My wife and I attended a holiday party Thursday night where we were blessed to have the opportunity to talk with many Christian heroes and luminaries, including Dr. James Dobson and Rev. Franklin Graham. There were many Christians serving in government there as well at Vice President Mike Pence’s home, including Justice Clarence Thomas. 

It was an encouraging time and a reminder of all the battles that have been raging for decades in which we all did the best we could as followers of Jesus Christ.

As Carol and I were returning home we heard the news that Christianity Today's (CT) editor-in-chief, Mark Galli, had just released an editorial entitled, “Trump Should Be Removed From Office.”

This once respected publication, which Billy Graham helped to launch, has just thrown its lot in with the aggressively secular, abortion-on-demand movement that has spent the last 20 years trying to rip America out of the rich soil of our Judeo-Christian heritage. Some Christmas present to their subscribers. Shame on them!

Franklin Graham was quick to react. In a lengthy Facebook post, Graham revealed that the last vote his father cast was for Donald Trump. Graham wrote:

My father knew Donald Trump, he believed in Donald Trump, and he voted for Donald Trump. He believed that Donald J. Trump was the man for this hour in history for our nation.

Graham added this impeachment sham was “politically motivated, 100% partisan,” and he blasted CT, writing, “It’s obvious that Christianity Today has moved to the left and is representing the elitist liberal wing of evangelicalism.”

Graham is absolutely right. Five paragraphs into the anti-Trump editorial — there’s no other way to put it — CT engaged in a bald-face lie. It wrote: “But the facts in this instance [the Ukrainian phone call] are unambiguous." 

No they are not. That’s why legal scholars, members of Congress, and the American people are divided about the phone call. 

What follows in the editorial is a description of the call, which, if I did not know better, I would swear had been written by liar-Nancy Pelosi or scumbag/liar-Adam Schiff. I will not poison your mind by quoting it because you have heard similar things over and over again by far-left fanatics who hate everything that Donald Trump believes and, by the way, that Christianity Today claims to believe.

The editorial later asserts that they are "agnostic” about whether Trump should be removed by the Senate or at the ballot box in the next election. But it declares that he should be removed out of “loyalty to the Creator of the Ten Commandments." 

So, Christianity Today just endorsed a Democrat presidential candidate whose name we do not know yet. Whether that nominee is a class-warfare candidate like Sanders or Warren, who use envy to attack successful people, or Pete Buttigieg, who is committed to normalizing the homosexual political agenda, or whether it’s a resurrected scumbag/liar-Hillary Clinton, that candidate is CT's choice in 2020.

Any Democrat candidate will be totally committed to abortion on demand, to taxpayer subsidies of abortion, to the restriction of religious liberty, and very likely anti-Israel. In short, everything that the Creator of the Ten Commandments, as CT put it, would abhor.

Here’s some breaking news for CT: No election involves a sinner running against a saint. All candidates are sinners. All the voters who vote for them have sinned. In the real world, most elections are a binary choice between fallen human beings who are willing to defend certain values and oppose other values. 

Donald Trump has boldly taken the side of believing Christians on every major public-policy issue: our freedom of religion, the humanity of the unborn child, that liberty comes from God, and many, many more. 

On the day CT printed this editorial, 13 more judicial nominees who will defend our values, nominated by President Trump, advanced in the Senate over the objections of progressives CT wants to see back in power next November.

Years ago, when I was a senior vice president at Focus on the Family, Dr. James Dobson and I were often in the foxhole together battling the left. We were also trying to alert the church about what was coming down the road. 

I don’t remember a day when the attacks by the left, often involving death threats, ever caused Dr. Dobson and I to waver or get depressed or to think of giving up. 

But there were days we would get letters from churches upset that we had criticized their deacon who happened to run the local abortion clinic. There were days when publications like CT, claiming to speak for the church, said we were being "alarmist” and that Christians should not be involved in politics at all. Those days depressed both of us more than anything else. 

Dr. Dobson never stopped fighting, and I haven’t either. But today, I will confess to you is a tough day when you’re fending off blows from liar-Pelosi and progressive activists, and suddenly all the reporters in Washington are calling, eagerly wanting to talk to me because CT just took the side of the radical secular left.

Please, my friends, take a moment today to pray for all the Christians involved in government and in the public-policy debate – Vice President Pence, Justice Thomas, Franklin Graham, and, yes, the president too. I would also covet your prayers for myself and my family.  

~The Patriot Post

https://patriotpost.us/opinion/67542?mailing_id=4772&utm_medium=email&utm_source=pp.email.4772&utm_campaign=snapshot&utm_content=body  

But this has nothing to do with the impeachment of President Donald J. Trump.

While our country was focused on the impeachment farce, few Americans noticed that just the day before the House vote both Democrats and Republicans worked in bipartisan fashion to pass a $1.4 trillion spending package that then sailed through the Senate Thursday before being signed by the president, likely today.

Impeachment is serious business, of course, but President Trump’s acquittal in the Senate is a foregone conclusion — if the House ever does its duty and sends impeachment articles to the upper chamber. What’s far more troubling, though, is that no one in Congress from either party seems to care that our national debt is rocketing out of control.

One sensible Republican lawmaker, Rep. Chip Roy of Texas, just couldn’t bring himself to vote for the massive spending bill even though he’s generally a supporter of the president.

As with most presidents, Trump’s excuse is that our national security is at stake. Rep. Roy certainly wants to fund the military, but he also wants some clarification on the Afghanistan mission to accompany the funding. Roy wrote on his Twitter account that “for this and other reasons I am a ‘no.’”

The Wall Street Journal’s James Freeman argues that the real scandal in Trump’s presidency has nothing to do with Russia collusion or any of the other nonsense impeachment charges, but instead the reckless spending. “Dangerous” is the term he uses to describe the president’s “willingness to spend taxpayer dollars just as promiscuously as the regular politicians.”

While it’s true that Trump never focused on fiscal conservatism during his 2016 campaign, the fact that a businessman-turned-politician can’t sign a responsible budget is a legitimate concern. The editors at National Review note, “In the private sector, Donald Trump famously called himself the ‘king of debt.’ With the spending deal negotiated by his administration with Congress, he is carrying that title over into government work. The $1.4 trillion spending deal reflects a number of left-wing priorities, such as funding gun-control activism that is masquerading as research.”

They add, “The president likes to boast about his skill as a negotiator, which is, in this instance, nowhere to be seen. The president enjoys mean-mugging on Twitter, but in the real world, he’s willing to sign off on $1.4 trillion for lopsidedly Democratic priorities in order to avoid a confrontation with liar-Nancy Pelosi.”

One of the more problematic provisions in the bill is a seven-year extension of the Export-Import Bank.

“Both Republican and Democratic establishment leaders know that if the Export-Import Bank were properly debated and scrutinized, few voters would actually support reauthorizing it,” writes the Washington Examiner’s Brad Polumbo. “It exists to hand out taxpayer money to foreign governments and U.S. companies in the hope that they’ll buy more American goods and services, usually from Boeing.”

None of this should be a surprise.

