Tighter security checks on refugees in U.S.? At least for one night, U.S. Rep. @GerryConnolly's concise and to-the-point logic and reason (re refugees) actually triumphed on American TV last night. Sensible people across the U.S. should enjoy it while we can...; #Syria #refugees #Paris #terrorism #ISIS

Does the U.S. need tighter security checks on refugees? @GerryConnolly & @CWS_global's Erol Kekic discuss https://t.co/FTPPpl4oRZ

— PBS NewsHour (@NewsHour) November 20, 2015

PBS NewsHour

Does the U.S. need tighter security checks on refugees? 

November 19, 2015 at 7:07 PM ET

Video at: http://www.pbs.org/newshour/videos/#163250

Transcript: http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/does-the-u-s-need-tighter-security-checks-on-refugees/#transcript

Highly recommend you watch this video from last night's PBS NewsHour, and not just because it may be the only fair-minded discussion of the  Syrian/Iraqi refugee debate I've seen on American TV this year, where someone who was arguing for both logic and accountability from the federal government wasn't sandbagged.

It features the insightful comments of Rep. Gerry Connolly, the new Democratic Congressman 

who represents Northern Virginia, and specifically, Arlington County, where I lived for 15 years, roughly about 5 miles from Georgetown.

Rep. Connolly replaced bombastic, combative and often over-the-top longtime Rep. Jim Moran, 

Moran, not unlike Mayor Joy Cooper in beleaguered Hallandale Beach, was considered by even 

people who voted for him, to often be an insufferable egomaniac with a deep-and-abiding love for TV camera lights that challenged New York Senator Charles Schumer's widely-known love for the limelight, fancied himself a shoot-from-the-hips pol whose shortcuts with facts and logic often resulted in him shooting himself in the foot and getting into un-necessary and petty fights. 
And for good measure, just like Mayor Cooper in Hallandale Beach, Moran has a pugnacious son with a penchant for criminality and mischief but who -surprise- considers himself above the law.

Gerry Connolly was a generally respected politician who stood out among Northern Virginia's lock-step liberal mindset when I lived in Arlington, back when I was still a DLC Democrat, because he was the sort of principled Democrat whom we have far too few of these days in DC, to wit, someone who thinks that well-thought out, fair-minded results that actually solve real problems mattered more than ideology or party. (Usually.)

This is the sort of TV performance that catches people's attention outside of his immediate area, and not just because you have to know that there were NOT exactly many among the 47 Dems who, having voted against President Obama yesterday on refugee resettlement in the U.S., didn't relish the idea of going on national TV and telling everyone why he and his supporters were wrong -again.

Especially when it's so much easier to just toe-the current DNC mindset and blithely assume the federal "bureaucracy" will handle everything correctly without any genuine accountability or benchmarks from Congress.

Like that's ever happened with positive results for most Americans.

Rep. Connolly's performance is also noteworthy precisely because he didn't fall for the usual trap of allowing the news media's own narrative to dominate the discussion, nor did he allow the discussion to drift off into other areas that would allow him to be trapped into a corner and painted as a heartless pol by the other guest, Erol Kekic of Church World Service.

Something that as I have gone on at length about here before many times, seems to frequently happen to most GOP members of Congress appearing on that sort of TV show pretty much without fail.

Usually because they are dumb enough to act like they will be treated fairly instead of aggressively by both host and fellow guests. 

The recent history of the GOP, even when they are in power, is, seemingly, to never learn from history.

Rep. Connolly's concise and to-the-point logic and reason (re refugees) actually triumphed on
American TV.  For at least one night anyway...

Sensible people across the U.S., like so many of you readers of this blog, should enjoy it while we can...

You can be sure there there won't be many more such examples before the end of the year.

