Monthly Archives: July 2024

The Biden Administration Has No Manners

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On Monday, Breitbart posted an article about Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s arrival in America. No one from the Biden administration was there to greet him. That is a disgrace.

The article reports:

Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu landed in the United States on Monday, with President Joe Biden and Vice President Kamala Harris both absent to greet him upon arrival.

In a video that the Israeli Embassy to the U.S. posted, Netanyahu was seen walking down the steps of an airplane and shaking hands with several people waiting at the bottom.

Biden’s absence comes as he tested positive for COVID-19 on Wednesday. The president’s physician, Dr. Kevin O’Connor, released a letter saying Biden had “completed his tenth dose of PAXLOVID” and that his symptoms were “almost resolved completely.”

The Consul General of Israel in New York Ofir Akunis was reported to have been among the people who greeted Netanyahu after his plane had landed, according to the Times of Israel.

Secretary of State Antony Blinken was also notably not present to greet Netanyahu upon his arrival in the U.S.

Israel is fighting for its survival, and the Biden administration is not being an ally. Hopefully the next administration will be able to repair the damage.

The article notes:

Netanyahu’s arrival comes ahead of his speech before Congress on Wednesday. In June, Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnel (R-KY), Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-NY), House Minority Leader Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), and House Speaker Mike Johnson (R-LA) released a letter inviting Netanyahu to speak before a joint meeting of members of the United States House and Senate.

Harris and the Senate President Pro-Tempore Patty Murray (D-WA) have reportedly refused to preside over Netanyahu’s speech to Congress. Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) previously stated that he would “not attend” the speech given by Netanyahu, whom he described as a “war criminal.”

Several sources told Axios in June that House Democrats had been discussing holding counter-programing to Netanyahu’s speech.

The Democrats are now officially supporting terrorism over democracy.

Disturbing Information About The Assassination Attempt On President Trump

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On Monday morning, Red State posted an article about the preliminary report on the assassination attempt on President Trump. The report is from Senator Ron Johnson.

The article notes:

We reported on Sunday about the disturbing news that the Secret Service admitted they hadn’t provided resources when asked for the Trump detail, when they had previously denied that. Also, according to information from Sen. Chuck Grassley (R-IA) reported by Real Clear Politics’ Susan Crabtree, they delegated 12 post-standers for Jill Biden’s event in Pittsburgh versus three for Trump’s event with many more people in Butler. That, despite a known threat from the Iranians against Trump.

We had already covered the report that resources had been moved to Jill Biden from the Trump detail and that the Trump detail didn’t have a lot of their regular people on it, that there were “temps” on the detail.

The report includes a list of security failures by the Secret Service:

1.) Secret Service did not attend a security briefing provided to local special weapons and tactics (SWAT) and sniper teams the morning of July 13, 2024. Why not?–There was a 9 a.m. briefing on July 13, 2024, Butler County Emergency Services (Butler ESU) provided a security briefing for the local SWAT teams and snipers assigned to the rally. In addition to Butler County, local SWAT teams and snipers from Washington County and Beaver County were also tasked with security responsibilities.

2. Local law enforcement said communications were siloed and they were not in frequent radio contact directly with Secret Service.

3. Local law enforcement notified command about Crooks prior to the shooting and received confirmation that Secret Service was aware of the notification.

4. Following the shooting Secret Service was seen on the roof of the AGR building with local law enforcement; photos of the shooter were sent to the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco and Firearms (ATF) for facial recognition.

5.) Secret Service was initially not going to send snipers to the rally, according to local law enforcement.

This is unacceptable. Someone needs to be held accountable for this failure.

The Damage To Our Economy That Is Still Possible

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President Biden will spend the last five months of his presidency as a lame duck. That is if he is not forced out by the 25th Amendment (which I consider highly unlikely). Because he remains as President, he can still do considerable financial damage to America by promoting certain policies.

On July 15th, The Federalist posted an article about the Biden administration’s latest healthcare proposal. The Biden administration proposal would extend a “temporary” increase in Obamacare subsidies, create new federal spending and undermine the current healthcare system. The higher subsidies were part of the Democrats’ partisan “stimulus” bill in early 2021. These subsidies were then extended for three years in 2022. These subsidies will expire at the same time the Trump tax relief package expires.

The Congressional Budge Office (CBO) reports that this increase in subsides would result in a “3.5 million decrease in enrollment in employment-based coverage.” The budget office explained that “the decline in employment-based coverage would be larger under a permanent [subsidy] extension,” because “more employers would change their offers of health insurance if the policy became permanent.” In other words, if you like your plan, tough luck — your employer could cancel it for you.

The article at The Federalist also notes the although extending the subsides would increase the number of insured Americans by 3.4 million, under the proposal 3.5 million Americans would lose employer-based coverage.

The article further notes that from the Exchanges’ launch in 2014 through 2021, only households with incomes under four times the poverty level ($124,800 for a family of four this year) qualified for subsidies.This year that 750 percent-of-poverty threshold stands at $112,950 for an individual, and $234,000 for a family of four.

The administration has also allowed Deferred Action for Childhood Arrivals (DACA) recipients to qualify for subsidies. You don’t even have to be an American to get money from the government! The DACA policy will cost $9 billion in the coming decade plus $1.6 billion in interest costs.

Congress needs to say “NO” to any Biden administration proposals that increase the deficit. Any members of Congress that agree to spending more money during the end of this lame duck presidency need to be voted out of office.

Sometimes It Pays Not To Update

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This article is from July 19th, so I am sure most of the problems mentioned have been corrected by now, but I love the irony.

