Dr. Ben Carson Says Iran Deal Proves U.S. President Obama Is 'Anti-Semitic', Encourages Americans to Demand a 'Better Deal'

Republican presidential hopeful Ben Carson recently asserted that "divider-in-chief" U.S. President Barack Obama's controversial nuclear deal with Iran proves he is anti-Semitic and encouraged American citizens to demand a "better deal" from Congress.

On this week's broadcast of "Fox News Sunday," the retired neurosurgeon further elaborated on earlier comments he made criticizing Obama's decision to significantly limit Tehran's nuclear ability in return for lifting international oil and financial sanctions.

"Well, all you have to do, Chris, is, like I have, go to Israel, and talk to average people, on all ends of that spectrum. And I couldn't find a single person there who didn't feel that this administration had turned their back on Israel," Dr. Carson told host Chris Wallace. "And I think the position of president of [the] United States should be one where you begin to draw people together behind a vision, not one where you castigate those who believe differently from you. I think it's a possibility for great healing, if it is used in the correct way."

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When asked what specifically is anti-Semitic "in what the president is saying," Carson, who is currently a top contender for the GOP nomination, responded, "I think anything is anti-Semitic that is against the survival of a state that is surrounded by enemies, and by people who want to destroy them. And to sort of ignore that, and to act like everything is normal there, and that these people are paranoid, I think that's anti-Semitic."

In an August op-ed for the Jerusalem Post titled "White House Employing Ugly Tactics to Sell a Rotten Iran Deal," Dr. Carson warned that the deal will enable $150 billion to "flow into the coffers of a rogue regime that systematically abuses the human rights of its own citizens, foments violence in the Middle East, funds terrorist proxies who have killed hundreds of American soldiers and whose leaders decry the United States as the 'Great Satan' and lead mass rallies featuring chants of 'Death to America.'"

He also criticized the Obama administration for failing to secure the release of four American hostages, including U.S. pastor Saeed Abedini, while negotiating with Iran, writing, "And let's not forget the American hostages who continue to suffer in captivity just as they did while talks proceeded apace and concluded with handshakes and smiles."

As Congress will vote next month on whether to approve or reject the deal, Dr. Carson encouraged the American people to "continue to demand a better deal with Iran that will dismantle Tehran's nuclear program and strengthen, rather than threaten, our nation's long-term security."

Dr. Carson is not the only Republican presidential hopeful to condemn the Iran deal: in a recent interview on CNN's "State of the Union," Arkansas Gov. Mike Huckabee called such negotiations "insane."

"I think it is one of the most dangerous situations that we face, not just for the Middle East but for the rest of the world in a long time," the 2016 candidate said on Sunday.

"This is essentially arming and equipping a terrorist state," added Huckabee, who will travel to Israel this week to talk about the deal with leaders there, according to the New York Daily News. "The Iranian government is not to be trusted and we're being pushed to get into a deal that gives us nothing but gives the Iranians the capacity to ultimately end up with a nuclear weapon."

Via: Gospel Herald

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[VIDEO] Biden: Most Important Thing Obama Can Do Is Get a Handle on Climate Change

(CNSNews.com) – Vice President Joe Biden said on Tuesday that climate change is the “single most important thing” that he and President Barack Obama will address during their eight years in office.

“This is the single most important thing that Barack Obama and Joe Biden can do in eight years of a presidency and vice presidency is to actually get a handle – get a handle -- on climate change,” Biden said at the White House’s clean energy summit.

As CNSNews.com previously reported, in his State of the Union address on Jan. 20, 2015, Obama said, “No challenge--no challenge--poses a greater threat to future generations than climate change," President Obama declared in his State of the Union Address on Tuesday night.

At the summit, staged to announce $4 billion in private sector investment in clean energy research and development and detail executive actions taken by Obama to increase the federal government’s role in investing and developing clean energy, Biden touted that role and importance of fighting climate change.

