Tag Archives: The Daily Caller

A Few Comments On The Trump Trial In New York

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From Jonathan Turley at The Daily Caller:

Fox News legal analyst and constitutional law professor Jonathan Turley laid out a major problem for Democratic New York Attorney General Letitia James’ civil case against former President Donald Trump on Monday.

James sued Trump in Sept. 2022, accusing him of committed fraud to secure more favorable terms for loans. Judge Arthur Engoron ruled Tuesday that Trump and his businesses exaggerated his net worth and deceived banks and insurance companies.

…“But I also want to note that James’ comments ignore one thing, in front of that courthouse,” Turley continued. “She ran for office on the pledge to bag Donald Trump. She didn’t say on what grounds. She ran to bag him on any grounds, and so she doesn’t have any more credibility in making these comments than did the Trump team, for people who view this as a very political environment. You know, many of us wrote at the time that we were deeply concerned about a candidate for attorney general that was essentially pledging a trophy defendant as the basis for running for office. And she delivered it … And so I think that she has also damaged her own credibility in that effort.”

From Attorney Robert DuChemin at Substack:

…That is why I find it bizarre that New York would go after the Trump Organization for what the state claims are inflated real estate values. It took me only one trial to learn that appraisers say what they are paid to say.

…The case against the Trump organization, however, is not a criminal case. That is why he was not entitled to a jury. Nevertheless, although the Sixth Amendment to the United States Constitution guarantees us the right to jury trials only in criminal cases, the Eighth Amendment prohibits “excessive fines.” Several U.S. Supreme Court decisions have held that any fine designed as “punishment” instead of restitution is excessive. Many intermediate appellate and trial courts have ignored those decisions but some recent comments by members of the current Supremes have indicated they are going to stop the practice.

Therefore, because there were no damages incurred as a result of the alleged fraud, New York will be limited by the Eighth Amendment in their ability to fine the Trump Organization. Anything above court costs and some nominal fine would likely violate the Eighth Amendment.

In short, the New York case is clearly the persecution of a political opponent. If I was the judge I would have thrown out the state’s case immediately. But then again, I am not a judge in a communist state that values party loyalty over truth and justice.

Let’s see if the court acknowledges or abides by the Eighth Amendment. Please follow the link to read the Substack article. Attorney DuChemin definitely has a way with words.

When Lying Gets You Promoted

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On Sunday, The Daily Caller posted an article about some of the appointees to the Biden administration. Some of the names are very familiar.

The article reports:

Several of the 51 former intelligence officials who signed a letter casting doubt on the authenticity of Hunter Biden’s laptop before the 2020 presidential election have ended up serving in roles with President Joe Biden’s administration.

In less than three years, the Biden administration has brought on six out of the 51 former intelligence official signatories of the October 2020 letter arguing that the leak of emails from Hunter Biden’s laptop had “all the classic earmarks of a Russian information operation.” Earlier this week, Biden’s Department of Homeland Security (DHS) selected three signatories of the letter to join a federal “intelligence experts” national security group, according to an announcement on Tuesday.

These 51 intelligence officials already knew that the laptop was real and the information on it was valid, yet they lied to influence an election. They should be in jail–not in government.

In case you have forgotten, in July 2023, The Washington Examiner reported:

An FBI official told the House Judiciary Committee in a transcribed interview this week that at least one top agent and likely others who were warning social media companies about a “hack and dump” operation ahead of the 2020 election knew Hunter Biden’s laptop was real.

Laura Dehmlow, head of the FBI’s Foreign Influence Task Force, said, according to excerpts of the testimony obtained by the Washington Examiner, that her then-colleague Brad Benavides “certainly” was aware of the laptop’s authenticity.

The Daily Caller notes:

Former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper, former CIA Director John Brennan and former CIA Operations Officer Paul Kolbe will be members of the new group, which will advise DHS on intelligence and national security matters including “terrorism, fentanyl, transborder issues, and emerging technology,” according to the DHS announcement. All of them signed onto the October 2020 letter casting doubt on the legitimacy of the Hunter Biden laptop before the presidential election.

The Daily Caller News Foundation verified the authenticity of Hunter Biden’s laptop contents in October 2020.

Is there anyone out there who still believes that the 2020 election was legitimate? Is there anyone out there who doesn’t believe that Americans need to do everything they can to make sure 2024 is an honest election?

What Happened At The Hearing?

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On Wednesday, The Daily Caller posted a summary of Attorney General Merrick Garland’s testimony before the House Judiciary Committee on Wednesday. It’s amazing how many Democrats seem to have memory problems.

