It’s The Spending, Stupid!

On Tuesday, The Daily Caller posted an article about federal spending. If the average American family spent money the way the government does, they would be bankrupt within six months.

The article reports:

The U.S.’ national deficit surged in February as income declined and expenses rose, resulting in the federal government spending more than double what it collected in the month, according to a release from the Treasury Department.

The federal government collected $271 billion in February, mostly through taxes and social insurance and retirement payments, but spent $567 billion, a difference of $296 billion that was funded by an increase in the national debt, according to the Treasury Department. The gain in February brings the total national debt increase in fiscal year 2024 to $828 billion, which began in October 2023.

Remember–we have to pay interest on that debt.

The article continues:

At the end of February, the national debt totaled $34.71 trillion, with $27.38 trillion of that being held by the public and $7.09 trillion being held by other government organizations, according to the Treasury. The federal government recently passed the $34 trillion debt mark right before the start of 2023.

The government has already paid $433 billion in gross interest expenses in fiscal year 2024, far higher than the $306 billion that had been paid at this point in the last fiscal year, according to the Treasury. For the current fiscal year, the Treasury anticipates that it will pay over $1 trillion in just interest costs.

The article concludes:

A Biden administration official claimed that 90% of the non-emergency increase in the debt-to-GDP ratio since 2001 has been the result of tax cuts, the official told the Daily Caller News Foundation in response to a request to comment. The official argued that Biden’s recently proposed budget would reduce the national deficit by $3 trillion through taxing wealthy individuals and big corporations.

If President Joe Biden’s budget proposal is enacted, it is estimated that the debt would increase to $42.5 trillion by the end of fiscal year 2028, around the time his presumptive second term would end.

Can we please have a President who understand the Laffer Curve and economics!

Using Your Tax Dollars To Influence An Election

This is an election year. When you consider everything that has gone on for the past four years, you realize that things were bound to get a little crazy. However, the craziness and dishonestly has reached levels very few of us ever realized they would reach.

On Thursday, Legal Insurrection posted the following headline:

Biden Admin to Use Tax Dollars to Pay College Students to Register Voters Ahead of 2024 Election

Does anyone want to guess the political leanings of college students?

The article reports:

The Biden administration is already facing accusations of trying to buy the votes of college student aged voters by ‘cancelling’ billions in student loan debt. Now they have announced that they will pay college students to register voters, and they’re doing this with tax dollars.

The corruption is right out in the open, for all to see.

The article quotes The Daily Caller:

Vice President Kamala Harris announced Tuesday that college students would be able to collect federally-funded work study for registering voters.

Harris’s announcement of the new policy was posted on X, formerly known as Twitter. The federal work-study program is intended to allow students to earn money for day-to-day expenses while at college, according to the Department of Education.

“We have been doing work to promote voter participation for students,” Harris said. “For example, we have under the Federal Work-Study program now allow students to get paid through Federal Work-Study to register people and to be non-partisan poll workers. As we know, this is important for a number of reasons. One, to engage our young leaders in this process and activate them in terms of their ability to strengthen our communities.”

Do you really think that college students are interested in registering conservative voters? Conservatives and patriots are going to have to come out to vote in very large numbers to overcome the cheating that the Democrats are already planning.

That Ship Already Sailed

On Monday, The Daily Caller posted an article about some concerns in the intelligence community.

The article reports:

The intelligence community is warning that key agencies may be politicized under a second Trump administration as the 2024 election approaches after it tried to discredit the Hunter Biden laptop story and pushed a now-debunked dossier about the former president, Politico reported on Monday.

Former President Donald Trump could politicize the intelligence community through who he appoints and removes as well as demanding adherence to his agenda, the 18 former Trump officials and analysts claimed to Politico. The FBI welcomed the now-discredited Steele Dossier alleging Trump had ties to Russia and 51 former intelligence officials signed onto a letter saying Hunter Biden’s now-authenticated laptop was Russian disinformation shortly before the 2020 presidential election.

I think a more accurate story would be that the intelligence community is concerned that a second term of President Trump might force them to be neutral and obey the Constitution. He might also hold them accountable for the times they broke the law. I suspect he might even change the personnel to make the agencies politically neutral. Oh horrors.

The article concludes:

However, Trump’s campaign cited the examples of the Steele Dossier and Hunter Biden laptop letter among examples of intelligence community weaponization against the former president.

“President Trump has been under assault ever since he announced his campaign in 2016,” Trump campaign spokesperson Steven Cheung told the DCNF. “From spying on his campaign, Russiagate, the Russia collusion hoax, the debunked Steele dossier, and the 51 intelligence officials wrongly ignoring Hunter Biden’s laptop from Hell, the establishment has been trying to meddle in elections because they simply can’t stand voters choosing a candidate who puts America First.”

Trump is currently leading Biden by 2.1 points in a RealClearPolitics national average of polls.

The FBI insisted that the intelligence community incorporate the Steele Dossier in a report of foreign meddling in the 2016 election, according to Politico.

Rep. Jim Jordan of Ohio hinted Wednesday that the Department of Justice is operating under a double standard after it indicted an FBI informant who allegedly provided false evidence of corruption involving Biden, while letting Christopher Steele, a former operative of the Secret Intelligence Service, off the hook for his dossier that was used to try and remove Trump from office.

The FBI “dug their own grave” by promoting the Steele Dossier, one former intelligence official told Politico.

I pray for an honest election without interference from the intelligence community or the deep state.

Is This Legal?

Campaign finance laws require the candidates to list the names of their donors. Generally that works, although not all candidates follow the law. On Wednesday, The Daily Caller reported the following:

Fulton County Superior Court Judge Scott McAfee, who is overseeing the case against former President Donald Trump, made a small donation of $150 to Fulton County District Attorney Fani Willis’ campaign prior to his appointment.

