Right Wing Granny

News behind the news. This picture is me (white spot) standing on the bridge connecting European and North American tectonic plates. It is located in the Reykjanes area of Iceland. By-the-way, this is a color picture.

Right Wing Granny

Monthly Archives: February 2025

Some Of These Names Are Awfully Familiar

Posted on by

As we await the release of the Epstein files that was supposed to happen earlier this morning, there are a few things to keep in mind. When you look at the people tangentially connected to Epstein, you wonder if we will ever see the files that actually expose the corruption.

James Kunstler posted an article at his website this morning that reminds us of some of the obstacles the Justice Department might be encountering in releasing the Epstein files.

There are a number of facts listed in the article that some of us may have forgotten or not been aware of:

…AG Bondi said a whistleblower informed her that the New York office of the FBI and their counterparts in the Southern District of NY (Manhattan) DOJ offices were hiding “thousands and thousands” of pages evidence and other stuff (videos? photos?) they had been sitting on for years.

AG Bondi quickly fired off a letter to brand-new FBI Director Kash Patel demanding that the New York FBI office deliver all that stuff to Washington by eight o’clock in the morning today (Friday). If you were Mr. Patel, rather than waiting until morning, wouldn’t you just take a twilight ride up the Jersey Turnpike from Blobville to the Big Apple with an FBI swat team and bust into both the FBI and DOJ offices there. . . and maybe frog-march a few federal employees onto the street like so many grannies caught praying in front of an abortion mill?

…For example, Maurene (spelled that way) Comey, daughter of fired FBI director James Comey has been a lead US attorney out of the SDNY in the case against Ghislaine Maxwell and the more recent case against Sean (“Diddy”) Combs — both cases revolving around grand-scale sexual depravity among world-class celebrities. Note, too, that the SDNY was the origin point of more recent janky cases brought against Mr. Trump in the 2024 runup to the election.

…Bill Barr was USAG in 2019 when Jeffrey Epstein was finally busted, stuffed into the Manhattan federal lockup, and promptly (shall we say, conveniently) turned up dead a few days later (putting aside the known irregularities involving the disposal of his body and the pathology reports about the cause-of-death). Did you notice that no one was ever disciplined for that?

…Nor did Bill Barr ever answer for that, or for some other capers — such as sitting on Hunter Biden’s laptop in the fall of 2019 when Adam Schiff’s House Intelligence Committee held preliminary hearings to consider impeaching President Donald Trump over his inquiring phone call to V. Zelenskyy in Ukraine. The laptop, you surely know, was stuffed with deal memos and emails about the Biden family’s ex-officio financial shenanigans in Ukraine that surely would have amounted to exculpatory evidence and was withheld from Mr. Trump’s lawyers through the entire psychodrama of the impeachment and trial in the Senate.

…Then there is the peculiar history of Bill Barr’s dad, Donald Barr, present at the founding of the CIA (as an OSS officer in WWII), who groomed young Jeffrey Epstein into a job teaching math New York’s Dalton prep school in 1974 on the basis of fake college credentials (Stanford). Epstein was soon transformed into a Wall Street go-getter and most probably an agent for Mossad, Israeli intel. Epstein’s rise in high finance and international spookery led him to crypto-British media mogul and Mossad agent Robert Maxwell and Maxwell’s sex-crazed daughter Ghislaine. . . and the Epstein underage sex operation proceeded from there.

Somehow we keep hearing the same names.

Why Letting The Palestinian Authority Rule Gaza Is A Bad Idea

Posted on by

On Thursday, The Jewish News Syndicate posted an article about the Palestinian Authority’s Martyrs’ Fund. This is the fund that pays terrorists and their families monthly stipends for attacking Jews. The Taylor Force Act, which was signed into law in 2018, is an Act of the U.S. Congress to stop American economic aid to the Palestinian Authority (PA) until the PA ceases paying stipends through the Palestinian Authority Martyr’s Fund to individuals who commit acts of terrorism and to the families of deceased terrorists.

The article reports:

The Palestinian Authority will not deduct a single penny from its “pay-for-slay” fund that rewards terrorists and their families for their attacks, P.A. chief Mahmoud Abbas told members of his ruling Fatah faction last week, according to translated remarks Palestinian Media Watch published on Thursday.

“We again emphasize that we are proud of the sacrifices made by the martyrs, prisoners and wounded [terrorists],” the P.A. leader said at the Feb. 21 gathering of the Revolutionary Council—Fatah’s second-highest body, which is chaired by Abbas—in Ramallah, Samaria.

“I told you once and I stand by my word: Even if we have [only] one penny left, it is for the prisoners and the martyrs,” he continued, echoing previous remarks made during a July 23, 2018, address in the Palestinian city.

It is time to disperse the Palestinians throughout the Arab world in a way that will not allow them to regroup.

The Bottom Line

Posted on by

On Thursday, Townhall posted an article stating ten hard facts about the war in Ukraine.

This is the list:

1. Russia is absolutely in the wrong for invading Ukraine.

2. Ukraine is not going to be able to win the war if the definition of winning the war is recovering all the conquered Ukrainian territory.

3. Zelensky will have to accept the reality that America will need to be paid back for its aid, which means, as a practical matter, access to Ukraine’s mineral reserves.

4. Ukraine is an unbelievably corrupt country, and the idea that no substantial portion of our aid money has been stolen is ridiculous.

5. The American people are, by and large, tired of subsidizing Ukraine’s end of this war.

6. China is a substantially greater threat to the United States than Russia in the macro.

7. The Europeans should be taking the lead in supporting Ukraine and should be taking the lead in defending Europe.

8. The campaign to insult critics of past Ukraine policy by calling them Putin’s puppets and so forth is a lie and is going to result in enmity towards the idea of helping the Ukrainians.

