Being Obstreperous Because You Can

The tax bill the President signed today was a major victory for the President and those who supported it. The Democrats are looking a little unhappy about the whole thing. The real reasons the Democrats opposed the bill are most likely political, but there was one thing the Democrats changed in the bill that they need to be held accountable for.

Townhall posted an article about the tax bill today explaining how parents of children with disabilities and parents who homeschool were denied a benefit by Democrats.

The article reports:

Senator Ted Cruz (R-Texas), one of the Senate’s most outspoken advocates for school choice, introduced an addition to the tax bill called the Student Opportunity Amendment. The amendment would expand 529 college savings plans to also include K-12 education, allowing parents and grandparents to use these tax-advantaged plans to save up to $10,000 per child per year for private schools, religious schools, or even homeschooling.

…However, Democrats weren’t about to let a beneficial piece of legislation pass without a fight. Party leaders ran to the Senate Parliamentarian to complain that the entire amendment ran afoul of the Byrd rule — another one of those arcane Senate rules that no one understands. But while the Parliamentarian disagreed with the Democrats’ argument about the majority of the provisions in the amendment, she unfortunately found their argument compelling when applied to homeschooling and struck the language from the bill.

In response, Senator Cruz rushed to the floor and pushed a Motion to Waive the Parliamentarian’s changes, which solely affected the homeschooling provision. This motion would require a 60-vote majority to succeed.

This is what happened next:

Nevertheless, not a single Democrat voted for Senator Cruz’s motion. Not one. The Democrats knowingly and proudly discriminated against homeschooled kids and kids with disabilities, in many cases destroying their access to quality education. Even by the Democrats’ woefully low standards, it was a shameful display.

Next time Democrats attempt to take the moral high ground on some issue related to education or welfare, Americans should remember exactly what they did here. When given the choice to help children with disabilities, they chose partisanship. When given the opportunity to make life better for millions of children, they chose to RESIST.

The actions of the Democrats in the Senate are truly despicable.

Isn’t The President Supposed To Be Looking Out For The Interests Of Americans

Yesterday Breitbart posted an article about one of the unexpected side effects of the Trump tax plan recently passed by Congress and signed by the President today.

The article reports:

German economists are warning that the tax overhaul bill that now awaits the signature of President Donald Trump will mean that “significant amounts of new investment and jobs will shift from Europe to the United States,” according to the German business news publication Handelsblatt.

The United States has had a much higher tax rate for businesses than Germany and most of Europe. Under the tax reform bill, the corporate rate in the U.S. will fall to 21 percent, lower than the estimated 28.2 percent effective rate in Germany and close to the European average of 20.9 percent.

The obvious question is, “Why wasn’t the corporate tax cut a long time ago?”

The article further explains:

Gavin Ekins, a research economist at the Tax Foundation in Washington, argued that it is not only the tax rate that will make the US more attractive. He told Handelsblatt Global that in figuring out their “service cost,” a metric that measures the cost of capital, companies also have to consider local labor costs, regulatory burdens, and things like energy prices and the cost of land.The US has the advantage in almost every category, he noted, but until now firms were deterred by the high corporate tax.

“Now you get a windfall for having capital in the US, so that causes investors to invest,” Mr. Ekins says. The change in the capital investment rules gives US firms “a tremendous advantage,” he said. “It’s a pro-capital formation tax bill and this is why other countries are so wary about what the investment landscape will look like.”

Using direct investment figures from the period 2008-2012, the German specialists calculated that the value of German foreign direct investment in the US could rise by €39 billion with the tax reform. It said US direct investment in Germany would also rise, but by a much smaller amount: €6.3 billion.

The challenge to Congress will be to make sure that the extra money flowing into government coffers because of the changes in the tax law will be used to pay off the debt–not to increase spending.

Some Taxpayers Are Already Benefiting From Passage Of The Tax Cuts

Yesterday The Business Insider posted an article about some American corporations’ reaction to the passage of the Tax Reform bill.

The article reports:

AT&T said Wednesday it will pay a $1,000 bonus to more than 200,000 US employees after the GOP tax bill is enacted.

“Once tax reform is signed into law, AT&T plans to invest an additional $1 billion in the United States in 2018 and pay a special $1,000 bonus to more than 200,000 AT&T US employees — all union-represented, non-management and front-line managers,” a company press release said. “If the president signs the bill before Christmas, employees will receive the bonus over the holidays.”

Boeing released a statement announcing “immediate commitments for an additional $300 million in investments that will move forward as a result of the new tax law.”

They are:

“$100 million for corporate giving, with funds used to support demand for employee gift-match programs and for investments in Boeing’s focus areas for charitable giving: in education, in our communities, and for veterans and military personnel.

“$100 million for workforce development in the form of training, education, and other capabilities development to meet the scale needed for rapidly evolving technologies and expanding markets.

“$100 million for “workplace of the future” facilities and infrastructure enhancements for Boeing employees.

Boeing CEO Dennis Muilenburg said: 

“For Boeing, the reforms enable us to better compete on the world stage and give us a stronger foundation for the investment in innovation, facilities and skills that will support our long-term growth.”

Fifth Third Bancorp said it would raise its minimum hourly wage for all employees to $15, with 3,000 hourly employees benefiting from the hike. The bank also said it would distribute a one-time bonus of $1,000 to about 75% of its employees.

“We want to invest in our most important asset – our people,” said Fifth Third President and CEO Greg Carmichael. “Our employees drive our reputation, our business and our success.”