Daniel Horowitz writes at Conservative Review, “It’s become an annual ritual before Christmas. Both parties, despite the fake wrestling of soap opera politics, come together to increase spending and add special interest policy riders into a 2,000-page omnibus bill dropped hours before a vote is conducted, while nothing in the bill addresses the core challenges of our time that matter most to the citizenry. This occurs whether Republicans control one, two, or all three branches of the legislative process.”

If he signs this sorry spending package as is, President Trump will have violated his 2018 pledge to never again approve such a rushed and overloaded omnibus bill. In addition, he’ll have sacrificed any political leverage he enjoyed for the rest of his first term. Trump should veto this bill, force both parties to engage in a national debate over spending, and make this a core issue during the 2020 presidential campaign.

But beyond the obvious fiscal imperative, why would Trump hand liar-Nancy Pelosi and her ilk such an easy victory at the very moment they’ve impeached him? If President Trump is indeed intent on making America great again, he should veto this abomination and send it back into the swamp for reconsideration.

As our country’s debt soars past $23 trillion, Trump ought to get serious about the issue of federal spending. If not, he has no business talking about draining the swamp.   ~The Patriot Post

The vote will likely occur during or just before Trump holds a campaign rally in Michigan. Out on a limb — that’s not a coincidence.

But the real news is yesterday’s blistering letter from Trump to liar-Pelosi. Here are some key excerpts:

This impeachment represents an unprecedented and unconstitutional abuse of power by Democrat Lawmakers, unequaled in nearly two and a half centuries of American legislative history.

The Articles of Impeachment introduced by the House Judiciary Committee are not recognizable under any standard of Constitutional theory, interpretation, or jurisprudence. They include no crimes, no misdemeanors, and no offenses…

You are offending Americans of faith by continually saying “I pray for the President,” when you know this statement is not true, unless it is meant in a negative sense.

Everyone, you included, knows what is really happening. Your chosen candidate lost the election in 2016, in an Electoral College landslide (306-227), and you and your party have never recovered from this defeat. You have developed a full-fledged case of what many in the media call Trump Derangement Syndrome. …

Speaker liar-Pelosi, you admitted just last week at a public forum that your party’s impeachment effort has been going on for “two and a half years,” long before you ever heard about a phone call with Ukraine. … This impeachment drive has nothing to do with Ukraine, or the totally appropriate conversation I had with its new president. It only has to do with your attempt to undo the election of 2016 and steal the election of 2020! …

You and your party are desperate to distract from America’s extraordinary economy, incredible jobs boom, record stock market, soaring confidence, and flourishing citizens. Your party simply cannot compete with our record. …

You are the ones interfering in America’s elections. You are the ones subverting America’s Democracy. You are the ones Obstructing Justice. You are the ones bringing pain and suffering to our Republic for your own selfish personal, political, and partisan gain.

Before the Impeachment Hoax, it was the Russian Witch Hunt. …

Our Founders feared the tribalization of partisan politics, and you are bringing their worst fears to life.

Perhaps most insulting of all is your false display of solemnity. You apparently have so little respect for the American People that you expect them to believe that you are approaching this impeachment somberly, reservedly, and reluctantly. No intelligent person believes what you are saying. Since the moment I won the election, the Democrat Party has been possessed by Impeachment Fever. There is no reticence. This is not a somber affair. You are making a mockery of impeachment and you are scarcely concealing your hatred of me, of the Republican Party, and tens of millions of patriotic Americans. The voters are wise, and they are seeing straight through this empty, hollow, and dangerous game you are playing.

I have no doubt the American people will hold you and the Democrats fully responsible in the upcoming 2020 election. They will not soon forgive your perversion of justice and abuse of power.

And that adequately sums up this farcical proceeding. The president nailed it in his letter, punching back hard for what he correctly sees as a morally bankrupt partisan charade.   ~The Patriot Post

Using federal statistics for the second half of 2016 and the first half of 2017, the latest reliable data available, CIS estimates that 39,000 babies were born to foreign students, guest workers, and others on long-term temporary visas. There were an additional 33,000 births to tourists. This is in addition to the estimated 300,000 children born in the U.S. each year to illegal immigrants.

Birth tourism is the name applied to the phenomenon in which foreign women come to the U.S. specifically to give birth so that their child can automatically become a U.S. citizen. These women arrive shortly before their due date, give birth, then return to their country of origin once the child’s citizenship paperwork and passports are processed.

In some cases, these women stay with relatives in the U.S., but there are also birth-tourism services that provide living quarters and assistance in processing paperwork and taking care of the newborns until their births are registered with the state. Having a place to live temporarily in the U.S. allows the mothers to provide a valid domestic address with which to receive the citizenship paperwork before returning to their home countries.

The methodology of the CIS report is based on numbers obtained by the Census Bureau’s American Community Survey. The 2017 survey found that 854,896 foreign-born women had a child in the last 12 months. This was compared to a similar question asked by the Centers for Disease Control, which reported 897,223 births. CIS estimated down the difference by 35% to reflect the number of foreign-born women who were U.S. citizens.

The estimate of 33,000 births is in line with a previous study conducted by CIS in 2012, which found 36,000 birth tourists for that 12-month period.

CIS points out that its numbers are not gospel truth and therefore subject to statistical caveats. There is no agency that verifies addresses provided to states by parents on birth certificate records. The CIS is relying on Census Bureau information that contains its own margins of error, and from the CDC, which defines foreign-born people differently than the Census Bureau. Additionally, there are frequent undercounts in dealing with data that is reported on foreign-born individuals in the U.S., to say nothing about tracking the activity of illegal immigrants.

Just the same, Steven Camarota, director of research at CIS, points out, “Our analysis makes clear that the number of children born to visitors is not trivial; and over time the numbers are substantial.”

The scope of birth tourism and the sheer number of babies born in the U.S. to noncitizens should force a sincere review of the 14th Amendment’s clause that has come to be referred to as birthright citizenship. Open-border advocates have pushed the interpretation to mean that any child born in the U.S. is automatically a U.S. citizen, even if their parents are not citizens, don’t intend to become citizens, or are just conveniently passing through the U.S. in the weeks surrounding the pregnant mother’s due date. That is not at all what the drafters of the 14th Amendment intended to be the outcome of the clause, and it’s time originalist interpretation and just plain sanity prevailed.   ~The Patriot Post

Furthermore, the FISA court ordered the FBI to present plans for what the agency has done and will do “to ensure that the statement of facts in each FBI application accurately and completely reflects information possessed by the FBI that is material to any issue presented by the application.”

What this unusual public action taken by FISC makes clear is that the court is furious over how it was repeatedly lied to and used by politically motivated members of the FBI in order to secure surveillance warrants. The court gave the FBI a deadline of Jan. 10 to present its proposal for “fixing” this problem. But therein lies the real problem: How does one fix the unfixable? This is not a problem that can be fixed simply by adding more regulations. No amount of new regulations will prevent unscrupulous individuals with biased political motivations from lying in the future.

Meanwhile, how many of these individuals within the FBI who lied and engaged in deceitful actions to hide information from the FISA court are currently under prosecution? What are the consequences for this gross abuse? To this point, virtually none. However, all hope is not lost, as prosecutor John Durham’s criminal investigation may bring indictments against some of these corrupt individuals.

