Former Waukesha County District Attorney Paul Bucher wrote Van Hollen a very direct and well-reasoned letter pleading with the Attorney General to get control of the circus occurring in the office of Milwaukee County District Attorney John Chisholm. Bucher’s letter to Van Hollen has been included here for you to examine.

Bucher entreated Van Hollen not only to find the source of the illegal John Doe investigation leaks which have spewed out of the DA’s office since the investigation began, but to assume full control of the John Doe investigation itself. As reported by Media Trackers, 43 members John Chisholm’s office signed the Walker Recall Petition. Worse yet, DA office signers of the Recall Petitions repeatedly stated that these signatures were gathered in the office during work hours – the same crimes the already charged parties in the John Doe investigation have been accused of committing.

This obvious conflict of interest of personnel working in the office compromises any appearance of objectivity, especially ones with direct access to investigation information. And we certainly know someone with access to this statutorily secret information has created a culvert which empties into the office of Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reporter Dan Bice. Someone needs to be arrested and charged here.

Within a few hours of the release of Bucher’s letter, the Attorney General’s office predictably stated that Van Hollen would not be getting involved in the John Doe investigation or the Milwaukee County DA’s office in any way, citing the lack of authority to do so. Interestingly, Van Hollen and his office seem to be the only people in Wisconsin that believe this lack of authority exists. Bucher certainly thinks Van Hollen has the authority.

John Chisholm has lost control of the DA’s office. Either he is incompetent and politically motivated to allow this circus to happen (he is a Democrat), or the job is too big for him. Regardless of the reason, Van Hollen needs to step up to the job and get some sanity re-established in the office  issued against Walker speaks volumes. There is nothing there and they know it.

The timing of the leaks and everything done thus far has been choreographed so perfectly to correspond to the Walker Recall effort. The partisan political nature of this circus cannot be denied nor covered up. If charges are issued against Walker between now and June 5th, who can seriously argue that these charges are nothing more than Democrat-manufactured fantasies?

I recently produced a documentary film about Conservative talk radio in Milwaukee called “Liberty or Lies?” I managed to get it aired on Milwaukee Public Television in January and again in February. Conservatives, whose response to the documentary has been overwhelmingly positive, ask me, “How did you pull it off?”

My answer is twofold. First, it just may be that the stereotype of MPTV as an exclusively Liberal organ is not entirely accurate. In fact, the management and staff, knowing I was a Conservative, could not have been more accommodating and professional in my dealings with them. Secondly, MPTV screened the documentary, saw that it contained about as much criticism of Conservative talk radio from the Left as it did defense of it from the Right and deemed it balanced.

“There’s little question that conservative talk radio has had a significant impact on political conversation and results in Wisconsin over the past few years,” said MPTV general manager, Ellis Bromberg, in the station’s press release announcing the show. “We think this documentary does a good job of explaining, in a balanced way, why that has been the case.”

Bruce Murphy, one of the critics of Conservative talk radio featured in the documentary and former editor of Milwaukee Magazine, wrote in his review: “Farley is certainly sympathetic to talk radio, but he does a great job of threading together powerful quotes from both critics and supporters. What Farley has done – and done very well – is closest to what daily newspapers routinely do, getting comments from both sides on an issue.”

Indeed I took great strides to make sure I presented both sides respectfully. I sought the most prominent and active critics of Milwaukee Conservative talk radio I could find. Well in advance of taping I provided each with my interview questions and my show proposal in which I describe my political sentiments as “decidedly to the Right.” After the fact, I sent each an unedited DVD of their interview so that if they felt I had taken their comments out of context in the final edit they could prove it.

In the documentary, critics are given ample time (particularly in the long-form series version of the project) to expound non the familiar complaints about Conservative talk radio: it dominates the Milwaukee airwaves, misinforms listeners, is one-sided, is a spokes-puppet for the Republican Party, indulges in hateful rhetoric and is detrimental to the wellbeing of the community and American democracy at large.

