Those connections include Iranian President Hassan Rouhani — whose nation is considered a state sponsor of terror — and Nation of Islam leader Louis Farrakhan. This week it was reported that in September 2013, scum-Ellison, also a Muslim, met with Rouhani and Farrakhan privately over dinner just outside the UN headquarters. He has had additional rendezvouses with Farrakhan, the most recent reportedly being 2015, but their affiliation dates back to at least the mid-1990s.
          scum-Ellison knew his relationship with Farrakhan was a problem, which explains his penning a Washington Post op-ed in December 2016 in which he said, “I glossed over the hurtful and divisive language he [Farrakhan] directed at other communities” and “neglected to scrutinize the words of those such as Khalid Muhammad and Farrakhan who mixed a message of African American empowerment with scapegoating of other communities.”scum-Ellison’s op-ed was not received well by Farrakhan, who critiqued it as “deceitful.” And why shouldn’t he have? There is ample evidence that there was far more to their relationship than scum-Ellison cares to admit.
          The Nation of Islam is a hateful, anti-Semitic cult that high-profile Democrats yearn to associate with, just not publicly. In 2005, Barack liar-nObama was depicted in a photograph meeting with Louis Farrakhan. But as we noted, the media obligingly overlooked some of liar-nObama’s other sordid connections to guys like Jeremiah Wright and Bill Ayers. The media would have treated his photo of Farrakhan the same way. scum-Ellison’s situation is no different. The consequence is that the Democrat Party is being molded by a man who wants to destroy the West as we know it.   ~The Patriot Post
https://patriotpost.us/articles/54165-ellison-joins-list-of-dems-with-connections-to-farrakhan

          Nevertheless, courtesy of a 71-28 vote of approval in the Senate, and a 240-186 thumbs up from the House, deficit spending will likely hit $984 billion in FY 2018, and once again top $1 trillion in FY2019, paving the way to $30 trillion of national debt within the next 10 years.
          Columnist Andrew Malcom spells it out, writing, “Remember Republicans’ enduring commitment over most of our lifetimes to eliminate the federal budget deficit and trim the national debt? Well, forget it.”
          Forget it indeed. And it’s not just Republicans. The irresponsible mindset of both parties is the same, albeit for different reasons. Republicans want more money for the military, Democrats for the social welfare state.
          Hence, the chest-puffing. “This is a great victory for our men and women in uniform. Republicans and Democrats joined together to finally give our troops the resources and our generals the certainty to plan for the future,” crowed House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI). “What makes Democrats proudest of this bill is that after a decade of cuts to programs that help the middle class, we have a dramatic reversal,” boasted Sen. Chuck clown-Schumer (D-NY).
          Cuts? When liar-Bill Clinton left office, the federal debt was $5.8 trillion. When George W. Bush left office, it was $11.6 trillion. When Barack liar-nObama left office, it was $19.5 trillion.
          Moreover, most of the spending is on mandatory automatic pilot. In 2018, the federal government will spend 27% of its budget for health care, 26% for pensions (federal employees and Social Security), 22% for the military — and 8% servicing the existing debt.
          That’s 82% of the entire outlay. Debt service must be paid or we’ll precipitate worldwide financial Armageddon. Moreover, despite massive spending levels, both Medicare and Social Security face insolvency over the next two decades. How do we solve the problem? Absent serious reform, we don’t.
          Unfortunately, an utter lack of seriousness rules. “Republicans believe that tax cuts and regulatory reform will negate the need for spending reductions because the first two policies will ignite the economy, allowing for economic growth to outpace debt creation (and the larger growth would also mean the more money that companies and citizens paid to the government in taxes without an actual tax increase),” explains columnist Brandon J. Wiechert. “Republicans say this was precisely what happened during the Reagan boom. The GOP is correct.”
          Being correct is irrelevant, because with the exceptions of Presidents Warren G. Harding and Calvin Coolidge, every administration, from Woodrow Wilson through Barack liar-nObama, added to the national debt. In other words, despite increased levels of revenue — including revenue increases spurred by the Kennedy, Reagan and Bush administrations’ tax cuts — spending outlays have consistently outpaced revenue intake. And they’ve done so for over a century.
          Democrats? Just as in Europe, American leftists would rather dodge serious welfare state reform and instead import a younger workforce of immigrants — who also have higher birthrates than native populations — to support the increasing demands of an increasingly older native population. That several studies done on both sides of the Atlantic reveal immigration provides no net surplus to the economic pie means little to a Democrat Party with visions of securing a permanent majority of voters.
