IPFS John Semmens

SEMI-NEWS: A Satire of Recent News

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SEMI-NEWS/SEMI-SATIRE: January 12, 2019 Edition

Omar Warns Against Religious Fanatics Imposing Beliefs on Others

In a speech at the US House of Representatives, Ilhan Omar (D-Minn) railed against "religious fundamentalists who are trying to manipulate State laws in order to impose their beliefs on an entire society. Their horrifying effort to restrict access to abortion will, if successful, coerce millions of women into bearing children against their will. This is but another chapter in their quest to trample the rights of those who disagree with them."

"They cite their religious belief in the sanctity of life as if respecting the right to life is some sort of absolute," Omar complained. "There are other religions that hold different views—views that require the faithful to make war against unbelievers. Yet, those trying to observe this religious obligation are routinely prosecuted if they are apprehended trying to exercise this religious right."

"According to the Constitution, every person has the right to freely practice their religion," the Representative pointed out. "No State has the authority to interfere with this right. There is no clause negating this right for any reason. The desire of some to interfere with the termination of an undesired life has no legal foundation. So I call upon every woman in America to join with me to strike down any laws that seek to impede our right to rid ourselves of unwanted motherhood."

2nd Amendment Sanctuaries "Unlawful"

The rising tide of local governments in Virginia declaring themselves Second Amendment sanctuaries "is entirely unlawful" because "state law prohibits local governments from enacting ordinances or resolutions that are inconsistent with state laws," according to a Washington Post editorial authored by Mary McCord.

"Allowing local governments to act in defiance of state laws imposing gun control will lead to anarchy," she wrote. "Permitting disobedience in this matter would be a dereliction of government's duty to see that its laws are faithfully enforced."

McCord sought to differentiate illegal Second Amendment sanctuaries from illegal immigrant sanctuaries that have been declared by local governments throughout the nation, saying that "the right of any person to cross any border in order to live wherever they choose is a human right that supersedes any man-made law. The anti-gun control allegation that the right to self-defense is a natural right that supersedes government measures to limit the means by which a person may respond to deadly threats doesn't bear up to scrutiny. Obviously, a society where only the government had firearms would ensure the safety of everyone much more effectively than one where individuals were allowed to arm and defend themselves."

Kerry Blames Trump for "Undermining US/Iran Relationship"

Former Secretary of State John Kerry blasted President Trump for "undermining all the progress made by myself and President Obama to build a stable relationship with Iran. Part of getting along with other nations is give and take. We cannot expect our standards of behavior to prevail over the long-term practices of as ancient a land as Iran."

"The genius of the Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA) we negotiated was that it allowed both sides to carry on with activities it felt comfortable with," Kerry explained. "In exchange for our granting access to $150 billion dollars, Iran promised to pretend that it would not overtly develop nuclear weapons. Both sides gained from this. President Obama could proclaim an historic, Nobel Prize-worthy accomplishment. Iran could continue to covertly develop nuclear weapons and only publicly acknowledge them after they were ready for deployment. A decade of amity between our two nations was at hand."

"Then along comes Trump's disavowal of the JCPOA," the Secretary said. "He carelessly ripped away the comfortable facade that kept the peace between Iran and the US. The targeted assassination of Iran's great and heroic General Soleimani replaced the amicable appearances with overt truculence. That this assassination has not yet led to all-out-war defies all logic. Our only hope of restoring the JCPOA is to get Trump out of office by any means necessary and as rapidly as possible."

Dems Blame Trump for Downed Passenger Plane

Shortly following Iran's ballistic missile attack on two US bases in Iraq, the regime also downed Ukrainian Airlines Flight 752 with a surface to air missile. All 176 on-board the aircraft were killed. The Iranian government has denied responsibility for the slaughter—alleging that mechanical failure or pilot error caused the plane to go down. So sure are they of their allegation that the debris field is currently being bulldozed to, as Irani officials say, "remove any false evidence that could be used to discredit our heroic air defense soldiers."

