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Tuesday, May 1, 2018

GUN/RIGHT TO LIFE RIGHTS; SECOND AMENDMENT NEWS: JOIN PRO GUN LAWMAKERS SEEKING ANSWERS & ACCOUNTABILITY FROM ANTI-GUN BANKS

Tomi Ledford: 
Everybody Has a Right to Life
I do know what it's like to be vulnerable. I know what it's like to feel like you can't protect your children or yourself. And it's terrifying when you have a spouse, whether it be husband or wife, that's serving overseas thousands of miles away, and you’re the only one there to stand up for yourself, to stand up for your home, for your little kid that’s right there next to you.I support the Second Amendment because of that. I support the NRA because they support my right to protect my kids. Everybody has a right to life. And you have the right to protect that. And nobody has a right to take it away from you.
JOIN PRO GUN LAWMAKERS 
SEEKING ANSWERS & ACCOUNTABILITY 
FROM ANTI-GUN BANKS
BY NRAHQ
SEE: https://www.ammoland.com/2018/04/join-pro-gun-lawmakers-seeking-answers-and-accountability-from-anti-gun-banks/#axzz5EFfCNxWGrepublished below in full unedited for informational, educational, and research purposes:

Fairfax, VA – -(Ammoland.com)- We recently reported on the disturbing trend of large U.S. banks – most notably Bank of America (BofA) and Citigroup – using their enormous market power to discriminate against customers based on lawful firearm-related business activities.
These decisions were unabashedly prompted and lauded by anti-gun activists as political statements and social engineering, not as business decisions based on any alleged financial unsoundness or criminal activity of the affected customers. This feigned high-mindedness is particularly galling to gun-owning Americans whose billions of tax dollars helped bail out these financial behemoths after the banks’ reckless business practices brought their companies and the U.S. economy to the brink of disaster. Now, pro-gun members of Congress are demanding answers and accountability. You can do your part, too, by lodging your own complaints against the banks with the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau.
Sen. John Kennedy (R-LA) led the way with a March 29, 2018 letter to Citigroup CEO Michael Corbat. Kennedy expressed “significant concerns” about the bank’s new policies and asked to be provided with “the specific number of entities in Louisiana which stand to lose banking services as a result of [Citigroup’s] increased scrutiny on law-abiding businesses.” He pointedly reminded the bank, “It feels like yesterday when Citi received nearly half a trillion dollars in taxpayer-backed guarantees and cash after putting the entire financial system at risk,” a move Kennedy called, “the largest government bailout in American history.” Kennedy encouraged Citigroup to be a good corporate citizen by refocusing on business decisions, including “addressing apparent shortcomings like overcharging credit card interest rates to account holders and compliance with U.S. anti-money laundering laws.”
Also joining the effort were 16 Congressmen led by Rep. Todd Rokita (R-IN), who on April 11 wrote to Emily W. Murphy, head of the General Services Administration, asking her to reconsider a $700+ billion contract with Citigroup to help implement the federal charge card system, SmartPay 3.  The letter noted that the bank’s new firearm policies “run counter to laws and regulations passed by Congress, and they infringe and discriminate against an individual’s Second Amendment rights.” Such policies, the signatories opined, “should not be endorsed by our federal government,” which instead should “do business with companies that respect all of our constitutional rights, including the Second Amendment.” The letter urged the GSA to “take all necessary steps to review and terminate its contract with Citibank unless they rescind their guidelines … .”
The most recent action came from Sen. Mike Crapo (R-ID), Chairman of the Senate Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs. On April 25, Crapo sent letters to the CEOs of both BofA and Citigroup demanding answers about their recent anti-gun activity. “It is deeply concerning to me,” he wrote, “when large national banks … which receive significant forms of government support and benefits, use their market power to manage social policy by withholding access to credit to customers and companies they disfavor.”
Crapo also raised the issue of the banks’ collection of personally identifiable information (PII) and how it might be used “to monitor and deny financial services to individuals and companies who are engaging in completely legal and, in this case, Constitutionally-protected activity.” He additionally sought further information about the banks’ restrictive firearm policies and any other legal transactions, industries, and businesses they disfavor, prohibit, or boycott. “We should all be concerned if banks … seek to replace legislators and policymakers and attempt to manage social policy by limiting access to credit,” he concluded.
One way banking consumers concerned about BofA’s and Citigroup’s antigun discrimination can make their views known is to submit a complaint directly to the Consumer Financial Protection Bureau (CFPB). The CFPB is an entity of the U.S. Government charged with “mak[ing] consumer financial markets work for consumers, responsible providers, and the economy as a whole.” Its mandates include “[r]ooting out unfair, deceptive, or abusive acts or practices,” taking “consumer complaints,” and “[m]onitoring financial markets for new risks to consumers.”

Particularly useful would be complaints by any business or individual who was directly affected by the BofA’s or Citigroup’s new policies.

