Changing The Rules

On Friday, Victor Davis Hanson posted an article at The New York Post detailing how the Democrat party has changed some of the basic rules of our Republic in recent years. It’s a long list.

Here are the highlights of the list:

1. When in control of the Senate, demand the end of the filibuster; when not, don’t.

2. Call for the end of the Electoral College — but only if it appears to recently favor the candidate of the opposition.

3. In an election year, change any state balloting laws deemed unhelpful through administrative fiat or court order to favor your political candidate.

4. Seek to flip electors from voting in accordance with the popular vote count in their states; indict as an insurrectionist any of the opposition who dare do the same.

5. Raid the home of any opposition ex-president who removed classified files; exempt any sitting president of your party who did the same.

6. Swarm the private homes of, and then bully and intimidate, any Supreme Court officials, politicians or citizens you oppose.

7. Appoint two special counsels: one to go after the current chief presidential opponent in an election year; the other to exempt and excuse the sitting president for the very crimes charged against his rival.

8. Lobby to remove any oppositional president through the 25th Amendment; smear anyone as ageist who suggests a cognitively challenged sitting resident of your party should be subject to similar invocations of the 25th Amendment.

9. Exempt thousands of arrested rioters from charges of 120 days of arson, looting, injuring 1,500 law enforcement officers, and assault — but only if they are radical supporters of your party.

10. Excuse any demonstrator or rioter for desecrating public monuments and cemeteries or shutting down bridges and freeways, or swarming and disrupting the Capitol Rotunda — but only if they agree with you and/or are pro-Hamas. Otherwise, ensure the charged face lengthy prison sentences.

That’s just the top ten. Please follow the link to the article to read the next ten. It’s amazing how far we have fallen in recent years. When you read the list of things that used to be considered out-of-bounds that have been done since 2016 or so, it is scary.

 

 

 

What An Incredible Coincidence

On Wednesday, The New York Post posted an article about the new minimum wage law in California.

The article reports:

California Gov. Gavin Newsom signed a law that exempts Panera Bread from a new $20-an-hour minimum wage hike for fast food chains after the billionaire owner of several of the chain’s locations donated to his campaign, according to a report.

In September, Newsom, a Democrat, signed into law a measure that raises the minimum wage of food fast workers from $16 an hour to $20 an hour.

But the Fast Food Accountability and Standards Recovery Act (FAST Act) includes an unusual carve-out that exempts “chains that bake bread and sell it as a standalone item,” according to Bloomberg News.

Newsom reportedly sought the exemption, which benefits among others Greg Flynn, the billionaire CEO of Flynn Restaurant Group, the company that owns some two dozen Panera Bread locations in the state.

Flynn, who attended the same high school as Newsom, has been involved in business dealings with the California governor, according to Bloomberg News.

He has also contributed to Newsom’s political campaigns.

…The governor’s office told Bloomberg News that the law was the “result of countless hours of negotiations with dozens of stakeholders over two years.”

Flynn was publicly critical of the legislation when it was first floated in 2022.

He said that raising the minimum wage of fast-food employees would have an adverse business effect on franchise owners.

Flynn quietly lobbied Newsom’s aides to reconsider whether Panera Bread can be considered fast food, according to Bloomberg News.

The exemption for bread sellers was inserted into the legislation after the union that was pushing for the hike in minimum wage accepted it as a concession aimed at getting the governor’s support, the report stated.

I would not be disappointed if In-N-Out Burger decided to get out of California and come east!

Finally!

On Wednesday, The New York Post reported that Mitch McConnell will step down as Republican leader in the Senate in November. He became a Senator in 1985. It was not mentioned in the article, but I suspect Senator John Thune will be selected by the uni-party to replace Mitch McConnell as the Republican leader.

There have been a few problems with Senator McConnell–mainly  the fact that his wife is part of one of Communist China’s richest families (they are involved in the shipping industry). Obviously, you don’t get rich in Communist China without the approval of the government. To me that is an uncomfortable connection.

The article at The New York Post reports:

He noted that when he arrived in the Senate, “I was just happy if anybody remembered my name.” During his campaign in 1984, when Reagan was visiting Kentucky, the president called him “Mitch O’Donnell.”

McConnell endorsed Reagan’s view of America’s role in the world and the senator has persisted in face of opposition, including from Trump, that Congress should include a foreign assistance package that includes $60 billion for Ukraine.

…Trump has pulled the party hard to the ideological right, questioning longtime military alliances such as NATO, international trade agreements and pushing for a severe crackdown on immigration, all the while clinging to the falsehood that the election was stolen from him in 2020.

McConnell and Trump had worked together in Trump’s first term, remaking the Supreme Court and the federal judiciary in a far more conservative image, and on tax legislation. But there was also friction from the start, with Trump frequently sniping at the senator.

Their relationship has essentially been over since Trump refused to accept the results of the Electoral College. But the rupture deepened dramatically after the Jan. 6, 2021, attack on the Capitol. McConnell assigned blame and responsibility to Trump and said that he should be held to account through the criminal justice system for his actions.

President Trump has not pulled the party hard right–he has pulled it back to where it was before the days on George H.W. Bush and George W. Bush. President Trump seems hard right because the uni-party, the press and the culture have moved so far left.

Are We Living In A Police State?

News organizations are firing employees because of law ratings. CNN, BuzzFeed, and Vice Media have all recently announced layoffs. CBS is also firing reporters.

On Thursday (updated Friday), The New York Post reported the following:

The acclaimed CBS reporter who was investigating the Hunter Biden laptop scandal before she was fired last week had her personal files seized by the network in an “unprecedented” move, sources told The Post on Thursday.

Catherine Herridge — who is the middle of a First Amendment case being closely watched by journalists nationwide — was among 20 CBS News staffers let go as part of a larger purge of hundreds of employees at parent company Paramount Global.

Her firing had stunned co-workers, but the network’s decision to hold on to her personal materials, along with her work laptop where she may have other confidential info, has left many staffers shaken, according to insiders.

“It’s so extraordinary,” a source familiar with the situation told The Post, noting that the files — which are presumptively now the property of CBS News — most likely contain confidential material from Herridge’s stints at both Fox and CBS.

The source said the network boxed up all her personal belongings except for Herridge’s notes and files and informed her that it would decide what — if anything — would be returned to her.

“They never seize documents [when you’re let go],” a second source close to the network said.