“What you’re doing really, really matters, and I want to tell you you’ve got a partner in us,” Biden said to a crowd of alternative energy advocates and activists. “We’ll do everything that’s reasonably possible, and there’s no pride of authorship here. We’re doing things that aren’t working.

“We could do more to make it work better for you, all to make it more attractive to invest and be engaged. Let us know, because this is the single most important thing that Barack Obama and Joe Biden can do in eight years of a presidency and vice presidency is to actually get a handle climate change,” he said.

Via: CNS News

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Fact Check Whacks Bill Clinton

Bill Clinton’s claim that Hillary did economic diplomacy because there was no Commerce Secretary

“She [Hillary Clinton] believed that part of the job as secretary of state was to advance America’s economic interests around the world. And, for much of the time she was secretary, for a number of complex reasons, we didn’t have [a] commerce secretary. And now we have got Penny Pritzker. And she’s very vigorous and very good, I think. But we didn’t have one. And so, if she hadn’t been doing this economic diplomacy work, nobody would have been doing it.”

— Former President Bill Clinton, interviewed on CNN’s “State of the Union,” June 14, 2015

Former president Clinton, in rebutting accusations that Hillary Clinton helped donors to the Clinton Foundation while serving as secretary of state, made an interesting point on one of the Sunday politics shows — that she had to engage in “economic diplomacy” because “much of time she was secretary,” there was no Commerce Secretary.

This made little sense to us, and it’s certainly easy to check. Was there such a gap in Commerce leadership that it was left to Clinton to conduct the administration’s economic diplomacy?

The Facts

The Commerce Department is sometimes described as the broom closet of the federal bureaucracy, in that it contains a number of unrelated agencies, such as the Census Bureau, the National Weather Service, the Patent and Trademark office, the Economic Development Administration, the National Telecommunications and Information Administration, and so forth. The notion that the commerce secretary was some sort of globe-trotting promoter of American industry only began to take hold in Clinton’s administration, when Ron Brown became commerce secretary.

The Commerce Secretary, in the department’s mission statement, “serves as the voice of U.S. business within the President’s Cabinet.” Commerce Department Order 1-1 says “the historic mission of the Department is ‘to foster, promote, and develop the foreign and domestic commerce’ of the United States.”

Via: Washington Post

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Wasserman Schultz: Obama ‘Should Use His Executive Authority’ -- 'We've Got to Make Progress'

(CNSNews.com) – Despite criticism of President Barack Obama’s pledge that he will use his executive authority and executive orders to advance his agenda regardless of Congress, Rep. Debbie Wasserman Schultz (D-Fla.) said the president “should use his executive authority.”

At the U.S. Capitol on Tuesday following the president’s State of the Union speech, CNSNews.com asked Congresswoman Wasserman Schultz,  “What do you think of the criticism about using executive order(s) to get things done on climate change or [the] minimum wage?”

“Well, the ball’s in their court,” she said, in reference to Republicans in the House of Representatives. “I mean, they have an opportunity to work with him.”

“The president made that very clear,” said Wasserman Schultz, who also is chairwoman of the Democratic National Committee. “We want to make sure that we’re working together and deepen our impact by passing legislation, but there are urgent challenges that we [are] facing and the president is going to have to use his executive authority.”

“And I agree that he should use his executive authority because if the Republicans continue to try to be obstructionists, then we’ve got to make progress,” Wasserman Schultz said.

Via: CNS News

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Rothman: NBC News State of the Union Coverage Identical to MSNBC

There was a time when there was a cleardistinction between NBC News and MSNBC. While MSNBC’s editorial slant was obvious, NBC News made an effort to ensure that its news coverage remained neutral enough so that they did not alienate non-liberal viewers. That distinction is seemingly gone.

During Brian Williams’ Tuesday night State of the Union Address coverage for NBC Nightly News, reporters Chuck Todd and Andrea Mitchellmade no effort to broadcast neutral commentary. Instead, they echoed themes that had previously been broadcast on MSNBC, only to a much larger audience.