Wells Fargo said it would raise its hourly minimum wage 11% to $15 from $13.50. Additionally, the bank plans to donate $400 million to community and nonprofit organizations in 2018 and will target 2% of its after-tax profits for corporate philanthropy beginning in 2019.

“We believe tax reform is good for our U.S. economy and are pleased to take these immediate steps to invest in our team members, communities, small businesses, and homeowners,” said President and CEO Tim Sloan in a company release.

…Brian Roberts, CEO of Comcast NBC Universal, said the company would award $1,000 special bonuses to more than 100,000 eligible frontline and non-executive employees following tax reform and the repeal of net neutrality.

Roberts also pledged to spend $50 billion over the next five years investing in infrastructure, saying that the investments would “add thousands of new direct and indirect jobs.”

Sounds like a pretty good start!

Behind The Scenes In The Inspector General Investigation Of The FBI and DOJ

Yesterday The Conservative Treehouse posted an article about the Congressional attempts to get information from Deputy FBI Director Andrew “Andy” McCabe and his role in the 2016 “Trump Project”.

Here are some highlights from the article:

♦It is increasingly clear the entire purpose of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s probe was not to investigate some nefarious and innocuous Russian election interference; but rather with a Trump victory the same people who weaponized the FBI and DOJ to conduct the “Trump Project” needed to generate a shield or firewall to protect them from sunlight. The Mueller probe is that shield.

…♦Secondly, the same FBI and DOJ officials, along with career FBI and DOJ lawyers and administrators, who are at risk from exposure within the plot, do not want to answer questions in public hearings. They are using closed sessions under the auspices of everything therein being “classified”. This venue and manner of testimony blocks congressional representatives from talking about the content publicly.

Everything is being structured to avoid public scrutiny. In essence these career co-conspirators are using the familiar DC system to protect themselves from ramifications of their plot reaching the public.

♦Having said that, it certainly appears we have one person on the side of justice who predicted this was going to happen. By all external appearances DOJ Office of Inspector General Michael Horowitz has moved proactively to set up as much transparency as possible upon his years-long investigation into the politicization of the FBI and DOJ.

The article goes on to list some of the things the Inspector General has released to the press in order to increase transparency in the FBI and DOJ:

IG Stimulated Releases of Information:

♦Release #1 was the FBI Agent Strzok and Attorney Lisa Page story; and the repercussions from discovering their politically motivated bias in the 2015/2016 Clinton email investigation and 2016/2017 Russian Election investigation.

♦Release #2 outlined the depth of FBI Agent Strzok and FBI Attorney Page’s specific history in the 2016 investigation into Hillary Clinton to include the changing of the wording [“grossly negligent” to “extremely careless”] of the probe outcome delivered by FBI Director James Comey.

♦Release #3 was the information about DOJ Deputy Bruce Ohr being in contact with Fusion GPS at the same time as the FISA application was submitted and granted by the FISA court; which authorized surveillance and wiretapping of candidate Donald Trump; that release also attached Bruce Ohr and Agent Strzok directly to the Steele Dossier.

♦Release #4 was information that Deputy Bruce Ohr’s wife, Nellie Ohr, was an actual contract employee of Fusion GPS, and was hired by F-GPS specifically to work on opposition research against candidate Donald Trump. Both Bruce Ohr and Nellie Ohr are attached to the origin of the Christopher Steele Russian Dossier.

♦Release #5 was the specific communication between FBI Agent Strzok and FBI Attorney Page. The 10,000 text messages that included evidence of them both meeting with Asst. FBI Director Andrew McCabe to discuss the “insurance policy” against candidate Donald Trump in August of 2016.

The Inspector General’s report is due out in January. If the media chooses to report on it, I suspect it will be very interesting reading for all Americans. I also expect that it may put an abrupt end to the idea that President Trump colluded with the Russians.

When All Else Fails, Do The Math

The Democrats are screaming that the tax bill will add to the national debt. It might. Or it might not–depending on the growth of the American economy unleashed by lower taxes. However, there are some numbers that those Democrats might want to consider before they scream too loud.

A website called The Balance posted the following and updated it earlier this month:

The Gateway Pundit reported the following yesterday:

The major complaint that the Democrats have with the tax bill is that it is projected to increase the U S debt by $1.5 trillion. However, when compared to Obama President Trump already nearly has it covered.

The article at the Gateway Pundit includes the following:

The Gateway Pundit also points out:

The FED kept interest rates at near zero percent for most of Obama’s eight year term. Since President Trump was elected the FED have increased rates four times by a total of 1%. Increases in the Fed Funds Rate increase the cost of borrowing and the largest borrower in the world is the US government. With $20 trillion in debt, a 1% increase in interest payments equals $200 billion in annual interest payment increases.

President Trump has already paid for nearly all of the tax cuts. Aside from that fact, whose money is it anyway? The tax cuts will allow Americans to keep more of what they have earned. That is a good thing.

What Does The Tax Plan Look Like?

Investor’s Business Daily posted an article today detailing some of the impact of the new tax plan.

The article reports:

The Tax Policy Center (TPC), a liberal think tank, noted that more than 80% of Americans will get tax cuts under the plan just passed. And the benefits will go to every income group, not “billionaires.” This, by the way, is bolstered by other recent analyses by Congress’ Joint Committee on Taxation and by the widely respected nonpartisan Tax Foundation.

TPC estimates an average tax cut of about $2,140 per person. By the way, some 16% of the richest Americans — those in the top 0.1% of incomes — will face an average tax increase of $387,610.