McAfee, who was sworn in on Feb. 1, 2023 after being appointed by Republican Georgia Gov. Brian Kemp, made his donation in June 2020 while still working as an assistant U.S. Attorney for the Department of Justice (DOJ), according to financial disclosures. He will soon have to decide whether Willis should be disqualified over allegations that she financially benefited from appointing her romantic partner, Nathan Wade, to work on the Trump case.

McAfee also formerly worked under Fani Willis when she led the complex trial division in the Fulton County District Attorney’s Office, according to the New York Times.

Atlanta-based criminal defense attorney and legal analyst Philip Holloway told the Daily Caller News Foundation McAfee’s donation was “nominal,” but said it should still have been disclosed to the defendants so they could determine “whether they believed that amounted to a conflict of interest on the part of the judge.”

I agree that the judge should be able to donate whatever amount is legal to whatever candidate he chooses. However, I also agree that the defendants in this case should have been informed of his donations. Logically, they could have asked for a different judge.

From what I have seen of the legal cases against President Trump, I am not convinced of the honesty, integrity or intelligence of those bringing the cases. All of them are fraught with problems on the part of those pursuing them. In Georgia, Fani Willis is going to have her hands full with her own legal issues. In New York, the law was changed to allow Jean Carroll to bring her suit against President Trump. That seems questionable. And also in New York, major business leaders are pulling out of the State, and truckers are refusing to make deliveries there. I don’t think any of these lawsuits are going to have the desired impact and there may be some serious unintended consequences along the way.

Congress Strikes Back

On January 26th, the Biden administration announced a temporary pause on pending approvals of liquefied natural gas exports, claiming that natural gas, as a fossil fuel, is partially responsible for climate change.

On January 27th, World Net Daily reminded us:

Natural gas is considered to be the cleanest variety of energy-dense fossil fuels, and and U.S. LNG is about 30% cleaner than Russian LNG, for example, according to ClearPath.

“Despite the White House’s claims to the contrary, it is profoundly absurd to claim this action will do anything to curb emissions. The natural gas to meet global demand will come from somewhere — either from the US, where it is produced more responsibly than anywhere else on earth, or from other nations with far fewer environmental regulations,” David Blackmon, a 40-year veteran of the oil and gas industry who now writes and consults on the energy sector, previously told the DCNF (Daily Caller News Foundation).

I am sure that Russia appreciated the pause.

Well, Congress has had enough.

On February 15th, The Daily Caller posted the following headline:

‘Easy Vote’: House Passes Bipartisan Rebuke Of Biden Admin’s ‘Radical’ Natural Gas Restriction

The article reports:

The House passed a bill Thursday that would effectively lift the Biden administration’s pause on new liquefied natural gas (LNG) export terminals.

The lower chamber of the legislature passed the “Unlocking Our Domestic LNG Potential Act,” introduced by Republican Rep. August Pfluger of Texas, by a 224-200 bipartisan vote, with nine House Democrats crossing the aisle to join Republicans in voting in favor of the bill. The bill would remove the Department of Energy (DOE) from the process of approving LNG export terminals and give the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) exclusive discretion over whether or not to green light LNG export hubs, according to its text.

All of the Republicans in the House who were present voted for the bill. Nine Democrats also voted for the bill.

The article at The Daily Caller also notes:

“President Biden was pretty clear when, as a candidate, he said, ‘I guarantee you. We’re going to end fossil fuel.’ He has used every weapon and every tool available to make it more difficult on this industry,” Pfluger told the DCNF. “This export ban is just the latest strike in his efforts to appease his radical climate interest groups who refuse to accept the reality that American energy is the cleanest, most secure option for the U.S. and our allies. If you care about energy, about the security of the country, and about what the energy industry has done to lower prices for American households and strengthen our allies and partners, then this is an easy vote.”

If the  American economy is going to survive the Biden administration, we need to be able to harness domestic energy.

 

 

The Overlooked Smoking Gun

On Sunday, The Liberty Daily posted an article by Peter Roff of the Daily Caller News Foundation. The article dealt with one point in the Special Counsel’s Report of President Biden’s mishandling of classified documents that seems to have been overlooked.

The article notes:

Nonetheless, by focusing on what special counsel Robert Hur wrote about Biden’s failing memory in his report on his mishandling of confidential government files dating from his time as vice president, they missed the more significant nugget in Hur’s explanation of why there would be no indictment.

Remember, the Biden Justice Department indicted former President Donald J. Trump over the same issue. The outcomes were different, Hur explained, not just because Biden couldn’t remember things but because he cooperated with the investigation while Trump didn’t.

That should about blow the case out of the water. It all but confirms Trump was singled out for special treatment, as he claimed. The case against him is political, and it’s okay for America to move on because there’s really nothing to see.

As a former president and as a citizen, Trump has rights. He doesn’t have to turn over every document they ask for to the government. Every departing chief enters into a negotiation regarding what they can take with them when they leave. The rules are not at all clear.

They’re obviously not supposed to take any of the furniture that was there when they moved in with them (one recent first couple apparently missed that memo). As far as any documents go, the president and the National Archives are usually allowed the time necessary to work out who gets to keep what.

The former president was not afforded the same luxury as his predecessors. His suggestion the Biden Justice Department rushed the case into court to damage him politically now looks stronger.

I am not a lawyer, but there is another aspect of this that is troubling. Let’s say someone robs a bank and puts the money in an interest-bearing account hidden somewhere. After five of six years in prison, they figure they can live on the interest, so they give back the money. Are they then not charged with the crime? That’s what this sounds like (other than the obvious unequal justice under the law).

The Danger Of An Open Border

America is a land of immigrants–legal immigrants who came here to build a better life and were vetted before they were allowed in. Currently we are being overrun by people seeking access to our welfare system and an easy life. I don’t begrudge anyone seeking a better life, but I do have a problem with seeking a better life at someone else’s expense. As American cities pour money into housing, feeding and providing medical care for people who are here illegally, our own citizens who are struggling economically are being ignored. Our homeless are on the streets–they are not getting hotel rooms and three meals a day. Aside from the misplaced priorities of our current border policy (or lack thereof), there is the national security aspect.

