Monthly Archives: December 2019

We May Disagree, But We Need To Remember Our Manners

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Former Navy SEAL Jonathan Gilliam is someone who occasionally fills in for David Webb on the David Webb radio show. He is a former Navy SEAL who is well trained in the art of self defense. Recently he was asked to speak in Washington to a group called Women for America First.

The Gateway Pundit posted an article today about what happened next. The quote below is included in the article (the quote is originally from a Breitbart article):

Andrew James Ruder, 37, of Charleston, South Carolina, was arrested for simple assault by the District of Columbia Metropolitan Police Department on Saturday for allegedly hitting and choking a man who attended a pro-President Donald Trump event at the Willard International Hotel, according to a police report obtained by Breitbart News and a spokesperson for the Metropolitan Police Department.

Jonathan Gilliam, a retired Navy SEAL and former FBI special agent who was a speaker at the Women for America First event, is named as the victim of the alleged assault in the police report.

…The police report said Ruder used “Personal Weapons (Hands / Feet)” in the attack: On listed date time and location S-1 lunged in a aggressive manner towards V-1 in which S-2 joined and assaulted V-1 by grabbing his neck causing the listed injury. V-1 was able to defend himself and strike S-1 on the face with a closed fist. S-1 was placed under arrest and transported to the Second District for processing.

Please follow the link above to read the entire article. It details harassment by people who do not support President Trump attending a wedding in the same hotel . We are all entitled to our opinions, but certain behavior needs to be simply out of bounds.

The article reports:

Our event on Saturday evening was rudely disrupted when attendees from a high-profile democrat wedding in the adjacent ballroom repeatedly stalked, harassed, and both verbally and ultimately physically attacked our guests. Throughout the evening, on at least 30 different occasions, our private event was interrupted. One group of our guests trying to locate our event was invited into the room the wedding was being held by a group of women attending the wedding. Once inside, they realized it was the wrong room, but the women told them they should stay because it was a Biden rally and they simply shouldn’t support President Trump. Our guests were repeatedly verbally assaulted with comments such as “is this an actual thing?”, “you should be ashamed of yourselves”, “MAGA Trash”, “Nazis” and “C*nts”. Wedding guests walked into our event as if they belonged there and began bidding on silent auction items. Ultimately hotel security was placed at the door of our event at the end of the night but even that did not deter the wedding guests from antagonizing our group in the hallways or in the restrooms.

As the evening came to a close, our guest speaker, former Navy SEAL and FBI agent, Jonathan T. Gilliam, helped escort our guests out of the venue. During this time, the alleged best man refused to allow people on the elevator saying, “you’re only allowed in if you respect your ovaries”. As Jonathan escorted approximately five of our guests to the lobby of the hotel via the stairs so they could exit the hotel, the alleged best man in the wedding party and several other individuals began verbally taunting him and the women he was protecting, resulting in an altercation. Subsequently, Jonathan was physically attacked by approximately 4-6 other attendees of the wedding party who piled on attempting to choke and beat him, before he was able to break free and counter the attack. After others intervened, including a plain clothed officer, the fight was broken up. Metro DC police responded to the assault within minutes and the alleged best man was arrested.

The abuse by the wedding guests did not stop there. After the police arrested the man, the wedding guests proceeded to confront our guests and screaming to “make things right”. The wedding guests proceeded to the Round Robin Bar where they continued to intimidate members of our group to the point where our members retreated to their rooms to avoid any further attacks.

This is not acceptable behavior by any standards, and the hotel security should have stopped it on the spot by removing anyone harassing the guests. It is my hope that the men guilty of the assault will do some serious jail time and not just a slap on the wrist.

 

 

There Are A Few Honest Patriots Left In Washington

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The Conservative Treehouse reported yesterday that former NSA Director, Admiral Mike Rogers, has been working with U.S. Attorney John Durham for several months during his investigation into the origin of the 2016 intelligence operation against candidate Trump.

Who is Admiral Rogers? In May 2018, I posted an article about him.

In the article I quoted The American Thinker:

The FBI is asked–way back as early as 2015, but who knows? — to be helpful to the Dems and they agree. What they do is they hire non-government consultants with close Dem ties to do “analytical work” for them, which happens to include total access to NSA data. Advantages? For the Dems, obviously, access to EVERYTHING digital. A gold mine for modern campaign research. For the FBI there’s also an advantage. They get to play dumb — gosh, we didn’t know they were looking at all that stuff! They also don’t have to falsify anything, like making [stuff] up to “justify” opening a FI [full investigation]on an American citizen and then lying to the FISC to get a FISA on the USPER [US person] and having to continually renew the FISA and lie all over again to the FISC each renewal. And the beauty of it all is, who’s ever going to find out? And even if they do, how do you prove criminal intent?

So everything’s humming along until a pain in the a** named Mike Rogers at NSA does an audit in 4/2016, just as the real campaign season is about to start. And Rogers learns that 85% of the searches the FBI has done between 12/2015 and 4/2016 have been totally out of bounds. And he clamps down — no more non-government contractors, tight auditing on searches of NSA data. Oh sh*t! What to do, just give up? Well, not necessarily, but there’s a lot more work involved and a lot more fudging the facts. What the FBI needs to do now is get a FISA that will cover their a** and provide coverage on the GOPers going forward. That means, first get a FI on an USPER [US person] connected to the Trump campaign (who looks, in [April] or [May] 2016, like the GOP candidate) so you can then get that FISA. That’s not so easy, because they’ve got to find an USPER with that profile who they can plausibly present as a Russian spy. But they have this source named Halper.