The article reports what it considers the biggest takeaways:

1. Biden-appointed prosecutors could refuse to cooperate with Weiss

Republican Ohio Rep. Jim Jordan pressed Garland on his previous testimony to Republican Iowa Sen. Chuck Grassley that Weiss had complete authority. Jordan emphasized Graves’ decision not to “partner” with Weiss on bringing charges against Hunter Biden.

2. It is unlikely the DOJ investigates the IRS whistleblowers

Republican Louisiana Rep. Mike Johnson questioned Garland on whether his office requested an investigation into the whistleblower testimony.

3. It is unclear why Weiss’ letters to Congress contradict themselves

Weiss wrote multiple letters to Congress in June and July responding to the IRS whistleblower allegations that his charging authority was limited. Weiss wrote a letter to Jordan in June where he said his charging authority was geographically limited to his home district and it was DOJ procedure to collaborate with U.S. Attorneys in their jurisdictions.

4. Garland appeared to dispute testimony from two FBI agents

Johnson questioned Garland on testimony from FBI agent Thomas Sobocinski who said Weiss had a “cumbersome” bureaucratic process for filing charges.

“There was administrative charge — or administrative process, not within DOJ, but also within tax.

5. Garland won’t talk about the details of the Hunter Biden case

The attorney general deferred to Weiss throughout his testimony when lawmakers asked specific questions on the details of the Hunter Biden case.

6. Garland did not consider appointing a special counsel from outside the Justice Department

Garland appointed Weiss as special counsel in August to continue the Hunter Biden investigation, even though DOJ regulations instruct for special counsels to be appointed from outside the government.

The article concludes:

The House Ways and Means, Judiciary and Oversight Committees are investigating the IRS whistleblower allegations alongside House Oversight’s probe into Hunter Biden’s foreign business dealings. Speaker Kevin McCarthy said on Sept. 12 that the three committees would be leading the impeachment inquiry into President Joe Biden.

Hunter Biden was indicted on Sept. 14 on three counts related to his October 2018 purchase of a Colt Cobra revolver while he was allegedly addicted to crack cocaine. His attorney said in a court filing Tuesday that Biden would plead not guilty to the gun charges.

 

Let’s Go Back To Martin Luther King, Jr.’s Speech

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The Civil Rights movement of the 1960’s had some really good ideas. Martin Luther King, Jr., expressed one of the best ideas of the movement when he said, “I have a dream that my four little children will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by the color of their skin, but by the content of their character.” (source here) Unfortunately, we have forgotten or deliberately left behind that idea.

On Saturday, The Daily Caller reported:

Wall Street’s top investment banking firms offer career-advancing opportunities to college students, with one catch — applicants are expected to be of certain races and gender identities.

The programs, run by companies that include Morgan Stanley, JPMorgan Chase and Bank of America, aim to increase diversity, prioritizing students based on race and gender. They also potentially run afoul of federal civil rights laws, legal experts told the the Daily Caller News Foundation.

“Those programs are likely illegal violations of federal civil rights laws including Title VI, Title VII, Title IX, and Section 1981 of the Civil Rights Act of 1866, and they are ripe for a legal challenge of their blatant discrimination based on race, color, national origin, sex, gender identity or sexual orientation,” University of Michigan-Flint professor emeritus Mark Perry, who has filed hundreds of civil rights complaints against colleges, told the Daily Caller News Foundation.

The companies encourage specific groups to apply, naming racial and gender categories directly in their eligibility criteria, and then attempt to save face by adding statements to clarify applications are still open to all.

The article concludes:

Corporate diversity practices have increasingly been the subject of lawsuits by conservative legal groups. In August, an Atlanta-based investment manager, Fearless Fund, was sued over its grant program for black women. The lawsuit was funded by a nonprofit founded by Edward Blum, the activist behind the Students for Fair Admissions cases that led to the Supreme Court overturning affirmative action.

Separately, a law firm recently removed references to race and sexual orientation in the criteria for its diversity fellowship after it was hit with a lawsuit by Blum’s organization, the American Alliance for Equal Rights.

Morgan Stanley and JPMorgan did not respond to requests for comment.

Let’s get back to what Martin Luther King, Jr., said.

One Impact Of An Open Border

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On Friday, The Daily Caller reported the following:

Customs and Border Protection (CBP) flagged 74,904 illegal migrants nationwide for potentially posing risks to national security between October 2022 and August, according to CBP data obtained exclusively by the Daily Caller News Foundation.