Brian Riedl of the Manhattan Institute, further crunching the TPC numbers, found that while the top 1% of incomes now pay 27% of all federal taxes, they will get just 21% of the tax cuts. The bottom 80%, including the middle class, pays only 33% of all taxes, but will take home 35% of the tax cuts.

Of the 12% who will face tax hikes, they’re overwhelmingly among the rich — not the middle class.

So, no, it’s not “tax cuts for the rich.” That’s a totally bogus argument.

For that matter, so are the arguments that tax cuts tank the economy. History is replete with examples of why that isn’t true.

The article concludes:

…As history clearly shows, growth-oriented tax cuts such as these almost always have major benefits for the economy and for average workers. During the 20th century, big tax cuts in the 1920s (Harding, Coolidge), 1960s (Kennedy) and 1980s (Reagan) all yielded major growth dividends for the U.S. economy.

What’s more, those past major tax cuts were to varying degrees bipartisan. Sadly, not this time. Not one Democrat voted for them. Not one.

That’s why the Democrats and progressive left have become so utterly unhinged. They’ve failed to stop the one thing that might deny them a chance to retake both houses of Congress in the 2018 midterm elections: an economic boom.

When the economy really begins cooking, with the economy growing close to 3%, hundreds of thousands of new jobs being created and workers seeing more in their paychecks, how will they explain that to their constituents?

One of the things to remember here is the impact of cutting the corporate tax rate. Corporations don’t pay taxes–they pass them on to consumers and shareholders. When you lower the corporate tax rate, good things happen for consumers and shareholders. The other aspect of this is the relationship between the American corporate tax and corporate taxes in other countries. America had one of the highest corporate tax rates in the world. This high tax rate encouraged companies to locate their headquarters elsewhere. Lowering this tax rate makes America more competitive as a home base for businesses. The lower tax rate combined with the low cost of energy in America makes America a very attractive place to do business.

Time will tell what the impact of this tax plan will be. If all Americans do better under this tax plan, it will be difficult for Democrats to explain their opposition to it.

How Does This Math Work?

CNS News posted an article today detailing which Americans pay our taxes under the current tax code. Please follow the link to article and read all of the statistics. It is amazing that America has prospered at all under this warped tax code.

The article reports:

Of the 150,493,263 filers who submitted individual income tax returns to the Internal Revenue Service for the 2015 tax year, only 99,040,729 paid any income tax at all.

Together, those Americans paid a record $1,457,891,441,000 in total income taxes — for an average of $14,720 per taxpayer.

The other 51,452,534 — or about 34.2 percent of all filers — did not pay a penny. Their average income tax payment was $0.

This is a fundamental divide in the American tax system. On one side are those who do pay taxes; on the other, those who don’t.

It gets worse:

So who paid the taxes the federal government needed to send that $89,614,669,000 to those 30,417,609 who paid no income tax?

One major contributor was a group the IRS calls “married persons filing jointly.”

In 2015, according to Table 1.2 in the IRS report, 54,294,820 belonged to this group — with 41,551,043 joining the side that did pay taxes, and 12,743,777 joining the side that did not.

Thus, while 34.2 percent of all filers paid no income taxes, only 23.5 percent of married couples filing jointly paid no income taxes.

The 41,551,043 married couples filing jointly who did pay income taxes accounted for only 27.6 percent of all 150,493,263 filers. But they made up about 42 percent of the 99,040,729 filers who did pay income taxes.

More tellingly, of the record $1,457,891,441,000 in total income taxes the IRS collected for tax year 2015, married couples filing jointly paid $1,040,684,097,000 of it — or about 71.4 percent.

So, married couples filing jointly constituted only 42 percent of filers who actually paid income taxes, but they paid 71.4 percent of the income taxes.

Obviously, this is a tax system that drastically needs to be overhauled. Hopefully the tax bill passed today represents that overhaul.

The Next Financial Collapse The Taxpayers Will Be Asked To Bail Out

On January 17, 1962, President John F. Kennedy signed Executive Order 10988. This order allowed federal employees to form unions. Eventually bureaucrats at all levels of government formed unions. So what was the result of this? The eventual result is large amounts of unfunded liabilities in terms of generous retirement benefits and medical benefits for retirees. These are listed as unfunded liabilities because the actual cost of the benefits negotiated did not show up in the annual budgets of the towns and cities that were approved by the states. This is the perfect negotiating tool–unions make large donations to candidates. These unions then negotiate for retirement benefits for union members. Those doing the negotiations want to stay on the good side of the unions in order to continue to receive campaign contributions.

The Daily Signal posted an article today showing the per capita amount of these unfunded liabilities in every state.

Here is the chart and the list:

The article reports:

Contractual or constitutional obligations for government pensions could mean that paying the pensions of retired government employees may take precedent over paychecks for current employees.

Moreover, some state constitutions prevent any changes to government employees’ pension benefits. That means current government employees can’t ever be required to contribute more to their pension plan than they did on the first day they were hired. And, actually, not a single term of their initially promised pension benefits ever may be altered.

Just imagine how detrimental it would be to private employers if they never were allowed to alter the benefits they initially offered their employees.

With an average funding ratio of only 33.7 percent across state and local pensions and every single state at risk of defaulting on pension obligations (as measured by Pension Protection Act standards, assuming a risk-free rate of return), taxpayers across all states face significant tax increases to pay for their governments’ unfunded pension promises.

As the federal government attempts to cut the amount of taxes each American pays, the states may be forced to raise their taxes to cover their unfunded liabilities. States and municipalities need to fund their pension programs as the money is needed and encourage employee participation–past practices need to change.