So they first open a PI [preliminary investigation]. That allows them to legally use NatSec Letters and other investigative techniques to keep at least some of what they were doing going. But importantly this allows them to legally use Halper to try to frame people connected to the Trump campaign — IOW, find someone to open a FI on so they can then get that FISA. However the PI is framed, that’s what they’re looking to do. It has legal form, even if the real intent is to help the Dems. And you can see why this had to be a CI [counterintelligence] thing, so in a sense the Russia narrative was almost inevitable — no other bogeyman would really fit the bill, and especially on short notice.

So that’s what they do, and Halper helps them come up with Papadopoulos and Page, so by the end of July they’ve got their FI. Problem. Their first FISA is rejected, but eventually, 10/2016, they get that.

And then Trump wins and Rogers visits Trump Tower. And the Deep State has a fit.

The Conservative Treehouse reports:

♦ On November 17th, 2016, NSA Director Admiral Mike Rogers went to see President-Elect Donald Trump in Trump Tower, New York. –SEE HERE– Director Rogers never told his boss DNI, James Clapper or anyone else in the intelligence community.

♦ On November 18th, 2016, the Trump Transition Team announced they were moving all transition activity to Trump National Golf Club in Bedminster, New Jersey. –SEE HERE– Where they interviewed and discussed the most sensitive positions to fill. Defense, State, CIA, ODNI.

The transition team was set up in Trump Tower. The very next day, November 18th 2016, Trump moves the entire transition team to Bedminister New Jersey?

The information the FBI collected, and the stuff Fusion GPS was creating via Christopher Steele, was used to create the Russian Narrative and also to manipulate the FISC into giving them a FISA warrant. ie. “The Insurance Policy”.

Ultimately, the people within all of these intercepts is what Devin Nunes discovered when he looked at the “unmasking requests” which were a result of those FISA 702(17) collections on Team Trump. That’s why Devin Nunes was so stunned at what he saw in February and March 2017.

Back to FISA Judge Collyer.

On October 26th, 2016, NSA Director Rogers wouldn’t know what Collyer knew about the FBI requesting a surveillance warrant on Carter Page and by extension the Trump campaign. However, Collyer would be putting the briefing about database searches together with her knowledge of the FISA application she authorized.

In her mind, those Trump Tower searches would likely be part of the arc of the FBI investigation. To FISC Judge Collyer everything may seem to be in the lane of legal, albeit stretched on the database (FISA-702) searches, up and until she is informed the underlying evidence for the FISA application was built on FBI fraud and misrepresentations to the court in 2019 by IG Horowitz.

Now, it’s all out in the open and no longer subject to opinion.

After the DOJ inspector general informs, positively affirms, Judge Collyer was purposely misled into cooperating with, and authorizing, a fraudulent FBI investigation…. well, now Collyer is also likely rethinking those Trump Tower searches Director Rogers told her about back in 2016.

There are a few honest men in Washington. Admiral Rogers is one of them.

Protecting Americans From Unlawful Surveillance

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Yesterday Judicial Watch posted the following Press Release:

(Washington, DC) – Judicial Watch announced it today filed a lawsuit against Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) and the House Intelligence Committee for the controversial subpoenas issued for phone records, including those of Rudy Giuliani, President Trump’s lawyer. The phone records led to the publication of the private phone records of Giuliani, Congressman Devon Nunes, journalist John Solomon, Trump attorney Jay Sekulow, attorney Victoria Toensing, and other American citizens.

Judicial Watch filed the lawsuit under the public’s common-law right of public access to examine government records after it received no response to a December 6, 2019, records request (Judicial Watch v Adam Schiff and U.S. House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence (No. 1:19-cv-03790)):

    1. All subpoenas issued by the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence on or about September 30, 2019 to any telecommunications provider including, but not limited to AT&T, Inc., for records of telephone calls of any individuals;
    2. All responses received to the above-referenced subpoenas.

Schiff is a member of the U.S. House of Representatives, currently serving as Chairman of the United States House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence. Schiff is being sued in his capacity as Chairman of that committee. The new lawsuit states:

The records are of critical public importance as the subpoenas were issued without any lawful basis and violated the rights of numerous private citizens.

Disclosure of the requested records would serve the public interest by providing information about the unlawful issuance of the subpoenas.

The requested records fall within the scope of the public’s right of access to governmental records as a matter of federal common law.

“Adam Schiff abused his power to secretly subpoena and then publish the private phone records, in potential violation of law, of innocent Americans. What else is Mr. Schiff hiding?” asked Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton. “Schiff and his Committee ran roughshod over the rule of law in pursuit of the abusive impeachment of President Trump. This lawsuit serves as a reminder that Congressman Schiff and Congress are not above the law.”

What Adam Schiff did is inexcusable. Private phone records are private unless subpoenaed. What was the basis for the subpoena? This is simply another instance where someone aligned with the deep state chose to ignore the rights of American citizens for his own purposes. If this is not stopped and people held accountable, Americans will continue to be subject to unwarranted violations of their constitutional rights.

How Does Economic Growth Influence Your Vote?

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During the Democrat debate last night, former Vice-President Joe Biden made a very interesting statement.

Townhall reported the following:

Former Vice President Joe Biden stated he is more than willing to “sacrifice” the ongoing economic growth, resulting in the displacement of thousands of blue collar workers, in order to shift towards a more green economy. 

“The answer is yes, because the opportunity, the opportunity for those workers to transition to high paying jobs, as Tom said, is real,” Biden said during the sixth Democratic presidential debate on Thursday.

