Opinion by John Tutten:

I bet about right now you are getting a little weary from all the political chaff exploding around us. How about something a little different this week?

Here goes. A team of scientists from the University of California at Berkeley using a supercomputer have generated a vastly more complex model of the Darwinian “tree of life”. In a report published online in Nature Microbiology, the researchers explain how they have dramatically expanded the amount of diversity included in the new tree by incorporating new genomic data from 1000 little known organisms, primarily bacteria.

This latest version of the tree of life (which looks more like a bird to me) has three main branches that encompass all known life forms – Eukarya which includes animals, plants and us; Bacteria and Archaea, cellular life that live in extreme or harsh environments.

Darwin conceptualized his theory of natural selection acting on random mutation as a tree, a tree that took root when a collection of complex molecules in a totally random, unguided way self-organized into the first living cell. This first cell then began replicating and random changes in the DNA contained in its nucleus produced changes that were either beneficial or detrimental to its progeny. The beneficial changes survived to reproduce and the detrimental changes died out. This process extended for hundred of millions of years, life upon life, resulting in what could be characterized as a tree with increasingly intricate branches as is described in the Nature Microbiology report.

I do appreciate the work and effort it took to classify and catalog the incredible number of genomes we know of today. However, I have a real problem with Darwin’s original idea of a tree of life that these scientists expand upon. The concept is simply not supported by the archeological data we have. A more accurate botanical description of life arising on the planet would be that of a lawn, not a tree.

The fossil record clearly shows life in many forms arising independently, not from some common ancestor. From over 500 million years ago, the data we have from the Cambrian Explosion confirms that many of the body plans present today sprang into existence independently in parallel and in a period of time far too short for Darwinian evolution to have been the mechanism.

If Darwinian evolution was responsible for all life as it proponents assert, then there should be innumerable transitional forms that lead from lesser complex animals to more complex animals, in turn forming the tree of life. However, there is a dearth of transitional forms that have been found. The only confirmed data we have about life is the end of the tree’s branches. The larger connecting branches and the trunk are just scientific inference. The actual archeological data connecting all life forms together is not there and easily should be if Darwinian evolution was really responsible for all life.

What we know for sure is that the fossil record is characterized by sudden appearance and stasis of organisms. Life forms just show up in the fossil record suddenly, fully formed. They exist for a while with minor changes due to environmental pressures (like Darwin’s finches) and then die out. There is no directional progression from less complex to more complex that Darwinism insists on.

So the fossil record is a big problem for Darwinian proponents. The information contained in DNA is an even bigger problem. DNA, contained in the nucleus of cells, is very much like the software that enabled me to type this article and enables you to read it – only it is far more advanced according to Bill Gates. While computers run on a two character language, DNA is based on a four character language and constitutes the instructions for how a cell manufactures the proteins it needs to exist. Without the information in DNA, proteins don’t exist. Without proteins, we don’t exist.

The salient point about the information content in biology is that we know of only one mechanism capable of generating such complexity – a mind. And materialistic scientists avoid this conclusion at all costs. Evolutionary biologist Richard Lewontin states that a majority of scientists will not consider an intelligent origin for life because “…materialism is absolute, for we cannot allow a Divine foot in the door”. I thought science was about a search for causes wherever the data leads. Clearly that’s not true in the world of highly politicized science today.

We’ve seen this before. At the beginning of the last century, science assured us that the universe was static and eternal. However, through Einstein’s theoretical work and Edwin Hubble’s empirical data, it became clear that the universe had a beginning a finite time ago. Scientists then had to face the fact that there was a cause of the universe beyond time, space, and matter/energy with obvious theological implications. They’re still fighting those implications today.

Now the information foundation of biology again is pointing clearly to a Creator yet so many try to suppress this truth. The apostle Paul describes this clearly in his letter to the Romans. He teaches how men will suppress the truth, their thinking then becomes futile and they descend into depravity. Yeah, I think I’m seeing that.

Opinion  by John Tutten:

Donald Trump may have inadvertently helped the Republican cause this year with his stumbling over a hypothetical gotcha question about the abolition of Roe v. Wade.