But every American adult likely uses or will need banking services to survive in the modern economy. Law-abiding gun owners have legitimate concerns about possible collusion and collective efforts between banks and/or banks and advocacy groups aimed at denying them services simply for exercising their rights under the U.S. Constitution and laws. These efforts also can create a hostile and chilling climate for the exercise of Second Amendment rights, particularly for those hoping to obtain financing for such things as home and auto purchases or running a small business. Once financial institutions take it upon themselves to set social policy that exceeds the requirements of the law, it’s impossible to know where they will stop or what other indicators of disfavored activity might become relevant to them. No American should be treated as a scapegoat for someone else’s crimes.
Complaints may be submitted directly through the CFPB’s website and will be forwarded to the banks themselves. Information on complaints may also be made publicly available so other consumers can evaluate for themselves whether the banks’ are behaving improperly and possibly share their own relevant experiences.
The NRA thanks Sens. Kennedy and Crapo and Rep. Rokita for their leadership in fighting discrimination against law-abiding gun owners.
About:
Established in 1975, the Institute for Legislative Action (ILA) is the “lobbying” arm of the National Rifle Association of America. ILA is responsible for preserving the right of all law-abiding individuals in the legislative, political, and legal arenas, to purchase, possess and use firearms for legitimate purposes as guaranteed by the Second Amendment to the U.S. Constitution. Visit: www.nra.org
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NRA Endorses 2nd Amendment Lawsuit Filed by Ammunition Depot and CRPA
BY LAURA BURGESS
SEE: https://www.ammoland.com/2018/04/nra-endorses-2nd-amendment-lawsuit-filed-by-ammunition-depot-and-crpa/#axzz5EFPjEWx5republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, and research purposes:
Ammunition Depot stands up for America’s Second Amendment Rights and access to ammunition.

NRA Endorses 2nd Amendment Lawsuit Filed by Ammunition Depot and CRPA
NRA Endorses 2nd Amendment Lawsuit Filed by Ammunition Depot and CRPA

Boca Raton, Fla. (Ammoland.com) – Ammunition Depot has joined the California Rifle & Pistol Association with support of the National Rifle Association (NRA) in filing a lawsuit challenging California’s restriction regarding the sale or transfer of ammunition. The lawsuit, titled Rhode et al v. Becerra, challenges California’s new ammunition sales restrictions as a violation of the Second Amendment and Commerce Clause of the United States Constitution.
The restrictions California is imposing on their residents include not being permitted to order ammunition online and have it delivered to their place of residence or business. Proposition 63 mandates ammunition retailers to check with the Department of Justice to determine if a buyer is authorized to purchase. Individuals and businesses must obtain a 1-year license for the California Department of Justice to sell ammunition. Individuals must have any ammunition purchased online delivered to a firearms retailer in order to take possession of it. If ammunition is shipped from out of state, the California resident may be required to pay a transfer fee and, starting in 2019, will need to submit to a background check. There is a penalty for failure to follow the retailer licensing requirements
“These restrictions on the sale and transfer of ammunition in the state of California are a direct impingement on the rights and liberties of the residents of that state, and we at Ammunition Depot are committed to standing up for our customers and our Second Amendment rights,” Scott Blick, managing partner of Ammunition Depot said. “Shopping online offers our customers convenience, selection, great pricing and our uncompromising service, which we feel is the right of all citizens of the United States, including Californians.”
The Rhode et al v. Becerra suit will be the fourth lawsuit filed by CRPA attorneys with support from the NRA challenging the provisions of Proposition 63 and other “Gunmageddon” bills on the docket.  Duncan v. Becerra has already succeeded in obtaining an injunction against Proposition 63’s ban on the possession of magazines capable of holding more than 10 rounds. Two other lawsuits, Rupp v. Becerra and Villanueva v. Becerra are challenging California’s “assault weapon” restrictions and registration requirements and are also seeing injunctions.
Ammunition Depot asks customers and anyone concerned about our Second Amendment Rights to stay informed and subscribe to the NRA and CRPA email alerts and visit the NRA-ILA California dedicated webpage at www.StandAndFightCalifornia.com and the CRPA website at www.CRPA.org.
For additional information on the complaint filed, click here.
For more information go to  https://www.crpa.org/programs/volunteers-grassroots/ or send an email to volunteer@crpa.org.