Brit Hume posted the following on Twitter:

 

This is just one more step in the direction of a police state where the media is controlled by the people in power.

The article at The New York Post concludes:

Jonathan Turley — a legal scholar and a former CBS legal analyst who first broke the news of Herridge’s documents being seized in an opinion piece for The Hill — said the timing of the journalist’s termination raised suspicions.

“She was pursuing stories that were unwelcomed by the Biden White House and many Democratic powerhouses, including the Hur report on Joe Biden’s diminished mental capacity, the Biden corruption scandal and the Hunter Biden laptop,” Turley wrote.

Under normal circumstances, journalists are entitled to their notes and make available the files if needed in future ligation, but leaving sensitive documents in the hands of unnamed CBS officials, could compromise Herridge’s numerous other confidential sources.

It also potentially violates HIPAA laws, as her files may also contain personal and family medical records.

Turley said CBS’ “heavy-handed approach” to the files” is “dead wrong” and that it had “sent a chilling signal in the ranks” of the network.

SAG-AFTRA, the union which represents CBS staffers, condemned the network for seizing Herridge’s notes and research from her office.

“This action is deeply concerning concerning to the union because it sets a dangerous precedent for all media professionals and threatens the very foundation of the First Amendment,” the union said in a statement to The Post.

The union added it has been in touch with CBS News and is hopeful the matter “will be resolved shortly.”

We are in a dangerous place.

Where Can We Sign Up?

On Monday, The New York Post reported that New York City Mayor Eric Adams is giving out pre-paid cash cards to illegal immigrants. Maybe I am missing something, but it seems to me that if you want to discourage people from coming to your city, you don’t hand them $10,000 without any kind of an identification check. The possibilities for fraud are endless. Also, what impact does putting $50 million into the New York City economy have on inflation. Didn’t we learn a lesson about that from the Covid stimulus payments?

The article reports:

Earlier this month, The Post broke the story that Mayor Eric Adams is giving out pre-paid cash cards to migrants.

Unusually for the mayor, Adams didn’t publicize this story himself, and his administration for nearly a month has failed to correct several public misperceptions about it.

One misperception is that the program allows the city to give out just $50 million to migrants.

No wonder the mayor has been reticent.

This debit card program — if you read the actual contract — has the potential to become an open-ended, multibillion-dollar Bermuda Triangle of disappearing, untraceable cash, used for any purpose.

It will give migrants up to $10,000 each in taxpayer money with no ID check, no restrictions and no fraud control.

The article also points out that the company overseeing this program is Newark-based Mobility Capital Finance, which also has an office in Harlem. The article explains some of the background of the company and some interesting aspects of the program.

The article notes”

Yes, the city can ask MoCaFi to activate or deactivate certain merchant or spending codes.

But these restrictions are not built into the contract; they are at the city’s changing discretion.

The city can even enable cardholder “consumers” to withdraw cash from the cards at domestic and international ATMs. “ATM withdrawal amounts per day can be restricted as required by the city,” the contract reads. “Should ATM access be included as part of the program, card fees will be subject to the schedule provided.”

The article concludes:

As the mayor told radio host Gary Byrd earlier this month, “it’s important for us to speak directly to you to separate the facts from fiction … Fact from fiction is the migrant cards that we gave out to migrants to purchase food. Just some quick bullets that you need to know about these cards. They are not American Express gold cards, folks. This is a pilot project we’re doing with 500 migrants.”

The fiction is in what the mayor says.

The fact is in the contract documents.

The city has given itself the full contractual and technical authority, under a supposed “emergency,” to disburse billions of dollars in cash to unidentifiable people who otherwise are not eligible to access the American financial system, in untraceable global cash.

Please follow the link to read the entire article. I wish our veterans were treated this generously.

The Real Purpose Of The Raid At Mar-a-Lago?

If you don’t have your conspiracy hat on, you are probably going to need it for this article.

An animal is most dangerous when it is cornered. On Tuesday, The New York Post posted an article about the illegal spying on President Trump during the presidential campaign of 2016 and afterward. Obviously, that was illegal, but it seems as if Democrats are not required to abide by laws.

The article reports:

The US Intelligence Community asked foreign spy agencies to surveil 26 associates of Donald Trump in the run-up to the 2016 election, which triggered the allegations that the former president’s campaign had been colluding with Russia, according to a report. 

Former CIA Director John Brennan identified and presented the targets to the US’s intelligence-sharing partners in the so-called “Five Eyes” agencies – the intelligence-gathering organizations in the US, United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and New Zealand – according to a report published Monday on Michael Shellenberger’s Public Substack

The report by independent journalists Shellenberger, Matt Taibbi and Alex Gutentag has not been confirmed by The Post.

They cite multiple unnamed sources, including ones close to the House Permanent Select Committee on Intelligence, led by Rep. Mike Turner (R-Ohio). 

The article concludes:

Former FBI lawyer Kevin Clinesmith was sentenced to probation in 2021 after admitting that he falsified an e-mail to renew a wiretap against former Trump campaign adviser Carter Page. 

​​Page had been wiretapped after intelligence sources suspected he might have been targeted by Russian spies. The wiretap, which was approved by the secret Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court, was renewed several times after it was first granted.

Last March, Special Counsel John Durham concluded that the FBI investigation of Trump’s alleged collusion with Russia was “seriously flawed” and had no basis in evidence, after a four-year review of the probe. 

In response, the FBI said it had “implemented dozens of corrective actions” since the improper Trump probe and that “the missteps identified in the report could have been prevented” had the reforms been in place in 2016. 

In 2022, Taibbi and Shellenberger were involved in the publishing of the Twitter Files expose, which detailed how the social media giant’s previous management team sought to silence controversial voices and suppress news items such as The Post’s reporting on Hunter Biden’s laptop.

Do you really believe all necessary corrective actions have been taken? What if there is more to this than meets the eye? What if documents detailing exactly who was involved in this illegal activity exist and the FBI does not know where they are? Would they logically be at Mar-a-Lago or in President Trump’s possession? Is it possible that was what the raid at Mar-a-Lago was really about since other Presidents have never been treated that way?

President Trump is a smart man. I suspect (and I would also suggest that the parties who broke the law spying suspect) that somewhere in a very secret place the documents showing the abuse of our justice system are in President Trump’s possession. I also think that those who engaged in the illegal spying will be brought to justice if President Trump is re-elected. That is why the deep state is working so hard to prevent President Trump from being our next President.