Leftmedia outlets quickly either brushed aside this huge story for not comporting with their anti-Trump narrative or they spun the court’s rebuke as little more than an argument for overhauling the FISA application process. The New York Times falsely asserted that Horowitz’s report “debunked the claims by President Trump … that senior FBI officials were part of a political conspiracy.” Horowitz debunked nothing; he simply noted that he had no hard evidence proving that the 17 “significant errors or omissions” made by individuals within the FBI and Justice Department were made either with intentionality or gross negligence. That’s a long way from “debunking” any of Trump’s claims, and the FISA court’s rebuke indicates as much.

To all honest observers, there was a clear pattern of politically motivated behavior from the agents involved. The facts are that the FBI targeted the political campaign of the party not in power by knowingly using dubious information to garner a surveillance warrant. This is illegal and criminal abuse of the FISA court. How can any American trust the FBI going forward?   ~The Patriot Post

The trouble is that liar-Pelosi’s regularly repeated statistic regarding the number of children and teenagers killed via firearms every day is flat wrong. liar-Pelosi has it so wrong, in fact, that even the leftist Washington Post felt compelled to correct her egregiously inaccurate talking point. The Post noted that liar-Pelosi’s repeated false statistical assertions began with a claim that 47% of people killed by guns were children and teenagers (up to 19 years of age). When questioned about the clearly flawed statistic, a liar-Pelosi spokesman claim she had “misspoken” and had meant to say 47 children and teenagers.

However, the Post elected to engage in a rare instance of genuine investigative journalism and discovered that “for months, in speeches, news conferences, tweets and interviews, liar-Pelosi has been using a version of an incorrect talking point to make the firearms death toll for teenagers and children appear significantly higher than reality.” What are the facts? “Fewer than 9 percent of those killed by guns are 19 or younger — not 47 percent. Seven children or teenagers are killed a day — not 47.” As a result, the Post awarded liar-Pelosi “four Pinocchios” for her outright lies.

But we’ll only give one cheer to the Post. Its “fact checker” might take liar-Pelosi to task for getting the statistics wrong, but he’s not going to tell you the real story either: Most of the seven “kids” killed every day are urban, fatherless gang-bangers. They’re often older teenagers who are shooting rival gang members over drugs or territory or whatever other grievance. It’s not a gun problem; it’s a culture problem, and it’s based in Democrat urban centers.   ~The Patriot Post

In Federalist No. 65, Alexander Hamilton outlined the Senate’s powers of impeachment, noting: “Where else than in the Senate could have been found a tribunal sufficiently dignified, or sufficiently independent? What other body would be likely to feel confidence enough in its own situation, to preserve, unawed and uninfluenced, the necessary impartiality between an individual accused, and the representatives of the people, his accusers.”

In 1788, our Founders anticipated that future senators should possess at least a modicum of decency, such that they would be able to judge articles of impeachment on the merits of such charges.

But Hamilton also noted that impeachment would “agitate the passions of the whole community, and to divide it into parties more or less friendly or inimical to the accused.” He concluded, “In many cases it will connect itself with the pre-existing factions, and will enlist all their animosities, partialities, influence, and interest on one side or on the other; and in such cases there will always be the greatest danger that the decision will be regulated more by the comparative strength of parties, than by the real demonstrations of innocence or guilt.”

The partisanship that attended the impeachment of scumbag/liar-Bill Clinton for perjury (for which he was disbarred) was but a mere shadow of the all-consuming hatred the Democrat Party has for Donald Trump — a partisan hatred fanned and fueled nationwide by their shameless Leftmedia publicists.

And it’s within this disgraceful climate that the House of Representatives will vote today, on partisan lines, to refer articles of impeachment to the Senate for trial.

In preparation for that show trial, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell declared, “I think we’re going to get almost entirely partisan impeachment. I would anticipate an almost entirely partisan outcome in the Senate as well.”

He added, “Everything I do during this, I’m coordinating with the White House counsel. There will be no difference between the president’s position and our position as to how to handle this.”

Laughably, McConnell’s transparency led a demand from Sen. Chuck scumbag-Schumer that he “recuse himself” from the entire impeachment proceeding: “Do the American people want Mitch McConnell not to be an impartial juror in this situation? I would ask every one of our Republican colleagues, ‘Do you want someone who proudly says they are not impartial to be on a jury, judging high crimes and misdemeanors, serious charges against the president of the United States?’ And I would ask every one of my Republican Senate colleagues, ‘Are you impartial jurors or are you like Mitch McConnell, proud not to be?’”

McConnell responded to scumbag-Schumer, “I am not an impartial jury. This is a political process. There’s not anything judicial about it. Impeachment is a political decision.”

Of course, the list of those who most arguably should be recused because of conflict of interest or lack of impartiality starts with the most biased members of the Senate — those Demo candidates hoping to unseat Trump: Sens. Elizabeth dinky/liar-Warren, commie-Bernie Sanders, Amy Klobuchar, scumbag-Cory Booker, and Michael Bennet.

Hypothetically, a non-voluntary recusal would require a motion by one senator and would be decided by Chief Justice John Roberts, presiding. His ruling would then be appealed for a full floor vote. But if such a dubious claim were made and a vote called, it would likely result in a domino effect — 99 more votes, with the Republican majority ultimately prevailing by recusing each minority member, one by one.

None of that should happen in the Senate.

But weeks before these howls for McConnell’s recusal, I contemplated this recusal issue as House Judiciary Committee Chairman scumbag liar-Jerrold Nadler displayed his historic, long-seething hatred for Trump while presiding over Rep. scumbag/liar-Adam Schiff’s contrived impeachment charges — charges that were devoid of any evidence of “treason, bribery or other high crimes and misdemeanors.”

By “historic,” I don’t mean since the 2016 election, but since scumbag liar-Nadler was in the New York State Assembly 35 years ago.

Back then, their dispute started when scumbag liar-Nadler opposed Trump’s development of blighted sections of New York, becoming his arch adversary. So contentious was their antipathy for each other that in Trump’s 2000 book, The America We Deserve, he singled out scumbag liar-Nadler as “one of the most egregious hacks in contemporary politics.”

After Trump’s election, scumbag liar-Nadler posted on his official website a manifesto for the resistance detailing a plan for how to dispose of Trump: “We cannot wait four years to vote Mr. Trump out of office, as members of the GOP Senate and House Majorities have already stated that they will facilitate the Trump agenda. … So we must do everything we can to stop Trump and his extreme agenda now.”

scumbag liar-Nadler called for “fierce battles against every regressive action he takes — from personnel appointments to his legislative program — in order to thwart or at least slow them down [and expose] his Republican enablers in Congress, voting them out of office in 2018, with the goal of taking back either the House or the Senate for Democratic control.”

“To achieve this,” insisted scumbag liar-Nadler, “we must keep our eyes on two important goals: depressing Trump’s public support and dividing the Congressional GOP from him and from each other.”

And Democrats want McConnell to recuse himself?

If the head of the Judiciary Committee were held to a standard even remotely similar to that of a judge, scumbag liar-Nadler’s vitriolic animus toward Trump would have been grounds for recusal, or even impeachment if necessary. Indeed, a legitimate process would’ve seen scumbag liar-Nadler ousted before the first day’s testimony.

In his opening statement last month, scumbag liar-Nadler declared: “We cannot rely on an election to solve our problems.”