On July 19th, Digital Trends reported:

Nearly every flight in the U.S. is grounded right now following a CrowdStrike system update error that’s affecting everything from travel to mobile ordering at Starbucks — but not Southwest Airlines flights. Southwest is still flying high, unaffected by the outage that’s plaguing the world today, and that’s apparently because it’s using Windows 3.1.

Yes, Windows 3.1 — an operating system that is 32 years old. Southwest, along with UPS and FedEx, haven’t had any issues with the CrowdStrike outage. In responses to CNN, Delta, American, Spirit, Frontier, United, and Allegiant all said they were having issues, but Southwest told the outlet that its operations are going off without a hitch.

Some are attributing that to Windows 3.1. Major portions of Southwest’s systems are reportedly built on Windows 95 and Windows 3.1, which is something the company has come under fire for in the past several years. It should go without saying that Southwest needs to update its system, but in this case, the ancient operating system seems to be doing the airline some favors to avoid a complete Y2K-level apocalypse.

Computers are either wonderful or awful. There seems to be no in-between!

Before We Continue With Offshore Wind Farms…

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On Friday, The Maine Wire posted an article about an environmental disaster currently happening off of the New England coast. It’s summertime when New Englanders head for the beaches of Maine, the Cape (Cod), or the islands of Nantucket or Martha’s Vineyard to cool off and enjoy the water. This year, that isn’t going to work well.

The article reports:

An offshore wind turbine project operated by Avangrid and Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners broke apart this week, scattering debris throughout Massachusetts’ coastal waters, with much of the flotsam washing up on Nantucket beaches.

Since the turbine experienced a catastrophic malfunction — for reasons that are not yet clear — social media has been inundated with pictures and videos of beachgoers and government employees picking up trash bags and dumpsters full of debris.

The turbine in question is owned by Vineyard Wind US, a joint project of Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners of Denmark and Avangrid, the parent company of Central Maine Power (CMP). The turbine itself was manufactured by GE Vernova, which has experienced similar failures in the past with their offshore wind projects.

The article includes the following Tweet:

The article concludes:

The recent incident has led Leeman to renew NEFSA’s calls for New England governments to slow down the push for industrial-scale offshore wind development due to their possibly disastrous consequences and potential to harm commercial fisheries.

Offshore wind turbines have long concerned fishermen and lobstermen, and not only for their effect on the environment and commercially important fish populations.

The turbines are potentially dangerous for fishermen sailing in low-visibility conditions, and the chemicals they release into the ocean can contaminate their catches, significantly devaluing their products.

Most recently, Vineyard Wind has claimed that the blade of the damaged turbine is sitting on the ocean floor, and company has promised to recover it “in due course,” without indicating a timeline for that recovery. It’s unclear whether environmental remediation plans were put in place at the time the Commonwealth of Massachusetts created legal and financial incentives for the company to install the turbine.

We have seen the dead whales washing up on the shore. The article also notes a recent U.K. study that discovered that oysters and mussels were contaminated by hazardous fiberglass particles that can cause harm to humans. It truly is time to re-evaluate offshore wind farms and the rest of so-called ‘green’ energy.

 

 

 

Aware, But Not Yet Tainted

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I have a few comments on President Trump’s choice of J.D. Vance as his running mate.

J.D. Vance is a former Marine and a graduate of Yale Law School. He grew up in a family that put the “d” in dysfunctional. No one paid for his education; he worked two or three jobs to get through college (along with help from the G.I. Bill). At one point he worked for Ohio State Senator Bob Schuler, so he had some understanding of what elected office involved even before he ran for Congress.

J.D. Vance has not been in Congress very long. He has been there long enough to see the dark side of how things work, but not long enough to be part of the system.

There is no perfect pick for President Trump’s Vice-President, but I think J.D. Vance comes close. He was a successful venture capitalist, so he understands basic economics and how money works. He is young–so his perspective and experiences will be different from the Republican “old guard.” Because his is young, his being on the ticket may cause younger voters to consider voting for President Trump.

The Trump/Vance ticket is a ticket that understands economics and combines the wisdom of age with the forward-looking perspective of youth. Their election would help bring economic sanity back to America.

The Maneuvering Begins

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President Biden will not be the Democrat candidate for President in November. This was announced today. The obvious choice to replace him as a candidate is Kamala Harris, but so far President Obama and Nancy Pelosi have not endorsed him. On Sunday, Breitbart reported that Alex Soros, now who is now the head of the Open Society Foundations (OSF) George Soros led for so many years, has endorsed Kamala Harris as the candidate. Hillary Clinton has endorsed Kamala.

Let’s walk down memory  lane with Kamala Harris for a minute. She encouraged people to donate to post bail for the rioters arrested during the summer riots of 2020. She will probably campaign as the first African-American woman to run for President. Her mother was from India and her father was a college professor who arrived in America in 1961 from Jamaica. Her upbringing had little to do with the ‘black experience,’ but I doubt you will hear that. She was named the ‘border czar’ early in the Biden administration. She may have visited the border once or twice. People who support her will have to decide whether or not they want to listen to her cackle for four years if she wins.

My observation is that Hillary Clinton wants to be on the ticket. I would be surprised if she wanted to be Vice-President rather than President. It is common knowledge that the Obamas and the Clintons do not get along. This is going to be an interesting few weeks as the Democrats prepare for their convention in Chicago on August 19th. To add to the mix, Robert Kennedy, Jr., has stated that he wants an open convention and wants to be nominated.

All of the people who voted in the Democrat primary elections have now had their votes cancelled because the Democrats were not honest about the state of President Biden’s health.

President Biden is expected to make a statement about his withdrawing as a candidate some time this week.

Keep the popcorn handy.