“We’re the only country that’s taken great, great crises and turned them into enormous opportunities. I’ve met with the union leaders. For example, we should in fact be making sure right now that every new building built is energy contained, that it doesn’t leak energy, that in fact we should be providing tax credits for people to be able to make their homes turn to solar power,” he continued.

Instead of fossil fuel jobs, Biden said there is an opportunity to install 550,000 charging stations across the United States so that the country can own the electric vehicle market. 

“There are so many things we can do. We have to make sure we explain it to those people who are displaced, that their skills are going to be needed for the new opportunities,” Biden added.

I wonder if the former Vice-President understands what it will be like for those workers as he ‘transitions’ the economy. I wonder if he is planning to make their house payments and their car payments. I wonder if he remembers the hardships the Obama administration caused to the coal industry workers in West Virginia. We really cannot afford to elect a President who plans on taking jobs away for the good of the people.

In Britain, The People Are Winning

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Fox News is reporting today that British lawmakers overwhelmingly voted to approve Prime Minister Boris Johnson’s new Brexit deal Friday. The deal means that Britain will leave the European Union by January 31st.

The article reports:

Before Friday’s vote, Johnson painted it as a moment of closure for Britons, saying, “Brexit will be done, it will be over.”

“This is a time when we move on and discard the old labels of ‘leave’ and ‘remain’,’ he added. “Now is the time to act together as one reinvigorated nation.”

He said passing the bill would end the “acrimony and anguish” that has consumed the country for the last three years.

…The bill commits Britain to leaving the EU on Jan. 31 and to concluding trade talks with the bloc by the end of 2020. Trade experts and EU officials say striking a free trade deal within 11 months will be a struggle, but Johnson insists he won’t agree to any more delays, The Brexit bill has been amended to bar ministers from agreeing to extend the transition period with the EU.

The new divorce bill needs to be ratified by the European Parliament, whose vice president, Pedro Silva Pereira said officials expect to happen by Jan. 29.

It took a referendum and another election, but the wishes of the people in Britain are finally being honored. The political elites who fought Brexit have now been defeated–at least temporarily.

President Pelosi?

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Yesterday The Gateway Pundit reported some recent comments by Adam Schiff to Rachel Maddow.

The article quotes the comments:

Adam Schiff: Well, we have acquired a piece of evidence, classified by Jennifer Williams, something she alluded to in her open testimony. Then going back and looking through her records she found other information that was pertinent to that phone call that we asked her about and made that submission. There is nothing that is classified in the document but the vice president’s office has said they are going to classify… It is not proper to classify something because it would be embarrassing or incriminating. And that submission does shed light on the vice president’s knowledge. We think the American people should see it.

The article notes:

During their conversation Schiff announced he was going after Vice President Mike Pence next and may have “acquired evidence” that the Vice President is hiding information in the House Ukrainian investigation.

If this sounds totally ridiculous (which it is), I would like to remind you of a quote from Maxine Waters (reported by Hot Air in September 2018):

“They say, ‘Maxine, please don’t say impeachment anymore.’

“And when they say that, I say impeachment, impeachment, impeachment, impeachment, impeachment, impeachment, impeachment, impeachment,” she said to applause.

Waters told the crowd she won’t stop with Trump.

“I had a conversation here today with someone asked, ‘Well, what about Pence? If you are able to impeach, Pence will be worse,’” she recollected.

“Well, I said, ‘Look, one at a time.’

“You knock one down, one at a time,” she said.

“You knock one down, and we’ll be ready for Pence. We’ll get him, too,” she vowed.

The article at The Gateway Pundit concludes:

Jennifer Williams testified before Congress in November and offered nothing. She worked for Vice President Mike Pence. So now Schiff has Democrats thinking Williams holds the key to Pence’s impeachment.

It is a scary thought that the ultimate result of what the Democrats are trying to do would be to install Nancy Pelosi as President. Hopefully, what Adam Schiff is trying to do is impossible, but his comments are a frightening window into his thoughts. I guess Representative Schiff really does not care that nearly 63 million Americans voted for President Trump.

 

Stay Tuned

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The Democrats in Congress seem intent on rewriting the Constitution and rewriting precedent on how things are supposed to be done. The latest rewrite involves the comment by Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi that she will delay forwarding articles of impeachment to the Senate until she is convinced that the Senate trial will be fair. That is an amazing statement given the total unfairness of the trial in the House of Representatives, but it also goes against precedent. I am not a lawyer, but one lawyer who graduated from Harvard Law School has weighed in on what may happen next.

Yesterday Breitbart posted an article written by Joel B. Pollak about the legal aspect of what Speaker Pelosi is doing.

The article reports:

Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) appears to be considering an idea Democrats have floated for several days of holding back the articles of impeachment to exercise leverage over the Senate and the president.

She declined formally to transmit the articles to the Senate on Wednesday evening after the House voted to impeach President Donald Trump.

Unfortunately for them, the Senate can act, regardless — and would vote to acquit.

That’s because the Constitution is absolutely clear about the Senate’s authority. Article I, Section 3 says: “The Senate shall have the sole Power to try all Impeachments.”

That is all.

The Chief Justice presides over a trial involving the president, but the Senate makes the rules. And the Senate is controlled by Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-KY), who regards what the House has done with contempt.

You’re in Cocaine Mitch’s court, now.

Politico outlined Democrats’ new idea, citing constitutional lawyer Laurence Tribe (but, interestingly, not the Constitution itself). Pelosi hopes to pressure McConnell into holding a “fair trial” — this, after she and her party broke every relevant House rule and precedent, and several Amendments in the Bill of Rights, all in the name of their “sole Power of Impeachment.”

They forget that a “fair trial” applies to the accused, not the accuser, and has since 1215.