          The searing irony? Like Democrats, immigrants want bigger government, which will inevitably make the problem worse.
          The general public? As columnist Nathanael Blake explains, young voters with the most to lose “are often disengaged and besotted with adolescent socialist fantasies,” while retirees and near retirees who vote religiously “aren’t keen on politicians who raise taxes or cut military spending, and they will annihilate any politician who threatens their government checks and health care.”
          True enough, but much of the public is also blissfully ignorant, or angrily so. For the blissful, $20 trillion of debt is little more than a chimerical number, representing a crisis that has yet to occur. Or in a more selfish sense, one that will occur “long after I’m gone” so as not to affect them in any way. For the angry, one often hears the familiar refrain about “solving” the crisis by cutting off funding “to countries that hate us,” even though the nation’s entire foreign aid budget comprises less than 1%of our annual spending.
          If the public won’t make intelligent or hard choices, why should the people they vote for do so?
          There was a time when the politicians tried. In 1982, President Ronald Reagan issued an executive order establishing “The Private Sector Survey on Cost Control” (PSSCC), more commonly known as the Grace Commission. It was led by industrialist J. Peter Grace, who tasked approximately 2,000 business executives with the project of getting rid of federal waste and inefficiency. Two years later, the group presented its findings to Congress: if their recommendations were followed, the government could save $424 billion over a three year period.
          In 1985, the federal government spent $946.3 billion. If one simply divides the Grace Commission saving totals by three (instead of factoring in year over year increases in the budget and commensurate savings) government spending could have been reduced by approximately 14% per year. Trump has proposed a $4.4 trillion budget for this year. Fourteen percent of that comes to $616 billion. Congress completely ignored the Grace Commission’s findings.
          Nothing has changed. Thus, for example, the fact that the Pentagon can’t account for $800 million in construction project spending, or that Medicare and Medicaid fraud costs the nation approximately $120-$150 billion per year, or that a third annual “Federal Fumbles” report released last Nov. by Sen. James Lankford revealed the government wasted $473 billion on frivolous spending, still fails to resonate with our free-spending political class.
          Why? Because spending “other peoples’ money” coupled with the need to get re-elected virtually guarantees indifference. “The electoral math suggests that there will be no reform or restraint except what will eventually be forced on us by the pitiless math of accounting and economics,” Blake warns.
          Unless the nation demands term limits. Only genuine statesmen can save us now, and budget epitomizes the difference between them and the terminally self-interested career politicians in both parties. Republicans who routinely abandon oft-stated fiscal principles, and Democrats who never had them to begin with. That’s how you get $20.5 trillion of national debt — with no end in sight.
          And as for the looming debt crisis, it will be gradual trouble until it’s sudden catastrophe.   ~The Patriot Post
https://patriotpost.us/articles/54145-budget-betrayal

          Pulosi’s hypocrisy is nothing new, but it is a reflection of the worst in our culture. As we and many other defenders of Americans’ Second Amendment rights have pointed out time and time again, firearms are merely tools — the intent of the individual wielding the tool is where the problem lies. To attack the Second Amendment is to attack Americans’ Liberty itself. But political opportunists like Pulosi ignore the real cause of the problem and attack freedom.
          The reality of the world is that people hurt others. And no matter the number of laws passed, nothing will change this fact. Taking away people’s rights to protect themselves doesn’t stop the evil; in fact, it only allows for the evil to grow. Too many people in Western culture have bought into the lie that people are essentially motivated by good, selfless impulses, when in truth the opposite is the case. How else does one explain evil?
          With this latest atrocity, individuals who knew the killer were quick to acknowledge that they were not shocked that he would perpetrate this mass murder. It goes beyond his being described by several people as “weird.” In fact, a YouTube producer reportedly notified the FBI months ago regarding a comment he made claiming, “I’m going to be a professional school shooter.”
          President Donald Trump also noted this, tweeting, “So many signs that the Florida shooter was mentally disturbed, even expelled from school for bad and erratic behavior. Neighbors and classmates knew he was a big problem. Must always report such instances to authorities, again and again!” He’s absolutely right. When you see something, say something. And those warnings must be heeded.
