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The contrast could not have been starker. One picture showed House Speaker liar-Nancy Pelosi smiling as she signed (with numerous pens) two articles of impeachment against President Trump. She passed out the pens like souvenirs to fellow Democrats. They were embossed in gold with her signature and rested on silver trays.

The other picture was of President Trump signing phase one of a new trade deal with China.

Which picture depicted events of greater long-term benefit to Americans? Unless you are a rank partisan out to remove President Trump from office by whatever means, the obvious answer is the China trade deal.

The latest wrench thrown into the machinery of government comes from Democrats who released to their compliant media friends a “note to self” written on a hotel notepad supposedly by Lev Parnas, a former associate of Rudy Giuliani, the president’s personal attorney and a frequent flyer to Ukraine. The note said, “Get (Ukrainian president) Zalensky to announce that the Biden case will be investigated.”

Democrats claim Parnas was an intermediary in the effort to get Ukraine to investigate loose lips liar-Joe Biden and his son, Hunter.

Parnas’ credibility would be in doubt were he under oath before a court, instead of “testifying” on various cable TV programs. Parnas heads a company that claims to combat fraud. Oh, the irony!

Democrats insist the Senate trial be “fair.” How is it fair when House Democrats continue to leak documents they hope will damage the president and influence senators to vote for his removal from office? Some Democratic senators, who will sit in judgment of the president, have already declared him guilty.

It is politics at its worst and opens the door, as some of the Founders warned, for “normalizing” impeachment.

Historical background is always helpful and so I consulted the National Constitution Center, a private, nonprofit organization and a leading platform for constitutional education and debate, where I found this: The “high crimes and misdemeanors” language (in the Constitution) remains controversial today. In two essays… Neil J. Kinkopf and Keith E. Whittington looked at the Founder’s vision: “The Framers meant for the phrase ‘high crimes and misdemeanors’ to signify only conduct that seriously harms the public and seriously compromises the officer’s ability to continue. If the phrase is given a less rigorous interpretation, it could allow Congress to influence and control the President and the courts…”

The article continues: “When the Founders wanted to ensure accountability, they mostly relied on elections and the voters to hold government officials responsible for their actions,” said Whittington. “But what might fall into the category of ‘other high Crimes and Misdemeanors’ was still quite unclear.”

Trump’s call to Ukraine’s president, which is at the heart of the impeachment articles, does not meet the standard of seriously harming the public or compromising the president’s ability to do his job as shown by the China trade deal and the USMCA trade agreement between the U.S., Mexico and Canada, both signed and passed days after impeachment.

That the Government Accountability Office says the president “broke the law” by withholding $250 million in military aid to Ukraine, aid Congress had approved, doesn’t help the president’s defenders, but does it rise to the level of a “high crime and misdemeanor”? Senators will decide. But they should recall that in 2014 the GAO ruled President scumbag/liar-nObama’s prisoner deal to exchange Guantanamo Bay detainees for deserter Bowe Bergdahl violated federal law. scumbag/liar-nObama was not impeached.

Speaker liar-Pelosi summed up the true motives of Democrats when she said that regardless of what the Senate does, impeachment will be a “permanent stain” on President Trump’s legacy.

In fact, the stain will be on Democrats. It is Democrats who have plotted ways to reverse the will of voters who elected Trump. It is Democrats who fear he will be overwhelmingly re-elected in November.  

~The Patriot Post

https://patriotpost.us/opinion/67999?mailing_id=4813&utm_medium=email&utm_source=pp.email.4813&utm_campaign=snapshot&utm_content=body  

It’s clear that McConnell wants to avoid a drawn-out process, which is exactly what Democrats are aiming for. McConnell allotted 24 hours over two days for partisans on each side to present their case, starting with House Democrats. Then, following the Trump team’s rebuttal, senators will have up to 16 hours to submit questions in writing to both sides. Only after that process is complete will the Senate consider “the question of whether it shall be in order to consider and debate under the impeachment rules any motion to subpoena witnesses or documents.”

Furthermore, if the Senate votes to call witnesses, “no testimony shall be admissible in the Senate unless the parties have had an opportunity to depose such witnesses.” And any deposing of witnesses will be done behind closed doors.

Also on Monday, Trump’s legal team released its  blistering 110-page brief against the Democrats’ articles of impeachment, calling them “an affront to the Constitution and our democratic institutions.” Team Trump adds that the “two flimsy Articles of Impeachment,” which “allege no crime or violation of law whatsoever — much less ‘high Crimes and Misdemeanors, as required by the Constitution,” will “permanently weaken the Presidency and forever alter the balance of power among the branches of government in a manner that offends the constitutional design established by the Founders.”

Trump’s acquittal is almost a foregone conclusion given that it would take the votes of 67 senators to convict, though the Democrats’ real ploy is not conviction but political damage. To that end, their aim is to paint Republicans as unfair if they vote against calling witnesses — witnesses House Democrats didn’t bother to call. Minority Leader Chuck scumbag-Schumer and company do hold the advantage of needing only a simple majority vote to get their witnesses, whom vulnerable Republicans will feel compelled to vote in favor of calling. By getting witnesses called, scumbag-Schumer hopes to drag out the trial for as long as possible with the hope of damaging Republicans and aiding the Democrats’ bid to gain control of the Senate in the 2020 election. As we grow tired of noting, the Democrats’ whole despicable exercise is purely partisan political theater.   ~The Patriot Post

https://patriotpost.us/articles/68035?mailing_id=4813&utm_medium=email&utm_source=pp.email.4813&utm_campaign=snapshot&utm_content=body  

The race is on: Which will happen first — the end of the world due to manmade climate change or the destruction of capitalism?

While Democrats are on message for their base, their steadfast hatred of the Liberty that created the greatest economy in the world should put every American on high alert. It’s America’s economic engine that provides opportunities for individuals to be self-reliant, own private property, work, and use those private earnings for their growth, their family, and their futures. Yet the entire Democrat Party is running on policies that erode the very foundation of Liberty.