About Ammunition Depot:
Ammunition Depot was founded by freedom-loving Americans committed to American’s right and responsibility to defend themselves, their families and their country. Ammunition Depot’s goal and promise is to provide to the American public high-quality ammunition at the lowest possible price with the best customer service they have ever experienced, period.
As Ammunition Depot has grown over the years, we have been able to create numerous jobs for hard-working Americans in our home state of Florida, as well as help many charities and foundations that support our troops, law enforcement, and the shooting sports.  Our plan is to keep growing, keep creating jobs, keep giving, and keep Ammunition Depot strong so that we can deliver the same great products and same great service for decades to come. www.ammunitiondepot.com
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More in the Firearms Industry Should Follow Hornady’s New York Example
BY DAVID CODREA
SEE: https://www.ammoland.com/2018/04/more-in-firearms-industry-should-follow-hornadys-new-york-example/#axzz5EFPJuiCvrepublished below in full unedited for informational, educational, and research purposes:
USA – -(Ammoland.com)- “Today, the State of New York did one of the most despicable acts ever perpetrated by any state by asking New York banks, financial institutions and insurance companies to stop doing business with the gun and ammo industry,” an April 23 press release by Steve Hornady, president of Hornady Manufacturing Company announced.
“While it may not make a difference to New York, Hornady will not knowingly allow our ammunition to be sold to the State of NY or any NY agencies,” Hornady pledged. “Their actions are a blatant and disgusting abuse of office and we won’t be associated with a government that acts like that. They should be ashamed.”
That is exactly the correct way to respond, and gun owners who agree should show it by making Hornady a preferred brand. It’s the best way to demonstrate that such leadership in appreciated form those who show it, and expected from those who do not.
It’s reminiscent of a 2002 letter Ronnie Barrett, President of Barrett Firearms Manufacturing, sent to then-Chief William J. Bratton of the Los Angeles Police Department, about his company’s .50 caliber rifles.
“Your officer, speaking for the LAPD, endorsed the banning of this rifle and its ammunition,” Barret wrote, recounting how LAPD acted as stooges for a Violence Policy Center disinformation and smear campaign for the Los Angeles City Council.
“When I returned to my office from Los Angeles, I found an example of our need for mutual cooperation.” Barrett went on to explain. “Your department had sent one of your 82A1 rifles in to us for service.
“Please excuse my slow response on the repair service of the rifle,” he continued. “I will not sell, nor service, my rifles to those seeking to infringe upon the Constitution and the crystal clear rights it affords individuals to own firearms.”
It was not the only time Barrett has taken such a stance.
“Barrett cannot legally sell any of its products to lawbreakers,” he wrote in 2005. “Therefore, since California's passing of AB50, the state is not in compliance with the US Constitution's 2nd and 14th Amendments, and we will not sell nor service any of our products to any government agency of the State of California.”
“If Hawaii or any state bans the sale of the .50-caliber rifle, we will immediately stop the sale and service of all Barrett products to that state’s government agencies,” Barrett wrote to Honolulu Police Department Chief Boisse Correa in 2008. “We will also welcome all small arms manufacturers to take the same action.”
And in 2013, Barrett declared the State of New York as well as individual elected officials supportive of bans ineligible for sales and service.
These are precisely the measures gun owner rights advocates should expect from manufacturers. If a state or city discriminates against the right of citizens to keep and bear arms, those we patronize should not be giving aid and comfort to the enemy – and how else would you characterize an oath-breaking totalitarian wannabe trying to establish and enforce a monopoly of violence?
We see continuous new efforts to squeeze gun companies and gun owners out of the marketplace, with bank discrimination, insurance denials, boycotts and the like. Yet there are millions of gun owners who consider themselves Second Amendment advocates, and it’s past time they put their economic clout to effective use.
This is something national and state gun groups could take the lead on, at least the ones not afraid to rock the boat. And it’s past time gun manufacturers stopped acting like neutral parties, willing to reap the benefits of RKBA activism as long as they don’t have to take a stand.
What are the prominent anti-gun state and municipal agencies? Who supplies them with their firepower? In many cases it’s easy enough to find out.
It’s not inappropriate to publicly ask those companies where they stand, and to favor, publicize and patronize those that stand with American gun owners.

About David Codrea:David Codrea
David Codrea is the winner of multiple journalist awards for investigating / defending the RKBA and a long-time gun owner rights advocate who defiantly challenges the folly of citizen disarmament.
In addition to being a field editor/columnist at GUNS Magazine and associate editor for Oath Keepers, he blogs at “The War on Guns: Notes from the Resistance,” and posts on Twitter: @dcodrea and Facebook.


LIBERAL HYPOCRISY IN NEW YORK CITY~WEALTHY UPPER WEST SIDE LIVID LIBERALS: PARENTS LOVE DIVERSITY; BUT NOT IN THEIR KIDS' SCHOOLS!

