dailycaller
Scott GreerDeputy Editor
12:43 PM 01/31/2018
President Trump’s first State of the Union address was by all accounts a smashing success.
Instant polls of Americans who watched the speech found that at least 70 percent of Americans — including a large majority of independents — agreed with what Trump was saying. (RELATED: CNN Poll: Majority Had Positive Opinion Of Trump SOTU)
The president also broke applause records during his State of the Union, with a speech mostly centered around calling for bipartisanship and highlighting the successes of the American economy. (RELATED: Trump Breaks Nearly All Applause Records On State of the Union Addresses)
But Democrats and liberal pundits were quick to imagine that there was some dark force hidden in Trump’s remarks, and they were compelled to call it out.
MSNBC host Joy Ann Reid found Trump’s appeals to patriotism quite terrifying. “Church … family … police … military … the national anthem … Trump trying to call on all the tropes of 1950s-era nationalism. The goal of this speech appears to be to force the normalization of Trump on the terms of the bygone era his supporters are nostalgic for,” Reid tweeted during the speech.
The American Civil Liberties Union bemoaned Trump said “America” too many times and that it was done in an “exclusionary” way.
Illinois Rep. Luis Gutierrez, Congress’ number one immigration booster, walked out of the speech after Republicans began chanting “U.S.A.” Gutierrez later issued a statement claiming the president’s speech was translated from Russian and that his remarks were “explicitly racist.”
Smart move for the guy triggered by U.S.A. chants to claim his enemies are the real anti-Americans.
As he was drooling during his car crash of a State of the Union rebuttal, Massachusetts Rep. Joe Kennedy told illegal immigrants, in Spanish, that they are part of the country. Even a few liberals thought the language choice totally undermined Kennedy’s message that the “Dreamers” are real Americans.
Several commentators were also troubled by Trump’s embrace of the national anthem and the flag, feeling that it was “divisive” and “racist” to do such a thing.
Trump has always been blessed with the best enemies, and these kinds of responses to his acclaimed speech are a gift to him. Rather than challenging the president’s form of patriotism, many Democrats and liberals appear to be implying patriotism is veiled racism and they want no part in it.
This leaves patriotism solely to Trump and Republicans.
The vast majority of Americans aren’t offended by saying the word “America,” U.S.A. chants or celebrations of the military. That’s just showing love for your country, and it doesn’t matter if Trump is the one engaging in it.
Democrats were further hampered in their response to patriotism by bringing illegal immigrants to the address and loudly groaning when Trump brought up the victims of these so-called Dreamers. Democrats also remained sitting while Trump highlighted the heroic first responders and soldiers he invited to the State of the Union, a bad look for a party trying to present itself as the real America. (RELATED: LIST: Things Democrats Refused To Applaud During SOTU)
It was less than two weeks ago when Republicans were able to effectively portray Democrats as caring more about non-citizens than first responders and the troops during the government shutdown fight. Now Republicans have visual proof of this preference on their part of their adversaries thanks to last night’s address.
One of the more important political fights of our time is how we define America. Is it a nation of immigrants with no inherent culture, or is it a nation defined by its citizens? Is the best of America represented by the illegal immigrant Dreamer, or is it embodied by the police officer who adopted the daughter of a heroin addict? Do we embrace all languages, or do we insist that English is our national language? Are our symbols and anthem problematic and needing a change, or do we continue to revere them?
These are conflicts that dominated the responses to Trump’s State of the Union. With the Democrats’ help, the president is declaring himself on the side of those who honor the flag and the anthem.
As the NFL can attest, it’s never a good thing in America to be seen as against the flag, but it appears Democrats haven’t learned that yet.
[Ed: Democrats are Constitutionally Incapable of 'Learning' it. If they did they'd lose Huge portions of the base supporting them which they've spent Eternity Balkanizing America to acquire.]
Follow Scott on Twitter and buy his new book, “No Campus for White Men.”
Tags: Donald Trump, Patriotism, Scott Greer, State of the Union
Thank You Mr Greer, the DC and President Trump.
Wednesday, January 31, 2018
Manhatten's Shithole Museum
American Greatness
Esther Goldberg| January 29, 2018
When Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan, known for his quirky sense of humor, his bad taste and his sculpture of Pope John Paul II crushed by a meteor, conceived the idea of creating a fully functioning solid gold toilet and installing it in a public restroom, he called Nancy Spector, the curator at the Guggenheim Museum. Might she be interested in it?
A woman of exquisite artistic sensibility—she’d been with the Guggenheim for almost 30 years—Spector undoubtedly got the joke straight away. America was an 18-carat shithole! It would be an “interactive exhibit” deriving its meaning from having the Museum’s patrons do their business in it. The idea of shitting on America would surely cause shivers to run down the legs of New York’s intellectuals. To ensure that everybody “got it,” there’d be a large sign above the commode saying “America.”
Spector thought that would be a splendid idea, and her boss agreed.
I don’t know how much the Guggenheim paid for it, but the cost of the gold alone is estimated to have been in excess of $1 million. Neither do I know if it’s EPA-compliant, but there’s an easy way to find out. If it only requires one flush to dispose of the waste, then it’s likely not.
The toilet was installed on the fifth floor of the Guggenheim in 2016. Getting in on the scatological fun, the New York Post’s front page headline was “WE’RE NO. 1! (And No.2)”. “More than one hundred thousand people have waited patiently in line for the opportunity to commune with art and with nature,” snickered Spector in a subsequent Guggenheim blog post.
And so it happened that when President and Mrs. Trump, in accordance with tradition, requested the loan of a painting for the White House—a Van Gogh landscape—Spector thought she’d have a little joke of her own. We’re lending the Van Gogh to Spain, she replied. Then, having first run the idea by the artist, she offered to lend them the toilet instead.
Get the joke? No? Neither do I. And neither did the Washington Post, who asked Mr. Cattelan what was meant by the offer. He thought it might be better to ask the idiot whose idea it was first place. “It’s a very delicate subject,” he chuckled. As to what the exhibit meant, Cattelan replied that it had no meaning. “What’s the point of our life? Everything seems absurd until we die and then it makes sense.”
And then he signed off with, “I have to go.” Can you hear the barely-suppressed giggle at the stupidity of Americans.
So that’s all there is to it? The Guggenheim paid millions of dollars for something that’s absurd and meaningless? The Washington Post asked its art critic, Philip Kennicott, to comment.
In Kennicott’s expert opinion…ah…well, it’s complicated. You see, when Spector offered Cattelan’s piece of shit to the Trumps in lieu of the Van Gogh, she transmogrified it into her own creation. No longer a joke on the Guggenheim, it’s now a joke on the President of the United States, and through him the American people. A “sick burn,” in Kennicott’s admiring words.,“Now the Guggenheim owns a new work, a Spector original, which will add if not luster at least levity to the museum’s collection,” he concludes.
The Guggenheim deals in pieces of levity? Remember when art was a vehicle whereby man might transcend his animal nature and connect with the Divine? This is what the Left has done to art: Instead of transforming shit into gold, art now transforms gold into shit.
The Guggenheim has had its share of humiliation lately. Last September the museum was forced to withdraw exhibits featuring films of live animals, reptiles and insects pitted against each other in a struggle to the death. When PETA called them “vile acts of cruelty masked as creativity,” it wasn’t exaggerating. The films are disgusting beyond words. In bowing to the public’s outcry, the Guggenheim whined that the exhibits were canceled due to threats of violence against its staff.
A year earlier, the Finns turned down flat a proposal to build a Guggenheim Helsinki museum with a combination of private and public monies. Expressing his disappointment, Richard Armstrong, director of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum and Foundation in New York, said he’d believed the museum could substantially raise Helsinki’s cultural profile. What breathtaking arrogance!
Armstrong further blamed the populist Finns party for vetoing a proposal that would have had Norwegians contribute $53 million to the project. “I suppose that it was a reaction to a sense of engulfing internationalism, or a reaction against globalism,” he said. Maybe, but it couldn’t have helped that the proposed building was a contemporary eyesore—a “horizontal campus of ascending linked pavilions . . . based on a design concept of openness [and] flexibility.” (To me it resembles Obama’s proposed presidential library.) ]
In its snarky offer to the Trumps, the Guggenheim has disgraced itself beyond redemption. And by the way, is it any wonder that President Trump admires Scandanavians?
Thank You Ms Goldberg and American Greatness.
Esther Goldberg| January 29, 2018
When Italian artist Maurizio Cattelan, known for his quirky sense of humor, his bad taste and his sculpture of Pope John Paul II crushed by a meteor, conceived the idea of creating a fully functioning solid gold toilet and installing it in a public restroom, he called Nancy Spector, the curator at the Guggenheim Museum. Might she be interested in it?
