Michael R. Shannon
Michael R. Shannon is a Virginia-based public relations and media consultant with MANDATE: Message, Media & Public Relations who has worked in over 75 elections on three continents and a handful of islands. Michael’s columns have appeared on his own News & Messenger site and AmericaSpeakOn. The Tampa Trib has published some of his columns, as has Black Velvet Bruce Li. He was an editorial writer and columnist for the Dallas Morning News, and has been in politics and journalism since 1972. As consultant to The Israel Project, he has made a number of trips to Israel where he worked closely with the Ministry of Foreign Affairs in their efforts to promote a positive image of Israel. Shannon has also conducted media and message training workshops for MFA and Israeli Defense Forces spokespersons along with representatives of various non–governmental organizations. During the UN Court trial in The Hague, Shannon worked closely with the MFA in its international media outreach. You can reach Michael at
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or
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. You can also read more on his blog, "The Whole Shebang (mostly)" at http://michaelshannon.wordpress.com/. Look for Michael's Book, "A Conservative Christian's Guidebook for Living in Secular Times: (Now With Added Humor!)".
I am well aware Donald Trump isn’t a conservative. What’s more, I’ve seen no indication that he’s interested in adopting a consistent constitutionally conservative philosophy. He’s the personification of the “random walk” brought to politics.But none of that matters.
For our purposes we don’t need James Madison. The fact that Trump’s background is closer to that of Ashley Madison is entirely irrelevant to the tremendous service he can perform for conservatives.
What Donald Trump understands is winning and winning’s corollary: Getting even. And that’s why he’s the perfect candidate to give conservatives a real chance of achieving our greatest victory in the last 50 years.
And that’s where two words become crucial for my vote: Term limits.
If Trump adds term limits to his signature issue of immigration then I’m instantly a Trumpista. Term limits is another perfect issue for Trump and his eclectic assembly of voters who are fed up with a self–serving, unresponsive and corrupt political establishment.
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Most of us with a cable, newspaper or Internet subscription are familiar with the 21st Century’s global epidemic: Sudden Jihad Syndrome. First identified outside the laboratory by Daniel Pipes, the disease is typically confined to males.There also appears to be a correlation with Islam, but that’s controversial.
Mainstream media practitioners usually apply the Sudden Jihad Syndrome diagnosis to quiet, younger men who keep to themselves and do a great deal of research on YouTube. Hobbies include building pipe bombs, going to the shooting range and collecting anhydrous ammonia.
The rest of us know we’re in a Sudden Jihad Syndrome outbreak when, for no particular reason, the young man yells Allahu Akbar and either starts shooting or explodes.
Now, in the wake of the Philadelphia attack on a police officer, I’ve identified a related pathology called Sudden Imam Syndrome. This occurs when a secular politician, typically a Democrat although weak–minded Republicans exhibit low resistance, assures us after an attack that the Moslem terrorist “had nothing to do with Islam.”
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Displaying that tone of pretentious concern that its made famous, the New York Times writes that as of 2014 the US birthrate has declined for the sixth consecutive year. One would think the Times, of all papers, would be overjoyed by this development since the decline means a reduction in number of little carbon producers in the future.Although it’s too late for Cecil the Lion, maybe polar bears will have a fighting chance.
The decline is also counterintuitive “because the number of women in their prime childbearing years, 20 to 39, has been growing since 2007.”
This means the drop in absolute numbers is cushioned due to the larger population of potential mothers. “The National Center for Health Statistics reported Thursday that there were 3.93 million births in the United States in 2013, down slightly from 3.95 million in 2012, but 9 percent below the high in 2007.
Some think this could be a problem in the Boomer’s golden years, when there’s no one around to push the wheelchair even at a $15/hr. minimum wage. Demographer Andrew J. Cherlin assures us, “Americans haven’t worried much about birthrates in the past, because we have the faucet of immigration to turn on and off.” Actually, that’s not true. Every high school kid that’s got it on in the back seat has worried the next morning about birthrates. But for the nation as a whole, Cherlin says we can decide whether we want to become Mexico slowly or rápido.
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It’s not always necessary for a nation to wave the white flag for its enemies to know it has surrendered. Sometimes a leak from an administration official will do just fine without requiring all the logistics of a formal surrender ceremony.The Washington Post lays the latest Obama capitulation out in detail: “Months after the discovery of a massive breach of U.S. government personnel records, the Obama administration has decided against publicly blaming China for the intrusion in part out of reluctance to reveal the evidence that American investigators have assembled…
The administration also appears to have refrained from any direct retaliation against China or attempt to use cyber-measures to corrupt or destroy the stockpile of sensitive data stolen from the Office of Personnel Management.”
Contrast that feeble hand–wringing with the nation’s last reaction to a massive attack on the homeland originating from across the Pacific. Only four months after Japan attacked Pearl Harbor, the Doolittle Raid returned the favor by bombing Tokyo.
Compare that with an Obama administration that can’t even be bothered to attempt corrupting the vital information stolen during the data breach. Even the French tried to spike the guns before they ran.
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My father grew up in rural Texas during the 1930s. His childhood featured dirt roads, a hand–crank telephone and outhouses. Most, if not all, of the bathrooms the Shannons constructed were what is termed a “one–holer.”Meaning the board that kept you from falling into a pit of (you–know–what) had a single hole carved in it, usually smack dab in the center. For some inexplicable reason, a some people built outhouses that were two–holers, possibly on the theory that if there were two of you inside, you stood an even chance with the flies. Although it seems to me it would have worked better if one swatted while the other, well, you know.
But on the plus side for modern progressives, all those bathrooms were “gender neutral.” The splinters didn’t care whose behind they poked. And the Shannons recycled without any government coercion. Last year’s Sears Roebuck catalog provided reading matter to pass the time and once you were finished passing, the pages helped one tidy up.
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Developments on the women–in–combat front are cause for concern, even for leftists that have made cognitive dissonance a way of life, because the women don’t seem to be holding up their end of the ideological bargain.If Ranger Sgt. Rosie Riveter is going to be leaping out of aircraft and putting paid to ISIS misogynists — either by a well–placed burst from her rifle or silently dispatching him with the Camel Clutch (first made famous by the Iron Shiek) — it would be a big help if she’d quit complaining about her shoes.
I was under the impression that if a shoe didn’t hurt a female wasn’t interested in wearing it, but evidently that’s not the case. Females deployed in Afghanistan are complaining they lack access to combat boots designed especially for them.
This is where the dissonance really bites.
Feminists believe “gender” is a social construct and men and women are interchangeable. Lefty women, secure in Washington think tanks, contend that denying other women the opportunity to be killed on the front line is patriarchal discrimination.
Meanwhile women actually in the Army are hoping for something a little more strappy with a semi–open toe.
Even in branches of the service that have essentially struck their colors, women aren’t happy about equality. The Washington Times quotes a middie (maybe widdie?) at the Naval Academy unhappy that the unisex unis “make women look like men.”
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