What Economic Equality Really Looks Like

Today Breitbart posted an article about aspects of the Trump economy that have not been widely reported.

The article cites 7 economic facts:

  1. Latino Unemployment Hits Record Low
  2. Black Unemployment Rate Hits 17-Year Low
  3. Real Economic Growth
  4. Soaring Economic Optimism
  5. Booming Stock Market
  6. Unemployment Rate Hits 17-Year Low
  7. Manufacturing Jobs Boom

Regardless of his imperfections, Donald Trump is a businessman. He understands how money works and how economies work. His knowledge (and common sense on the part of many of the people around him) have turned around our economy.

The article reminds us:

After an unexpectedly high growth rate of 3.3 percent in the third quarter of 2017 (and that is with two devastating hurricanes), projections for the fourth quarter have edged into the magic number of 4 percent.

…So far in 2017, a full 171,000 manufacturing jobs have been created. Moreover, the manufacturing unemployment rate is just 2.6 percent, the lowest ever recorded.

In July 2013, CNS News reported:

During just the years that President Barack Obama has been in office (2009 through 2012), average annual growth in real GDP has been only 1.075 percent.

The 1.075 percent average annual growth in real GDP under Obama equals less than a third (31.57 percent) of the 3.405 percent average annual growth in real GDP the United States saw in the last two decades of the last century.

The 1.775 percent average annual growth of GDP in the twelve years since the beginning of this century, equals only 52 percent of the 3.405 percent average annual growth in real GDP the country saw in the last two decades of the last century. 

In the first two quarters of this year, the beginning of President Obama’s second term, real GDP has grown at an annualized rate of 1.1 percent and 1.7 percent.

In October 2017, The Balance posted a chart showing GDP growth by year. This is a portion of that chart:

Leadership and economic policy matter.

It Just Gets Slimier

The U.K. Daily Mail posted an article yesterday (and updated it today) about the FBI offering Christopher Steele (the author of the Trump dossier) $50,000 if he could verify the charges in the dossier. As far as investigators can tell, he was never able to do that and collect the money.

The article reports:

“I believe, just from examining the public sources, that the FBI offered Christopher Steele $50,000 if he could corroborate the dossier. He either couldn’t, didn’t, wouldn’t, and they didn’t pay him the money,’ news analyst Andrew Napolitano told Stuart Varney on Fox Business Monday.

Former MI6 agent Steele’s dossier claims the Russians possess compromising information that could be used to blackmail Trump, and alleges the Trump campaign colluded with Russia during the 2016 election.

Napolitano appears to be basing his claim on an April report from the New York Times, which cited two sources claiming that an FBI agent met Steele in Rome in October of 2016, just weeks before the presidential election. 

The agent offered Steele $50,000 if he could get ‘solid corroboration of his reports’, which the FBI ultimately never paid out, the report said.

Last week, Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein refused to tell the House Judiciary Committee whether the FBI had paid or offered to pay for the dossier.

This is further proof that we need to remove the top few layers of personnel at the FBI.

Standing With Our Friends

On December 8, Nikki Haley, the United States ambassador to the United Nations, gave the speech below to the United Nations after the organization attempted to pass a resolution blocking President Trump from moving the U.S. Embassy in Israel to Jerusalem. Since when does the United Nations tell countries where their capitals are?

The speech was posted at YouTube:

Some highlights of the speech are listed at The Blaze.

Below is a portion of what Ambassador Haley said:

And finally, I will not let this moment pass without a comment about the United Nations itself. Over many years the United Nations has outrageously been at the world’s foremost centers of hostility towards Israel. The U.N. has done much more damage to the prospects for Middle East peace than to advance them. We will not be a party to that. The United States no longer stands by when Israel is unfairly attacked in the United Nations. And the United States will not be lectured to by countries that lack any credibility when it comes to treating both Israelis and Palestinians fairly.

It’s nice that the Trump Administration is remembering who our friends are.

Currently There Are More People Being Thrown Under The Bus Than Are On The Bus

Politico is not a right-wing website. Generally, it leans left. So why are they throwing President Obama under the bus? I don’t know, but Politico posted an article yesterday detailing how the Obama Administration blocked an ambitious law enforcement campaign targeting drug trafficking by the Iranian-backed terrorist group Hezbollah, even as it was funneling cocaine into the United States. This is part of the price President Obama was willing to pay to get the Iranian nuclear treaty.

The article at Politico is long, but it is worth reading. I will try to summarize the main points, but I strongly suggest that you follow the link above to read the entire story.

The article reports:

…Project Cassandra, was launched in 2008 after the Drug Enforcement Administration amassed evidence that Hezbollah had transformed itself from a Middle East-focused military and political organization into an international crime syndicate that some investigators believed was collecting $1 billion a year from drug and weapons trafficking, money laundering and other criminal activities.

Over the next eight years, agents working out of a top-secret DEA facility in Chantilly, Virginia, used wiretaps, undercover operations and informants to map Hezbollah’s illicit networks, with the help of 30 U.S. and foreign security agencies.

They followed cocaine shipments, some from Latin America to West Africa and on to Europe and the Middle East, and others through Venezuela and Mexico to the United States. They tracked the river of dirty cash as it was laundered by, among other tactics, buying American used cars and shipping them to Africa. And with the help of some key cooperating witnesses, the agents traced the conspiracy, they believed, to the innermost circle of Hezbollah and its state sponsors in Iran.