Are You Surprised?

On Tuesday, The New York Post posted an article reporting that President Biden will not take a cognitive test during his upcoming annual physical.

The article reports:

The White House says President Biden will not take a cognitive test — even after a damning report from his own Department of Justice highlighting his “poor memory” and voters expressing major concerns about his mental acuity.

“The president proves every day [in] how he operates and how he thinks — by dealing with world leaders, by making difficult decisions on behalf of the American people — whether it’s domestic or national security,” White House press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre told reporters Monday, quoting from Biden’s physician, Dr. Kevin O’Connor.

“That is how Dr. O’Connor sees it, and that is how I’m going to leave it,” she said, adding that she has known the now-81-year-old Biden since 2009 and he is still “sharp.”

“When we have meetings with him and his staff, he is constantly pushing us, trying to get more information, and so that has been my experience with this president,” Jean-Pierre said.

I am not willing to demand that every candidate for President take a cognitive test, but I would support a law that said every President over the age of 70 in office should include a cognitive test as part of his annual physical.

The article also notes:

Last year, O’Connor did not put Biden through any cognitive tests. The doctor has also never taken questions from the press — in a clear break from White House precedent.

Jean-Pierre, asked about finally letting O’Connor take reporters’ questions after the oldest-ever president’s annual physical, which is expected to take place as soon as this month, refused to commit to whether that would occur.

At this point, I think the only thing that is keeping President Biden from being forced to step down from the presidency is the fact that Kamala Harris is Vice-President.

One Consequence Of “No Bail” Laws


On Thursday, The New York Post posted an article about four of the eight migrants who beat up two New York policemen on Saturday.

The article reports:

Four of the migrants cut loose without bail after allegedly ganging up on two NYPD cops near Times Square may be on the run, The Post has learned.

Cops believe the group could have hopped on a bus bound for California on Wednesday after giving phony names to a church-affiliated nonprofit group that helps migrants get rides out of the city, according to law enforcement sources.

The four accused cop-attackers believed to have skipped town were charged with assault on a police officer and obstruction immediately after the shocking, caught-on-video attack Saturday in Midtown.

Darwin Andres Gomez, 19, Kelvin Servita Arocha, 19, Wilson Juarez, 21, and Yorman Reveron, 24, were released without monetary bail by a Manhattan judge.

But Reveron, who had prior arrests on his rap sheet, was put on supervised release. Sources said hightailing it out of the city would likely be a violation of his court-ordered release.

…A fifth asylum-seeking suspect, Jhoan Boada, 22, was hit with the same charges and also released without bail Wednesday.

Two more migrants, Jandry Barros, 21, and Yohenry Brito, 24, were arrested by cops later that night, the NYPD said.

We should not even consider giving asylum to a person who beats up policemen!

The article notes:

The Manhattan District Attorney’s Office said the $15,000 cash bail or a $50,000 bond was warranted because Brito had been positively identified on the video footage of the attack through a “distinct tattoo.”

He has four prior arrests for petty larceny, with two open cases and a guilty plea on a disorderly conduct charge in September, according to sources and a criminal complaint.

Assistant District Attorney Zachary Kotin also argued that Brito didn’t have a permanent address or ties to the community, warranting the bail to ensure his return to court, and Judge Marisol Martinez Alonzo agreed to the amount.

The article concludes:

The DA’s office previously said investigators were still reviewing the footage to determine the extent to which the earlier five suspects were involved.

The spokesperson on Thursday also said the office was investigating the allegations that the four released migrants had skipped town.

“The Court is not aware of the defendants’ whereabouts but they are obligated to return to Court on their scheduled dates,” which is Feb. 6, said Al Baker, spokesman for the state Office of Court Administration.

The defendants should be tried quickly and deported quickly if they are found guilty.

 

It’s Time To Re-educate Our Children

On Monday, The College Fix reported the following:

Nearly 90 percent of Ivy League grads support the “strict” rationing of gas, meat and electricity to fight climate change, according to a new poll.

The conservative Committee to Unleash Prosperity, in a survey that sought to measure the beliefs of “elites,” stated the findings reveal climate change “is clearly an obsession of the very rich and highly educated.”

“An astonishing 77% of the Elites – including nearly 90% of the Elites who graduated from the top universities – favor rationing of energy, gas, and meat to combat climate change. Among all Americans, 63% oppose this policy,” the organization reported.

The poll, released this month and titled “Them vs. U.S.: The two Americas and how the nation’s elite is out of touch with average Americans,” was billed by the committee as a “first-of-its-kind look at the views of the American Elite.”

They are defined as “people having at least one post-graduate degree, earning at least $150,000 annually, and living in high-population density areas (more than 10,000 people per square mile in their zip code).”

Another key finding is nearly six in 10 “elites” say there is too much individual freedom in America.

The report is based on two surveys of 1,000 elites conducted last fall.

Remember the song “Mammas Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be Cowboys”? Maybe it should be rewritten to say, “Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Go to Ivy League Colleges.”

Individual freedom is what made America great. Individual freedom is what allowed these graduates to achieve what they needed to achieve to get into Ivy League schools.

The article concludes:

The “shocking” findings reveal “a wealthy, partisan elite class that’s not only immune from and numb to the problems of their countrymen, but enormously confident in and willing to impose unpopular policies on them,” argued Isaac Schorr in an op-ed Friday for the New York Post.

“It’s near impossible to behold the results and not acknowledge they’re indicative of a fundamental disconnect between two Americas,” he wrote. “That disconnect should be of as much concern to proud aristocrats as it is to the peasantry.”

The new poll results are reminiscent of another survey The College Fix reported on last summer which found two thirds of college students believe climate change is an “existential threat” to their generation; however, fewer than one in five were willing to give up their smartphones to help.

 

Slowly Uncovering The Spider’s Web

On Tuesday, The New York Post posted an article about the tunnels the Israeli Defense Forces are uncovering in Gaza.

The article reports:

Hamas’ sinister network of tunnels underneath the Gaza Strip may be over 350 miles long – or hundreds of miles more than initial estimates, sources said this week.

The tunnels may run for anywhere between 350 to 450 miles, and boast a staggering 5,700 entrance shafts, senior Israeli officials told The New York Times.