 

The Legacy Of The Biden Presidency

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On Saturday, The Washington Examiner posted an opinion piece evaluating President Biden’s legacy as President. It wasn’t a real positive article.

The article notes:

Leaving aside whether or not the country needed saving from Trump, Biden has not “done an excellent job as president,” as claimed by the sweetly generous New York Times. If he is “one of the most consequential presidents in our nation’s history,” as the dulcet-tongued Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA) said when he asked Biden to step aside, those consequences have been overwhelmingly negative.

I guess Schiff believes that flattery will get you everywhere.

The article continues:

Biden could have been remembered as a president who united the country and passed the baton to a new generation of leadership. To do this, he needed to govern as a commonsense centrist and then stick to his word and pass the baton. The economy was already adding 1.4 million jobs a month before Biden was sworn into office. If he had simply speeded the reopening of the economy after the COVID shutdowns, he would have presided over strong, equitable economic growth.

Instead, he allowed fawning historians to convince him he could be the second coming of Franklin Roosevelt. This manipulated by the Left, he pushed for massive and unneeded spending on a purely partisan basis, sending inflation through the roof and thus punishing vulnerable workers. As a direct result of Biden’s partisan overspending, consumers have accumulated $12.8 trillion in housing debt, $1.62 trillion in car debt, and $1.1 trillion in credit card debt, all record highs. According to the latest Federal Reserve Economic Well-Being survey, inflation has worsened the finances of 65% of people, including 19% who said it was “much worse.” Almost one-fifth of adults, 17%, said they could not pay all their bills in the month before the survey was taken.

No wonder voters disapprove of Biden’s handling of the economy by 20 points.

The article concludes:

It is hard to see how Biden’s botched withdrawal from Afghanistan, a politically rushed maneuver that got 13 American service members killed, did not encourage Russian aggression. And while Biden has done some good in managing NATO’s response to the invasion of Ukraine, he has been slow and indecisive in getting Ukraine the weapons it needs to push invading Russian troops out.

Then there are the divisive actions Biden has taken on forcing women’s dorms and bathrooms to take in men, forcing consumers to buy electric cars, and selectively prosecuting his political opponents.

There is a reason — indeed many reasons — that Biden has the lowest approval rating among presidents at this point in his presidency: He is a bad president. No amount of flattery from the New York Times or Democrats eager to push him out of his reelection campaign is going to change that.

Biden must go not because his legacy is splendid but because he has been an unmitigated calamity for America.

That pretty much sums it up!

The Monster Under The Bed

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I guess screaming that President Trump is a threat to our democracy has not worked as well as predicted (we are a representative republic) since he is not the one jailing his political opponents and ignoring the rulings of the Supreme Court, so the Democrats need a new fear. The new monster under the bed is Project 2025. Project 2025 is simply a conservative wish list put out by the Heritage Foundation that would bring America closer to the country our Founding Fathers envisioned.

The Project 2025 website notes:

“Mandate for Leadership: The Conservative Promise” offers both specific proposals for addressing every major issue facing the country and a blueprint for how to restructure each agency to solve those issues.

Among the recommendations in this edition:

    • Restore the integrity of the Department of Justice to ensure accountability by giving the FBI a hard rest, ensuring consistent litigation decisions, and enforcing immigration laws.
    • Solidify our border by restructuring the Department of Homeland Security and its priorities in ways that streamline the immigration process, end unclear immigration visas, and create a more secure immigration process.
    • Break up the Department of Education to strengthen education freedom, enhance parental rights in education, and protect taxpayers from student loan “forgiveness.”

Which of those ideas is objectionable?

The Heritage Foundation posted an article about the effectiveness of the Department of Education in 2019. The article states:

Federal government efforts to improve education have been dismal.

The fact that Common Core didn’t catalyze improvements in the U.S. isn’t surprising. Large-scale government programs rarely, if ever, do. 

The sooner we can acknowledge that improvements will not come from Washington, the sooner we’re likely to see students flourishing in learning environments.

…Heritage’s Jonathan Butcher and I detail Yuval Levin’s theory of government failure in “The Not-So-Great Society.” Levin explains that large-scale government programs fail for three reasons:

    1. “Institutionally, the administrative state is ‘dismally inefficient and unresponsive, and therefore ill-suited to our age of endless choice and variety.’”
    2. “Culturally and morally, government efforts to ‘rescue the citizen from the burdens of responsibility [have] undermined the family, self-reliance, and self-government.’”
    3. “Fiscally, large-scale federal programs supporting the welfare state are simply unaffordable, ‘dependent as it is upon dubious economics and the demographic model of a bygone era.’”

Federal government efforts to improve education have been dismal. Even if there were a constitutional basis for its involvement—which there isn’t—the federal government is simply ill-positioned to determine what education policies will best serve the diverse local communities across our vast nation.

The sooner we can acknowledge that improvements will not come from Washington, the sooner we’re likely to see students flourishing in learning environments that reflect their unique needs and desires.

Let’s restore “equal justice under the law,” secure the border, and bring education back to the local district where it can be properly guided. These are not radical ideas, but don’t expect the mainstream media to tell you that.

Anything the government touches gets worse.

To quote Milton Friedman:

“If you put the federal government in charge of the Sahara Desert, in 5 years there’d be a shortage of sand.”

Is This Surprising To Anyone?

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On Saturday, The Daily Caller posted an article about some mega-donors to Democrat campaign coffers. If you ever doubted ‘follow the money,’ this might change your mind.

The article reports:

The U.S. subsidiary of a Chinese electric vehicle (EV) manufacturer and its top executive have given hundreds of thousands of dollars in campaign cash to Democrats in recent years.