But as Project Cassandra reached higher into the hierarchy of the conspiracy, Obama administration officials threw an increasingly insurmountable series of roadblocks in its way, according to interviews with dozens of participants who in many cases spoke for the first time about events shrouded in secrecy, and a review of government documents and court records. When Project Cassandra leaders sought approval for some significant investigations, prosecutions, arrests and financial sanctions, officials at the Justice and Treasury departments delayed, hindered or rejected their requests.

The article quotes someone involved in the investigation as saying that the program was blocked from the top.

The article further reports:

Obama had entered office in 2009 promising to improve relations with Iran as part of a broader rapprochement with the Muslim world. On the campaign trail, he had asserted repeatedly that the Bush administration’s policy of pressuring Iran to stop its illicit nuclear program wasn’t working, and that he would reach out to Tehran to reduce tensions.

The man who would become Obama’s top counterterrorism adviser and then CIA director, John BrennanJohn BrennanObama’s White House counterterrorism adviser, who became CIA director in 2013., went further. He recommended in a policy paper that “the next president has the opportunity to set a new course for relations between the two countries” through not only a direct dialogue, but “greater assimilation of Hezbollah into Lebanon’s political system.”

Anyone who knows the history of Lebanon understands that Hezbollah is not a force for  peace, freedom, or stability.

The article goes on to detail money laundering by Hezbollah and  the fact that Hezbollah has operatives in America planning terrorist attacks. It is very obvious in reading the article that the activities of the Obama Administration put Americans at risk. The efforts at ending the drug trafficking and money laundering will resume under the Trump Administration. At a time when America has major drug problems, it would be a really good idea to shut down any traffickers we can.

Why Isn’t News Just News?

This blog is an opinion blog. The name of the blog tells you what to expect. I don’t claim to be objective news, but I try to report things that I believe the mainstream media might have missed. The problem in news occurs when a news source claims to be objective, but is only giving you one side of the story. Unfortunately, there is a lot of that going on.

CNS News posted a story on Friday about the news coverage of President Trump.

The article reports:

There may be fake news, but there’s no making up the media’s loathing of Donald Trump. The press has been unrelenting toward this president since day one – and Media Research Center’s data proves it. Even the 89 percent negativity from his early months almost seem benevolent now, with numbers in the 91-93 percent range (the latter, according to Harvard).

“Our latest numbers show that coverage of Trump on the ABC, CBS and NBC evening newscasts in September, October and November was more than 90 percent negative (our methodology counts only explicitly evaluative statements from reporters or non-partisan sources)” MRC explains. “In September, there were just 31 pro-Trump statements on the Big Three vs. 359 negative. In October, the number of positive statements grew to 41, while the negative statements swelled to 435.”

That is really sad. What we are witnessing now by the Democratic Party, the Washington establishment and the mainstream media is an attempted coup of a duly-elected President. Make no mistake, this group is well aware that the economic policies of the Trump Administration will be beneficial to all Americans. They are not stupid. They understand that a successful Trump presidency would illustrate that sometimes the answers to our nation’s problems are found outside the ‘club’ that has been in power for so long. Smart Americans will understand this media bias and find alternative sources of information.

The Problem With Special Prosecutors Is That They Don’t Have Limits Even When They Are Supposed To Have Limits

If we think back to recent (a year) history, Robert Mueller was appointed as a special prosecutor to investigate whether or not there was Russian interference in the 2016 election. He has been searching for a year, and so far has charged two people formerly associated with the Trump Administration with crimes unrelated to the purpose of his investigation. It seems as if he is using his unlimited budget to follow rabbit trails. Now there is a new controversy about some of those rabbit trails.

Yesterday Townhall posted an article about some recent problems with the Mueller investigation.

The article reports:

According to Axios, special counsel Robert Mueller has confiscated thousands of e-mails and communications from President Donald J. Trump’s transition team, including from notable figures such as Jared Kushner and other high profile aides.

“Trump officials discovered Mueller had the emails when his prosecutors used them as the basis for questions to witnesses, the sources said.

The emails include 12 accounts, one of which contains about 7,000 emails, the sources said.

The accounts include the team’s political leadership and the foreign-policy team, the sources said.”

These e-mails supposedly all occurred after  the 2016 presidential election. Mueller’s investigation is explicitly to determine if there was any Russian interference before the election that could have rigged the results for Donald Trump. But, according to Axios’ source “Mueller is using the emails to confirm things, and get new leads.”

If these are the emails of the transition team, they have nothing to do with events before the election–they are the records of the new administration organizing its policies. They are subject to executive privilege and to the Fourth Amendment. It sounds as if neither was honored.

The article concludes:

As Fox News notes, Langhofer says that Mueller’s team gained access to the e-mails via the General Services Administration. The Transition team was using the GSA’s office space and e-mails severs. Trump’s attorneys say that in doing so, Mueller may have violated the 4th amendment by asking the GSA for e-mails which were supposed to be private and secure. 

According to Reuters, the letter says “career staff members at the agency unlawfully produced TFA’s private materials, including privileged communications, to the Special Counsel’s Office.”

Stay tuned.

Saving Money Anywhere He Can

The Dennis Michael Lynch website is announcing today that the new WhiteHouse.gov website which was launched yesterday will save taxpayers as much as $3 million a year. Wow. The savings are the result of changes to the security and maintenance of the site.

The article reports:

The reconstructed website will feature enhanced search tools, provide “in-depth policy updates” and appear “much cleaner,” the official revealed, adding, “It adapts the U.S. web design standards and uses a style that is clean, simple and presidential.”

