Tag Archives: Ben Carson

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‘Liberal media’ take no prisoners

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media

Ben Carson has counterattacked the “liberal media” for what he calls a “witch hunt.”

Questions about his past have become all the rage. CNN keeps poking around in the hunt for corroboration that he once stabbed someone in a fit of anger. The network can’t find anyone to back it up. Now we hear that Dr. Carson, um, didn’t exactly get offered a West Point scholarship in the manner he said he did.

The media want to know the truth.

The counterattack points to what the doctor/Republican presidential candidate said is a double standard as it regards Democrats running for president. The media don’t look quite as intently at them as they do Republicans, according to Dr. Carson.

Hold on, doc.

Barack Obama faced intense scrutiny over:

  • His relationship with a fiery Church of Christ pastor, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright.
  • His friendship with anti-Vietnam War activist William Ayers.
  • His place of birth and whether he was constitutionally qualified to run for president of the United States.
  • His academic records at Harvard, which Carson brought up again this week.

And, oh yes, Hillary Clinton, the current Democratic frontrunner has, throughout her public career, faced down matters involving:

  • Allegations that she covered up information about Benghazi.
  • Her involvement with her husband, the 42nd president, in the Whitewater real estate matter.
  • The death of her good friend, Vince Foster, who some in the media have suggested was murdered.

So … let’s take a breath, shall we?

I also should mention the names of other prominent Democratic pols who’ve wilted under the media glare.

Do the names Gary Hart and John Edwards ring a bell? How about Anthony Weiner and Barney Frank?

Let’s get back to the story at hand. Did a leading candidate for president of the United States misrepresent whether he was offered a West Point scholarship?

Well … ?

 

military news, national news, political news

‘Cadet Carson’ never suited up

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deadstate-Ben-Carson

The vetting of the latest Republican presidential front runner has begun.

It’s gotten a bit bumpy for the noted neurosurgeon.

Politico reports that contrary to what he’s written about himself, Dr. Ben Carson never was offered a scholarship to the U.S. Military Academy. He didn’t even apply for admission, Politico reports.

Carson, though, says he was told when he was 17 years of age that if he applied, he’d be offered the full ride. Who told him? He said it was Army Gen. William Westmoreland, who had just finished commanding U.S. forces in Vietnam.

So … did the good doctor lie, fib, “misremember,” or what?

Carson’s record is under scrutiny more than ever now for a simple reason. He’s among the leaders of a still-packed GOP presidential field of candidates.

If he made it all up, then he’s likely guilty of something approaching stolen valor … you know, when folks make up war stories about themselves. It’s more or less what former NBC News anchor Brian Williams did when he claimed to have to been shot down by an Iraqi rocket-propelled grenade in 2003; oops, didn’t happen, we found out later.

Still, one shouldn’t be allowed to get away even with “misremembering” such details about one’s life when he seeks to become president of the United States of America.

It kind of reminds me of when Democratic presidential candidate Bill Clinton once said he didn’t remember getting a draft notice. Interesting. As one who did get such a notice from Uncle Sam, I can speak for others who did as well that you do not forget getting such a letter.

Dr. Carson has some serious explaining to do. His campaign now says he didn’t get the scholarship or the appointment to West Point.

Now, let’s hear from you, Dr. Carson. Did you make it up?

 

national news, political news, religious news

Hey, didn’t JFK settle this religious thing already?

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I’ve always thought — or hoped, at least — that John F. Kennedy’s 1960 speech in Houston settled the notion that a candidate’s religion should have no bearing on whether he could serve as president of the United States.

He told some Protestant clergy that the Vatican would not dictate to the Catholic candidate how he should govern, that he would swear to be faithful only to the U.S. Constitution.

Well, silly me. The issue is coming up again. The target this time is Dr. Ben Carson, the famed neurosurgeon whose faith is of the Seventh-day Adventist variety.

Donald Trump raised the issue the other day in typical tactless Trump fashion. Now comes a well-known lefty commentator, David Corn, editor of Mother Jones, to wonder aloud whether Carson’s faith would inform the way he would govern should he “take control of the government.”

This is a ridiculous debate.

First of all, presidents don’t control the government. We have this notion that power is spread among two other governmental branches — the courts and the Congress.

The Constitution says there should be “no religious test” for candidates seeking any public office. That includes the presidency.

Yes, Carson has brought up his own faith. He’s talked about how his faith would guide him. He hasn’t said he would toss the Constitution aside any more than then-Sen. Kennedy said he would more than five decades ago.