On Friday, The Daily Caller reported:

  • Federal immigration authorities released for one day a Pakistani man who illegally crossed the southern border into California whose name appeared on the terror watchlist, according to an Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) memo reviewed by the Daily Caller News Foundation.
  • Border Patrol apprehended the Pakistani national on Nov. 10, 2023 in Tecate, California, according to the memo.
  • “Imagine how many cases like this one get through without us knowing,” a DHS official told the DCNF on the condition of anonymity because they’re not authorized to speak publicly.

The article continues:

The Pakistani national entered the U.S. illegally on Nov. 9, 2023 and was nabbed by Border Patrol the next day in Tecate, California, according to a memo the DCNF received from two different Department of Homeland Security (DHS) sources. While in Border Patrol custody on Nov. 22, the Terrorism Screening Center (TSC) confirmed he was a positive match on the terror watchlist, according to the memo.

Despite this, the memo says the terror suspect was released from the custody of ICE San Diego on Jan. 23. ICE served him with an “Order of Release on Recognizance” with tracking technology through the Alternatives to Detention (ATD) program during that time.

Border agents served him with an expedited removal order on Nov. 11, after which he expressed that he had a credible fear of going back to Pakistan, according to the memo.

On Jan. 24, however, the ICE office in San Diego informed the agency’s office in Los Angeles of his presence on the terror watchlist, along with his “mandatory detention requirement,” and had him report on his own to the ATD check-in office. ICE Los Angeles was able to arrest him when he showed up for the check-in.

Imagine how many cases like this one get through without us knowing,” a DHS official told the DCNF on the condition of anonymity because they’re not authorized to speak publicly.

I fear we have reached the place where ordinary Americans are going to have to be responsible for their own safety. Terrorist do not generally value their own lives, and that fact makes them very dangerous. Because so many of the people who have crossed our southern border are military-age men, we may all have to be prepared to defend ourselves from a major attack within our country.

 

In America It Can Be Dangerous To Be A Conservative

On Thursday, The Daily Caller reported that the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (ATF) is investigating an arson attack on a building in Minnesota that houses a number of politically conservative groups.

One of the offices in that building was the office of John Hinderaker who writes Power Line Blog. In an article posted Thursday, John Hinderaker talks about the fire bombing.

The article at Power Line Blog reports:

I wasn’t entirely forthcoming in this post about why I haven’t written much the last few days. It is true that I have been in Washington, mostly to attend the Michael Mann v. Mark Steyn trial. I will write up my thoughts on the trial (or at least, those portions I have seen) when I have time.

But something else has been distracting me: leftists firebombed my office last Saturday night. At around 2 am, they broke into the building that houses Center of the American Experiment and two other conservative organizations with which we often collaborate, along with many other businesses. The arsonists set two fires: one was in the first floor corridor between American Experiment’s office and the space we sublease to Take Charge, Kendall and Sheila Qualls’ organization. A second fire was set on the third floor, immediately outside or perhaps actually inside the office of the Upper Midwest Law Center, on whose board I serve. This photo shows what the corridor outside my office looks like:

The article concludes:

I am working with the FBI to try to identify the perpetrators. As I told them, the list of potential suspects is long, as my organization is active, and unusually effective, across a broad range of issues. I will have more to say about this before long.

To all my conservative friends–Be careful out there.

The New Definition Of Low Income

On Wednesday, The Daily Caller posted an article about the Biden administration’s continuing push to convince Americans that electric vehicles are a good idea. The mental and verbal gymnastics in this effort are becoming comical.

The headline of the article reads:

Biden Admin Classifies Martha’s Vineyard, Elite Locales As ‘Low-Income’ To Push EV Charger Subsidies

The article reports:

The Biden administration is classifying some of the country’s most elite and exclusive locales as “low-income” areas, making them eligible for electric vehicle (EV) charger subsidy programs.

The administration’s EV charger tax credit program — made possible by the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA), President Joe Biden’s signature climate bill — is specifically designed to route subsidies to “low-income” or “non-urban” areas of the country. The “low-income” emphasis for eligibility aligns in spirit with the Biden administration’s wider pursuit of so-called “environmental justice,” which is effectively the combination of social justice ideology and green policy.

Numerous elite hangouts and locales — including Montauk and Fishers Island in New York, and parts of Martha’s Vineyard and Nantucket in Massachusetts — are among the areas that the administration has classified as “low-income” and eligible for receipt of EV charger subsidies, according to a Daily Caller News Foundation analysis of the Department of Energy’s (DOE) interactive eligibility map.

Building out a nationwide charging network is a key supporting plank of the Biden administration’s EV agenda, but the charging infrastructure that currently exists is concentrated in wealthier, more densely-populated coastal regions of the country. The Biden administration’s tax credit program is designed to blunt the costs of charger construction specifically in non-urban, less wealthy parts of the country that would be less likely to install them.

“This tax credit provides up to 30% off the cost of the charger to individuals and businesses in low-income communities and non-urban areas, making it more affordable to install EV charging infrastructure and increasing access to EV charging in underserved communities,” the White House stated on Jan. 19.

To meet the “low-income” definition, a given Census tract must have a poverty rate of 20% or more. Alternatively, an area can qualify if the median family income is below 80% of the median family income in the wider metropolitan area or in its state if a given Census tract is not part of any particular metropolitan area, according to section 45D(e) of the Internal Revenue Code.

In practice, however, the latter definition for a “low-income” area enables places that may not be colloquially considered “low-income” to qualify for the credit by virtue of being located in a wealthy state or metropolitan area.

Some of these ‘low-income’ areas include homes worth over a million dollars. Unfortunately, this is simply another example of the Biden administration paying off its wealthy donors.

Please follow the link to the article for further details. Many of us would love to live in some of the low-income areas that are getting the tax credits.