During an interview with MSNBC’s Chris Matthews, Trump stated that with abortion illegal, women seeking abortions should face “some form of punishment”. (Why is Trump taking questions from Matthews and ducking Mark Levin? Doesn’t strike me as conservative.) Trump later recanted his initial response and restated his position as only a doctor performing an abortion should face prosecution and not the woman undergoing the procedure.

I can’t begin to fathom how Trump could be so ill prepared for such a question. He should clearly understand that abortion is part of the Left’s fictitious “war on women” playbook and be ready with a thoughtful response. However, this is another example of his lack of understanding and shallow thinking on many serious issues he should be well prepared for.

Hillary Clinton couldn’t wait to pounce. And pounce she did…and then fell flat on her face.

In an interview on NBC’s Meet The Press with Chuck Todd, Hillary while trying to burnish her image as a champion of women’s rights, managed to give a response that incensed everyone on both sides of the issue.

In responding to Todd’s question about the constitutional rights of the unborn, Clinton stated, “the unborn person doesn’t have constitutional rights.” And with just these seven words, Hillary alienated virtually everyone concerned about the abortion issue, an amazing feat even for the world’s smartest woman.

On the one hand, she is denying constitutional protection to a “real person” and on the other she refers to what abortion promoters call an unviable lump of cells as a “real person”. Wow, what an amazing, non-sensical conflation! I would love to have the commission on all the Republican ads that will be run highlighting her incredible faux pas.

Asserting that the unborn is simply an aggregate of cells like some superfluous tumor is the bedrock of the Left’s justification for ending a pregnancy. There’s nothing of value associated with a rapidly growing fertilized egg. Just get rid of it before it becomes a real inconvenience! Besides, you ladies have the right to choose whether to permit this valueless aggregate of cells to develop into, well, a life.

And that is the question, isn’t it? When does that the growing pregnancy transition from worthlessness to pricelessness? Abortion proponents are all over the map on the question. The more reasonable assert that up until the end of the first trimester the growing pregnancy is of no value and can be destroyed. After this, abortions should be prohibited. However, more ardent supporters promote much later term terminations that require gruesome techniques I will not describe here.

There are even others that think termination of babies delivered full term is acceptable. Peter Singer, professor of bioethics at Princeton University, believes parents should be able to kill infants up to thirty days after their birth: “Human babies are not born self-aware, or capable of grasping that they exist over time. They are not persons”; therefore, “the life of a newborn is of less value than the life of a pig, a dog, or a chimpanzee.” Dang, it’s a girl! We have two already, so let’s get rid of her!

So is Singer right that what constitutes life is self-awareness and a sense of time? Or is there a set of biological parameters that instead define personhood? This is the question we as a society must answer.

However, the pro-abortion forces avoid at all costs any kind of definition of what constitutes life and instead deflect the argument to one of women’s rights. They sloganize about a woman’s right to choose and proclaim a woman has a right to decide what she does with her body. Would that mean then that a woman can choose to charge money for the sexual use of her body too? I believe we have laws against that.

The left has controlled the focus and the language of the abortion debate for too long and we must bring it back to where it belongs – when does life begin?

Singer’s assertion that personhood begins with self-awareness and a sense of time could extend well into infancy and clearly leads to state sanctioned infanticide. If we say that life begins at the second trimester, we need to have a set of biological parameters that justify the claim. Just what happens physically at an instant into the second trimester that makes a growing pregnancy life when it wasn’t just prior to that instant?

You see, we can’t answer that question. Therefore, the only way to make sure that we do not take innocent life is to define conception as when life begins.

The Left is staunchly against the death penalty because we could possibly execute an innocent man. Yet they are very cavalier when defining when abortions are permissible. With our lack of understanding when life begins, how do we know that every abortion does not kill an innocent? Isn’t the most enlightened thing we can do is to insure no possibility of innocent life being taken by affirming that life begins at conception? Of course it is.

Hopefully, Hillary’s Freudian slip will help elect a conservative this year, one who will begin rebuilding the Judiciary with solid conservative judges. Then maybe, just maybe, down the road, we can begin to eradicate this stain on our society.