The new estimates – which could not be confirmed – are over 100 miles longer than the original numbers, which placed the tunnel network at around 250 miles long, the outlet noted.

The tunnels’ vastness is “extraordinary” given that Gaza’s longest point only stretches about 25 miles, the Times said.

…There are believed to be about 130 hostages left in Gaza – many of whom are suspected to be held somewhere in the vast tunnel network.

Thanks to new intelligence gathered during the campaign, the IDF can now quickly detect a single tunnel – a task they previously took up to a year, one anonymous official told the Times.

Some of the crucial information was found on the computers of Hamas operatives who were involved in digging the tunnels, as well as a list of families that “hosted” the tunnel shafts underneath their homes, the insider said.

The money used to build the tunnels was given to Gaza to create infrastructure that would result in the prosperity of its citizens. Obviously, those ruling Gaza had no concern for their citizens. That alone is reason to refuse to allow Gaza to rule itself–it has proven to be incapable of successful self-government.

The Accusers Have NO Moral Ground To Stand On

On Wednesday, The New York Post posted an article about some of the activities surrounding the legal case against President Trump in Georgia. The shenanigans are unbelievable.

The article reports:

The special prosecutor that Georgia District Attorney Fani Willis is accused of having an “improper” relationship with billed the Fulton County DA’s office $4,000 for two eight-hour meetings with White House officials while overseeing the election interference case against former President Donald Trump, according to court documents.

The apparent meetings attended by Nathan Wade, an Atlanta-based private attorney hired by Willis to assist in the prosecution of the Trump and his co-defendants, took place in 2022 after he was tapped for the role, according to invoices included in a bombshell court filing by Michael Roman, a former Trump 2020 campaign official.

Roman argues in the court filing that Willis should be disqualified from the case and the charges against him dropped because of her alleged “improper, clandestine personal relationship” with Wade.

The services rendered by Wade in conjunction with the case seemingly included attending an event with White House counsel in Georgia and a meeting at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave, the invoices show. 

Not only are the taxpayers paying for the lawfare against President Trump, they are paying for an inappropriate relationship between the District Attorney and one of the prosecuting attorneys. The chutzpa of these people in amazing.

The article notes:

Last September, House Judiciary Committee Chairman Jim Jordan (R-Ohio) demanded that Willis detail any contact her office has had with federal officials about her prosecution of Trump, a request the DA refused to comply with. 

Jordan, a staunch defender of Trump, argued that Willis’ case could be “designed to interfere with the 2024 presidential election,” in which the 77-year-old is the Republican front-runner against President Biden.

Willis, in a chiding response to Jordan, accused the committee chairman of lacking “a basic understanding of the law” and attempting to “intrude upon and interfere with an active criminal case.”

Roman’s filing claims that “sources close to both the special prosecutor and the district attorney” have confirmed that Willis and Wade had an ongoing fling, and that Wade filed for divorce in Cobb County, Ga., “a day after his first contract with Willis commenced” in November 2021. 

The Wall Street Journal reported on Tuesday Willis has been subpoenaed to testify in Wade’s divorce proceedings. 

Does anyone in the Democrat party have a sense of decency or a respect for the Constitution?

Sad News From Israel

On December 22nd, The New York Post reported the following:

An elderly American Israeli with deep ties to New York has become the first US citizen confirmed to have died while being held hostage by Hamas terrorists, it was announced Friday.

Gadi Haggai, 73, was murdered by the terrorists who are still thought to be holding his 70-year-old wife, Judi Weinstein, according to the Hostages and Missing Persons Families Forum representing the families.

“Gadi was a man full of humor who knew how to make those around him laugh,” the families group told the Times of Israel.

“A musician at heart, a gifted flautist, he played in the IDF Orchestra and was involved with music his whole life.”

Kibbutz Nir Oz also said Friday the Israeli Defense Forces informed Haggai’s family that he had been murdered.

His body is still in the Palestinian territory.

The article concludes:

According to Israel’s official tally, 129 people are still in captivity in the Gaza Strip.

Of those, 22 are dead, the Israeli government says.

The forum said that between five and 10 of the hostages hold US citizenship. The US Embassy had no immediate comment.

Israel needs to finish what Hamas started.

Do You Like Having Electricity 24 Hours A Day?

Years ago, I remember talking to someone from another country who was very impressed that Americans had electricity for 24 hours every day. In her country they thought four or five hours of electricity a day was good. That was a foreign concept for me. I would like it to remain a foreign concept.

On Sunday, The New York Post posted an article about President Biden’s plans for American energy.

The article reports:

The Biden administration made two virtue-signaling proclamations at last week’s COP28 conference in Dubai that it says will help save the planet from climate change.

The policies aren’t likely to change the planet’s temperature by even one-tenth of a degree, but they might just destroy the 21st-century American industrial economy as we know it.

First, Team Biden announced it will stop production of all new coal plants in the United States.

This comes on the heels of President Biden’s Environmental Protection Agency saying this year it would impose new power plant emission regulations that are virtually impossible for coal plants to comply with.

The article also notes comments from the Vice-President:

Vice President Kamala Harris trumpeted the next day new rules to “sharply reduce methane from the oil and natural gas industry.”

The administration calls methane a “super-pollutant” that it wants to eliminate because it’s “many times more potent than carbon dioxide.”

But methane is effectively a hydrocarbon that comes from natural gas.

Eliminating methane is a de facto ban on natural gas power plants.

Here is the most sinister part of this story that no one in the Biden administration is telling you: Eradicating coal and natural gas plants will ravage America’s electric power capacity.

These regulations will cause rolling blackouts and brownouts across the country, much like we’ve already seen in California — America’s forerunner of radical anti-fossil fuel policies.

The lights will go out intermittently, and home heating in the winter and air conditioning in the summer will have to be turned off or rationed.

Without gas and coal plants, hospitals, schools, the internet, construction projects and factories will be routinely shut down when unreliable alternative energy sources like wind and solar power aren’t delivering enough juice.

Upward of 60% of America’s electric power generation will go away — and soon.

Does anyone want to make a wager as to whether or not the mucky-mucks who are making these policies will continue to have electricity 24 hours a day while the rest of us have electricity for maybe eight hours a day?

When Taking Bribes, Make Sure The Origin Of The Product Is Not Traceable

When taking bribes, unmarked bills are a good idea, other things can be risky–gold bars, for instance, have serial numbers. New Jersey Senator Bob Menendez really should have considered that.