Among the leading Democrat candidates, Sanders finds his appeal among the 18- to 44-year-olds. But what if the contrasting message hailing the virtues and values of capitalism and consumerism was carried by Millennials from a nation destroyed by socialism, rather than by hated Republicans?

Meet Jorge Galicia, who traveled to the U.S. in October 2018, and Andrés Guilarte, who arrived in January 2019. Both 20-somethings are asylum seekers born and raised in Venezuela, and they now speak to American college students about their firsthand experience with socialism’s destructive power. The college-educated gents are convinced that today’s indoctrinated intellectuals either simply don’t know what’s happening in Venezuela or need to be confronted with what they will lose.

Addressing their peers on college campuses in the Fund for American Studies program, Guilarte stressed, “We are eyewitnesses of the falling of the country. … We used to have rights like you have here. You can go to the supermarket, buy everything. You can have money for the month. … We used to be just like everybody else.”

Galicia chimes in, “Who in the world wouldn’t want to have free healthcare, free college tuition, free whatever? The thing is those kinds of offers are not sustainable in the longterm.” Then came the warning: “I know it is tempting, but do not fall into that trap. You need to learn from other people’s experience. Keep your Liberty protected, because what you have — it’s a beautiful country.” By contrast, with socialism in Venezuela “you started to see the scarcity of medicine, food supplies,” and other staples.

What Galicia cited as unsustainable offers that come at the expense of Liberty are all the enticing bait of the 2020 Democrat Party. They will, according to the survivor of socialism, yield “a horrible future for America.”

The pair’s warning about socialism in Venezuela reminds us about the Soviet Union. Democrats fear “Russian influence” but embrace the failed economic policies that Nobel laureate Aleksandr Solzhenitsyn warned of after surviving as a political prisoner in the Soviet Gulag for eight years. Seeing the blood of millions slaughtered by totalitarianism, Solzhenitsyn wrote of “an atmosphere of moral mediocrity, paralyzing man’s noblest impulses,” and a “tilt of freedom in the direction of evil … evidently born primarily out of a humanistic and benevolent concept according to which there is no evil inherent in human nature.”

Americans can listen and learn from Galicia and Guilarte — and the late Solzhenitsyn before them — or we’ll learn firsthand that socialism destroys the Liberty that makes us unique and great.   ~The Patriot Post

https://patriotpost.us/articles/68022?mailing_id=4813&utm_medium=email&utm_source=pp.email.4813&utm_campaign=snapshot&utm_content=body  

Impeachment is moving forward and going nowhere. There is new information but it doesn’t really tell those who’ve paid attention anything they didn’t know. Putative administration operative Lev Parnas said on “The Rachel Maddow Show” Wednesday that the president knew everything about efforts to lean on Ukraine. But this was clear in testimony throughout the impeachment hearings. His own ambassador to the European Union said it! The ambassador to Ukraine knew she was being schemed against, lost her job because of it, and spelled it out under oath.

It’s icing on a cake that’s already sagging. The president will be acquitted for a host of reasons, from partisanship to a prudential judgment that his actions don’t warrant removal with a presidential election 10 months away.

What did Speaker liar-Nancy Pelosi gain by playing her monthlong game of peekaboo, waiting to send the charges to the Senate? She withheld from Majority Leader Mitch McConnell papers he didn’t wish to receive and she saw that as leverage? It appears she was playing for time as investigators tried to develop more evidence. But again, for what? The president couldn’t look more guilty.

Meantime impeachment as a dramatic and distinct event lost all momentum. In the month after the House vote the story lost lift, then got lost in the Iran drama. This second stage feels not like the continuation of the first but a brand new second impeachment, which a lot of people will experience as overkill.

On the creepiness of the signing ceremony for the impeachment articles: Modern presidents have always held such ceremonies and signed big, happy legislation with many pens. Lyndon B. Johnson liked clutching bunches of them in his thick, meaty fist and handing them out personally. But the impeachment of a president is a grave and unhappy event. It’s not celebratory. Enacting triumphalism was shallow and looked like a tell. Why pens, why not a scalp?

Serious people understand the implications of things. Impeachment has now been normalized. It won’t be a once-in-a-generation act but an every-administration act. Democrats will regret it when Republicans are handing out the pens.

To the Democratic debate Tuesday night in Des Moines.

It contained my favorite panel-candidate moment of this cycle.

Bright young woman journalist: “Sen. Sanders, I do want to be clear here, you’re saying that you never told Sen. dinky/liar-Warren that a woman could not win the election?”

Sanders: “That is correct.”

BYWJ: “Sen. dinky/liar-Warren, what did you think when Sen. Sanders told you a woman could not win the election?”

dinky/liar-Warren: “I disagreed.”

It was like Judge Judy on drugs:

“commie-Ernie, did you hit Peggy on the head?”

“No, of course not.”

“Peggy, how did you feel when commie-Ernie hit you on the head?”

The moment went uncorrected. This is why people hate the press.

I found myself watching Elizabeth dinky/liar-Warren. She has proved she can take a punch and throw one (“Look at the men on this stage. Collectively, they have lost 10 elections.”) Of the candidates in their 70s she’s the highest-energy and most indefatigable. Actually she’d have high energy for a 50-year-old. All candidates now have to be actors but she’s a good one, telling her stories over and over, her voice growing husky at the moving parts.

Her challenge is not that she’s a woman, it is her policies, and maybe something else. I watched the debate with a man who’s sophisticated observer with no dog in the fight. Ms. Warren was doing her magical thinking about how universal Medicare won’t cost people a thing, it’s all savings with a few small tax increases on people we don’t like. I asked aloud, “Does she believe what she says or does she know it’s make-believe?”

He considered: “She did.” he said. That sounds right, that she started with belief but at this point sees the holes in what she’s saying. She’s caught, because she’s said it too often and now can only repeat it.

commie-Bernie Sanders has the same magical thinking about the cost of things, who’ll pay, and what effect that will have on the nation’s life. But he gets away with it because he’s a declared socialist. His supporters don’t want realism and his foes don’t expect it. Ms. dinky/liar-Warren says she’s a capitalist with a critique, so she faces a different burden.

