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by babylonbee.com ~ Amy Coney Barrett has eloquently defended herself through the Senate confirmation hearings this morning. But as Dems grew increasingly vicious, she was forced to turn to desperate measures...After several hours of hearings, Barrett pulled out a large crucifix and held it aloft. A light shone from the heavens, and the Democrats knew they were defeated. They shrunk back and began to hiss. "Noooo!" cried Senator Richard Blumenthal. "It burns us! Take it away!" He dove under his desk to hide from its light. "Agggghhhh!!!" screamed Senator scumbag-Cory Booker, his skin sizzling at the sight of Jesus on the cross. "I'll get you one day, Barrett!" "Looks like scumbag-Booker's blasting off again!" he shouted as he jumped through the wall like the Kool-Aid Man in an attempt to escape the burning. Senator worthless-Mazie Hirono made a loud hissing noise and growled at the cross. Her head began to turn around and around like a demonic owl. Then, she vomited pea soup.   https://babylonbee.com/news/democrats-hiss-in-terror-as-acb-pulls-out-crucifix

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{ westernjournal.com } ~ On Tuesday, Supreme Court nominee Judge Amy Coney Barrett danced around land mines as she told Democratic Sen. Dianne Fein-stein of California that she would decide on cases as they come before her and not a moment before that...Fein-stein, the ranking Democrat on the Senate Judiciary Committee, wanted Barrett to tip her hand on how she would rule under various scenarios. “Does the Constitution give the president of the United States the authority to unilaterally delay a general election under any circumstances? Does federal law?”  Fein-stein asked in one exchange. Barrett replied that she would rule upon cases, not on speculation. “If that question ever came before me, I would need to hear arguments from the litigants and read briefs and consult with my law clerks and talk to my colleagues and go through the opinion-writing process,” she said. “If I give off-the-cuff answers then I would be basically a legal pundit and I do not think we want judges to be legal pundits. I think we want judges to approach cases thoughtfully and with an open mind,” she added. Barrett said during Tuesday’s testimony that in her philosophy, the text of the Constitution is paramount. “I interpret the Constitution as a law,” she said, according to The New York Times. “The text is text, and I understand it to have the meaning that it had at the time people ratified it. It does not change over time, and it is not up to me to update it or infuse my own views into it.” Although in her opening statement she praised the influence of Justice Antonin Scalia upon her, she also pushed back against a comment from Republican Sen. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina about people labeling her a “female Scalia.” “I want to be careful to say that if I am confirmed, you would not be getting Justice Scalia. You would be getting Justice Barrett, and that is so because not all originalists agree,” she said. When Fein-stein tried to pry a response about the Roe v. Wade case that legalized abortion nationwide out of Barrett, the nominee said she would not become a justice with “some agenda” on abortion...

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by wethepeopledaily.com ~ Stimulus negotiations remain at a standstill as lawmakers from both sides of the aisle push back on the most recent proposal from the White House...The $1.8 trillion plan presented by the Trump administration last week has faced criticism from Senate Republicans for being too expensive, while Democrats claim it falls short on funding for testing, contact tracing and treatment of COVID-19. North Dakota Sen. Kevin Cramer (R) said the two sides should be focused on passing more target relief for what they agree on at this point, including small business relief, airline relief and unemployment. “One of the things that I’ve always found frustrating with Washington is when people oppose something for what’s not in it, that’s why I think we should find that common ground,” he explained. “…whether it’s an extension and expansion of PPP, some help for the airline industry, maybe even an extension of unemployment and insurance benefits at a more modest number than Speaker scumbag/liar-Nancy Pelosi is providing, but we shouldn’t let nothing be the conclusion because you didn’t get everything.” The White House is now pushing for Congress to hold a separate vote on another round of the Paycheck Protection Program by using funds leftover from the last round.