On December 4th, The New York Post reported the following:

Four of the gold bars Sen. Bob Menendez stashed at his home were previously stolen from the businessman accused of bribing the New Jersey Democrat, according to a report. 

The serial numbers on some of the gold found by the FBI during a June 2022 raid on Menendez’s Englewood Cliffs, NJ, home match identifiers that Fred Daibes reported to police after a 2013 armed robbery, according to NBC News

Robbers made off with $500,000 in cash and 22 gold bars from Daibes’ Edgewater, NJ, home during the 2013 heist, the outlet reports.

Police later nabbed four suspects and recovered the stolen gold. 

The matching serial numbers indicate that authorities have directly linked at least some of the gold found in Menendez’s home to Daibes, a New Jersey real estate developer and Menendez fundraiser.

Daibes has been accused of bribing the senator for a series of favors, including help in disrupting a federal prosecution against him. 

“Each gold bar has its own serial number,” Daibes told investigators in 2014 when questioned about the stolen gold. “They’re all stamped … you’ll never see two stamped the same way.”

The article concludes:

Menendez has vehemently denied any wrongdoing and has refused to resign from the Senate, despite numerous calls for him to do so, even from fellow Democrats. 

Menendez and his wife are accused of accepting bribes from Daibes in exchange for the senator’s help shielding him from criminal prosecution in a bank fraud case.

The New Jersey Democrat allegedly helped Daibes by recommending President Biden pick Philip Sellinger, who the senator believed would apply a light touch to the case, for the post of New Jersey US attorney. 

If convicted on all charges, Menendez faces up to 45 years in prison.

I guess if you are a Democrat, you just don’t plan on having your house searched or a swat team arrive at six o’clock in the morning.

A Question That Needs To Be Asked

On Monday, The New York Post posted the following headline:

How many aid groups knew Hamas was hiding in a hospital and lied about it?

The article reports:

Hamas used Gaza City’s al-Shifa Hospital as a base of terror operations. That’s the obvious conclusion following Sunday’s discovery of a large terror tunnel under the hospital along with videos of Hamas bringing Israeli hostages inside.

Now comes an important question for Congress: Which US-funded international organizations knew the truth about al-Shifa and helped Hamas conceal its war crimes?

The Israel Defense Forces this weekend discovered a tunnel beneath al-Shifa Hospital that extends 10 meters down and 55 meters across — leading to what might be a booby-trapped door. Special units that specialize in handling explosives have been summoned to break through to the next section.

Meanwhile, Israel also released security footage showing two hostages brought through al-Shifa by Hamas terrorists following the Oct. 7 massacre as hospital workers looked on — suggesting a widespread conspiracy to conceal both the presence of hostages at al-Shifa and Hamas’ terror infrastructure within the compound.

The article notes:

Within days of the Hamas massacre, Fabrizio Carboni, the Middle East regional director for the International Committee of the Red Cross, began spreading Hamas disinformation — telling international media that Gaza “hospitals risk turning into morgues.”

When Carboni said this, he may have already known that hospitals in Gaza were used as terror bases and hostages were being stashed under those hospitals.

…In its 2022 annual report, the ICRC says it received $689 million from the United States last year — roughly one-third of contributions received from all countries combined. That’s a lot of taxpayer money sent to an organization that may have betrayed its most fundamental duty to uphold the Geneva Conventions by covering up Hamas war crimes and abandoning Israeli hostages.

The article concludes:

The ICRC and WHO have strong lobbies in Washington that will fight to protect their flow of taxpayer money. If, as expected, the State Department does nothing to hold these groups accountable, Congress — which holds their purse strings — should intervene. The first step: Investigate. The next: Put a pause on US funding until leadership changes and reforms guarantee that complicity in terrorist war crimes will never happen again.

How much American taxpayer money paid for Hamas headquarters?

Hopefully This Results In Some Major Lawsuits

On Tuesday, The New York Post posted an article about a group of people headed to the pro-Israel rally from Detriot.

The article reports:

Hundreds of Jewish people headed to Tuesday’s pro-Israel rally in DC were left stranded when bus drivers staged “a deliberate and malicious walk-off,’’ a major Jewish organization said.

The “anti-protest” left a charted flight from Detroit — about 300 people — on the Dulles Airport tarmac for about 11 hours before being sent back home, causing them to miss the entire March for Israel event.

“I thought it was nuts, I thought it was crazy that we’re blocked from getting to the rally,” Jonathan Kaufman told The Post, adding that there were “frantic” calls to find out what was happening as they were stranded for hours.

“Our right to assembly is a constitutional right — and this was straight up blocking that.”

Kaufman and 900 others hopped on three private planes out of Detroit chartered by the Jewish Federation of Detroit, which also booked several buses to transport the massive group to the march at DC’s National Mall.

A third of the passengers weren’t allowed to leave the tarmac, however, after several buses failed to show up on the tarmac upon their 10:30 a.m. landing, according to a federation spokesperson.

The article notes:

The drivers had organized a “mass sick out” day to prevent Jewish ralliers from attending the much-anticipated march, leaving just a handful available to meet their obligations.

“We have learned from the bus company that this was caused by a deliberate and malicious walk-off of drivers,” the spokesperson told The Post.

The bus company — which the federation repeatedly refused to name — told the Jewish Federation of Detroit that a “significant number” of drivers called out sick when they learned they would be taking hundreds of Jewish Americans to the pro-Israel rally, the organization’s David Kurzmann told reporters at a press conference Tuesday.

…They were also forced to wait several hours for their team members who did make it to the rally to finally return before the chartered flights could fly back to Michigan.

Throughout the day-long fumble, organizers from the Jewish Federation of Detroit were giving updates to the passengers about the supposed counter-protest through the speaker on the plane.

Kaufman — who spent hundreds of dollars to attend the march with his mother — called the walkout “a deliberate antisemitic act,” that “would have been called a hate crime” if it happened to any other ethnic group.

“This is a historical moment — and I would have loved to be part of it.”

This was a criminal act and needs to be treated as such.

People Vote With Their Feet

On Saturday, The New York Post reported that in the past four years, ten billionaires have changed their residences from New York to Florida.

The article reports:

New York has lost 10 billionaires in the last four years — three of whom fled to Florida — leaving tax coffers lighter by tens of millions of dollars annually.