After years of hearing about the previous administration’s pricey battles with internet technology, taxpayers can expect a better deal with Trump. A White House spokesperson told the Washington Examiner the old website cost “more than $6 million a year.”

This is another reason to have a businessman in the White House.

This Keeps Getting Uglier

The Hill is not known to be a conservative news outlet, but lately their investigative reporting has certainly not been slanted left.

Yesterday The Hill reported that California lawyer Lisa Bloom, a well-known women’s rights lawyer, was paying women to accuse President Trump of sexual impropriety. First of all, I would like to mention to all the Trump-haters breathlessly awaiting his impeachment or resignation that a President cannot be impeached for things he did before he took office. I would also like to point out that the voters understood that Trump was not a saint. They also understood that the was not part of the corruption of the last administration.

The article reports:

California lawyer Lisa Bloom’s efforts included offering to sell alleged victims’ stories to TV outlets in return for a commission for herself, arranging a donor to pay off one Trump accuser’s mortgage and attempting to secure a six-figure payment for another woman who ultimately declined to come forward after being offered as much as $750,000, the clients told The Hill.

The women’s accounts were chronicled in contemporaneous contractual documents, emails and text messages reviewed by The Hill, including an exchange of texts between one woman and Bloom that suggested political action committees supporting Hillary Clinton were contacted during the effort.

The story concludes:

“If you are interested I would recommend Inside Edition or Dr. Phil as they are much bigger. Dr. Phil is doing a show on Trump accusers next Tuesday in LA and would fly you here and put you up in a nice hotel, and pay for your meals as well, with your daughter if you like,” Bloom’s text added. “Media moves very quickly so you need to decide and then once confirmed, you need to stick to it.”

Representatives of “Inside Edition” and “Dr. Phil” said they did not pay any Trump accusers for appearances last year.

Bloom’s firm sent the woman a “media-related services” contract to represent her for “speaking out against Donald Trump” that laid out business terms for selling a story in the most direct terms.

“You will compensate the Firm thirty-three percent (33%) of the total fee that you collect, whether the media deal or licensing fees is for print, Internet, radio, television, film or any other medium,” Bloom’s proposed contract, dated Oct. 10, 2016, read. The woman said she signed the contract.

When Bloom found out in early November that the woman and the friend had discussions with CBS News about doing an interview on their own, the lawyer texted back: “CBS does not pay for stories.”

A little later Bloom sent another text suggesting the arrangements she was making could be impacted by the unauthorized media contacts. “You and your friends should not be shopping the story it will come back to bite you,” Bloom texted. “And this whole thing we have worked so hard to make happen will go away.”

Yuck. Just yuck.

President Trump’s Economy

Today The Daily Signal posted an article showing four aspects of economic growth under President Trump.

This is their list:

1. Growth Gets Closer to 4 Percent  –  remember when President Obama said that we would not see growth of 3 percent again (that is probably true under Democratic economic policies).

2. Stock Market Hits Record Highs – this is important because many working Americans have 401k retirement accounts. This helps all of those Americans–not only the ‘rich.’

3. Companies Are ‘Coming Back Fast’ – part of this is due to pending lower corporate tax rates and part of this is due to the continued low cost of energy as America moves toward energy independence.

4. Healthy Consumer and Employer Confidence –  optimism can be contagious, and President Trump understands that and projects optimism.

If the Republicans in Congress would cooperate and pass tax reform, we will all be even better off.

This Raises More Questions About What Was Going On In The State Department Under President Obama

Frontpage Magazine posted an article today about documents removed from the State Department by Hillary Clinton and Huma Abedin.

The article reports:

Sandy Berger, Bill Clinton’s former National Security Adviser, stole classified documents about the terror failures of the Clinton administration, hid documents under a construction trailer, lied about taking them and destroyed some of them.

 Hillary Clinton confidants were part of an operation to “separate” damaging documents before they were turned over to the Accountability Review Board investigating security lapses surrounding the Sept. 11, 2012, terrorist attacks on the U.S. mission in Benghazi, Libya.

According to former Deputy Assistant Secretary Raymond Maxwell, the after-hours session took place over a weekend in a basement operations-type center at State Department headquarters in Washington, D.C. This is the first time Maxwell has publicly come forward with the story.

“When Cheryl saw me, she snapped, ‘Who are you?’” Maxwell says. “Jake explained, ‘That’s Ray Maxwell, an NEA deputy assistant secretary.’ She conceded, ‘Well, OK.’”

Maxwell says the two officials, close confidants of Clinton, appeared to check in on the operation and soon left.

…The new records also show that Huma Abedin was allowed to take five boxes of “physical files” out of the State Department that include records described as “Muslim Engagement Documents.”

Huma Abedin has family ties to the Muslim Brotherhood and at one point worked as an editor or writer for their magazine. It is very interesting to me that the “Muslim Engagement Documents” were removed from the State Department.

I would like to note here that John Brennan, in 2011, during his time as Assistant to the President for Homeland Security and Counterterrorism received at request form Farhana Khere, President and Executive Director of Muslim Advocates requesting that all material relating to Islamic-based terrorism be removed from government documents and briefings. According to the book Catastrophic Failure by Stephen Coughlin, “The Department of Defense followed shortly thereafter with a Soviet-style purge of individuals along with disciplinary actions and re-education.” Why our government put the interests of a Muslim-Brotherhood related group above the security interests of America is anyone’s guess. I have personally met a CIA agent who was no longer allowed to brief our diplomats and military after this change was made.