Opinion by John Tutten:

You know what’s scaring me? Hillary Clinton is still in the running for president and there is no other viable Democratic candidate in play. Forget Sanders. He would make Walter Mondale look competitive in the general. With all the super delegates in play in the Democratic process, despite the Sanders surge, he will never sniff the nomination. The Democrats’ establishment is all in for Hillary and they have full control of the nomination outcome.

And that’s what concerns me. We are this far down the nominating process and there is no realistic alternative to Hillary for Democrats. That means that Obama will make sure that the FBI investigation into Clinton’s egregious use of a personal server for her governmental business will go nowhere. Despite overwhelming evidence of felonious mishandling of top secret information, Clinton will be allowed to skate and run in the general election.

I had always counted on the much-publicized animosity between the Obamas and the Clintons to insure Hillary’s campaign would eventually be derailed by the president. The fact that the Oval Office allowed Clinton to use a personal server in what could be construed as giving Hillary “the rope to hang herself with” had seemed to confirm that Obama would not allow her to carry on his legacy. However, here we are and it sure looks like she will be the Democratic nominee.

What we hear of the FBI investigation certainly sounds ominous for Clinton. One hundred and fifty dedicated agents will get to the bottom of the Secretary’s chicanery and a finding will be issued to the Attorney General. However, I believe Loretta Lynch will be prevented from issuing a formal indictment. Certainly Clinton can continue to run under criminal indictment and can even be elected president while defending herself against the charges. Realistically though she would lose enough support that an indictment would cost her the election. Therefore, without another viable candidate to Hillary, Democrats must not allow her to be indicted.

The only thing I can figure as to why Obama is acquiescing to her candidacy is that Clinton must have enough dirt on the president to keep him from preventing her nomination. I can’t begin to speculate about what Hillary could be holding over Obama’s head. There’s not much more that can be added to his obvious failure as a president, so maybe it’s something of a more personal nature. Whatever it is, it looks like Obama has been stiff-armed into allowing her nomination.

And here’s the even bigger problem. As hard as it is to believe that Hillary could beat anybody in the general, very sound polling is showing that she will trounce the most likely Republican nominee, Donald Trump. The latest numbers show that over seventy percent of women voting in the general would oppose Trump! And he just keeps digging the hole deeper. From Megyn Kelly to Carly Fiorina to the latest dustup with Breitbart reporter, Michelle Fields and his campaign manager Corey Lewandowski, Trump keeps worsening his chances with women voters. It almost seems to be a strategy.

I’ve speculated in previous writings that Trump doesn’t appear to really want to be president. His continued lack of preparation and knowledge of critical issues and policies certainly lend credence to this. I could understand being a little green when he first started his campaign last June, but by now nine months later with access to the best advisors, his knowledge and desire to understand the job of president more thoroughly seems to be actually ebbing. He’s looking less enthusiastic.

However, despite his negative polling and questionable interest, Trump looks to be the nominee. The Cruz surge is unfortunately coming too late to prevent Trump getting the delegates he needs. The RNC is stuck even if Trump fails to get enough votes to win on a first ballot at the convention. The rule the RNC put in place at the 2012 convention mandating that a candidate must have a majority in a minimum of eight states all but guarantees a Trump nomination. Therefore, it will be Trump versus Clinton and as I mentioned, the polling strongly favors Clinton.

Just think what a Hillary presidency would be like. Despite the damage Obama has done from the Oval Office, he still was much more passive than I believe a President Hillary would be. She will be much more aggressive in attacking Second Amendment rights. No doubt she will begin persecuting gun manufacturers.

There’s no doubt she will pursue a much more strident global warming initiative doing further damage to our already staggering economy. She will drag oil companies into court and prosecute them as global warming deniers. She will double down on Obama’s war on coal and in turn escalate energy prices.

She will make a now dangerous world even more dangerous with her ineptness at foreign policy. You can expect more nuclear proliferation, more Islamist incursions around the world, more Russian and Chinese expansionism, and misuse of our armed forces.

I have been a staunch Ted Cruz supporter during this primary process. To my great disappointment I do not see a way from him to win the Republican nomination. I do intend to vote for Trump if he is the nominee. I urge all of you Rubio, Kasich, Carson, Fiorina, Bush, etc., supporters to not take your ball and go home and get behind the nominee. And you Trump supporters, demand that he start taking this job more seriously, please.