This year 62 New York-based billionaires appeared on the Forbes 400 list of the wealthiest Americans, compared to 72 in 2019 and 65 last year. 

Investor and Washington Commanders owner Josh Harris, whose net worth was valued at $5.7 billion last year, has grown his fortune to $6.9 billion — but he packed his bags for Florida.

Other billionaires who have relocated from Gotham to the Sunshine State in the last four years include hedge funder Daniel Och — whose net worth now stands at $3.6 billion — and investor Carl Icahn, who’s worth $6.9 billion. 

“You have this incredibly high rate imposed on all of the income of the highest earners [in New York], and living just about anywhere else will substantially reduce your tax burden. Going to Florida will obviously eliminate your individual tax burden, and many of these billionaires clearly have that flexibility,” the National Tax Foundation’s vice president, Jared Walczak, explained.

The article notes:

New York relies on the top 1% of taxpayers to pay for 42% of its tax receipts, and billionaires’ incomes are taxed at the state’s highest rate — a staggering 14.8%, according to Walczak.

Although it’s impossible to quantify the exact loss in state taxes from billionaires’ fleeing without access to private income documents, “If you had someone who was earning $100 million [a year] in New York suddenly move to Florida, that’s something like a $11 million-a-year hit per year recurring to the state,” said Ken Girardin, the research director for the Albany-based think tank, Empire Center for Public Policy.

Even with the tax accountants and tax lawyers that billionaires can afford to hire, eventually they reach the point where it is not worth it to stay in a state that takes more money from them then the Medieval Lords took from the peasants. I just hope that when the leave New York, they leave their big spending government ideas behind.

Don’t Know Or Don’t Care?

On Thursday, The New York Post posted an article about how some of the pro-Hamas protestors in England view recent and current events in the Middle East.

The article includes the following:

Two girls interviewed at one pro-Hamas protest in London were asked what their reaction was when they first learned that Hamas had attacked Israel on October 7.

“I don’t believe they did, did they,” said one.

“Honestly, I think I need to be a bit more clued up on everything that’s going on, so I feel I’m not really qualified to answer that too well,” said the other.

Well, she appeared to feel “qualified” enough to turn up at an anti-Israel demo.

Her friend, holding a banner, actually said, “I mean, I’m not sure I’ve seen anything that shows that that’s actually happened.”

That is frightening.

The article continues:

These two ignoramuses should have come to Israel with me this week.

Specifically, they should have come to the site of the music festival massacre, and seen the remains of that “peace rave” where people their age, and very similar to them, were gunned down and raped just as the party was “coming up.”

Or perhaps they should have come with me to the small community of Nir Oz on the border of Gaza.

I have been to kibbutzim like this many times in the past. The citizens of these small towns and communities are often very left-wing. Often “peaceniks.” They have been accustomed to rockets for years.

Douglas Murray, the author of the article, walked through some of the areas that were attacked on October 7th. The article includes pictures of the destruction. We should not be concerned about the Israeli attack on the military strongholds in Gaza, we need to be concerned about the monsters that attacked innocent civilians and butchered them while celebrating their actions. The people who purposely killed women, young children and babies on October 7th need to be killed themselves. There is no chance of rehabilitation.

Looking At The Numbers

On Sunday, The New York Post posted an article about President Biden’s promise to promote equity as President.

A website called thoughtCo.com defines the difference between equity and equality as follows:

Key Takeaways: Equity vs. Equality

  • Equality is providing the same level of opportunity and assistance to all segments of society, such as races and genders.
  • Equity is providing various levels of support and assistance depending on specific needs or abilities.
  • Equality and equity are most often applied to the rights and opportunities of minority groups.
  • Laws such as the Civil Rights Act of 1964 provide equality, while policies such as affirmative action provide equity.

There are a number of problems with equity–the most obvious being determining who decides the level of assistance or the specific needs or abilities. If reparations is ‘equity’, who decides which people were harmed by slavery (does slavery include indentured servants?) and which people did the harm (were your ancestors in America during slavery? did your ancestors fight to free the slaves?). As you can see, equity is complicated and does not have fixed guidelines and is thus open to major abuses.

The New York Post article reports:

Joe Biden began his presidency with a promise to advance equity, which means favoring some races and ethnicities over others to shrink outcome disparities. Like many of his fellow liberal Democrats, Biden is tethered to the belief that black upward mobility won’t happen without coddling and special treatment from the government. Donald Trump’s record complicates such claims. 

One of the most underreported stories of the Trump presidency is the extent to which black economic fortunes improved. The mainstream media presented Trump daily as a bigot whose policies would harm the interests of racial and ethnic minorities. Meanwhile, black economic advancement occurred to an extent unseen not only under Barack Obama but going back several generations — until the pandemic shutdowns brought progress to a halt. 

Over the first three years of Trump’s presidency, blacks (and Hispanics) experienced record-low rates of unemployment and poverty, while wages for workers at the bottom of the income scale rose faster than they did for management. Whether that was the goal of the Trump administration or an unintended consequence is a debate I’ll leave to others. But there is no doubting that the financial situation of millions of working-class black Americans improved significantly under Trump’s policies. 

I am reminded of the John F. Kennedy quote, “A rising tide lifts all boats.”

Please follow the link above to read the entire article. Putting a businessman in the White House benefited all Americans. I am hoping we can do that again.

The Control Tightens

Hot Air posted an article today about something called the “Excelsior Pass” which will be making its debut in New York shortly.

The article reports:

We were warned at the beginning of the month that New York State was working to implement a system of immunity passports for people who wish to reenter most “normal” aspects of society. The state had clearly made up its mind already and had people working on the project because the “Excelsior Pass” is already in production and will be required for many social activities starting on April 2nd. Large venues in New York City are already using it, but most other “arts, entertainment and event venues” will require the pass shortly thereafter. People who have either been vaccinated or have received a negative COVID test in the previous few days will be able to obtain the pass, which can either be printed out on paper or displayed via an app on your phone. (New York Post)

The article also notes:

The first thing to point out here is that New York State has thus far vaccinated roughly half of its eligible citizens. That means that the other half of the state will now be shut out of nearly all nonessential activities unless they can find someplace to be tested and “verified” every few days. And if you think this only applies to things like basketball games, guess again. The state has specifically listed wedding receptions as events that will require a scanner at the door and an immunity passport to gain entrance. As of this morning, CNN is saying that 14.7 percent of adults in the United States are fully vaccinated at this point, so the disparity is vastly greater if a plan like this shows up at the national level.