A woman of exquisite artistic sensibility—she’d been with the Guggenheim for almost 30 years—Spector undoubtedly got the joke straight away. America was an 18-carat shithole! It would be an “interactive exhibit” deriving its meaning from having the Museum’s patrons do their business in it. The idea of shitting on America would surely cause shivers to run down the legs of New York’s intellectuals. To ensure that everybody “got it,” there’d be a large sign above the commode saying “America.”
Spector thought that would be a splendid idea, and her boss agreed.
I don’t know how much the Guggenheim paid for it, but the cost of the gold alone is estimated to have been in excess of $1 million. Neither do I know if it’s EPA-compliant, but there’s an easy way to find out. If it only requires one flush to dispose of the waste, then it’s likely not.
The toilet was installed on the fifth floor of the Guggenheim in 2016. Getting in on the scatological fun, the New York Post’s front page headline was “WE’RE NO. 1! (And No.2)”. “More than one hundred thousand people have waited patiently in line for the opportunity to commune with art and with nature,” snickered Spector in a subsequent Guggenheim blog post.
And so it happened that when President and Mrs. Trump, in accordance with tradition, requested the loan of a painting for the White House—a Van Gogh landscape—Spector thought she’d have a little joke of her own. We’re lending the Van Gogh to Spain, she replied. Then, having first run the idea by the artist, she offered to lend them the toilet instead.
Get the joke? No? Neither do I. And neither did the Washington Post, who asked Mr. Cattelan what was meant by the offer. He thought it might be better to ask the idiot whose idea it was first place. “It’s a very delicate subject,” he chuckled. As to what the exhibit meant, Cattelan replied that it had no meaning. “What’s the point of our life? Everything seems absurd until we die and then it makes sense.”
And then he signed off with, “I have to go.” Can you hear the barely-suppressed giggle at the stupidity of Americans.
So that’s all there is to it? The Guggenheim paid millions of dollars for something that’s absurd and meaningless? The Washington Post asked its art critic, Philip Kennicott, to comment.
In Kennicott’s expert opinion…ah…well, it’s complicated. You see, when Spector offered Cattelan’s piece of shit to the Trumps in lieu of the Van Gogh, she transmogrified it into her own creation. No longer a joke on the Guggenheim, it’s now a joke on the President of the United States, and through him the American people. A “sick burn,” in Kennicott’s admiring words.,“Now the Guggenheim owns a new work, a Spector original, which will add if not luster at least levity to the museum’s collection,” he concludes.
The Guggenheim deals in pieces of levity? Remember when art was a vehicle whereby man might transcend his animal nature and connect with the Divine? This is what the Left has done to art: Instead of transforming shit into gold, art now transforms gold into shit.
The Guggenheim has had its share of humiliation lately. Last September the museum was forced to withdraw exhibits featuring films of live animals, reptiles and insects pitted against each other in a struggle to the death. When PETA called them “vile acts of cruelty masked as creativity,” it wasn’t exaggerating. The films are disgusting beyond words. In bowing to the public’s outcry, the Guggenheim whined that the exhibits were canceled due to threats of violence against its staff.
A year earlier, the Finns turned down flat a proposal to build a Guggenheim Helsinki museum with a combination of private and public monies. Expressing his disappointment, Richard Armstrong, director of the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum and Foundation in New York, said he’d believed the museum could substantially raise Helsinki’s cultural profile. What breathtaking arrogance!
Armstrong further blamed the populist Finns party for vetoing a proposal that would have had Norwegians contribute $53 million to the project. “I suppose that it was a reaction to a sense of engulfing internationalism, or a reaction against globalism,” he said. Maybe, but it couldn’t have helped that the proposed building was a contemporary eyesore—a “horizontal campus of ascending linked pavilions . . . based on a design concept of openness [and] flexibility.” (To me it resembles Obama’s proposed presidential library.) ]
In its snarky offer to the Trumps, the Guggenheim has disgraced itself beyond redemption. And by the way, is it any wonder that President Trump admires Scandanavians?
Thank You Ms Goldberg and American Greatness.
Friday, January 26, 2018
Researcher At Japan Stem Cell Institute Falsified Nearly All Images In 2017 Paper
retraction watch
Jan 23, 2018
Jan 23, 2018
An investigation by Kyoto University in Japan has found a researcher guilty of falsifying all but one of the figures in a 2017 stem cell paper.
Yesterday, Kyoto University announced that the paper’s first author, Kohei Yamamizu, had fabricated and falsified data in the Stem Cell Reports paper. According to the investigation report, none of the other authors were involved in the data manipulation.
Yamamizu works at the Center for iPS cell Research and Application (CiRA) at Kyoto University, directed by Shinya Yamanaka, a Nobel Prize winner for his pioneering work in stem cell biology.
A spokesperson for the journal told us that the authors disclosed the problems last week and Stem Cell Reports will be retracting the paper, published last February.
In the university’s official statement, Yamanaka said:
I am saddened to report that our internal investigation has concluded that a specially-appointed assistant professor at CiRA falsified and fabricated the data used in a 2017 research publication for which he was the first and corresponding author.
In his university announcement, Yamanaka apologized for the situation:
As CiRA Director, I feel a strong responsibility for not having been able to prevent research misconduct at our institute and sincerely apologize to all who support us and our research activities…Kyoto University is now deliberating its punishment toward the above specially-appointed assistant professor, the professor who supervised the researcher and myself.
Yamamizu is still listed as an assistant professor at the university; the university did not release the name of his supervisor.
We reached out to Jun Yamashita, the 2017 paper’s last author and the principal investigator in the department where Yamamizu works, as well as Yamamizu.
A university spokesperson, who responded on behalf of Yamanaka, told Retraction Watch:
The main conclusions of the paper depended heavily on the fraudulent data.
The spokesperson also explained that the university has not received allegations regarding other papers by Yamamizu, and his other work is not in question.
According to the university’s announcement, last year, the university was informed about potential problems with images in the paper. The university “attempted to recreate some of the figures presented in the paper using original data,” but “found the conclusions in the paper were not consistent with the preserved data.”
In July, the university’s initial inquiry prompted a formal investigation of the paper, “In Vitro Modeling of Blood-Brain Barrier with Human iPSC-Derived Endothelial Cells, Pericytes, Neurons, and Astrocytes via Notch Signaling.” The paper has been cited nine times, according to Clarivate Analytics’ Web of Science.
The university, which conducted its investigation from September 11 to January 9, found that Yamamizu had falsified data in the six main figures in the paper, as well as in five of the six supplementary figures.
In his statement, Yamanaka wrote:
We take misconduct very seriously. We will reevaluate our research management to strengthen our research ethics and to regain public trust in our research.
According to the Mainichi:
CiRA, the research institute for induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells for which Yamanaka won the Nobel Prize for medicine in 2012, has a strict research management system to prevent wrongdoings. All researchers get their notes on experiments checked at least once every three months and if a research paper is to be published, the researcher must submit research materials such as original data and images. ..At the same time, the center had only made its researchers submit study materials, but failed to check their contents in detail. In reality, the submission rate of such data was not 100 percent…when Yamanaka checked Yamamizu’s notes for the first time after the issue surfaced, he thought they were insufficient.
In 2014, the Nobel laureate apologized for so-called “poor record keeping,” according to the Wall Street Journal, after questions arose regarding a 2000 paper on which he was lead author. Although a Kyoto investigation confirmed the paper’s conclusions, Yamanaka said he no longer had lab records to support the images.
Hat tip: Lemon-Stoism, Author of world fluctuation watch
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America 1st: European CEOs Go 1 by 1 To Tell Trump They Are Investing Billions Back In America
Benny Johnson
6:15 PM 01/25/2018
President Donald J. Trump hosted a dinner with European business leaders and CEOs at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland Thursday evening. Trump has been making the rounds in Davos, holding bilateral meetings with other world leaders and conducting business roundtables. Trump met with various business leaders in shadow of the recent economic boom in America.
In a stunning moment, one by one, European titans of industry from companies like Adidas, Siemens and Bayer went around the table to thank Trump for the passage of tax cuts and the easing of corporate tax burdens. Almost every CEO had a new US-based investment or strategic business to announce.
The president of Seimens, Joe Kaeser, said, “since you have been so successful in tax reform we have decided to develop the next generation gas turbines in the United States.”
Trump responded “That’s great!”