Opinion by John Tutten:

Did you see them? In the sky, hundreds of them, flying everywhere. Donkeys. All around the world donkeys took flight when uber-liberal, Piers Morgan, in a piece for the UK Daily Mail stated that maybe Donald Trump was not so wrong in his approach to dealing with escalating Islamic violence. I thought surely donkeys would become lighter than air before I would see such an admission from a prominent member of the liberal intelligentsia.

Seeing the European multi-cultural delusion shattered by the attacks in Brussels must have shocked Piers into a moment of clarity (probably not for long though). He admitted that the modern world is losing the battle against ISIS and there are no good ideas coming from the current crop of world leaders (can you name a conservative among them?). He further stated: “I see a global paralysis driven by fear, confusion and woeful lack of leadership.” Can you spell “The Obama Administration”?

Let’s review the salient facts about Islam, the ideology fueling the violence that has world leaders so afraid, confused and paralyzed.

First, Islam is not just a religion. It is a complete iron-fisted, authoritarian form of government that includes a religious component. It grew out of the life and sayings of the Prophet Muhammad as recorded in the Qur’an to now include a complete system of laws called Sharia that govern all cultural, financial, and moral aspects of behavior of the population it afflicts.

Next, Islam is not in anyway peaceful. While the Qur’an does contain verses from Muhammad’s early Meccan ministry calling for peace and accommodation, those verses have been abrogated or overwritten by the later Medinan verses that call for violence and hostility in the furtherance of Islam.

Muslims are instructed to see the world as divided into two spheres, the Dar al Islam (House of Islam) where Sharia law rules and the Dar al Harb (House of War) where Islam has yet to take control. Muslims are commanded to subdue and conquer the Dar al Harb and bring it into the Dar al Islam. This is exactly what the terrorists are trying to accomplish with their attacks.

The late, great Ayatollah Khomeini summed up Islam’s violent nature this way:

“Islam says kill all unbelievers….kill them and put them to the sword and scatter their armies….There are hundreds of Qur’an’s Psalms and sayings of the Prophet Muhammad urging Muslims to value war and fight.”

Fortunately, most followers of Islam do not get kinetically involved in the war against the infidels as their ideology implores them to. However, while not engaging in violence, far too many passively support the murder and mayhem of the true believers providing what national security experts term “a safe ocean the jihadis swim in”.

The political correctness the Left reflexively curls up in when attacks like those in Brussels occur will insure more innocents die senselessly. When the weak-kneed political leaders Piers rails against fail to call the attackers what they are, the Islamists see that as capitulation. The Qur’an tells them when they see this reaction to redouble their efforts to make the Dar al Harb “feel subdued”. The more we ignore the truth about what we face, the greater the peril we place ourselves in.

What liberals have to come to understand is that we are not dealing with twenty-first century minds here. We are dealing with a seventh century mentality. Just because we today would reciprocate kindness and accommodation with kindness and accommodation, that does not mean you will get that response from a true adherent to the Qur’an. Kindness and accommodation from an infidel represents weakness and encourages Islamists to engage in their seventh century behavior.

When we agree to take in a stream of refugees even though ISIS says they will infiltrate it with terrorists, Islamists believe we are being subdued.

When our administration agrees to a sham of an agreement that insures Iran will become nuclear, Islamists believe we are being subdued.

When our school children dress up in Islamic garb and recite verses from the Qur’an, Islamists believe we are being subdued.

When liberals are willing to allow Sharia law to be practiced in our courts, Islamists believe we are being subdued.

Liberal passivity and political correctness are being interpreted by Islamists as submission to the will of Allah and will bring far more violence. It is absolutely certain. Therefore, it is WE who need to redouble OUR efforts to neutralize this scourge.

First, we have to militarily clean up the Middle East. No more politically correct warfare. We fight with everything we have and win the damn thing. We have to totally destroy any idea that a caliphate can be re-established.

Second, in this country we need to step up the surveillance on mosques that could be preaching and inciting violence. This is not Muslim persecution. If mosques are centers of peace and thoughtfulness, they have nothing to be concerned about. However, those that choose to teach the violence of Islam need to be dealt with vigorously.