          The questions will be raised about what should have or could have been done to prevent this violent young man from engaging in this mass murder. What we do know is that Americans’ Second Amendment rights did not create this monster, and fixating on limiting gun rights as a “solution” to the problem only serves to punish the innocent for crimes of the guilty. This is a moral problem of the heart that politics is powerless to solve. Yet politicians like Pulosi chastise conservatives for defending Americans’ Second Amendment rights, while ignoring the blatant hypocrisy of demanding citizenship rights for illegal aliens who by definition are law-breakers.   ~The Patriot Post
https://patriotpost.us/articles/54164-florida-shooting-reflecting-the-worst-in-our-culture

According to The Washington Times, “RINs work to ensure that refiners — who hold the ‘point of obligation’ under law, meaning they are responsible for blending ethanol with gas — meet the yearly biofuels quotas set by the EPA. But many refiners, such as Philadelphia Energy Solutions, don’t have the infrastructure to blend the fuels. In such circumstances, companies use a system that somewhat resembles a cap-and-trade approach: buying unused RINs from larger refineries that have blending capacity and have extra credits to spare. The price of those RINs fluctuates wildly. Just a few years ago, RINs were sold for just a few cents, but they have skyrocketed to well over $1 recently.”
          This process is unfair and elicits corruption from major industry players that have better resources and can sell credits for their own benefit. As one energy-sector official explained it: “It’s picking and choosing winners within the oil industry in a way that’s causing some to go bankrupt.” Moreover, when used to support large-scale operations, that money adds up quickly. In fact, PES says crude oil accounts for its biggest expense, but, amazingly, that’s followed in second place by RIN compliance costs. Yet Renewable Fuels Association CEO Bob Dinneen asserts, “If refiners truly want lower RIN prices, the answer is really quite simple: blend more ethanol.” He added, “The very purpose of the [mandate] is to drive expanded consumption of renewable fuels, and the RIN provides a powerful incentive to do just that.”
          This is a baffling and self-defeating position to take. Anyone who owns an older vehicle or lawn care equipment knows the mechanical damage that ethanol causes. Despite this, congressional leaders like Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) remain diehard fans of the mandate. According to Grassley, “I’m confident that the Renewable Fuel Standard isn’t harming refineries, that other factors are at work and that the RFS law is working as Congress intended. Once these facts are known, there ought to be an end to the misleading rhetoric blaming the RFS.” Grassley is so invested in this ruse that last October he threatened to sideline Trump’s nominees unless they left the mandate alone.
          Unfortunately, Grassley’s support is shared by the Trump administration. Last May, Agriculture Secretary Sonny Perdue announced the mandate would stay intact. At least EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt recognizes the RIN catastrophe. He recently said, “We need RIN reform. It’s something I’ve talked to Congress about. We have to take steps to address this, and I think there are many that understand that.”
          But even he went on to explain, “This isn’t getting rid of the ethanol requirement; this is the accounting mechanism to ensure that a certain percentage of our fuel actually has ethanol. So it truly is an enforcement mechanism that is being used in ways that it really wasn’t intended. We need to get reform around that.” What all of them miss is that the RIN situation is just a symptom of a very bad law. The U.S. is awash in oil, but that production can’t be maximized unless the biofuel mandate is repealed in its entirety. At least the Philadelphia Energy Solutions ordeal provides another good reason to keep trying.   
~The Patriot Post
https://patriotpost.us/articles/54112-more-evidence-the-ethanol-mandate-hurts-the-economy

          Most conservatives have longed for the day when our elected officials would cut taxes, rein in spending and produce a balanced budget. We will have to long some more because from the looks of Trump’s proposal and the actions of Republicans in Congress, the days of working for any semblance of fiscal sanity are past. Instead of reducing spending, Trump’s latest proposal would add to the national debt even more because it makes little effort to control deficit spending.
          “Talk about an afterthought,” says The Wall Street Journal. “Congress just passed a two-year budget outline that supersedes nearly everything Mr. Trump is proposing.” Indeed, presidential budget proposals never pass Congress, but they provide a guide to the administration’s priorities.
          Among the many problems in Washington, one of the biggest is that there are too few fiscally conservative politicians. And it’s not just Democrats who have a spending problem — it’s the majority of Republicans in Congress as well. And, oh, by the way, the GOP currently has the majority in the House and the Senate. Kentucky Sen. Rand Paul perhaps said it best when he declared, “When the Democrats are in power, Republicans appear to be the conservative party, but when Republicans are in power, it seems there is no conservative party.”
          The budget Trump signed last week adds $320 billion in spending to an already bloated budget. Republicans caved to just about every one of the Democrats’ spending proposals, which will of course add to the national debt. Trump’s 2019 budget proposal sets a goal of $3 trillion in spending cuts, but it doesn’t balance the budget because those cuts aren’t cuts — they’re reductions in anticipated growth. Trump is counting on an improving economy due to the tax cuts to help with narrowing the gap. Thus his administration assumes that by cutting funds in certain government programs but spending more in others, the debt will shrink relative to the economy. That has not worked out well in the past.