I would love to know exactly what was in those “Muslim Engagement Documents.”

Restoring The Free Market To The Internet

In 2015, rules were put in place to prevent the free market from working in the Internet. Under these rules, Internet service providers, such as AT&T, Verizon and Comcast as well as smaller Internet service providers, were prohibited from blocking, slowing access to or charging more (priority pricing) for fast delivery of content above some specified threshold of high bandwidth usage.

An article in Frontpage Magazine posted today explains how the repeal of those rules will affect the Internet:

High-speed delivery of Internet services will no longer be heavily regulated on par with a common carrier utility monopoly service. However, the Internet service providers will have to disclose to the FCC changes to their access policies, which can consider any alleged abuses on a case by case basis. The Federal Trade Commission, which shares antitrust enforcement responsibility with the Department of Justice, will be tasked to take action against any anti-competitive behavior.

We are pretty much returning to what the Internet was before 2015. It needs to be considered in discussing this change that the Apple iphone could not have been released under the net neutrality rules–the original monopoly given to one service provider (which gave Apple a chance to work out the bugs) would have been illegal.

The article further explains:

The left would have us believe that the battle over “net neutrality” is between greedy, monopolistic, multibillion dollar Internet service companies and John Q. Public. This is the left’s typical class warfare rhetoric, helped along ironically by multibillion dollar content providers such as Netflix, Google and Facebook that hide behind slogans such as “net neutrality” and “open and free Internet” to obscure their own economic self-interest. Companies the size of Netflix, Google, Facebook, and the new Disney company that may emerge if its purchase of content assets from 21st Century Fox is approved by antitrust officials do not need FCC utility-style regulatory protection from Internet service providers. The FCC should not have placed itself in the position of picking industry sector winners and losers or coming down on the side of content providers, some of whom such as Facebook and Google have substantial market power of their own that allows them to censor content they believe is too controversial.

Moreover, “net neutrality” may be a nice slogan, but it does not reflect the reality of Internet usage. To understand why this is so requires a brief technology discussion.

Follow the link to the article to read the technical discussion–it is way over my head. Meanwhile, the political left never met a  government regulation it didn’t love!

The article concludes:

The economics of supply and demand should be permitted to play out under free market conditions. Internet service providers, just like the large content providers, are not monopoly utilities that require utility-style regulation. That said, there will need to be antitrust enforcement by the Federal Trade Commission to prevent anti-competitive abuses, such as an Internet service providers favoring their own affiliated content providers in terms of quality of service, ease of customer access, or discriminatory pricing. The FCC’s repeal of the overly burdensome “net neutrality” rules in no way undermines the ability of the FCC or the Federal Trade Commission to step in and address any abuses that may arise.

The left detests the free market, whether in the context of the Internet or virtually any other segment of the economy. Government knows best, leftists believe. Fortunately, elections have consequences and President Trump put in place at the FCC someone who understands the benefits of the free market. Under Chairman Ajit Pai’s leadership, the FCC removed the dead weight of intrusive regulation on Internet innovation and investment in infrastructure. It also restored the market freedom under which the Internet has thrived.

Freeing Americans From Red Tape

This was posted at One America News today:

The article reports:

President Trump touts his administration’s advanced progress on deregulation, saying for every one new regulation — 22 are eliminated.

From the White House Thursday, the president said this will allow the U.S. to build and create more jobs.

President Trump said checking on unlawful regulations means “defending Democracy” and “draining the swamp.”

In a symbolic “cutting of red tape,” the president compared a short stack of papers representing regulations from the 1960’s to that of a tall stack of papers symbolizing today’s regulations.

President Trump has stated that his goal is to get the stack of regulations smaller than the stack from 1960.

Was Anyone Paying Attention To The Law?

Judicial Watch released the following Press Release today:

(Washington, DC) – Judicial Watch today released new U.S. Department of State documents showing former Secretary Hillary Clinton and her then-Deputy Chief of Staff Huma Abedin were permitted to remove electronic and physical records under a claim they were “personal” materials and “unclassified, non-record materials,” including files of Clinton’s calls and schedules, which were not to be made public. The documents show the Obama State Department records would not be “released to the general public under FOIA.”

The new records also show that Huma Abedin was allowed to take five boxes of “physical files” out of the State Department that include records described as “Muslim Engagement Documents.”

Judicial Watch obtained the reports about the records from a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for:

Any and all DS-1904 (Authorization for the Removal of Personal Papers and Non-Record Materials) forms completed by, or on behalf of, any of the following individuals:

Former Secretary Hillary Clinton

Former Chief of Staff Cheryl Mills

Former Deputy Chief of Staff Huma Abedin

Former Deputy Chief of Staff Jacob Sullivan

The documents include a list of official and personal calls and schedules that Clinton removed, which carry a special notation that the documents were not to be made public records. The notation is on an addendum to a DS-1904 signed by Clarence N. Finney Jr., then-director of the Office of Correspondence and Records, who was the reviewing officer. (Judicial Watch has a pending request for the deposition of Finney in separate litigation concerning Clinton emails and the Benghazi terrorist attack.):

NOTE: The Secretary’s call log, grid and schedules are not classified, however, they would not be released to the general public under FOIA. They are being released to the Secretary with this understanding. [Emphasis in original]

***

Electronic copy of “daily files” – which are word versions of public documents and non-records: speeches/press statements/photos from the website, a non-record copy of the schedule, a non record copy of the call log, press clips, and agenda of daily activities

Electronic copy of a log of calls the Secretary made since 2004, it is a non-record, since her official calls are logged elsewhere (official schedule and official call log)

Electronic copy of the Secretary’s “call grid” which is a running list of calls she wants to make (both personal and official)

16 boxes: Personal Schedules (1993 thru 2008-prior to the Secretary’s tenure at the Department of State.

