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Democrats are quite upset about President Trumps decision to ramp up the war in Afghanistan and Im upset about it too, but I just have to ask: Do they remember that their own nominee had the most hawkish foreign-policy record in the race?

Now, I really cant say enough about how much I disagree with President Trumps decision to remain involved and to send up to 4,000 more troops into this disastrous war. After 16 years, somewhere between hundreds of billions and even trillions of dollars and thousands of American military (plus tens of thousands of civilian) lives lost and the U.S.-backed government controls less than 60 percent of the countrys territory. Candidate Trump was right: Its time to get out, and Im disappointed to see that he seems to have changed his mind.

Disappointed, by the way, does not mean that Im surprised. After all, Donald Trump is far from the first person to act more hawkish in the Oval Office than he did on the trail. Remember candidate versus President Obama? During the 2008 campaign, his supporters drove around with bumper stickers that spelled his name with a peace symbol instead of an O, only for him to immediately send 30,000 more troops into Afghanistan as soon as he was in office. Truly, it seems as if its nothing more than a pipe dream to hold out hope that any president, traditional politician or not, would ever be able to stand up to the military-industrial complex once landing in office.

It would be bad enough if Democrats were simply criticizing President Trumps hypocrisy on this issue. Yes, if someone is criticizing only Trumps hypocrisy, and did not criticize President Obamas, then that, of course, makes that person a hypocrite himself. But unfortunately, criticizing President Trumps evolution on this issue isnt even the most obnoxious thing those on the left are doing right now: Some Democrats are expressing horror at his decision to ramp up involvement on its face, when their own candidate, who they themselves championed, was a war-drum-beating neoliberal who would have brought us anything but peace.

Make no mistake: The selection of Hillary Clinton as the Democratic nominee does not suggest that the party wanted to move away from BushObama interventionism. Rather, it suggests the opposite. Remember those 30,000 troops that President Obama sent overseas? Clinton initially wanted 40,000. She was instrumental in pressuring President Obama to go to war in Libya, and she spearheaded the disastrous regime-change effort there (to be fair, Donald Trump had supported the regime change as well). One of her biggest foreign-policy influences was Iraq-surge-architect General Jack Keane who made a name for himself by continually calling for greater military intervention in Iraq, Syria, and Afghanistan and Keane has since reported that Clinton once told him she had made a mistake in not pushing for that surge. She continually supported much greater military involvement in Syria than Barack Obama did; the list goes on and on.

The person whom Democrats chose to represent their party in 2016 is about as well-documented of a hawk as they come, and now were seeing some on the left posturing as if their party champions diplomacy and peace. Senator Jeff Merkley (D., Ore.) was critical of President Trumps intention to bolster military action in Afghanistan, slamming his decision to put additional U.S. troops on the ground because it is long past time that we work toward strategies to wind down our operations. Representative Ro Khan (D., Calif.) tweeted: Democrats should be clear and bold: We are for withdrawal. Khans sentiment seemed to extend to party leadership; House minority leader Nancy Pelosi actually had the nerve to release a statement saying, We have wasted an enormous amount of blood and treasure in Afghanistan and lets get out!

To be fair, as an article in Vox points out, not every Democrat went so far as to criticize the plan because of their opposition to increased or continued involvement. Some, like Senator Kirsten Gillibrand (D., N.Y.), stuck to simply criticizing the plans lack of details, while others have stayed completely silent. But seeing Democratic politicians such as Pelosi suddenly pretending to be concerned about a politician choosing military intervention just because its politically convenient is nothing short of maddening. A President Hillary Clinton absolutely would not have decided to end the Afghan War. Nothing in her record even remotely suggests that she would have, and Pelosi and others damn well know thats true.

It is correct, of course, that we do need to get out but its absolutely laughable for these Democrats to be acting as though they are somehow the answer to our intervention exhaustion. They had the chance, after all, to present their answer to foreign-policy problems with their 2016 nomination, and the answer they chose came beating the drums of war...all while they stood confidently behind her.