And yet Conservatives have enthusiastically embraced “Liberty or Lies?” – Charlie Sykes and Jay Weber posted the documentary on their websites) while Liberals have, for the most part, dismissed and denounced it, as the following sampling of comments I and MPTV have received suggest:

Ó “You’re promoting dangerous ideas.”

Ó “As a progressive I see quite a bit of right wing bias in the film … you bring on poor representatives for opposing views.”

Ó “We have no interest in financially supporting such an indiscriminate provider (MPTV) of such glaringly biased promotion.”

Ó “Were your guests chosen specifically for their ill-informed views? Or is ignoring empirical data a qualifier for commentary on your shows?”

Ó “It really just impressed on me all the more the need for balance and government oversight against big money corporations who can buy their way into anything.”

Why the disparity in reaction?

Because by putting the Liberal/Progressive case against Conservative talk radio in the context of the larger contemporary media reality, “Liberty or Lies?” reveals that case as anything but liberal (i.e. open minded) or progressive (i.e. interested in advancing society). And this is a revelation those who identify with these movements cannot abide.

But again, how then did an institution like MPTV come to regard “Liberty or Lies?” as a balanced presentation and put it on their air? Because “Liberty or Lies?” is a balanced presentation. I did no clever editing to misrepresent critics’ views. I employed none of the typical production techniques used to make commentators look bad (e.g. sinister music, unflattering images, contradictory visuals, etc.) And at no point in the documentary do I identify critics’ commentary as “wrong” or “lies.” Any apparent fallacies on their part are made manifest by the arguments and observations of the critics themselves.

This was one of the more significant “Ah ha” moments I experienced while producing this documentary and what makes “Liberty or Lies?” so interesting.

“The juxtaposition of perspectives was fascinating,” wrote Mary of Freedom Eden in her review. “Frankly, as the program progressed, the Leftists, via their own words, made it clear that they don’t comprehend talk radio. They’re clueless. I don’t know if it’s jealousy over conservative talk radio’s popularity or fear of its power that renders them senseless.”

I share all this not belittle the critics I interviewed – they were all very sincere in their views and helpful to me – nor to suggest I am some sort of master documentarian, but to illustrate an exhilarating realization: when placed sideby- side in the light of day, the Conservative argument trumps the Liberal/Progressive argument every time, if not for the soundness of the Conservative argument, then for the brazen absurdity of the Liberal/Progressive argument.

Thus, when courting “independent” and “moderate” voters, repulsed by polemics and partisanship, all one need do is allow this dynamic to play out.

This is very important for Wisconsin Conservatives to understand. It is my belief that the most effective strategy for inspiring the people of Wisconsin to keep their state in their own hands and out of the hands of public sector union leaders, is simply for Conservatives to keep the light shining on the words and deeds of the Left.

Following the example of Milwaukee Conservative talk radio, which has been shining that light since 1989, a state-wide Conservative information and action network has emerged by which to do so, mainstream media bias be damned. Conservatives now have the means to independently expose and broadcast the Wisconsin Left as it truly is – fake doctor excuses, death threats, capital trashing, small business harassment, forged recall petitions, job killing and all – for the entire state to see.

And in this light – the light of truth – despite the ubiquitous hype, povertypimping, and flash mob theater of the Left, the people of Wisconsin are increasingly discerning for themselves “what democracy looks like” and moving to the Right.

So stand tall Conservatives; hold the light fast and let the Left rage on. In the battle for Wisconsin hearts and minds, they are only securing their own defeat.

Brien Farley is a resident of Genesee, Wis., and producer of “Liberty or Lies? Conservative Talk Radio in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.” For more information go to www.libertyorlies.com.  

Yours truly found his way into the middle of this picture with the Gadsden hat and Scott Walker MY Hero shirt standing next to the famous activist Dennis Barthenheier (who after the rally went to a bowling tournament in Baraboo where he averaged 215/game).

Emceed by the true original American Patriot of African Descent James T. Harris the event planners couldn’t have found a better spark plug to get the gig going though we now have to import him back from Arizona. But he’s ours and we love him!