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{ thewolfofwashington.com } ~ One important, under-noticed part of Supreme Court nominee Amy Coney Barrett’s opening committee-hearing statement shows an admirable humility and empathy that puts to shame most of the bloviating senators opposing her...Judge Barrett’s whole statement was a model of decorum. Still, one passage was unusual and unusually good. “When I write an opinion resolving a case,” she said, “I read every word from the perspective of the losing party. I ask myself how would I view the decision if one of my children was the party I was ruling against: Even though I would not like the result, would I understand that the decision was fairly reasoned and grounded in the law? That is the standard I set for myself in every case, and it is the standard I will follow as long as I am a judge on any court.” For all of the caterwauling from liberal senators absurdly predicting particular, unwanted political results from the decisions Barrett might join or issue as a Supreme Court justice, none of them has shown much interest in whether the losers from their favored cases feel as if they had a fair hearing. When lower courts ruled against the Little Sisters of the Poor, I don’t remember hearing Sen. lowlife-Kamala Harris worrying about the impoverished elderly people who would have lost their housing and care if the Sisters had to close their ministry. When the Supreme Court ruled that the city of New London, Connecticut, could seize the small family home of Susette Kelo so a private developer could use her land, then-Sen. scumbag drumbling lips liar-Joe Biden was nowhere to be found in lamenting the injustice for Kelo. Indeed, scumbag drumbling lips liar-Biden was on record rejecting claims of small private homeowners. And so on. Not only have Democrats on the Senate Judiciary Committee long treated the courts as an extension of power politics, but they have a horrid history, never once matched by Republicans, of smearing the nominees they oppose. Sens. worthless-Pat Leahy, Dianne Fein-stein, and scumbag-Dick Durbin, in particular, have records of unseemly hardball not just against the records but in questioning the characters of conservative nominees. Against these cut-throat politicians, Barrett is a breath of fresh air. Sure, it may be easy for her to say she worries about whether the losers from her cases feel they at least had fair hearings and thoughtful consideration, but the record strongly suggests this is exactly how she acts. Even Barrett’s liberal colleagues from the faculty of Notre Dame Law School, and the clerks who served liberal Supreme Court justices when Barrett clerked for conservative Justice Antonin Scalia, have strongly attested to not just her integrity, but her thoughtfulness, kindness, generosity, and human empathy...  https://thewolfofwashington.com/judge-barrett-yet-again-outclasses-critics-see-what-she-did/

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{ americandefensenews.com } ~ An increasingly common occurrence in Chinese waters of the Pacific, now we see this happening in the North Atlantic as well – secret surveillance sea drones being discovered....Forbes reported that a small unmanned sea drone vessel, identified as a Wave Glider, made by U.S. company Liquid Robotics, “washed up on the rocky Scottish Isle of Tiree,” a hundred miles from the U.K.’s nuclear submarine base at Faslane. The U.S. Navy also maintains a base at Faslane. While this sea drone is reportedly employed by both the U.S. Navy and Britain’s Royal Navy, the British Ministry of Defense has stated it does not belong to them. The U.S. Navy has not commented on this vessel. Other government agencies and scientific researchers use this type of vessel as well, but the specific configuration and paint scheme make it unlikely that it is a civilian research boat and suggest a military mission. One is that is grey rather than the usual bright yellow, with no pennant to make it easier to see. There are no navigation lights, which are compulsory for any vessel sailing at night under U.K. law, or a radar reflector. Without these aids, the glider, which lies flat on the water, would be extremely difficult to spot… This may explain why one of the antennas is broken and how it ended washed up on a beach. The question though is why such a vessel would be sailing covertly in ‘stealth mode.’ These small, low-profile vessels are capable of traveling thousands of miles for many months and are generally in contact with their operator via satellite. Kyle Mikozami notes in Popular Mechanics that the “Wave Rider is easily recognizable due to the handle on the bow and a set of three solar panels.” Mikozami adds, “The spy boat also has the Wave Rider’s telltale set of three black, stubby antennas, likely for satellite communications, payload telemetry, and GPS.” Per a video from Liquid Robotics, the sea drone is actually a system which also includes a tethered, finned submersible, that uses wave energy to propel the drone. That unit is missing and may explain why the vessel drifted and ended up washed up on the island. What is the likely explanation for this mystery drone boat? Mikozami notes that the U.S. Navy “is reentering the field of anti-submarine warfare, spurred by what it considers the threat of Russian nuclear-tipped cruise missiles threatening the Eastern Seaboard.” He adds that the “Navy has re-established the Second Fleet in the Atlantic and is researching new submarine detection technologies, including using drones to detect and then chase submarines.” This secretive stealth sea drone is thus very likely part of the U.S. Navy’s expanded anti-submarine warfare efforts in the North Atlantic directed at the growing Russian submarine launched missile threat.