Certain illegal migrants are deemed to be “special interest aliens” because they may have travel patterns that “possibly have a nexus to terrorism” or may come from countries with such ties, according to a 2019 Department of Homeland Security (DHS) fact sheet. Border Patrol agents encountered 25,627 “special interest” illegal migrants in fiscal year 2022, compared to 3,675 encounters in fiscal year 2021, according to internal agency data previously obtained by the DCNF; however, this data doesn’t account for all CBP encounters of special interest aliens.

…“This does not mean that all SIAs are “terrorists,” but rather that the travel and behavior of such individuals indicates a possible nexus to nefarious activity (including terrorism) and, at a minimum, provides indicators that necessitate heightened screening and further investigation,” DHS adds.

Illegal migrants can be deemed special interest aliens based solely on their country of origin, such as Turkey or Uzbekistan, according to an internal Border Patrol document previously obtained by the DCNF.

The FBI is currently searching for a group of more than one dozen Uzbek migrants that federal authorities released into the country after they used an ISIS-tied smuggler to cross the southern border illegally.

I know you are tired of hearing this, but as long as we elect Republicans who want cheap labor and Democrats who want future voters, our national security will be at risk. Allowing the southern border to stay open is the fault of BOTH political parties, and those involved in keeping the border open should be charged with treason.

Women Losing Their Right To Private Places

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On Saturday, The Daily Caller posted an article about a recent district court decision regarding men in women’s college sororities.

The article reports:

A federal district court ruled Friday that a national sorority organization did not violate its own bylaws by allowing a biological man to live in a sorority house and dismissed the complaint from sorority sisters, according to court documents.

Kappa Kappa Gamma (KKG) sorority sisters sued the national organization in March for admitting a biological male into the University of Wyoming chapter, alleging that the national organization violated its bylaws and that 6 foot 2 biological male Artemis Langford, who identifies as trans, watched women in the house get undressed. Judge Alan B. Johnson of the United States District Court for the District of Wyoming, appointed by Republican President Ronald Reagan, ruled that the national organization can interpret its own definitions as it wants to and didn’t breach its housing contracts by allowing a biological man to board with women, according to court documents.

The sorority sisters argued that KKG must enact new bylaws to define what a woman is and allow that into the sorority house, but the court disagreed. “Defining ‘woman’ is Kappa Kappa Gamma’s bedrock right as a private, voluntary organization – and one this Court may not invade,” the decision reads.

Situations like this used to be handled very easily by something called ‘common sense.’ Letting a man (I don’t care what he calls himself, he is a man) live in a sorority house is always going to cause problems. The only real solution the women in the sorority have is to leave the sorority, because obviously they are not going to have any privacy in the sorority house.

Americans Are Waking Up To The Problems With Green Energy

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On Wednesday, The Daily Caller posted an article about American’s views on energy production in America.

The article reports:

An overwhelming majority of Americans support the idea of tearing up regulations to boost domestic energy production and independence, according to a new poll by Power the Future (PTF) obtained exclusively by the Daily Caller News Foundation.

Of those surveyed, 90% found at least somewhat convincing the argument that permitting reform would strengthen U.S. energy independence, enhance national security and allow the country to stand tall in the face of geopolitical challenges, with 64% of respondents saying that the idea was extremely or very convincing to them, the PTF poll found. Eighty-eight percent of the poll’s respondents support improvements to the federal permitting system for energy infrastructure projects in order to keep energy affordable and reliable.

Ninety percent of the surveyed individuals similarly responded that it is at least somewhat convincing that permitting reform is necessary to unlock the massive potential of U.S.-made energy and reestablish the country as a net energy exporter, the poll found. Eighty-eight percent of respondents found the premise that bureaucratic idling cannot be allowed to kill energy projects at least somewhat convincing, with 50% of respondents finding the idea very or extremely convincing.

Energy independence helps Americans in a number of ways. When energy is inexpensive and reliable, companies are willing to move manufacturing to America. Even with the higher cost of labor, if corporation taxes are relatively low and energy is inexpensive and reliable, American manufacturing grows, our trade balance improves, and the federal government actually collects more in taxes. Also Americans are able to travel more because of lower fuel prices, and American goods are more competitive with foreign imports. Energy independence is a win-win for American citizens.

The article concludes:

The poll sampled 1,600 registered voters across the country, pulling respondents of varied demographic and socioeconomic backgrounds. Energy policy is emerging as a key issue in the 2024 presidential race, as Republican candidates and officials have slammed the Biden administration’s sweeping climate agenda for its role in driving up costs for Americans and increasing dependence on adversarial countries.

The Biden administration has stated its goal of having the U.S. power sector achieve net-zero carbon dioxide emissions by 2035, and having the overall U.S. economy reach net-zero by 2050. Fossil fuels provided nearly 80% of the energy consumed by Americans in 2022, while just over 20% of consumed energy came from nuclear energy and green technology in 2022, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration.