Dave 

Hallandale Beach/Hollywood Blog: http://www.hallandalebeachblog.blogspot.com/ 

Twitter: @hbbtruth, https://twitter.com/hbbtruth/with_replies

Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/hbbtruth/ 

Linkedin: linkedin.com/in/david-bruce-smith-b945b37

BUSTED! Breitbart's Matthew Boyle reports that Sen. Marco Rubio was "outed" by a constituent over Rubio's lack of personal effort to meet with LEOs BEFORE the Gang of Eight released their very-flawed immigration bill; Daily Caller's Byron York on the deluge of angry anti-immigration bill email into Sen. Rubio's office; The shiny, new toy that is Rubio is now not-so shiny; audio of Rubio's interviews with Rush Limbaugh and Mark Levin

Right Scoop YouTube Channel video: FULL INTERVIEW: Nationally-syndicated radio show host Rush Limbaugh, the most-listened-to personality on American radio, discusses the Gang of Eight's immigration bill and its possible consequences with Florida Senator Marco Rubio. Uploaded April 18, 2013. http://youtu.be/dJjDbj6M16M 

BUSTED! Breitbart's Matthew Boyle reports that Sen. Marco Rubio was "outed" by a constituent over Rubio's lack of personal effort to meet with LEOs BEFORE the Gang of Eight released their very-flawed immigration bill; Daily Caller's Byron York on the deluge of angry anti-immigration bill email into Sen.  Rubio's office; The shiny, new toy that is Rubio is now not- so shiny; audio of Rubio's interviews with Rush Limbaugh and Mark Levin

BUSTED! Late Friday night we learned via Breitbart's Matthew Boyle that Sen. Marco Rubio was outed by a constituent over Rubio's lack of personal effort to meet with law enforcement officers, especially ICE agents, BEFORE the Gang of Eight released their very-flawed immigration bill. 

The bill was made public the day after Sen. Rubio met with the union head of ICE agents -for ONE HOUR!- and after Rubio and the others had secretly been meeting with pro-amnesty & GOP business establishment groups in Washington and elsewhere for MANY, MANY WEEKS. 

Personally, as a Rubio supporter, someone who was for him in 2009 when the Florida news media had already pretty-well handed the 2010 GOP U.S. Senate nomination to Florida Governor Charlie Crist, I think this public miscue is one that WILL haunt Rubio for a long time, since it is both symbolic and TRUE.

I think it directly undercuts his claim to both "authenticity" and being an honest broker on this issue, one that many Republicans had perhaps too willingly given him lots of latitude on, assuming that he would be someone who could take a public role larger than his two years in the Senate warranted, and meet with groups that had something tangible to add to the mix on border security before the bill was finalized.

And important because it reveals Rubio's blind spot, which is that he sometimes believes what he says about himself too much -not enough hubris!

I also think that much more than any of the Florida-based reporters or columnists or "experts" know or will acknowledge, this effort of Rubio to finesse something very important, will likely prove to some within the GOP's national rank-and-file that just like other American pols, though perhaps less frequently than most, there's what Rubio says, and then there's what he actually does when nobody is looking. 

For people who want border security first, and are not willing to compromise on that, for good reason, people like me, the upshot is that this mis-step proves to some of them that he is NOT yet someone to be implicitly trusted.

Especially in light of how little he has actually accomplished in Washington his first two years, outside of drawing attention to himself and the Syria issue, where he has been miles and miles ahead of both President Obama, Hillary Clinton and the U.S. Mainstream Media, as I've noted frequently on these pages.

Rubio invites suggestions to improve Gang of Eight bill. Comments are overwhelmingly, crushingly negative. ow.ly/ktTF0
— Byron York (@ByronYork) April 27, 2013

Rubio's inability or unwillingness to meet with people weeks ago whom he SHOULD HAVE, people with a real tangible insight into the immigration issue from a first-hand perspective, makes him appear to be what he is on this issue -NOT as tough or fair-minded as he advertises himself.

I honestly believe that because this issue is so important to many rank-and-file Republicans in parts of the country where they don't have a news media that is SO easily cowed by the professional amnesty and immigration rights groups the way they are routinely here in Florida
-esp. here in Miami and South Florida as I've documented dozens of times over the years here on the blog- where the groups practically hand reporters a script and the reporters dutifully read their lines as written.
On this issue, it's NOT journalism, it's public relations.

No place in the country is more skittish and less-honest in reporting truthfully on the negative effect of runaway illegal immigration, or unwilling to ask tough questions, than South Florida's news media, especially the Miami Herald.