There was also in the debate a kind of detachment from real life. A voter asked: “How will you prioritize accessing quality affordable child care?” The candidates were indignant that women can be held from the workforce by the high cost of child care. Pete Buttigieg vowed to get “federal dollars” involved, and spoke of stunted careers. Ms. Warren said, “My plan is universal child care for everyone.” She told of how she was almost forced “off track” by child care problems. Mr. commie-Sanders said, “Every psychologist in the world knows 0 through 4 are the most important years of human life, intellectually and emotionally.”

No one spoke with compassion for parents, for mothers who forgo the earnings and status (“I have a job”) and relationships (“I’m not lonely all day”) of having a job to stay home with kids under 4. No one said that actually a lot of parents think the most important thing is to stay home and raise the kids, that many struggle to do it, and we might want to help them. No one noted we don’t give any particular honor to those who stay home, even though our culture depends on them.

What seemed to guide all the answers was a technocratic assumption that it’s best for little children to be raised by well-compensated strangers as mom is absorbed into the workforce, where she’ll finally achieve full self-actualization.

It was all so … cold. And detached from real life as many live it.

Meanwhile in full-employment America, Donald Trump is taking out terrorists with drones and announcing trade deals with China and seemingly weathering every storm. In the China ceremony Tuesday, in the East Room, after a booming “Hail to the Chief,” with a palpable sense of triumph filling the room, with the golden frames of the great portraits shining, Mr. Trump rolled off the names of the CEOs in the audience. There were a lot! It was in a way a fabulous celebration of the riches produced by capitalism. But it also seemed an almost sinister declaration of the intimate ties between great U.S. corporations and the federal government. The CEO of Boeing is here, the chief of eBay. “How’s General Electric doing, Nels?” “Ryan Lance, ConocoPhillips, you’re doing fantastically well!” “I made a lot of bankers look very good, but you’re doing a great job.” “Ken Griffin, Citadel, what a guy he is.”

It was reminiscent of the scene in “The Godfather: Part II” where Fulgencio Batista hands around the solid gold telephone. “I’d like to thank this distinguished group of American industrialists for continuing to work with Cuba for the greatest period of prosperity in her entire history. Mr. William Shaw, representing the General Fruit Company … Messrs. Corngold and Dant of the United Telephone and Telegraph Company … and of course our friend Mr. Robert Allen of South American Sugar.”

We all think our breathless recitations of the latest revelations matter but I don’t know, it keeps feeling like 2016. Only this time with full employment.   ~The Patriot Post

https://patriotpost.us/opinion/67983?mailing_id=4811&utm_medium=email&utm_source=pp.email.4811&utm_campaign=snapshot&utm_content=body 

I have often noted that media bias is about more than just how stories get spun. Media bias is also evident in what stories simply don’t get told — call them the sins of journalistic omission. And the left-wing media did it again Thursday night. 

All the networks wanted to talk about was impeachment, and that’s understandable given their obvious Trump hatred. But most journalists understand that this farce is not going anywhere. 

But something did happen on Capitol Hill that is going somewhere. As we told you, the USMCA trade deal to replace NAFTA passed the Senate by an overwhelming margin of 89 to 10.

Remember when Donald Trump campaigned against NAFTA? Predictably, the political establishment opposed him. The media mocked him. They said he would destroy our relationships with Mexico and Canada. 

WRONG! WRONG! WRONG!

Allow me to just reiterate that what everyone once said could not be done — the USMCA — passed the House last month by a vote of 385 to 41 and passed the Senate Thursday by a vote of 89 to 10. Donald Trump did it, and this new deal will have lasting benefits for the American people.

And the big three networks gave it absolutely zero coverage Thursday. Nothing. Nada. Zip. Zilch. 

For a fleeting moment, Politico appreciated the historic nature of the accomplishment and posted a story with this headline:  "Senate Passes USMCA In Major Win For Trump.“ 

After sufficiently flogging Politico's digital editor for his blasphemy — speaking well of Donald Trump — the title was quickly changed to this: "Senate Passes USMCA, But Much Work Remains." 

By the way, kudos to Sen. Martha McSally (R-AZ)! The former Air Force fighter pilot certainly knows how to handle the liberal media. 

As she was walking into the Senate chamber Thursday for the start of the impeachment trial, a CNN reporter shouted a gotcha question at her. McSally responded, "You’re a liberal hack. I’m not talking to you.”

Perhaps McSally can give her fellow Senate Republicans a few tips on public relations!

Impeachment Collusion

Collusion has been a big buzzword throughout the impeachment drama, and we got a prime example of collusion on Thursday.

As I am sure you have heard by now, the “non-partisan” Government Accounting Office (GAO) released a statement claiming that the president violated the law when he withheld funds from Ukraine. Speaker liar-Nancy Pelosi and her media allies quickly pounced.

First of all, Trump didn’t withhold the money. He delayed it to ensure it wasn’t going to be wasted by corruption, which is the president’s responsibility. But the release of that GAO statement on the opening day of the Senate impeachment trial was no coincidence. It was more anti-Trump collusion by the Swamp.

But since we’re talking about GAO reports as evidence of impeachable crimes, the Government Accounting Office determined that Barack scumbag/liar-nObama broke the law seven times. By the left’s logic, scumbag/liar-nObama should have been impeached seven times! Where was Pelosi’s outrage then? 

Pence’s Profile in Courage

If you’ve ever read John F. Kennedy’s book, Profile In Courage, you may recall that one of the chapters is about Sen. Edmund Ross, a Republican senator from Kansas. Ross bucked his party and prevented the partisan impeachment of President Andrew Johnson in 1868. (Northern Republicans at the time bitterly resented Johnson, a Democrat from Tennessee.)

Vice President Mike Pence, an astute observer of American history, has a great opinion piece in The Wall Street Journal about the courage of Sen. Ross. You can read it here. 

Pence raises Ross’s example to ask if any Senate Democrats will have the courage to stand up against this sham partisan impeachment, intended solely to reverse the last election. 

Great job, Mr. Vice President!