9. Some of our NATO allies are participating in internal repression, including suppression of free speech and the right to organize and participate in elections via non-establishment parties.

10. It is in America’s interest that this war ends.

One of the main trip wires that caused Russia to invade Ukraine was the threat of Ukraine joining NATO. How would we like it if Mexico formed an alliance with Russia and began placing Russian soldiers or weapons at our southern border? The Cartels are bad enough.

This war has benefited no one except those who supply weapons to Russia or Ukraine. In August 2023, Congress.gov reported the following:

The total number of Ukrainian and Russian troops killed or wounded since the war in Ukraine began 18 months ago is nearing 500,000, U.S. officials said, a staggering toll as Russia assaults its next-door neighbor and tries to seize more territory.

I shudder to think what the numbers are now.

Please follow the link above to read the entire article. It is long past time for the war in Ukraine to end.

Accountability?

Posted on by

In September 2024, I posted an article about the fast-tracking of  George Soros’ bid to take over hundreds of Audacy radio stations. The stations air such shows as Sean Hannity, Dana Loesch, Mark Levin, Glenn Beck and Erick Erickson. Well, not so fast. George Soros may have every right to buy those radio stations, but there is a review process involved, and that process was skipped.

On Tuesday, Breitbart reported the following:

Federal Communications Commission (FCC) Chairman Brendan Carr will brief the Republican Study Committee on Wednesday about George Soros’s “unprecedented” scheme to take over 200 Audacy radio stations.

Carr will detail how the FCC, under Democrat leadership, approved a license deal delivering leftist billionaire Soros over 200 Audacy radio stations.

Soros reportedly took foreign investment to make his bid for the 200 Audacy radio stations, which cover 40 media markets, and asked the commission to make an exception to the normal review process.

This is reportedly the first time such a deal was fast-tracked without a national security review process, which normally takes at least a year.

The article concludes:

Carr continued, “Did they obtain approval from the FCC for their excessive foreign ownership? No, they did not. Did the Applicants afford the Executive Branch agencies with national security and relevant policy expertise an opportunity to consider their application as well as the source and amount of foreign investment? No, they did not.”

“First, I just have to point out: a Commission eager to fast-track a billion dollar broadcast media reorganization, disregarding foreign ownership concerns,” FCC Commissioner Nathan Simington noted in a statement at the time, “is the same Commission that has gone back to the well several times to impose and re-impose foreign sponsorship identification rules on our smallest independent broadcast license holders every time they place local church content on the air.”

Simington added, “Just saying.”

The main issues in the approval are the fact that the approval was given without seeking public comment on altering established regulations, without actually changing the rules, and without enabling Executive Branch agencies with national security and specific policy expertise to weigh in (because of the foreign investment involved).

Fighting For Unbiased News Coverage

Posted on by

Anyone who has been paying attention in recent years knows that the press coverage of the White House is very different when a Republican is President than when a Democrat is President. That has to do with who controls the amount of access which news outlets have. In the past, access has been largely controlled by the White House Correspondents Association. That is about to change.

On Tuesday, Townhall reported:

“For decades a group of DC based journalists, the White House Correspondents’ Association, has long dictated which journalists get to ask questions of the president of the United States in these most intimate spaces. Not anymore,” Leavitt said. “All journalists, outlets and voices deserve a seat at this highly coveted table.”

“We are going to give the power back to the people,” she continued.

The move comes less than 24 hours after the White House won a legal fight against the Associated Press, which was kicked out of the press pool — a small group of reporters covering events — two weeks ago.

“As we have said from the beginning, asking the President of the United States questions in the Oval Office and aboard Air Force One is a privilege granted to journalists, not a legal right. We stand by our decision to hold the Fake News accountable for their lies, and President Trump will continue to grant an unprecedented level of access to the press. This is the most transparent Administration in history,” the White House released in a statement Monday.

The American public is not uninformed. Unfortunately, most who watch the mainstream media are misinformed. Allowing media other than the mainstream media to ask questions is a step in the right direction.

According to Ultraculture:

Six—six—conglomerates currently run the mainstream media, controlling over 90% of the media we consume; that was consolidated from 50 companies in 1980. Those six conglomerates are GE, NewsCorp, Disney, Viacom, Time Warner and CBS. And while they may not be as nepotistic as Murdoch’s NewsCorp, the general trend of centralization is still having chilling effects on free speech.

This is the reason we need more media companies represented in the White House Press Room.

The Double Standard In The Church

Posted on by

On Tuesday, The American Thinker posted an article about some of the recent comments made by the Catholic Church.

The article reports:

Within days of Donald Trump’s November landslide, Bishop Mark Seitz, head of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops’ migration committee, warned that Their Eminences were preparing to “’raise our voice loudly’” if Trump’s immigration policy “’violates basic human rights.’”

This episcopal loudness signals the end of the USCCB’s scrupulously-maintained four-year vow of silence through the entire presidency of the “devoutly” Catholic Joe Biden.

Their silence spoke volumes to Catholics witnessing Biden doing his utmost to wage open war on the most fundamental teachings of the Church. Not only was this “‘good Catholic’” (Biden claimed Pope Francis described him this way during a 2021 audience), the most extreme pro-abortion president in history, but his DoJ used federal law enforcement to imprison peaceful pro-lifers, and target traditional Catholics as “potential domestic terrorists.”

Biden proclaimed “transgender equality” to be “the civil rights issue of our time,” and weaponized his administration to pressure international medical experts to abandon limits on trans surgeries for minors. He transformed the White House lawn into a Pride Celebration freakshow of gender deviants, which went viral thanks to one particularly repulsive “transgender woman” flashing his fake breasts for the cameras.