Exchanges like this continued all around the table. Those in attendance, according to the White House press pool:
Kasper Rorsted, Adidas (Apparel)—Germany
Joe Kaeser, Siemens AG (Tech)—Germany
Heinrich Hiesinger, Thyssenkrupp AG (Industrials)—Germany
Eldar Saetre, Statoil ASA (Energy)—Norway
Mark Schneider, Nestle SA (Food and Beverage)—Switzerland
Vas Narasimhan, Novartis AG (Pharmaceutical)—Switzerland
Mark Tucker, HSBC (Financial Services)—UK
Patrick Pouyanne, Total SA (Energy)—France
Carols Brito, Anheuser-Busch InBev NV (Food and Beverage)—Netherlands
Rajeev Suri, Nokia Corporation (Technology)—Finland
Punit Renjen, Deloitte (Consulting)—UK
Martian Lundstedt, AB Volvo (Auto)—Sweden
Werner Baumann, Bayer AG (Pharmaceutical)—Germany
Bill McDermott, SAP SE (Technology)—Germany
Ulrich Spiesshofer, ABB Ltd (Manufacturing)—Switzerland
An America First moment.
6:15 PM 01/25/2018
President Donald J. Trump hosted a dinner with European business leaders and CEOs at the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland Thursday evening. Trump has been making the rounds in Davos, holding bilateral meetings with other world leaders and conducting business roundtables. Trump met with various business leaders in shadow of the recent economic boom in America.
In a stunning moment, one by one, European titans of industry from companies like Adidas, Siemens and Bayer went around the table to thank Trump for the passage of tax cuts and the easing of corporate tax burdens. Almost every CEO had a new US-based investment or strategic business to announce.
The president of Seimens, Joe Kaeser, said, “since you have been so successful in tax reform we have decided to develop the next generation gas turbines in the United States.”
Trump responded “That’s great!”
Exchanges like this continued all around the table. Those in attendance, according to the White House press pool:
Kasper Rorsted, Adidas (Apparel)—Germany
Joe Kaeser, Siemens AG (Tech)—Germany
Heinrich Hiesinger, Thyssenkrupp AG (Industrials)—Germany
Eldar Saetre, Statoil ASA (Energy)—Norway
Mark Schneider, Nestle SA (Food and Beverage)—Switzerland
Vas Narasimhan, Novartis AG (Pharmaceutical)—Switzerland
Mark Tucker, HSBC (Financial Services)—UK
Patrick Pouyanne, Total SA (Energy)—France
Carols Brito, Anheuser-Busch InBev NV (Food and Beverage)—Netherlands
Rajeev Suri, Nokia Corporation (Technology)—Finland
Punit Renjen, Deloitte (Consulting)—UK
Martian Lundstedt, AB Volvo (Auto)—Sweden
Werner Baumann, Bayer AG (Pharmaceutical)—Germany
Bill McDermott, SAP SE (Technology)—Germany
Ulrich Spiesshofer, ABB Ltd (Manufacturing)—Switzerland
An America First moment.
Thank You Mr Johnson and the DC.
Thursday, January 25, 2018
Sessions Threatens Sanctuary Cities With Subpoenas
frontpagemag
January 26, 2018
Matthew Vadum
The Department of Justice threatened to subpoena 23 jurisdictions across the country if they fail to answer questions about their lawless "sanctuary" policies that shield illegal aliens, a move that prompted left-wing big city mayors to boycott a White House meeting.
“I continue to urge all jurisdictions under review to reconsider policies that place the safety of their communities and their residents at risk,” Attorney General Jeff Sessions said in a statement.
“Protecting criminal aliens from federal immigration authorities defies common sense and undermines the rule of law. We have seen too many examples of the threat to public safety represented by jurisdictions that actively thwart the federal government’s immigration enforcement—enough is enough.”
The subpoena threat comes as federal prosecutors consider filing criminal charges against elected officials harboring illegal aliens in sanctuary cities.
"The Department of Justice is reviewing what avenues might be available,” Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen told a Senate panel Jan. 16. “The context of this is of course not only putting my ICE officers at risk but also finding an efficient and effective way to enforce our immigration laws,” Nielsen said.
The sanctuary movement gave illegal aliens permission to rob, rape, and murder Americans by, among other things, stigmatizing immigration enforcement. Some left-wingers use the dreadful euphemism "civil liberties safe zones" to describe sanctuary jurisdictions. The phrase blurs the distinction between citizens and non-citizens by implying illegal aliens somehow possess a civil right to be present in the U.S.
These sanctuary cities really ought to be called traitor cities because they are in open rebellion against the United States. They may as well be flying the Confederate battle flag at city hall in their modern-day campaign of massive resistance against federal immigration authorities.
"Cities do not have the right to pick and choose which federal laws they will obey or defy,” Dale L. Wilcox, executive director and general counsel for the Immigration Reform Law Institute, told FrontPage by email.
“The Attorney General is right to hold them accountable for their actions. The precedent set by sanctuary cities is one this country should not and does not want to follow."—
Democrat politicians across America are defending sanctuary jurisdictions because they want the illegal aliens living there to become citizens and loyal Democrats.
One of those Democrats, New York City’s hotheaded small-c communist mayor Bill de Blasio, melted down in a temper tantrum on Twitter.
“I will NOT be attending today’s meeting at the White House after @realDonaldTrump’s Department of Justice decided to renew their racist assault on our immigrant communities. It doesn’t make us safer and it violates America’s core values.”
U.S. Conference of Mayors president Mitch Landrieu (D), who is mayor of New Orleans, La., also bowed out using overblown political rhetoric.
"Unfortunately, the Trump administration’s decision to threaten mayors and demonize immigrants yet again – and use cities as political props in the process – has made this meeting untenable," he huffed.
The threat itself was contained in letters sent to Chicago, New York City, three states, and other jurisdictions that have accepted law enforcement funding from the Justice Department, demanding records related to whether those governments are "unlawfully restricting information sharing by law enforcement officers with federal immigration authorities." New York City, for example, in fiscal 2016 accepted $4.3 million in federal funds under the Edward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grant Program (JAG).
The letters seek documents “reflecting any orders, directives, instructions, or guidance to your law enforcement employees” about how to “communicate with the Department of Justice, the Department of Homeland Security, and/or Immigration and Customs Enforcement.”
Federal money usually comes with strings attached, so if the states, cities, and counties that took DoJ grants are violating other laws by interfering with federal immigration enforcement, they may have to give the money back and could be barred from receiving future grants.
“We’ve given them federal dollars – your taxpayer dollars – to cooperate with federal law enforcement,” DoJ spokeswoman Sarah Isgur Flores told Fox News Channel.
“They didn’t have to take that money, but they did. And when they took it, they said they would comply with federal law. So what we’re saying is if we find out you’re not complying with federal law, we’re taking the tax dollars back.”
Three states – California, Illinois, and Oregon – received the subpoena-related letters yesterday, according to the DoJ. The other jurisdictions were: Chicago; Cook County, Ill; New York City; Albany, N.Y.; Berkeley, Calif.; Bernalillo County, N.M.; Burlington, Vt.; the city and county of Denver, Colo.; Fremont, Calif.; Jackson, Miss.; King County, Wash.; Lawrence, Mass.; City of Los Angeles, Calif.; Louisville, Ky.; Monterey County, Calif.; Sacramento County, Calif.; the city and county of San Francisco; Sonoma County, Calif.; Watsonville, Calif.; and West Palm Beach, Fla.
California has been especially brazen in its obstruction of federal immigration laws.
The state is becoming ground zero in the battle over enforcement of the nation’s long-neglected immigration laws. Gov. Jerry Brown (D) signed “sanctuary state” legislation Oct. 5, dramatically curtailing the power of state and local law enforcement to hold, question, and transfer detainees at the request of federal immigration authorities. The law took effect New Year’s Day in the state that is home to more than 2 million illegal aliens. California Attorney General Xavier Becerra (D) has been threatening to prosecute residents of his state who cooperate with federal immigration authorities.
Left-wing federal judges have been sabotaging President Trump’s immigration policies since the beginning of his term of office.
For example, on Nov. 20 U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California Judge William Orrick III, a leftist appointed by President Obama, issued a nationwide injunction against Executive Order 13768, signed by President Trump on Jan. 25, 2017, which withheld federal monies from sanctuary jurisdictions.
Meanwhile, illegal-alien activists are becoming increasingly aggressive in their tactics.
Activists with the George Soros-funded group, United We Dream, staged a mock funeral in the rotunda of the U.S. Senate Wednesday, claiming the failure of Congress and President Trump to amnesty them is “killing our dreams,” Breitbart reports.
One illegal whined that the GOP and Trump were “scaring” her fellow illegals in Long Island, N.Y. Activists have also been invading congressional offices and causing trouble there.
On Tuesday, illegal aliens stormed the residence of Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D) in Brooklyn, N.Y., after he abandoned his party’s disastrous government shutdown strategy on Monday, allowing the government to reopen after being closed a mere 69 hours.
“If Chuck won’t let us dream, we won’t let him sleep!” illegals shouted outside Schumer’s home.
