This Could Take Some Very Interesting Turns

This article is based on two articles posted yesterday–one in The New York Post and one at Fox News.

The New York Post reports:

The Justice Department has opened an investigation into its own possible misconduct in the wrist-slap prosecution of multimillionaire serial pedophile Jeffrey Epstein.

The investigation is being conducted by the department’s Office of Professional Responsibility, according to MSNBC.

“OPR has now opened an investigation into allegations that Department attorneys may have committed professional misconduct in the manner in which the Epstein criminal matter was resolved,” Assistant Attorney General Stephen E. Boyd said in a Feb. 6 letter to Sen. Ben Sasse (R-Neb.).

“OPR will thoroughly investigate the allegations of misconduct that have been raised and, consistent with its practice, will share its results with you at the conclusion of its investigation as appropriate,” he wrote.

Sasse, a member of the Judiciary Committee, had asked last month for an investigation into Justice’s treatment of Epstein, citing a Miami Herald series on the pervy hedge fund manager’s crimes and the sweetheart deal that let him off the hook.

Senator Sasse has a reputation as someone who opposes President Trump.

Fox News reports:

The Justice Department’s Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR) has opened an investigation into a generous plea bargain awarded in 2007 by a top Florida prosecutor — who now serves as President Trump’s secretary of labor — to a wealthy, Clinton-connected financier and sex offender accused of abusing underage sex slaves.

…Alexander Acosta negotiated what critics are calling a sweetheart, potentially corrupt plea deal with Jeffrey Epstein when he was the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of Florida. The arrangement required Epstein to pay restitution to dozens of victims, but offered a variety of unusual concessions as part of a non-prosecution agreement.

So let’s back up and look at this for a minute. Jeffrey Epstein was (and is) very well connected politically. Bill Clinton is directly involved in this scandal–there are records of him flying to Epstein’s island on Epstein’s plane. However, the Clintons have lost a lot of their political sway in the past two years. It is quite possible that this investigation will snare Bill Clinton, but it will also make President Trump look bad because he appointed Alexander Acosta as Secretary of Labor. For a never-Trumper like Senator Sasse, it’s a win-win situation–the Republicans get Bill Clinton and he gets President Trump.

The matter did come up during Alexander Acosta’s confirmation hearing.

Fox News reports:

In 2017, Virginia Democratic Sen. Tim Kaine asked Acosta about the plea deal during his confirmation hearings.

“Why cut a non-prosecution deal despite your staff saying you shouldn’t?” Kaine asked.

“That is not accurate,” Acosta, who at the time was dean of Florida International University’s law school, responded. ““It was a broadly-held decision. … The grand jury recommended a single count of solicitation not involving minors. That would have resulted in zero jail time, zero registration as a sexual offender and zero restitution for the victims in this case.”

Instead, Acosta said, he pushed to escalate Epstein’s case to the federal level, even as he recognized that proving all of the allegations against him would be difficult.

“It was highly unusual where a U.S. attorney becomes involved in a matter that has already gone to the grand jury at the state level,” Acosta told senators. “We decided that Mr. Epstein should plead guilty to two years, register as a sexual offender, and concede liability so the victims should get restitution in this matter.”

Asked about keeping the deal confidential, Acosta suggested that he was following common practice.

Jeffrey Epstein’s sentence was a joke. The Department of Justice should investigate it. However, considering some of the bias shown in the recent actions of the Department of Justice, I have no idea what to expect.

Facts Are Very Inconvenient Things

There is a saying, “Truth is the first casualty of war.” I would like to add to that, “Truth is the first casualty of political campaigns.”

Breitbart posted an article yesterday dealing with how Tim Kaine has treated Israel in the past. Tim Kaine was one of the leaders in the boycott of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu‘s speech to Congress in March 2015.