BUREAUCRATS/COMMUNIST LIBERALS
SCOLDING WEALTHY WHITE PARENTS, WHILE THEY HIDE THEIR WEALTH
ABOVE: Principal Henry Zymeck, the Computer School
Email: hzymeck@schools.nyc.gov
BELOW: MAYOR BILL DE BLASIO WITH 
SCHOOL CHANCELLOR RICHARD CARRANZA
ANOTHER "CAPITOL OF LIBERAL HYPOCRISY"
Livid Liberals: NYC Parents Love Diversity;
But Not in Their Kids’ Schools!
BY SELWYN DUKE
SEE: https://www.thenewamerican.com/culture/education/item/28935-livid-liberals-nyc-parents-love-diversity-but-not-in-their-kids-schoolsrepublished below in full unedited for informational, educational, and research purposes:
Leftists would call conservatives objecting to forced integration “racists.” So what do you call liberals in a posh New York City neighborhood balking at minorities being moved into their kids’ middle schools?
Well, “angry,” for one thing.
The brouhaha has erupted in the Big Apple’s Upper West Side (shown), a limousine-liberal area that gave Hillary Clinton 89 percent of its votes. (Trump got less than eight percent.) Here’s what’s going on: The rare exceptional schools in NYC are virtually always in affluent neighborhoods — such as the Upper West Side. Entry “into them is based on statewide test scores,” according to American Thinker’s Peter Skurkiss, and these schools are predominantly white.
This doesn’t sit well with NYC racial bean counters, so enter the Distinct 3 desegregation plan. “This is a call to reserve 25% of the seats in the 16 high-performing schools of this Upper West Side district to students with low standardized test scores in math and English,” relates Skurkiss. “It will be blacks slated for those 25% reserved seats. This isn't going over well with the wine and brie set. But to make matters worse for them, in order to make room for the low performers, about 25% of their kids will have to go to schools of, shall we say, color. That's a game-changer.”
For sure. As I’ve reported in the past, things often don’t go well for white children when they’re a racial minority in schools. And they’re not going well in NYC, where the desegregation plan has sparked a battle among leftists, as a recent meeting at the Upper West Side’s P.S. 199 evidences (video below).
At the meeting, Henry Zymeck, principal of The Computer School, chastised the complaining parents for essentially saying, as he translates it, “My already advantaged kids needs [sic] more advantage! They need to be kept away from those [minority] kids!” He said this attitude was “tremendously offensive” to him (hey, at least he didn’t roll out the white-privilege tripe).
This is the Offensiveness Ploy, used regularly to stifle dissent. Of course, the person isn’t really offended; he just doesn’t happen to like what you’re saying. But stating as much would make him seem intolerant, so he instead shifts the onus onto the dissenter by claiming the latter is being “offensive,” today’s version of a heresy charge.
Also virtue signaling was school chancellor Richard Carranza, who expressed, “Wealthy white Manhattan parents angrily rant against plan to bring more black kids to their schools” in a tweet that made the New York Post’s cover (below).
new yorkk post ed boss
If Zymeck and Carranza appear more committed to leftist principles than those they condemn, note that they likely don’t have skin in the game. Zymeck is 60 years old and lives in posh Millwood, NY, outside of NYC, where the average annual income is $245,000 and the population is only 2.3 percent black. His income is listed at MyLife.com at $250,000-plus, and there’s no indication that he has spent recent decades anywhere but wealthy Westchester County. So it’s a good bet his kids never attended NYC government schools; they could even have gone to private school.
It’s harder finding information on Carranza. We do know that Bolshevik Bill (a.k.a. Mayor de Blasio) recruited him from the Houston school system, that he has been accused of sexual misconduct, and that he’s paid a whopping $345,000 a year for his Big Apple position. In other words, there’s no ghetto living or schools in his two children’s futures.
But we’ve heard this story before. I reported in 2015 on a similar integration controversy in a neighborhood appropriately named Dumbo, in Brooklyn, which National Review writer Reihan Salam called “the Capital of Liberal Hypocrisy” (though the Upper West Side may now steal that title). And Salam explained the leftists’ opposition to Dumbo diversity thus: “Of course they want integration, they’ll tell you, but only if it entails no sacrifice on their part.” He quoted one Dumbo parent who actually said, “It’s more complicated when it’s about your own children.” But as I wrote:
Really, though, it isn’t.
It just seems so when you stop being feelings-oriented and actually start to think.
It’s easy to operate emotionally and embrace feel-good ideology — which polishes up leftist credentials and guarantees invitations to the right cocktail parties — when someone else’s ox is being gored. It’s easy to be idealistic when you don’t have to live with your ideals. As learned, however, by the lad who’d dreamt of being an astronaut but then balked upon embarking upon the process and coming to understand the difficulty involved, fantasy can be simple. Reality, though, is often complicated. And actually living your policies brings their reality home to you.
And living in a fantasy-world leads to fantastical accusations. As Salam opined remarking on leftist hypocrisy, “It’s easy to imagine how these Dumbo progressives might have reacted had this story unfolded in Atlanta or Birmingham — they’d surely chalk up resistance to the rezoning to racism.”
And what of the virtue-signaling Zymeck, who claimed he was pained that the Upper West Side parents were rejecting the introduction of “tremendously disadvantaged” youth into their schools? Why doesn’t he leave his posh Millwood neighborhood and lilywhite school and work in inner-city schools to improve test scores there, so that more impoverished kids can be accepted at better schools based on merit — which is how it should be?
Ah, yes, that would mean giving people the shirt off your own back — not just off someone else’s.

EUROPEAN COMMISSION PRESIDENT JUNCKER SET TO HONOR KARL MARX~CHINESE DONATE BRONZE SCULPTURE OF MARX TO TOWN OF TRIER~TOURIST OFFICE SELLS COMMEMORATIVE ZERO EURO BANK NOTE PICTURING MARX