The article concludes:

Last October, a survey of Catholic Trump supporters showed an astounding 76 percent agreeing with the statement, “I support Trump because of his stance on immigration.” Are Pope Francis and the American bishops really telling all these Catholics their consciences are “wrongly-formed”? and their sole recourse is to renounce MAGA and embrace the Left’s disastrous erasure of our national borders?

This is a grave indictment. Yet, for some reason, Catholic Democrats are spared such pastoral rebukes. On one side we have a formal papal letter effectively anathematizing any Catholic who agrees with deporting illegal immigrants; on the other, an offhand interview remark entrusting President Biden’s intransigent abortion extremism to his “‘good Catholic’” conscience. 

As far as the bishops go, too much of this incoherence is the fruit of Marxist thought prevalent in Catholic seminaries in the 1960s. The USCCB’s one-sided social-justice hectoring exemplifies Herbert Marcuse’s “liberating tolerance” — “intolerance against movements from the Right, and toleration of movements from the Left.”

Millions of Catholics, watching how their bishops publicly fawn over politicians like Nancy Pelosi and Joe Biden — whose progressive views on climate change or income redistribution they share — infer falsely that “good Catholic” and “good Democrat” are interchangeable. The Babylon Bee headline, “Pope Francis Announces That God Agrees With Whatever It Is Democrats Want To Do Right Now,” has a disturbing basis in reality.

President Trump has emerged as a sort of litmus test to see if people in authority actually have principles. When they become so anti-Trump that they will justify open borders knowing that it includes drug and human trafficking in order to support a Democrat President, they have lost their moral compass.

Misleading Headline Of The Week

Posted on by

On Tuesday, The U.K. Daily Mail posted the following headline:

Musk stunned as dozens of DOGE staff suddenly QUIT with scathing letter… as eye-watering new savings figure is revealed

That sounded a little strange to me, so I looked a little further. The DOGE staff members quitting were the ones originally hired by President Obama to clean up the Obamacare website fiasco. The young geniuses hired by Elon Musk are working hard.

The article reports:

DOGE workers are revolting against Elon Musk and Donald Trump by signing a dramatic resignation letter vowing not to defund ‘public services.’ 

‘We swore to serve the American people and uphold our oath to the Constitution across presidential administrations,’ 21 former DOGE staffers wrote in a letter first reported on by AP.

These ex-DOGE workers, who are not part of Musk’s personally hired nerd army, said that they refuse to ‘dismantle critical public services’ being slashed.

The article notes:

‘Several of these interviewers refused to identify themselves, asked questions about political loyalty, attempted to pit colleagues against each other, and demonstrated limited technical ability,’ the staffers revealed in their letter, seemingly slamming the DOGE workers who quizzed them as hostile.

‘This process created significant security risks,’ they wrote. 

But DOGE Spokeswoman Katie Miller posted on X that the workers who signed the letters ‘were full remote workers who hung Trans flags from their workplaces.’  

It sounds to me like these are exactly the kind of federal workers that need to find other jobs. Anyone who believes that the government cannot be seriously cut without serious damage to America is part of the problem–not part of the solution. There is a reason many of the richest counties in America are withing commuting distance to Washington, D.C.

The Media Said Nothing!

Posted on by

This was posted at Storm’n Norm’n’s blog. I have not idea who wrote it, but it is fantastic!

YOU SAID NOTHING

To whomever wrote this- Well said!! 

When millions of illegals were ushered in through the southern border, you said nothing! 

When they abandoned millions of dollars worth of military equipment in Afghanistan, you said nothing! 

When they flaunted a two tier justice system, one for them and one for everyone else, you said nothing!

When they covered up the Hunter Biden laptop, you said nothing!

When they passed a trillion dollar infrastructure bill that failed miserably, you said nothing! 

When they forced Americans to take an untested vaccine, you said nothing! 

When inflation crushed the middle class, you said nothing!

When they sent billions to Ukraine, you said nothing! 

When chemicals polluted the water in East Palestine, Ohio and they ignored it, you said nothing! 

When Americans were raped, robbed and murdered by illegals, you said nothing!

When they implanted Kamala as the presidential nominee without getting a single vote, you said nothing! 

When billionaire and anti American George Soros funded dozens of AG elections, you said nothing! 

When they turned our classrooms into liberal indoctrination camps, you said nothing! 

When they spent our tax dollars on inmates transition surgeries, you said nothing! 

When they gave the citizens of Hawaii $700 after losing their entire city, you said nothing! 

When they gave free money, food and 5 star hotel lodging to illegals, you said nothing! 

When they came for our free speech, you said nothing! 

When DEI weakened the military and put our national security at risk, you said nothing! 

When they colluded with the media to push false reports, you said nothing!

When it was open season on law enforcement and criminals reigned, you said nothing! 

When they weaponized the justice system to take down their political opponents, you said nothing!

When the bureaucrats took over the White House and ran the government, you said nothing! 

When they covered up Biden’s rapidly declining mental state, you said nothing! 

When they groomed our kids in school and hid it from the parents, you said nothing! 

When the drug epidemic exploded and 1000s died annually, you said nothing! 

When they accosted the jews on their campuses, you said nothing!

When they weaponized the intelligence agencies against Americans, you said nothing! 

When they spent $45 million dollars on “Diversity and Inclusion” scholarships in Burma, you said nothing!

When they let men play women’s sports, you said nothing! 

When they chanted “Death to America” and burned our flag, you said nothing! 

When they shutdown our energy production, and emboldened Russia, you said nothing! 

When the crime rates in American cities increased, you said nothing!

While thousands of veterans were left to sleep out on the streets, you said nothing!

When 300,000 migrant children went missing and no one had a clue, you said nothing!

When Joe Biden pardoned his friends and family, you said nothing!

When they sent billions to Iran and inadvertently funded Hamas, you said nothing! 

When men were celebrated for pretending to be women, you said nothing! 

When they let a Chinese Spy Ballon sail across America, you said nothing! 