Katherine Timpf is a reporter for National Review Online.

Originally posted here:
Do Democrats Remember That They Nominated a Hawkish Candidate? - National Review

Drew Angerer/Getty Images

This weekend I had the misfortune to read Roxane Gays recent New York Times op-ed, in which she reflects on Charlottesville, Va., and waxes poetic about how much she wishes Hillary Clinton had won. She writes:

I keep thinking about how different things would be if Hillary Clinton had been elected president. I was, like so many of us, wildly overconfident about her chances. Her presidency was a certainty in my mind and in my heart. And then, it wasnt. Instead, it is 2017 and white supremacists no longer feel the need to wear hoods to hide their racism and anti-Semitism. I am a black woman and I live in a country where the president does not disavow racism.

I cant believe peopleespecially black peopleare still using this moment to push a tired, useless narrative about how much better things would have been if corporate Democrats remained in power. What a shame.

Let me be the one to break the news: Hillary Rodham Clinton is not and never has been our savior. Hillary would not have saved us.

While it is understandable to react to the current racial crises with horror, it is bizarre and ultimately unproductive to conclude that things would have been significantly better under a Hillary Clinton presidency. Gay and others on the left are perpetuating a neoliberal white-savior myththe delusion that Clinton would have swooped in and saved us from the white supremacists in our midst. Its obvious that the same woman who called black children superpredators, the same woman who co-signed racist policies that decimated black families and used racist tropes to attack Barack Obama in 2008, would not have ushered in some kind of racial utopia or led us to the proverbial mountaintop.

More importantly, the simple fact is that we dont have to guess what would have happened if Hillary had won. I can tell you exactly what would have happened because we have strong evidence from recent history. If Hillary had won, the vast majority of Democrats and Republicans would have continued to deny the fact that white supremacy still exists in the United States. If Hillary had won, the critical insights of Ferguson, Mo., youths, Black Lives Matter activists and indigenous people standing up at Standing Rock would have continued to be sidelined. If Hillary had won, millions of liberals (especially elites) would still be sleeping, tucked comfortably in their delusions of inclusion. And the painful realities of white supremacy that are now being openly discussed and confronted would have been swept under the rug of respectable, bipartisan denial.

We would not be better off with widespread ignorance (or apathy) about the sleeper cells of white supremacists infiltrating every sphere of power. While many contend that Donald Trump has enabled white supremacists, the truth is that our whole entire society has enabled white supremacists since its inception. The idea that Trump magically created or single-handedly enabled white supremacists is as historically shortsighted as it is politically inaccurate. If anything, his presidency is helping to wake people up to ongoing realities.

Trump did not magically create white supremacy or fundamentally alter the racial power structure of this country. White supremacist groups, long absorbed into (and tolerated by) the majority population, surged under Barack Obamas presidency. A recent Washington Post/ABC poll shows that nearly 1 in 10 adults, or 22 million U.S. citizens, call it acceptable to hold neo-Nazi or white supremacist views. And thats just the percentage of people who were willing to admit that they embrace white supremacy. A 2016 survey demonstrated that about a third of Trump supporters described African Americans as less intelligent than whitesand about one-fifth of Hillary Clinton supporters expressed the same racist view.

Sure, thousands of racist extremists might not have felt empowered to take to the streets without an overtly racist president But lets face it: These people (and their moderate white enablers) would have still been spreading cancerous views, making covert discriminatory decisions and helping to oppress people of color under a Hillary Clinton presidency. But apathy and denial would have continued to prevail under the banner of liberal progress.

And while Clinton did give lip service to systemic racism during the Democratic National Convention last year, the fact remains that she has yet to take full ownership of her role (and that of her political party) in perpetuating the very same systematic racism she ostensibly denounced. As Gloria Wekker demonstrates in her brilliant book White Innocence, white populations across the globe are socialized to deny or minimize their role in maintaining racismand Clinton is no exception.