Unlike our Leftist counterparts, we begin our events by honoring our heritage and country with the Pledge of Allegiance and National Anthem. Our disruptive friends shouted degrading comments during each which were barely heard and given no notice. The disrupters were truly a non-factor on this day.

Super Nashville recording artist Krista Branch opened with her awesome song “I am America” which I heard 3 times on my CD player on the way out. Wisconsin AFP Director Luke Hilgemann started out the messaging that we will not let Scott Walker or any of the other heroes being recalled be defeated by the Left.

What would a Tea Party rally be without a great speech from Kim Simac, the original Northwoods Patriot, this time outlining the true war on women being waged by the Left on mothers and conservatives. Lora Halberstadt of the Racine Tea Party offered her typically astute take on this leftist women’s war, a perfect complement for Kim’s remarks. Then of course, the Rock Star of Radio, Vicki McKenna, brought the whole thing home. You know how good she is by how crazy the disrupters get when she hits the stage.

The most important development which occurred over the winter, the development of the iverifytherecall searchable website, has give conservatives vast new tools for local elections for years to come. Ross Brown, the group leader of the Madison part of this herculean effort, provided the activists with his perspective on where we are and how we move forward.

Several other speakers from around the country fired up the activist crowd but it reached it’s peak when Dana Loesch, St. Louis Tea Party Patriots founder and radio talk show host took the stage. Fearless and direct with a commanding presence, Loesch worked the crowd into a frenzy much like the individual pictured on her shirt who had done so a year earlier, the late Andrew Breitbart. What an incredible lady and patriot!

But the grand finale had to come from our own Lieutenant Governor Rebecca Kleefisch, our homegrown product of the conservative activist army which now rules the state of Wisconsin. She knows more about the Left’s war on women than just about anyone else, save possibly Governor Sarah Palin. But her ever steely resolve and personal strength enveloped all who listened. And the Left fears her.

She was partying with her own people, the people that got her elected, the people she has fearlessly represented in her quest to assist Governor Walker in restoring sanity to a state long abused by marauders. The activist army has her back, and she knows it.

Thank God for Rebecca Kleefisch!

The final, essential and most fitting wrap up by James T. Harris implored acknowledgment of our one true ruler and leader, the Lord God Almighty, who made the heavens and the Earth, who sheds his grace upon thee. It is not our faith in a man but our faith in him that makes us free people.

Krista Branch finished the event with another of her excellent songs “Remember Who We Are.”

As per usual, the Tea Party rally site was perfectly clean when all departed and the tulips, untrampled, still blooming their heads off.    

A LETTER TO THE MEMBERS

In Governor Walker’s haste to forward his corporate agenda and strip public employees of their right to collectively bargain, he neglected many steps in making the process fair and legitimate. The Governor did not confer with the union prior to implementing his draconian agenda.

If our members have to ask why they need the union, perhaps we have failed to educate and enlighten members, or they have become apathetic and have forgotten what their affiliation means. Each of us has taken an oath to further the purposes for which the I.B.E.W. has been instituted, bear true allegiance to it and to not sacrifice its interest in any manner. For some, that merely means collecting union negotiated benefits and a paycheck while paying a modest amount of dues. For others, it means learning about union rights and benefits, speaking up when an employer violates a contract, attending union meetings and helping shape union policies, standing up for co-workers, helping with community outreach, reading union publications, supporting political candidates who back labor’s agenda, working safely, and heeding the call when sister unions ask for solidarity.

I.B.E.W. Local 494 has been an active partner with the Milwaukee JATC where many of us received our training. We have assembled the finest group of electrical mechanics in Wisconsin. We have partnered with NECA to offer our members educational opportunities at next to no out of pocket costs.

We have advocated for the rights of working people, including all public employees. We have political influence and have been working to elect laborfriendly politicians. We have an active Political Action Committee (PAC) and Committee on Political Education (COPE). The present political structure in Madison will pass, and we will once again have political strength at the Capitol.