When 50 intelligence agents all lied to bury the Hunter Biden laptop as Russian disinformation, you said nothing! 

When American citizens were taken hostage and held for a year in Gaza, you said nothing! 

When Facebook admitted, they conspired with the Biden administration to censor the truth, you said nothing!

When they cleaned the streets of San Francisco for the communist Chinese President Xi Jinping, you said nothing!

When Fauci and the WHO peddled covid 19 virus lies and covered up the origins, you said nothing! 

When they sealed the January 6th commission files or “lost them”, you said nothing! 

You saw the corruption, the lies, the bad policy, the anti American agenda and said nothing, so please spare us your crocodile tears and all your fake hysteria now. For 4 years you watched this country get run into the ground on all fronts and you said nothing!

Now, it’s our turn!!!! 🇺🇸🙏🏼🏆

Posted by at 2/23/2025 10:06:00 PM

The Money Machine Is Drying Up For The Cartels

Posted on by

On Monday, Breitbart posted an article about the migrant smuggling machine that has made so much money during the past four years.

The article reports:

What was once a “well-oiled migrant smuggling machine” into the United States has collapsed thanks to President Trump’s border enforcement and promise to deport every illegal alien in the country. So, to make money now, many of these same smugglers are taking self-deportees back to Venezuela.

Naturally, the far-left Associated Press reports on this as though it’s a bad thing…

“They once braved the jungles of the Darien Gap, trekking days along the perilous migrant passage dividing Colombia and Panama with a simple goal: seek asylum in the U.S.,” reports the AP. “Now, boat-by-boat, those migrants … have given up after President Donald Trump’s crackdown on asylum, and are returning to the countries they once sought to escape.”

Hey, all Trump did was enforce the law. If people want asylum, there is a legal way to ask for asylum at a point of entry. These folks didn’t do that. Former President Joe Biden tried to aid and abet their lawlessness with an app that would grant them an asylum hearing, but that’s now how it works, that is not the law, and Trump killed the app.

So now, tee hee…

After explaining that the boats had until recently been “part of a well oiled migrant smuggling machine” that was extremely lucrative for the smugglers, who took advantage of a seemingly unending influx of “hundreds of thousands” heading in the United States, AP came to my favorite part:

“But now that much of the Darien’s migrant smuggling industry has collapsed, some smugglers are taking advantage of the reverse migration to charge steep costs to migrants – between $200 and $250 per person, including minors – for the boat rides.”

I admit that our immigration system is broken and needs to be fixed. However, as long as we elect politicians rather than patriots, that system is not going to be fixed. Meanwhile, we need to enforce the laws as they are written. When illegal aliens self-deport, it saves the government money. That is not a bad thing.

Misspent Money

Posted on by

On Sunday, Breitbart reported that a church in New Jersey has had to lay off 195 workers as a result of the cuts to USAID. The church was receiving millions from USAID to help migrants. My question is if they had to lay off 195 workers, how much of the money they were receiving actually went to the migrants?

The article reports:

Leaders with the Reformed Church of Highland Park told Shore News Network they laid off 195 workers after President Donald Trump’s administration stopped federal money from going to migrant resettlement programs, the website reported Sunday.

…The outlet said it “confirmed layoffs through a WARN notice filed with the New Jersey Department of Labor.”

It continued:

The church, which had received $18 million in aid from USAID to place migrants in jobs across New Jersey, is now struggling to keep its programs running. Reverend Seth Kaper-Dale said his organization is owed more than $1.3 million for services rendered in January alone and warned that without immediate support, key programs could collapse.

“For the past 3.5 years, we have experienced that refugees and immigrants are a blessing,” Kaper-Dale said. “Since January 20th, everything has collapsed.”

According to the church’s website, it has had an “active immigration committee since 2002, when our members first started sharing their experiences of trouble with the U.S. Immigration System.”

I have no objection to a church resettling migrants that are legally here with their own money. I just see no reason for the American taxpayers to have to pay for the church’s charitable activities.

When Environmentalism Pollutes The Environment

Posted on by

On Monday, Hot Air posted an article about the fire at Vistra Corp.’s Moss Landing battery storage facility in Moss Landing, California. The fire began on January 16th and is still burning.

The article reports:

Not only were residents affected, but the batteries that went up in flames inside were a critical component of CA’s ludicrous dependency on renewables. They had just been awarded a major 15-year contract with Pacific Gas and Electric (PG&E) to store and deliver up to four hours’ worth of that stored excess capacity to the grid when shortages occur. 

The article cites a few environmental problems with this continuing fire:

Residents in the Moss Landing area are furious. The anger they expressed in interviews just a few days after being trapped in their homes, sealed up as best they could for days after the fire due to the fumes and ash, was palpable.

They want the facility gone.

…”It is a charred, stinking mess. And it is just, and it’s poison now. Okay? We’ve been poisoned,” said Patricia Yeargin, who has a clear view of the Moss Landing towers from her front porch.

“They’re telling us to wear masks. They’re telling us to go inside our house and not come out. They’re telling us they have to, uproot us from our, neighborhoods,” Yeargin said. “And we need to be taken someplace till this thing gets less toxic, for people. So we know what it’s doing to our water down there. We know what it’s doing to our animals.”…

The article notes problems with the environment:

 …San José State University has been monitoring the local ecologically rich but environmentally sensitive Elkhorn Slough estuary by Moss Landing for years, and when they came back for routine testing after the fire, the team found alarming results.

Research scientists at San José State University’s Moss Landing Marine Laboratories said they have detected “unusually high concentrations of heavy-metal nanoparticles in marsh soils at Elkhorn Slough Reserve” after the Moss Landing battery facility fire on Jan. 16.

We have a long way to go to create a safe, environmentally clean fossil fuel alternative.

Books Banned In Prison, But Not In Schools?