Losing Our Freedom, One Appliance At A Time

Remember when the Biden administration told us that they had no intention of limiting gas stoves? Well, that was then; this is now.

On Monday, The Daily Caller reported the following:

The Biden administration finalized an energy efficiency rule for stoves on Monday after claiming that it has no intention to ban gas-powered models.

The Department of Energy (DOE) published the final rule in accordance with a court order that requires the agency to publish the rule by the end of January. The administration proposed an aggressive efficiency regulation for stoves in February 2023 and subsequently promised that it is not attempting to ban gas stoves, calling suggestions to the contrary “misinformation.”

Compliance with the rules will be required for newly-manufactured products starting in January 2028, according to the DOE. The regulation applies to electric cooktops, gas cooktops, stand-alone electric cooktops, stand-alone gas cooktops and ovens.

…The rules are likely to make certain models more expensive up front, but the government contends that the rule will save Americans money on their utility bills in the long run by reducing the amount of energy their stoves use, according to The Washington Post.

“The new standards will also require only a small portion of models to make modest improvements to their energy efficiency to match the level of efficiency already demonstrated by the majority of the market today,” according to the DOE. “For example, approximately 97 percent of gas stove models and 77 percent of smooth electric stove models on the market already meet these standards.”

The article concludes:

A June 2023 Harvard CAPS Harris poll showed that nearly 70% of respondents oppose policies that would amount to a de facto gas stove ban. Over 80% of Republican respondents and 71% of independents are opposed to such policies, joined by 55% of Democrats polled in the survey.

Beyond stoves, the Biden DOE has also sought to impose energy efficiency regulations for items like water heatersfurnaces and pool pump motors. The administration has also spent hundreds of millions of dollars to help state and municipal governments pursue building codes meant to “decarbonize” buildings.

Neither the DOE nor the White House responded immediately to requests for comment.

The reason the U.S, Constitution requires Congress to make laws is that the members of Congress are elected and therefore accountable to the people. The regulatory state has no Constitutional basis other than Congress not doing its job. There is currently a case before the Supreme Court dealing with the regulatory state. That case is Chevron v. National Resources Defense Council.  Hopefully a ruling from the Court that is in line with the Constitution will save us from this nonsense.

Failure To Provide Public Safety

On Monday, The Daily Caller reported the following:

Federal authorities caught a terrorist at the U.S. southern border and released him into the country, where he roamed freely for nearly a year before being arrested in Minnesota just days ago, according to an internal federal memo exclusively obtained by the Daily Caller News Foundation.

The unnamed individual, who the memo only identifies as a member of the Somali terror group al-Shabaab, was released shortly after being caught illegally crossing the southern border near San Ysidro, California on March 13, 2023, according to the memo, which the DCNF is not publishing in order to protect the identity of a confidential source. The Terrorist Screening Center “deemed him a ‘mismatch’” after running his name through the terror watchlist, according to the memo, which was sent to Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) officials.

However, on January 18, 2024, the Terrorist Screening Center “made a redetermination” that the individual was “a confirmed member of al-Shabaab” and was involved in the use, manufacture or transport of explosives or firearms, the memo states. Two days later, ICE nabbed the al-Shabaab member in Minneapolis, Minnesota.

The article concludes:

The U.S. government has considered Al-Shabaab a foreign terrorist organization since 2008. The terrorist group operates in Somalia and has also committed attacks in Kenya and Uganda, according to the National Counterterrorism Center.

U.S. forces killed three al-Shabaab terrorists in a self defense air strike on Jan. 21 at the request of the Somali government

Al-Shabaab has carried out bombings, including suicide attacks, and the group has assassinated Somali peace activists, international aid workers, journalists and numerous civil society figures, according to the National Counterterrorism Center. The terror group carried out a 2013 attack on Westgate mall in Nairobi, killing 67 people, and in 2017 killed hundreds of civilians in Mogadishu through two suicide attacks.

After Hamas’ attack on Israeli civilians on Oct. 7, federal authorities warned Border Patrol to be on alert for Hamas, Palestinian Islamic Jihad and Hezbollah terrorists attempting to illegally cross the southern border, according to an internal memo exclusively obtained by the DCNF at the time.

“It is clear that our safety is dependent on enforcing our immigration laws and securing the border,” Fabbricatore said.

ICE didn’t respond to the DCNF’s request for comment.

It is probably time for every American to take the class to get their concealed carry license. It is becoming very obvious that our government does not have our backs. We need to be responsible for our own safety.

What An Incredible Coincidence!

On Tuesday, The Daily Caller reported that Hunter Biden didn’t sell any paintings under his father was elected President.

The article reports:

Hunter Biden’s first art sale with a professional art dealer came shortly after his father, Joe Biden, was elected president, his art gallerist testified earlier this month.

Attorneys for Georges Berges, Hunter Biden’s New York City-based gallerist, provided a letter to the House Oversight and Judiciary Committees showing Hunter Biden sold his first piece of art with Berges on Dec. 11, 2020, according to a transcript reviewed by the Daily Caller.

The article notes:

“[W]hen did you first sell a piece of Hunter Biden’s art?”

“Gees, I don’t remember,” Berges said. One of his attorneys appeared to show him the letter with the date of Hunter Biden’s first art sale with Berges.

“Is this the–so, December 11th, 2020,” Berges stated.

“So according to your letter, the first sale of Hunter Biden’s art was on December 20th. Had you established anything in writing regarding your relationship with Hunter Biden at that time? Excuse me. December 11th,” Berges was asked.

“I believe so, yeah,” he replied. He recalled a 60% to 40% split between Hunter Biden and himself in the terms of the first contract. He believed the first contract was agreed upon around the 2020 presidential election but he could not recall a precise date.

Berges and Hunter Biden entered into a new contract in September 2021, and Hunter Biden received a slight commission increase in the new deal. The 60% to 40% rate for artists and gallerists is the industry standard, Berges said.

As part of the initial contract, Hunter Biden was allowed to learn the identity of his art buyers, and in the second contract Berges was required not to inform Biden of his buyers, the art gallerist testified.