The article reports:

Kaine claimed to be proud of the boycott at the time. “I’m not dumb, I knew not going to the speech might make some folks mad with me – there would be a political price, but I felt so strongly as a matter of principle that this was done in an entirely inappropriate way,” he told Forward, denouncing Netanyahu’s speech as “done purely to try and influence the Israeli elections and demonstrate American support for one person and one party.”

Kaine was particularly incensed by Netanyahu’s criticism of the Iran nuclear deal – the same deal he now claims Israel supports.

“Kaine worked behind the scenes to try to delay the speech, but when that failed, was among the first Democratic senators to announce that they would not attend the address,” the Times of Israel reported in July.

As a senator, Tim Kaine was certainly entitled to take any stands on any issue he chose to speak out on, but as voters, we are certainly entitled to examine those issues. Israel has been America’s best ally in the Middle East. It is the only place in the Middle East that is a democracy with freedom of worship for all religions. In the future, it will be the only thing standing between America and a nuclear-armed Iran. Hillary Clinton is not a supporter of Israel. No one who supports Israel would have signed the Iranian nuclear deal. There are also other indications that Hillary Clinton as President will not support Israel. Huma Abedin has strong family ties to the Muslim Brotherhood–she is not a supporter of Israel and will probably be Hillary’s Chief of Staff. It is a reasonably safe bet that the Democratic Party presidential ticket will not support Israel.

Vetting The Candidates

Tim Kaine is the Democratic candidate for Vice-President. He is a former governor of Virginia and seems to be well-liked. However, there are some elements of his background that are troubling.

The Center for Security Policy reminds us that in 2010 then Democratic National Chairman Tim Kaine attended the annual fundraising banquet of the Islamic Center Dar Al Hijrah in the Washington DC suburbs.

The article reports:

The reasons the others (seven elected officials were “invited”: former Virginia Governor Tim Kaine, now Chair of the Democratic National Committee, Rep. Jim Moran (D-VA), Rep. Gerry Connolly (D-VA), Sen. James Webb (D-VA), Fairfax Board of Supervisors Chairwoman Sharon Bulova, Fairfax Supervisor Penny Gross, and Virginia State Delegate Kaye Kory….Within a few days, Senator James Webb and State Delegate Kaye Kory‘s names were removed from the invitation.)  should not legitimate the Dar Al-Hijrah fundraiser, we had written them, included the Islamic Center’s continued support for the Dar al-Hijrah imam in 2001, Anwar Al-Awlaki, the senior al-Qaeda recruiter for three 9/11 hijackers, imam and mentor to the accused 2009 Fort Hood shooter Major Nidal Malik Hasan who killed 13 people, and online mentor to Umar Farouk Abdulmutallab, the suspect in the Christmas Day 2009 attempt to blow up  Northwest Airlines Flight 253.   We described several other Dar Al-Hijrah leaders linked to terrorism and supporting violent jihad against America, including the current imam who will host the April 3 event.

This is not the kind of company American political leaders should be keeping.

The Hill posted a story about some of Tim Kaine’s background and beliefs on Friday.

Here are some excerpts:

According to the mediaTim Kaine took a life transforming “mission” trip to Latin America in 1980. Conveniently left out of these stories, are the radical reality of the Cold War in Latin America and Tim Kaine’s Soviet sympathizing mentors. In fact, whatever Kaine’s intentions, he more likely met Karl Marx than Jesus Christ while there. 

Connect the dots with a little history, and an alarming picture emerges of Kaine’s adventures with radicals and revolutionaries in 1980s Latin America.

Reports indicate that in Honduras, “Mr. Kaine embraced an interpretation of the gospel, known as liberation theology…”

Liberation theology is not standard Catholic doctrine–it is more in line with the preaching of President Obama’s friend Reverend Wright.

The article reports:

Journalistic and academic research has now shown that Liberation Theology itself was quite possibly a product of a Kremlin disinformation campaign designed to undermine the Church and bring Catholic countries into the Soviet sphere. The top-ranking Soviet Bloc defector of the Cold War, Gen. Ion Pacepa admits that he was personally involved in the operation.