There are around 700,000 individuals benefitting from President Obama’s constitutionally suspect Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program that he created with the stroke of a pen. Democrats shut down the government Saturday at 12:01 a.m. by denying it operating funds in hopes of extorting an amnesty package for DACA-eligible persons from the Republican-controlled Congress.
In two weeks when the government runs out of money again, Democrats are likely to press the point again. But they don’t just want amnesty for DACA individuals – they want it for all the 4 million or so so-called DREAMers, many of whom failed to apply for relief under DACA but could conceivably qualify under the kind of amnesty Democrats want. Contrary to what the word implies, DREAMers tend to be less educated and less established than typical Americans.
Come to think of it, Democrats want virtually all illegal aliens amnestied. If Americans won’t vote for them, they make up for the shortfall by importing voters.
This must stop.
Thank You Mr Vadum and FPM.
January 26, 2018
Matthew Vadum
The Department of Justice threatened to subpoena 23 jurisdictions across the country if they fail to answer questions about their lawless "sanctuary" policies that shield illegal aliens, a move that prompted left-wing big city mayors to boycott a White House meeting.
“I continue to urge all jurisdictions under review to reconsider policies that place the safety of their communities and their residents at risk,” Attorney General Jeff Sessions said in a statement.
“Protecting criminal aliens from federal immigration authorities defies common sense and undermines the rule of law. We have seen too many examples of the threat to public safety represented by jurisdictions that actively thwart the federal government’s immigration enforcement—enough is enough.”
The subpoena threat comes as federal prosecutors consider filing criminal charges against elected officials harboring illegal aliens in sanctuary cities.
"The Department of Justice is reviewing what avenues might be available,” Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen told a Senate panel Jan. 16. “The context of this is of course not only putting my ICE officers at risk but also finding an efficient and effective way to enforce our immigration laws,” Nielsen said.
The sanctuary movement gave illegal aliens permission to rob, rape, and murder Americans by, among other things, stigmatizing immigration enforcement. Some left-wingers use the dreadful euphemism "civil liberties safe zones" to describe sanctuary jurisdictions. The phrase blurs the distinction between citizens and non-citizens by implying illegal aliens somehow possess a civil right to be present in the U.S.
These sanctuary cities really ought to be called traitor cities because they are in open rebellion against the United States. They may as well be flying the Confederate battle flag at city hall in their modern-day campaign of massive resistance against federal immigration authorities.
"Cities do not have the right to pick and choose which federal laws they will obey or defy,” Dale L. Wilcox, executive director and general counsel for the Immigration Reform Law Institute, told FrontPage by email.
“The Attorney General is right to hold them accountable for their actions. The precedent set by sanctuary cities is one this country should not and does not want to follow."—
Democrat politicians across America are defending sanctuary jurisdictions because they want the illegal aliens living there to become citizens and loyal Democrats.
One of those Democrats, New York City’s hotheaded small-c communist mayor Bill de Blasio, melted down in a temper tantrum on Twitter.
“I will NOT be attending today’s meeting at the White House after @realDonaldTrump’s Department of Justice decided to renew their racist assault on our immigrant communities. It doesn’t make us safer and it violates America’s core values.”
U.S. Conference of Mayors president Mitch Landrieu (D), who is mayor of New Orleans, La., also bowed out using overblown political rhetoric.
"Unfortunately, the Trump administration’s decision to threaten mayors and demonize immigrants yet again – and use cities as political props in the process – has made this meeting untenable," he huffed.
The threat itself was contained in letters sent to Chicago, New York City, three states, and other jurisdictions that have accepted law enforcement funding from the Justice Department, demanding records related to whether those governments are "unlawfully restricting information sharing by law enforcement officers with federal immigration authorities." New York City, for example, in fiscal 2016 accepted $4.3 million in federal funds under the Edward Byrne Memorial Justice Assistance Grant Program (JAG).
The letters seek documents “reflecting any orders, directives, instructions, or guidance to your law enforcement employees” about how to “communicate with the Department of Justice, the Department of Homeland Security, and/or Immigration and Customs Enforcement.”
Federal money usually comes with strings attached, so if the states, cities, and counties that took DoJ grants are violating other laws by interfering with federal immigration enforcement, they may have to give the money back and could be barred from receiving future grants.
“We’ve given them federal dollars – your taxpayer dollars – to cooperate with federal law enforcement,” DoJ spokeswoman Sarah Isgur Flores told Fox News Channel.
“They didn’t have to take that money, but they did. And when they took it, they said they would comply with federal law. So what we’re saying is if we find out you’re not complying with federal law, we’re taking the tax dollars back.”
Three states – California, Illinois, and Oregon – received the subpoena-related letters yesterday, according to the DoJ. The other jurisdictions were: Chicago; Cook County, Ill; New York City; Albany, N.Y.; Berkeley, Calif.; Bernalillo County, N.M.; Burlington, Vt.; the city and county of Denver, Colo.; Fremont, Calif.; Jackson, Miss.; King County, Wash.; Lawrence, Mass.; City of Los Angeles, Calif.; Louisville, Ky.; Monterey County, Calif.; Sacramento County, Calif.; the city and county of San Francisco; Sonoma County, Calif.; Watsonville, Calif.; and West Palm Beach, Fla.
California has been especially brazen in its obstruction of federal immigration laws.
The state is becoming ground zero in the battle over enforcement of the nation’s long-neglected immigration laws. Gov. Jerry Brown (D) signed “sanctuary state” legislation Oct. 5, dramatically curtailing the power of state and local law enforcement to hold, question, and transfer detainees at the request of federal immigration authorities. The law took effect New Year’s Day in the state that is home to more than 2 million illegal aliens. California Attorney General Xavier Becerra (D) has been threatening to prosecute residents of his state who cooperate with federal immigration authorities.
Left-wing federal judges have been sabotaging President Trump’s immigration policies since the beginning of his term of office.
For example, on Nov. 20 U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California Judge William Orrick III, a leftist appointed by President Obama, issued a nationwide injunction against Executive Order 13768, signed by President Trump on Jan. 25, 2017, which withheld federal monies from sanctuary jurisdictions.
Meanwhile, illegal-alien activists are becoming increasingly aggressive in their tactics.
Activists with the George Soros-funded group, United We Dream, staged a mock funeral in the rotunda of the U.S. Senate Wednesday, claiming the failure of Congress and President Trump to amnesty them is “killing our dreams,” Breitbart reports.
One illegal whined that the GOP and Trump were “scaring” her fellow illegals in Long Island, N.Y. Activists have also been invading congressional offices and causing trouble there.
On Tuesday, illegal aliens stormed the residence of Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D) in Brooklyn, N.Y., after he abandoned his party’s disastrous government shutdown strategy on Monday, allowing the government to reopen after being closed a mere 69 hours.
“If Chuck won’t let us dream, we won’t let him sleep!” illegals shouted outside Schumer’s home.
There are around 700,000 individuals benefitting from President Obama’s constitutionally suspect Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) program that he created with the stroke of a pen. Democrats shut down the government Saturday at 12:01 a.m. by denying it operating funds in hopes of extorting an amnesty package for DACA-eligible persons from the Republican-controlled Congress.
In two weeks when the government runs out of money again, Democrats are likely to press the point again. But they don’t just want amnesty for DACA individuals – they want it for all the 4 million or so so-called DREAMers, many of whom failed to apply for relief under DACA but could conceivably qualify under the kind of amnesty Democrats want. Contrary to what the word implies, DREAMers tend to be less educated and less established than typical Americans.
Come to think of it, Democrats want virtually all illegal aliens amnestied. If Americans won’t vote for them, they make up for the shortfall by importing voters.
This must stop.
Thank You Mr Vadum and FPM.
Justice Dept Demands Documents From Sanctuary Cities
American Thinker
Rick Moran Jan 25, 2018
The Department of Justice sent a letter to 23 states and cities demanding documentation that law enforcement agencies were complying with federal immigration law. The demand is just the latest salvo from the Trump administration to force sanctuary cities to assist federal immigration officials in enforcing the law.
The administration is threatening to cut funding for certain federal law enforcement programs if sanctuary cities refuse to cooperate in deportation efforts against illegal alien criminals.
Ed; "Yippee Ki Yay! Muther . . . . . . . "
The letters warned that failure to turn over the documents in question could result in subpoenas being issued.
Reuters:
The Justice Department said it was seeking records from 23 jurisdictions -- including America’s three largest cities, New York, Los Angeles and Chicago, as well as three states, California, Illinois and Oregon -- and will issue subpoenas if they do not comply fully and promptly.
The administration has accused sanctuary cities of violating a federal law that prohibits local governments from restricting information about the immigration status of people arrested from being shared with the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency.
Many of the jurisdictions have said they already are in full compliance with the law. Some sued the administration after the Justice Department threatened to cut off millions of dollars in federal public safety grants. The cities have won in lower courts, but the legal fight is ongoing.