          Republicans have campaigned for years about cutting taxes, cutting spending and balancing the budget. So far we’ve seen action on the first plank, but little on the other two. Of course, Donald Trump did not campaign as a small government conservative — he campaigned as a businessman, a deal maker who could “drain the swamp.”
          For example, Trump’s two budget proposals keep his campaign promises to not touch Social Security and Medicare, but those programs account for an enormous part of the U.S. budget and are not sustainable. As the Journal notes, “Look at ‘payments for individuals,’ which encompass such income transfers as Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security and food stamps, among other things. This category was 47.7% of outlays in 1989 and has steadily climbed to reach an estimated 69.2% in 2019.”
          To be sure, there’s a big difference between food stamps and Social Security, but that’s astounding — nearly 70% of the budget is straight up income redistribution.
          Still, seniors in particular view Social Security and Medicare, not without reason, as something they are due and that shouldn’t be messed with because they paid into the system for decades. Despite the fact, however, that both programs are funded by today’s workers, and that the fiscal future for these government programs looking very bad, people who pay in don’t want the government intervening to “fix” it, because most realize that government fixes usually turn into greater problems. Trump knows this too.
          That leads to the primary factor here. Most voters — from both major political parties — just don’t care about the budget or deficit spending. The issue doesn’t even crack the top 10 list of concerns for most voters. Most voters despise politicians and during election years cry out for smaller government. But when elected officials start talking about spending cuts for this or that program, many of their constituents cry out for the program to remain in place — or demand that more funds be allocated for the particular program.
          Washington politicos know this, which is why both parties, particularly the “centrists” on both sides of the aisle push, pull and compromise on each other’s principles to spend money on pet projects that they think will benefit the majority of their constituents get the most votes. The focus becomes not on fiscal restraint but on pleasing constituents so that those in power can remain in power. The end result, as we have witnessed time and time again, is more of the same.
          That’s why getting a balanced budget passed or actually reducing federal deficit spending may not ever happen because in the end neither party cares enough about the deficit enough to cut money from their favorite programs. Unfortunately, we will continue to get more of the same until the old guard politicians from both parties who have clung to their power for so long are voted out of office and replaced with people who understand the importance of constitutional government run with fiscal restraint.   
~The Patriot Post
https://patriotpost.us/articles/54101-the-next-budget-boondoggle

          The current crisis du jour is the pending end of the Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals program, known as “DACA,” through which Barack liar-nObama granted protection against deportation for hundreds of thousands of illegal aliens.
          In 2010, with Democrats firmly in control of Congress, liar-nObama faced immense pressure to push amnesty for millions of illegals. At first,  liar-nObama rightly recognized the limits of his power, stating, “I am not king. I can’t do these things just by myself.” In March 2011, he reiterated that position, saying, “With respect to the notion that I can just suspend deportations through executive order, that’s just not the case.” In 2012, desperate for Hispanic voters to bail him out at the ballot box, liar-nObama did an about-face and announced the implementation of the DACA program.
          Of course, Democrats never allow the truth to ruin a political narrative, so despite liar-nObama’s confession that DACA is unconstitutional, and despite the courts concurring, Democrats now claim President Donald Trump is a heartless racist for ending a program that liar-nObama had no right to implement. And two activist judges have issued orders to block Trump’s move.
          In actuality, Trump is being far more compassionate than the law requires. In exchange for securing the border and ending chain migration and the visa lottery, Trump is offering to grant not only amnesty but a path to citizenship for 1.8 million illegals — nearly three times more than signed up for liar-nObama’s DACA program.
          Such generosity has been met with extreme demands by Democrats: amnesty without border security, and a continuation of chain migration, further exploding the number of illegals entering the U.S.
          There is zero legal obligation for the U.S. to grant amnesty to any illegals, and even the claim of a moral obligation is tenuous at best. The blame lies solely with the parents of the illegals who were brought here as children in direct defiance of U.S. immigration laws.
          Regardless, because Americans are a compassionate people, there is widespread agreement that those illegal alien children who are truly here through no fault of their own, and who have known no other country, should be allowed to stay. Even Numbers USA, which advocates for strict limits on immigration, supports giving the so-called “Dreamers” legal status.