Speaking of the impeachment trial, the members of the president’s impeachment defense team were announced yesterday. They are:

• • Pat Cipollone, who currently serves as White House counsel

  • Jay Sekulow, Donald Trump’s personal lawyer

  • Ken Starr, the former Whitewater/scumbag/liar-Clinton independent counsel

  • Alan Dershowitz, a Harvard law professor and renowned defense attorney

  • Pam Bondi, the former attorney general of Florida

  • Robert Ray, who also led the Whitewater/scumbag/liar-Clinton investigations

  • Jane Raskin, a former federal prosecutor who represented the president during the Mueller investigation   

Following the votes of the so-called “faithless electors,” both states responded — Colorado voided the elector’s vote and Washington fined the electors. The electors responded by suing their respective states; the Colorado elector won, but the Washington state supreme court ruled against the electors and upheld the fine.

The question that SCOTUS will answer is whether state requirements mandating that electors cast their vote with a state’s popular vote is constitutional. The ramifications of the Court’s ruling could derail the Left’s effort to  circumvent the Electoral College via the National Popular Vote Interstate Compact (NPVIC), the effort by several blue states to throw their electoral votes to the winner of the national popular vote regardless of the state’s popular vote. Ironically, 13 of the 16 states that have thus far joined the NPVIC movement have laws requiring EC electors to vote for their respective state’s popular-vote winner.

SCOTUS will likely hear the cases in April with a ruling expected in June, so this should be decided well before the 2020 election.  

~The Patriot Post

https://patriotpost.us/articles/68016?mailing_id=4811&utm_medium=email&utm_source=pp.email.4811&utm_campaign=snapshot&utm_content=body  

Medvedev, Putin’s long-time lackey, resigned so as to give Putin near-unilateral authority to change the constitution, and Putin’s changes effectively swing power away from the presidency to the parliament and more specifically the prime minister. Seeking to paint the move with the veneer of democracy, Putin called for a nationwide vote on his changes.

This move is reminiscent of Putin’s manipulations from 2008 to 2012, when he relinquished the presidency in order to observe the constitution’s term limits, yet became the prime minister with Medvedev serving as his puppet president. Washington Examiner’s Tom Rogan observes, “It’s pretty clear that Putin is creating new political structures to restrain the power of future presidents. An important factor to consider is that while these amendments seem declarative, Putin will play an outsize role in their interpretation and action. Again, this is about ensuring that no future leader can wrest control from Putin in a way that would jeopardize his interests.” And, Rogan adds, “The key takeaway here is that whether in the shadows or otherwise, Putin is going to be the Russian czar for a long time to come.”

Finally, Mark Alexander notes, “There is an arguable parallel between Putin’s efforts to erode the Russian constitution’s voter protections and Democrat efforts to erode our Constitution’s voter protections by eliminating the Electoral College.”   ~The Patriot Post

https://patriotpost.us/articles/67952?mailing_id=4807&utm_medium=email&utm_source=pp.email.4807&utm_campaign=snapshot&utm_content=body  

https://patriotpost.us/articles/67954?mailing_id=4807&utm_medium=email&utm_source=pp.email.4807&utm_campaign=snapshot&utm_content=body  

To mark the occasion, President Donald Trump hosted in the Oval Office students, teachers, and others whose expressions of faith have been silenced in public schools, as well as those who’ve fought in the court system to protect those rights. He declared that he’s fighting back against the “growing totalitarian impulse on the far left that seeks to punish, restrict, and even prohibit religious expression.” Indeed, he ordered nine federal agencies to roll back regulations that restrict religious liberty — most of them issued during the tenure of the most faith-intolerant regime in the history of our Republic.

Schools won’t be forced to sponsor religious activities. The guidance states, “For example, teachers and other public school officials, acting in their official capacities, may not lead their classes in prayer, devotional readings from the Bible, or other religious activities.” Yet, the order also states, “Students and teachers do not shed their constitutional rights to freedom of speech or expression at the schoolhouse gate.”

Moreover, each year, states must provide a list of districts or local schools that have “a policy that prevents, or otherwise denies participation in, constitutionally protected prayer.” And Fox News notes, “States are also required to report local schools that do not certify to the state that they don’t have unconstitutional prayer policies.”

While anti-religious zealots complained that Trump’s budding theocracy “undermines” civil rights and will have “dire consequences” for homosexuals and religious minorities, the truth is that he’s doing what he was elected to do — protect the religious liberty enshrined in the First Amendment.

Family Research Council President Tony Perkins praised the administration’s new rules, saying, “For years, we’ve watched secularists pressure school administrators into telling students that they can’t pray, read their Bibles, or talk about their faith in class. Now, the tables are turned. For once, the onus isn’t on kids or districts to defend their freedoms — it’s on states to certify that they’re compliant and respectful of these basic rights. Thanks to President Trump, the government is finally standing up to schoolyard bullies who make a living trying to intimidate and silence students.”   ~The Patriot Post

https://patriotpost.us/articles/67979?mailing_id=4807&utm_medium=email&utm_source=pp.email.4807&utm_campaign=snapshot&utm_content=body  

The latest protests in Iran by people angry over the Iranian military’s missile launch that “unintentionally” downed a Ukrainian jetliner killing many Iranians, Canadians and others, is different from past protests over rigged elections, rising gas prices, and what Americans like to call “voter suppression.”

This time, the protests are over a much wider area of the country. This time, there were no “death to America” or “death to Israel” chants. Video showed demonstrators refusing to walk on U.S. and Israeli flags. This time, anger was directed at the theocratic regime’s handling of the missile strike. This time, a president of the United States tweeted his support for the protesters in English and in Farsi and warned “the world is watching.” That’s something President scumbag/liar-nObama failed to do when demonstrations over a rigged election broke out in the summer of 2009 and the regime began killing and imprisoning protesters. scumbag/liar-nObama, opting at first for a wait-and-see approach, once violence reached its zenith, was finally forced to declare, “The United States and the international community have been appalled and outraged by the threats, beatings and imprisonments of the last few days,” and strongly condemned “these unjust actions.” Of course, his statement was too late to have much, if any, effect on the regime’s actions.