The Republican president’s fight with the Democratic-governed sanctuary cities, an issue that appeals to his hard-line conservative supporters, began just days after he took office last year when he signed an executive order saying he would block certain funding to municipalities that failed to cooperate with federal immigration authorities. The order has since been partially blocked by a federal court.
“Protecting criminal aliens from federal immigration authorities defies common sense and undermines the rule of law,” Attorney General Jeff Sessions said in a statement.
Democratic mayors fired back. Some including New York Mayor Bill de Blasio, Denver Mayor Michael Hancock and New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu protested by skipping a previously planned White House meeting on Wednesday with Trump.
“This is a destructive ploy by the Trump administration’s lawyers to politicize a routine exchange of information,” Hancock said. “I refuse to meet with the president under these kinds of threats and fearmongering.”
The courts have ruled that the federal government cannot deny states and cities funding if they meet all other criteria established by Congress. While this complicates the administration's efforts, the Justice Department is seeking evidence that the states and cities are deliberately refusing to obey the law. A few days ago, the Department of Homeland Security asked DoJ to pursue criminal charges against sanctuary states and cities who refuse to cooperate with ICE agents in rounding up criminal illegals. This frames the issue in a different light and could be the basis of a case the Feds would take to the Supreme Court.
It's hard to see states and cities handing over documents that will incriminate them. That means that subpeonas will be on the way. This sets up a classic constituional showdown between states who are seeking to nullify federal law and the government that seeks to enforce it.
Thank You American Thinker, Mr Moran, and US AG Sessions.
Rick Moran Jan 25, 2018
The Department of Justice sent a letter to 23 states and cities demanding documentation that law enforcement agencies were complying with federal immigration law. The demand is just the latest salvo from the Trump administration to force sanctuary cities to assist federal immigration officials in enforcing the law.
The administration is threatening to cut funding for certain federal law enforcement programs if sanctuary cities refuse to cooperate in deportation efforts against illegal alien criminals.
Ed; "Yippee Ki Yay! Muther . . . . . . . "
The letters warned that failure to turn over the documents in question could result in subpoenas being issued.
Reuters:
The Justice Department said it was seeking records from 23 jurisdictions -- including America’s three largest cities, New York, Los Angeles and Chicago, as well as three states, California, Illinois and Oregon -- and will issue subpoenas if they do not comply fully and promptly.
The administration has accused sanctuary cities of violating a federal law that prohibits local governments from restricting information about the immigration status of people arrested from being shared with the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) agency.
Many of the jurisdictions have said they already are in full compliance with the law. Some sued the administration after the Justice Department threatened to cut off millions of dollars in federal public safety grants. The cities have won in lower courts, but the legal fight is ongoing.
The Republican president’s fight with the Democratic-governed sanctuary cities, an issue that appeals to his hard-line conservative supporters, began just days after he took office last year when he signed an executive order saying he would block certain funding to municipalities that failed to cooperate with federal immigration authorities. The order has since been partially blocked by a federal court.
“Protecting criminal aliens from federal immigration authorities defies common sense and undermines the rule of law,” Attorney General Jeff Sessions said in a statement.
Democratic mayors fired back. Some including New York Mayor Bill de Blasio, Denver Mayor Michael Hancock and New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu protested by skipping a previously planned White House meeting on Wednesday with Trump.
“This is a destructive ploy by the Trump administration’s lawyers to politicize a routine exchange of information,” Hancock said. “I refuse to meet with the president under these kinds of threats and fearmongering.”
The courts have ruled that the federal government cannot deny states and cities funding if they meet all other criteria established by Congress. While this complicates the administration's efforts, the Justice Department is seeking evidence that the states and cities are deliberately refusing to obey the law. A few days ago, the Department of Homeland Security asked DoJ to pursue criminal charges against sanctuary states and cities who refuse to cooperate with ICE agents in rounding up criminal illegals. This frames the issue in a different light and could be the basis of a case the Feds would take to the Supreme Court.
It's hard to see states and cities handing over documents that will incriminate them. That means that subpeonas will be on the way. This sets up a classic constituional showdown between states who are seeking to nullify federal law and the government that seeks to enforce it.
Thank You American Thinker, Mr Moran, and US AG Sessions.
Evidence Mounts of Obama Involvement In Dinesh D'Souza's Selective Prosecution
American Thinker
Monica Showalter
Would President Obama have been that petty to target a critic for draconian law enforcement over a movie? The way the Soviet KGB might have targeted a dissident?
Well, given the common thread of socialism in both, it shouldn't be a big surprise that he would.
It now comes to light that apparently, yes, he did. Dinesh D'Souza reports that he seems to have been in that unlucky category, targeted for any violation however minor, after making a couple of richly textured, artistically good and very popular critical movies about Obama. When a minor campaign finance violation was finally found after all that looking, D'Souza got the book thrown at him.
Monica Showalter
Would President Obama have been that petty to target a critic for draconian law enforcement over a movie? The way the Soviet KGB might have targeted a dissident?
Well, given the common thread of socialism in both, it shouldn't be a big surprise that he would.
It now comes to light that apparently, yes, he did. Dinesh D'Souza reports that he seems to have been in that unlucky category, targeted for any violation however minor, after making a couple of richly textured, artistically good and very popular critical movies about Obama. When a minor campaign finance violation was finally found after all that looking, D'Souza got the book thrown at him.
Monday, January 15, 2018
NAVY Vet Told To Leave Hospital Over 'Cocaine' Actually Needed Emergency Surgery
dailycaller
Jonah BennettNational Security/Politics Reporter
12:28 PM 01/14/2018
U.S. Navy veteran Eric Walker was told to go home and take care of his cocaine addiction when he went to the emergency room at the Dorn Veterans Hospital in South Carolina over serious stomach pains.
It turns out 47-year-old Walker, who served in the Navy during the first Iraq War, had gall stones and gall bladder and pancreas disease. He’s now suing the Veterans Administration, The State reports.
When Walker first entered the emergency room in May 2015, medical staff at the Dorn VA apparently asked for a urine sample in response to complaints about stomach pain.
After an hour, staff told him he tested positive for cocaine and stated that “his stomach pains were a direct result of ingesting multiple illegal drugs, in particular, excessive cocaine,” notes a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court of Columbia.
Moreover, Walker says staff told him to head home and get rid of his cocaine addiction.
Walker’s condition got worse and after a few days, his neighbor had to drive him to Lexington Medical Center, where his attorney Todd Lyle said Walker was “promptly diagnosed and rushed to emergency surgery for gall stones and disease of the gall bladder and pancreas.”
Walker recovered from the surgery, and now he’s seeking damages from the VA to recover costs from his treatment at Lexington and for pain and suffering. His lawsuit claims his urine was switched with someone else’s at the hospital, and was the reason for the cocaine abuse misdiagnosis.
Thank You Mr Bennet and the DC
Jonah BennettNational Security/Politics Reporter
12:28 PM 01/14/2018
U.S. Navy veteran Eric Walker was told to go home and take care of his cocaine addiction when he went to the emergency room at the Dorn Veterans Hospital in South Carolina over serious stomach pains.
It turns out 47-year-old Walker, who served in the Navy during the first Iraq War, had gall stones and gall bladder and pancreas disease. He’s now suing the Veterans Administration, The State reports.
When Walker first entered the emergency room in May 2015, medical staff at the Dorn VA apparently asked for a urine sample in response to complaints about stomach pain.
After an hour, staff told him he tested positive for cocaine and stated that “his stomach pains were a direct result of ingesting multiple illegal drugs, in particular, excessive cocaine,” notes a lawsuit in the U.S. District Court of Columbia.
Moreover, Walker says staff told him to head home and get rid of his cocaine addiction.
Walker’s condition got worse and after a few days, his neighbor had to drive him to Lexington Medical Center, where his attorney Todd Lyle said Walker was “promptly diagnosed and rushed to emergency surgery for gall stones and disease of the gall bladder and pancreas.”
Walker recovered from the surgery, and now he’s seeking damages from the VA to recover costs from his treatment at Lexington and for pain and suffering. His lawsuit claims his urine was switched with someone else’s at the hospital, and was the reason for the cocaine abuse misdiagnosis.
Thank You Mr Bennet and the DC
Belgian Catholics: Euthanasia Laws Used To 'Kill People Without Consent'
Joshua Gill Religion Reporter
3:21 PM 01/14/2018
So much for the 'Death With Dignity' supporters.
Medical professionals and leaders of the Belgian Catholic Church claimed Belgian officials are abusing euthanasia laws to kill people without reasonable consent.