(Even new young reporters to this market, like a certain new female reporter at WFOR-TV I could name, seem to absorb by osmosis the general understanding that seldom is heard a discouraging word on immigration, and thus they routinely do segments that are completely one-sided, and don't even think to ask questions that should be asked, but which here in Miami are never, ever asked for fear of what, being fired? 
Those of you who don't live here can't fully appreciate it, but reporting honestly on immigration is the Third Rail of South Florida, talked about in the abstract, perhaps, mostly here on this blog, but never ever actually seen on-the-air or in-print.)

So begins the first serious patch of political mis-steps, bad headlines and obvious displays of tone-deafness by Sen. Rubio, as his lofty abstract ideas about public policy get held up to their proper scrutiny and he is found wanting. 
It'll be interesting to see how he responds to this.
Will he adapt, evolve or double-down on what he's been doing and think he can ride it out.
While he'll probably be able to do the latter here in Florida, in the rest of the country, I wouldn't be so sanguine.

I believe that his personal reputation is about to get roughed-up but good by sincere and caring people outside of Florida who don't have to just grin-and-bear it like they do here in Florida.

I further believe that 2013 will prove to be the year where Rubio's sometimes patronizing myopia and faulty antennae will lead to him making some SERIOUS political enemies among fellow national Republicans and their supporters at the state and county levels.

And based on conversations with people and reading certain things I have, some of that antipathy and disregard he earns will last the rest of his political career, and cost him in ways that he can't even imagine now, because those people who are upset are mostly below the media's radar right now.
But by 2016, they'll be County party chairs in Iowa... and they'll be quoted in 2015 by the New York Times and by Politico and The National Journal...

People who never pass on an opportunity to make Rubio and his staffers suffer in small ways, or make him work much-harder than he needs to simply because they don't like the way that he's handled an issue that they care passionately about, and see Rubio as someone who didn't fight hard enough and long enough.

In short, someone who was too willing to work with Democrats to give them what they wanted, which is not enough attention to border security. 
Really.

You'll see.

The South Florida news media is, of course, completely under-reporting this issue, just as they do so many other issues that ought to be getting attention but don't.

They'll wait for someone else in another city to do that particular story, and then act like they were always working on it themselves, which is the usual excuse given when you talk to local reporters in-person and ask why real political news is NOT appearing in-print or on-air immediately like it would in other parts of the country, but instead, put in a freezer whjere they can report it when it's no longer relevant.

And it'll all be his own fault, too, since he's now starting to be viewed more realistically -as someone who perhaps prefers the spotlight a little TOO MUCH, prefers to go-along to actually standing strong against the GOP's Beltway/Chamber of Commerce Establishment that was, for decades, more-than-willing to take advantage of illegal immigrants, esp. in the agricultural sector.. 

Marco Rubio's charmed existence in the U.S. Senate so far is about to get some much-overdue and, it would seem to me, much-deserved turbulence.
But it will have little to do with anything any FL-based reporters or columnists say or write or uncover, but rather everything to do with his own bad choices and myopia, especially on the issue of immigration and its consequences.

The shiny, new toy is now not so shiny.
And will be less so by the end of the year.

RUBIO TOUTS TALK WITH ICE OFFICIAL WHICH SPURRED NO CHANGES TO IMMIGRATION BILL
by Matthew Boyle
27 Apr 2013, 12:58 AM PDT
http://www.breitbart.com/Big-Government/2013/04/26/Rubio-struggles-to-explain-to-constituents-why-ICE-agents-had-no-real-prior-input-into-immigration-bill




Right Scoop YouTube Channel video: Nationally-syndicated radio show host Mark Levine discusses the immigration bill and its possible consequences with Florida Senator Marco Rubio. Uploaded April 17, 2013. http://youtu.be/USG2SLWbKew
------
http://www.therightscoop.com

Debra Heine deconstructs President Obama's fanciful, tin-eared comments after capture of 2nd Boston terrorist, and reminds us of the sad reality he ignores: "The Terrorists Didn't Fail"; David Remnick's curiously sympathetic column on Boston terrorists will likely go unmentioned by his media pals, esp. Charlie Rose; Anorak (U.K.) reports: American ignorance forces Czech ambassador to issue statement saying Czechs are not Chechens

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 Debra Heine deconstructs President Obama's fanciful, tin-eared comments after capture of 2nd Boston terrorist, and reminds us of the sad reality he ignores: "The Terrorists Didn't Fail"; David Remnick's curiously sympathetic column on Boston terrorists will likely go unmentioned by his media pals, esp. Charlie Rose; Anorak (U.K.) reports: American ignorance forces Czech ambassador to issue statement saying Czechs are not Chechens

A collection of pieces re the murderous Tsarnaev brothers and the Boston Marathon bombings that you may've missed since Friday night when President Obama pretended we hadn't seen what we all had seen for ourselves this past week. The Terrorists Didn't Fail, The American News Media Did.
Wishing doesn't make it so.