Perhaps President Kennedy said it best in his inaugural speech on January 20, 1961. “And so, my fellow Americans: ask not what your country can do for you – ask what you can do for your country.”http://www.famousquotes.me.uk/ speeches/John_F_Kennedy/5.htm

It is time for our members to ask what they can do for the Union, as we are under political attack and our way of life is being threatened. “Right to Work” is on the horizon. Blaming the union for a misaligned State budget is not productive. Unions are only as strong as its members, and it is time we stand together in solidarity and rally behind our union that has raised our standard of living as well as all workers in our industry.

By Paul Driessen

The Sierra Club and other environmental pressure groups are redoubling their efforts to “stop fracking in its tracks.” No wonder. The technology is an existential threat to fundamental “green” dogmas.

Horizontal drilling and hydraulic fracturing is a true “game changer.” In less than two years, this proven but still rapidly advancing technology has obliterated longstanding claims that we are running out of petroleum. Instead, the USA now finds itself blessed with centuries of oil and gas.

Thankfully, much of it is on state and private lands, which cannot easily be locked up by federal diktat.

Poland and Estonia are using it, China has invited companies to the Middle Kingdom, Britain, Israel and Jordan are evaluating their shale deposits, and other nations are following suit – coaxing oil and natural gas from shale and other rock formations that previously had refused to yield their hydrocarbon riches.

By making more natural gas available, fracking has reduced the US price for this clean-burning fuel to under $3 per thousand cubic feet (or million Btu), compared to a peak of $8 a few years ago.

Natural gas is also supplanting coal for electricity generation. Due to excessive, mostly unnecessary new Environmental Protection Agency regulations, many US coal-fired power plants are shutting down. Replacement plants are far more likely to be gas-powered than nuclear, especially in the near term.

Natural gas makes heating and electricity more affordable for families, hospitals, government buildings and businesses; feed stocks less expensive for makers of plastics, paints, fabrics and other petrochemical products; and the prospect of natural gas-power vehicles more enticing, without mandates or subsidies. That translates into thousands of jobs created or saved.

Companies are keeping chemical plants open that were slated to close, due to soaring prices for oil that they now can readily replace with cheap natural gas. Shell plans to build a $2-biillion ethane “cracking” plant near Pittsburgh – creating 10,000 construction jobs and 10,000 permanent jobs – thanks to abundant gas from Marcellus Shale. Louisiana, North Dakota, Pennsylvania, Texas and other states are reporting subsidy-free employment and revenue gains from shale gas development. More are likely to follow, as companies seek new ways to capitalize on access to abundant, inexpensive, reliable gas.

Natural gas also provides essential backup power for wind turbines. Without such backup, electricity generation from these projects would plummet to zero 70- 80% of the time, affecting assembly lines, computers, televisions, air conditioners and other electrical equipment dozens of times every day.

Even harder for environmentalists to accept, cheap natural gas also makes it harder to justify building redundant wind turbines that require large subsidies to generate far more expensive electricity only 5-8 hours a day, on average, while killing large numbers of raptors, migratory birds and bats. It makes more sense to simply build the gas turbines, and forget about the mostly useless wind turbines.

Fracking is also unlocking oil in the vast Bakken Shale formations beneath Montana, North Dakota and Saskatchewan. Oil production there has shot from 3,000 barrels a day in 2006 to nearly 500,000 today – creating thousands of jobs … and a growing need for the Keystone XL pipeline to Texas.

In response, eco-activists are spreading unfounded fears about this proven technology. Using words like “reckless,” “dangerous” and “poisonous,” they say unregulated fracking companies are operating with little concern for ecological values and causing cancer, earthquakes and groundwater contamination.

The claims have fanned borderline hysteria in some quarters and prompted Maryland, New York and other states to launch drawn-out studies or impose moratoria that will postpone drilling and the benefits it would bring. Facts are sorely needed.

Drilling and fracking have been carefully and effectively regulated by states for decades. As studies by the University of Texas and various state agencies have documented, there has never been a confirmed case of groundwater contamination due to fracking. Even EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson acknowledged that to a congressional panel.

These analysts, drilling companies and even an Environmental Defense expert now say fracking has not played a role in any of the rare cases where methane has gotten into drinking water.