Jean Kockerols, Auxiliary Bishop of Mechelen-Brussels, claimed that Belgian doctors are euthanizing patients without following proper medical and legal checks, sparking outcry from “not just the church’s hierarchy, but doctors and medical professionals as well,” according to the Catholic Herald. Belgium’s Federal Commission for Monitoring and Evaluation of Euthanasia has violated “both the law and its role” by allowing the euthanization of the mentally handicapped and mentally ill and failing to prosecute doctors who shirk the required safeguards under current euthanasia law, according to a report from Cathobel.
“It’s shocking that, 15 years since its creation, this commission has not referred a single file to prosecutors or condemned a single doctor,” the report from the Belgian Catholic Church’s news agency read.
“It is acting as judge and jury, and not fulfilling its role. It isn’t broadening application of the law, but violating it,” the report added.
Belgium’s Euthanasia Control Commission, led by Dr. Wim Distelmans, has failed to prosecute doctors despite public complaints and ample evidence of malpractice, the report claims, citing the example of a 38-year-old woman who requested euthanasia after her boyfriend broke up with her. The woman was subsequently diagnosed with autism after meeting with three doctors, and euthanized two months later.
The woman’s two sisters claimed the doctors never explored alternative treatments and reported the doctors’ violations to the Euthanasia Control Commission. The commission found that the presiding doctor even failed to file the necessary paperwork and record of the euthanasia treatment, but showed grace for his negligence by allowing him to file the paperwork two months later. The commission did not prosecute or otherwise penalize anyone.
A member of the commission also recently resigned over the commission’s failure to prosecute a doctor who euthanized a dementia patient without their consent, according to the report. Deaths by euthanasia have increased annually in Belgium by 27 percent since euthanasia’s legalization in 2002, health ministry data shows, according to Catholic Herald.
The commission is required to verify that each of those deaths follow the procedures mandated by current euthanasia law, but Kockerols asserted the commission’s willful failure to do so is an open secret.
Kockerols told Catholic News Service the church has known for a long time that the commission was “not working as it should” and that it should be investigated and corrected. The church, Kockerols said, will continue to fight euthanasia practices and rally citizens against the moral evils they believe it represents.
“Even if there’s little chance for now of legal changes, the church can work on a moral and pastoral level with medical staff and support critical voices,” Kockerols told Catholic Herald.
Thank You Mr Gill and the DC.
Lives 'Unworthy' of Living.
3:21 PM 01/14/2018
So much for the 'Death With Dignity' supporters.Medical professionals and leaders of the Belgian Catholic Church claimed Belgian officials are abusing euthanasia laws to kill people without reasonable consent.
Jean Kockerols, Auxiliary Bishop of Mechelen-Brussels, claimed that Belgian doctors are euthanizing patients without following proper medical and legal checks, sparking outcry from “not just the church’s hierarchy, but doctors and medical professionals as well,” according to the Catholic Herald. Belgium’s Federal Commission for Monitoring and Evaluation of Euthanasia has violated “both the law and its role” by allowing the euthanization of the mentally handicapped and mentally ill and failing to prosecute doctors who shirk the required safeguards under current euthanasia law, according to a report from Cathobel.
“It’s shocking that, 15 years since its creation, this commission has not referred a single file to prosecutors or condemned a single doctor,” the report from the Belgian Catholic Church’s news agency read.
“It is acting as judge and jury, and not fulfilling its role. It isn’t broadening application of the law, but violating it,” the report added.
Belgium’s Euthanasia Control Commission, led by Dr. Wim Distelmans, has failed to prosecute doctors despite public complaints and ample evidence of malpractice, the report claims, citing the example of a 38-year-old woman who requested euthanasia after her boyfriend broke up with her. The woman was subsequently diagnosed with autism after meeting with three doctors, and euthanized two months later.
The woman’s two sisters claimed the doctors never explored alternative treatments and reported the doctors’ violations to the Euthanasia Control Commission. The commission found that the presiding doctor even failed to file the necessary paperwork and record of the euthanasia treatment, but showed grace for his negligence by allowing him to file the paperwork two months later. The commission did not prosecute or otherwise penalize anyone.
A member of the commission also recently resigned over the commission’s failure to prosecute a doctor who euthanized a dementia patient without their consent, according to the report. Deaths by euthanasia have increased annually in Belgium by 27 percent since euthanasia’s legalization in 2002, health ministry data shows, according to Catholic Herald.
The commission is required to verify that each of those deaths follow the procedures mandated by current euthanasia law, but Kockerols asserted the commission’s willful failure to do so is an open secret.
Kockerols told Catholic News Service the church has known for a long time that the commission was “not working as it should” and that it should be investigated and corrected. The church, Kockerols said, will continue to fight euthanasia practices and rally citizens against the moral evils they believe it represents.
“Even if there’s little chance for now of legal changes, the church can work on a moral and pastoral level with medical staff and support critical voices,” Kockerols told Catholic Herald.
Thank You Mr Gill and the DC.
Lives 'Unworthy' of Living.
Sunday, January 14, 2018
We Aren't Lucky Enough For A Government Shutdown
zerohedge
Tyler Durden
by TDB
Sat, 01/13/2018 - 11:17
Via The Daily Bell
Oh no! Another looming “government shutdown,” what are we going to do?!
We should be so lucky.
People talk about bipartisanship like it’s a good thing. But the point of Congress was never to get stuff done. The point was the make sure that only important stuff got done.
President Calvin Coolidge said, “It is much more important to kill bad bills than to pass good ones.”
Bipartisanship got the U.S. $20 trillion in debt. Bipartisanship got wars in the middle east, NSA spying, a trillion dollar per year welfare state, and yearly deficits from $450 billion to $1.4 trillion. (Fun fact: the fiscal year 2017 budget deficit was $666 billion.)
If the government actually “shut down” the American people might actually get some relief.
The Washington Post offers this analysis:
Trying to fund the government on a budget is hard. Trying to fund the government under a strict budget law that automatically cuts spending anytime you break your budget is nearly impossible.
That’s why both sides say it’s a priority to find a way to lift mandatory spending cuts put in place with the 2011 budget deal. But Republicans are focused on raising the limits for military spending to give Trump his requested increase of about $100 billion. Democrats are demanding a dollar-for-dollar raise on domestic spending, too.
Really? Hard? Impossible? What is the plan here? To keep this fantasy going until it all collapses?
Members of Congress talk tough trying to strong arm the other side into accepting their preferred version of bloated oversized government.
Democrats insist that more disaster relief funds go to states and territories affected by last year’s hurricanes and wildfires. They also want to use their votes as leverage to protect illegal immigrants minors from deportation.
Trump, on the other hand, insists on funding for a border wall in exchange for letting “dreamers” stay in the country. America has the largest military budget on earth, the size of the next ten countries combined. Yet Trump also insists this budget item needs to grow.
No one is interested in going through the government and finding redundant and unneeded programs to cut. No one wants to trim expenditures, tighten the belt, or root out waste. This despite trillions of dollars of spending from various agencies spent without any accounting record of what that money paid for.
But there is another take here. These Senators and Representatives obviously think their jobs are very important and the government is quite necessary. Yet they are willing to deny Americans the alleged lifeblood of society for a few measly concessions?
As a South Park character says in one episode, “We’re the USDA! Without us, people would be eating dirt… and chairs.”
Politicians’ actions betray the truth. Either their behavior is an unacceptable hostage situation of the American people. They are holding the American people, who need the government, for ransom.
Or it is the temper tantrum of bratty children.
Either way, they should all be fired. They should be sent to their rooms, and never allowed to run for public office again. And we can go on without a functioning government until after the midterm elections.
Unfortunately, that won’t happen. They will either reach a bipartisan agreement that is terrible for the American people, or the government will “shut down” until they do. “Shut down” truly meaning furlough fewer than a third of government employees, who will all get back pay once the issue is resolved.
Like the “shut down” in 2013, they might even spend more money closing down open-air parks and monuments, just to make their point to the American people.
This government will lumber on no matter what the clowns in Congress do.
Thank You zerohedge and TDB.
Tyler Durden
by TDB
Sat, 01/13/2018 - 11:17
Via The Daily Bell
Oh no! Another looming “government shutdown,” what are we going to do?!
We should be so lucky.
People talk about bipartisanship like it’s a good thing. But the point of Congress was never to get stuff done. The point was the make sure that only important stuff got done.
President Calvin Coolidge said, “It is much more important to kill bad bills than to pass good ones.”
Bipartisanship got the U.S. $20 trillion in debt. Bipartisanship got wars in the middle east, NSA spying, a trillion dollar per year welfare state, and yearly deficits from $450 billion to $1.4 trillion. (Fun fact: the fiscal year 2017 budget deficit was $666 billion.)
If the government actually “shut down” the American people might actually get some relief.
The Washington Post offers this analysis:
Trying to fund the government on a budget is hard. Trying to fund the government under a strict budget law that automatically cuts spending anytime you break your budget is nearly impossible.