Discussing the importance of the State of the Union, Mitchell took the opportunity of this coverage to repeat a dubious and unambiguously offensive assertion she had made earlier in the day on her own MSNBC show.

“One quick historic note,” she allowed herself. “It was the State of the Union back in 2002 whenGeorge W. Bush said those three little words, ‘Axis of Evil,’ including Iran, which was aligned against us with the Taliban and that blew up any hope of diplomacy with Iran until now.”

Disregard the fact that Mitchell seeks to conflate Iran’s post-9/11 risk-mitigating behavior as the equivalence of an alliance; or that Mitchell seems content to take the word of the administration that the White House’s push for diplomacy today is fruitful in spite Iranian officials’ statements to the contrary; or the fact that the administration has refused to release the text of a supposed breakthrough deal.

Even overlooking these points, Mitchell might have shown some respect for the hundreds of Americans killed as a result of Iranian-sponsored terrorism from 1979 – 2002 in her tenacious effort to litigate a 12-year-old political gripe.

RELATED: Andrea Mitchell: ‘Iran Was More or Less an American Ally’ Before Bush’s ‘Axis of Evil’ Remark

Moving on, NBC News’ chief White House correspondent Todd lamented a lack of dignity shown by Republicans who invited Duck Dynasty star Willie Robertson to the event.

“Three years ago after the shooting with Gabby Giffords, and for a couple State of the Unions in a row, everybody found a bipartisan date,” he recalled. “There was more of a dignified feeling about the guests you would invite. Boy, you can tell things are a lot different now when you’re inviting Duck Dynasty stars.”

Never mind that, as National Review’s Kevin Williamson scathingly observed, the pomp surrounding the State of the Union presently has all the dignity of walking backwards out of the queen’s chambers and is unbecoming of a republican government. For Todd, it is the invitation of a reality show star –- a conservative one at that -– to the sacred House chamber that has sapped dignity from this event.

Judging from this two-minute segment, the distinction between MSNBC and NBC News that was once self-evident has seemingly vanished. It makes you wonder how long it will take for NBC executives to recognize the redundancy and simply consolidate the two entities.

Via: Mediaite.com

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The Four Republican SOTU Responses Couldn't Agree On What To Say

There was no unified opposition at the conclusion of President Barack Obama's State of the Union address Tuesday night. Instead, four different Republicans -- representing, in some ways, four different factions of the Republican party -- had something to say to the nation.

They shared some of the same talking points: Obamacare is a disaster and Obama's economic agenda is ruining America's future. The GOP is trying to offer some kind of alternative to the electorate. But the similarities largely stopped there, in yet another display of the fractured Republican Party that has a chronic inability to present a coherent and singular vision to the country.

Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers (WA) spoke for the party's establishment, with the added bonus of being a woman in leadership at a time when the party's standing with women seems shaky. Sen. Mike Lee (UT) was the self-appointed leader of the tea party, who rebutted the president while attempting to represent that nebulous constituency that has so influenced the party since 2010. 

Sen. Rand Paul (KY) more or less represented himself, the lone 2016 aspirant to speak Tuesday night, and also gave voice to the libertarian sect. And Rep. Ileana Ros-Lehtinen (FL) addressed the Spanish-speaking audiences on behalf of the party's leadership, another attempt to reach a population with whom Republicans have been unpopular.

That just about covers everybody. Each constituency had a messenger, and ascendant members of the party had an opportunity to showcase themselves in the national spotlight.
The only problem is: It was hard to tell what exactly Republicans, as a whole, wanted Americans to take away from their multi-pronged rebuke of the president, other than their always-fervent opposition to Obama.

As the official voice of the party, McMorris Rogers continued the rebranding effort that has obsessed Republicans since the 2012 election. What exactly it was actually remained a bit opaque, but the tone was undeniably optimistic.

Via: TPM
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Tom Cotton Responds To Obama’s State Of The Union

Representative Tom Cotton (R., Ark.)  joined KARK Wednesday morning to respond to President Obama’s State of the Union, saying the President should have apologized for the harm Obamacare has done to many Americans, and that the President should focus his use of executive action on a rapidly deteriorating situation in the Middle East.