The article notes the contradiction between what Speaker Pelosi is doing now and previous statements by House of Representatives regarding impeachment.

The article concludes:

If Pelosi refuses to submit the articles of impeachment to the Senate, McConnell can convene the Senate anyway, summon the Chief Justice, and swear in the Senators as jurors. Democrats can boycott, but they can’t stop the trial.

McConnell can then propose to dismiss the charges or even hold a vote to acquit the president.

Pelosi can hide the articles of impeachment in Adam Schiff’s basement forever, and it won’t make a bit of difference.

Stay tuned. This entire process has turned the Constitution on its head–from the rights of the accused, to vague articles of impeachment, to ignoring precedents involved in impeachment.

National Security Includes Immigration

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On Sunday, The Clarion Project reported:

A Saudi student in New Mexico arrested for illegal possession of a handgun had a hit list of people he planned to kill.

The list included professors at the University of New Mexico, where he was an engineering student.

Hassan Alqahtani, 27, who also received his bachelor’s degree from UNM, turned himself in to authorities on Friday.

Alqahtani allegedly had a gun and wanted to buy other guns. The FBI received a tip about Alqahtani’s illegal possession of a gun by a person who also reported that Alqahtani had compiled a “list of people who he wants to kill before he leaves the U.S.”

The list included the acquaintance of Alqahtani who tipped off the FBI.

The incident follows the deadly shooting at the Pensacola, Florida naval base, in which a 21-year old Saudi aviation student killed three and wounded eight when he open fired with a handgun.

Those who want to harm America already have people in place. We need to be very careful about who we allow to come to our country–for whatever reason. It really is the time to reevaluate the relationship between Saudi Arabia and terrorism. I understand that we need Saudi Arabia as an ally to counter Iran in the Middle East, but we are not being smart about the Saudis we allow into our country. Thank God they arrested this man before he had a chance to carry out his plans.

Why The Bill Of Rights Is Important

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The First Amendment of the U.S. Constitution states:

Amendment I

Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

The free exercise of religion will be under scrutiny in the Supreme Court this session.

Yesterday CBN News reported:

The US Supreme Court has agreed to weigh in on an important religious liberty concern. On Wednesday, the high court announced it will take up two cases which could decide if religious institutions have the right to pick who teaches their religion. Or if the government gets to have the final say.

Both cases will be rolled into one case for a hearing this spring at the court. Both involve California Catholic schools that each dismissed fifth-grade teachers the schools felt were performing their jobs poorly.

These teachers were deeply involved in the religious education of their students. But the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals overturned lower court rulings and decided neither teacher was so involved in religious teaching that the schools should be allowed to get rid of them.

The article concludes:

Becket ( Becket Fund for Religious Liberty) Executive Director Montserrat Alvarado stated, “Parents trust Catholic schools to assist them in one of their most important duties: forming the faith of their children.   If courts can second-guess a Catholic school’s judgment about who should teach religious beliefs to fifth graders, then neither Catholics nor any other religious group can be confident in their ability to convey the faith to the next generation.”

The two cases are Our Lady of Guadalupe School v. Morrissey-Berru and St. James Catholic School v. Biel. In the Morrissey-Berru case, the Ninth Circuit agreed the teacher had “significant religious responsibilities,” but decided those duties weren’t religious enough for the school to invoke its First Amendment right to control who’s teaching the faith to its students.

The cases involve something known as the ministerial exception. It represents the idea that religious groups involved in teaching their faith can only truly be free from government interference if they have full control of choosing who teaches that faith in their institutions.

Freedom is always one generation away from extinction. We need to protect all of the rights guaranteed in the Bill of Rights.

Still Fishing…

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Yesterday Paul Mirengoff posted an article at Power Line Blog about some recent comments by Senator Schumer.

The article notes:

Chuck Schumer’s moan that “the facts” need to “com[e] out” before a full impeachment trial can occur is an invitation to a motion to dismiss the House’s articles of impeachment, once they arrive. The House had its opportunity to develop the facts. If it didn’t develop facts sufficient to support removing the president, the Senate shouldn’t waste its time on the matter.

Mitch McConnell reportedly is considering a motion to dismiss. According to this report, he hinted that the Senate will move to dismiss the articles of impeachment after opening argument.

McConnell noted that in the 1999 trial of Bill Clinton, Schumer supported a motion to dismiss the case. He also recalled that Schumer opposed calling live witnesses. This time around, Schumer wants to call at least four witnesses who did not appear before the House.

Some Republicans, including President Trump apparently, also want to call witnesses during the impeachment trial. Joe and Hunter Biden have been mentioned, along with the whistleblower and even Adam Schiff. However, I agree with those who want to end the impeachment trial early. If Republicans want to hear from certain players, they can try to bring them in as part of the ordinary oversight process.

Why is Chuck Schumer still looking for the facts? It is the job of the House of Representatives to present the facts to the Senate for trial. If there are no facts, there is no reason for a trial. The Democrats have been looking for a crime for almost three years now. They have done little else. It is time for them to put their toys away and get to work. There will be an election in less than a year. Let the American people decide (or is that what they are afraid of?).

The Deflection Involved In Impeachment

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One of the things the media became expert at during the Obama administration was deflection. They were good at it before then, but they perfected it during the Obama years. The current impeachment trial is one example of deflection.

On December 16th, The Federalist posted an article that tells a story that the Democrats in Congress have fought to avoid telling.

The article reports:

Robert Powell, the husband of Rep. Debbie Mucarsel-Powell, D-Fla., reportedly took $700,000 from a Ukrainian oligarch named Igor Kolomoisky. Mucarsel-Powell sits on the House Judiciary Committee, the committee that drafted two articles of impeachment against President Donald Trump for his alleged abuse of power with regards to Ukraine.