That’s why both sides say it’s a priority to find a way to lift mandatory spending cuts put in place with the 2011 budget deal. But Republicans are focused on raising the limits for military spending to give Trump his requested increase of about $100 billion. Democrats are demanding a dollar-for-dollar raise on domestic spending, too.
Really? Hard? Impossible? What is the plan here? To keep this fantasy going until it all collapses?
Members of Congress talk tough trying to strong arm the other side into accepting their preferred version of bloated oversized government.
Democrats insist that more disaster relief funds go to states and territories affected by last year’s hurricanes and wildfires. They also want to use their votes as leverage to protect illegal immigrants minors from deportation.
Trump, on the other hand, insists on funding for a border wall in exchange for letting “dreamers” stay in the country. America has the largest military budget on earth, the size of the next ten countries combined. Yet Trump also insists this budget item needs to grow.
No one is interested in going through the government and finding redundant and unneeded programs to cut. No one wants to trim expenditures, tighten the belt, or root out waste. This despite trillions of dollars of spending from various agencies spent without any accounting record of what that money paid for.
But there is another take here. These Senators and Representatives obviously think their jobs are very important and the government is quite necessary. Yet they are willing to deny Americans the alleged lifeblood of society for a few measly concessions?
As a South Park character says in one episode, “We’re the USDA! Without us, people would be eating dirt… and chairs.”
Politicians’ actions betray the truth. Either their behavior is an unacceptable hostage situation of the American people. They are holding the American people, who need the government, for ransom.
Or it is the temper tantrum of bratty children.
Either way, they should all be fired. They should be sent to their rooms, and never allowed to run for public office again. And we can go on without a functioning government until after the midterm elections.
Unfortunately, that won’t happen. They will either reach a bipartisan agreement that is terrible for the American people, or the government will “shut down” until they do. “Shut down” truly meaning furlough fewer than a third of government employees, who will all get back pay once the issue is resolved.
Like the “shut down” in 2013, they might even spend more money closing down open-air parks and monuments, just to make their point to the American people.
This government will lumber on no matter what the clowns in Congress do.
Thank You zerohedge and TDB.
Friday, January 12, 2018
Obama's Legacy: Empowering Iran and Russia
dailycaller
Abraham H. MillerEmeritus Professor, University of Cincinnati
2:07 AM 01/11/2018
On December 2, Arab media sources reported that Israeli warplanes flew over the Golan Heights, entered Syrian airspace, and bombed an Iranian military installation inside Syria.
Iran’s quest for strategic dominance in the region has been ongoing for decades. In recent years, Iran has been aided by three fundamental events: ISIS’ wrought chaos has provided new opportunities for Iranian interventionism; the Obama administration’s incomprehensible decision to release $170 billion in Iranian assets, and the Obama administration’s intrusion into Operation Casandra, an American intelligence operation directed against the Hezbollah’s ferrying drugs and cash between it and the Venezuelan communist dictatorship.
So obsessed was the Obama administration with nuclear “agreement” with Iran that a large-scale American operation designed to stop the drugs for cash operation between Iran’s terrorist proxy and the communist dictatorship was halted.
For the Middle East, the new arrangement with Iran was a shift in the strategic balance of power in favor of the Iranian quest for hegemony. For the rest of the world, it has meant more drugs on the streets of Western cities and the threat of Iranian proxies in Latin America with Venezuelan passports.
Even the time frame for Iranian postponement of building a nuclear weapon is not agreed upon. The “agreement” itself was never signed. Iranian military installations are immunized from inspection.
The tangible effects of the agreement are the modernization of Hezbollah’s military capabilities on Israel’s northern border and that of Hamas on the southern. As if the 150,000 rockets Hezbollah has aimed at Israel and its Iranian backing were not a sufficient cause for concern, the Obama administrations obsession with producing the Iran deal permitted Hezbollah to become an unimpeded, major player in the international drug trade.
Iran’s proxy in Yemen, the Houthi, are threatening the Yemeni government and the Saudis. Ambassador Nikki Haley showed the world a Houthi rocket fired into Saudi Arabia bearing all the hallmarks of Iranian technology and design.
Whatever one thinks of Obama’s strategic vision or lack thereof in the Middle East, the permissive policy toward Hezbollah’s drug operations will mean more and cheaper product on the streets of America’s inner cities.
Save for a military coup, the Obama administration would have turned Egypt into a vassal of the Muslim Brotherhood. Egypt has now turned to Russia.
Since the Sinai Accords in the wake of the 1973 War, America’s aim has been to keep the Russians out of Egypt. Obama’s support of the fundamentalist Muslim Brotherhood at the expense of human rights put an end to over 40 years of highly crafted American diplomacy.
On November 28, the Kremlin announced an agreement with Egypt that will allow Russia to build airbases on Egyptian soil and to use Egyptian air space. It was retaliation for the Obama administration’s support for Mohammed Morsi, support that persisted even after the tyrant was overthrown.
Like the Saudis, the Egyptians are worried about destabilization of the region caused by Iran and ISIS. The Egyptians no longer perceive America as a trustworthy ally. Russia has been able to gain a position on both the Iranian and Egyptian side of the Middle East chasm.
Even President Obama finally admitted, during his last year in office, that his policies in Libya resulted in the power vacuum filled by ISIS affiliates and enabled Libya to become a conduit for the unending flow of African migrants into Europe.
Obama was so focused on overthrowing strongman Muamar Khaddaffi that he had no game plan for what came next. Only after the chaos blew up in his face did he realize what he had created.
The Middle East has always been unstable, but Obama, in his ineptitude, made it more unstable. Consequently, hundreds of thousands will die in military conflicts and others will be made homeless. Thousands will reportedly be sold into slavery as is now occurring in the open-air slave markets in Libya, something even Khaddaffi would not have tolerated.
Obama’s Middle East legacy is written in the suffering of its people, the inevitable war between Israel and Iran’s proxies, the reemergence of Russia as a power broker in the region, and the drugs that will flow into our inner-cities with the interference in Operation Cassandra.
Abraham H. Miller is an emeritus professor of political science, University of Cincinnati, and a distinguished fellow with the Haym Salomon Center. Follow him @salomoncenter.
The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of The Daily Caller.
Tags: Egypt, Iran Nuclear Agreement, President Barack Obama, Russia
Thank You Prof Miller and the DC.
Abraham H. MillerEmeritus Professor, University of Cincinnati
2:07 AM 01/11/2018
On December 2, Arab media sources reported that Israeli warplanes flew over the Golan Heights, entered Syrian airspace, and bombed an Iranian military installation inside Syria.
Iran’s quest for strategic dominance in the region has been ongoing for decades. In recent years, Iran has been aided by three fundamental events: ISIS’ wrought chaos has provided new opportunities for Iranian interventionism; the Obama administration’s incomprehensible decision to release $170 billion in Iranian assets, and the Obama administration’s intrusion into Operation Casandra, an American intelligence operation directed against the Hezbollah’s ferrying drugs and cash between it and the Venezuelan communist dictatorship.
So obsessed was the Obama administration with nuclear “agreement” with Iran that a large-scale American operation designed to stop the drugs for cash operation between Iran’s terrorist proxy and the communist dictatorship was halted.
For the Middle East, the new arrangement with Iran was a shift in the strategic balance of power in favor of the Iranian quest for hegemony. For the rest of the world, it has meant more drugs on the streets of Western cities and the threat of Iranian proxies in Latin America with Venezuelan passports.
Even the time frame for Iranian postponement of building a nuclear weapon is not agreed upon. The “agreement” itself was never signed. Iranian military installations are immunized from inspection.
The tangible effects of the agreement are the modernization of Hezbollah’s military capabilities on Israel’s northern border and that of Hamas on the southern. As if the 150,000 rockets Hezbollah has aimed at Israel and its Iranian backing were not a sufficient cause for concern, the Obama administrations obsession with producing the Iran deal permitted Hezbollah to become an unimpeded, major player in the international drug trade.
Iran’s proxy in Yemen, the Houthi, are threatening the Yemeni government and the Saudis. Ambassador Nikki Haley showed the world a Houthi rocket fired into Saudi Arabia bearing all the hallmarks of Iranian technology and design.
Whatever one thinks of Obama’s strategic vision or lack thereof in the Middle East, the permissive policy toward Hezbollah’s drug operations will mean more and cheaper product on the streets of America’s inner cities.
Save for a military coup, the Obama administration would have turned Egypt into a vassal of the Muslim Brotherhood. Egypt has now turned to Russia.
Since the Sinai Accords in the wake of the 1973 War, America’s aim has been to keep the Russians out of Egypt. Obama’s support of the fundamentalist Muslim Brotherhood at the expense of human rights put an end to over 40 years of highly crafted American diplomacy.