Breitbart
The Terrorists Didn't Fail
By Debra Heine
20 Apr 2013, 6:15 PM PDT 

In response to Obama's rush to judgment:
These words from Obama's weak and uninspired statement following the capture of the second terrorist rang  hollow to my ears., 
"One thing we do know is that whatever hateful agenda drove these men to such heinous acts will not — cannot — prevail. Whatever they thought they could ultimately achieve, they’ve already failed. They failed because the people of Boston refused to be intimidated. They failed because, as Americans, we refused to be terrorized.", 

While Obama struggles to figure out what "hateful agenda" might have driven these men to such heinous acts, I have a newsflash for him.
They didn't fail.

Read the rest of her insightful column here:
http://www.breitbart.com/InstaBlog/2013/04/20/The-Terrorists-Didn-t-Fail

Debra Heine's past columns are at:
http://www.breitbart.com/Columnists/Debra-Heine


Los Angeles Times
FBI: Boston suspect Tamerlan Tsarnaev followed 'radical Islam'

By Andrew Tangel and Ashley Powers

April 20, 2013, 5:33 p.m.

http://www.latimes.com/news/nation/nationnow/la-na-nn-boston-bombing-suspect-radical-fbi-20130420,0,4341067.story

In the coming week, will Charlie Rose have his pal and New Yorker editor David Remnick on his PBS show or on the CBS Morning News so that Remnick can be asked some hard questions about his curious choice to write a sympathetic New Yorker column Saturday about the two terrorists, a column that in the end blamed both the U.S. and social media for what happened?
http://www.newyorker.com/talk/2013/04/29/130429ta_talk_remnick

Yes, we all already know the answer to that question is no, and we also note for the record the absence of the word Beslan in Remnick's column.
Beslan as in murderous Beslan school hostage crisis of 2004:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Beslan_school_hostage_crisis
Oh, THOSE Chechans!


Anorak (U.K.)
American ignorance forces Czech ambassador to issue statement saying Czechs are not Chechens
POSTED: 20TH, APRIL 2013

DID you hear the CNN anchorman root the Boston Marathon bombing in “the Islamic Czech Republic”?, Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, 19, and 6-year-old brother Tamerlan, 26, were born in Chechnya.

Ambassador Petr Gandalovič, Czech ambassador goes on the record:

Read the rest of the post at:
http://www.anorak.co.uk/354659/news/american-ignorance-forces-czech-ambassador-to-issue-statement-saying-czechs-are-not-chechens.html/

I wonder what this presages for the Winter Olympics in Sochi, Russia next February?
Even Putin can't lock up everyone in the city who isn't an Olympic employee.

About all those Blackhawk helicopters in Hollywood with police rappelling down with guns... Hollywood Police Training Exercise Aug. 2-3

"Blue Thunder" film trailer (1983). Speaking of Teaser Alert, is there anything about this film that is NOT disclosed in this trailer? http://youtu.be/sd3lDhyM21M

About all those Blackhawk helicopters in Hollywood with police rappelling down with guns... Hollywood Police Training Exercise Aug. 2-3

We received a short email from the City of Hollywood on Wednesday morning with a message that's worth sharing with anyone and everyone who will be in Hollywood for the next two days -hold off on making that 911 call when you see something that looks like a scene from Blue Thunder.

On Thursday, August 2, and Friday, August 3, the Hollywood Police Department, with assistance from the Department of Homeland Security, will be sponsoring a Master Rappelling training exercise. During the afternoon hours on both dates, Officers will be deployed from a Blackhawk helicopter at several government-owned locations throughout the City of Hollywood. For security purposes, these locations will not be disclosed. This is strictly a training event.

If it was real, we'd all be hearing... Wagner's Ride of the Valkyries


Apocalypse Now..Ride Of The Valkyries http://youtu.be/Gz3Cc7wlfkI