EUROPEAN COMMISSION PRESIDENT JUNCKER SET TO HONOR KARL MARX 
BY STEVE BYAS
SEE: https://www.thenewamerican.com/world-news/europe/item/28934-eu-commission-president-juncker-set-to-honor-karl-marxrepublished below in full unedited for informational, educational, and research purposes:
“The philosophy of Karl Marx, when applied, has created some of the greatest episodes of human suffering in all of history,” Marion Smith, director of the Victims of Communism Memorial Foundation, said in stunned response to the announcement that European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker will join in a celebration of Marx’s 200th birthday on May 5, in Trier, Germany. Trier was where Marx was born and raised.
Juncker (shown) is slated to give a speech at the unveiling of a statue of Marx in Trier. The statue was a gift from the Communist government of China. Juncker's participation will give the event a lot of stature, considering that he heads the European Commission, the executive arm of the European Union (EU). And it perhaps will also serve to illustrate the totalitarian mindset at the top of the EU.
“Marxist states like the Soviet Union and Communist China are responsible for more than one hundred million deaths as a result of their insane quest to implement Marx’s utopian ideas in practice,” Smith said.
Marx was hired in the 1840s by a group of socialist revolutionaries known as the League of the Just to write the platform of the Communist Party they were launching. The League was composed of various radical subversives, apparently wishing to build on the ideas of secret societies such as the Jacobins and the Illuminati that brought on the bloody French Revolution. Marx and his friend Friedrich Engels wrote The Communist Manifesto, forever tying his name to the communist movement that would lead to horrific miseries for the human race in the next century.
But apparently, Juncker, the president of the European Commission, thinks Marx is a man who merits honor upon the occasion of his 200th birthday.
Juncker is a politician from Luxembourg, who has long been a strong supporter of a more centralized European Union. He was a key architect of the Maastricht Treaty, and is credited with the clauses on Economic and Monetary Union that created the common currency for Europe — the euro.
Juncker is certainly no anti-socialist. In 1995, his Christian Social People’s Party formed a coalition with the Luxembourg Socialist Workers’ Party, making him prime minister in Luxembourg. In 2005, Juncker rose to become the first permanent president of the Eurozone Finance Ministry. Then, in 2014, he became president of the European Commission, over the no votes of Britain’s David Cameron and Hungary’s Viktor Orban.
While Juncker has protested, “I do not want a United States of Europe,” he has also said that national “borders are the worst invention ever made by politicians.” Not surprisingly, Juncker is a close ally of German Chancellor Angela Merkel, strongly supporting her open-door policy concerning the immigration crisis.
Even the former General Secretary of the old Soviet Union, Mikhail Gorbachev, has expressed amazement at the lurch of the EU to the Left. He said, “The most puzzling development in politics during the last decade is the apparent determination of western European leaders to re-create the Soviet Union in western Europe.”
Given this apparent desire to implement Marxism in western Europe, Juncker’s decision to celebrate the birthday of the man whose ideology has driven the two bloodiest dictatorships in human history (the Soviet Union and Communist China), is not surprising, but it is still shocking.
Juncker is an honorary citizen of Trier, the birthplace of Marx. The minister-president of Rhineland-Palatinate, Malu Dreyer, invited Juncker, and will join him in honoring the communist icon.
But Paul Nuttall, a member of the European Parliament, offered a harsh rebuke for the decision to honor him. “It is appalling that Jean-Claude Juncker feels it is necessary to commemorate a man whose ideology — Marxism/communism — led to more than 100 million deaths. Both Marx and his warped ideology should not be commemorated; they should be consigned to the dustbin of history.”
The Commission issued a statement defending the decision to commemorate Marx’s 200thbirthday. “Not speaking about him would come close to denying history.”
The statement added, “After decades of experience in politics at a national and European level, President Juncker is very well aware of the historical facts and sensitivities and whatever people’s views on Karl Marx. I think that nobody can deny that Karl Marx is a figure who shaped history in one way or the other.”
Of course, no one is denying Marx’s role in shaping history, but it is unlikely that Juncker will ever travel to Linz, Austria, to honor Adolf Hitler on his birthday, who also “shaped history.” A British Conservative MP, Daniel Kawczynski, was particularly incensed at Juncker’s intention to honor Marx. He escaped to the UK from Communist Poland as a seven-year-old boy. “I think it’s in very poor taste. We have to remember that Marxism was all about ripping power and individual means away from people and giving to the State. Marxism led to the killing of millions around the world as it allowed a small band of fanatics to suppress the people.”
Certainly, we should not forget Marx, just as we should not forget Lenin, Mao, Hitler, and other totalitarian fanatics. We need to learn about them and their monstrous crimes, and avoid anyone like them from ever gaining the reins of power. That doesn’t mean celebrating their birthdays.
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Germany: Trier celebrates Karl Marx’s 200th birthday with zero-euro banknote

Karl Marx's hometown Trier has chosen to honour the founder of communism's 200th birthday by selling a Karl Marx zero-euro banknote, as a short film made on Friday showed. In what must surely be a homage to Marx's sworn enemy capitalism, the town's tourist office has decided to sell a fake zero-euro banknote of Marx at a price of €3 ($3.63). The special edition note has already attracted interested from Russia, China and even Australia. In total, there will be more than 30 other items of memorabilia on sale. "Four exhibitions will be held on his life, his influence, his works and the times of Karl Marx at the Rhineland state museum, at the city museum and at the Karl Marx House," said Norbert Kaethler, Managing Director of Trier Tourism. Trier will also celebrate the philosopher's life by accepting a bronze sculpture of Marx donated by the Chinese government and installing traffic lights which depict Marx.
REMINISCENT OF THE 100 MARK EAST GERMAN NOTE FROM 1964

POPE FRANCIS: "DO WE REALLY WANT PEACE? THEN LET'S BAN ALL WEAPONS SO WE DON'T HAVE TO LIVE IN FEAR OF WAR"~ISLAM: THE "RELIGION OF PEACE" IS REALLY THE "RELIGION OF BLOOD"

Pope Calls For World Wide Ban Of “All Weapons”; 
Will The Vatican Police Lay Down Theirs? 
POPE FRANCIS: "DO WE REALLY WANT PEACE? THEN LET'S BAN ALL WEAPONS SO WE DON'T HAVE TO LIVE IN FEAR OF WAR" 
BY ROBERT SPENCER
SEE: https://www.jihadwatch.org/2018/04/pope-francis-do-we-really-want-peace-then-lets-ban-all-weapons-so-we-dont-have-to-live-in-fear-of-warrepublished below in full unedited for informational, educational, and research purposes:

Do we really want peace? Then let’s ban all weapons so we don’t have to live in fear of war.
Ban all weapons? Kitchen knives? Rocks? Automobiles? Does the Pope want us to live in the Stone Age? No, stones will be banned. What he is actually advocating is totalitarian government control of a defenseless populace.
If someone hits someone else over the head with a volume of Pope Francis’ statements, will that volume, too, have to be banned?
In this age of advancing jihad and ongoing Muslim persecution of Christians, for Pope John Lennon to be making statements such as this one is the height of irresponsibility, and worse. Pope Francis is working actively to ensure that as many Catholics as possible are ignorant, complacent, and unprepared in the face of the jihad threat. He is betraying his people, and the free people of the world, as well as those who yearn to be free.
“Leave them; they are blind guides. And if a blind man leads a blind man, both will fall into a pit.” (Matthew 15:14)
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The Religion of Peace is In Fact the Religion of Blood

BY AMIL IMANI
SEE: https://www.jihadwatch.org/2018/04/the-religion-of-peace-is-in-fact-the-religion-of-bloodrepublished below in full unedited for informational, educational, and research purposes:
To propose that the solution to Muslim killings of non-combatant civilians rests with Muslim leaders declaring anyone who does such a thing will go to hell is a product of a delusional mind or the fantasy of an ignorant naive dreamer who is unfamiliar with the fundamental bases of Islamic violence. Here are a few fatal flaws in such a pontification.
* Muhammad is long dead. There is no one person, a pope-like figure, in Islam, and has never been one from the minute Muhammad died. Immediately after Muhammad died, Islam became Islams. It kept dissolving into factions and continues to do so to this day. It is not dissimilar to the death of the founder of a violent gang, that spawns a whole bunch of contenders for the position, inevitably leading to infighting among the late gang leader’s top lieutenants.
* Any Islamic leader worth his salt would neither dare nor want to issue such a fatwa. It would be like asking a slaveholder who is leading a charmed life at the expense of slaves to free the slaves and start working the cotton fields to earn his bread.
* Furthermore, even if this leader who has bought into the system and has reaped the immensely-valued benefits of his position were to in fact give it all up and come up with this fatwa, he would be immediately defrocked, if not lynched, by his own followers as a heretic who had betrayed the explicit teachings of the holy Quran, which repeatedly urges the faithful to wage war against all kefir, civilians or not.
* Islam is tantamount to violence. Violence is the lifeblood of Islam, and it has been ever since the time of Muhammad in Medina, as is shown by Muhammad’s own example and conduct.
* Without violence of all types, Islam will undergo a slow death. Violence is in the fabric of this cult. Take away violence and you shut down the blood supply from the body of Islams. Islam is violent not only against non-Muslims; it is violent against its own numerous sects and offshoots. Even within every sect and offshoot violence, violence is practiced in the most savage ways. Public lashing. Cutting of hands for stealing even a morsel of bread. Blinding convicts or hanging them. Stoning so-called adulteresses. Castrating sexual offenders and hanging homosexuals.
The final outcome of a cult born of violence seems to be death by violence — something like what is going on daily in Iraq and Syria, and to some extent in other Muslim lands. Non-Islamic lands will do well to keep this cult of violence out of their countries and let them practice their systemic violence among their contending sects in their own lands.
Muslim leaders advance to their positions of leadership in Islam’s numerous subsidiaries by cleverly and ruthlessly navigating their way through the hierarchical labyrinth of cutthroat competition. Kissing up and demonstrations of unconditional loyalty to the higher-ups, as well as undeviating total devotion to the charter of the corporation as defined and promoted by the particular subsidiary, while vigilantly exploiting any opportunity for climbing up the next rung of the leadership ladder, are prime requirements of staying in the game.
The individuals who attain high leadership position in Islam have invested their all with great acumen and gone through a tortuous ringer for years in order to attain their positions. The profession of clergy attracts a select segment of men: men who have already significantly bought into the Islamic charter and its methods. As these men undergo formal indoctrination, a culling process takes place. Hundreds of thousands of these men, for a variety of reasons, do not advance very far. The great majority languish in lower ranks for the rest of their life. They are the drones, so to speak. They loyally keep working the rank-and-file Muslim believers at villages and towns, making them toe the line and pay their tributes and cash to their parasitic handlers, who continue their highly successful smoke and mirror charade. A significant number may abandon their ordination altogether, for a variety of reasons, and begin earning their living like the rest of the people.
Another not unimportant complicating factor is that the Islamic leaders actually believe the entire Islamic package, as absurd as much of it may seem to non-Muslims. It is in human nature to start believing even the most absurd after having it preached to you by higher authorities — you yourself will begin to parrot it all repeatedly to others. Millions of Shiites, for example, make a pilgrimage to a well near the city of Qum in Iran in order to pay homage and tribute to the Shiites’ 12th imam, who is claimed to have been hiding there for over a thousand years. No one forces these millions to believe this patently absurd contention, which is successfully hammered in their minds by the purveyors of Islamic fraud — the high divines.
It is also wishful thinking and outright naïveté to believe that Islam is reformable. Islam is interested in reform only in reforming the rest of humanity to its charter of primitive savagery. Realism, not pipe dreams, is needed in the Herculean effort to resist the spread of the oppression of Islam to free nations. This expansionist and authoritarian ideology will not stop expanding on its own. It is determined to conquer the entire world and control each and every human being.
No, Islam has never been a religion of peace. What we need to do is demand that politicians, Islamic apologists, and paid-for media do not abuse freedom by lying about Islam. When these people portray Islam as a religion of peace, they are lying through their teeth. Just take a quick look at Islam’s history, as well as what is happening today in the Islamic lands. Islam is not a religion of peace and it has never been. Islam is violent, oppressive, racist, and irrational at its very core. It is treachery for people to present it as otherwise, either out of ignorance or for their own personal reasons.
Yes, “the religion of peace” is in fact the religion of blood.
Amil Imani is an ex-Muslim from Iran.