The article also notes another strange coincidence:

On Feb. 17 2021, right after President Biden’s inauguration, Democratic donor Elizabeth Naftali purchased a piece of Hunter Biden’s art for $52,000, Berges stated. It took the art gallerist a year of persuasion to get Naftali to buy the piece.

President Biden appointed Naftali in July 2022 to a presidential commission tasked with preserving America’s heritage abroad. She bought another Hunter Biden art piece for $42,000 on Dec. 9, 2022. Berges confirmed that Naftali knew Hunter Biden and he believed she could have told him about her art purchases.

The art gallerist said he did not provide the White House with any records of Hunter Biden’s art sales or the patrons who bought his art.

Please follow the link to the article for further details. To say that this whole new art career on the part of Hunter is fishy is like saying water is wet.

Reining In The Federal Government

In recent years, the federal government has altered the lives of Americans in small ways and big ways. The small ways include dishwashers that used to take an hour to cycle now take two hours, showerheads don’t put out the same amount of water that they put out ten years ago, and washing machines also take longer to wash the clothes. These changes are not the result of laws passed by Congress (which is where we are supposed to get out laws), they are the result of federal regulations. Well, the ability of federal agencies rather than Congress to pass laws is now being challenged in our courts.

On Tuesday, The Daily Caller reported the following:

A federal appeals court shot down the Biden administration’s efforts to repeal existing regulations on dishwashers and clothes washers on Monday.

The U.S. Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals issued an opinion in a legal battle between eleven red states and the federal government over the Department of Energy’s (DOE) efforts to impose energy and water efficiency standards for dishwashers and clothes washers that asserted it “is unclear that DOE has statutory authority to regulate water use in dishwashers and clothes washers,” according to the opinion’s text. The Biden administration has attempted to push new standards for both appliances since coming into office in 2021 as part of a wider push to nudge the market toward more energy efficient appliances, which in some cases are generally  less effective than their other models, the court asserted in its opinion.

In March 2018, the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) proposed standards for dishwashers that allow the sale of models that run faster cycles, using more energy and water than standard dishwashers in the process. The Trump administration then adopted similar guidelines as policy in 2020, but the Biden DOE repealed those standards in 2021 before advancing its own standards that crack down on the faster models advantaged by the Trump administration’s rules in May 2023.

The article concludes:

Beyond clothes washers and dishwashers, the Biden DOE has also sought to impose energy efficiency regulations for items like water heatersfurnaces and pool pump motors. The administration has also spent hundreds of millions of dollars on helping state and municipal governments pursue building codes

“In this opinion, the court has forced DOE to follow the law and even noted that one of the positions DOE took in this suit ‘borders on frivolous.’ This decision allows manufacturers to build better dishwashers, not be encumbered by counterproductive federal regulations,” Devin Watkins, an attorney for CEI, said of the opinion.

The DOE did not respond immediately to a request for comment.

When Your Narrative Just Doesn’t Work

As the walls are closing in on the Biden family crime syndicate, Democrats are desperate to change the focus and change the narrative. The latest attempt is laughable. On Friday, The Daily Caller posted an article about the efforts by the spin masters in the Democrat party to convince Americans that the Trump family is guilty of taking foreign money (just like the Biden family). Only there is a small problem with this claim–the Trump family has hotels and golf courses that produced the money the family received. The Biden family has no visible product or service provided in exchange for the money.

The article reports:

House Oversight Committee Democrats released a report Thursday attempting to connect former President Donald Trump to a pay-for-play foreign influence scheme, but the evidence fell far short of a smoking gun.

Maryland Rep. Jamie Raskin, Ranking Member of the Committee on Oversight and Accountability, released a report revealing that Trump’s business entities raked in at least $7.8 million from 20 foreign governments and their subsidiaries during the first two years of his presidency, including from China, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Kuwait and Malaysia. A majority of that money, however, came from one business that began renting office space from Trump Tower in 2008 and concluded its partnership in 2019, during his administration, the report shows.

“The difference between Trump’s foreign income and Biden’s foreign income is that Trump had legitimate goods and services to sell and was tough on China while the Bidens did not have any legitimate business and Joe has been weak on China,” Seamus Bruner, director of research at the Government Accountability Institute, told the Daily Caller in a statement.

The article concludes:

Hunter Biden’s federal tax indictment in California clarified that he received about $1 million of the funds sent to the State Energy HK account. He made additional income in 2017 and 2018 from Hudson West III, a business entity he formed with CEFC associates. Hunter Biden’s relationship began in 2015 when his father was still vice president, his California indictment shows. 

In November, Comer detailed through a series of bank records how the funds from China made it through multiple Biden family accounts, ending in a $40,000 check to Joe Biden in September 2017.

“Democrats like Jamie Raskin are trying to deflect from the fact that the Biden family bagged at least $30 million from foreign individuals linked to the highest levels of the Chinese military and intelligence apparatus—perhaps the greatest presidential scandal in American history,” Bruner told the Daily Caller.

I Guess That Didn’t Go As Planned

On Wednesday, Just the News posted the following headline:

Massive offshore wind project that was to be operational in 2023 gets a single turbine running

At some point, I believe that we are going to discover that wind and solar may not be the future of energy–they may be a supplement, but they can never replace fossil fuel to handle the energy needs of a growing world population.

In 2019, I reported the following:

In August 2014 The Daily Caller posted an article about Spain’s attempt to convert to green energy:

According to a new report by the free-market Institute for Energy Research, Spain’s green energy policies have resulted in skyrocketing electricity prices, billions of euros in debt and rising carbon dioxide emissions.

“For years, President Obama has pointed to Europe’s energy policies as an example that the United States should follow,” said IER in a statement on their new study. “However, those policies have been disastrous for countries like Spain, where electricity prices have skyrocketed, unemployment is over 25 percent, and youth unemployment is over 50 percent.”