Posted on by

On Sunday, The Daily Signal posted an article reporting that books that were banned in prisons by The Texas Department of Criminal Justice are allowed in schools.

The article reports:

A Texas mother is looking to pass several bills through the state legislature this session after discovering what she calls “vulgar,” “profane,” and “indecent” books in public school libraries across the state.

Bonnie Wallace, a member of the Llano County Library Advisory Board and mother to a former Llano County Independent School District student, began warning parents, school officials, and lawmakers about the inappropriate content available to children in public schools after she found dozens of “bad books” at her local high school library. 

“Someone showed me a picture from a book, and the book is called ‘Gender Queer,’ and it’s by … an author named Maia Kobabe … and it was in our library,” Wallace told The Daily Signal.

“Gender Queer” contains graphic depictions of sex and discusses topics such as “gender identity” and sexual preference. 

During her investigations into Texas public school libraries, Wallace said she found books containing QR codes that link to online sex shops, Planned Parenthood, and a website called “F***ing Trans Women.” 

The article notes:

“The Texas Department of Criminal Justice that handles all the prisons in Texas and protocols, they have a list of 10,800 books that they prohibit Texas prisoners from accessing,” Wallace told The Daily Signal. “Any sex act that is illegal in Texas cannot be in a book that’s sent to a prisoner in Texas. … By the way, I have books in high schools and junior highs that have all of these things. It’s shocking.”

Anyone who remembers Junior High School or High School understands the problem leaving these books in the library poses. School libraries have a responsibility to give students access to good literature and books that will help them become contributing members of society. The types of books mentioned above will not advance that goal.

Spending Taxpayer Money On Americans

Posted on by

On Thursday, President Trump signed an Executive Order to ensure taxpayer resources are not used to incentivize or support illegal immigration. The fact that taxpayer money was giving people who are here illegally rooms in luxury hotels in New York City and prepaid credit cards is a disgrace. We have Americans who need help with housing, homeless people, and military people in need of medical care, and we are prioritizing people who are here illegally.

The White House webpage states the following:

Donald J. Trump signed an Executive Order to ensure taxpayer resources are not used to incentivize or support illegal immigration.

    • The Order directs Federal departments and agencies to identify all federally funded programs currently providing financial benefits to illegal aliens and take corrective action.
    • It ensures that Federal funds to states and localities will not be used to support “sanctuary” policies or assist illegal immigration.
    • It mandates improvements in eligibility verification to prevent benefits from going to individuals unlawfully present in the United States.
    • President Trump is committed to safeguarding Federal public benefits for American citizens who are truly in need, including individuals with disabilities and veterans.

We need Congress to pass a law codifying this Executive Order.

View From The Lair

Posted on by

What Is a Conservative?

I consider myself to be a conservative.  I suspect that most people reading this consider themselves to be one as well. Except the previously discussed leftists. Maybe they will learn something, but I won’t hold my breath.

“Conservative” comes from “conserve.” Thus, I endeavor to conserve things. Natural resources. Money. Time, if possible. Notice that I didn’t say “preserve” things. Somethings should be preserved: pickles, fruit, precious artifacts, good relationships.

But natural resources should be conserved: used wisely, not wasted nor used extravagantly without purpose. Many Leftists – enviro-nazis, as the late great Rush Limbaugh described them, believe that all of our natural resources should be preserved, that we should buy them from other countries, especially those countries that would like to see us destroyed. The primary reason for such a position is to see this country destroyed and the people subjugated. Fortunately, we now have President Donald J. Trump to prevent that.

But it’s still wise to conserve our resources. To use them wisely. One of the Executive Orders require a real cost/benefit analysis on all regulations. Such analysis has been required previously, but most of them were not real. The benefits were greatly exaggerated and the costs greatly inflated. Thus, while the agency met the criteria of doing the analysis, the agency itself, set the parameters. Sort of like creating, filing, and grading your own test. A+ Every Time!

Recycling is a good example. I recycle (much to the aggravation of my dear sweet wife). Recycling used materials must be sorted, either at the start or at the end. Plastics in particular present a challenge to the recycler. Some recycle easily, others not so much. Is it cheaper and more efficient to use new raw materials or recycled? What is the use of the end product? Vests for Walmart employees or bottles for hospital IV fluids. Both can use the same plastic. Which would you choose?

Some plastics – and virtually all other materials CAN be recycled, but at what cost? Especially compared to the production stream of new material. ALL products contain energy. For most, the energy to extract, refine, transport, and manufacture the raw material is a substantial part of the raw material cost. And the energy to transport, separate, recycle and render into an acceptable condition for used materials as a raw material is greater than to produce new material.

Yet the enviro-nazis using their cohorts in the EPA and other agencies manipulate the cost/benefit analysis to skew reality into their “reality.” What the market will actually pay is a good starting point for the EPA and other agencies to use to determine what should be recycled and what should be used as incinerator fuel to recover energy and reduce the landfill requirements. I’m anxious to see the results.

ciao,

The Snark

When The Objections Illustrate The Problem

Posted on by

If your news sources are limited to the mainstream media, you might think that now is not a good time to visit Yosemite National Park–you might not be able to get into the restroom! Obviously that is ridiculous, but not to everyone.

On February 23rd, Townhall reported the following:

There’s something about being exposed that causes stupidity; a kneejerk reaction to push back against reality, no matter how obvious. As DOGE and President Donald Trump work to expose and fight government waste, fraud and abuse (how sad is it that they have to FIGHT Democrats to end those things?), more ways in which the federal government has been doing those things is coming to light.

…One of the dumbest and most hilarious cases of this very phenomenon was on display in a story in the Washington Post this week. It opens with this paragraph, “At California’s Yosemite National Park, the Trump administration fired the only locksmith on staff on Friday. He was the sole employee with the keys and the institutional knowledge needed to rescue visitors from locked restrooms.”