In 2018, the Daily Beast reported that a number of businesses linked to Kolomoisky hired Powell as an attorney. One of those firms paid Powell at least $700,000 over two years, according to public records.

The Miami Herald reported Powell was working for companies tied to Kolomoisky for 10 years. Powell made most of his money in the two years leading up to his wife’s election in 2018.

Kolomoisky has been accused of contract killings and embezzlement in the past. Yet, in 2018 when Mucarsel-Powell was running for her seat, she did not see her husband’s work as relevant to her campaign.

“Debbie Mucrasel-Powell is running for Congress, not her husband. To imply that Debbie has anything to do with her indirect shareholder of a parent company that once employed her husband is an enormous stretch,” said Michael Hernandez, senior communications advisor for her campaign in 2018.

While Mucrasel-Powell may have convinced her constituents that her husband’s work is unrelated, it is a clear conflict in the current impeachment of Trump. Mucarsel-Powell voted to impeach Trump.

The article concludes:

And yet, no Democrats see a problem with one of their own committee members’ spouses doing business with a Ukrainian ogliarch. There has been no check on whether Mucrasel-Powell is benefitting from her husband’s work with a foreign power that interfered in the 2016 election.

There is a double standard in Mucrasel-Powell’s ability to impeach the President for his work in Ukraine, simultaneously, allowing her husband to earn money from Kolomoisky, a thug from the same foreign power.

The alternative media still includes a number of investigative reporters. It is quite likely that more of this sort of information will be uncovered in the near future. We may be about to discover how someone can enter Congress as a member of the Middle Class and emerge ten years later as a millionaire on a salary of $174,000 while supporting a home in their district and one in Washington, D.C.

Why Your News Source Matters

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Yesterday CNS News posted an article about recent events involving Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court judge Rosemary M. Collyer and the FBI.

The article reports:

A complete and total blackout. That was how ABC, CBS, and NBC reacted on their Tuesday evening newscasts when the top Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court judge, Rosemary M. Collyer blasted the FBI for misleading the court when seeking surveillance warrants for a former Trump campaign staffer. The order was damning, accusing an FBI lawyer of a criminal act in intentionally lying to the court. It added that the court’s confidence in the FBI’s evidence was so shaken they needed extra oversight for all cases.

Judge Collyer penned the four-page order declaring: “When FBI personnel mislead NSD [National Security Division] in the ways described above, they equally mislead the FISC.” Much of the order explained the application process for obtaining FISA warrants and what happened in the case of Carter Page; in order for the public to “appreciate the seriousness of that misconduct and its implications…”

On page three of the order, the judge accused an unnamed FBI lawyer of intentionally lying to other FBI personnel and the FISC in turn, which was a criminal act:

In addition, while the fourth electronic surveillance application for Mr. Page was being prepared, an attorney in the FBI’s Office of General Counsel (OGC) engaged in conduct that apparently was intended to mislead the FBI agent who ultimately swore to the facts in that application about whether Mr. Page had been a source of another government agency.

She added that the FISC couldn’t trust anything the FBI told them anymore:

The frequency with which representations made by FBI personnel turned out to be unsupported or contradicted by information in their possession, and with which they withheld information detrimental to their case, calls into question whether information contained in other FBI applications is reliable.

From Fox News:

Please follow the link to the CNS News article to read the entire piece. Not only were the civil rights of American citizens violated, the mainstream media has refused to report what is going on.

 

Do Liars Ever Apologize?

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Scott Johnson at Power Line Blog posted an article today about what we now know about conflicting memos by Devin Nunes and Adam Schiff regarding FISA warrants.

The article reports:

When then House Intelligence Committee Chairman Devin Nunes released his memo asserting that the FBI had improperly taken out FISA warrants on Carter Page, Ranking Member Adam Schiff responded with a memo of his own disputing it. The Nunes memo is accessible here and elsewhere; the Schiff memo is accessible here and elsewhere.

Both Nunes and Schiff had access to the same classified information for their memos, but Nunes was interested in disseminating the truth while Schiff sought to lie about it in the service of the Russia hoax. As has become all too clear, Schiff lies with the sangfroid of a pathological liar.

After the Department of Justice Inspector General report on FISA abuse that was released last week, we now know to a certainty that Nunes was right and Schiff was wrong. We know that Schiff was lying.

Schiff is lying now about about his lying then. It’s a postmodern world after all. In an interview with Chris Wallace on FOX News Sunday (beginning at about 5:30 below), Schiff allowed that there were indeed “serious abuses of FISA” — “serious abuses that I was unaware of.” He explained: “Had I known of them, Chris, yes, I would’ve called out the FBI at the same time,” Schiff said. “But I think it’s only fair to judge what we knew at the time.”

The article includes the memos. Scott Johnson reminds us that both men had the same access to the same information. Adam Schiff’s claim that he was unaware of the abuses is simply false. He is lying. And he continues to lie.

Please follow the link above to read the entire article. It is discouraging to see a Representative who lies so easily and so frequently.

Economic Indicators In November

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One America News is reporting today that U.S. homebuilding increased more than expected in November and permits for future home construction surged to a 12-1/2-year high.

The article reports:

The economy’s near-term prospects were also bolstered by other data on Tuesday showing a strong rebound in manufacturing production in November as the return of formerly striking General Motors’ <GM.N> workers boosted automobile output. The data suggested the economy remained on a moderate growth path in the fourth quarter despite slowing consumer spending.