Third, we need to defeat the ideology of Islam and its accompanying Sharia. We have to begin the long-term effort of showing how the virtues of individual sovereignty and liberty as enshrined in our founding documents make for a much better life. Without this, we will continue to play Islamic whack-a-mole around the world.

Opinion by John Tutten:

The successful continuance of our country depends on our youth and with what we see happening today, I am very concerned if America as we have known it will even exist in a couple of decades.  So many of our future leaders do not have even a basic understanding of our founding documents and the principles they enshrine.  They do not understand how the concepts of self-governance and personal responsibility have led to the freedom and prosperity they enjoy today.

Their ignorance and lack of critical thinking skills make them easy prey for avowed socialists promoting absurd societal models that have produced nothing but misery, poverty, and death wherever they have been instituted.  I fear the kind of violence seen last week in Chicago will continue to effervesce as the hateful Left steps up its efforts to stoke ignorant rage and unjustified hatred to burn down America and remake it into their own personal utopia.

Our youth for some reason have become increasingly more anxious and depressed despite the prosperity and opportunity they enjoy.  Jesse Singal documents this in a recent article at nymag.com.  In the piece, Singal states: “Ever since the 1930’s, young people in America have reported feeling increasingly anxious and depressed.  And no one knows exactly why.”

 Singal quotes social psychologist, Dr. Jean Twenge, who has done significant research into this phenomenon, saying, “I think the research tells us that modern life is not good for mental health.”   Twenge has researched results obtained from the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory (MMPI) that has been given to high school and college students since the 1930’s.  The MMPI assesses the level of anxiety and depression and the results of her analysis are unmistakable – there has been a significant rise in the symptoms of these conditions in young people over the last eighty years.  The question is why?

Twenge believes a main cause is the lack of interaction and connection with others as a condition of modern life today.  It seems though we are more and more connected with our electronic appliances, we are less and less connected with our own species.  There is a basic need we all have for human contact and intimacy that our electronics is stripping away.

Twenge also blames smaller families, the higher divorce rate, and couples marrying later in life.  She also identifies that our youth’s preoccupation with money, fame, and image lead to higher levels of depression and anxiety.  She then goes so far to cite increased female autonomy as another anxiety producing factor and states that: “…the potential tradeoff for our equality and freedom is more anxiety and depression because we’re more isolated.”

 I can agree with the causal factors Twenge cites in Singal’s article, but I believe they are secondary in nature and not the principle reason for the increasing uncertainty and anxiety in our youth.  I believe the true cause lies with the secular humanistic worldview that has been thrust upon them.  Our kids are indoctrinated in our schools to believe that they are here through a long series of accidental, totally random events and that they have no more worth than an earthworm or the bird that eats it.

Objective, universal morality has been displaced with what’s expedient and individual.  Truth has become malleable and situational.  Even our sense of who we are as individuals is questioned.  The late Nobel Prize winner and co-discoverer of the structure of the DNA molecule, Francis Crick completely undermines the idea that we are autonomous individuals with free will.  In his book on the nature of consciousness, “The Astonishing Hypothesis”, he states this about the true nature of the human experience:

“The Astonishing Hypothesis is that ‘You’, your joys and your sorrows, your memories and your ambitions, your sense of personal identity and free will, are in fact no more than the behavior of a vast assembly of nerve cells and their associated molecules.”

 Now Francis Crick is smart and our kids are told they just need to accept what he says without debate.  Scientists have become our high priests of reality and our kids are pressured to just accept what they say and do not question anything.

Think about what such a view does to a young person’s developing sense of self.  There is no ultimate meaning or purpose to your life.  There is no right or wrong, good or bad, righteous or evil.  Things just are.  This robs kids of their initiative and their confidence to act in any capacity.

Kelly Monroe Kullberg in her book “Finding God At Harvard” described many of today’s college students this way:

“Students feel safer as doubters than as believers, and as perpetual seekers rather than eventual finders.”

 Our youth has no foundation anymore to base their beliefs and actions on.  When there is no right or wrong, how do you make a decision on anything?  When nothing is good or evil, how do you make any kind of behavioral judgment?  Most people will just acquiesce into passivity but others can spiral into frustration and violence.