And contrary to the myth, this was never Pope Francis’ theology of choice.

The article concludes:

In Virginia he ran as a moderate and ruled as a liberal. Today he runs as a “Pope Francis” Catholic but on abortion and marriage, Kaine opposes Francis.

On the conscience rights of groups like the Little Sisters of the Poor, Kaine sided with Obama. Francis sided with the Little Sisters, whom he visited in Washington a year ago to publicly show his support.

As in the 1980s, Kaine’s “Catholicism” serves neither his Church nor his country, but a Leftist political agenda that has proven to be on the wrong side of the Church, on the wrong side of history, and against the interests of freedom and the United States.

I struggle with people who claim to be Catholic and support abortion. The Catholic Church has been on the front lines of the abortion issue since Roe v. Wade. They have set an example that I wish the other churches in America would embrace–the idea that your faith influences your moral and political choices. Tim Kaine may call himself a Catholic, but it is obvious that he does not believe the teachings of the Catholic faith.

The Script Of The Democratic Convention Was Eight Years Old

Duane Patterson, who produces the Hugh Hewitt show on Salem radio, posted an article at Hot Air on Saturday. The article is speculative, but it bears examining because of the way the pieces fit together.

The article deals with a timeline going back to 2008 when Barack Obama won the Democratic nomination for President and he and Hillary Clinton suddenly became best friends. If you look at the players in the DNC at that time and the events of the past two weeks, it is amazing that a lot of the names are the same and the positions rotated in a very interesting way.

In 2009, Tim Kaine became the chairman of the DNC at the request of President Obama. In 2011, he stepped down, at the request of President Obama, to run for the Virginia Senate seat held by Jim Webb. Kaine was not particularly interested in running for the seat, but was persuaded to run for the seat and won. Donna Brazille was the interim chairman after Kaine stepped down, and was expected to become chairman. However, President Obama moved Hillary Clinton’s former campaign co-chair, Debbie Wasserman-Schultz into the chairmanship of the DNC.

The article concludes:

Snopes notes that the timeline is basically correct, that all these events did take place. As for proving the backroom deal between Obama and Hillary, with the players in the trade being Kaine and Wasserman-Schultz, Snopes can’t prove or disprove it. But that’s the fun about the innertubes. Speculation can run rampant, especially on a weekend after a political convention that was manipulated to make sure that the Bernie Sanders people got screwed over every which way possible.

When you look back at this chain of events, post-DNC hacking scandal, it sure is a lot easier to understand why there was a thumb, a fist, hell, a side of beef, on the scale against Bernie Sanders and his supports in the 2016 primary cycle.

Bernie voters, you sad saps, you never had a chance. Now, we can reasonably suspect that the chance you didn’t have goes back eight years. We can also deduce that the Democratic Party is a top-down organization, not a grassroots organization. They claim to be, of course, but the power at the top has nothing to do with the will of the people in its base. It’s a club where only the opinions of a couple of members count.

Unfortunately, the Republican establishment probably tried something very similar to the scenario above to get Jeb Bush nominated, but they are simply not as good at corruption as the Democrats and wound up with Donald Trump. Regardless of how you feel about Donald Trump, he may be the person who will end the tyranny of the current political system.

What Hillary Clinton And Tim Kaine Will Mean For American Jobs

The Washington Examiner posted an article about the immigration policies of Hillary Clinton and Tim Kaine.

The article reports:

Sen. Tim Kaine, who told Telemundo in Spanish that he and Hillary Clinton would push legalize 12 million illegals in their first 100 days in the White House, is also a proponent of bringing up to 1.8 million more foreign workers sought by U.S. outsourcing companies.

Kaine, who on Wednesday is expected to win the nomination as the Democratic vice presidential candidate here, was one of several co-sponsors of S. 169, the so-called I-Squared Act, that would have boosted visas for high-tech workers from 65,000 to 300,000 a year.