While it won’t be part of the initial rollout, large retail chains and even grocery stores are reportedly studying how this system could be put into effect at their establishments. You can’t be barred from shopping for food and other essentials entirely, but some stores are considering setting up separate entrances for those with and without the passport or having some shopping hours restricted for only those who pass muster.

I’ve gone through the Post’s “explainer” of how the system operates and I don’t see any exceptions listed for people with comorbidities or other underlying conditions that could lead their doctors to recommend that they avoid the vaccine. So if you either choose not to be vaccinated or are medically disqualified from receiving it, at least in New York, you will officially be a second-class citizen on April 2nd. Without the pass, you will be part of a new class of pariahs who are barred from mingling with the new, upper class of people with immunity, or those who purchase a few days of “normalcy” by showing a negative COVID test result.

How long before this insanity begins in every state?

Stay Tuned

On Monday, The New York Post posted an article by Betsy McCaughey about the coronavirus vaccine. The Trump administration has plans to make the vaccine available to all Americans by Spring 2021 using the military to expedite the process. Unfortunately if Joe Biden becomes President, those plans will change.

The article reports:

Joe Biden is fearmongering that “more people may die,” because Team Trump hasn’t begun shifting oversight over COVID-19 vaccines to Team Biden: “There was a plan for 300 million doses to be available at the end of the year. What they’re reporting now is 20 to 30 million doses available. Why? Where’s the bottleneck?”

Biden mixed up the numbers — again. Dr. Moncef Slaoui, head of Operation Warp Speed, predicts 20 million doses will be shipped out on Dec. 11 and 12 — and immediately administered to health workers and other high-risk groups in all 50 states.

Tens of millions more doses will be delivered according to a precision plan in the following months, with delivery sites already designated by each state’s health department. By May, Slaoui predicts, enough Americans will have been vaccinated to create herd immunity, allowing the nation to get back to normal — a historic triumph.

Unfortunately, Joe Biden has a different plan:

Biden’s advisers have dangerous ideas about who should get vaccinated first. Already, groups like the corrupt World Health Organization are objecting that the United States has purchased hundreds of millions of doses, putting Americans ahead of others. WHO wants every country to get a vaccine supply based on its population, sending 2 percent to each country, then ramping up eventually to 20 percent. That would doom America to more suffering, because herd immunity requires about a 70 percent vaccination rate.

What’s scary is that Biden advisers buy into this globalist mentality. God help us if they interfere with Warp Speed.

Biden’s COVID adviser, Dr. Ezekiel Emanuel, slams “vaccine nationalism,” calling it unethical that the rich countries developing vaccines get first dibs. Emanuel, a member of several WHO advisory groups, proposes in the journal Science a vaccine-distribution model whose effect would be to prioritize poor countries with younger populations first, because vaccinating an elderly person saves fewer life years than vaccinating a younger person.

On Monday, Biden said he will nominate arch-globalist Antony Blinken as secretary of state. Blinken decries America First and is pushing to rejoin WHO immediately. Biden and Blinken are ­ignoring that WHO concealed the virus outbreak in Wuhan and shilled for the Chinese Communist Party, allowing the disease to spread and kill millions.

As for who gets vaccinated, the American public paid to be first.

The article concludes:

Though the Trump administration conceived and launched ­Operation Warp Speed, Slaoui explains that the vaccine rollout has been done totally “isolated from the [Trump] administration, from the political environment and political context.” He added: “no political interference, no bureaucracy, no red tape.” He hopes that will continue after the Jan. 20 inauguration.

Responding to Biden’s demagoguery about a the transition delay costing lives, Health and Human Services Secretary Alex Azar reassured the nation on Sunday that “the career people” from the Defense Department and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention running Warp Speed on Jan. 19 are going to be the same people on Jan. 21.

Message to Biden: Hands off this medical miracle.

Let’s hope that if Biden becomes President he can’t mess this up.

 

Peaceful?

Yesterday The New York Post reported that federal officers in Portland suffered 113 eye injuries while guarding a courthouse from activists armed with powerful lasers.

The article reports:

“We’ve had a number of officers who have days-long blindness. So far they’ve all kind of come back, if you will,” Cuccinelli (Ken Cuccinelli, deputy director of the Department of Homeland Security) said. “But you also get what’s called flash blindness. Think of it as the old Kodak cameras where you get that blue spot and you can’t quite see your entire field of vision for a period.”

Cuccinelli brought a high-powered laser as a prop to a Senate subcommittee hearing hosted by Sen. Ted Cruz (R-Texas) focused on Antifa violence during protests against the killing of George Floyd by Minnesota police. He said the devices could be purchased on Amazon.com.

The novel laser attacks drew attention last month as President Trump deployed federal officers to bolster the besieged federal court building. White House Press Secretary Kayleigh McEnany said at a briefing in July that three officers were believed to have been permanently blinded.

Although Cuccinelli said all officers recovered their sight, he said activists appear to be aiming to maximize damage.

That’s not protest–that’s assault and needs to be dealt with harshly.

The article continues:

Democrats at the hearing largely described violence attributed to Antifa, or “anti-fascist,” activists as a distraction from misconduct of police and what they said was the improper deployment of federal agents to Portland.

“What we’ve seen in Portland, Oregon, is peaceful protesters in need of protection from federal officers,” said Sen. Mazie Hirono (D-Hawaii). “The hearing we should be having is one called the right of the people to peaceably assemble without being beaten up by unidentifiable federal agents.”

Cuccinelli said some protesters are indeed peaceful, but others aren’t.

“This is sort of the Portland formula: there’s peaceful protesting until 10 or 11 o’clock, and then they go away. And maybe some of them come back, but the group that comes back is A.) much bigger, but also they come back for violence,” Cuccinelli said.

I really think that Senator Hirono needs to listed to her own words. Peaceful protesters do not attempt to blind police. They do not set fire to buildings and shoot fireworks at people. It is becoming very obvious that members of the Democrat party are not willing to stand up for the rights of ordinary people who simply want to live in peace. What about the rights of the people who live in the neighborhoods where these riots are taking place? Are they not entitled to protection from the violence of the rioters?

Elections Have Consequences

Yesterday The New York Post posted an article about the recent Democrat primary races in New York State.