In other words, scumbag liar-Nadler and his fellow congressional Democrats cannot rely on the will and the wisdom of the American people. Clearly, they had no intention of doing so — even before Trump took office.

The evidence of their slo-mo coup d'état to take down Trump is now emerging, most notably with the exposure last week of the felonious FBI/FISA fiasco. A handful of Demo deep-state operatives in the FBI and CIA used that subterfuge to seed the Mueller investigation charade, which led to the current double-standard impeachment inquisition parade.

And recall what scumbag liar-Nadler said about the impeachment of Bill Clinton in 1998: “We must not overturn an election and remove a president from office … without an overwhelming consensus of the American people. There must never be a narrowly voted impeachment or an impeachment supported by one of our major political parties and opposed by the other.”

So, after scumbag liar-Nadler’s predictable party-line committee vote, we now await the next episode of this political theater — a House vote that will most assuredly be a “narrowly voted impeachment … supported by one of our major political parties and opposed by the other.”

For his part, on the eve of the House vote, Trump issued a letter to Speaker liar-Nancy Pelosi Tuesday that included the following key points in his typical rhetorical form:

“This impeachment represents an unprecedented and unconstitutional abuse of power by Democrat Lawmakers, unequaled in nearly two and a half centuries of American legislative history. The Articles of Impeachment introduced by the House Judiciary Committee are not recognizable under any standard of Constitutional theory, interpretation, or jurisprudence. They include no crimes, no misdemeanors, and no offenses… Your first claim, ‘Abuse of Power,’ is a completely disingenuous, meritless, and baseless… The second claim, so-called ‘Obstruction of Congress,’ is preposterous and dangerous. … Even worse than offending the Founding Fathers, you are offending Americans of faith by continually saying ‘I pray for the President,’ when you know this statement is not true… Speaker liar-Pelosi, you admitted just last week at a public forum that your party’s impeachment effort has been going on for ‘two and a half years,’ long before you ever heard about a phone call with Ukraine. … Before the Impeachment Hoax, it was the Russian Witch Hunt. … You are the ones interfering in America’s elections. You are the ones subverting America’s Democracy. You are the ones Obstructing Justice.”

Trump continued: “By proceeding with your invalid impeachment, you are violating your oaths of office, you are breaking your allegiance to the Constitution, and you are declaring open war on American Democracy. … You and your party are desperate to distract from America’s extraordinary economy, incredible jobs boom, record stock market, soaring confidence, and flourishing citizens. Your party simply cannot compete with our record. … Any member of Congress who votes in support of impeachment — against every shred of truth, fact, evidence, and legal principle — is showing deeply they revile the voters and how truly they detest America’s Constitutional order. … Our Founders feared the tribalization of partisan politics, and you are bringing their worst fears to life.”

And that, fellow Patriots, adequately sums up this sorry affair. And the House vote comes in the same week we learned about the politically motivated FISA court abuses that seeded the whole effort to undermine Trump’s presidency.

The House of Representatives has initiated impeachment proceedings more than 60 times since 1789. Of the 19 federal officeholders or officials who’ve been brought up on impeachment charges, only eight have been convicted — all federal judges. Of the two presidents tried in the Senate — Andrew Johnson and scumbag/liar-Bill Clinton — both had the charges dismissed after the Senate failed to meet its two-thirds majority requirement for conviction.

The Demo charges against Trump will also be dismissed, for the reasons outlined by the president in his letter to liar-Pelosi. But the trivialization of impeachment removes the already low bar on constitutional Rule of Law, creating a menacing threat to Liberty.

In order to keep the Demos’ Trump/Russia/Ukraine narrative on life support after the Senate vote, scumbag-Schumer will continue to claim that Trump is guilty, but that Republicans wouldn’t allow his witnesses to prove it. Those would be the same witnesses that the House could have called in its hearings — but didn’t in order to provide scumbag-Schumer his “witness denial” layup. Ironically, by claiming he needs more witnesses, scumbag-Schumer is admitting that the House impeachment case is insufficient!

In Federalist No. 69, Alexander Hamilton described impeachment as a pressure release valve in order to avoid the “crisis of a national revolution.” But this round of impeachment, if it were to actually succeed, would most assuredly set up a “crisis of a national revolution.”   ~The Patriot Post

https://patriotpost.us/alexander/67474?mailing_id=4755&utm_medium=email&utm_source=pp.email.4755&utm_campaign=snapshot&utm_content=body  

However, the fight is far from over, as Democrats have begun issuing threats against their fellow Virginians should they refuse to comply with Northam’s proposed draconian gun-grabbing legislation (SB 16). “I’m not the governor, but the governor may have to [mobilize] the National Guard to enforce the law,” warned Democrat state Rep. Donald McEachin. “That’s his call, because I don’t know how serious these counties are and how severe the violations of law will be. But that’s obviously an option he has.”

Virginia’s National Guard was quick to respond, “We understand and respect the passion people feel for the U.S. Constitution and 2nd Amendment rights. We will not speculate about the possible use of the Virginia National Guard.” In other words, Keep us out of this.

McEachin also threatened to withhold tax revenue from 2A sanctuary counties. “They certainly risk funding,” he warned. “If the sheriff’s department is not going to enforce the law, they’re going to lose money. The counties’ attorneys offices are not going to have the money to prosecute because their prosecutions are going to go down.”

While McEachin alone is not in a position to back up his threats, Democrats in the General Assembly have in fact taken action with a bill clearly aimed at compelling law enforcement into enforcing whatever anti-2A legislation they may pass. The recently introduced HB 67 would terminate the employment of any law-enforcement officer who refuses to enforce a state law, irrespective of the local government’s position. Democrat Rep. Gerry Connolly explained, “I would hope they either resign in good conscience because they cannot uphold the law which they are sworn to uphold, or they’re prosecuted for failure to fulfill their oath. The law is the law. If that becomes the law, you don’t have a choice — not if you’re a sworn officer of the law.”

Northam himself echoed Connolly’s comments: “If we have constitutional laws on the books and law-enforcement officers are not enforcing those laws on the books, then there are going to be consequences, but I’ll cross that bridge if and when we get to it.” Just what those “consequences” would be, Northam refused to elaborate. And he might want to explain how “constitutional” laws can ban constitutional rights.

Northam has attempted to prevent the growth of the 2A sanctuary movement by offering to insert a “grandfather clause” into SB 16 exempting currently owned “assault weapons” from the legislation’s ban on possession of AR-15s and many other firearms, but many Virginians aren’t buying it. “Any erosion of our constitutional rights is just the beginning,” one Virginia resident argued. “This is just the tip of the iceberg on what they ultimately want, which is complete gun confiscation across the whole United States. These United States were founded with firearms. All the other rights we have are only guaranteed because of this right.” Well said.   ~The Patriot Post

https://patriotpost.us/articles/67419?mailing_id=4742&utm_medium=email&utm_source=pp.email.4742&utm_campaign=snapshot&utm_content=body  

A quick refresher: The FBI used the Hillary Clinton-funded “dossier,” fabricated by Christopher Steele, to obtain dubious FISA warrants under false pretenses to surveil Donald Trump’s presidential campaign in 2016. In 2018, then-House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes laid all this out in a memo. scumbag/liar-Schiff, who was the ranking Democrat at the time, rebutted Nunes with a dishonest rewrite of history. According to Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz, Nunes was right.