Our greatest defender of Christianity today is philosopher William Lane Craig.  He makes the point that life without God is absurd.  Without God there is simply no grounding for objective moral values that make life livable and gives us certainty and confidence on how to live.  Take this away and you see what happens – anxiety, uncertainly, hostility, and depression.  It’s becoming all too clear.

Opinion by John Tutten:

I picked up my shiny, new Ford F150 last night.  You know there’s just something good and right about getting behind the wheel of such a classic American machine.  I couldn’t resist keeping the turbocharger whining all the way back to the homestead.  I like the idea of recklessly expanding my carbon footprint too.  I have to admit that I revel in being accused by Al Gore acolytes of being a climate change “denier”.  It’s half the fun of getting a new truck that only gets 20 miles to the gallon and eats “smart cars” for breakfast.

However, admitting to being a denier of anthropogenic global warming could soon become hazardous if our perpetually irritated leftist bureaucrats in Washington have their way.  Yes, Attorney General Loretta Lynch in an exchange with climate change zealot and all around wackadoo, Senator Sheldon Whitehouse, admitted that there are discussions within the Department of Justice about taking civil action against those that would deny that prosperity and capitalism are destroying the planet.

Lynch stated this week at a Senate Judiciary Committee hearing, “This matter has been discussed.  We have received information about it and have referred it to the FBI to consider whether or not it meets the criteria for which we could take action on”. 

Has been discussed?  Has been referred to the FBI for further consideration?  Dear readers, this should have been laughed right out of the Capital building.  Instead, our cranky leftists have conjured up using the RICO statutes against “deniers” in much the same way as was used to fleece the tobacco companies.  Do you really think the FBI will not find criteria to take action on?

Whitehouse justified the strategy by saying, “The similarities between the mischief of the tobacco industry pretending that the science of tobacco’s dangers was unsettled and the fossil fuel industry pretending that the science of carbon emissions’ dangers is unsettled has been remarked on widely, particularly by those who study the climate denial apparatus that the fossil fuel industry has erected.”

 Despite that fact that reams of data clearly show the rise of atmospheric carbon dioxide FOLLOWS temperature rise and does not precede it, despite the fact that there really is a consensus that global temperatures HAVEN’T RISEN for over eighteen years, and despite the fact that there HAVE BEEN WARMER PERIODS in pre-industrial times, these boneheads are moving full speed ahead with a scheme to wreck our economy.

Whitehouse in an op-ed in the New York Times last May stated the energy industry was following a three-part strategy to mislead Americans.  Quoting from his piece, the strategy consists of:

• Pay scientists to produce studies defending your product
• Develop an intricate web of PR experts and front groups to spread doubt about real science
• Relentlessly attack your opponents.

Does this look familiar to you?  It should.  This is exactly the strategy the global warming wingnuts are following.  The Left does that a lot, accusing their opponents of doing just what they do.

The Left owns academia and lavishly funds it to produce the data it wants.  If you’re a professor who wants tenure or a department chair, just produce a study that shows a looming sea ice catastrophe or that some cute animal’s mass migration patterns are being devastated by soccer mom SUV use.  Do that and you’re in, baby!

They use their long labored on political correctness mechanism to silence us with the charge of “Denier!”  They’ve seeded the media with nattering nabobs that spread bumper slogan deep claims of scientific consensus, settled science, and sure calamity straight ahead!  Yet their stewards live lives of limousines, private jets, and mansions measured in tens of thousands of square feet, an ever-expanding carbon footprint of decadence.

However, since their efforts to alarm and stampede the American people have failed, now we see the leftists ratcheting up their attack by bringing the ultra-coercive power of the Federal Government to bear on those that would deny them and their efforts to reduce the United States to neo-feudalistic misery.

My fellow Patriots, this can’t stand.  The Left is becoming more brazen in showing their desire to rule us with an iron fist.  Their decades long effort to reengineer the electorate for an unassailable majority is near completion.  We must have a wave election in November for Republicans at all levels of government.  We must reverse the tide now or being forced to accept climate change nonsense as true will be the least of our worries.