Many people still havent learned the basic lesson of the 2016 election: Over 60 million people voted for an overt racist endorsed by the Ku Klux Klan because we live in a racist society. The white supremacists who are openly marching have been tolerated and normalized by white communities for generations. Each new day brings fresh empirical evidence that while some Republicans claim to disapprove of Trumps open defense of white supremacists in Charlottesville, they dont disapprove quite enough to stop supporting him.

In other words, millions of people in this country, most of them white, either openly embrace white supremacy or openly embrace politicians who openly embrace white supremacy.

While I, too, am horrified by Trumps presidency and all that it reveals about our nation, it is a good and necessary thing that widespread attention is finally being focused on the enduring reality of white supremacy. We now have a unique opportunity to see and name systematic racism clearly and think strategically about the kinds of social and political transformations that will be needed to create anti-racist change.

Those with a platform (especially but not only black intellectuals) should use it to help the public understand that our society has been enabling white supremacy for centuries. Now is not the time to wish for a Hillary Clinton presidency or to lapse into white saviorism. Instead, anti-racists of all backgrounds should seize this moment to challenge the pervasive racial denial that still exists across the political spectrum and build the collective action we need to create a more just society.

Weve got work to do, and Hillary Clinton sho aint gonna do it for us.

Read more from the original source:
Hillary Is Not Your White Savior - The Root

Hillary Clintons pastor has been caught plagiarizing part of a prayer he sent the ex-presidential candidate the day after she lost the election and later published in a book released last week.

The Rev. Bill Shillady said he was stunned to learn his prayer, Sunday is Coming, was so similar to a blog post written by an Indiana pastor in March 2016, CNN reported.

Shillady has apologized to the Rev. Matt Deuel and will credit the Mission Point Community Church Pastor in future additions of his book, "Strong for a Moment Like This: The Daily Devotions of Hillary Rodham Clinton," The New York Post reported. Clintons image appears on the cover of the book and she wrote the forward.

The book is based on emails that the Rev. Bill Shillady exchanged with Clinton between April 2015 and December of last year, and Shillady readily admits his musings and devotions are based as much on Scripture as on the perspective of other pastors, more than 200 of which are credited in his book.

Mary Catherine Dean, editor-in-chief of Shilladys publisher, Abingdon Press, said in a statement, We fully accept his explanation that he did not intentionally leave Matt Deuels passages unattributed.

Deuel contacted CNN four days after the book was released after he noticed Shilladys writings appeared inspired by his work.

For example, Deuel wrote, "Death will be shattered. Hope will be restored. Redemption is coming. But first, we must live through the darkness and seeming hopelessness of Friday."

Shillady's email to Clinton, published in his book, says, "Death will be shattered. Hope will be restored. But first, we must live through the darkness and seeming hopelessness of Friday."

Several other passages and ideas in Deuels column were echoed by Shillady and left unattributed.

Deuel told CNN he was shocked when he read Shilladys email to Clinton, which was posted on CNN.com and realized it was his words. But he also noted he is not interested in publicly pursuing anything.

"The last thing the world needs right now is two pastors having a public dispute over a blog. The reality is, there's nothing new under the sun," he said to CNN.

The concept and phrase Its Friday, but Sunday is coming, referring to Jesus death and coming resurrection on Sunday, is a common thread. Deuel himself was inspired to write his blog post by an even earlier sermon on the topic.

"If my blog then, in turn, inspired Rev. Shillady and it was used to encourage Hillary Clinton, then praise God for that! Could it have been done differently? Probably," Deuel said to CNN. "But for me to fire back publicly would be inappropriate and out of line on my part."

Originally posted here:
Hillary Clinton's pastor caught plagiarizing portion of new book - Metro US

There they are! President Donald Trump and former Secretary of StateHillary Clinton make appearances in the opening credits for American Horror Story: Cult.

