesters and police in downtown Cleveland on Friday, one protester started elbowing and shoving an officer before spitting in the officer's face. The incident was captured on video by Fox News 8.

The order is designed to "ease the burden of ObamaCare," aide says.

From the formation of the Federalist Party until today, we've remained consistent with our perspective that when Donald Trump and the GOP do well, we'll support those initiatives. When they do poorly, we'll oppose their moves. That hasn't changed and likely won't change unless they shift in a wholesale manner towards big government.

Kid Protesting Donald Trump tells Fox News, ‘Screw Our President’ on live TV. We didn’t start the fire. Conner did. Tensions were running high across the U.S...

Donald and Melania Trump were joined by their 10-year-old son Barron to wave to crowds on Pennsylvania Avenue on Thursday during the Inaugural Parade.

On Friday, Donald J. Trump became President of the United States. His inaugural address was pure Trump: a populist brew of government interventionism, patriotic rhetoric, law and order toughness, protectionist economics, and isolationist foreign policy. It was politically brilliant, and it had little to do with conservatism. Trump is Trump.

Since its inception globalism has needed a nation state to be its caretaker, a role Britain played through much of the 19th century along with the US into the current era.  The World Economic Forum…

Black-clad activists angry about U.S. President Donald Trump's inauguration smashed store and car windows in Washington on Friday and fought with police in riot gear who responded with pepper spray and stun grenades.

To Block Schumer, Name Mike Lee to the Supreme Court - Robert Morrison: There's a way for the incoming Trump administration to call .01/20/2017 14:55:07PM EST.

Donald Trump is now the 45th president of the United States, having been sworn in by John Roberts, chief justice of the United States. “There is a chance that Trump marks the beginning of the end of American democracy. And, yes, there is a good chance that Trump will corrupt the American republic in lasting ways.” At least the hysterical denial and anger from his detractors and the media is over. Maybe. But as the moment approached, many in the mainstream media could not help themselves and disgraced journalism and themselves with over-the-top pronouncements of alarm and bitterness. They fretted. They sweated. They worried. And, of course, they made outrageous comments about Trump as the sand in the hourglass ran out. ‘I Wish You Pain, Trumpers’ Chauncey DeVega of Salon wrote of Trump supporters, “They made a decision that loyalty to whiteness took precedence to a shared sense of humanity and the Common Good.” Therefore, they almost deserve to suffer, he wrote.