29 boxes: Miscellaneous Public Schedules during her tenure as FLOTUS and Senator-prior to the Secretary’s tenure at the Department of State

1 box: Personal Reimbursable receipts (6/25/2009 thru 1/14/2013)

1 box: Personal Photos

1 box: Personal schedule (2009-2013)

The originals of some Clinton documents were retained, such as the call logs and schedules. For other records, including material that predates Clinton’s tenure, there is no indication that a copy was made. The most significant of these are her personal correspondence and gift binders, which could reflect Clinton Foundation and Clinton Global Initiative ties.

Through its previous investigations Judicial Watch made public numerous examples of Clinton’s schedule being broadcast via email through her unsecure, non-government server (for example, see here, here, here and here.)

The records uncovered by Judicial Watch also contain a list of materials removed by Clinton accumulated by Robert Russo, Clinton’s then-special assistant, including PDFs of Clinton’s “correspondence in response to gifts … thank you and acknowledgements,” as well as other records.

The documents indicate that Clinton removed a physical file of “the log of the Secretary’s gifts with pictures of gifts.”

The receipt of gifts by federal employees in the Executive Branch is regulated:

A “prohibited source” [of gifts] under the regulations is one who seeks official action from the employee’s agency; one who does business or seeks to do business with the agency; one whose activities are regulated by the employee’s agency; one whose interests may be substantially affected by the performance or nonperformance of the employee’s official duties; or an organization a majority of whose members fit any of the above categories.

A gift is given “because of” the employee’s official position if it would not have been offered “had the employee not held the status, authority or duties associated with his Federal position.”  Gifts that are “motivated by a family relationship or personal friendship” may therefore be accepted without limitation.

“We already know the Obama State Department let Hillary Clinton steal and then delete her government emails, which included classified information. But these new records show that was only part of the scandal. These new documents show the Obama State Department had a deal with Hillary Clinton to hide her calls logs and schedules, which would be contrary to FOIA and other laws,” said Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton. “When are the American people going to get an honest investigation of the Clinton crimes?”

What are they trying to hide?

Stuck On Stupid

Brietbart reported last week that one of the changes made in the tax bill when it went to the Senate was to continue to allow non-citizens to collect tax money from the government.

The article reports:

Rep. Luke Messer (R-IN) made sure that a fix to this long-standing discrepancy was included in the House version of the tax bill. When the bill came out of chairman Kevin Brady’s (R-TX) House Ways and Means Committee, it included the language Messer originally inserted, demanding a credit claimant include “the taxpayer’s Social Security number on the return of tax for such taxable year.” This language would have blocked illegal aliens, who lack real SSNs, from claiming the lucrative benefit.

Yet when the Senate marked up the bill, the language was tweaked to allow some illegals to continue to claim the benefit. The text of the version the Senate eventually passed reads, “No credit shall be allowed under this section to a taxpayer with respect to any qualifying child unless the taxpayer includes the name and Social Security number of such qualifying child on the return of tax for the taxable year” (emphasis added).

The article explains:

The Personal Responsibility and Work Opportunity Act of 1996 (PRWOA) expressly provides that illegal aliens are “not eligible for any Federal public benefit.” But as Jan Ting of the Center for Immigration Studies (CIS) has explained at length, this benefit has continued to be available to illegals because the IRS has interpreted the ambiguity of the language of the current tax code to make no distinction between U.S. citizens and legal residents and claimants who have no right to be in the United States. A 2011 Treasury Inspector General for Tax Administration report suggests credits like these are putting billions of dollars in the hands of illegals. It was this situation that led to Messer and others attempting to fix the loophole.

CIS’s Ting, a law professor, sounded the alarm Monday that the Senate version had stepped drastically away from the House intent to keep the child tax credit from illegal aliens. Asked by Breitbart News if there was any plausible motive in the Senate’s change in language other than to benefit illegal aliens, Ting replied, “It’s a mystery to me. Why should we funnel taxpayer dollars to illegal aliens?”

Notably, even the Senate version’s language is an improvement to the existing law in keeping federal benefits from illegals. Under the altered version, at least illegal aliens with illegal alien children who are not covered by DACA will be unable to claim the child tax credit.

In 2015, I posted the following from the DC Clothesline:

Sen. Jeff Sessions proposed an amendment, which would prevent illegal aliens from receiving the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC)  and child credit.

…In the last year with complete records, 2010, the amount of fraudulent payments hit 4.2 billion dollars and all tax credits combined cost about 7.6 billion last year.

Democrats who voted against the amendment were:  Bernie Sanders, Debbie Stabenow,  Sens. Patty Murray, Ron Wyden, Sheldon Whitehouse, Jeff Merkley, Mark Warner, Tammy Baldwin, Tim Kaine and Angus King.

…Debbie Stabenow, who is one of many democratic women with IQs in single digits said she doesn’t believe illegal aliens are collecting federal benefits even though the idea came from the Treasury Inspector General who stated unequivocally that illegals are collecting benefits was right in front of her.

The amendment failed with unanimous support of the republicans on the committee.

Is the Senate trying to bankrupt the country? Why are we giving this money to people who are here illegally while our veterans are living on the streets?