Stella Li, a top executive for BYD Americas, and the company itself have given tens of thousands of dollars in campaign cash to Democratic candidates and organizations in California and beyond over the past decade, according to a Daily Caller News Foundation review of federal and state political spending records. Based in China, BYD is the biggest EV producer in the world, and Congress moved in January to ban the Pentagon from buying its batteries due to security risks, according to Bloomberg News.

Why are they giving money to Democrats rather than Republicans? That is something to think about.

The article continues:

For example, BYD and Li gave more than $40,000 to the Democratic National Committee (DNC) between 2020 and 2023, according to the DCNF’s review of political spending records. The company and Li have also poured more than $30,000 into organizations boosting President Joe Biden’s 2024 reelection effort to date.

The article concludes:

BYD is one of the biggest EV manufacturers in the world, though its Americas subsidiary focuses specifically on electric trucks, forklifts, and buses, according to its website. The company is reportedly examining options for penetrating the U.S. EV market by way of Mexico, and the Environmental Protection Agency’s (EPA) recently-finalized tailpipe emissions standards for heavy-duty vehicles may end up benefiting BYD USA in the long-term, according to analysis by HEATMAP, a climate-focused publication.

The company has expanded its presence around the world in recent years under the “impetus” of China’s Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), according to a 2018 paper published in Advances in Economics, Business and Management Research. The BRI is a $1 trillion Chinese government effort to build infrastructure projects and accrue economic influence in other countries that is “widely recognized as an economic power play that could challenge U.S. influence geopolitically,” according to the Jamestown Foundation.

Additionally, BYD is touted in several articles posted to an official Chinese government website called “Belt and Road Portal.”

Moreover, Congress has specifically flagged the company in two separate National Defense Authorization Acts (NDAA). The 2020 NDAA contained a provision that banned public funds going to boost China-linked transportation companies like and including BYD, according to The Washington Post, and the NDAA that passed in December 2023 prohibits the Pentagon from buying batteries made by BYD and five other Chinese companies starting in 2027, according to Bloomberg.

The offices of Newsom, Ma, de Leon, BYD USA, the DNC, the California Democratic Party, ActBlue, and the Biden campaign did not respond to requests for comment. Anotovich could not be reached for comment, and Villaraigosa’s current employer did not respond to a request for comment on his behalf, nor did the Superior Court of Los Angeles County, on which Chau now sits.

Politicians need to start wearing patches on their jackets like race car drivers so that we know who is sponsoring them.

This Is Not Surprising, But The Fact That It Has Been Hidden Is Disturbing

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The American President is one of the most powerful people in the world. America and the world need him to be at the top of his game. Unfortunately, there are those who really don’t care about the condition of America and simply want to hold on to power. That’s where we have been for a few years now.

On Friday, The Gateway Pundit reported the following:

A Democratic Congressman and longtime ally of Joe Biden has revealed that the president no longer recognizes him.

Seth Moulton, who has represented Massachusetts’s 6th congressional district since 2015, says that he has known Biden for over a decade.

In a column for The Boston Globe in which he joined the chorus of Democrats calling on the 81-year-old to step aside, Moulton said Biden’s memory loss was part of a “deeper problem.”

He explained:

In the early days after my contentious 2014 primary race for the US House of Representatives, when the party establishment had lined up against me, I felt like an outcast even though I had won. Then-Vice President Joe Biden showed up. He held a big rally for my general election campaign in Lynn, and I have treasured him as a mentor and friend ever since.

Perhaps he saw a little of himself in a young upstart taking on an entrenched incumbent. That’s how he won his first race, too. The next year, after I had won the general election, he would invite me to breakfast at the vice president’s house and teach me about Congress. Sometimes he would pick up the phone to comment on a TV interview.

Every time we crossed paths and I caught his eye, he would break into that big, wide Joe Biden grin and say how glad he was to see me. It was like that just last Christmas at the White House Ball.

The Representative then shared his account of meeting President Biden during the D-Day celebration in Normandy:

More recently, I saw him in a small group at Normandy for the 80th anniversary of D-Day. For the first time, he didn’t seem to recognize me. Of course, that can happen as anyone ages, but as I watched the disastrous debate a few weeks ago, I have to admit that what I saw in Normandy was part of a deeper problem.

It was a crushing realization, and not because a person I care about had a rough night but because everything is riding on Biden’s ability to beat Donald Trump in November. America needs him to win and, like most Americans, I’m no longer confident that he can. The president should bow out of the race.

Remember, all of the comments you are hearing about President Biden bowing out of the race are orchestrated. If he leaves gracefully, it  makes redistributing the campaign funds easier and calms down some of the civil war in the Democrat party. I can’t believe that President Biden will be the candidate, but stranger things have happened in politics.

 

He Hated Trump; His Wife Was A Spy

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On Thursday, The Daily Caller reported that Sue Mi Terry, wife of Max Boot, has been accused of being a spy for South Korea.

The article reports:

Sue Mi Terry, a former CIA analyst and a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, is accused by federal prosecutors of acting as a secret agent for South Korea.

Despite these dealings, Terry never registered as a foreign agent with the Justice Department. She was previously warned by the FBI in 2014 about the potential for foreign influence targeting. After being charged with failing to register as a foreign agent and conspiring to act as one, Terry was released on a $500,000 bond, according to the New York Post. Her lawyer, Lee Wolosky, defended her, stating the allegations distort her reputation and career., is accused by federal prosecutors of acting as a secret agent for South Korea.

Terry, whose husband Max Boot regularly falsely accused former President Trump of being a Russian asset, reportedly used her position and access to U.S. officials to provide sensitive information to South Korea in exchange for luxury items and other lavish benefits, according to the indictment, New York Post reported. The allegations state that from Oct. 2013, Terry engaged in activities that compromised her role as an independent foreign policy expert.