…In a separate report on Tuesday, the Fed said manufacturing production rose 1.1% last month after dropping 0.7% in October. Excluding motor vehicles and parts, manufacturing output increased 0.3%.

The rebound in manufacturing production suggests the factory downturn is probably close to running its course. Manufacturing output is still expected to contract in the fourth quarter.

“This is a welcome shift after declines in three out of the four preceding months, but not the end of the struggles for manufacturing,” said Tim Quinlan, a senior economist at Wells Fargo Securities in Charlotte, North Carolina.

Single-family homebuilding, which accounts for the largest share of the housing market, increased 2.4% to a rate of 938,000 units in November, the highest level since January. Single-family housing starts rose in the West and Northeast, but fell in the Midwest and the South.

Single-family housing building permits rose 0.8% to a rate of 918,000 units in November, the highest since July 2007.

Starts for the volatile multi-family housing segment jumped 4.9% to a rate of 427,000 units last month. Permits for the construction of multi-family homes rose 2.5% to a rate of 564,000 units.

The economy is doing very well. The only thing that would make it better would be if the people we elected and sent to Washington would get serious about cutting spending and lowering our national debt.

The New Standard–Expect A January Surprise

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Yesterday Byron York posted an article at The Washington Examiner that previews what will happen when the impeachment trial moves to the Senate. It’s not a particularly optimistic article in terms of antics by the Democrats, although I think the eventual outcome will be the acquittal of President Trump.

The article reports:

With a House impeachment vote a foregone conclusion, the battle to remove President Trump from office has moved to the Senate. Minority Leader Chuck Schumer grabbed control of the debate Monday with demands for what he called “fairness” in the president’s trial.

I think Senator Schumer’s definition of fairness is, “Heads I win; tails you lose.”

The article continues:

Schumer wants the Senate to allow testimony from four witnesses the House did not interview: former national security adviser John Bolton, acting White House chief of staff Mick Mulvaney, key Mulvaney aide Robert Blair, and Office of Management and Budget official Michael Duffey. House Democratic impeachers wanted the men to testify, but after the White House, claiming privilege, refused, House leaders chose not to try to force them to appear. Going to court to compel their testimony, Democrats said, would take too much time.

Now, Schumer wants the witnesses simply to forget about privilege questions and testify in the Senate trial.

“How, on such a weighty matter, could we avoid hearing this, could we go forward without hearing it?” Schumer asked at a news conference Monday. “I haven’t seen a single good argument about why these witnesses shouldn’t testify — unless the president has something to hide and his supporters want that information hidden.”

Republicans will respond that the Senate is not the place for fact-finding — that is, for senators to become investigators and do what the House declined to do. Some will also note that the House chose not to seek the appointment of an outside investigator, a special counsel, to establish what happened in the Trump-Ukraine matter, and the Senate is ill-equipped to play that role. Many will also argue that the facts of the case do not align with the Democratic accusation of bribery and more testimony will not change that. Others will argue that they don’t believe what the president did rises to the level of an impeachable offense.

The technique the Democrats will use is the one we saw in the Kavanaugh confirmation hearing. The Democrats needs four Republicans to sign on to the idea of calling new witnesses (a simple majority vote is needed). Then they can dig up all the imaginary dirt on the President they can manufacture and totally taint the hearing. The idea is to damage President Trump to the point where the Democrats win the Presidency in 2020 and none of their misdeeds like government abuses of surveillance or violations of citizen’s civil rights will ever be dealt with. I am not sure Americans are stupid enough to buy what they are selling.

On a final note, I would like to share my prediction that Hillary Clinton will be the Democrat’s candidate for President in 2020.

A New Level Of Chutzpah

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Breitbart posted an article today about some recent comments by Senator Schumer.

The article states:

Democrats have a new talking point in their attack on Senate Republicans, ahead of a House vote on the impeachment of President Donald Trump later this week: the Senate is denying Trump a “fair trial.”

That is the line taken by Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY) on Monday, as he insisted that Republicans allow Democrats to call four witnesses who did not appear during the House inquiry.

Three of those witnesses were subpoenaed by the House Intelligence Committee, and declined to appear. Rather than wait for the courts to decide, Democrats passed an article of impeachment on “obstruction of Congress.”

One of the witnesses — former National Security Advisor John Bolton — was never even subpoenaed by the Intelligence Committee, for the same reason: Democrats decided that impeachment simply could not wait.

It would be odd to grant Democrats their requests for witnesses after they themselves decided to impeach Trump before the witnesses could be made available — or, in Bolton’s case, without having even called him in the House.

And Senate Republicans are unlikely to grant Schumer’s request — not after Democrats flouted precedent, due process, and basic fairness in the House, launching a closed-door inquiry in which Republicans were often silenced and were never permitted to call any public witnesses that had not already been called by the Democratic majority.

After the kangaroo court in the House of Representatives, Senator Schumer has reached a new level of chutzpah in complaining the the Senate rules may be unfair. What this dialog illustrates is that this impeachment is a totally partisan affair and because different political parties control each branch of Congress, the process is only going to get worse.

The Trump Economy

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Fox Business reported today that the Dow has gained 10,000 points since Trump’s election.

The article reports:

The stock market has been unstoppable under the influence of President Trump.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average crossed 28,332.74 on Monday, meaning it has rallied 10,000 points, or more than 54 percent, since Trump’s election victory on November 8, 2016. The benchmark S&P 500 has gained more than 46 percent.

“The rally has been driven by pro-growth measures, de-escalation of trade tensions, huge liquidity injections by central banks and a FOMO approach by investors worried about missing out on a remarkable U.S. market outperformance that has set one record high after the other.” Mohamed El-Arian, chief economic adviser at Allianz, told FOX Business.

