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‘We Should Be Grateful We’re Getting a Preview’

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Top Clinton campaign officials are under fire after the latest batch of emails from Wikileaks referred to the Catholic Church as a “Middle Ages dictatorship,” suggested some conservatives convert to Catholicism out of political expedience and that Clinton’s campaign chairman considered the creation of nominally Catholic organizations to erode support for the church itself.

Two exchanges among the latest batch of 1,200 emails released by Wikileaks are drawing the most scrutiny on this issue.  The first came in in 2011 in an email from John Halpin of the Center for American Progress to John Podesta and Jennifer Palmieri.  Podesta is now Clinton’s campaign chairman and Palmieri is a top spokeswoman.

After mocking News Corp. chairman Rupert Murdoch for having his Catholic children baptized in the Jordan River, Halpin broadens the discussion.

“Many of the most powerful elements of the conservative movement are all Catholic (many converts) from the SC and think tanks to the media and social groups,” wrote Halpin.

“It’s an amazing bastardization of the faith. They must be attracted to the systematic thought and severely backwards gender relations and must be totally unaware of Christian democracy,” he continued.

“I imagine they think it is the most socially acceptable politically conservative religion. Their rich friends wouldn’t understand if they became evangelicals,” replied Palmieri.

In a 2012 email, Podesta corresponds with Voices for Progress President Sandy Newman.  Newman was looking for ways to build a movement to weaken the power of the Catholic church in the political debates over contraception, particularly with respect to the contraception mandate imposed as part of President Obama’s new health care law.

“We created Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good to organize for a moment like this. But I think it lacks the leadership to do so now. Likewise Catholics United. Like most Spring movements, I think this one will have to be bottom up,” wrote Podesta, noting that former Maryland Lt. Gov. Kathleen Kennedy Townsend would be a good choice to lead such a movement.

Republican Vice Presidential nominee Mike Pence immediately slammed the emails on Wednesday.

“Hillary Clinton should denounce those bigoted, anti-Catholic, anti-evangelical remarks and her campaign staff should apologize to people of faith and do it now,” said Pence.

For many observant Catholicsm the contents of these email exchanges are deeply troubling.

“It’s hard to know where to start, to be honest,” said Maureen Ferguson, senior policy adviser at The Catholic Association.

However, she says her first reaction was oddly one of gratitude.

“We should all be grateful that we’re getting a preview of this before Election Day, so that we can go into the voting booth with very clear eyes knowing what a Hillary Clinton administration would look like,” said Ferguson.

“People at the highest level in her campaign are just displaying blatant bias and discriminatory attitudes towards people of faith.  The way that they’re mocking Catholics and evangelicals, there is obviously no respect here for those who cherish their first amendment freedom of religion,” she added.

While appalled at the comments, Ferguson says no one should be expect the Clinton team to think otherwise.

“On the one hand, it’s very surprising and stark to read these attitudes in black and white, but on the other hand we should not be surprised.  This anti-Catholic, anti-people of faith bias comes on the heels of eight years of an administration which has been systematically undermining our religious liberty,” said Ferguson.

She points specifically to the Obama administration’s imposing of the contraception mandate.

“Remember the HHS mandate on contraceptives, telling Catholic nuns that had to be paying for contraceptives.  This is using the heavy hand of the federal government, threatening massive government fines on a group of nuns (Little Sisters of the Poor) who are serving the elderly poor, unless they get in line with this liberal agenda,” said Ferguson.

She also says Hillary Clinton has also laid down the gauntlet on religious freedom.  In April 2015, Clinton told the Women in the World Summit that biblical and moral opposition to abortion would be in the cross hairs of her administration.

“Laws have to backed up with resources and political will and deep-seated cultural codes, religious beliefs and structural biases have to be changed,” said Clinton.

Ferguson is especially galled at Podesta for wanting to create nominally-Catholic groups to challenge Catholic authorities on cultural issues.

“He admits to having been a part of creating these groups called Catholic Alliance for the Common Good and another one called Catholics United.  Their specific purpose is to undermine the Catholic Church,” said Ferguson.

She says this is nothing new for Democrats.

“We all became familiar over the years with Catholics for a Free Choice, which was a pro-abortion group that put the name ‘Catholic’ on it it to undermine the Catholic position in defense of the sanctity of human life.  In these emails, John Podesta even admits to creating these two liberal Catholic front groups as a way to subversively attack the church,” said Ferguson.

Ferguson admits this has been a tough election season for many observant Catholics, being repulsed by Clinton’s positions on a host of issues vitally important to them and by Donald Trump’s behavior past and present.

“I think so many of us Catholics feel quite homeless in this election,” she said.

But that does not mean both options are equally terrible in her eyes.

“I think most people wish we had different choices in this election, but we should at least be clear-eyed about what a Hillary Clinton administration would look like.  It would be full of people who are aggressively attacking our freedom of religion,” said Ferguson.

