Scandal and Distrust Trifecta

"Let's take a breath and take stock, shall we?" writes Dave Carter @ ricochet.com.

We have the IRS acting more like the KGB, singling out groups and people for harassment on the basis of political philosophy.  We have efforts to learn about the deaths of four Americans under attack overseas, and the subsequent lies that our government told us about that attack, labeled as a sideshow and a political circus by the Commander in Chief.  We have the federal government secretly gathering months of phone records of Associated Press editors and reporters in what AP's management has termed a, "massive and unprecedented intrusion." ... As David Burge observed on Twitter, "MSNBC must be having a hard time deciding which story to ignore first."

As if that weren't enough for Obama, abortionist Kermit Gosnell has been found guilty of first-degree murder for brutally killing newborn babies (a practice Obama refused to vote against as a legislator), Obamacare is going off the rails in a slow-motion train wreck, and immigration reform—Obama's latest play to a political constituency—appears less persuasive after learning the Boston marathon terrorists were recent immigrant-citizens who raked in at least $100,000 in welfare dollars.

The IRS scandal offers valuable lessons, particularly for Obamacare and immigration reform proponents, argues Paul Mirengoff at powerlineblog.com:

Parker: How Abortion Has Changed America

"Let’s be clear that pro-aborts and pro-lifers differ on far more than technicalities about when life begins. They differ about what life is," writes Star Parker.

20-week baby in utero (WEBMD)

In the state of Pennsylvania, where Gosnell was doing his dirty business, abortion is legal until the developing child is 24 weeks - 6 months - old. Among Gosnell’s many transgressions was performing abortions after 24 weeks.

But Planned Parenthood, and their guest speaker, our president, oppose that 24-week limit. They believe abortion should be legal until the child is born.

[snip]

Justice Kennedy, who wrote the [Partial Birth Abortion Ban] decision, included a description of one of these procedures on a 26-week-old infant. It takes a certain deadening of the heart, of the soul to read the description of the little baby clasping his fingers and toes as the doctor jams his scissors into his skull, and still believe this should be permitted.

Since Roe v Wade, we’ve given birth to a new materialistic culture of narcissism where reverence for life itself is gone. Life has become a commodity and people use each other as cavalierly as they destroy innocent young life.

As our reverence for life has diminished, so has our reverence for the institutions that surround and support it.

Scholars at the Brookings Institution observed in 1996 that Roe v Wade contributed to the collapse of marriage and the dramatic increase in out-of-wedlock births. The idea that children were part of a sacred institution called marriage started disappearing.

The sense of honor, the sense of shame disappears in this culture of self.