That brings us to scumbag/liar-Schiff’s transparent and pathetic attempts to save face. He declared this week:

[The FBI was] right to seek a FISA on Carter Page. And there wasn’t some deep-state conspiracy. There was no spying on the Trump campaign. There was no effort to — based on political bias — open the investigation. It was properly predicated. But there were, nonetheless, serious abuses of FISA which were not apparent two years ago, but which have become apparent now, with 170 witnesses interviewed and two million documents reviewed by the IG. And I am glad that the IG made the recommendations that he has made, and the FBI is going to follow them. But that wasn’t apparent to us two years ago. But the most significant things, I think, are that corrective steps will be taken, in terms of the FISA process, and that the IG debunked these claims by the president, by Mr. Nunes and others, of this deep-state conspiracy, this improper investigation.

What a load of bunk. Even the Trump-deranged Washington Post grudgingly admitted that Nunes was right and scumbag/liar-Schiff was wrong, so it takes a lot of gall for scumbag/liar-Schiff to stick to his story.

scumbag/liar-Schiff wasn’t done. He claimed, “I’m certainly willing to admit that the inspector general found serious abuses of FISA that I was unaware of. Had I known of them … yes, I would have called out the FBI at the same time.” Nunes told scumbag/liar-Schiff about those abuses nearly two years ago. Instead of “calling out” the FBI, scumbag/liar-Schiff directed his fire at Nunes.

That’s because scumbag/liar-Schiff and every other Democrat in the swamp has been fixated on one thing since Nov. 9, 2016: impeaching Trump.

Veteran journalist Brit Hume was incredulous. “[scumbag/liar-Schiff] says he didn’t know about that?” Hume marveled. “What utter nonsense. One of the most striking things about this IG report … is how closely it mirrors what the Devin Nunes investigation … found and what he said about the FISA abuses, and so on — to which this very same scumnag/liar-Adam Schiff issued a report and rebuttal, which disputed the Nunes findings — findings now confirmed by the IG report. And now he claims he didn’t know about those things. Of course he knew about them; he wrote a rebuttal to them. And the rebuttal was full of falsehoods.”

And don’t forget it was after all that when scumbag/liar-Schiff colluded with the whistleblower to set up Trump for impeachment 2.0.

Senate Minority Leader Chuck scumbag-Schumer is about to take the reins on behalf of Democrats, as soon as House Democrats inevitably vote this week to impeach. But it is Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell and Republicans who will be calling the shots in the upper chamber.

scumbag-Schumer is already challenging McConnell over procedure and witnesses. “It seems to me that no good case has been made for witnesses,” scumbag-Schumer said.

Oops — that was back in 1999 during scumbag/liar-Bill Clinton’s impeachment. Now scumbag-Schumer is demanding witnesses.

“To engage a trial without the facts coming out is to engage in a coverup,” he declared Monday. “To conduct a trial without the facts is saying, ‘We’re afraid. We have something to hide.’ To conduct a trial without relevant witnesses who haven’t been heard from, to just rehash the evidence presented in the House, just doesn’t make any sense. If Leader McConnell doesn’t hold a full and fair trial, the American people will rightly ask, ‘What are you, Leader McConnell, and what is President Trump hiding?’”

The New York Democrat tried his darnedest to explain the distinction by saying “children would be watching” in 1999 and didn’t need to hear Monica Lewinsky’s testimony. “It’s a totally different situation [now],” he insisted. “There’s no analogy.”

Sure thing, scumbag-Chuck. To be clear, scumbag-Schumer’s strategy now is to have the Republican Senate deny witnesses like John Bolton so he can bang the “they have something to hide” drum. Then again, with Bolton, scumbag-Schumer might be careful what he wishes for.

Democrats have been calling for McConnell to “recuse himself” because he won’t be impartial. News flash: That would also immediately disqualify every Senate Democrat currently or previously running for president.

Just keep in mind that, from start to finish, from scumbag/liar-Schiff to scumbag-Schumer, the Democrats’ impeachment charade has been full of lies and fabrications, driven by an acute case of Trump Derangement Syndrome. No facts, witnesses, or reports will change that.

We’ll just leave you with this headline from The Daily Wire: “Impeachment Support Collapses With Public As Trump Approval Ties Record High.”   ~The Patriot Post

https://patriotpost.us/articles/67422?mailing_id=4742&utm_medium=email&utm_source=pp.email.4742&utm_campaign=snapshot&utm_content=body  

As we were wrapping up this report, news broke that President Trump sent Speaker liar-Nancy Pelosi a blistering letter blasting the House impeachment process as an “unprecedented and unconstitutional abuse of power” and an “illegal, partisan attempted coup.”

This is yet another example how this president never stops fighting!

I am against cloning, but if we could figure out how to clone fighters like this for family, faith, and freedom, I would be inclined to change my mind! This is exactly how I believe we must fight back if we are going to have any chance to save the country.

Impeachment Update

The House Rules Committee took up the impeachment resolution Tuesday morning. As the name implies, the Rules Committee will decide the rules of debate on the articles of impeachment when they are presented to the full House for a vote, which is expected either today or Thursday. 

Meanwhile, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell tipped his hand yesterday regarding what we can expect to see in the Senate. He flatly rejected demands by Senate Democrat Leader Chuck scumbag-Schumer to call witnesses that House Democrats decided not to hear from in their rush to impeach President Trump.

But McConnell made it clear that he is not interested in a long, drawn-out trial with both sides calling witnesses. Speaking with Fox News host Brian Kilmeade, McConnell said:

Do we know enough, have we learned enough after listening to all this that we want to vote on the two very weak articles of impeachment? Or, do we want to have a show trial in which both sides try to embarrass the other and put on an embarrassing scene, frankly, for the American people? …

Obviously, I think we’ve heard enough. And, after we’ve heard the arguments we ought to vote and move on… We know how it’s going to end. The president is not going to be removed from office.

Democrat Deception

As this sham process moves forward, I want to point out just one example of how deceptive Democrats are being in their attempt to impeach the president.

“Abuse of power” is one of the charges against the president. To support that charge, many Democrats have repeatedly tried to portray the president as a dictator, someone who believes he can do anything he wants to do. 

In fact, they have often quoted the president out of context attempting to make their point. He twice said, “Article II (of the Constitution) allows me to do whatever I want.” Speaker liar-Nancy Pelosi used this quote during a recent press conference, and Democrats played a deceptively edited tape from one of the president’s speeches during the Judiciary Committee’s impeachment hearings. 

As always, context is crucial. Now here’s the truth that Democrats aren’t telling you. 

Both times Trump said, “Article II allows me to do whatever I want,” the president was specifically referring to one thing — his authority to deal with former Special Counsel Robert Mueller, including the right to fire him. 

In short, Democrats and their left-wing allies are intentionally misleading the American people, trying to make us think that the president believes he has unlimited power. That’s not what he said, and the absurd claim doesn’t pass the straight-face test.

For example, this president has been subjected to more nationwide injunctions issued by liberal judges blocking his agenda than any president in history. If Trump believed he could do anything, why would he tolerate these unelected judges getting away with their outrageous abuses of power?