…One of the key incidents cited in the indictment involves Terry passing notes from a confidential meeting with U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken about North Korea to a South Korean intelligence contact immediately after the meeting. Additionally, she reportedly facilitated interactions between South Korean spies and congressional staffers under the guise of social gatherings, the outlet added.

Despite these dealings, Terry never registered as a foreign agent with the Justice Department. She was previously warned by the FBI in 2014 about the potential for foreign influence targeting. After being charged with failing to register as a foreign agent and conspiring to act as one, Terry was released on a $500,000 bond, according to the New York Post. Her lawyer, Lee Wolosky, defended her, stating the allegations distort her reputation and career.

At least she wasn’t spying for a Communist or Islamist country. That is the only good thing you can say about her actions. This story also calls into question the motives and influences on those who strongly oppose President Trump. Are they truly working toward America’s best future or do they have other things influencing their actions and statements?

 

A Disturbing Pattern We Have Seen Before

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On Wednesday, Finbold posted an article some interesting stock transactions that took place between July 1 and July 12. These transactions raise even more questions about the assassination attempt on President Trump.

This could be an entirely innocent coincidence based on the legal cases against President Trump and the other non-violent attacks on him. I don’t know. However, in any case, it is something we need to be aware of.

The article reports:

After an assassination attempt on former President Donald Trump, which sent shockwaves through the U.S. political landscape, Trump Media (NASDAQ: DJT) shares surged more than 60% in the early trading hour on Monday before retracing by 20% to the valuation of $36.89 at the latest close on July 16.

However, a fact bound to raise a few questions is that short positions against Truth Social stock doubled between July 1 and July 12, going from 7 to 15 million shares, in what was a record of shares shorted for DJT stock since its trading debut.

This surge indicates that individuals or large organizations anticipated a significant drop in the stock’s value by July 15, a scenario that would likely have materialized had President Trump died in Pennsylvania.

This sort of stock shorting has happened before.

The article notes:

A similar occurrence was observed on September 11, 2001, when substantial bets were placed against the stocks of major airlines, American Airlines (NASDAQ: AAL) and United Airlines (NASDAQ: UAL), the day before the attacks. 

Subsequent investigations revealed that a single entity and an insider newsletter had tipped off investors, leading them to place fortuitous bets against the top two U.S. airlines, which suffered significant losses following the hijackings.

Hmmm.

Good News For The January 6th Political Prisoners

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Reader alert: this is one of those stories I occasionally post that I really don’t understand the repercussions of.

On Wednesday, The Epoch Times posted an article about the repercussions of the Supreme Court’s ruling involving obstruction charges against the January 6th defendants.

The article reports:

U.S. prosecutors have started dropping obstruction charges against defendants alleged to have been involved in the Jan. 6, 2021, breach of the U.S. Capitol, in the wake of a crucial Supreme Court decision.

Government prosecutors informed defendants and the judge overseeing the defendants’ cases that it will drop charges brought under federal law Section 1512(c)(2) in light of the ruling from the nation’s top court, according to a July 15 filing.

“This decision was made in order to avoid disruption to the trial schedule for a five-defendant case, and the dismissal eliminates the need for additional litigation as to the sufficiency of the Section 1512 charge as applied to these defendants,” the prosecutors told the judge.

…“Given the length of time this case has been pending, the specific facts of this case, the other relevant charges, the current trial date, and the need to promote judicial economy and efficiency, the United States requests that Count One be dismissed without prejudice in the interests of justice and that trial proceed on the remaining counts on August 12, 2024,” prosecutors said.

Defendants in other cases, and multiple people who have been convicted and are awaiting sentencing, have asked judges to consider the effect of the ruling. Some of the judges have ordered prosecutors to file briefs presenting their positions on what impact the ruling has on charges against the defendants.

The article notes:

Supreme Court justices said in the ruling, released June 28, that federal prosecutors went overboard in their application of Section 1512, which was approved by Congress in the aftermath of the Enron scandal and bars altering, destroying, mutilating, or concealing records.

The law also says that a person who “otherwise obstructs, influences, or impedes any official proceeding or attempts to do so, shall be fined under this title or imprisoned not more than 20 years, or both.”

Prosecutors said that the latter part of the law cover various crimes carried out by Jan. 6 defendants, a view rejected by the court’s majority.

It’s interesting that some of these charges are being dropped in view of a possible election victory by President Trump in November. Will the people who actually riot on President Trump’s inauguration day (as they did in January 2017) actually be put in jail?

The Third Generation Of A Dynasty?

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On Wednesday night, Kai Madison Trump, the oldest daughter of Donald Trump, Jr., spoke at the Republican convention. The young lady is 17 and was poised, articulate, and painted a wonderful picture of her grandfather.

On Wednesday night, Red State reported:

On day three of the Republican National Convention, Donald Trump, Jr. brought out his oldest daughter, Kai, to the stage because she wanted to tell the audience and those watching on television who former President Donald Trump is as a grandfather, something you will never hear from the mainstream media.

The young Trump started off her speech by saying:

Hi everyone, my name is Kai Madison Trump. I am the granddaughter of Donald Trump. I’m speaking today to share the side of my grandpa that people don’t often see. To me, he’s just a normal grandpa. He gives us candy and soda when our parents aren’t looking; he always wants to know how we’re doing in school. 

When I made the high honor roll, he printed it out to show his friends how proud he was of me. He calls me during the middle of the school day to ask how my golf game is going and tells me all about his. But then I have to remind him that I’m in school and I’ll have to call him back later. When we play golf together, if I’m not on his team, he’ll try to get inside my head, and he’s always surprised that I don’t let him get to me. But I have to remind him I’m a Trump, too. Even when he’s going through all these court cases, he always asks me how I’m doing. He always encourages me to push myself to be the most successful person I can be. Obviously, he sets the bar pretty high, but who knows, maybe one day I’ll catch him.