Corn is playing to voters’ fears when he says of Carson: “Now, he is running on the basis that he has faith. And I think it’s going to open, you know, a big can here. Because, you know, he does come from a church that believes in end times, prophesies, and he’s said he believes in the church’s teachings.”

A simple declarative question is in order: Dr. Carson, do you vow to uphold the law under the Constitution of the United States?

I believe he’s already pledged to do so.

 

national news, political news, religious news

Faith should be off limits on the campaign trail

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I keep coming back to a simple phrase in the U.S. Constitution.

Article VI says there will be “no religious test” for anyone seeking public office.

Isn’t that clear? As in crystal clear?

Why, then, is Donald Trump injecting faith in the Republican Party’s presidential primary campaign by questioning whether one of his opponents, Ben Carson, worships outside the mainstream?

Trump proclaimed the other day he is a Presbyterian. “I’m Presbyterian. Boy, that’s down the middle of the road, folks, in all fairness. I mean, Seventh-day Adventist, I don’t know about. I just don’t know about.”

Carson is a Seventh-day Adventist.

How does this guy get away with saying these things about his political adversaries?

A candidate’s faith is supposed to be off the table. The Constitution — the document that politicians, Democrat and Republican and alike say they revere — lays it out there in stark terms. There must be “no religious test.”

Trump, though, flouts his professed respect for the Constitution while questioning whether another candidate’s faith is mainstream enough to suit the voters both men are courting as they fight for their party’s presidential nomination.

What’s more … the guy is getting away with it!

God help us …

 

national news, political news

Now it’s Dr. Carson’s faith drawing Trump barbs

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You might have heard Donald Trump score another one for the tasteless, tactless and thoughtless.

Will this latest insult doom his candidacy for the Republican presidential nomination? I doubt it.

The object of Trump’s latest bit of scorn happened to be Dr. Ben Carson … specifically his faith.

Trump was rambling over the weekend about his being a Presbyterian. Then he launched into a brief riff wondering about Carson’s Seventh-day Adventist faith.

It was as if Trump didn’t think much of Carson’s belief.

Let’s see, Trump has gone after:

John McCain’s war record; Carly Fiorina’s appearance; broadcast journalist Megyn Kelly’s line of questioning; Jeb Bush’s “lack of energy”; the media in general; talk-show host Hugh Hewitt’s so-called “gotcha” journalism; Hispanic immigrants.

Anyone else? Oh, probably. I just can’t think of them.

Will any of it doom him. One would think. But wait! This isn’t a normal election year.

Goofiness is what many of the GOP faithful seem to want.

Heaven help them … and the rest of us.

 

national news, political news

What would Ben do?

deadstate-Ben-Carson

Ben Carson ought to be a little more circumspect about some of the responses he gives to hypothetical situations.

Dr. Carson, a Republican running for president of the United States, had the bad form the other day to say that the Umpqua Community College students in Roseburg, Ore., should have ganged up on the gunman who killed nine people before killing himself.

Easy for you to say, Doc. But … but what did you do when someone actually pointed a gun at you?

He said that happened once at a Popeye’s restaurant and he told the gunman that his target was someone else. According to the Los Angeles Times: “Guy comes in, put the gun in my ribs. And I just said, ‘I believe that you want the guy behind the counter,'” Carson said.

Dr. Carson’s account of what happened differed quite dramatically from what he said others should do when faced with mortal peril.

So, Dr. Carson’s hypothetical bravery actually became something else when he faced a threat of his own.

This, I submit, is the danger that politicians — and, yes, Carson’s status as an active presidential candidate makes him a politician — face when they respond to real-life situations with tragic outcomes. They need to take care when saying such things about what they might do or how others should respond.

Perhaps the next time something happens that compares to what occurred in Roseburg, public figures everywhere should say: “I only can imagine the horror that raced through their hearts. I have no idea how they should have reacted, nor do I know what I would have done.”

Hey, just leave it at that.

 

national news, political news

President serving role as ‘comforter in chief’

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roseburg

Presidents of the United States have a number of unwritten roles in their job description.

The current president, Barack H. Obama, is going to perform one of them Friday when he stops in Roseburg, Ore., to throw his arms around a community shattered by an unspeakable tragedy.

However, at least one of his critics, Republican presidential candidate Dr. Ben Carson, thinks such a task is too political and that Americans are “sick and tired” of politicians who “politicize everything.”

Give me a break.

Dr. Carson is wrong, period.