So if you are an average working American, why does this matter to you? First of all, most Americans have 401k plans. As the stock market rises, the value of those plans rises. However, there is another often overlooked aspect of a growing stock market. Many communities, counties, and states have pension plans for former employees. These are unfunded liabilities. That means that those payments are not considered when drafting budgets. Those payments are made from investment accounts. As the stock market rises, the possibility of having to decrease these payments diminishes and the possibility of the municipality involved having to raise taxes to cover these payments also decreases. People who work gain by both having the value of their retirement accounts increase and by not having to pay higher taxes to cover retirement costs.

When Politics Gets In The Way Of Solving A Problem

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Farming in the Central Valley of California, once the breadbasket of America, has almost ceased entirely because of environmentalist trying to protect a fish that may not even be a unique species, much less endangered.

In February 2014 I posted the following quote from the Herald and News in 2009:

“Thousands of people have also become unemployed or lost the ability to farm, which adversely affects both local and national economies.

“In addition to the California drought, there has been court-ordered protection of a 2-inch smelt fish that has stopped the pumping of water from the delta that is necessary for agriculture in central California. If it is listed as an endangered species, it’s likely that California agriculture, which supplies a third of the nation’s food supply, will be permanently changed.”

I also included the following vacation picture:

Fast forward to the present. One America News posted the following video on YouTube on  November 27th:

Meanwhile, some of the most fertile land in the country lies idle. Common sense has taken a vacation.

Hungary Steps Up To The Plate

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The Gatestone Institute posted an article today about Hungary’s Prime Minister Viktor Orbán. Prime Minister Viktor Orbán is the only European leader who is willing to protect the persecuted Christians fleeing the Muslim onslaught in the Middle East. Please follow the link above to read the entire article. It gives detailed information about what is currently happening to Christians in the Middle East.

The article reports:

  • “Those we are helping now can give us the greatest help in saving Europe. We are giving persecuted Christians what they need: homes, hospitals, and schools, and we receive in return what Europe needs most: a Christian faith, love and perseverance”. — Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, Daily News Hungary, November 28, 2019.
  • “Our estimation is that more than 90 percent of Christian have already left Iraq and almost 50 percent of Christians in Syria have left the country”. — Ignatius Aphrem II, Patriarch of the Syrian Orthodox Church.
  • European leaders, rather than being embarrassed, should make the condition of Christians under Islam the starting point of their conversations with Muslims.
  • “The fate of Eastern Christians and other minorities is the prelude to our own fate.” — Former French Prime Minister François Fillon, Valeurs Actuelles, December 12, 2019.

The article notes that western countries are not reacting to the plight of Christians in the Middle East.

The article reports:

In Europe, however, there is a solitary defender of persecuted Christians: Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán, whom the mainstream media love to peck at and attack. No other European government has invested so much money, public diplomacy and time on this topic. Writing in Foreign Policy, Peter Feaver and Will Inboden explain that aid to Christians come from “a few international relief organizations like the Knights of Columbus and Aid to the Church in Need, and the Hungarian government”. The Knights of Columbus alone raised $2 million to rebuild the Christian Iraqi town of Karamlesh.

“Those we are helping now can give us the greatest help in saving Europe,” Orbán recently said at an international conference, On Christian Persecution 2019, that he organized in Budapest. “We are giving persecuted Christians what they need: homes, hospitals, and schools, and we receive in return what Europe needs most: a Christian faith, love and perseverance”. “Europe is quiet,” Orbán went on. “A mysterious force shuts the mouths of European politicians and cripples their arms.” He said the issue of Christian persecution could only be considered a human rights issue in Europe. He insisted that “Christians are not allowed to be mentioned on their own, only together with other groups that are being persecuted for their faiths.” The persecution of Christians “is therefore folded into the diverse family of persecuted religious groups”.

According to Tristan Azbej, Hungary’s State Secretary for the Aid to Persecuted Christians, Orbán’s is the first European government to have a special State Secretariat “which has only one duty: To look after and monitor the destiny and the situation of the Christian communities all over the world, and if there is a need, we help.”

All western nations need to take part in saving the Christians that are being killed or marginalized in the Middle East. Some of the world’s most ancient Christian communities have been destroyed in the past few years. Western countries need to give these endangered minorities priority status in their refugee programs.

Rewriting History One Campaign Stop At A Time

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Yesterday Breitbart posted an article about a recent statement by former Vice-President Joe Biden.

The article reports:

Former Vice President inaccurately claimed on Saturday that he helped convince Republicans to vote in favor of the Affordable Care Act.

Biden, who has a history of embellishing his political accomplishments, made the claim while boasting about his ability to forge bipartisan consensus during a campaign rally in San Antonio, Texas.

Evidently he was not all that great at forging bipartisan consensus–no Republicans voted for the Affordable Care Act! In fact, Scott Brown, after winning a special election in Massachusetts, somehow was delayed in taking his seat while waiting for the Massachusetts authority to certify the election. Instead of newly-elected Senator Brown being able to vote on the Affordable Care Act, a Democrat appointed by a Democrat state governor was able to cast his vote. I guess the former vice-president forgot all that..

The article notes:

The former vice president said:

The fight ahead of us is not about just what we have planned, its about … whose going to take on and get these things passed. We need someone with proven ability to bring people together and do the hard work of getting legislation passed. I’ve done that, I’ve done that before. Finding Republican votes for … Obamacare.

Stay tuned. I am sure there will be more to come.