Democrats were nearly silent about the latest protests. Democrats once boldly voiced opposition to totalitarian regimes. When Democrats do comment it is often without substance or meaning.

Interviewed on ABC’s “This Week” last Sunday, House Speaker liar-Nancy Pelosi appeared to minimize the significance of the demonstrations. Host George Stephanopoulos asked her if she supported the demonstrations and whether it would be good for the regime to collapse. She replied: “The protesters are protesting — as I understand it, this brand of protesters — about the fact that that plane went down. And many students were on that plane and these are largely students in the street.”

Come again?

The lunatic left, which increasingly dominates the Democratic Party, predictably took Iran’s side against their own country. Actress Rose McGowan tweeted: “Dear #Iran. The USA has disrespected your country, your flag, your people. 52 percent of us humbly apologize. We want peace with your nation. We are being held hostage by a terrorist regime. We do not know how to escape. Please do not kill us. #Soleimani.”

A.J. Caschetta responded to McGowan and many others on the far left in National Review magazine: “While it may be tempting to dismiss McGowan’s attempts at wit, her line of reasoning, however faulty, is echoed by nearly all the Democrats on the campaign trail and by virtually every Middle East specialist in the media and in academia. Her apologetic plea for peace and her moral equivalency between Trump’s "terrorist regime” and “#Soleimani” differ from tweets of her erudite allies only in the number of polysyllabic words and historical references. Otherwise they are quite similar, in some cases practically identical.“

Why aren’t the Democratic presidential candidates asked if they share such views? Perhaps it is because those asking the questions don’t want to do anything that would harm the chances of one of the Democrat presidential candidates beating President Trump in the November election. Does that sound too harsh? Consider that 92 percent of media coverage of the president has been negative, according to a study by the Media Research Center, a politically conservative content analysis group based in Reston, Virginia.

Could the protests in Iran follow the pattern of other freedom movements, like Solidarity in Poland, or demonstrations that led to the fall of the Berlin Wall and the collapse of the Soviet Union? Or, could they end in a stalemate with increasingly brutal repression, as in Venezuela?

It’s too early to say, but the least that should be expected is that people who enjoy the blessings of liberty, including the right to say very foolish things, support the efforts of others who want to free themselves from totalitarian oppression. If they won’t, perhaps they should pick what they think is a better country and live there.   

~The Patriot Post

https://patriotpost.us/opinion/67934?mailing_id=4805&utm_medium=email&utm_source=pp.email.4805&utm_campaign=snapshot&utm_content=body 

Yesterday, the United States and China signed a new trade deal, resulting in a pause in the trade war. In spite of predictable negative press coverage, this is a huge win for the Trump administration and the country. 

According to various reports, China has agreed to buy an additional $200 billion of U.S. products — from agricultural goods to energy products — all of which will be good for American farmers, businesses, and manufacturers. In addition, China also agreed to end intellectual property theft and currency manipulation. 

It is understandable that many people might be skeptical of China’s promises. That’s why the deal is only “phase one” of ongoing negotiations and is fully enforceable based on China’s compliance. 

What did we give up in exchange for China’s new commitments? Very little. 

According to The Wall Street Journal, President Trump agreed to reduce “the existing 15% tariff rate on roughly $120 billion of Chinese goods… But tariffs will remain on roughly $360 billion of annual Chinese imports to the U.S." 

In addition, other areas of conflict with China, from national security threats to human rights and religious liberty issues, will continue.

Ending America’s Decline

Former White House adviser Steve Bannon put it well when he told CNBC yesterday that President Trump’s aggressive trade strategy has stopped "the managed decline of the United States." 

For many years, under administrations of both parties, but especially on the left, there has been a growing sense of America being in inevitable decline. Sadly, a lot of people (again, mostly on the left) are okay with that because they think America is evil and the source of problems around the world. 

But it translated into real problems for many Americans as their jobs were sacrificed on the altar of free trade and globalism. 

When Donald Trump said he wanted to rebuild America’s manufacturing base, Barack scumbag/liar-nObama  mocked him and said those jobs aren’t coming back. Well, scumbag/liar-nObama was wrong. 

Remember those on the right who laughed at Trump’s notion of a border wall? They said, "You can’t shut the border! And why would you want to?" 

Remember all the experts who predicted the death of the nation-state, suggesting that the ancient passions of patriotism were causing nothing but problems, while singing the praises of globalism?

This is why Trump’s mantra of "Make America Great Again” so outraged the political establishments of both parties. And it is a good catchall phrase for his efforts to end “the managed decline of the United States.”

I remember serving in the White House when President Ronald Reagan was constantly being told that America had to accommodate the Soviet Union. Thank God Reagan rejected that terrible advice. He had tremendous confidence in the American people, and he had a simple motto: “We win, they lose.” Today the Soviet Union is gone.

For years we’ve been told that China is the rising power in the world today, that we can’t outcompete China and should just accept its theft of our technology and its expansionist designs in the Pacific. This president rejects that. He also has a simple motto: “Make America Great Again.”

China is signing this deal because it needs food and energy. And guess where it is going to get it? And Trump rightly is keeping most tariffs in place to ensure that China complies with the deal.

Hopefully, Beijing understands that “business as usual” is over in Washington, that this administration won’t turn a blind eye to abusive trade practices. If it does, the “phase two” talks should go well.

A Striking Contrast

The president had a major rally in Wisconsin Tuesday night as the Democrats had a major debate in Iowa. The simultaneous events should have been aired on a split screen because you couldn’t come up with a more striking contrast between competing visions for America. It’s hard to believe they were talking about the same country!

In Iowa, the Democrat candidates were bemoaning that we have no allies, suggesting that we are isolated against Iran. 

In Wisconsin, the president celebrated our successful strike against Iran’s terror general and praised the courageous people of Iraq and Iran who are taking to the streets to protest the mullahs.

In Iowa, the Democrat candidates were downplaying the economy. But come Wednesday, November 4th, just about the only unemployed Americans will be failed Democrat presidential candidates! (Granted, that’s a lot of people.)