Spain began heavily subsidizing green energy sources, like wind and solar, in the early 2000s with its“Promotion Plan for Renewable Energies. The country used a combination of generous feed-in tariffs, green energy generation quotas and green power subsidies to boost renewable energy development in the country and lower its carbon dioxide emissions.

…But what seemed like a booming green energy economy on the surface was really becoming a costly way to help drive Spain into economic recession. By 2011, Spain’s electricity prices stood at 29.46 U.S. ¢/kilowatt-hour — two and a half times what electricity cost in the U.S. at the time.

The Just the News article reports:

Vineyard Wind, a massive offshore wind project 15 miles south of Martha’s Vineyard, failed to deliver electricity in 2023 as its developers had pledged to do, but they announced Wednesday that one of the project’s 62 turbines was running.

The project’s developers had for years been selling the project as the first utility-scale offshore wind project in the country, based on the 2023 timeline, according to Statehouse News. In December, New York’s South Fork Wind became the nation’s first.

Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners and Avangrid, Inc. announced Wednesday that it had managed to get one of the project’s 62 turbines operational, supplying 5 of its 800 megawatts to the grid.

The Commonwealth Beacon reported Tuesday that the developers had missed its 2023 pledge, which they were promising to meet late last week.

Two days into the new year, the Beacon reported, the developers of the $4 billion project still had not made good on the promise.

Please follow the link above to read the rest of the story. At what point are we going to admit that no matter how much money the government gives solar and wind energy, the disadvantages outweigh the benefits?

In What Universe Does This Make Sense?

On Tuesday, The Daily Caller reported that the Medi-Cal program in California will now cover healthcare for illegal aliens. It is not a surprise that California has one of the highest tax rates in the country and one of the highest cost of living.

The article reports:

The state of California’s program providing taxpayer-funded health care to illegal immigrants covers sex change surgeries and hormones, according to a Daily Caller News Foundation review of the program.

The program, which is known as Medi-Cal, covers hormone therapy and surgical procedures “that bring primary and secondary gender characteristics into conformity with the individual’s identified gender, including ancillary services, such as hair removal, incident to those services,” according to a state memo from May 2022. Roughly 700,000 illegal immigrants in the state between the age of 26 and 49 qualify for full coverage as of Jan. 1, California State Sen. María Elena Durazo said in May of the state’s latest move to expand the program.

I have no problem providing necessary medical care to anyone who needs it. However, the cost of sex change surgery and the drugs necessary to keep up the pretense should not be paid by the taxpayers–particularly when the people requesting the surgery are not here legally.

The article concludes:

In recent years, there’s been a massive surge in illegal immigration at the southern border, where federal authorities recorded more than 2 million encounters of migrants crossing the southern border illegally in fiscal year 2023 and more than 2.2 million in fiscal year 2022, according to federal data.

“In California, we believe everyone deserves access to quality, affordable health care coverage – regardless of income or immigration status,” Newsom’s office told ABC News of the latest expansion. “Through this expansion, we’re making sure families and communities across California are healthier, stronger, and able to get the care they need when they need it.”

At some point, Americans need to realize that the cost of illegal aliens and the disrespect many of these illegal aliens are showing to our laws will destroy the country as we know it.

The Accomplishments Of The Biden Administration

On January 2nd, The Daily Caller posted the following headline:

Biden Added $745 Billion Worth Of Regulations In 2023

Just what we needed.

The article reports:

The Biden administration promulgated over $745 billion worth of regulations in 2023, according to information supplied by Advancing American Freedom (AAF) to the Daily Caller News Foundation.

The Biden administration has used rulemaking procedures in agencies to enact several of its left-wing policy initiatives, such as stringent emissions standards to encourage the adoption of electric vehicles and student loan forgiveness plans. From Jan. 1 to Dec. 29 of 2023, the administration greatly exceeded both the Trump and Obama administrations in terms of the regulations it issued, adding to the 743 rules since 2021, according to data from AAF, a government regulations watchdog.

Remember that when President Trump took office, he began removing regulations in order to allow the American economy to grow. What impact have these new regulations put on by the Biden administration had on economic growth?

The article notes:

“Since January 1, the federal government has published $745.2 billion in total net costs (with $129.2 billion in new costs from finalized rules) and 251.3 million hours of net annual paperwork burden increases (with 60.5 million hours in coming from final rules),” AAF told the DCNF. “[T]he Biden Administration heads into 2024 with to-date final rule cost and paperwork totals exceeding those of the Obama Administration by $173.7 billion and 91.4 million hours, respectively.”

The article reports:

Moreover, in the last working week of the administration from Dec. 26 to Dec. 29, which was shortened due to Christmas Day, the administration added $45.6 billion in total costs and added 43.4 million annual paperwork burden hours, according to AAF.

The article includes the following statement:

Today, we released new standards for fridges & freezers that reflect a joint agreement with manufacturers & advocacy groups.

This will save Americans $5B/year & underscores our ongoing work with industry partners to promote innovation & cut energy costs.https://t.co/0Q9UKTRB31 pic.twitter.com/mXWh6SxR2U

— Secretary Jennifer Granholm (@SecGranholm) December 29, 2023

Can we please have a new President in 2025 before this administration can do any more damage.

More Follow The Money

On Friday, The Daily Caller posted an article that might explain why Republican Governor Mike DeWine of Ohio vetoed House Bill 68.

The article reports:

Republican Gov. Mike DeWine of Ohio received thousands of dollars in donations from donors who provided transgender medical services or opposed efforts to ban the procedures for minors.

DeWine vetoed House Bill 68 on Friday, which would have prohibited doctors from prescribing puberty blockers and cross-sex hormones for minors and banned boys from competing in girls’ sports, just hours before the deadline. A review of donations from 2018 to 2023 found that the governor received $40,300 from the Ohio Children’s Hospital Association (OCHA), Cincinnati Children’s, Nationwide Children’s Hospital and ProMedica Children’s Hospital, all of whom support transgender medical care.