ABOMINATION: HUNDREDS FLOCK TO APOSTATE CATHEDRAL'S "BEYONCE MASS", BLENDING SECULAR POP STAR'S MUSIC WITH SCRIPTURE READINGS, COMMUNION

Hundreds Worship Beyonce at 
San Francisco's Grace Cathedral

HUNDREDS FLOCK TO APOSTATE CATHEDRAL'S "BEYONCE MASS", BLENDING SECULAR POP STAR'S MUSIC WITH SCRIPTURE READINGS, COMMUNION  
BY HEATHER CLARK
SEE: https://christiannews.net/2018/04/29/hundreds-flock-to-cathedrals-beyonce-mass-blending-secular-pop-stars-music-with-scripture-readings-communion/republished below in full unedited for informational, educational, and research purposes:
SAN FRANCISCO, Calif. — An estimated 750-900 people flocked to a San Francisco cathedral’s “Beyoncé Mass” on Wednesday night, an event that blended renditions of the secular pop star’s music with the reading of Scripture, communion, and the presentation of a related message by a seminary professor. While the event was popular with the locals, others state that the world’s music has no place being performed in what is supposed to be the holy house of God.
“Countless professing Christians seem to have little or no shame about the compromises they will make with God’s word to attract a larger crowd. Substituting godly music, filled with words that glorify the Lord, for Beyoncé’s music, is just more evidence that we are in the apostasy that was prophesied by Jesus and the apostles (2 Tim. 4:2-4),” Joe Schimmel, pastor of Blessed Hope Chapel in Simi Valley, California and host of the documentary “They Sold Their Souls for Rock ‘N’ Roll,” told Christian News Network.
The event, hosted at Grace Cathedral in Nob Hill, was part of the weekly “Vine” offering, first launched in March 2017 for “urbanites and spiritual seekers.”
As the most recent series has been focused on the experiences of those marginalized by society, Wednesday night’s service featured Yolanda Norton, the assistant professor of Old Testament at San Francisco Theological Seminary, who teaches a class at the institution on “Beyoncé and the Hebrew Bible.” The course focuses on themes in the pop singer’s music and the struggles and injustices that black women face.
Norton rebuffed notions that the service was “worship” of Beyoncé.
“We worship God at Grace, and none other. The medium is not the message. The medium is Beyoncé’s powerful songs, which give voice to black female experience, exploring themes of spirituality, sexuality and agency,” Norton told Ebony.
“Your friends may ask you about this [event],” also reads a note posted to the Grace Cathedral website. “You might want to remind them that God is in all the world and that Beyoncé is made in God’s image. The Church has not treated women of color fairly and it is time to face this truth.”
A line was stated to have wrapped around the building Wednesday night as hundreds arrived to partake in the Beyoncé Mass. The evening featured the performance of songs made popular by Beyoncé, both as a solo artist and as a part of the group Destiny’s Child.
“I’m a survivor/I’m not gon’ give up” singers on stage belted out, performing the Destiny Child’s tune about bouncing back from a breakup.
According to the San Francisco Chronicle, the event also featured readings from the Psalms and Luke, the recitation of the Lord’s Prayer, and the offering of communion. Norton additionally delivered a message about love in the face of hatred.
“I’ve been asked time and time again, ‘Why Beyoncé?'” she explained to those gathered, according to NBC News. “I believe in Beyoncé because she reminds us you have to do things your way.”
However, some state that the often scantily-clad, sexually suggestive singer isn’t exactly the most exemplary role model for African American women today, especially those who seek to follow Christ and lead holy lives.
Schimmel
“Beyoncé is a horrifying role model for those who want to worship the living God, but sadly, she is a great role model for those who would rather worship Beyoncé, themselves, and dark occult powers,” Schimmel told Christian News Network.
He noted an image of the pop singer wearing a large goat head ring, as well a screenshot from one of her music videos in which a woman bears the numbers “666” on her clothing.
“No one can dispute that Beyoncé has repeatedly [utilized] symbols promoting Satanism, like rings bearing the Crowleyan goat headed Baphomet,” Schimmel said. “In the video for her song ‘Superpower,’ Beyoncé struts around with a girl brandishing 666, the number of the Antichrist, on her shirt!”
In a 2016 video produced by Good Fight Ministries, Schimmel noted that Beyoncé made a Mudra hand gesture symbolizing occultic energy in the music video for “Hymn for the Weekend.” The video focused on the Hindu “Festival of Colors,” known as Holi, named after the goddess Holika. The event is celebrated in modern times by Hindus and non-Hindus alike.
“Ah-oh-ah-oh-ah/Got me feeling drunk and high,” Beyoncé sings in the video, her hands covered with intricate henna designs customary to Hindu celebrations.
Schimmel also recalled that in 2013, the singer “posted a risqué picture of herself in front of a depiction of the Last Supper,” in which she blocked Jesus out of the photograph with her body. The image was soon deleted after controversy ensued over the matter.
“[No one] can deny that her husband, Jay-Z, praises Satan in his song ‘Lucifer,’ where he states that Lucifer rebelled against God for a ‘righteous cause,'” Schimmel additionally noted. “It is also undeniable that Jay-Z has worn a hoodie promoting the satanic slogan of Satanist Aleister Crowley, proclaiming the satanic maxim ‘Do What Thou Wilt!'”
ABC News quipped about the Beyoncé Mass on Thursday, recognizing that the pop star’s songs aren’t church material.
“It was only good until they started singing ‘Drunken Love’ and ‘Naughty Girl,'” one reporter jested.
“I’ve been drinking/I get filthy when that liquor get into me/I’ve been thinking/Why can’t I keep my fingers off you, baby?” one of the songs cited states. The tune was most likely not performed at the event.
Leader Jude Harmon told the Huffington Post that he doesn’t see a problem with the Wednesday night offering because “conservative Christians see a high wall separating the Church from the world; progressive Christians do not.” Grace Cathedral identifies as progressive and has a webpage noting that it is “proud of [its] history of LGBT acceptance and advocacy.”
1 John 2:15-17 states, “Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world. If any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him. For all that is in the world, the lust of the flesh, and the lust of the eyes, and the pride of life, is not of the Father, but is of the world. And the world passeth away, and the lust thereof, but he that doeth the will of God abideth forever.”
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‘Beyoncé Mass’ Adds to Episcopal Cathedral Excess

