Rejecting Tomi Lahren's Pink Slime Pro-Choice Perspectives

In offering analysis after President Donald Trump nominated Brett Kavanaugh to be on the Supreme Court, Fox News commentator Tomi Lahren opined that conservatives seeking to overturn Roe v. Wade are effectively spitting on the Constitution.

Lahren has been outspoken in her adherence to abortion rights.  She was separated from Glenn Beck's "The Blaze TV" last year because of her inconsistent opinions about abortion.  This was sparked by an appearance on ABC's The View in which she argued that it was hypocritical to be anti-choice and be a small government conservative.    Beck insisted that he wanted to terminate Lahren for lacking intellectual integrity.

“I can’t speak for the company and why they did it, but it had nothing to do with being pro-choice...
What I have a problem with is somebody who will change their point of view or that will say absolutely crazy, red meat things, and not have any intellectual firepower to back it up. Have the intellectual integrity to be able to back things up.”

Now Lahren laments that some conservatives want a Supreme Court to carry out religious judicial activism to get rid of Roe v. Wade (1973).  Tantalizing pro-choice red meat but it like the pink slime substitute which some fast food outlets use to sell dollar menu items to a hungry public even though it causes indigestion.

Lahren assumes that any rollback of Roe would be premised on religious issues.  Even the Roe decision recognizes that government has interests in unborn life in the last trimester that is viable.  Prenatal medicine has made great leaps of advancement so viability is pushed closer to the 20th week of pregnancy.  No signs of religion in this hermaneutic. And that does not even consider the scientific fact that human life begins at the moment of conception

Pro-Choice jurisprudence currently rests on the shaky foundation of abortion as being included in a right to privacy that is within  penumbras and emanations of the Bill of Rights, as applied to states by the Fourteenth Amendment.  Justice Blackmun's holding in Roe is a quintessential example of judicial activism, legislating from the bench for the entire nation.

Conceptually, a texualist originalist led Supreme Court could rule that "the right to privacy" is not enumerated within the Federal Constitution and that the Tenth Amendment is applicable.  This would throw the abortion issue back to the states, where it resided prior to the 1973 judicial fiat.  Some states, like California and New York, would have liberal abortion laws, while other states may be more restrictive.   That sort of subsidiary jurisprudence sounds like small government conservatism.

Maybe Lahren's political science studies at UNLV did not adequately cover jurisprudence.  She seems to think that it is unconstitutional for the Supreme Court to overrule bad precedent or is judicial activism.   In his confirmation hearing to become Chief Justice in 2005, John Roberts noted that stare decisis does not hold as a legal precedent when a matter was wrongly decided.  But in Tomi Lahren's legal logic, Brown v. Board of Education (1954) that overturned the Separate but Equal standard of  Plessy v. Ferguson (1896) was just spitting on the Constitution too. 

It is lamentable that Fox News turns to Tomi Lahren for legal analysis.  In little more than a year, she has shifted her abortion rights advocacy from being premised on what she believes is small government conservatism to combating religious judicial activism.  No wonder she burned her bridge at The Blaze TV for lacking intellectual integrity. 

Some may want to consume pink slime perspectives because they are spicy tasty morsel temptations, but assuredly many leave the establishment when such dreck is  seen on the television menu.

Chuck Schumer Supposes Significant GOP Dissent on Trump

Liberally Aborting Character Assessment

It would seem that Joy Behar does not have a change in view after the Bill Cosby indictment on sexual assault almost 14 years ago.  After all, his character does not matter if he supports the acceptable progressive positions.  So much for character.

Channeling The Force on the Hawkeye Hustings

Presidential candidates spend lots of time doing retail politics in New Hampshire and Iowa to convince first contest voters to support them.  Often they repeat the same refrains time after time, which gets to be old hat to journalists on the campaign beat but sounds fresh to new audiences. 

So it's refreshing when a candidate breaks from well worn scripts to show some humanity.  Senator Ted Cruz let loose with a couple of classic Star Wars impressions during a public availability in Iowa. 

The coven on ABC's "The View" was not impressed with Cruz's impressions of Yoda and Darth Vader as they called the exercise embarrassing.  Of course the self proclaimed comediennes who are regulars on The View lean so far left that they would never have a kind word for a Republican. But few GOP primary voters would be bewitched enough to watch the televised progressive feminist gab-fest.

This is not the first time in which Cruz has publicly demonstrated his audiographic memory on cinematic notable quotables. In  November, Cruz did an off-the-cuff rendition of the Miracle Max scene from "The Princess Bride" (1987).   Will the next media moment be from Monty Python's "And Now for Something Completely Different" (1972)  or from "Monty Python and the Holy Grail" (1975).

Santorum Corrects "The View" on Planned Parenthood

In the midst of the effort to defund Planned Parenthood, longshot Republican Presidential hopeful former Senator Rick Santorum (R-PA) dared to school "The View" about Planned Parenthood.



Santorum pointed to up to date information showing the Planned Parenthood President Cecile Richards lied to Congress about her organization giving mammograms.  The tough questioning in Congress over defunding Planned Parenthood may have wiped the smarmy smile off of Ms. Richard's face.

 Santorum hopes to repeat his values oriented blue collar conservative grassroots success which allowed him to win the 2012 Iowa Caucuses.  Despite his second place finish in 2012, Santorum is barely registering 1% in the polls, did not connect well at the Value Voters Summit (which should be his crowd) and he seems permanently assigned to the undercard table for the GOP debates.

One wonders what good is Santorum's campaign in a crowded field of a baker's dozen of serious Republican candidates.  Is it just Potomac Fever?  Does he honestly believe that his campaign can catch lightning again?