Instead, the cause has generally been a failure of “well integrity” – the result of improper cementing between the well borehole and the steel “casing” and pipes that go down through aquifers and thousands of feet deeper into gas-laden shale formations. Similar failures occur in water wells drilled through rock formations containing methane (natural gas).

The solution is straightforward: better standards and procedures for cementing vertical pipes in place, and testing them initially and periodically to ensure there are no leaks.

Similarly, fracking fluids fail to match the “toxic” and “cancerous” opprobrium alleged by anti-drilling campaigns. Over 99.5% of the fluids is water and sand. The other 0.5% is chemicals to keep sand particles suspended in the liquid, fight bacterial growth and improve gas production.

Although industrial chemicals were once used, almost all of today’s are vegetable oil and chemicals used in cheese, beer, canned fish, dairy desserts, shampoo, and other food and cosmetic products.

As to “earthquakes,” barely detectable “tremors” have occasionally been measured near fracking operations and wastewater disposal injection wells. However, calling these snap, crackle and pop noises and movements “earthquakes” is akin to screaming “Earthquake!” when a cement truck goes by.

Despite these facts, EPA is nevertheless trying to invent problems and inject itself into already vigilant and responsive state regulatory efforts. The agency has conducted a roundly criticized study in Wyoming and is conducting water tests in Pennsylvania, where state officials view its activities as unnecessary meddling.

Additional over-reach and overregulation would be hugely detrimental to US and global well-being. Fracking could help create numerous jobs and provide a far more secure, affordable, dependable and lower-pollution future than would ever be possible with wind or solar power.

By expanding oil and gas development, it could make North America the world’s new energy hub. Middle East sheiks, mullahs and OPEC ministers would lose economic, political and strategic power. Threats of Russian pipeline closures would no longer intimidate Eastern European countries. Politicians everywhere would waste less money on “renewable” energy T-Boonedoggles.

Unfortunately, though, fear campaigns are preventing some of America’s poorest counties and families from enjoying the economic benefits of Marcellus Shale development.

Baltimore’s Sage Policy Group calculated that fracking in western Maryland could reduce energy costs, create thousands of jobs, and generate millions of dollars annually in revenue for the state and Allegany and Garrett Counties.

Similar studies in New York and elsewhere have reached similar conclusions.

Hydraulic fracturing technologies are proven. Regulations to protect drinking water are in place and improving steadily, as cementing and other legitimate concerns are recognized and addressed.

North Dakota, Pennsylvania, Texas, Poland and Israel are showing the way forward.

Communities that have not yet opened their doors to responsible drilling, fracking and production need to replace antihydrocarbon agendas and fears with facts, optimism and science-based regulations.

Paul Driessen is senior policy advisor for the Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow and Congress of Racial Equality, and author of Eco-Imperialism: Green power – Black death.  

So the latest revelation by the investigative reporters at Media Trackers is ample cause to scream bloody murder, and to place a call to Milwaukee County District Attorney John Chisholm (414-278-4646) to ask what in the heck is going on.

Media Trackers has identified almost four dozen employees of the D.A.’s office as signers of the Walker recall petition. That’s the same D.A.’s office that’s been running a John Doe investigation of former Walker aides in Milwaukee County government – and others never associated with Scott Walker, though you’d be hard-pressed to learn that through mainstream media reporting.

Another thing you’d be hard-pressed to learn from the mainstream media is that Scott Walker requested the investigation in the first place.

But the D.A.’s office has been leaking confidential John Doe information like a sieve, to the benefit of Walker rivals and Milwaukee Journal Sentinel reporter, Dan Bice (414- 223-5468).That makes them coconspirators.

Now Bice and his newspaper are working overtime to defend Chisholm’s office with this backward headline and shall we say, incomplete interview?

DA’s office: John Doe prosecutors didn’t sign recall papers

“My understanding is that none of the attorneys in this office involved in politically related investigations has participated in the recall process,” said Chief Deputy District Attorney Kent Lovern.