While the president was talking about the future of the country, loose lips liar-Joe Biden and his fellow Democrats were arguing about the Iraq War and what transpired during a private conversation between commie-Sanders and dinky/liar-Warren. 

It was literally a “he said / she said” moment. But in the #MeToo era, we’re always supposed to believe the woman, and clearly the CNN moderator did!

I could go on, but you get the point. Even many liberals noticed too.

Progressive CNN commentator Van Jones described Tuesday night’s Democrat debate as “cold oatmeal,” saying, “There was nothing I saw tonight that would be able to take Donald Trump out.”

One media outlet dedicated to covering Hollywood and the entertainment industry blasted the debate as the "Dull Night Of The Living Dead.“ Ouch!

Even MSNBC's left-wing "Morning Joe” hosts panned the debate as “painful,” adding, “Nobody looked good on the debate stage.”

liar-Pelosi’s Prosecutors

Speaker liar-Nancy Pelosi yesterday announced the members of her caucus who will serve as “managers,” or prosecutors, during the Senate impeachment trial. The lead manager is Rep. scumbag/liar-Adam Schiff (D-CA), chairman of the House Intelligence Committee. The other managers are:

• Rep. scumbag liar-Jerry Nadler (D-NY), chairman of the House Judiciary Committee

• Rep. Zoe Lofgren (D-CA), chairman of the House Administration Committee

• Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), chairman of the House Democratic Caucus

• Rep. Val Demings (D-FL), a member of the House Judiciary and Intelligence Committees

• Rep. Jason Crow (D-CO), a member of the House Armed Services Committee

• Rep. Sylvia Garcia (D-TX), a member of the House Judiciary Committee

Some preliminary measures are expected to take place today with the swearing in of Chief Justice John Roberts. The actual impeachment trial will most likely begin Tuesday, when all 100 senators will be required to sit at their desks without their iPhones or other electronic devices.

The process has been a sham from the beginning, but it has not stopped the president from moving aggressively to fulfill the promises he made in 2016.   

~The Patriot Post

https://patriotpost.us/opinion/67929?mailing_id=4805&utm_medium=email&utm_source=pp.email.4805&utm_campaign=snapshot&utm_content=body

As Angelo Codevilla, former staff member of the Senate Select Committee on Intelligence, put it, “Possibly the saddest fact about the intelligence deep state’s conspiracy against Trump is that at least some of the federal judges who sit on the FISA court apparently have been and continue to be part of it.”

Even as arguably the biggest scandal in the history of the nation was unfolding, the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court (FISC), created by the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act of 1978 (FISA), managed to remain immune from accusations of impropriety. Ostensibly, all the contemptible machinations — “mistakes,” according to Inspector General Michael Horowitz — that enabled the spying on Trump’s presidential campaign were committed solely by the FBI, the Justice Department, and the CIA.

Such assumptions are belied by reality. We begin with former FISC presiding Judge Rosemary Collyer sending a letter to the FBI in December 2019 criticizing it for misleading the court over its surveillance-application process and giving the agency until January 10 to come up with reforms.

Yet where has Collyer been? House Intelligence Committee Ranking Member Devin Nunes (R-CA)  wrote a memo on February 2, 2018, explaining that “the Committee found that the FBI and DOJ failed to disclose the specific political actors paying for uncorroborated information” that went to the FISC, “misled the FISC regarding dissemination of this information,” and “failed to correct these errors in the subsequent renewals.”

Moreover, Nunes also wrote a letter to Collyer herself  illuminating the same details.

Collyer’s response? As Wall Street Journal columnist Kim Strassel puts it, Collyer “responded a week later, with a dismissive letter that makes no reference to the Intelligence Committee findings.” Incredibly, Collyer also asserted that the court does not maintain a “systematic record” of proceedings and that Nunes would be better off asking the DOJ to look into the matter, due to “separation of power” considerations.

As Fox News legal analyst Gregg Jarrett rightly notes, if the FISC was behaving legitimately, when it learned it was being lied to — a year and a half ago — “Collyer should have immediately ordered a ‘show cause contempt’ hearing demanding that Comey, Sally Yates, Andrew McCabe, Dana Boente and Rod Rosenstein all appear before the court to explain why they should not be held in criminal contempt for deceiving judges in the four warrant applications they signed.”

Jarrett’s conclusion for the failure to do so? “It means that the FISA court doesn’t really care that it was lied to by the FBI,” he adds.

All of the above history was necessary to give context to the latest machinations, which involve the man appointed to oversee the reforms demanded by Collyer, who has since retired. FISC’s new presiding Judge James Boasberg has appointed former scumbag/liar-nObama-era Justice Department official David Kris to do the job.

To say that Kris brings a bit of “baggage” with him to the job is an understatement. “Kris appeared in locations that pushed the false Russia collusion narrative, such as Rachel Maddow’s MSNBC show, the Lawfare blog, and Twitter, to defend the FBI and attack President Trump and other critics of the harmful surveillance campaign,”  explains columnist Mollie Hemingway. “He once wrote that Trump ‘should be worried’ that Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation into treasonous collusion with Russia meant ‘the walls are closing in.’”

As Fox News reveals, Kris has “also written extensively in support of the FBI’s surveillance practices.” In a published piece at Lawfare, a leftist blog site run by scumbag-James Comey’s friend Benjamin Wittes, Kris asserted  that the now-vindicated Nunes memo “tried to deceive the American people in precisely the same way that it falsely accused the FBI of deceiving the FISA Court.” He further asserted that the agency had “probable cause” to conclude former Trump aide Carter Page “was a Russian agent.”

Per the IG report, Americans now know that evidence pertaining to Carter was deliberately doctored.

In a piece for The Washington Post, Kris also defended the Steele dossier. He conceded that while some parts “apparently remain both salacious and unverified,” he argued that “other parts may well have been verified by independent investigation” and thus “would strengthen the credibility of the remainder.”