Opinion by John Tutten:

I am beginning to believe that if Ronald Reagan were alive today and running for president, he would never be elected. He might not even win the Republican nomination given the state of our culture today. His landslide victories are fading fast in our rearview mirror and I doubt we will ever see such unity again in this country.

We have the most principled conservative since Reagan vying for the Republican nomination and yet so many of those that should be staunchly supporting him have been seduced away by a media persona of questionable substance.

Make no mistake, Tea Party conservatives and evangelicals are propelling Mr. Trump to the Republican nomination. They are casting aside what should be core principles and the certainty of action guaranteed by Senator Cruz in exchange for some vague idea of strong-arming the elites in Washington. They are willing to pass on a rock-ribbed conservative who has proven he has the courage, stamina, and integrity to challenge and win against the Washington establishment. Instead, they cast their support for a candidate who up until very recently was essentially a liberal New York Democrat.

I’ve heard many defend their choice by saying Mr. Trump is more electable than Senator Cruz. I have to ask them where are they getting their data? Every head-to-head poll I’ve seen shows Trump losing to Secretary Clinton in the general election. Trump’s undesirable ratings are even higher than Clinton’s, the same Clinton that is a possible felon and a known liar! Senator Cruz on the other hand wins against Clinton in the general election and his negatives are much lower. So how is Trump more electable than Cruz?

The Tea Party really took flight with the passage of Obamacare. This unconstitutional, coercive legislation that mandated citizens purchase government-approved health insurance was the catalyst that catapulted the Tea Party into national prominence. Many regional organizations coalesced around the country. There were marches on Washington to demand Obamacare’s repeal. The Tea Party energy propelled Republicans into majorities in the House of Representatives and the Senate with the understanding that repeal of Obamacare would soon follow.

Of course, the scourge of Obamacare is still with us. However, why do so many Tea Partiers support Mr. Trump when he has stated many times he is for a government mandate on health insurance? A mandate is the essence of Obamacare and is what should make it so objectionable to conservatives. Yet many, many Tea Partiers continue to support Trump over Senator Cruz. Tea Partiers should be running from Trump’s campaign on this issue alone.

Mr. Trump has made it clear that he is very soft on abortion and even extols the virtues of Planned Parenthood. He tries to thread the needle by saying he doesn’t support Planned Parenthood’s abortion business but then commends them for doing a lot of other good for women.

Well, last year in Congressional testimony under oath, Planned Parenthood CEO Cecil Richards had to admit that 86% of Planned Parenthood’s revenue comes from abortions. That doesn’t leave a lot of room for “other good for women”. When they are not performing abortions, they appear to be trafficking in baby body parts. I simply do not understand how evangelicals can support any candidate who is not committed to the demise of this vile organization and Mr. Trump clearly isn’t.

Mr. Trump says he going to get the government moving and makes a point of how good a negotiator he is and how skilled he will be in making deals with Congress. He prides himself on how he will be able to get everyone in a room and work out a “great deal”.

What Trump fails to realize is that his opponents will not be other businessmen. They will be Marxist ideologues. They will be Muslim Brotherhood zealots. They will not be interested in making a deal or compromising. They are ruthless, relentless, and committed to their agenda. His “Art of the Deal” will be of little value against such opponents. Senator Cruz’ approach will be like that of Reagan’s, “we win, they lose”.

With Mr. Trump, I’m afraid we are exchanging one cult of personality for another. Like Obama eight years ago, many people are processing Trump’s shallow rhetoric and are fashioning an image of the president they imagine he will be. He presents a history that is disjointed and contradictory and his followers are grabbing on those facts that fit who they want him to be and then ignoring the rest.

We must not allow our anger at the current administration to affect whom we choose for our next president. We have to look clearly and unemotionally at Mr. Trump’s history and not just listen to who he says he is. We must look at what he has supported in the past, what he has said in the past, and what he has done in the past. His past serves are prologue for what he will do as president and all of it must be considered.

We should all fear this continuing descent into populism. We are substantially unmoored from the Constitutional constraints on the presidency and we cannot allow any president to operate outside of his Constitutional limits no matter how good it makes us feel. The next president must pull executive branch power back into the proper balance the Framers prescribed. Senator Cruz understands this and will.