She represented the America we used to know–family, faith, and wholesomeness.

This was a great moment. It provided a wonderful contrast with the way the media has painted Donald Trump. Americans need to remember that Donald Trump is a person, just like the rest of us. The hatred and vitriol need to stop.

How Much Is The Biden Presidency Costing Americans?

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On Tuesday, PJ Media posted an article about the impact of the Biden administration’s economic policies on Americans.

The article reports:

Thank to Joe Biden-flation and his catastrophic economic policies, American families are spending over $11,000 more annually just for necessities.

The obscene cost of inflation is hitting hardworking Americans, as overall prices have gone up almost 20% since the Meanderer-in-Chief came into office in 2021. Americans can thank the Biden administration for that $11,400 extra for necessities, about 20% of the average U.S. annual salary. And if you hear the lie that inflation is down, don’t believe it. All that means is that the inflation rate is allegedly slowing, and the Biden administration loves to engage in monkey business to manipulate such statistics.

As Sen. Tom Cotton (R-AR) posted last week, “Inflation is still ~50% higher than the targeted rate. Biden’s inflation is far from over.” Unfortunately, he’s right.

Grocery and energy costs have, of course, gone up drastically under Biden, as the Washington Examiner reported. Gas is 33% more expensive than at the start of 2021 and electricity prices increased 29%. But groceries have, perhaps, seen the most staggering increase:

Grocery staples such as cheese, eggs, meat, and fruits and vegetables have all seen significant price increases, with ground beef as much as 103% higher.

Because inflation persists and prices continue to climb, it’s getting harder and harder to make ends meet. Biden wants you to believe the government can spend its way to prosperity — which is good for the government but not so for the rest of us.

The Biden administration continues to lie about inflation, but most Americans believe what they see rather than what the Biden administration tells them.

How The Internet Impacts Elections

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Search engines are a useful tool. However, search engines are biased. As someone who is constantly looking for information on the internet, I can tell you that it is very unusual for me to find an article without a liberal slant on the first three pages of a search engine result. And I am using and have used search engines that are supposed to be unbiased. During the election season, biased search engines are a problem. The voters need to access both sides of a story, and that can be very difficult.

On Wednesday, Newsbusters posted an article about some of their recent experiences with search engines.

The article reports:

MRC researchers searched Google using a “clean environment” (without the influence of prior search history and tracking cookies) and found that the search giant completely eliminated Donald Trump’s website from the top 100 search results, while pushing President Joe Biden’s campaign website up to the number one spot.

Researchers conducted three separate searches for the top three candidate’s names along with the words “presidential race 2024.” While the results for Trump brought up seemingly endless 2024 election updates, including news articles, polls and commentaries, the search engine did not display the candidate’s campaign website.

Google, however, had no issues displaying Joe Biden’s campaign website as the first result in an equivalent search. Independent candidate Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s website appeared as the fourth result in a similar search.

MRC Free Speech America Vice President Dan Schneider commented on Google’s tone-deaf bias in the aftermath of an assassination attempt on Trump. “Other left-wing media outlets and platforms are taking a pause from their anti-Trump tactics, but not Google,” he said. “The search giant has doubled down on its anti-American, election interference strategies.”

Schneider continued: “People who often do political searches on their computers will likely get different results since Google tracks their search history. But this study reflects a much darker, more sinister behavior at Google. It is through this kind of data manipulation that Google swayed millions of votes in the 2020 election. It must not be allowed to corrupt our democracy.”

The importance of where a search result appears on the first page of a Google search cannot be overstated. Not only is Google the go-to search engine for most people, holding a market share of nearly 92 percent worldwide, but the higher a search result appears, the more likely a user will click on a particular result, according to Brian Dean, a search engine optimization expert.

Never be hesitant to go to page two or three of whatever you need to find information that is not totally biased. It’s unfortunate that Google does this, but the American voters are smart enough to get around it.

A Preview Of Things To Come?

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It’s only July, and the presidential election is in November. A lot can change between now and then. The lawfare against President Trump has made him more popular, and the assassination attempt has only increased his lead in the polls. Sadly to say, I don’t expect this to be the last assassination attempt. Hopefully the Secret Service will do a better job of preventing the next one. The Democrats are in a difficult position.

Hot Air posted one of the more entertaining comments made at the Republican convention last night:

It’s time to “end the Weekend at Bernie’s presidency,” DeSantis (Florida Governor Ron DeSantis) declared, and to “send Joe Biden back to the basement.”

On Wednesday, The New York Post reported the following:

President Biden said in a new interview that he would consider dropping out if he was diagnosed with a “medical condition” by doctors — giving the clearest indication yet that he may be faltering in his vow to seek a second term.

The 81-year-old president made the remark in a BET interview taped Tuesday when asked what it would take to prompt him to reconsider his candidacy.

“If I had some medical condition that emerged, if somebody, if doctors came to me and said, you got this problem and that problem,” Biden said in an excerpt released Wednesday.

In the same interview, Biden said that he feels the need to run again — rather than serve as a “transitional” leader, as he said in 2020 — because the country is “so divided.”

As far as divisiveness is concerned, President Biden has been a large part of the problem–not the solution.

The comment about stepping down for medical reasons is a very interesting change from the recent “I’m not going anywhere” statements. So what might be going on? Even though it is a long way until November, the Democrats are reading some pretty ugly writing on the wall. Even if President Biden is not aware of his poll numbers, I am sure Jill is. Does Jill want her husband defeated in a George McGovern-style rout? Even if President Biden drops out of the race on whatever excuse, who is willing to be the sacrificial lamb for this election cycle?