“The one thing I thought missing, more than anything from the speech, was an apology by Barack Obama for what Obamacare has done to Arkansans,” Cotton said, citing canceled plans, rising premiums and deductibles, and loss of doctors for many of his constituents.

Asked about the President’s proposed “Year of Action” through executive orders, Cotton responded, “The only surprising thing about the President’s call for more unilateral executive orders and decisions is the fact he thinks he hasn’t done enough of it.” Cotton noted the President’s changes to the Affordable Care Act through executive orders and his reluctance to enforce parts of the both the healthcare law and immigration law.

“Unfortunately, the one place he could take executive action more effectively, overseas, he continued to sound the bell for retreat and defeat in the world,” Cotton said.

As for what he would like to see in 2014, Cotton focused on protecting Americans from various facets of Obamacare. Cotton listed initiatives passed by the House that would allow Americans to keep their insurance plans cancelled by Obamacare, and would eliminate the penalty if they could not afford a new Obamacare plan.

Said Cotton, “There’s a whole host of ways that we can try to solve the problems Obamacare has created, if only President Obama and the Senate Democrats would realize Americans do not want this law.”

Via: WFB

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How Obamanomics Promotes Inequality

The great Obama contradiction on the economy is this: he takes credit for the improved economy, but openly admits that in this recovery almost all of the gains have gone to the very rich.

Here is the disturbing passage from Obama’s State of the Union speech that I refer to:

“What I believe unites the people of this nation…is the notion that if you work hard and take responsibility, you can get ahead.

“That belief has suffered some serious blows… Today, after four years of economic growth, corporate profits and stock prices have rarely been higher, and those at the top have never done better. But average wages have barely budged. Inequality has deepened. Upward mobility has stalled. The cold, hard fact is that even in the midst of recovery, too many Americans are working more than ever just to get by – let alone get ahead.  And too many still aren’t working at all.”

What a downer. This is hardly morning in America stuff. Obama likes to ridicule “trickle down economics” but under Obamanomics, almost nothing has even trickled down to the poor. He’s brutally honest in admitting that this has been effectively a non-recovery for a whole large segment of American society.  It’s not clear how Democrats think they can leverage that message of futility to their political advantage in November.

An alarming Fox News poll this week found that more than half of Americans still think the recession is still with us. Ironically, those who have seen the least progress tend to be single women, the young, Blacks, and Hispanics.  These were the very groups that voted in 2012 in large majorities to reelect Mr. Obama.

Via: The Foundry

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ANALYSIS: Obama proposes same-old discredited education ideas

During his State of the Union speech on Tuesday, President Obama once again called for renewed and vigorous funding of universal preschool programs at the state and national level–a favorite policy of the president that nevertheless is opposed by most education experts.

“Research shows that one of the best investments we can make in a child’s life is high-quality early education,” said Obama. “I’m going to pull together a coalition of elected officials, business leaders, and philanthropists willing to help more kids access the high-quality pre-K they need.”

Contrary to the president’s statements, research does not indicate that greater funding of early education efforts would be a worthwhile investment for the nation’s children. Experts from the American Enterprise Institute, the Brookings Institution and the Reason Foundation have all told The Daily Caller that there is very little evidence for the claims made by universal pre-K supporters.

While children enrolled in preschool tend to develop more quickly than their peers, the gains don’t last. By fourth grade, children who enrolled in preschool are no more intellectually or socially advanced than their peers, according to studies.

There is also scant evidence that expanding early education programs would have a noticeable reduction on crime or poverty, as liberals often claim.

Still, the evidence has not stopped Obama from frequently demanding increased funding for federal preschool programs like Head Start, as well as state efforts. Funding for pre-K was a major policy proposal in previous SOTU addresses as well as in other speeches the president gave throughout the year. (RELATED: Obama skirts Congress, funds pre-K through Obamacare)

Via: Daily Caller

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