Slowly Getting To The Truth

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Fox News posted an article today about a recent comment by James Comey. In an interview with Fox News Sunday host Chris Wallace, James Comey stated that the recently released Justice Department Inspector General’s report on the launch of the FBI’s Russia investigation and their use of the surveillance process showed that he was “overconfident” when he defended his former agency’s use of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA). I don’t mean to be difficult, but I think you could fertilize your garden with that statement. Remember, it was James Comey who leaked information to his friend to leak to The New York Times in order to promote the idea that a Special Prosecutor was needed. It was James Comey who listed all the crimes committed by Hillary Clinton and then said they weren’t really crimes because she didn’t mean to commit them. It was James Comey who briefed the President on the Steele Dossier so that it could be leaked to the press. It was James Comey who paved the way for the entire phony Russia investigation that cost taxpayers millions and prevented Congress from actually accomplishing anything for the good of the country. Keep that in mind as he proclaims he had no idea what was going on.

The article notes:

“He’s right, I was wrong,” Comey said about how the FBI used the FISA process, adding, “I was overconfident as director in our procedures,” and that what happened “was not acceptable.”

Horowitz did make it clear that he believes the FBI’s investigation of Russian election interference and possible connections with the Trump campaign was properly initiated, but he did note that this is based on a “low threshold.” He also concluded that there was no testimonial or documentary evidence to show that the investigation started due to any political bias, but said the issue of bias “gets murkier” when it comes to the various issues with the FISA process.

That process included the reliance on information gathered by former British spy Christopher Steele as part of opposition research conducted by Fusion GPS for the Democratic National Committee and Clinton campaign. Horowitz’s report stated that government attorneys were hesitant to approve a FISA warrant application until they relied on unverified information from Steele. That information also was used in subsequent renewals for the FISA warrant.

Comey downplayed the role of Steele’s information in obtaining the FISA warrant against Page, claiming Sunday that it was “not a huge part of the presentation to the court,” just part of the information included in the warrant application.

It will be interesting to see if James Comey is included when indictments are handed out. My bet is that he will be. He should at least be held accountable for leaking information.

Tariffs Work

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No one likes trade wars, but we continue to see evidence that tariffs (combined with economic strength) work. Bloomberg posted an article on Thursday (updated Friday) about the recent trade agreement reached between the United States and China.The article notes that the tentative agreement was reached just as more tariffs were due to go into effect against China on December 15th. Because of the tentative agreement, the tariffs are postponed.

The article reports:

President Donald Trump signed off on a phase-one trade deal with China, averting the Dec. 15 introduction of a new wave of U.S. tariffs on about $160 billion of consumer goods from the Asian nation, according to people familiar with the matter.

The deal presented to Trump by trade advisers Thursday included a promise by the Chinese to buy more U.S. agricultural goods, according to the people. Officials also discussed possible reductions of existing duties on Chinese products, they said. The terms have been agreed but the legal text has not yet been finalized, the people said. A White House spokesperson declined to comment.

While there was no official confirmation from the government in Beijing on Friday, an announcement is expected in Washington as early as today, according to people familiar with the Americans’ plans. One possible option is for U.S. Trade Representative Robert Lighthizer to sign the agreement with Chinese Ambassador Cui Tiankai, according to people briefed on the matter.

When the agreement was announced, global stocks soared to record highs.

The article concludes:

In addition to a significant increase in Chinese agricultural purchases in exchange for tariff relief, officials have also said a phase-one pact would include Chinese commitments to do more to stop intellectual-property theft and an agreement by both sides not to manipulate their currencies.

Put off for later discussions are knotty issues such as longstanding U.S. complaints over the vast web of subsidies ranging from cheap electricity to low-cost loans that China has used to build its industrial might.

Nothing is at yet cast in stone. Stay tuned.

Comments From Someone Who Would Know

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The Gateway Pundit posted an article today that included the following comment by Charles S. (Sam) Faddis, Senior Partner – Artemis, LLC, a former CIA operations officer with thirty years of experience in the conduct of intelligence operations:

The essence of a coup, which some might refer to as covert action, is the hidden hand. One does not announce that a foreign power is overthrowing the government and installing a new government. One pulls strings as if from behind a curtain, making events that are all part of a carefully orchestrated plan appear disconnected, spontaneous and serendipitous.

As I read through the recently released IG report for the second time, as someone with a great deal of experience in military and intelligence matters, I see that hand everywhere.

Per the IG report, a single report is delivered to the FBI in the summer of 2016. It concerns a meeting between a cooperative contact of a foreign intelligence service and a junior level employee of the Trump campaign, George Papadopoulos. The report relates what are frankly very amorphous comments by Papadopoulos concerning the Russian government and its alleged possession of information on Hillary Clinton.

On any other day this report would command no attention whatsoever. The source in question has no track record of any kind with the FBI. Papadopoulos has been employed by the Trump campaign for perhaps 90 days at this point, and there is no reason to believe he has contacts of significance in the Kremlin.

Not on this occasion. This one report from a foreign intelligence service goes directly to the top of the FBI. The Director himself, James Comey is briefed. A full investigation is launched. Multiple confidential human sources are tasked. Wiretaps are ordered. A task force is organized. Crossfire Hurricane is born.

…The FBI did not conduct an investigation of Donald Trump and his associates that ultimately proved to be based on false information and continue that investigation long past the time it should have been shut down simply because some people made some errors in judgment or some procedures need to be changed. That investigation was simply the most visible piece of a deliberate, covert attempt to overthrow the democratic process. The perpetrators of that crime have yet to be brought to justice and identified. Let’s hope that happens soon.

Please follow the link above to read the entire article. It provides further proof of the theory that this was an illegal coup.