Notice that Lovern didn’t say that no one involved in the John Doe investigation signed a petition. Nor did he say, no one with access to information about the investigation signed the petition. A good journalist would have asked those specific questions, unless of course he didn’t want to know the answer.

Bice completely ignores the fact that Janet Oelstrom, a secretary in the Public Integrity Unit which oversees the John Doe investigation, signed the petition. Did Oelstrom have access to information about the investigation?

And what about Mary Ann Oronato, who collected signatures from several of her coworkers in the DA’s office on two consecutive work days, Friday November 18th and Monday November 21st? Unless she traveled to all of their homes at a variety of addresses in three different cities, Oronato had to collect them while at work. This would amount to conducting political activity on government time, which is precisely what the DA’s office claims county staffers for Walker did. That’s another point Bice might have made if not for his obvious conflict of interest in writing this story.

The smell emanating from the D.A.’s office is sickeningly familiar. We’ve seen leading conservatives railroaded by kangaroo courts before, and later exonerated.

There is more than sufficient reason to ask whether crimes have been committed by District Attorney staff leaking confidential information in an effort to smear the Governor and undo the 2010 elections. We have seen enough rot in this state’s justice system to take seriously the prospect of its active involvement in a political coup.

If the word coup is too uncomfortable, try frame-up. Either way, it’s time to demand answers.

Gearing up for increased political activism on the cusp of a campaign to recall Governor Scott Walker, the State’s teachers’ union is being guided by the philosophy of radical leftist Saul Alinsky, the MacIver News Service has learned.

On Friday and Saturday WEAC is sponsoring community organizing training seminars put on by the Industrial Areas Foundation.

The IAF is a leftist community organizing network established in 1940 by Saul Alinsky. Alinsky, author of the book Rules for Radicals, remains a controversial political figure many years after his death. Opposed to many of the bloody revolutionary strategies supported by his fellow radicals, Alinsky was guided by a neo-Marxist philosophy that promoted infiltration and gradualism over violent confrontation.

“A Marxist begins with his prime truth that all evils are caused by the exploitation of the proletariat by the capitalists,” Alinsky wrote. “From this he logically proceeds to the revolution to end capitalism, then into the third stage of reorganization into a new social order of the dictatorship of the proletariat, and finally the last stage — the political paradise of communism.” READ MORE>> http://maciverinstitute.com/?p=9468

Some anti-Israel church activists in the West blast Israel in time for Christmas. Others choose Easter. Recently, World Vision chief Richard Stearns, who heads one of the largest U.S. evangelical relief groups, proclaimed in the Huffington Post that Palestinian Christians are enduring a Holy Week of “trial and tribulation” thanks to Israel.

Claiming Israel allows only 2,000- 3000 travel permits for Jerusalem during Holy Week to a population of about 50,000 Palestinian Christians, Stearns never bothered to acknowledge why Israel has security concerns about visitors to Jerusalem. Quoting a Palestinian colleague who attended church in Jerusalem in 2010, Stearns ominously recalled: “The crowd, striving to stay joyful, could still feel the change of what Easter had now become and the dark cloud of checkpoints, police forces, and denial of entry that had obscured the joy of this holiday.” Stearns announced he’s praying for the “miracle” of “full religious freedom to the Christians in the West Bank and Gaza.”

If he has time, maybe Stearns can pray for all Christians in the Middle East, whose problems entail considerably more than travel inconveniences.

Responding to Stearns, Israeli Ambassador to the U.S. Michael Oren said Israel has provided more than 20,000 permits this year for Palestinian Christians to enter Jerusalem for Holy Week, plus 500 permits for the handful of Christians left in Hamas-controlled Gaza.

“With the exception of the very few individuals who have raised security concerns, and notwithstanding the measures we must take to protect our citizens, any Christian from the West Bank can reach Jerusalem on Good Friday and Easter,” Oren said. “Israel, the only Middle Eastern country with a growing and thriving Christian population, remains committed to maintaining its superb relations with Christian communities worldwide. Though we face serious and continuing defense challenges, we uphold the principle of free access to the Holy Places to all religions.”