          It is important to delineate between the “Dreamers” under DACA and what might be called “DACA-plus.” The DACA recipients took advantage of liar-nObama’s (illegal) program and applied for the deferral, paid fees and were issued work permits that allowed them to be hired by American employers. There were about 800,000 who took advantage of the program, minus the approximately 110,000 who were deported for crimes, or failed to renew their green cards, or married U.S. citizens. These are the people Americans support allowing to stay.
          Not good enough, say Democrats. They cynically shut down the government last month to pressure Republicans to capitulate to their demands to expand the amnesty pool to include illegals who came here late in their teens, who were not born here, and for whom America is not their only home. It was a showdown they lost, but it was a revealing moment.
          What is particularly galling to many Americans is to have their compassion rewarded with contempt and ingratitude. The job of the American government is first and foremost to protect the rights and interests of American citizens. As President Trump stated in his State of the Union Address, “My duty, and the sacred duty of every elected official in this chamber, is to defend Americans, to protect their safety, their families, their communities, and their right to the American Dream. … Because Americans are dreamers, too.”
          Democrats are overplaying their hand, and it will come back to bite them. Nothing will erode the goodwill of the American people like being told that their kindness is not only owed to the illegals who broke our laws but that it is insufficient.
          No other nation takes in as many immigrants as the United States. No other nation treats them as well as we do. Not only have we allowed them to stay, we have spent tens of billions of dollars feeding, housing and educating them.
           Compare that to Mexico, home to many of these illegals. Mexico is in the process of a harsh crackdown on illegals coming up through Central America. In Mexico, instead of access to welfare programs and education, illegals are rounded up in police raids, imprisoned, beaten and often tortured.
          America’s current situation is untenable. Our immigration laws must be reformed to deal with those here and those who want to come here. But in doing so, Americans and their interests should come first. Not one single immigrant or illegal alien has a “right” to come to America. Those allowed to stay do so out of the kindness of the American people.
          And limiting immigration to those who truly love America, who want to embrace our history and culture, who promise to obey our laws, and who will be a net gain for our country is not an unreasonable demand.   
~The Patriot Post
https://patriotpost.us/articles/54116-democrats-overplay-their-hand-with-extreme-daca-demands

          Oops. Conversely, those words were offered by Sen. Barack liar-nObama in 2006.
          Here’s what Sessions actually said yesterday at the NSA: “I want to thank every sheriff in America. Since our founding, the independently elected sheriff has been the people’s protector, who keeps law enforcement close to and accountable to people through the elective process. The office of sheriff is a critical part of the Anglo-American heritage of law enforcement. We must never erode this historic office.”
          If words are any indication, liar-nObama and Sessions actually agree on something here. You’d never know it though given the Left’s ridiculous response to and vitriol toward Sessions. According to Hawaii Sen. Brian Schatz: “Do you know anyone who says ‘Anglo-American heritage’ in a sentence? What could possibly be the purpose of saying that other than to pit Americans against each other? For the chief law enforcement officer to use a dog whistle like that is appalling. Best NO vote I ever cast.”
          To answer his first question, yes, we can name someone who says “Anglo-American” in a sentence — Schatz’s fellow Democrat and former black politician, Barack liar-nObama. (Maybe it was liar-nObama’s white half talking.) And the purpose of Sessions saying it revolves around long-standing etiquette. Here’s what DOJ spokesman Ian Prior had to say to rabble-rousing leftists: “As most law students learn in the first week of their first year, Anglo-American law — also known as the common law — is a shared legal heritage between England and America. The sheriff is unique to that shared legal heritage. Before reporters sloppily imply nefarious meaning behind the term, we would suggest that they read any number of the Supreme Court opinions that use the term. Or they could simply put ‘Anglo-American law’ into Google.”
          Writing in National Review, Charles C. W. Cooke elaborates: “[Sessions’] talk was to sheriffs — about sheriffs. His subject was the ‘historic office’ that most of his audience filled. His point … was that, ‘since our founding, the independently elected sheriff’ has played a ‘critical’ role within a law enforcement system that developed in England and was then adopted in America. (‘Sheriff’ derives from a combination of the word ‘shire’ and the word ‘reeve.’) … Within the law, ‘Anglo-American’ does not mean ‘white.’ It does not mean ‘the KKK.’ It is not a ‘dog whistle.’ It is fundamental. It is used — shock! — to refer to those institutions, ideals, structures, and customs that are common to England and the United States.”
          The Left’s real objective is to erase historical references to America’s institutions, ideals, structures and customs. That comes in many forms — whether it’s eviscerating statues or purging from our lexicon benign words they don’t like.   ~The Patriot Post
https://patriotpost.us/articles/54102-sessions-lauds-anglo-american-heritage-left-wails