On November 28, the Kremlin announced an agreement with Egypt that will allow Russia to build airbases on Egyptian soil and to use Egyptian air space. It was retaliation for the Obama administration’s support for Mohammed Morsi, support that persisted even after the tyrant was overthrown.
Like the Saudis, the Egyptians are worried about destabilization of the region caused by Iran and ISIS. The Egyptians no longer perceive America as a trustworthy ally. Russia has been able to gain a position on both the Iranian and Egyptian side of the Middle East chasm.
Even President Obama finally admitted, during his last year in office, that his policies in Libya resulted in the power vacuum filled by ISIS affiliates and enabled Libya to become a conduit for the unending flow of African migrants into Europe.
Obama was so focused on overthrowing strongman Muamar Khaddaffi that he had no game plan for what came next. Only after the chaos blew up in his face did he realize what he had created.
The Middle East has always been unstable, but Obama, in his ineptitude, made it more unstable. Consequently, hundreds of thousands will die in military conflicts and others will be made homeless. Thousands will reportedly be sold into slavery as is now occurring in the open-air slave markets in Libya, something even Khaddaffi would not have tolerated.
Obama’s Middle East legacy is written in the suffering of its people, the inevitable war between Israel and Iran’s proxies, the reemergence of Russia as a power broker in the region, and the drugs that will flow into our inner-cities with the interference in Operation Cassandra.
Abraham H. Miller is an emeritus professor of political science, University of Cincinnati, and a distinguished fellow with the Haym Salomon Center. Follow him @salomoncenter.
The views and opinions expressed in this commentary are those of the author and do not reflect the official position of The Daily Caller.
Tags: Egypt, Iran Nuclear Agreement, President Barack Obama, Russia
Thank You Prof Miller and the DC.
Wednesday, January 10, 2018
Insolvent New Mexico Obamacare Co-op Boasted 6 Figure Salaries
dailycaller
Richard Pollock Reporter
4:31 PM 01/10/2018
New Mexico Health Connections, one of the four remaining nonprofit Obamacare Co-ops, did not inform its customers in June that it was insolvent and its entire board had resigned, The Daily Caller News Foundation has learned.
It also never told its customers the nonprofit paid its executives up to $450,000 in annual salaries.
The nonprofit, one of 24 Co-op’s originally set up under Obamacare, was supposed to provide affordable health insurance to individuals, predominantly low-income citizens. The demise of the New Mexico Co-op means that only three are fully functioning.
The New Mexico Co-op boasted extraordinarily high six figure salaries per year like many other failed Obamacare nonprofits, according to a DCNF review of its 2015 tax filing Form 990 with the Internal Revenue Service.
Dr. Martin Hickey, the nonprofit’s CEO, received a $450,000 salary, according to its 990. It is unclear what his compensation was in 2017 when the Co-op notified the state insurance superintendent it was insolvent.
All 12 of the nonprofit’s top staff received six-figure salaries, according to its tax filing. Joining Hickey was Chief Medical Officer Dr. Mark Epstein who received an annual salary of $413,000, Chief Operating Officer Anne Sapon who received $342,000, and Primary Care staffer Frances Torres who received $318,000.
The New Mexico Co-op burned through $77.3 million in federal loans awarded by the Obama administration’s Centers for Medicare and Medicaid in 2012. The nonprofit was “bleeding about $20 million in red ink a year,” an Albuquerque Journal editorial noted.
Customers first learned in September the Co-op was facing financial difficulties. It announced an agreement to sell its small and large business policies to a for-profit company called Evolent Health for $10 million in cash.
The deal meant the insolvent nonprofit would continue serving individual customers – its most vulnerable and poorest customers. About 22,000 customers were affected.
The nonprofit’s dire financial straits were so severe its total capital and surplus were $3.5 million even after the infusion of $10 million, according to its Sept. 30 financial filings as reported by the Journal last December.
Co-op customers also weren’t informed that their insurer was insolvent and its board had resigned until after the Obamacare “open enrollment” period for 2018 had expired.
Under New Mexico law, that state can take over insurers that face financial distress. Yet, the state did not assume control of Health Connections after the resignation of its board last June, according to the Albuquerque Journal. Instead, it allowed True Health to take over the two smaller divisions and permitted the individual market customers to remain in the cash-strapped nonprofit.
Hickey, the highest paid Co-op executive, left the nonprofit and joined True Health, Evolent’s subsidiary. True Health did not respond to a DCNF inquiry about his current compensation.
Sapon, in a Linked-In posting in the first week of 2018 attempted to claim the co-op wasn’t facing any financial distress.
“The nonprofit’s leadership have continued NMHC is happy to announce that, contrary to rumors that have been circulating, the company is in a great financial position for the coming year,” he wrote. “We look forward to continuing to serve our members with the same high levels of care, expertise, and compassion that we have been providing for the past four years. We wish you a healthy and happy 2018!”
“We all wanted the company to succeed, but we were effectively insolvent in June,” said Diane Denish, a Co-op board member and New Mexico’s lieutenant governor under Democratic Gov. Bill Richardson in an interview with the Journal on Jan. 9.
Other insurance companies are facing significant losses because of the nonprofit’s insolvency. The largest creditor is Presbyterian Healthcare Services, which is owed $7.6 million. Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Mexico said Health Connections will likely owe it several million dollars.
Thank You Mr Pollock and the DC.
Richard Pollock Reporter
4:31 PM 01/10/2018
New Mexico Health Connections, one of the four remaining nonprofit Obamacare Co-ops, did not inform its customers in June that it was insolvent and its entire board had resigned, The Daily Caller News Foundation has learned.
It also never told its customers the nonprofit paid its executives up to $450,000 in annual salaries.
The nonprofit, one of 24 Co-op’s originally set up under Obamacare, was supposed to provide affordable health insurance to individuals, predominantly low-income citizens. The demise of the New Mexico Co-op means that only three are fully functioning.
The New Mexico Co-op boasted extraordinarily high six figure salaries per year like many other failed Obamacare nonprofits, according to a DCNF review of its 2015 tax filing Form 990 with the Internal Revenue Service.
Dr. Martin Hickey, the nonprofit’s CEO, received a $450,000 salary, according to its 990. It is unclear what his compensation was in 2017 when the Co-op notified the state insurance superintendent it was insolvent.
All 12 of the nonprofit’s top staff received six-figure salaries, according to its tax filing. Joining Hickey was Chief Medical Officer Dr. Mark Epstein who received an annual salary of $413,000, Chief Operating Officer Anne Sapon who received $342,000, and Primary Care staffer Frances Torres who received $318,000.
The New Mexico Co-op burned through $77.3 million in federal loans awarded by the Obama administration’s Centers for Medicare and Medicaid in 2012. The nonprofit was “bleeding about $20 million in red ink a year,” an Albuquerque Journal editorial noted.
Customers first learned in September the Co-op was facing financial difficulties. It announced an agreement to sell its small and large business policies to a for-profit company called Evolent Health for $10 million in cash.
The deal meant the insolvent nonprofit would continue serving individual customers – its most vulnerable and poorest customers. About 22,000 customers were affected.
The nonprofit’s dire financial straits were so severe its total capital and surplus were $3.5 million even after the infusion of $10 million, according to its Sept. 30 financial filings as reported by the Journal last December.
Co-op customers also weren’t informed that their insurer was insolvent and its board had resigned until after the Obamacare “open enrollment” period for 2018 had expired.
Under New Mexico law, that state can take over insurers that face financial distress. Yet, the state did not assume control of Health Connections after the resignation of its board last June, according to the Albuquerque Journal. Instead, it allowed True Health to take over the two smaller divisions and permitted the individual market customers to remain in the cash-strapped nonprofit.
Hickey, the highest paid Co-op executive, left the nonprofit and joined True Health, Evolent’s subsidiary. True Health did not respond to a DCNF inquiry about his current compensation.
Sapon, in a Linked-In posting in the first week of 2018 attempted to claim the co-op wasn’t facing any financial distress.
“The nonprofit’s leadership have continued NMHC is happy to announce that, contrary to rumors that have been circulating, the company is in a great financial position for the coming year,” he wrote. “We look forward to continuing to serve our members with the same high levels of care, expertise, and compassion that we have been providing for the past four years. We wish you a healthy and happy 2018!”
“We all wanted the company to succeed, but we were effectively insolvent in June,” said Diane Denish, a Co-op board member and New Mexico’s lieutenant governor under Democratic Gov. Bill Richardson in an interview with the Journal on Jan. 9.
Other insurance companies are facing significant losses because of the nonprofit’s insolvency. The largest creditor is Presbyterian Healthcare Services, which is owed $7.6 million. Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Mexico said Health Connections will likely owe it several million dollars.
Thank You Mr Pollock and the DC.
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