BY JEFF WALTON

SEE: http://www.anglican.ink/article/‘beyoncé-mass’-adds-episcopal-cathedral-excessrepublished below in full unedited for informational, educational, and research purposes:

Author: 

Jeff Walton

No, it wasn't a service intended to facilitate worship of music superstar Beyoncé Knowles-Carter, as one Nigerian publication incorrectly reported, but the recent “Beyoncé mass” at San Francisco’s Grace Episcopal Cathedral was predictably over-the-top.
According to glowing reports from California media, the gathering themed around the song catalogue of the former Destiny’s Child lead singer attracted approximately 900 participants to the April 25 midweek worship service. The crowd size was far in excess of the Episcopal congregation’s average Sunday attendance, which has dropped from 900 to 600 in the past decade.
The Beyoncé mass joins a long list of themed Eucharistic celebrations, among them the U2charist, the Dr. Seuss-themed “Seusscharist”, and the Clown Eucharist. Some feature artists’ popular music interspersed within an otherwise normal prayer book service, while the more outlandish have clergy dressed in costume.
Each share a common attribute: projects of mainline Protestants eager for media exposure and recognition as liturgical innovators.
Knowles-Carter has not publicly identified herself with the Episcopal Church – or the Christian faith in general – nor did she participate in the Grace Cathedral event. The performer’s identity as an African-American woman did shape the liturgy, with participants given a womanist version of the Lord’s Prayer to recite addressed to “Our Mother”. The prayer’s plea to “lead us not into temptation but deliver us from evil” was exchanged for “Separate us from the temptation of empire, But deliver us into community.”
Participants also joined in a “calling out” for those in bondage to homophobia, transphobia, and patriarchy, interspersed with a stanza from the song “Freedom”: “Freedom! Freedom! I can’t move Freedom, cut me loose!”
Grace Cathedral is not a newcomer to this field, having hosted a variety of outlandish events going back decades, including a “Rave Mass” in 1994. Episcopal diocesan cathedrals in Washington, D.C. and New York have also hosted oddball celebrations: in 2009 the Washington National Cathedral organized and hosted “Sacred Circles: A Celebration of Women’s Spirituality” featuring pagan idolatry in which gifts were offered up to summon spirits. More recently, the Cathedral offered “sacred breath yoga” complete with “sound bath meditation with crystal bowls”.
Grace cathedral’s most enduring contribution has been the modern Labyrinth movement, in which progressive Episcopal churches offer a vague promise of spiritual awakening found more often in eastern mysticism and untethered from the person of Jesus Christ.
Cathedrals are expensive buildings to operate and maintain, which led the Washington National Cathedral in 2014 to make the space available to rent for corporate events.
In 2007, George Conger of Anglican Ink reported how the Cathedral of St John the Divine in New York leased its premises to the singer Elton John to celebrate his 60th birthday:
John, who months before gave voice to his disdain for Christianity, noting he would “ban religion completely … Organized religion doesn’t seem to work. It turns people into hateful lemmings, and it’s not really compassionate,” turned the Diocese of New York’s cathedral into a ballroom.
The New York Post reported that for John’s party “the altar was set up as a stage for the performers, which included the trendy rock group Scissor Sisters, Sting and Paul McCartney.”
The full text of the womanist Lord’s Prayer recited at Grace Cathedral is below:
“Our Mother,
who is in heaven and within us,
We call upon your names.
Your wisdom come.
Your will be done,
In all the spaces in which You dwell.
Give us each day
Sustenance and perseverance.
Remind us of our limits as
we give grace to the limits of others.
Separate us from the temptation of empire,
But deliver us into community.
For you are the dwelling place within us
the empowerment around us
and the celebration among us
now and for ever.”
Video from the “calling out” segment of the service:


 
This rendition of “Freedom” was my favorite part of the service. Freedom from racism, sexism, classism, homophobia, and transphobia.


 
 

Reprinted with the permission of the author from Juicy Ecumenism