OCHA donated $10,000 to the Mike DeWine and Jon Husted Transition Fund on Dec. 28, 2018, and another $10,000 on Dec. 7, 2022, according to the report. A transition fund allows candidates to spend donations for “transition activities and inaugural celebrations,” according to Ohio’s campaign finance handbook.

We need to remember that if a child ‘transitions’ to the opposite sex, he will need major medical care for the rest of his life. The body continues to make whatever hormones are connected to the person’s original sex (as determined by their DNA). Constant medication is needed to override what the body is doing naturally. Campaign donations by groups tied to transgender surgery are a good investment–they will receive patients (and profits) for life.

Selling A Major American Icon

On Monday, The Daily Caller reported that Japanese Nippon Steel Corporation (NSC) is buying the United States Steel Corporation.

The article reports:

NSC will purchase U.S. Steel for $55.00 per share and assume the company’s debt equating to $14.9 billion, 40% higher than the company’s stock price as of Friday, according to a press release by U.S. Steel. The company was founded in 1901 in Pittsburgh by J.P. Morgan and Andrew Carnegie through the merger of the Federal Steel Company and the Carnegie Steel Company

“NSC has a proven track record of acquiring, operating, and investing in steel mill facilities globally — and we are confident that, like our strategy, this combination is truly Best for All,” David Burritt, CEO of U.S. Steel, said in the press release. “For our U.S. Steel employees, who I continue to be thankful for, the transaction combines like-minded steel companies with an unwavering focus on safety, shared goals, values, and strategies underpinned by rich histories. For customers, U.S. Steel and NSC create a truly global steel company with combined capabilities and innovation capable of meeting our customers’ evolving needs.”

NSC will continue to honor all agreements between U.S. Steel and the United Steelworkers Union, pointing to the company’s history of working with unions. U.S. Steel will maintain its name, brand and current American headquarters, operating under NSC.

The Japanese have a record of managing corporations more efficiently than Americans do. It will be interesting to see exactly how the new owners deal with the unions.

Stay tuned.

Part Of A Trend?

On December 11th, The Daily Caller posted an article about a man who switched his party allegiance from Democrat to Republican. He had worked as an advisor to Bernie Sanders and as a fundraiser for Joe Biden. So why did he change his mind?

The article reports:

But despite my active involvement in the Democratic Party, the concerns I hold regarding the party’s direction in recent years can no longer be ignored. 

I love our country. That is why I can no longer remain in today’s Democratic Party, a party that is focused on dividing us by radicalizing every issue and undermining our rights enshrined in the Constitution. 

The main reason I am leaving the Democratic Party is its utter disconnect with the American people. The party that once championed the working class has now been overtaken by elites in affluent hubs who couldn’t care less about the struggles of the average American. This shift has left many Americans, including myself, unheard and feeling like an afterthought of the Democratic Party. 

The party’s shortcomings in education have played a significant role in my departure. They have declared war on concerned parents like myself, labeling them “domestic terrorists,” for expressing their opposition to radical curricula that disseminate sexual content to young children. The party’s emphasis on “progressive ideology” in schools, at the expense of parental involvement and a robust STEM education, raises legitimate concerns about the future preparedness of our children. It’s time to shift our focus back to the fundamentals that ensure our children’s success, thereby building a foundation for a more prosperous society. 

Also, the Democratic Party’s shift toward identity politics has steered us away from the timeless belief of judging individuals by their character, and not by the color of their skin or similar characteristics. The weaponization of race and gender identity for partisan political purposes does a significant disservice to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s legacy, and is a detriment to us all.

The article concludes:

This difference between stated values and actual behavior undermines the trust that citizens should be able to place in their government. As I reflect on these issues, I am compelled to seek a political home that aligns with a commitment to judging individuals by their character, fostering accountability, and advancing the well-being of all Americans.

By joining the Republican Party, I am not abandoning my values. Instead, I’m seeking a political home that aligns more closely with my vision for a free, united, and prosperous America. The Republican Party, with its emphasis on individual freedoms, fiscal responsibility, and a commitment to addressing the concerns of all Americans, offers a new path forward — one that I am eager to explore as I re-enter the political arena. 

Please follow the link to read the entire article. He makes a lot of sense.

The Ever-Changing Narrative

Yesterday, instead of complying with the subpoena issued by Congress, Hunter Biden held a mini press conference outside the Capitol building. When Republicans are in contempt of Congress (which Hunter Biden now is), they get arrested. It will be interesting to see what happens to Hunter Biden.

The Daily Caller posted an article about the statement made by Hunter Biden when he gathered the press together yesterday.

The article notes:

Republican Ohio Rep. Jim Jordan said six words that Hunter Biden told reporters on Wednesday represent a “huge change” in the ongoing impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden.

Hunter defied republicans’ subpoena for closed-door testimony on Wednesday, saying he would only testify publicly. House republicans have threatened to hold Hunter in contempt of Congress.

The article includes the following statement by Representative Jordan:

“The White House’s story has changed multiple times, the Justice Department story has changed multiple times how they handled this investigation. But the story that hasn’t changed, the testimony that has been consistent and stood up to cross examination is the two whistleblowers. Their story has not changed and frankly it’s been buttressed and reinforced by – we’ve done eight different depositions of people involved in the investigation at the Justice Department…None of them have refuted what those guys say. So over time it just keeps changing from the White House. This statement today I think is the biggest news of the morning I guess along with the fact he didn’t show up which he’s supposed to do.”

In September I posted an article about the changing narrative on Hunter Biden’s business dealings (article here). The narrative has evolved as evidence has been uncovered. It began with ‘President Biden has no knowledge of his son’s business dealings, evolved into ‘there is no direct evidence Hunter Biden did anything wrong’ and now has become ‘my father was not involved in any of the financial transactions that I was involved in.’

The next iteration will be, “Joe Biden was in business with his son, but they didn’t do anything illegal.” They need to come up with more Trump drama to see if they can distract people from the truth.