Roseburg was stunned by the deaths of nine people at Umpqua Community College by a gunman who then took his own life. It was yet another case of gun violence that resulted in the massacre of innocent victims. Is the president enraged by what happened? Of course he is … as I’m sure Dr. Carson is angered as well.

But this task of offering comfort to the stricken is part of the job description that the president inherits whenever he takes the oath of office.

Presidents of both parties have been called upon to perform the task of comforter in chief. However, Carson told “Fox and Friends” today: “When do we get to the point where we have people who actually want to solve our problems rather than just politicize everything? I think that’s what the American people are so sick and tired of.”

Well, as the president said the other day in the wake of the Roseburg massacre, if a tragedy calls out for a political solution, then so be it.

 

 

national news, political news, religious news

Religion takes center stage

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Bobby Jindal says Donald Trump isn’t really a Christian.

Ben Carson said — initially, at least — that a Muslim isn’t fit to be president.

Mike Huckabee says Barack Obama is trying to “criminalize” Christianity and that the president is a “pretend” Christian.

Can we stop — please! — with the religion rhetoric?

Jindal was just the latest to ridicule another Republican presidential candidate’s statement of faith. Trump had spoken to the Values Voter Summit and proclaimed his deep Christian faith. Jindal followed him and said Trump has never read the Bible and that he believes only in himself.

Religion has no place here

I kind of get where Jindal, the Louisiana governor, is going with the Trump jabs. Trump opened himself up to the ridicule by proclaiming to a group of zealous conservatives that he’s one of them. Jindal, I suppose, has the right to challenge one of his rivals’ assertions in that regard.

But this continual back and forth regarding candidates’ faith is getting tiresome and, frankly, it misses a critical point about electing the next president of the United States.

The point is that the president is head of a secular state and government. We can argue until hell freezes over about what the founding fathers intended when they wrote the Constitution. But the finished document is as secular as it can possibly be.

The First Amendment spells it out. Congress shall make no law that establishes a state religion, it says. Isn’t that enough evidence of what the founders intended when they established the Bill of Rights in the nation’s government document?

So, let’s cut the talk about who’s a real Christian?

It does not matter.

 

 

national news, political news, religious news

The doc softens his view of a Muslim president

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It turns out that Dr. Ben Carson doesn’t really and truly think no Muslim could serve as president of the United States.

The good doctor is right to change his mind … more or less.

Sharia law at issue

Carson  — one of 15 candidates seeking the Republican presidential nomination — said on “Meet the Press” that Islam is incompatible with the U.S. Constitution. Thus, he said, he couldn’t ever condone the idea of a Muslim running for president.

Now he says something different — and much more reasonable.

He believes now that if a Muslim were to disavow Sharia law then, by golly, he’d be all right with a Muslim running for — and possibly becoming — president of the United States.

You see — and I am sure Dr. Carson knows this — the Constitution is a secular document to which all presidents swear to defend and protect.

His purported fear of Sharia law was nonsense on its face when he said it over the weekend.

Anyone who takes the oath swears to set his or her religious faith aside when performing the duties of the public office. Sen. John F. Kennedy faced accusations during the 1960 presidential campaign that he would take orders — as a Roman Catholic — from the Vatican. He torched that concern with one speech in September 1960 in which he would promise fealty only to the Constitution were he to win the election.

According to The Hill newspaper: “If someone has a Muslim background, and they’re willing to reject those tenets [of Sharia law] and to accept the way of life we have, and clearly will swear to place our Constitution above their religion,” the 2016 hopeful said in a Monday night interview with Sean Hannity on Fox News Channel, “then I would then be quite willing to support them.”

There you have it. Reason and sanity have taken their rightful place in this discussion.

national news, political news, religious news

No place for religious bigotry

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ellison

U.S. Rep. Keith Ellison, D-Minn., is one of just two Muslim members of Congress.

He has just posted this item on social media. I feel compelled to share it here.

He is answering two leading Republican presidential candidates’ recent assertions about those who practice the Islamic faith.

Ellison writes:

“The freedom of religion is a founding principle of our nation. Our Constitution gives this right to all Americans – including elected officials. For Ben Carson, Donald Trump, or any other Republican politician to suggest that someone of any faith is unfit for office is out of touch with who we are as a people. It’s unimaginable that the leading GOP presidential candidates are resorting to fear mongering to benefit their campaigns, and every American should be disturbed that these national figures are engaging in and tolerating blatant acts of religious bigotry.”

I believe I’ll let Rep. Ellison’s words stand on their own.