We have definitely come to a get-out-the-popcorn moment.

Didn’t He Ask For A Cooling Of The Rhetoric?

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On July 16th, Hot Air posted an article that illustrates how serious the Biden administration is about cooling the rhetoric during the election season.

The article reports:

Biden’s position is that the problem with heated rhetoric is entirely on Republicans, and nothing he has ever said or done has been anything but loving and unifying. All that talk of existential threat to democracy? About MAGA extremists? About this being the last election if Trump wins?

All totally normal, says Joe Biden. It’s Trump who is the nasty one.

…Of course, when J.D. Vance was announced, the Biden campaign went straight back to it’s old form. Fewer than 48 hours after a man took a shot at President Trump, they released this:

Just for the record, Project 2025 is not Trump’s platform. Please do your homework!

The article concludes:

Biden is flailing, and when he flails he gets nasty. He gets nasty with opponents. He gets nasty with supporters. He gets nasty with citizens. It is his way, the “dog-faced pony soldier.”

…Biden simply doesn’t have it in him to rise to the moment, and it’s not due to his decline. He never has had it in him. He is a nasty old man, and was a nasty young man when he was elected.

…Expect President Biden’s campaign to go lower and lower because that is all he has.

The article contains multiple examples of the President Biden and the media vilifying President Trump and calling him a threat to our ‘democracy.’ Their rhetoric is the problem.

J.D. Vance Is President Trump’s Pick For Vice-President

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On Tuesday, Real Clear Politics posted an article listing five reasons why they thought J.D. Vance was a good choice for Vice-President.

Here are the five reasons:

1. His Backstory: Like Trump, Vance arrives in politics as an outsider. J.D. gained national recognition when he captured hearts and minds with his bestselling memoir, Hillbilly Elegy, and the Academy Award-winning movie adaptation. With searing eloquence, he describes the challenges facing working-class America, especially heartland communities decimated by economic decline and cultural decay.

2. America First Foreign Policy: As a veteran who was deployed with the Marines to a war zone, Vance speaks with personal authority and authenticity when he counters the schemes of the interventionist Washington foreign policy establishment. In fact, Vance has emerged as one of the most persuasive voices for a true Trumpian international approach of realism and restraint. Regarding trade policy with China or military assistance to Ukraine, Vance represents well the growing populism of Republican and independent voters who insist that we secure America’s own prosperity and our own border before prioritizing foreigners and faraway regional battles.

3. Media and Debate Skills: Vance won his Senate seat as an outsider political novice in a hotly contested primary against far better-financed opponents with significant political experience. This grueling come-from-behind win sharpened his media abilities enormously, and that trend has only accelerated since he joined the Senate. Unlike many Republican elected officials, Vance willingly and enthusiastically welcomes tough, confrontational interviews on hostile platforms, and handles those interrogations with aplomb.

4. The Correct Political Detractors: Vance acts as a magnet for particularly heated vitriol from the spokesmen and platforms of the American ruling class. Why? Because they see him as a former insider who turned on them. In other words, just like Donald Trump, Vance was once considered part of the “club” of elites, given his educational pedigree and experience in finance. Moreover, the huge success of his book and movie made him, briefly, the toast of the town in places like Silicon Valley and Hollywood. Like Trump, he could have continued on that path of lucrative deals and constant adulation from the supposed “important people.”

5. Youth and Vigor: In a race where the cognitive state of the current president becomes a front-and-center theme of the campaign, the vitality and strength of Vance provide an important contrast. But even more importantly, beyond this election, Vance is perfectly positioned to be Trump’s effective partner and understudy for four years in the White House – and then to lead the America First movement well into the future after Trump’s term.

J.D. Vance is an asset to the current ticket, but also represents looking toward the tuture. He is a great choice.

President Biden’s Plan For Inflation

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On Tuesday, Hot Air posted an article about one way the Biden administration plans to fight inflation. It’s a plan guaranteed to be rife with unintended consequences.

The article reports:

Enough about Joe Biden’s mindless nastiness. I’ll take my cue from Donald Trump and Biden himself and focus on policy this morning.

Specifically, let’s talk about Joe Biden’s mindless and nasty demagoguery on economic policies. Faced with the electoral consequences of his corrosive inflationary wave, especially in shelter costs, Biden has to come up with some promised policy solution. And that is … federal rent control:

According to the Associated Press:

President Joe Biden is ready to propose a 5% cap on annual rent increases for tenants of major landlords as he tries to show he’s doing something about the high cost of housing, according to a person familiar with the plan.

The proposal, to be announced while the president visits Nevada on Tuesday, is being championed by Biden in the middle of a tense presidential campaign and a time when housing costs have been a major driver of overall inflation.

Hasn’t this man ever studied economics?

Housing costs are a major driver of overall inflation. That is true, but let’s examine why. Interest rates are double what they were under President Trump. According to U.S. News, the interest rate on November 19, 2020, for a 30-year mortgage was 2.72 percent. A loan of $250,000 would be paid back at the rate of $1,016.63 per month. On May 16, 2024, the interest rate on a 30-year mortgage is 7.02 percent. That loan would be paid back at a rate of $1,666.62 per month. The cost of the actual house you would be financing has also increased significantly in the past four years. So exactly what would be the result of federal rent control? First of all, find rent control in the U.S. Constitution. It’s not there. The 10th Amendment does not include rent control.

In January 2020, The Manhattan Institute posted an article about rent control.