Ambassador Oren has recently had to address the realities that confront the Middle East’s shriveling Christian populations while many Western Christians prefer silence or blaming Israel.

In a Wall Street Journal op-ed recently he described the Christian exodus from Palestinian territories thanks to Islamist intimidation. The Religious Left and its preferred Palestinian voices responded indignantly, since Oren had challenged their narrative that only Israel can be faulted for Christian difficulties in the Middle East.

Oren’s facts were indisputable. About 20 percent of the Middle East a century ago was Christian. Today it’s 5 percent and plunging, as churches are burned in Iraq, Egypt and elsewhere, forcing thousands to flee. Oren likened the Christian exodus to the 800,000 Jews forced from their homes in Arab lands after Israel’s creation. The only safe place for Christians in the current Middle East is in Israel, he observed with understatement.

As a minority, Christians experience some “intolerance” in Israel, Oren admitted. “But in contrast to elsewhere in the Middle East where hatred of Christians is ignored or encouraged,” he wrote, “Israel remains committed to its Declaration of Independence pledge to ‘ensure the complete equality of all its citizens irrespective of religion.’”

In contrast, half of Gaza’s almost tiny Christian community has fled since the Hamas coup in 2007, Oren noted. On the West Bank, the Christian community has fallen to under 2 percent. Although Israel is commonly blamed for Christian emigration, most Palestinian Christians live in West Bank cities under the Palestinian Authority. And the Muslim majority population continues to grow. In Bethlehem, where Christians where once the majority, they have become 20 percent since the Palestinian take-over in 1995.

“The extinction of the Middle East’s Christian communities is an injustice of historic magnitude,” Oren concluded. But an anti-Israel Christian group called Kairos Palestine denounced Oren’s oped as “inaccurate and manipulative” for faulting Muslims instead of Israel’s “illegal Israeli occupation.” Their response, helpfully broadcast by the United Church of Christ’s Global Ministries Board, did not identify any specific inaccuracies by Oren. Instead, the Palestinian activists blamed Christian “persecution” on the “occupation that systematically degrades all Palestinians” and the “underlying political oppression that afflicts Christians and Muslims alike.”

Oddly, Kairos Palestine surmises that Oren’s citation of Israeli protections for Christians implies Israel’s “lack of interest in ensuring the same for Muslims.” And of course they incredulously wonder why permits should be needed for visiting holy sites in Jerusalem. Ostensibly, they claim, “Christians and Muslims lived together for the past 1500 years without major problems,” until Israel’s creation. And naturally they fault the “roots of empire and colonialism,” and the U.S. invasion of Iraq.

“As Kairos Palestine, we refuse to be marginalized in the way Oren defines our marginalization,” they boast. “We refuse to be pitted against our Palestinian Muslim neighbors and friends; and we refuse to let our collective oppression be manipulated in a way that fragments us, obscures us, or masks the oppression’s true cause, which is the Israeli occupation.”

How very brave. But Kairos Palestine, like other supposed proponents of Christian Palestinians, doesn’t explain why the Muslim population in the West Bank and Gaza continue to grow while only the Christian population declines. If exodus signifies persecution, then seemingly Israeli policies must favor Palestinian Muslims.

In fact, the vast majority of Palestinians, Muslim and Christian, live under the direct rule of the Palestinian Authority. Palestinians do not have military control over the West Bank. And Palestinians must contend with the inconveniences of security checks when they travel from one region to the next. The much maligned Israeli security wall, which has saved so many lives from terror, has created additional inconveniences by separating some communities. But travel and security inconveniences, compounded by the indignity to Palestinian nationalism of ultimate Israeli military oversight, afflict all Palestinians and do not selectively affect Palestinian Christians.

“Israeli obstacles and practices do not differentiate between Muslims and Christians, and are imposed over a whole nation,” admitted a Palestinian priest in a Palestinian news service story intended to rebut the Israeli ambassador. “The bullets that fired against Palestinians do not differentiate between Christians and Muslims.”