The truth? The IG report revealed the FBI withheld evidence undercutting that very idea. It also noted the agency failed to disclose damaging information about Steele’s credibility and reliability, despite the fact that one of Steele’s main dossier sources told FBI agents in January 2017 that Steele had misrepresented and exaggerated the dossier’s contents.

Kris’s take on the IG report itself? “First, the report repudiates the claims of a coup and related deep-state conspiracies in the FBI as advanced by President Trump and his supporters,” he tweeted on December 9, 2019.

His take on the FISC is equally biased. In September 2018, he asserted that that “FISA applications are subjected to exacting … and serious scrutiny” and “the FISA Court is not a rubber stamp.”

Really? In 33 years of of surveillance requests the FISC has rejected 0.03% of them, as in only 12 of 38,169 requests for surveillance warrants between 1979 and 2015.

Moreover, there have been no rejections since 2009.

And for those who only see the potential for abuse through a partisan lens, Codevilla reminds us that if the FISC had existed in 1972, “Nixon’s ‘plumbers’ would easily have gotten a warrant to get everything they wanted out of the DNC secretly. Their application need only have cited the McGovern campaign’s plentiful links to North Vietnam and the Communist world.”

Nunes has Kris’s appointment exactly right. “The FBI lied to the FISC, and to help make sure that doesn’t happen again, the FISC chose an FBI apologist who denied and defended those lies,” he asserted. “The FISC is setting its own credibility on fire.”

Or, maybe they’ve had help. One might ask where Chief Justice John Roberts has been. He has named every member of the current court and the separate three-judge panel called the Court of Review that hears appeals of FISC orders. His silence is hardly reassuring — at best.

At worst? America is heading toward a new “post-constitutional” normal where “justice” is whatever secret courts, unelected bureaucrats, documented apologists, and conspiracy theorists say it is — all championed by useful-idiot “resisters” naive enough to believe they are insulated by their ideological bona fides.

Until they aren’t.   ~The Patriot Post

https://patriotpost.us/articles/67942?mailing_id=4805&utm_medium=email&utm_source=pp.email.4805&utm_campaign=snapshot&utm_content=body  

By almost all measures, Trump has had a great start to 2020. He strongly faced down Iran’s provocative behavior, hitting the mullahs right where it hurt by taking out their top terrorist Gen. Qasem Soleimani following their orchestrated attack on the U.S. embassy in Baghdad. His decisive action sent a clear message to Iran and the world: Don’t to mess with the U.S.

On the illegal-immigration front, Trump has clearly made significant headway with the recent announcement of 100 new miles of a border wall, as well as a 70% decline in the number of individuals attempting to illegally cross the U.S. southern border. There is still much work to be done, but things are clearly going in the right direction.

The economy continues to hum along nicely, and there’s no sign of recession anywhere in sight, dashing one of the Democrats’ best hopes.

And now regarding the trade war with China, Trump’s aggressive efforts via raising tariffs appears to be paying off. While yesterday’s signing of Phase One is only an incremental step, it is still a significant step forward in Trump’s efforts to force China into ending its unfair trade practices. Here are a few of the reforms included in the deal as listed by the White House:

• Importantly, the reforms included in the agreement are fully enforceable and include a strong dispute resolution system to ensure effective implementation and enforcement.

• For the first time in any trade agreement, China agreed to end its practice of forcing companies to transfer their technology to Chinese companies in order to gain market access.

• China will address numerous longstanding intellectual property concerns in the areas of trade secrets, trademarks, enforcement against pirated and counterfeit goods, and more.

• The agreement includes significant commitments by China on accepting United States agricultural biotechnology products.

On top of this trade win, the Senate is poised to pass Trump’s reworked and updated NAFTA trade deal, now called USMCA. This would be Trump’s biggest win on trade to date, further fueling the booming U.S. economy.

Meanwhile, liar-Pelosi is content to play games with impeachment, making a mockery of the Constitution while passing out the pens she did it with, and Democrat presidential candidates are in a dust-up over who was the one lying on the debate stage Tuesday evening. What a contrast for the 2020 election.   ~The Patriot Post

https://patriotpost.us/articles/67944?mailing_id=4805&utm_medium=email&utm_source=pp.email.4805&utm_campaign=snapshot&utm_content=body  

Yesterday was Religious Freedom Day. It commemorates the day in 1786 when the Virginia General Assembly adopted the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom, written by Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson’s statute became the foundation for the First Amendment to the Constitution, which guarantees religious freedom, among other key liberties.

In recognition of the day, President Trump issued a proclamation acknowledging the vital importance of our “first freedom.” He also held an Oval Office meeting with students, teachers, and coaches who have experienced harassment because of their faith, and he blasted the “growing totalitarian impulse on the far left that seeks to punish, restrict and even prohibit religious expression.”

There’s more. Nine federal departments yesterday issued rules rolling back regulations that restrict religious liberty. For example, the Department of Health and Human Services, a vast bureaucracy responsible for a myriad of federal grant programs, issued new rules eliminating barriers and discriminatory burdens against faith-based organizations. 

The administration is also reminding states that, according to recent Supreme Court precedent, they cannot discriminate against religious institutions when awarding grants solely because the group applying is a church or faith-based school.

Perhaps most significantly, the Department of Education announced that it is taking a series of actions to protect the First Amendment rights of students, student organizations, and religious schools. 

In other words, pro-life and faith-based student groups must be afforded the same rights and access to facilities as secular student groups. And public universities that cannot guarantee the free speech of conservative students will risk losing federal funding. 

The Department of Education is also updating its guidance on constitutionally protected prayer and will notify states that students do not surrender their First Amendment rights at the schoolhouse door.

In other words, students can’t be told that they are not allowed to quietly read Bibles in class or pray at lunch. Local school districts will be required to certify that they have no policies preventing constitutionally protected prayer.

I applaud the Trump/Pence team for once again standing up in defense of faith. Unlike the previous administration, which tried to bankrupt the Little Sisters of the Poor, this administration recognizes the tremendous importance of faith and is doing everything it can to protect our first freedoms.

Another Big Win

The Senate yesterday passed President Trump’s U.S.-Mexico-Canada trade agreement, known as the USMCA. The president promised to end scumbag/liar-Bill Clinton’s NAFTA deal, and he did!