Here are some highlights from the article:

Rent Control Makes It Harder to Find an Apartment

    • Cities that implement rent control see substantial declines in the availability of rental housing.
    • Locking people in to existing rental units leaves many renters in apartments much larger or much smaller than they would prefer.
    • In some cities, waitlists for rent-controlled housing are decades-long.

Rent Control Does Not Increase Diversity

    • Rent control benefits incumbent tenants at the expense of migrants hoping to relocate to a city. In New York City, white tenants have disproportionately benefited relative to black or Hispanic tenants, and landlords give preference to older and childless households.
    • Many of rent control’s benefits typically flow to higher-income households even as rent control drives up rents for everyone else.

Rent Control Degrades the Quality of Its Beneficiaries’ Housing

    • Rent control reduces investment in a property’s quality and causes a city’s housing stock to decay.
    • By suppressing property values, rent control also reduces tax revenue to municipalities, hindering their ability to provide essential services.

It will not decrease inflation, but it will increase government control.

Exactly What Is The Republican Platform?

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The Republican Platform has been approved by the Republican Party. The Democrat Platform is 80 pages long, the Republican Platform is considerably shorter.

On article posted at Townhall on June 16th lists the 20 principles of the Republican platform:

1. Seal The Border, And Stop The Migrant Invasion

2. Carry Out The Largest Deportation Operation In American History

3. End Inflation, And Make America Affordable Again

4. Make America The Dominant Energy Producer In The World, By Far!

5. Stop Outsourcing, And Turn The United States Into A Manufacturing Superpower

6. Large Tax Cuts For Workers, And No Tax On Tips!

7. Defend Our Constitution, Our Bill Of Rights, And Our Fundamental Freedoms, Including Freedom Of Speech, Freedom Of Religion, And The Right To Keep And Bear Arms

8. Prevent World War Three, Restore Peace In Europe And In The Middle East, And Build A Great Iron Dome Missile Defense Shield Over Our Entire Country — All Made In America

9. End The Weaponization Of Government Against The American People

10. Stop The Migrant Crime Epidemic, Demolish The Foreign Drug Cartels, Crush Gang Violence, And Lock Up Violent Offenders

11. Rebuild Our Cities, Including Washington DC, Making Them Safe, Clean, And Beautiful Again.

12. Strengthen And Modernize Our Military, Making It, Without Question, The Strongest And Most Powerful In The World

13. Keep The U.S. Dollar As The World’s Reserve Currency

14. Fight For And Protect Social Security And Medicare With No Cuts, Including No Changes To The Retirement Age

15. Cancel The Electric Vehicle Mandate And Cut Costly And Burdensome Regulations

16. Cut Federal Funding For Any School Pushing Critical Race Theory, Radical Gender Ideology, And Other Inappropriate Racial, Sexual, Or Political Content On Our Children

17. Keep Men Out Of Women’s Sports

18. Deport Pro-Hamas Radicals And Make Our College Campuses Safe And Patriotic Again

19.  Secure Our Elections, Including Same Day Voting, Voter Identification, Paper Ballots, And Proof Of Citizenship

20. Unite Our Country By Bringing It To New and Record Levels of Success.”

That’s a pretty tall order, but remember, President Trump did a lot of those things during his first term–he sealed much of the border (despite foot dragging from Congress), he kept inflation down, he made America energy independent which deprived Russia and Iran of the money to make war and fund terrorism, and he supported law enforcement. I suspect he will be able to keep most of the promises in that platform.

The Cord That Holds Us Together Is Fraying

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On July 10th, The Federalist posted an article about the current disunity in America. The title of the article is, “America’s Conflicts Are Not Primarily Political Or Ideological, But Religious.” That is an interesting premise.

The author observes:

Because America, like all nations, is founded on religious claims, and relies on those claims for its coherence. We’ve long been accustomed to talking about America as a “propositional nation,” a phrase taken from Abraham Lincoln’s famous line in the Gettysburg Address that America was “dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal.”

The idea is that America is fundamentally different from the ethnic nation-states of Europe, which were based on blood and soil and religion. America supposedly transcended all that. It was based instead on an idea — a proposition. Anyone could become an American if he agreed to the proposition. 

And this is true. But nearly everyone who says America is a propositional nation is wrong about what the proposition is. America is not a collection of Enlightenment tropes at the intersection of Locke and Rousseau, a grab bag of philosophical sentiments about the rights of man. America is the creation of Christian civilization.

The proposition at the heart of America, undergirding our nation’s existence, is not just “all men are created,” but Christianity and all that comes with it. Without Christianity, you don’t get free speech, liberty, equality, freedom of conscience. All of it relies on the claims of the Christian faith, none of it stands on its own.

The article goes on to explain the problems with accepting the trappings of Christianity without accepting the basics of the faith–the deity and sacrifice of Jesus.

The article notes:

Some will acknowledge the Christian inheritance of America but insist that it’s a point of departure, that once the American experiment was launched, it could be safely separated from the religion that launched it. They think it’s possible to take the “best” parts of the Christian faith without the need to continually affirm Christ. “Christless Christianity,” you might call it.

But it doesn’t work like that. A few months ago the famous atheist Richard Dawkins wondered aloud in an interview why his own country, England, could not just go on having “cultural Christianity” without actual, believing Christians. He said he liked the cathedrals and the Christmas carols, and would like to enjoy them without the bother of actual Christianity. He wants fewer believing Christians and more cultural Christians.

It never occurred to Dawkins that you don’t get to keep the culture without the cult. The sad spectacle of modern England should suffice to prove the point. If there is no one to worship in the cathedrals, they will become concert halls or, in England’s case, mosques. If no one really believes what the Christmas carols proclaim, eventually people will stop singing them.

Please follow the link to read the entire article.