I have questions.

Why is there a locksmith on staff, as a locksmith, when you could just contract with one when needed? How often in your life have you said, “Damnit, why isn’t there a locksmith on staff?!” At the most, I’d say one time. But the odds are heavily in favor of never.

Next, why is this guy the only person with keys? Is that the source of his job security? “Fire me and you’ll never get into any building or room again, because I will destroy every key!” Doubtful, as other locksmiths exist, not to mention the fact that changing a lock isn’t all that hard.

The article concludes:

I promise you there are hundreds of thousands, if not millions of examples of other things too stupid to believe that our government pays for because no one is accountable for wasting money or cares. 

This is the system Democrats and Republicans created over the years, but only Democrats defend now. They wouldn’t run their family’s finances this way, and if they ran a company’s books the way they allow government to function they’d all be in jail. 

Remember that the next time you have an argument with one of your liberal friends about how “evil” Trump and Elon Musk are. Of course, there’s a better than average chance you’d be having that argument through a bathroom door with your friend “trapped” inside as they await the locksmith’s arrival, which makes the whole conversation pretty easy to avoid.

I am totally convinced that Yosemite National Park could put a locksmith on speed dial to avoid any problems firing the current one might cause.

How Does The Amount Of Money Actually Used To Solve The Problem Compare To The Amount Of Money Given To The NGO ?

Posted on by

On Saturday, The New York Post posted an article about the misuse of American taxpayer dollars under the banner of USAID.

The article reports:

DOGE wants to see where our tax dollars go, and we should let them. No surprise that the “government industrial complex” will resist every effort to bring transparency and accountability to how those funds are spent when the system is ripe with problems.

I’ve had first-hand experience with USAID and other international aid organizations, such as the World Bank, UNESCO, and even the Red Cross, during my 40-plus trips to Haiti after being invited by then Haitian President René Préval to help rebuild the nation following the devastating 2010 earthquake.

And I’ve seen how USAID, along with other NGOs, delivered on very few of their promises, failed to coordinate relief activities, and even skimmed money off the top.

…What happened in Haiti captures, at the very least, the incompetence — if not the outright corruption — of these international relief organizations. There is probably no more corrupt government agency than USAID.

Since the 2010 earthquake in Haiti killed as many as 300,000 people, the US government has disbursed around $4.4 billion in foreign assistance to the small island nation.

At least $1.5 billion was disbursed for immediate humanitarian aid, while another $3 billion went to recovery, reconstruction and development.

Of the at least $2.13 billion in contracts and grants for Haiti-related work, less than $50 million, or 2% went to Haitian organizations or firms. By comparison, $1.3 billion, or 56%, has gone to firms located in or near the US capitol. Little wonder USAID is so threatened by the sudden scrutiny.

The article concludes:

Money is lost when charities give funds to other organizations to implement the work they had promised. For example, the Red Cross set aside some of the original Haiti funds for their own administrative fees. Then, the charities they hired took a cut of their subsequent administrative fees.

Finally, the Red Cross had yet another charge which they described as “program costs incurred in managing third-party projects,” or an oversight fee.

Ultimately, this lack of transparency allows for ineffective and misleading uses of large donations that might otherwise have the potential to make an important impact in long-term relief.

The lack of information required by these organizations also complicates further analysis of this distribution of money and its long-term success.

The US provided $72 billion in aid to 180 countries in 2023, with USAID serving as its lead agency. DOGE attention to USAID is much deserved and long overdue as American goodwill and generosity have been repeatedly squandered.

The Haitian experience is the best case study of the failures of the American foreign aid program’s lack of transparency and accountability.

Governmental agencies such as USAID and their NGO partners and collaborators act as if they are sovereign nations — accountable to no one.

I don’t mind helping countries in need. I do mind lining the pockets of people who run charities where very little of the collected money actually goes where it needs to go.

A Sad And Reluctant Conclusion

Posted on by

We cannot in any way make excuses for the behavior of the Arabs who claim to be Palestinians during the return of the bodies of the hostages they murdered. Remember, no one cared about a Palestinian state until Yasser Arafat (who was Egyptian) decided to use it as an excuse for terrorism. The behavior of the people who claim to be Palestinian is an affront to civilization.

On Thursday, Jonathan Tobin posted an article at The Jewish News Syndicate about the continuing behavior of these Arabs who claim that all they want is their own state (and to kill Jews).

The article notes:

Avoiding generalizations about groups of people is almost always wise. In doing so, we avoid the snares that can lead to prejudicial conclusions that cause us to forget that even those who differ from us in many ways have a common humanity. When people refer to opponents of any kind by saying that “they” (whoever the “they” might be) ”are all alike” and therefore bad, we know they are usually telling us far more about themselves than anything else.

And yet, as much as we might wish it not to be so, there are occasions when groups do exhibit loathsome behavior that are a clear illustration of their beliefs and values.

Over the last month, the Palestinian Arabs have done just that during ceremonies as part of the release of hostages they took on Oct. 7, 2023. Their celebrations of that orgy of mass murder, rape, torture, kidnapping and wanton destruction reached a new low this week when they turned over the remains of four murdered hostages: Oded Lifshitz, 83 when he was taken; Shiri Bibas, 32; and her little sons, Ariel, age 4; and Kfir, only 9 months old when kidnapped. However, testing later showed that the body that was supposed to be Shiri was, in fact, not her. That was just one more act of cruelty to add to so many others committed by the Palestinians.

The article concludes:

Faced with total defeat and with their country in ruins, the Germans did change and put their Nazi past behind them, even if not all of those responsible for the Holocaust were held accountable. The Palestinians, however, will never change until the civilized world stops coddling them and making excuses for their culture of death, hate and intransigent dedication to perpetual war on the Jews.