Mayor Pete Buttigieg, a 2020 Democratic presidential contender, tweeted "innocent civilians are now dead because they were caught in the middle of an unnecessary and unwanted military tit for tat. Soleimani has been conducting murderous terror operations years. We prudently turned a blind eye toward those killings. Trump's overreaction to take out one bad guy has led to the deaths of so many innocent civilians. When I am president we will observe more forbearance. Bearing a few hundred deaths a year due to terrorist attacks is a small price to pay for averting a wider conflagration."

Rep. Ro Khanna (D-Calif) asserted that "the downing of this plane is just the culminating event in a tragic series of events in the region since Trump became president. Our embassy in Baghdad was attacked. Nothing like that happened when Obama was president. Neither Bush nor Obama thought Solmeimani was an appropriate target, even though he was know to be the mastermind of Iran's terror network. Trump is the one who's out-of-step with normal foreign policy." When Fox News' Sandra Smith mentioned that the Benghazi Consulate was attacked and Ambassador Stevens killed during Obama's first term, Khanna dismissed this as "totally different. That was only a consulate and, unlike Trump, President Obama made a conscious decision to sacrifice those people rather than escalate the situation. I think he made the right choice."

Rep. Jackie Speier (Calif) appeared on CNN to say that "this is yet another example of collateral damage from the actions that have been taken in a provocative way by the President of the United States. The airline crash wasn't the only tragic consequence of Trump's murder of Soleimani. Kimia Alizadeh, Iran's only hope for an Olympic medal this summer, is emigrating to The Netherlands. These kinds of things didn't happen when Obama was president. So, I think that the previous administration's policy of coddling Iran was clearly the better course of action from a global perspective."

One aspect of the aftermath of taking out Soleimani that doesn't fit with contentions that Trump has escalated tensions is the fleeing of terror cells from Iraq. Trump's daring elimination of this high ranking terrorist has broken their complacency. Combined with Iran's advance notice to the Iraqi government of its ballistic missile attack, it appears that toughness may be the better course of action from a global perspective.

Biden: "How Can We Repeal a Law No One Understands"

Striving to burnish his image as the sole sane contender for the Democratic 2020 presidential nomination, former Vice-President Joe Biden tried to explain his support of Obamacare to a questioner at a campaign stop in Iowa. The voter recounted Obama's promises prior to the health care law's passage that "you can keep your doctor, you can keep your plan, your costs will go down. None of these promises were kept. Why should we keep Obamacare?"

Biden responded saying that "there's two ways people know when something is important. One is when it's so clear when it's passed, that everybody understands it. The other is when it is so complicated that no one understands it. Well, we passed the Affordable Care Act bill in order to find out what was in it. Now, here we are almost ten years later and still no one understands it. My question back to you is how can we repeal a law no one understands? I don't think we should risk losing the benefits just because we're ignorant of how the law is supposed to work."

Rival candidate Sen. Bernie Sanders (Vt) used Biden's remarks as a rationale for "why we need universal health care. The great flaw in Obamacare was the expectation that health consumers should choose their own insurance. Since by Joe's own admission, no one understands Obamacare, rational choice among plans is futile. Health is a collective benefit. Decisions on how much care each person should get need to be made by dispassionate government experts. Only socialized medicine can achieve this objective. People need to have faith that the government will do what's best for society even if that doesn't work out in their favor."

In related news, Biden also came out in favor of a total ban on plastic because "I don't understand that either. We all need to lead simpler lives. Humans have used reed baskets and clay pots for millennia. If these were good enough for our ancestors I don't see why they shouldn't be good enough for us."

Booker Explains Abrams' Loss in Georgia

In November of 2018 Georgia House of Representatives Minority Leader Stacey Abrams lost her race for governor. Democratic presidential candidate Sen. Cory Booker (NJ) sought to explain why this far-left candidate failed to be elected.

"It was because of voter suppression," Booker claimed. "People just stopped voting, even when the polls were still open. Too many Democrats had been brainwashed with the idea that you can only cast one ballot per election. Others who broke free from the brainwashing voted multiple times in various precincts around the state. If every Democrat had done this Stacey would be governor today."

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