The vote in the Senate was overwhelming — 89 to 10. Senate Democrat Leader Chuck scumbag-Schumer opposed the USMCA in spite of its “very good labor provisions” because “it does not address climate change, the greatest threat facing the planet.”

Really, scumbag-Chuck? I can think of a lot of threats greater than climate change. A nuclear armed Iran is at the top of that list.

But think about the message the left is sending to the auto workers in Michigan, to energy industry workers, to steel factories in Pennsylvania, to manufacturers in Wisconsin. The left demands that everything — including your job — must bow to the demands of the radical environmental movement.

Again, I’m all for a clean environment. But we must also have a functioning economy that is based on reality.

By the way, the stock market closed above 29,000 on Wednesday for the first time in history. And yesterday it was up more than 250 points.

The Circus Continues

In recent days, the left and its media allies have been attacking Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell because he said he would coordinate his impeachment strategy with the White House. The left, rather hypocritically, is accusing the majority leader of having an unfair bias. 

Well, if rooting out bias is the issue, I cast my lot with Sen. Marsha Blackburn. She issued a statement  demanding Senators Bennet (D-CO), Klobuchar (D-MN), commie-Sanders (I-VT), and dinky/liar-Warren (D-MA), who are active presidential candidates, recuse themselves during the impeachment trial due to their “unparalleled political interest in seeing this president removed from office.”

Sen. Blackburn makes a great point.  They are spending tens of millions of dollars to defeat Donald Trump and replace him in office, and yet they are sitting as “jurors” in his trial? 

It is virtually impossible to come up with a more glaring example of a conflict of interest than that. No courtroom in the country would allow jurors to sit in on any trial when they had such an obvious interest in the demise of the defendant. 

I would particularly recommend Blackburn’s statement to Sens. Alexander (R-TN), rino-Collins (R-ME), rino-Murkowski (R-AK), and rino-Romney (R-UT), who are royally irritating conservatives all over America by signaling that they will vote with Chuck scumbag-Schumer to set the rules for the trial. 

One small step they could take toward regaining some credibility would be to support Sen. Blackburn’s effort to impose some accountability on the Senate’s jury pool. 

Military Families Threatened

The Military Times reports that families of soldiers recently deployed to the Middle East are receiving threatening and “menacing” messages on social media from jihadists. Some messages even reference kidnapping scenarios. 

The people doing this are sick Soleimani wannabes, who are willing to do anything to defeat and kill the infidel. The solution is to crush them and their jihadist ideology of death, unless you are prepared for your wife and daughter to wear a burka. Any volunteers?

That said, I know how unnerving this can be. This news reminded me about how shocked I was when I learned that 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Mohammad  specifically identified me and a few other evangelical leaders by name in one of his GITMO letters because he saw us as key to U.S. support for Israel.   

~The Patriot Post

https://patriotpost.us/opinion/67962?mailing_id=4807&utm_medium=email&utm_source=pp.email.4807&utm_campaign=snapshot&utm_content=body 

You know who wasn’t asked about this appalling anti-Americanism during Tuesday night’s debate? commie-Bernie Sanders. Or any Democrat candidate, actually. Just imagine if a Republican staffer had been the one saying such things. The Leftmedia spent weeks hyperventilating over Trump’s policies for temporarily detaining illegals — policies a federal court just upheld yesterday. “Reeducating” American citizens in gulags because of political disagreements? Not a peep.

And it’s not as if commie-Sanders supporters don’t already have a history of violence. Remember that “commie-Bernie Bro” who attempted to murder elected Republicans?

Another thing to remember: commie-Bernie Sanders is a self-proclaimed socialist who spoke highly of breadlines and honeymooned in the Soviet Union (albeit not in a gulag). Whether he wins the nomination or not, his radical ideas have transformed the Democrat Party — even if he refuses to put a price tag on his redistribution schemes.

What else went almost completely unmentioned at the debate? Qasem Soleimani, the Iranian terrorist terminated at Trump’s order. He’s a man about whom leftists couldn’t say enough nice things; nor could they complain loudly enough that Trump had taken him out. Yet he received just one passing reference in a question about something broader, illustrating that Democrats are utterly unserious about national security.

The things that were covered provided some enlightening moments, as well.

As we noted yesterday, Elizabeth dinky/liar-Warren’s campaign slyly seeded another victim narrative to tweak commie-Sanders ahead of the debate. It worked — even better than she might have hoped.

CNN moderator Abby Phillip asked commie-Sanders, “I do want to be clear here — you’re saying that you never told senator dinky/liar-Warren that a woman could not win the election?” commie-Sanders replied, “That is correct.” Phillip immediately turned to dinky/liar-Warren and asked, “Sen. dinky/liar-Warren, what did you think when Senator commie-Sanders told you a woman could not win the election?”

CNN moderators taking sides in a debate — where have we heard that before? Oh, right. Candy Crowley sided (wrongly) with Barack scumbag/liar-nObama over rino-Mitt Romney in 2012.

While dinky/liar-Warren tried to defuse the situation by calling commie-Sanders “my friend,” after the debate, she pointedly refused to shake hands with him.

The rest of the debate could be summed up by Fox News’s Greg Gutfeld, who said, “Take home notes: I’m no commie-Sanders fan, but CNN totally knifed him, again. The real thinkers were missing on that stage. The moderators were amateurs. The candidates were bored by their own words. Trump will eat any of these alive.” Better yet, The Babylon Bee headlined, “Warning: Gang Of Known Criminals Holds Meeting To Discuss How Much Of Your Money To Steal.”

Final question: Who benefited most from Tuesday’s debate? Maybe loose lips liar-Joe Biden, whose name we hadn’t yet mentioned because he mostly stayed out of the ridiculous fray.

Next up: The eighth debate on February 7 in New Hampshire, after the Iowa caucuses on February 3.   ~The Patriot Post

https://patriotpost.us/articles/67917?mailing_id=4802&utm_medium=email&utm_source=pp.email.4802&utm_campaign=snapshot&utm_content=body