Opinion written by John Tutten:

Something really stinks about this dust up between the FBI and Apple.  Don’t you wonder why their dispute was made public by the government?  If the FBI was really concerned about protecting we the people, wouldn’t they want to keep secret the fact that they cannot crack into the latest Apple software?  Why would our government announce to the world that they can’t get into any iPhone and in turn confirm to terrorists that they have a secure communications channel shielded from U.S. Government surveillance?

Not only did the FBI confirm to terrorists that they’re communications are safe using iPhones, they then publicly impugned Apple’s response and motives in an apparent attempt to threaten their business if they don’t deliver on what the government wants.  This kind of fascism would have Mussolini nodding in approval.

Make no mistake, this is not about cracking just the one iPhone used in the San Bernardino attacks despite what Marco Rubio and other establishment pundits are proclaiming.  The FBI wants to be able to break into any type of secure consumer communications anytime, anywhere.  And they are using the “terrorism trumps personal privacy” play again as it has been used to erect the vast surveillance apparatus that continues to metastasize.  Don’t fall for this disinformation.

The FBI and Apple would not even be in this “contest” if both the city of San Bernardino and the FBI had handled things right.  The phone belongs to San Bernardino and if they had installed the basic administrative software available for the iPhone, they could have been in complete control of the phone and have access to the totality of its contents today.

And then somewhere in the chain of custody between San Bernardino and the FBI, the iCloud password gets changed making it impossible to gain access to the backed up information there.  Is this just incompetence or perhaps a chance to create an opportunity?

Setting the concern about government surveillance aside for a moment, if Apple is coerced into providing a key that will unlock iPhones as the FBI insists, this will create an exploitable crease in the security software on the device.  Criminal hackers and hostile governments seeking to steal our personal information or instigate potentially damaging mischief could then exploit this crease.  This is what Apple fears and what our government seems willing to accept.  I understand Apple will soon refine their security capability to the point where iPhone software will simply be uncrackable.  I applaud their efforts.

Getting back to the surveillance state issue, this week I happened to catch “America’s Mayor”, Rudy Giuliani, on my formerly favorite fair and balanced channel.  Of course, he was promoting the establishment line about terrorism trumping privacy and Apple just needs to open just this one phone, yada, yada, yada.  He then proclaimed that our government is only grabbing the “metadata” from our communications and that there is not one case of the government misusing the information.  Well, let’s unpack that statement.

First, metadata literally means “data about the data”.  So the government now admits it is capturing phone metadata that includes details about the call but not its content.  In other words, the government knows when you made a call, what phone you made the call from, where you were when you made the call, who you called, their phone number, their location, date, time, duration, etc.  However, they say the content of the call is not being captured.

In addition, this data surveillance mechanism is sweeping up all your web transactions as well.  All of your FaceBook postings, the various web sites you peruse, and internet news sites you visit are all being captured and stored.  The NSA very openly now admits they do this and they cheerfully explain it here:  https://nsa.gov1.info/data/

So, if that’s all they are capturing, why then do they need data repositories the size of the one in Utah?  Affectionately called “Bumblehive” by the NSA, this site cost us over 1.5 billion dollars and occupies about a million square feet.   The data servers installed at the site take up about one hundred thousand of that million square feet.  It consumes 1.5 million gallons of water per day just to keep the servers cool.  Bumblehive’s storage capacity is estimated to be between a few exabytes to one or two yottabytes.  The actual capacity is classified.

Understand when talking about exabytes or yottabytes, we are describing mind-boggling amounts of data storage capacity.  Let’s say that Bumblehive can store one yottabyte of data.  This would enable the facility to store a high definition video of every second of life for everyone who has lived in the United States for the last forty years.  Patriots, even just a few exabytes in capacity so far exceeds the storage requirements for metadata gathering as to make those claims a ridiculous joke.

Couple this with the fact that the government is hiring behavioral specialists as fast as the can to develop search algorithms to sort through all of the social media data they are gathering to understand, predict, and ultimately to influence our behavior.

Is the picture becoming clearer now?  I fear that the billions of dollars of our money that are being spent under the guise of protecting us from terrorism are really being spent to protect the government from us.