The priest boasted that Israeli oppression would “strengthen the ties between Christians and Muslims.” How wonderful. Then why are Christian Palestinians leaving? The priest jibbed that Israel should “offer freedom to the Christian communities under its occupation before criticizing Muslim oppression in other countries in the Middle East.” And he insisted: “No such oppression exists in Palestine.”

Right. Critics of Oren’s op-ed further cited a Palestinian study showing Christians who emigrate are “aggravated by the lack of freedom and security.” Will Palestinian Christians gain in “freedom and security” under a fully autonomous Palestinian state where Hamas is a likely co-ruler?

The tiny Christian minority among Palestinians, always struggling to survive, is hardly in any position to criticize its Palestinian Muslim overlords. On a human level, they cannot be faulted for saying what they have to say and defensively burnishing their nationalist credentials. But Western church groups, like the United Church of Christ’s Global Ministries, should be ashamed for exploiting their plight. Ideally Western church groups would instead speak truth about why Christians are fleeing the Middle East. But at least the Israeli ambassador is speaking on behalf of besieged Middle East Christians when too many Western churches refuse to do so.

Paul Clement will attack the expansion of Medicaid. He’s talking about whether it’s “coercive,” because if it is, it won’t fit the Spending Power. Justice Kagan wants to know why a “big gift from the Federal Government” is coercion. “The Federal Government is here saying, we are giving you a boatload of money.”Just a big old boatload of money is coercive, Clement says confidently. But the actual bill has a “very big condition.” Kagan interrupts, trying to make her point that a big boatload of money is not coercive. What if someone offered you a job and would pay you $10 million a year. Of course, you say yes, but you’re not coerced are you? Clement lays down one of the cleverest teasers I have ever heard: “Well, I guess I would want to know where the money came from.”

“Wow. Wow.” says Kagan. Has a Supreme Court ever said “Wow. Wow” before? She can’t believe you’d do anything other than snap up that money. “I’m offering you $10 million a year to come work for me, and you are saying that this is anything but a great choice?”

Clement springs his trap: “Sure, if I told you, actually, it came from my own bank account.” BRILLIANT!!

We just sued Kathleen Sebelius.

Moments ago we filed a new federal lawsuit against HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, and Labor Secretary Solis – those government officials responsible for enforcing the new HHS mandate.

Our lawsuit was filed in St. Louis on behalf of Frank O’Brien and his corporation – and is the first legal challenge to be brought against the new HHS mandate on behalf of a private business.

Mr. O’Brien employs 87 people, and has dedicated his manufacturing business to the Sacred Heart of Jesus. He is a faithful Catholic and objects to the government forcing him and his company to pay for medicines and procedures he believes are immoral.

Religious freedom for all! Not just the few.

What you may not realize is that this attack on our religious liberty is even worse than you may have first thought.

Many people of faith have been lulled into thinking that as long as we can convince the Obama Administration to exempt religious groups from the new mandate, then everything would be OK, right?

WRONG!

Religious freedom is explicitly protected by the First Amendment of our Constitution. It is not a right that government bestows, or can take away. It is our First Freedom – and it applies to everyone – individuals, churches, schools, hospitals, and yes, even private businesses.

But President Obama and Secretary Sebelius want to change everything.

President Obama does not believe religious freedom is a foundational freedom for every American. His HHS mandate, for example, seeks to define what groups are religious enough and which groups are not. The mandate invents arbitrary rules (do you primarily serve people of your own faith, etc.), while claiming that businesses like Mr. O’Brien’s deserve no protection whatsoever!

Since when did religious freedom become a privilege the government bestows on the few groups they deem are religious enough?

Our bishops have made this point better than anyone. They have explained that the HHS mandate is both an assault on religious institutions and an assault on the civil rights of every American.

We’ll keep you informed as this new lawsuit gets underway.

We’re fighting back in Congress.

We’re preparing to fight back at the ballot box.

And now we’re taking the fight to the courts.

Not just for Catholics.

For everyone.

Sincerely,

Brian Burch, Director

CatholicVote.org Legal Fund