After the latest examples of their collective depravity—the slaughter of an old man, a young mother and her two babies—they should be made to see that a failure to transform their national culture will be punished with policies that will have permanent consequences for their national life and ambitions. The alternative is to doom both Israelis and Palestinians to another century of pointless conflict and more sick exhibitions of hate such as the one that Hamas staged to celebrate the deaths of innocents.

Please follow the link to read the entire article. It is a very honest assessment of where we are.

Moving Quickly To Improve Things

Posted on by

Kash Patel was sworn in as FBI Director last week. He is already making his presence known.

On Friday, PJ Media reported:

Newly confirmed FBI Director Kash Patel is on fire. After his swearing-in, he gave a not-so-subtle speech, showing that he’s ready to handle the media’s smears.

“I know the media’s in here, and if you have a target, that target’s right here,” he said, pointing to himself. “It’s not the men and women at the FBI.”

…He wasted no time turning his bold rhetoric into action. Following his blistering speech on Friday, he ordered the transfer of 1,500 agents and staff from the bureau’s Washington, D.C., headquarters to field offices across the country.

Roughly 1,000 will be sent to high-crime cities that the Trump administration designated, where they can focus on fighting crime instead of political games. Another 500 will be reassigned to Huntsville, Ala., which is widely seen as D.C.’s version of exile.

Getting FBI agents out of Washington and into the rest of America makes sense. They are needed to aid local and state law enforcement. We have a drug epidemic in this country and a crime epidemic that goes along with that. Let’s get the FBI out of the office and on the street helping local law enforcement.

Pay Down Debt or Spend More?

Posted on by

Author:  R. Alan Harrop, Ph.D.  

The first month of the second Trump administration has not only been historic, but has shown that he is determined to keep his promises and make “America Great Again.”  This has been exhilarating for his supporters and for every patriotic American.  One of the historic things he has done is the creation of the Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE).  No other president has taken such a meaningful step to search out fraud, waste, and abuse in the federal government, even though we all suspected it was there.  Seemingly every day, DOGE reports examples of government spending of our tax money that needs to be stopped.

Although we do not yet know the total amount of taxpayer money that can be saved, the amount will be substantial.  The question that now arises is what to do with that money. At least three possible options are being considered.  First:  Pay down the national debt; second: use it in constructing the current budget; and third: give a direct refund back to the taxpayers.  Let’s examine these options.

The national debt is currently is $36.5 trillion and increasing by $1 trillion every 100 days.  By 2030, it is projected to reach $45.5 trillion.  Just the interest payment on the debt will be $1.2 trillion this fiscal year ending in October.  By 2035 it’s projected that just the interest on the national debt will be $6 trillion.  This far exceeds the total federal tax revenue for 2024 which was $4.5 trillion.  What does all this tell us?  That the federal government is on a slide to fiscal bankruptcy that is growing more inevitable every year.  The analogy with personal finances would be owing money, say to credit cards companies, where the total interest paid each month more than exceeds one’s monthly income!  Clearly, this is unsustainable.

As far as the annual budget option is concerned, in 2024, the federal government spent $1.8 trillion more than it took in in revenue.  The budget being considered for this fiscal year will likely have a deficit of similar size.   Applying any savings found be DOGE to this year’s budget would seem to help, but only if the politicians can be trusted to not spend more since they will have more to spend.   Given their track record, I am not optimistic they would do the right thing.

Lastly, giving a refund back to the people sounds good but in many ways is fraught with problems when deciding who should get the refund and how much.  Generally, only about 50% of workers actually pay federal income tax.    Also, the amount of tax paid varies considerably.  So, would it be right to grant, say, a refund of $5,000. to all workers when they vary not only in how much federal tax they paid to begin with, or whether they paid any at all? Sorting this out would be complex indeed.  It is also likely, that infusing more cash into the system will result in higher inflation, which we must not allow to happen.

Since the crisis facing our country is the national debt, it seems to me that the best strategy would be to directly apply any savings found by DOGE directly to reducing the federal debt.  It would be equivalent to the example of the person with excessive credit card debt applying some windfall to paying the credit card off or rather taking the money and buying more things.  We need to face up to the crisis of the national debt and the best way to do that is to apply any and all savings identified by DOGE directly to reducing that debt.  This will show our citizens and the world that we are actually serious about solving the federal debt crisis.

The Road Toward Fiscal Sanity

Posted on by

On February 22nd, Fox News posted an article listing seven things that happened this week that will move us toward more a fiscally responsible government.

Here is the list:

1. On Thursday, U.S. District Judge Christopher Cooper, an Obama appointee, shot down a request from several federal labor unions, including the National Treasury Employees Union (NTEU), to pause the mass firings of federal workers by the Trump administration.

2. DOGE was handed another victory by U.S. District Judge Tanya S. Chutkan, who denied a request to issue a temporary restraining order preventing Musk and DOGE from accessing data systems at the Department of Education, Office of Personnel Management (OPM), Department of Labor, Department of Health and Human Services, Department of Energy, Department of Transportation and Department of Commerce. 

3. DOGE scored a win in court after a federal judge declined a request to temporarily block Elon Musk’s government efficiency team from accessing sensitive data from at least three federal agencies.

4. Earlier this week, DOGE announced it had discovered an identification code linking U.S. Treasury payments to a budget line item, which accounts for nearly $4.7 trillion in payments, that was oftentimes left blank.

5. Schools spent hundreds of billions of COVID relief funds on expenses that had “little” impact on students, such as Las Vegas hotel rooms and the purchase of an ice cream truck, according to the Trump administration’s cost-cutting department.

…The cost-cutting department also revealed that schools spent $60,000 in COVID relief funds on swimming pool passes, while a California district used its funds to purchase an ice cream truck.