The article reports:

A half-dozen insurgent candidates in Brooklyn and Queens — some backed by the Democratic Socialists of America — toppled veteran incumbents in Democratic primary races, including close allies of Assembly Speaker Carl Heastie (D-Bronx).

With Heastie’s backing, the Democratic Assembly Campaign Committee poured more than $400,000 combined to prop up 46-year veteran Joe Lentol, Felix Ortiz and Walter Mosley in Brooklyn and Aravella Simotas, Michael Den Dekker and Michael Miller in Queens.

They all lost.

Insurgent Zohran Mamdani, who defeated four-term incumbent Simotas in the 36th Assembly District covering Astoria, said in a tweet: “Socialism won.”

He was endorsed by the DSA.

The DACC donated $125,000 to Simotas’ re-election campaign.

So what does this mean for the State of New York? Emily Gallagher, one of the socialists elected stated, “I’m ready to get to work.” She has already stated that she would push to raise income taxes on the “top one percent” to preserve services, adding, “We need the revenue to survive.” Someone needs to tell her about the Laffer Curve.

The article concludes:

Meanwhile, five other progressive Democrats backed by the WFP (Working Families Party) and other progressive groups are expected to win open Assembly seats.

The newcomers are expected to raise hell, but Albany watchers said the jury is out on how much impact they will have in a body with more than 100 Democrats — including many moderates representing suburban and upstate districts.

“Clearly the candidates who won have a more liberal, progressive agenda,” said University of Albany political science professor Bruce Gyory.

He said he believes Heastie’s position as speaker is secure.

Heastie personally called all the winning insurgents to congratulate them.

All the candidates are running in heavily Democratic districts and are expected to prevail in the general election.

There is actually some good news here. A group is arising out of the Democrat party that will eventually form a third party (to the left of traditional Democrats). As the results of their policies become obvious, they will lose votes. If any of the tax increases and other policies of these recently elected Democrats are put in place, I predict that New York State will lose its tax base.

According to a Forbes Magazine article in January 2020, New York was already leading the nation in the number of people leaving the state:

Actually, I am surprised that California did not make the top ten states losing population.

 

Things That Cause Division In Our Country

The New York Post posted an article yesterday about the role the media played during the Russia scandal.

The article reports:

Despite what The New York Times and Washington Post were loudly reporting in early 2017, the FBI had failed to find any evidence of Trump-Russia “collusion” — and indeed had found that the central source of those claims was a joke.

This is a key takeaway from the Justice Department’s latest release of documents from the FBI’s investigation.

One shocker is the summary of the long FBI interview that January with the “Primary Subsource” for the infamous Steele dossier — indeed, about the only source.

The FBI had learned that Hillary Clinton’s campaign had paid for British ex-spy Christopher Steele to produce dirt on Donald Trump, and the resulting dossier was pretty much the entire basis for any investigation (barring gossip about a drunken conversation with an on-paper-only Trump adviser).

And now Steele’s “factual” source admitted, essentially, to simply repackaging rumors — some of them from Internet “research.”

Yet the nation’s two most prestigious papers were reporting that the FBI was finding a treasure trove of scandal.

Such as a Feb. 14, 2017, Times piece declaring, “Phone records and intercepted calls show that members of Donald J. Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign and other Trump associates had repeated contacts with senior Russian intelligence officials in the year before the election.”

Ha! A memo from Trump-hating (now ex-) FBI man Peter Strzok shows that story was garbage: “We have not seen evidence of any individuals affiliated with the Trump team in contact with” intelligence officials. The story also said top FBI officials trusted Steele, when they’d learned he was full of it.

Think about the impact this dishonest reporting has had on the American political discourse. Half the country believes that President Trump has some sort of arrangement with the Russians. That half of the country considers themselves well-informed because they read The New York Times or The Washington Post. The other half of the country has been reading the media that has been reporting on the classified documents that have been de-classified and understands that the accusations of Russian collusion are not true. We have entered a topsy-turvy world when the people we should trust to keep us informed are lying to us and the honest investigative reporting is left to the alternative media. I am reminded of the scene in “Men in Black” where the agents pick up the tabloids to find out what is actually going on. Unfortunately, dishonest reporting is a threat to our republic. The job of the media in a republic is to inform the voters so that they can make informed choices when they vote. Our mainstream media has forgotten (or abdicated) their responsibility.

Saving Money By Refusing To Support Organizations That Don’t Do Their Job

Hot Air posted an article yesterday about President Trump’s decision to withdraw from the World Health Organization (WHO).

The article reports:

The Trump administration is withdrawing the United States from the World Health Organization. The administration submitted a letter to the UN but the letter itself hasn’t been made public yet. The Washington Post reports that the U.S. needs to give a year’s notice before withdrawing.

…WHO really has favored China’s version of events during the pandemic. Just last month the AP published a story revealing that China was aware early on that China was slow-walking information about the virus. Just a few days ago WHO revised its official timeline about when China notified it about the existence of a cluster of pneumonia cases in Wuhan.

We’re only hearing the very start of this now. It appears congressional Democrats are going to attempt to get involved in this decision. At a minimum they are going to try to drive a few new cycles off it. Get ready to hear the phrase “in the midst of a pandemic” 10,000 times.

The WHO (like the rest of the United Nations) has become political, ineffective, and unnecessarily expensive.

On May 20, 2019, The New York Post reported:

The World Health Organization spent nearly $192 million on travel expenses last year, with staffers sometimes breaking the agency’s own rules by traveling in business class, booking expensive last-minute tickets and traveling without the required approvals, according to internal documents obtained by The Associated Press.

The abuses could spook potential donors and partners as the organization begins its week-long annual meeting Monday in Geneva, seeking increased support to fight a devastating outbreak of Ebola in Congo and other deadly diseases including polio, malaria and measles.

The nearly $192 million is down 4 percent from 2017, when the agency pledged to rein in travel abuses following an AP investigation.

The WHO has lost its way as an organization helping the world fight health issues. The coronavirus revealed the WHO as simply a mouthpiece for Chinese propaganda that allowed the virus to become a pandemic. We would have been better off following our own instincts than listening to the WHO. Remember, the WHO complained when President Trump shut down air travel from China to America. That alone saved thousands of lives. The WHO opposed it. That tells us all we need to know. It is past time to leave the WHO. I am sorry that we are required to wait a year to actually do it.