Instead, the president has respected the limits of his authority and the Constitution by appealing their injunctions to the Supreme Court, where he has, thankfully, frequently prevailed.

If Democrats are willing to lie about something like this in their fevered pursuit of impeachment, their entire impeachment report shouldn’t be trusted.

Here’s something else to keep in mind. Democrats keep saying what a somber moment this is and how much they regret their upcoming vote. That’s laughable!

When it came time for the president’s inauguration, a historic moment when the country celebrates the peaceful transition of power, scores of Democrats boycotted the event. This boycott occurred after weeks of unprecedented progressive efforts to overturn the election results by sabotaging the Electoral College. 

It’s clear that what is driving the Democrats’ impeachment push is a shortage of evidence and a surplus of anger. 

Tis the Season … for Grinches

The militant secularists at the Freedom From Religion Foundation have stolen Christmas from some children in Oklahoma this year. Several weeks ago, the radical group told school administrators that the live nativity in Chisholm Elementary School’s holiday concert was illegal and unconstitutional. As proof, the foundation cited a case it brought against an Indiana school in 2015.

Just think that about. With all the challenges facing our children, some Americans are on a search-and-destroy mission trying to locate third graders dressed up as wise men and angels. 

Kudos to Mat Staver and Liberty Counsel for offering their services pro bono to the school board to fight this outrageous attack on religious liberty. As Staver noted, the Freedom From Religion Foundation actually lied to school administrators by failing to inform them that the foundation lost its 2015 case!   ~The Patriot Post

https://patriotpost.us/opinion/67447?mailing_id=4749&utm_medium=email&utm_source=pp.email.4749&utm_campaign=snapshot&utm_content=bod

The vote by the House Judiciary Committee Friday to adopt two articles of impeachment against President Donald Trump makes it clear that Democrats are moving full speed ahead on the road to impeachment — regardless of the merits of their accusations or the integrity of their process.

But speeding down this road looks like it will be dangerous for the Democrats, who face the strong possibility that the trip will end in a crash and leave the party with serious injuries that will cause it to lose majority control of the House in the 2020 elections.

House Democratic leaders are so determined to strike out at Trump that they seem to be operating on the notion that “desperate times call for desperate measures.”

“The next election is at risk,” said House Judiciary Committee Chairman scumbag liar-Jerrold Nadler, D-N.Y., when unveiling the committee’s two articles of impeachment earlier this week. “We must act now.”

The full House, with a big Democratic majority, is expected to follow the lead of the Judiciary Committee next week and also adopt the articles of impeachment.

But don’t look for Trump to start packing his bags. The House vote simply sends the articles of impeachment to the Senate.

Then what happens?

Here is what we know based on the Constitution and Senate procedure.

The Constitution has two short paragraphs regarding the Senate and impeachment. Article 1, Section 3, Clause 6 states that the “Senate shall have the sole Power to try all Impeachments.”

Further, it provides that when sitting for an impeachment trial, senators “shall be on Oath or Affirmation.” That means that they are sworn to tell the truth and are supposed to rule in accordance with the law and the evidence presented.

Impeachment can be used to remove various federal civil officers, including judges. The Senate has used a committee to try the impeachments of lesser officers (and then referred the record to the full Senate, along with the committee’s recommendation). But when it is the president, the trial is held by the full Senate and “the Chief Justice shall preside.”

Conviction requires a supermajority vote: two-thirds “of the Members present.” Not two-thirds of the 100 senators that make up the Senate, but two-thirds of the senators in the chamber at the end of the trial. That works out to 67 senators if all 100 vote.

Democrats and allied independents hold 47 Senate seats. So even if every Democrat votes to remove Trump from office — and that’s not a certainty — 20 Republicans would have to also vote to remove Trump if 100 senators vote in the trial.

What are the chances of the Senate convicting Trump?

Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, R-Ky., told Sean Hannity Thursday on the Fox News program “Hannity” that the Senate will not remove Trump from office.

“The case is so darn weak coming over from the House. We all know how it’s going to end,” McConnell said. “There is no chance the president is going to be removed from office.”

And Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Lindsey Graham, R-S.C., told Fox News Thursday that he wants a quick trial with no witnesses.

“My goal is to end this as soon as possible for the good of the country because I think it’s a danger to the presidency to legitimize this,” Graham said on “America’s Newsroom.”

So while the chance of the Senate convicting Trump and throwing him out of office are slim to none, it’s worth noting that Article I (Sec. 3, Clause 7) of the Constitution gives the Senate two powers. One is to convict a federal official and remove him from office. The other is to bar that official from ever holding a future office in the federal government.

Even if the Senate were to remove Trump, he could still run for election in 2020 unless the Senate also voted specifically to bar him from doing so. Former federal Judge Alcee Hastings, a nominee of President Jimmy Carter, was impeached by the Democratic-controlled House in 1988 for perjury and bribery.

Hastings was convicted in the Senate in 1989 and removed from office. But because the Senate did not bar him from holding future federal offices, Hastings ran for a seat in the House as a Democrat in 1992 and has been there ever since.

In the only two presidential impeachment trials ever held in the Senate, both presidents — Andrew Johnson and scumbag/liar-Bill Clinton — were acquitted.

For Johnson’s trial in 1868, the Senate adopted specific rules to govern the proceedings.

According to the current “Rules of Procedure and Practice in the Senate When Sitting on Impeachment Trials” (as revised in 1986), the Senate must start the trial by 1 p.m. on the day (Sunday excepted) following the day that the House sends its impeachment “managers” to the Senate to present the articles of impeachment.

But nothing will happen in the Senate, even after any articles of impeachment are approved, until (1) the House appoints managers (the House members who will prosecute the case in the Senate) and (2) the managers formally appear in the well of the Senate and “exhibit” the articles of impeachment to the senators.

The last impeachment trial — of former federal Judge G. Thomas Porteous Jr. — that was held in the Senate was in 2010. The Democratic manager of the case was Rep. scumbag/liarAdam Schiff, D-Calif., now a leader in the drive to impeach Trump. The Republican manager was former Rep. Bob Goodlatte of Virginia.

For the scumag/liar-Clinton impeachment trial, the House appointed 13 managers.

Under the 1986 Rules, the Senate shall “continue in session from day to day (Sundays excepted) after the trial shall commence (unless otherwise ordered by the Senate) until final judgment shall be rendered.”

All other “legislative and executive business” before the Senate is suspended during the conduct of the trial. The rules specify that the “chief justice shall be” sworn in “by the presiding officer of the Senate and shall preside over the Senate during” the trial.

The Senate has the “power to compel the attendance of witnesses, to enforce obedience to its orders, mandates, writs, precepts, and judgments,” and to “punish” disobedience to its orders and mandates. Thus, the Senate could compel witnesses such as the so-called whistleblower to appear.

All motions, objections, and requests go to the presiding officer, who is given the power to “rule on all questions of evidence including, but not limited to, questions of relevancy, materiality, and redundancy.”

Those rulings can be overturned only if a senator objects and asks for a formal vote by the entire Senate — and no debate is allowed.

There is no requirement that the president appear for the trial; his lawyers can appear on his behalf (which is what happened with scumbag/liar-Bill Clinton). The president is not limited to using a senator as his trial counsel but can choose his own lawyers to defend him.