Do As I Say, Not As I Do

On Tuesday, The Daily Caller noted that Harvard President Claudine Gay will remain at her job after accusations of plagiarism. This action does not seem to be consistent with the University’s Code of Honor.

The article reports:

The Harvard Corporation, which is one of Harvard’s governing bodies, announced Tuesday that they would remain supportive of Gay after a contentious Congressional hearing and accusations  of plagiarism, although the Corporation admitted that a review of her work found “a few instances of inadequate citation.” Harvard University has disciplined students for similar violations of its honor code, which prohibits turning in work that is “not their own,” The Harvard Crimson reported

I like the term “inadequate citation.” That term is further proof that he who controls the vocabulary controls the issue.

The article notes:

The Honor Council heard 138 cases of “academic integrity cases” during the 2020-2021 school year and 99 of those resulted in an “academic dishonesty violation,” in which 27 students were forced to withdraw from the school, according to the Crimson. There were 47 reported violations regarding plagiarism during the academic year.

“Students who, for whatever reason, submit work either not their own or without clear attribution to its sources will be subject to disciplinary action, up to and including requirement to withdraw from the College,” Harvard’s plagiarism policy reads.

An approximate average of 18 students per year were forced to withdraw from Harvard between the 2015-2016 academic year and the 2020-21 academic year, according to the Crimson.

The article concludes:

Along with Gay, University of Pennsylvania President Liz Magill and Massachusetts Institute of Technology President Sally Kornbluth faced calls for removal after refusing to say whether calls for genocide against Jews violated the schools’ codes of conduct. Gay and Magill both backtracked their comments, and the latter resigned on Dec. 9.

Harvard and Gay did not immediately respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.

What Was He Hiding?

On Tuesday, The Daily Caller reported that they have received a response to their Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for access to Biden Vice Presidential records pertaining to the creation of Vice President Biden’s alias/pseudonym email accounts.

The article reports:

“We have performed a search of our collection for Vice Presidential records related to your request and have identified approximately 731 electronic files of potentially responsive records that must be processed in order to respond to your request. Please keep in mind that these totals are an estimate and that all material processed may not be applicable to your specific topic,” the letter continues.

NARA confirmed to the Daily Caller it has identified 731 files of “potentially responsive records” for the Heritage Foundation’s FOIA request. The records will be reviewed by NARA in accordance with the Presidential Records Act (PRA) and the agency will determine if the records are responsive.

NARA discovered 82,000 pages of potential records related to Joe Biden’s suspected email accounts, according to a status report NARA filed in October alongside the Southeastern Legal Foundation (SLF) for an unrelated FOIA lawsuit. As part of the SLF lawsuit, NARA previously disclosed its possession of up to 5,400 potential email records tied to Joe Biden’s apparent aliases.

So I guess it’s okay to use aliases and secret servers if you are a Democrat. Hopefully the documents discovered will eventually make their way into the public square so that people can draw their own conclusions about how the Biden family created their immense wealth with no visible product or service.

 

 

 

Just Amazing

On Thursday, The Daily Caller reported the following:

Special counsel Robert Hur is unlikely to charge anybody at the conclusion of his investigation into President Joe Biden’s handling of classified documents, according to multiple reports.

Hur is expected to prepare a report with harsh criticism of how Biden and his aides handled classified documents but his investigation is not expected to result in criminal charges, the Wall Street Journal (WSJ) first reported citing people familiar with the matter.

Remember, these documents were related to his terms as Vice-President and as Senator. There are some valid questions as to whether or not he was entitled to even possess these documents.

The article notes:

The House Oversight Committee wrote a letter to Hur in October requesting information on whether President Biden possessed classified documents related to his son’s foreign business dealings. The classified documents discovered at the Penn Biden Center and Joe Biden’s Delaware residence date back to his vice presidency and decades-long senate tenure.

Kathy Chung, a Defense Department aide and former Vice President Biden aide recommended by Hunter Biden, was one of the individuals who handled classified documents, according to the Oversight Committee.

Wow. Mar-a-Lago was raided because a President who was entitled to have documents from his presidency might have had classified documents. That trial is still pending.

I guess it pays to have a corrupt justice department that is willing to ignore the law to protect you.

Paying People To Attack Our Soldiers

On Tuesday, The Daily Caller reported that the Biden administration has given Iran access to another $10 billion in previously frozen assets. Iran is the major sponsor of terrorism around the world. Now they have more money to buy weapons to attack American soldiers stationed in the Middle East. I am sure the people who manufacture weapons are thrilled–they just got $10 billion in new sales.

The article reports:

The Biden administration is extending a sanctions waiver that will allow Iran continued access to $10 billion in previously frozen assets, The Associated Press reported Tuesday.

The four-month extension will allow Iran continued access to previously frozen $10 billion in electricity revenues for humanitarian aid, according to the AP. Critics of the Biden administration have said that giving Iran to access frozen funds will free up money in Tehran’s money reserves and allow them to carry on sponsoring terrorism.

The sanctions waiver will authorize Iraq to continue purchasing electricity services from Iran and give Tehran access to the billions in payments currently stored in the Iraqi banks, according to the AP. The Biden administration made assurances that Iran has only spent a small amount of the existing $10 billion and can only be used for humanitarian relief.

Does anyone believe that the $10 billion will be used only for humanitarian relief? Are we really that naïve?

The article concludes:

“Biden administration doubles down on giving $10 billion sanctions relief to Iran,” Richard Goldberg, senior advisor at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, said on X Tuesday. “Money is fungible. This is 100% budget support for the world’s leading state sponsor of terrorism.”

Iran supports a number of terrorist groups to carry out its will, including Hamas, which killed over 1,400 civilians in attacks on Israel that began on Oct. 7. Iranian-backed militias have launched 46 attacks on U.S. troops on U.S. troops stationed in the Middle East since the Hamas Oct. 7 attacks.

The State Department did not immediately respond to a request for comment.