Santorum's factual interaction with Whoopie Goldberg put lie to the persisting Planned Parenthood propaganda about women's health care services like mammograms.  Whether die hard progressives will accept that truth is another matter, but at least their flawed facts were charitably challenged.

Perhaps this is Santorum's moment in the sun in the 2016 cycle. What a fitting moment for an earnest traditional values candidate whose biography emulates living out pro life values. 

Late Night POTUS Rimshots

What sort of leader goes on a late night talk show to make his first comments on a supposed terror threat which closed down a score of US diplomatic missions in the Middle East and deny domestic spying programs?

The same one who went on televised gab-feast know as ABC's "The View" to further the lie that an obscure American YouTube video sparked a terror attack in Benghazi, Libya on September 11th 2012 which killed four Americans including Ambassador Chris Stevens.  Afterwards, this Chief Executive spoke at the the United Nations and insisted that: "The future must not belong to those who slander the prophet of Islam."

While live blogging on President Obama's nearly hour long press conference which seemed to have been called to quell murmurs in the media that the President was not taking things seriously by going to Jay Leno for making big news, Hugh Hewitt tweeted:  "Obama is a collection of cliches surrounded by an Oval Office."  It is arguable that based upon his persistent partisan pugnaciousness and predilection towards folly that Mr. Obama is better characterized as a pack of punchlines.

It's a Mad world.  Alas these jokes are not confined to Late Night rim shots or adolescent inspired humor magazines but are entrenched in the center of power in the District of Calamity (sic) for the next 3 1/2 years (at least). 

h/t: Kevin Siers

Whoopsie--The View on Whoopi's Failed Mormon Smear

Ann Romney taped an appearance on ABC's The View. When the visit got serious (4:14 mark of video), panelist Whoopie Goldberg posed a poignant question to the prospective First Lady:

WHOOPI GOLDBERG: As first lady, if you get the job, it’s going to entail a lot of things, and one of those things is going to be talking to the mothers whose children are coming home in bags, you know, from wars. Now, I know -- I believe that your religion doesn’t allow you to go fight.

ANN ROMNEY: No, that's not correct. We have many, many members of our faith that are serving in armed services.

GOLDBERG: Okay, um, I say that because when I read about your husband, what I had read, and maybe you can correct this is that the reason that he didn’t serve in Vietnam was because it was against the religion. That’s what I read.

 ROMNEY: No, that's not correct. He was serving his mission and you know my five sons have also served missions. None served in the military.

It seems that Ms. Goldberg confused the Church of Jesus Christ of the Latter Day Saints (a.k.a. Mormons) with Quakers, Jehovah's Witnesses, Seventh Day Adventists or other small American Christian pacifist oriented denominations.

 Mrs. Romney was astute to highlight all of her sons being called to mission (through their church) which helped mature them and them better citizens. It tacitly acknowledged Mormon culture while accentuating the virtues from the practice.

 Perhaps Goldberg was not at all ignorant about Latter Day Saint practice of faith.  Her query gave credence to the chicken hawk charge (never served in uniform) as well as implying strange religious practices while conjuring notions of body bags from future American "aggression".

Whoopi's whoopsie strikes me as a ham-handed attempt to play the Mormon card.  This sort of ad hominem attack seems like a desperate ploy to bolster a faltering incumbent by scaring unconvicted low-information voters with borderline religious bigotry.  It could also have been foray to bog the Romney campaign to explain subtleties of Mormon theology, which can differ with most traditional Christian creeds.

Of course, First Lady Michelle Obama and President Obama got comparative softball questions when they were last on the View on September 25th, rather than meet with any world leaders after addressing the United Nations.   That was when "Barack" said that he was just eye candy. Yet that fluff View interview still made some important news because Mr. Obama's careful statement about the attack on the Benghazi consulate contradicts the supposed Rose Garden "Act of Terrorism" claim at the Hofstra debate.


Obviously the producers of "The View" were remiss at doing background briefs for their coterie of star chatters.  But progressive minds also seemed to have missed the memo from Chicago about now eschewing negative advertising.  Karl Rove observed that the Obama campaign has pulled negative ads in swing states and now is only showing positive pieces touting Obama's accomplishments.  It seems that the debates have wrecked $100 million negative advertising blitz on opponent Gov. Mitt Romney (R-MA).   Maybe the Obama campaign is relying upon their media surrogates to continue doing the dirty work as well as the puerile social media Binders of Women meme.

h/t: Real Clear Politics

Obama's Mickey Mouse Diplomacy

At first, when President Barack Obama was planning his trip to New York to speak at the United Nations General Assembly, he did not have enough time to schedule a meeting with Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu.  After the rioting at the US Embassy in Cairo on September 11th and threatening words from Egyptian President (and Muslim Brotherhood leader) Muhamed Morsi, President Obama found it convenient to cancel with Morsi. 

Rather than slight the leader of the Ummah, the "Leader of the Free World" declined to meet with any foreign leaders.  Instead, Obama's Mickey Mouse diplomacy was to go on ABC-TV's "The View". Mr. Obama had such a hard hitting interview with his wife on "The View" that he could quip that the President was just "eye candy."

But this was not the first time that the House of Mouse has bent over backwards to help the Celebrity-in-Chief.  In January, Mr. Obama wanted to announce a strategy to improve tourism and travel using Disney World's Cinderella's castle as a backdrop.  So Disney closed down Main Street for the morning to accommodate the President's 13 minute photo op. 

Serious voters may decide to exile Mr. Obama from Fantasyland on the Potomac come January 20th, 2013.