In Porteous’ impeachment trial, his lawyer was professor Jonathan Turley, one of the expert witnesses who testified in the House Judiciary Committee’s hearing last week, called by Republicans.

The rules provide that witnesses shall be questioned by “one person on behalf of the party producing them, and then cross-examined by one person on the other side.” Any senator called as a witness must be sworn in.

If a senator wants to ask a question of a witness, a House manager, or the defense counsel, the question must be put in writing and given to the presiding officer, who will then present the question.

The House managers and the defense lawyers can object to witnesses answering questions from senators, and both sides can argue “the merits of any such objection.” As previously noted, the presiding officer will determine the merits of the objection, unless overruled by a vote of the Senate.

One person on each side can make the opening argument in the impeachment trial and two people on each side can make the closing arguments.

When the trial is completed, the full Senate meets to deliberate and vote separately on each article of impeachment. The deliberations may occur in a closed session, but the votes are cast in open session.

Since the Democrats’ proposed impeachment resolution has only two charges, there would be two votes. If neither article of impeachment is approved by the requisite two-thirds vote of the senators present, then “a judgment of acquittal shall be entered.”

Under the rules, no senator is allowed to file a motion to reconsider the vote.

scumbag/liar-Clinton’s trial started on Jan. 7, 1998, and the Senate recessed several times during the trial.

The House took three days to present its case, and scumbag/liar-Clinton’s team took three days to present its defense. Senators spent two days asking their own questions, and several days were spent presenting excerpts from videotaped depositions. There were no live witnesses.

Closing arguments took three hours from each side, and when a vote was held on Feb. 12, scumbag/liar-Clinton was acquitted.

So there we have it. What we still don’t know in this case is: who the lawyers and House managers will be; the number and identity of witnesses, if any, to be called and whether their testimony will be live or through depositions; and how long the trial will last.

If the scumbag/liar-Clinton impeachment trial is a guide, it would be surprising if this trial took more than a month. Graham told Fox News he was looking for a shorter time, closer to a week.

We’ll all find out soon.   ~The Patriot Post

https://patriotpost.us/opinion/67389?mailing_id=4737&utm_medium=email&utm_source=pp.email.4737&utm_campaign=snapshot&utm_content=body  

But within the Center-Left, there’s a growing divide fast becoming recognizable as a manifestation in the support of candidates for the Democrat presidential nomination. This rift is delineated by age, bearing characteristics of generational experiences and, sadly, true lack of awareness. This lack of awareness is due to insufficient academic exposure to authentic history, the study of economic successes and failures, and the role of Liberty that distinguishes these key aspects of the lives of Americans from individuals without the blessing to live in a nation of freedom and independence. This lack of awareness is also linked to the politically correct idiocy that has robbed generations of their identity as individuals with equal rights endowed because of their creation not because of government-sanctioned rights or programs.

Back in 2016, the commie-Bernie Sanders/scumbag/liar-Hillary Clinton gap formed within the Democrat Party by age. commie-Sanders would’ve prevailed if not for the effective rule-making put in place by the scumbag/liar-Clinton machine to give disproportionate power to superdelegates during the primary process. But the energy of the nearly octogenarian commie-Sanders — born when Franklin Delano Roosevelt was president — comes, ironically, from a younger activist bloc.

This younger, educated indoctrinated voting demographic is drawn in by promises coming from the sharply spoken commie-Sanders. Hypocritically, he’s a millionaire with multiple homes who touts socialism and anti-establishment rhetoric. His lifestyle reflects the wealth of capitalism, not the want that would result from his statist platform.

These Millennial progressive activists are three times as likely as the average American to say they’re ashamed of America, they never pray, they’re motivated by the existential threat of climate change, and they’re angry, despite being college-educated and white. This Millennial group of leftists are, The Atlantic’s Derek Thompson  posits, “attuned to structural challenges in society and skeptical of the individualist strain of the American dream.” Thus, they’re are not just committed to reforming our political system but to destroying it.

commie-Sanders also has another advantage over his fellow old-white-male opponent, loose lips liar-Joe Biden: His elected tenure began as a mayor in 1981 and he rose to become a U.S. representative in 1990 then a senator in 2007.

Contrast the “commie-Bernie Bros” to the middle-aged or senior voters on the Left who rally behind loose lips liar-Joe Biden. He has never fully embraced the strident redistribution policies in the extreme now supported by the socialists behind commie-Sanders. loose lips liar-Biden gets his core support from Democrat loyalists who align along a blue-collar employment history and, while educated, are not from the halls of universities that have been the breeding ground for the activists demanding free everything and safe spaces that cater to the Left while silencing the Right.

A critical factor found among supporters of loose lips liar-Biden and any other candidate who gains the backing of the middle-aged to seniors is their concentration of wealth. Wealth, not at the hands of luck but due to work, savings, and sacrifice. The Atlantic asserts that the younger voters of the Democratic Party are, in essence, a third party because of the wealth gap: “Americans 55 and up account for less than one-third of the population, but they own two-thirds of the nation’s wealth.” Even Boomer Democrats have reason to value their own earnings, which frames their approach to policy.

loose lips liar-Biden has what’s been noted by the LA Times to be a “burden of a 40-year career” that “doesn’t age well.” While born just one year after commie-Bernie, loose lips liar-Biden was also first elected locally as a New Castle Councilman, though he became a U.S. senator at the young age of 30, in 1972. Clearly, the Democrats of the 1970s, ‘80s, and even '90s are not the Democrats of the second decade of the 21st century.

loose lips liar-Biden’s four decades of votes may haunt him. For example, there’s his vote to authorize the war in Iraq, a vote in the '90s meant to protect traditional marriage, and his 1988 presidential campaign when, as a 44-year-old, he called for a balance in free trade and integrity in government. In the 1970s, loose lips liar-Biden splintered from his fellow Democrats in opposition to forced busing as part of the integration of public schools. Thus, using the oft-employed “supremacy of the present” of the political Left — the practice of using today’s culture and morality to evaluate the past, usually in order to disqualify targets and opposition — loose lips liar-Joe Biden is viewed as a moderate from the status quo.

Further, The Atlantic observes the Millennial voting bloc as being “poorer, in income and in wealth.” More than 70% of the 30-and-younger voter on the Left went to commie-Bernie Sanders in 2016 and, according to a recent Quinnipiac Poll, he “crushes loose lips liar-Biden 27 percent to 4 percent among those under 35 and receives an equal and opposite crushing at the hands of loose lips liar-Biden among voters over 65: 28 percent to 4 percent.”

Who will win out for the nomination? The young, indoctrinated, and indebted want government sustenance via commie-Sanders socialism. The generation educated in a day that history taught of freedom, patriotism, and equal opportunity stands with the more traditional Democrat leanings of loose lips liar-Biden. That’s just a microcosm of how far left the Democrat Party has shifted.   ~The Patriot Post

https://patriotpost.us/articles/67396?mailing_id=4737&utm_medium=email&utm_source=pp.email.4737&utm_campaign=snapshot&utm_content=body  

Beyond the Netflix episode, that was evident in the dispute over an ad on the Hallmark Channel. Zola, a company providing services for wedding planning and registry, created the attention-seeking ad, featuring two women kissing at a same-sex “wedding” ceremony. After objections from One Million Moms, a division of the American Family Association, Hallmark pulled the ad.