“Trump has made a lot of pledges on religious liberty and a lot of the people around him and a lot of the people around him, like Mike Pence for example, have come out very strongly.  He has a history of very good positions on life and religious liberty and issues related to the family,” said Ferguson.

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Did Humans Cause Hurricane Matthew?

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President Obama hailed his unilateral ratification of the climate change accords this week and his allies went so far as to say the agreement goes a long way to stopping major storms like Hurricane Matthew, but a leading climate change expert says that’s nonsense.

On Wednesday, President Obama hailed the accords as the “best possible shot to save the one planet we’ve got.”  NBC News White House reporter Ron Allen took the significance even further.

“It’s very interesting that this is happening on a day when there is a hurricane bearing down on the United States and in the Caribbean.  Because these severe storms, beach erosion, intense weather episodes that we’ve had are perhaps the most practical example of what the president is talking about as the threat that the planet faces,” said Allen.

“This is what this whole climate agreement, signed by 190 nations and ratified by about 60 or so, is designed to stop,” continued Allen.

So is human activity in any way to blame for Hurricane Matthew?

“Absolutely not,” said Dr. Tim Ball, former professor of climatology at the University of Winnipeg.  He is also the author of “The Deliberate Corruption of Climate Science” and “Human Caused Global Warming: The Biggest Deception in History.”

“By the way, Hurricane Matthew arrived off the coat of Florida on the four thousandth day of no recorded landfall hurricanes in the United States.  This is why they had to hype it so much,” said Ball.

Ball says it’s not hard to refute the supposed scientific consensus on the impact of human activity on our climate.  He says they’ve been wrong all along.

“If you look at the forecasts of the [United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change] since 1990, every single one of them has been wrong,” said Ball.  “The basics of science is that if your prediction or forecast is wrong, you’re science is wrong,  But they’re not admitting that.  They’re pushing ahead anyway.”

He says those trying to get the public on board with the climate agenda don’t even have the basics of climate science correct.

“From a science point of view, it’s an absolute disaster and completely unnecessary.  CO2 is less than four percent of the total greenhouse gases and the human contribution of that is .04 percent.  Yet they completely ignore water vapor, which is 95 percent of the greenhouse effect,” said Ball.

Ball also has a problem with some of the data presented about Matthew and other storms.  He asserts that the experts consistently over-estimate the power of hurricanes.

“They determine the wind speed of the hurricane over water because they have no surface wind speed measurements.  They determine it by flying an aircraft through at 30,000 feet.  It gets a wind speed up there and then, using a computer model, it calculates the wind speed at the surface,” explained Ball.

“In every single case, that has been wrong.  It happened with Katrina.  They said it was a Category Five and it was actually barely a Category Three by the time it got ashore.  The same thing is happening with Matthew,” said Ball.

Ball is also pouring cold water on the celebration of the climate accords.  He says it’s not nearly the global consensus that Obama would have us believe.

“It is, of course, a non-binding treaty and that was demanded by countries like China and Russia, who said, ‘We’re not going to tie our hands with this.’  And of course China has gone ahead with building two coal-burning plants every five days.  It’s just laughable,” said Ball.

He says the whole point of the Paris accords was not to line up commitments to reduce carbon emissions but to establish the Green Climate Fund, an idea that has been pursued by climate activists since the Kyoto Accords in the 1990s.

And what is the Green Climate Fund?

“The developed nations had to pay for their sins according to the amount of CO2 they were producing.  Then the money was going to be given over to the developing nations because they were suffering from the sins of the developed nations,” said Ball.  “It was just a great wealth transfer.”

Ball says it’s important to note that less than a third of the nations that signed the accords have actually ratified it.  He also says the nations of the world are expected to contribute $100 billion to the fund every year, but so far it has less than five billion dollars.

In his Wednesday statement, Obama admitted the accords would not solve climate issues but would be a good start.

“The Paris agreement alone will not solve the climate crisis.  Even if we meet every target embodied in the agreement, we’ll only get to part of where we need to go,” said Obama, while saying the deal would help to delay or avoid looming problems.

Ball fears the next steps will only involve more government or even United Nations demands on the American taxpayer.  He also says many climate activists admit all this action won’t accomplish anything with respect to the climate, which was also the case with the highly trumpeted Kyoto Accords years ago.

“Even if [Kyoto] was implemented in its full form, even the scientists were saying it will not be a measurable difference.  The Paris climate agreement is even worse,” he said.

“It’s a travesty from the start.  It was the use of science for a political agenda and it’s properly collapsing around its ears,” said Ball.

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‘They Know It’s in Trouble’

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Health care expert Grace-Marie Turner says Bill Clinton’s public criticism of Obamacare and obvious infighting within Obama’s own administration proves the U.S. health care system is in big trouble on its current course.