In the bloody, patriotic-themed first look, which was released on Monday, August 21, members of the cult are seen wearing creepy masks of the 2016 Republican and Democratic presidential candidates. The credits are set to a slower rendition of the FX series' usual theme song.

Returning stars Sarah Paulson, Evan Peters and Cheyenne Jackson receive top billing in the credits, followed by newcomers Billie Lourd and Alison Pill.

Cult begins on election night in Michigan and tackles the real-life political event and its aftermath, though it will not feature characters portraying the nominees. The cast of the new season also includes returnees Emma Roberts, Frances Conroy, Adina Porter and Mare Winningham, and newcomers Colton Haynes, Lena Dunham and Leslie Grossman.

Franchise creator Ryan Murphy first revealed that season 7 of AHS would focus on the election during an appearance on Watch What Happens Live With Andy Cohen. "The season that we begin shooting in June is going to be about the election that we just went through," he said earlier this year. "I think that will be interesting for a lot of people."

American Horror Story: Cult premieres on FX on Tuesday, September 5, at 10 p.m. ET.

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'American Horror Story: Cult' Opening Credits Feature Creepy Donald Trump and Hillary Clinton Masks - Us Weekly

Hillary Clinton's former campaign aides and other liberals who still lamenting the results of the 2016 election fired back at the New York Times on Monday for how the paper covered Clinton last year.

Times reporter Glenn Thrush was bombarded by critics on Monday when he shared a news article on Twitter about the Secret Service running out of money to pay its staff due to President Trump and his family's frequent traveling.

"Trump's gilded lifestyle is bankrupting the Secret Service," Thrush tweeted.

One person sarcastically replied to Thrush's tweet, "But the emails," a reference to the wide and extensive media coverage of Clinton's private email server throughout the election.

Thrush replied by publishing a series of tweets mocking the critique and pointed out other elements of Clinton's campaign that many political observers have said cost her the election.

"But hour-long speeches that should have been 10 minutes, but complacency, but Bernie, but generational apathy, but silly war with the media," he said in one message. "But why-do-we-need-to-go-to-Wisconsin, but setting up an email server in Chappaqua when you know the right-wing-conspiracy is out to get you," he said in another.

That didn't sit well with Clinton's supporters, who relitigated the campaign as they replied to Thrush.

Democratic activist Peter Daou replied to Glenn Thrush's tweet by accusing him of using "every stale mainstream narrative about 2016."

Joan Walsh, the liberal writer for the Nation magazine, compared the Times election coverage to the way the media covered the lead up to the war in Iraq.

"Seriously, the Times needs to hire an outside investigator to look at the 2016 election the way it did the run-up to Iraq War," she said. "Or else its best reporters will lose credibility in Twitter beefs trying to 'balance Times bad email coverage with Clinton flaws."

But Thrush's colleague Maggie Haberman said if the Times erred in its coverage, it's in that it didn't report on the Clinton campaign's dysfunction.

"The mess that campaign was was extremely undercovered pre-election," Haberman wrote on Twitter.

Clinton and her defenders have cited dozens of factors that they say tipped the election, including interference by Russia, lack of resources at the Democratic National Committee and sexism. Clinton has said she bears some responsibility for her loss but she more often blames outside forces.

"I was on the way to winning," she said in May, "until the combination of [then FBI Director] Jim Comey's letter on Oct. 28 and Russian WikiLeaks raised doubts in the minds of people who were inclined to vote for me but got scared off and the evidence for that intervening event is, I think, compelling [and] persuasive."

Team Clinton has also said that the national media gave excessive attention to the federal investigation into her email server, something they say that news organizations have not accounted for.

However, there is evidence to suggest Clinton got more breaks from the media than Trump did. A study by the Harvard Kennedy School's Shorenstein Center published in December said that 77 percent of coverage related to Trump was negative, and that 64 percent of Clinton's coverage was negative.

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Hillary Clinton supporters still moaning about media coverage nearly 10 months later - Washington Examiner