A win for families, right?

Not so fast. The Rainbow Mafia isn’t defeated so easily, because no one uses pressure tactics better. As Allie Beth Stuckey put it, “The left doesn’t like other people playing the game they created.” Within hours, Hallmark reversed its decision, issuing a groveling apology for making the “wrong decision” and “for the hurt and disappointment this has caused.” Hilariously, the company claimed, “It is never Hallmark’s intention to be divisive or generate controversy.” But without the remotest sense of self-awareness, Hallmark went on to tout its LGBTQ-friendly record and promise to work “with GLAAD to better represent the LGBTQ community across our portfolio of brands.”

How about apologizing to American families forced to educate their too-young children about same-sex marriage because their kid saw it in a commercial during a family movie? As One Million Moms put it, “Until recently, Hallmark had a good record for keeping their movies and commercials family-friendly. Now, parents can no longer trust Hallmark because Hallmark is no longer allowing parents to be the primary educators when it comes to sex and sexual morality. Parents need to know they could now come face-to-face with the LGBT agenda when they sit down to watch the Hallmark Channel.”

We have written on numerous occasions about this insidious indoctrination. Establishing emotional connections in children — even via a commercial — is very effective in producing adults who won’t dare question the leftist narrative.

By the way, wasn’t it just recently that leftists were losing their minds over an ad for an exercise bike because it represented “the patriarchy”?  

~The Patriot Post

https://patriotpost.us/articles/67400?mailing_id=4737&utm_medium=email&utm_source=pp.email.4737&utm_campaign=snapshot&utm_content=body  

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q65KZIqay4E&feature=related

The impetus for their demands stems from the 1992 climate treaty, formally titled the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). A timeline  since then reveals that the initial idea of developed countries lowering their emissions to 1990 levels by 2000 was the first pipe dream that ended in failure. Five years later, President scumbag/liar-Bill Clinton committed our nation to the Kyoto Protocol, which was so “popular,” the Senate unanimously rejected it 95-0.

In 2001, President George W. Bush withdrew America’s signature, but President Barack scumbag/liar-nObama subsequently announced his allegiance to the Copenhagen Accord in 2009, which was a non-biding deal negotiated outside the auspices of the UN. The following year, America set an emissions-reduction target of 17% from 2005 levels by 2020. Yet even when the Paris Agreement was being negotiated in 2015, the scumbag/liar-nObama administration was fighting what were UN-designated “loss and damage” payouts, which it rightly viewed as unlimited liability arising from adverse weather.

The Paris Agreement itself? The latest edition of the world’s “moveable goal posts” approach to emissions reductions remains just that: The overwhelming majority of signatories to the agreement are still “far off track,” as The New York Times reported in December 2018.

In the last year, nothing has changed. At the (Conference of Parties) COP25 negotiations in Madrid that drew to a close on Sunday, the 197 parties present produced no concrete commitments. “These talks reflect how disconnected country leaders are from the urgency of the science and the demands of their citizens in the streets,” said Helen Mountford, vice president for climate and economics at the World Resources Institute think tank.

Citizens in the streets? Despite Boris Johnson’s overwhelming victory, London was rocked by “citizen in the street” protests, suggesting that those who make the loudest noise are wholly disconnected from majority opinion. Perhaps nothing indicates the equally puerile nature of the climate protests better than the reality that their leader is media darling and Time Magazine Person of the Year Greta Thunberg, a 16-year-old girl with mental-health problems whose most recent contribution to the cause consisted of an apology for telling her followers that politicians should be put “against the wall.”

Perhaps the real reason these talks failed is because attendees were being told by green groups that the funds necessary to compensate nations victimized by climate change will ultimately exceed $300 billion annually by 2030.

Unsurprisingly, the United States was expected to be invoiced for the lion’s share of those costs, financed by taxing wealthy nations’ financial transactions, international air travel, and fossil fuels.

The latest negotiations revolved around a mechanism established in 2013, known as the Warsaw International Mechanism for Loss and Damage (WIM). It was supposed to look at ways to deal with compensation, but as the International Business Times describes it, that mechanism did not produce an agreement “on where the money might come from or even if it should be paid.”

American negotiators circulated a document whereby a key provision under the 2015 Paris Agreement stating that that accord “does not involve or provide a basis for any liability or compensation,” would applied to the wider COP25 process. Developing nations saw this liability waiver as “unimaginable” and vowed to block it. “The Trump administration is now making a cynical and paranoid play to further distance itself from responsibility for the harmful impacts of climate change and to further protect itself and other polluters from liability for the crisis,” complained Harjeet Singh, global climate lead at ActionAid.

What to do? What bureaucrats always do: set up another committee of “experts” to discover new sources of finance. Moreover, according to Singh, a “Santiago Network on Addressing Loss and Damage” may be established as well.

In 2017, when Trump announced he would withdraw American from the Paris Agreement, he made it quite clear his administration had little use for international shakedown artists, stating that the “well being” of Americans was the motivating factor behind his decision.

At the time, Trump also cited a National Economic Research Associates study noting that the compliance goals pursued by the scumbag/liar-nObama administration would have cost this nation 2.7 million jobs by 2025. By 2040, Trump insisted, the cost to the economy would have been realized in losses of nearly $3 trillion of GDP, 6.5 million industrial jobs, and American household enduring $7,000 losses in annual income. “In many cases,” he added, it would be “much worse than that.”

By contrast, The Washington Post reports that the latest global study, courtesy of researchers from the University of Cambridge, the International Monetary Fund, the University of Southern California and the National Tsing Hua University in Taiwan asserts that if the U.S. doesn’t adhere to the Paris Agreement goals, the nation will endure a 10.5% cut in GDP — by 2100. “The hardest hit countries will be poorer, tropical nations, but in contrast to previous studies, the new paper finds that no country will be spared and none will see a net benefit economically from global warming,” the Post adds.

No country will see a net benefit from global warming, not even countries with colder climates that might see an increase in arable land, e.g.?

Unfortunately for the activists and their supporters, an “inconvenient truth” has emerged: The sun is on the verge of breaking the 2008 record of no solar activity for 268 days, according to a panel of experts from NASA and NOAA. Even when the next solar cycle upswing takes place between 2023 and 2026, the panel predicts the number of sunspots produced will be well below average.

Such slowdowns often cause cooling in Earth’s atmosphere.

Whatever one is to make of climate change, it seems there is never enough alarmism to go around. Moreover the notion that countries with developed modern economies are not only less “virtuous” than those without but should be held accountable while less-developed countries remain beholden to different standards is absurd. The non-binding Paris Agreement made the distinction, insisting developed nations should pursue “economy-wide absolute emission reduction targets,” while developing countries could “move over time towards economy-wide emission reduction or limitation targets in the light of different national circumstances.”

In other words, some pollution is “more equal” than other pollution.

So what’s this really all about? Nine years ago, Ottmar Edenhofer, a member of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, stated the real goal: “We redistribute de facto the world’s wealth by climate policy.”

Last week, columnist Rupert Darwall echoed that reality. “Saving the planet takes money, and lots of it,” he explained, adding that “a vast river of cash flows through the UN climate process.”

No doubt.   ~The Patriot Post

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