The former president made headlines Monday, when he discussed the big problems created by President Obama’s signature domestic legislation.

“The people that are getting killed on this deal are small business people and individuals who make just a little too much to get any of these subsidies.  Why?  Because they’re not organized.  They don’t have any bargaining power with insurance companies.  They’re getting whacked,” said Clinton.

“So you’ve got this crazy system where suddenly 25 million more people have health care and the people busting it sometimes 60 hours a week wind up with their premiums doubled and their coverage cut in half.  It’s the craziest thing in the world,” said Clinton.

Turner, who actively fought Clinton’s health care reform in the 1990s and the push for Obamacare says, Clinton is on the right track – but only to a point.

“He’s got the diagnosis right.  People are very unhappy with this law.  The longer it’s in place, the more unhappy they are.  He’s clearly hearing from small businesses.  He’s hearing from families who cannot afford their premiums,” said Turner.

However, Turner suspects Clinton’s solution to the problem will only create more problems.

“What he’s doing I fear is teeing up, if Hillary is elected president, even more government control over the health sector.  The American people know the problem is too much government control over health care,” said Turner.

She also says his characterization of what those millions of new people with health care coverage are receiving is badly misleading.

“He’s saying people have health care.  No, they have health insurance.  Ask people how hard it is to find a doctor to see them.  People on Medicaid still have to go to hospital emergency rooms, particularly if they need specialty care,” said Turner.

Turner says the reasons for Obamacare’s failures are obvious.

“The health insurance companies are absolutely in straitjackets.  The American people are being told the kind of health insurance they must buy, soup to nuts and absolutely everything anybody could think of, instead of actually having a policy that may work for them and their families that they may be able to afford.  That’s not a choice they have right now,” said said Turner.

She fears a Hillary Clinton presidency would look to add a public option or some other way to increase government control of the health care system.  Bill Clinton hinted similarly by suggesting those not qualifying for subsidies should be able to buy in to Medicare or Medicaid at a cost that’s comfortable for them, even if they don’t qualify for them.

Turner says that’s a recipe for disaster.  She says the average senior citizen couple pays about $160,000 into the Medicare system but ends up needing more than $400,000 in care.  She says the math of stuffing more people into that system should be clear to everyone.

“The system is not sustainable.  It will go broke.  It will go broke even faster if you put more people on it,” said Turner.

The Obama administration is also reportedly split on what do about insurance companies dropping out of the exchanges and demanding reimbursement in the billions of dollars.  Some in the administration are apparently trying to work around existing law that forbids insurance company bailouts to keep the system alive.

At the same, the Justice Department is also fighting back against court challenges from insurance companies to pay them overdue subsidies.

Turner says this contradiction shows a fierce debate playing out within the administration.

“You have a big disagreement between the political people who want to do everything they can to rescue Obamacare and the civil servants who understand that these payments are illegal.  Congress has passed very specific legislation forbidding any more corporate welfare,” said Turner.

Turner says this public infighting, plus the Clinton comments prove this administration understands the perilous state of our health care system.

“They know it’s in trouble.  We have been talking since the beginning, since before this law passed, about the problems with this law.  It was totally predictable that this was going to happen.  Finally the supporters are saying it has problems.  I think it is a whole other level when former President Bill Clinton basically says the law is a mess and a crazy scheme,” said Turner.

She says it will be difficult to fix the law because the Democrats are only interested in spending more money in a bad direction and Republicans want nothing to do with that.  Turner says real negotiation will have to take place since Republicans will have to be part of the discussions, unlike 2010 when the law passed with support only from Democrats.

But Turner isn’t interested in tinkering with what she sees as a failure.  She wants to return to healthy competition in the health care sector.

“Give consumers choices.  They’re happy with the product.  They’re engaged in helping to make sure that they spend their health care dollars wisely.  And they see the savings when they make smart decisions,” said Turner.

“That’s what we need more of, not more government spending and government control, thinking that somehow we’re going to be able to spend enoughto that everybody can have all the health care they want all the time without any strings attached.  That’s not possible,” said Turner.

 

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More Tea Anyone?

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Adam Ulbricht of Radio America examines the role of the Tea Party in the upcoming 2012 November elections. FreedomWorks Josh Eboch and South Carolina Senator Jim DeMint weigh in, while highlighting what they believe will be another successful election for the movement.

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The News Part 1

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We have the biggest moments from Tuesday night’s debate.  What did McCain and Obama say about the current financial crisis?  What new idea does McCain have for helping struggling homeowners?  And how do they differ on energy policy?  We have the top news from Wednesday, October 8, 2008.

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The News Part 2

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More of the day’s biggest headlines…how are Obama and McCain different when it comes to health care reform?  What significant action did the Fed take on Wednesday to help ease the financial crisis?  And what is Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson saying about where we stand in this crisis?  We have all the answers.  Listen here!

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