Because the H-1B employment visas last six years, that bill and a similar one currently under consideration in the Senate could bring in 1.8 million new workers.

The visas have become controversial because many big firms who apply for the visas are replacing higher-wage American workers with cheaper foreign help.

There is a rule that states that American companies cannot replace American workers with cheaper foreign workers, but that rule exempts jobs where the employee is paid $60,000 per year or more. Obviously, jobs in information technology routinely pay more than that, so American workers can easily be replaced.

The article concludes:

Kaine cheered immigration reform as a plan to help companies like those in high-tech rich Northern Virginia find workers. In a 2013 trip to Oracle, he said, “Immigration is fundamentally a talent issue. How do we attract and train the most talented people in the world to come to Virginia and help grow our economy?” He added: “I am encouraged by the bipartisan proposal laid out by a group of senators that recognizes the need for a comprehensive solution to an immigration system that hasn’t been seriously reformed in more than 25 years.”

We do need immigration reform. We need to make it easier and cheaper for skilled workers to come to America. We also need to make it illegal for new immigrants to immediately go on welfare and food stamps program. We need to encourage people to assimilate and become part of America and the American dream. I am not convinced we are doing that right now.

Don’t Democrats Understand National Security?

I realize that many Americans are not old enough to remember the “Loose Lips Sink Ships” posters of World War II, but it seems as if many of our politicians have gone totally in the wrong direction on the matter of national security.

USMC Life posted the following article yesterday:

Hillary Clinton’s running mate, Tim Kaine, has a son in the Marines. And he’s getting ready to deploy — today apparently.

Clinton spoke at a VFW Convention saying, “My running mate in this election is a wonderful man from Virginia named Tim Kaine. He’s a US Senator, he was governor of Virginia, mayor of Richmond, Virginia… His son is a Marine. His son is actually deploying today, to help defend our NATO allies in Europe.” See 7:20 in YouTube below for the sequence.

So now the enemies of America have the date and location of these troops, putting a target on them overseas.

A few days earlier, one of Kaine’s aides told reporters Saturday that Lt Kaine was deploying to Europe on Monday, according to CNN.  Kaine followed up saying his son was helping “to uphold America’s commitment to our NATO ally,” according to the news source.

It seems Kaine needs to attend OPSEC classes as well and national news organizations have posted the information since he relayed it.

Didn’t Clinton and Kaine read the directions?

Politics Is More Important Than Action

We have been hearing for a while now that ISIS is a serious threat. President Obama has made a few speeches emphasizing the importance of recognizing and dealing with the threat. I suspect most Americans who are actually paying attention also believe that ISIS is a threat. So what does the Senate do?

Yesterday The Hill reported that Senate Democrats have decided to debate and vote on a broad resolution authorizing military strikes against the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) after the election.

The article reports:

“We’re going to take up the construction of a new authorization for the use of military force. It’s long overdue,” said Senate Democratic Whip Dick Durbin (D-Ill.).

The authorization would focus narrowly on ISIS, likely bar the deployment of ground troops and set a one-year time limit on military action.

The plan to vote on a resolution specifically authorizing strikes against the extremist Sunni group could help reassure liberal Democrats nervous about supporting a measure that authorizes President Obama to train and equip moderate rebels in Syria.

Durbin announced the roadmap at a Democratic leadership press conference shortly before the chamber was scheduled to vote on a government funding measure that included the so-called Title 10 authority to train the rebels.

Durbin said he is pushing the measure with Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman Bob Menendez (D-N.J.) and Sen. Tim Kaine (D-Va.).

“This is one of the most important votes we can cast,” he said.

Durbin said the Senate would take up the measure when the pending authorization for training Syrian rebels expires on Dec. 11.

I guess the Senate Democrats believe that ISIS is a problem that can wait until after the election. That belief goes on my rather long list of reasons the Democrats in the Senate need to be voted out of office. If the threat of ISIS is as important as the President says it is, the Senate needs to figure out what it wants to do to counter the threat as soon as possible.