REDLINE || Tuesday, May 26, 2015

Tuesday, May 26, 2015​

Good morning! In the news today: Killer floods devastate Texas and threaten more destruction; Obamacare causes deductibles to soar; Michelle urges activism; China on the move; Iraq says it’s striking back; and a boy honors his dad on Memorial Day.

Have a great day.

Keith

 

Floods inflict death, threaten Houston . . . Flash-flood watches and warnings were issued across seven states early Tuesday as an unprecedented downpour of torrential rain triggered “extremely dangerous and potentially life-threatening” conditions in Houston. At least 12 people were still missing, eight people have been killed, and countless more evacuated amid the deluge that has inundated Texas and Oklahoma with record-breaking floods since Saturday. MSNBC

The 12 missing are likely dead. In Mexico, at least 13 people were killed when a tornado ripped through Ciudad Acuna, a city of 125,000 on the border with the U.S.

Texas homecoming queen swept away . . . Alyssa Ramirez, a graduating senior, died in Devine on her way home from prom when her car was swept away. USA Today

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Deductibles soaring because of Obamacare . . . So now, many of the same groups that agitated for Obamacare are agitating for new government spending or tighter controls on the insurance industry and businesses to “solve” the problem. Washington Examiner

This is how Obamacare morphs into Socialized medicine. Private insurers must raise prices, so the government steps in with more controls, until you have a de facto government-run system, with all its inefficiencies and inadequacies.

Report: Words behind Obamacare challenge a mistake . . . The suit against Obamacare is predicated on a phrase that says exchanges must be establish by the state. But according to the New York Times, which interviewed Democratic and GOP staffers: “The words were a product of shifting politics and a sloppy merging of different versions. Some described the words as ‘inadvertent,’ ‘inartful’ or ‘a drafting error.’ But none supported the contention of the plaintiffs, who are from Virginia. New York Times

Yeah, well, the words were quite clear. It’s hard for me to imagine that scores of staffers and lawmakers who read them missed the “error.”

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Obama lets world order disintegrate . . . What is unique about American foreign policy today is not just that it is rudderless, but how quickly and completely the 70-year postwar order seems to have disintegrated — and how little interest the American people take in the collapse, thanks to the administration’s apparent redeeming message, which translates, “It’s their misfortune and none of our own.” Victor Davis Hanson

Michelle urges activism . . . Michelle Obama told college graduates to run toward contentious places instead of away from them, in a commencement address at Oberlin College on Monday. “Today, I want to urge you to actively seek out the most contentious, polarized, gridlocked places you can find,” Obama said. “Because so often, throughout our history, those have been the places where progress really happens.” Washington Examiner

Woodward: Bush didn’t lie about WMD . . . The argument has been used for years by Democrats and other detractors, but Woodward said on “Fox News Sunday” that his own 18-month investigation showed that Bush was actually skeptical that Iraqi President Saddam Hussein had WMDs as Saddam claimed. Newsmax

EPA floods the zone on water rule . . . To mollify critics, the EPA invited public comments, as agencies must do in the regulatory process. Later, its administrator, Gina McCarthy, would boast that it received nearly 1 million comments on the rule — nearly 90 percent of which were in favor. What McCarthy did not mention is that the EPA used government resources to coordinate with environmentalist groups in order to achieve this 90 percent support. Washington Examiner

 

China moves to extend military reach . . . China outlined a strategy to boost its naval reach on Tuesday and held a groundbreaking ceremony for two lighthouses in disputed waters, developments likely to escalate tensions in a region already jittery about Beijing’s maritime ambitions. Reuters

U.S., allies to show muscle . . . Japan will join a major U.S.-Australian military exercise for the first time in a sign of growing security links between the three countries as tensions fester over China’s island building in the South China Sea. Reuters​

Iraq says it’s striking back . . . Iraq’s government announced Tuesday that its military had launched a counterattack aimed at driving the Islamic State terror group out of the western part of Anbar province just days after militants captured the city of Ramadi. Fox News

Uh, may the force be with you.

 

Woman who ran over non-voting husband gets three years . . . One Arizona woman may have taken the slogan “Vote or Die” literally when she ran over her husband with the family Jeep back in November 2012 after she found out he failed to cast his ballot for Mitt Romney in that year’s presidential election. On Thursday, Holly Nicole Solomon was sentenced to three-and-a-half years in prison for running over her now-ex husband Daniel Solomon, who fortunately survived the ordeal. Daily Caller

Who says the Romney campaign failed to ignite passion among its supporters?

Sen. Thad Cochran marries staffer . . . Sen. Thad Cochran, R-Miss., 77, adamantly declared that there was no affair between him and top aide Kay Webber, 76, during his bid for re-election. His staff also insisted there was nothing to the rumors that surrounded the couple. Now, it seems Cochran has used to cover of Memorial Day to minimize news that the two have wed. Breitbart

Former NY governor George Pataki will announce his candidacy for president Thursday.

 

 

Pakistan tries to finish off Taliban . . . Pakistani troops on Friday began a “massive” offensive to try to push the Taliban from their last major stronghold in the mountainous northwestern region of North Waziristan, moving in from north and south, officials and residents said. Reuters

Meet “the Michele Bachmann of Israel” . . . She has been called the Michele Bachmann of Israeli politics, a nod to their shared far-right ideology and striking appearance. For Justice Minister Eyelet Shaked, a former computer engineer, the main thing is “to strengthen the Jewish identity” of Israel, “to have a democratic, Jewish, strong state.” New York Times

 

Antagonist to feminists needs protection . . . Christina Hoff Sommers says she “stands for the moral, social, and legal equality of the sexes,” but also for women’s freedom—including the freedom to embrace traditional femininity. At Sommers’s speech in April at Georgetown University, multiple undercover policemen were placed in the audience. At Oberlin, also in April, uniformed police officers never let her out of their sight and after her speech escorted her in a police car from the campus to a dinner. Weekly Standard

Liberal Fox News contributor warns of the “illiberal left” . . . Under attack for her new book, “The Silencing: How the Left is Killing Free Speech,” Kirsten Powers, the USA Today columnist and Fox News contributor, may be the most recent canary in the coal mine warning America of a toxic influence on civility. Powers’s book highlights her research on the increasing number of incidents of intimidation of political opponents who challenge the liberal orthodoxy in America. Daily Caller

Memorial Day and the Vietnam Memorial . . . I have come to appreciate the Vietnam War Memorial more than I used to. But I have never really liked it. White House Dossier

“He is always watching over me” . . . When Christian Jacobs was only 8-months-old, his father — Marine Sgt. Christopher James Jacobs — died in a training accident in California. Now Christian is 4 years old. And on Memorial Day 2015, he and his mother Brittany arrived with many other families at Arlington National Cemetery to remember their loved ones who died serving their country. The Blaze

 

 

Keith Koffler
Editor
White House Dossier

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