6. Secretary of Defense Pete Hegseth is working with DOGE to make cuts within his department, saying he believes it will find waste “not core to our mission.”

7. DOGE revealed on Tuesday that the U.S. government has more than 4 million active credit cards on its books.

“The US government currently has ~4.6M active credit cards/accounts, which processed ~90M unique transactions for ~$40B of spend[ing] in FY24,” DOGE said in a post on X.

We are definitely moving in the right direction.

 

View From the Lair

Posted on by

Remember the Elephant

The symbol of the Republican Party is an elephant, representing dignity and strength. It didn’t start that way; cartoonist Thomas Nast portrayed Republicans as such in a number of different settings, some not so kindly. Elephants are also noted for their excellent memory. I don’t think that that particular elephantine talent always translates to the Republican Party. It should. It better.

Now that the Trump-Musk BullDOGEr has crushed and chewed its’ way into the Deep State Swamp the rats are scrambling. Leftist’s wails and screams and gnashing of teeth are music to my ears. They are attempting to fight back, of course. This time President Trump and Elon Musk are far better prepared not just to do battle but to eviscerate their opposition. Good for them.

There is a new book out, you might have seen it advertised – I’m reading it now and comparing it to the revelations being exposed by The BullDOGEr.

“The Woketopus: The Dark Money Cabal that is Manipulating The Federal Government” was published and released before the BullDOGEr got started but it reveals the tentacles and kudzu like morass of NGO’s, government agencies and dark money from the likes of George Soros. Possible also from Satan, though it’s hard to tell the difference.

“Woketopus” is one of, if not THE, most researched and footnoted books I’ve ever read. It follows the money trail from and through the government to all of the myriad Marxist agencies infecting our government.

Trump and Musk are making fabulous – and frightening – progress in slashing both the size of government and fraud, waste and abuse. We can hope that their efforts will be long lasting.

Yet I fear that Republicans (not to mention the general public) will not long enough remember what has been done to our Republic that they are having to undo. Marxists are nothing if not tenacious. They play the long (and dirty) game. They are not like a simple weed that can be plucked from the lawn or garden and discarded forever.

No, they are more like kudzu or Poison Ivy, that even after being cut, sprayed and pulled, the tiniest remnant will return to infest the lawn and garden, stealing the strength and sapping the energy of the honest bureaucrat (yes, an oxymoron. Though a few might exist. Like unicorns.) who is actually trying to spend our hard-earned tax dollars wisely and efficiently. (You have no idea how hard that concept is for me to grasp. Or type.)

We MUST remember. We MUST insist on transparency. We MUST refuse to sit back and expect this lesson to be learned. Because the Donkey party is stubborn. They are obnoxious. And they will fight back. They must be treated like General Sherman treated Georgia. On second thought – compared to what the Marxists deserve, Sherman was too kind.

ciao

The Snark

This Makes My Blood Boil

Posted on by

On Thursday, Hot Air posted an article about Hamas’ release of the bodies of four hostages. The fact that Israel is backed into a corner and is releasing live terrorists for dead hostages is bad enough, but Hamas used to occasion as propaganda. It was disgusting.

The article quotes The U.K. Daily Mail:

Hamas has been condemned for parading the coffins of hostages in Gaza, with the United Nations rights chief saying the ‘abhorrent’ treatment of the October 7 attack victims ‘flies in the face of international law.’

Israelis are mourning the youngest hostages – baby Kfir Bibas and his four-year-old brother Ariel – as well as their mother Shiri and elderly captive Oded Lifshitz, whose bodies are believed to have been inside the caskets.

The four coffins were displayed to crowds in front of disturbing propaganda posters before being handed over to the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) by armed Hamas fighters. 

I admire Israel’s restraint. If it were up to me, Gaza would be a radioactive parking lot by now.

The article at Hot Air includes multiple pictures of the transfer of the bodies of the hostages.

The article at Hot Air includes the following screenshot from X:

I agree.

UPDATE:

The woman’s body that was returned is not the mother of the two murdered children.

 

Don’t Let The Taxpayers Have Their Own Money!

Posted on by

On Thursday, The Daily Caller posted an article spotlighting one Democrat’s reaction to the idea of refunding some of the money the Department of Government Efficiency saves back to the taxpayers–the people who paid it. I love the idea of giving money back only to those who actually pay taxes.

The article reports:

Democratic Texas Rep. Jasmine Crockett could not comprehend the idea of the federal government handing out dividends to Americans over the money it has wasted for decades during a Thursday segment on ABC News.

President Donald Trump expressed interest in handing out $5,000 dividend checks to every taxpayer with the money saved by the Department of Government Efficiency’s (DOGE) downsizing of the federal government. Crockett said she does not believe $5,000 will help out the average American and appeared to ignore the fact that the federal government has wasted billions of dollars in spending for several years.

…DOGE reported on Monday that it saved $55 billion in federal spending by conducting mass layoffs and dismantling various government agencies. Trump’s newly established department dismantled the U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) on Feb. 3 to end its spending on left-wing causes abroad, including a $200 grant to fund sex change operations in Guatemala and its $47,000 in spending on a transgender opera in Colombia, according to the White House.

The article concludes:

Musk, who is overseeing many of DOGE’s efforts, told Fox News’ Sean Hannity on Tuesday that the agency “must be over the target” for Democrats to be so upset about their efforts.

“I guess we must be over the target or doing something right. They wouldn’t be complaining so much if we weren’t doing something useful, I think,” Musk said. “What all we’re really trying to do here is restore the will of the people through the president. What we’re finding is that there’s an unelected bureaucracy — speaking of unelected, there’s a vast federal bureaucracy that is implacably opposed to the president and the cabinet.”

If she doesn’t want her check, I will gladly take it for her.

Representative Crockett was not in Congress when the three Covid stimulus checks were handed out. I can’t help but wonder if she would have approved.