Something That Should Cause You To Lose Sleep

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On Friday, The Daily Caller reported the following:

Border Patrol agents recorded a roughly 800% increase in Chinese migrants crossing the U.S.-Mexico border illegally, according to federal data updated Friday.

There were roughly 17,678 illegal migrant encounters of Chinese nationals between October 2022 and July, compared to 1,970 in all of fiscal year 2022, according to the data. In March, U.S. Customs and Border Protection (CBP) sent a memo exclusively obtained by the Daily Caller News Foundation to agency officials warning of a surge in Chinese migrants.

“The loosened COVID protocols in China have allowed Chinese nationals to flee repressive rule in China and begin their journey to the United States seeking better living conditions,” CBP’s earlier memo stated of the reasons for the looming surge.

“According to CBP, custodial interviews indicate that Chinese citizens are requesting asylum claiming religious persecution by the Chinese Government due to their Christian faith. Additionally, Chinese nationals reportedly make their own smuggling arrangements for most of their journey, only utilizing elements of smuggling networks to cross the border,” the memo stated.

Additionally, Chinese migrants often pay between $15,000 and $30,000 to smugglers to reach the U.S. where they have been found with large sums of U.S. currency, Border Patrol agents previously told the DCNF.

Gordon Chang, author of “The Coming Collapse of China,” a Gatestone Institute distinguished senior fellow, and a member of its advisory board, previously told the DCNF that there are potential national security concerns associated with the latest surge.

Actually, I would love to see more Chinese migrants if they would swear allegiance to America and promise to teach their work ethic to Americans. However, considering the way the government  of China operates, there are serious security concerns about letting a large number of Chinese enter the country illegally. They will not necessarily be tracked by the American government (although they will probably be tracked by the Chinese government), and it would be very easy for them to engage in activities that would have a negative impact on Americans and America.

How Is Bidenomics Working For You?

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On Thursday, The Daily Caller posted an article about the current state of the American economy.

The article reports:

Inflation rose in July after steadily declining from a high of 9.1% in June 2022, according to the latest Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) release on Thursday.

The Consumer Price Index (CPI), a broad measure of the prices of everyday goods like energy and food, increased 3.2% on an annual basis in July, compared to 3.0% in June, according to the BLS. Core CPI, which excludes the volatile categories of energy and food, remained high, rising 4.7% year-over-year in July, compared to 4.8% in June.

“Inflation has become much more ingrained in the economy than the White House, Congress, or the Fed want to admit,” E.J. Antoni, a research fellow at the Heritage Foundation’s Grover M. Hermann Center for the Federal Budget, told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “Combined with slowing economic growth, we have the perfect recipe for stagflation.”

The workforce participation rate has remained at 62.6 since March. In February 2020, before Covid, it was 63.3. It began a downward spiral in March 2020 and has never fully recovered. The economy has not grown significantly–jobs added are simply the jobs coming back after the Covid pandemic.

The article concludes:

The U.S. added 187,000 jobs for the month of July, 13,000 fewer than economists expected, and the unemployment rate fell to 3.5%. The number of jobs for the months of June and May was revised down by a cumulative 49,000 jobs.

The U.S. economy grew at a rate of 2.4% in the second quarter of 2023, surprising economists who anticipated a more modest expansion of 2%.

Who Do These People Represent?

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America is a representative republic. We elect people and send them to Washington to represent us and the best interests of America. Lately it seems as if some of our representatives have forgotten who they work for.

On Thursday, The Daily Caller reported that after Senator Ted Cruz introduced an amendment to the National Defense Authorization Act (NDAA) which would ban the federal government from selling strategic petroleum reserve (SPR) oil to America’s adversaries. Fourteen Democrat Senators voted against this amendment.

The article reports:

Republican Sen. Ted Cruz of Texas authored the amendment, which would bar Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm from drawing down oil from the SPR to sell to any entity that is under the control of the Chinese Communist Party, Russia, North Korea or Iran. Democrats who voted against the amendment include Sens. Tammy Baldwin of Wisconsin, Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut, Corey Booker of New Jersey, Benjamin Cardin of Maryland and Dick Durbin of Illinois.

The amendment passed the Senate by an 85-14 vote, indicating wide bipartisan support for the restrictions on SPR supply making its way into the hands of nations adversarial to the U.S. Democratic Sens. Joe Manchin of West Virginia and John Fetterman of Pennsylvania joined Republican Sen. Joni Ernst of Iowa as cosponsors for the amendment.

Sens. Dianne Feinstein of California, Mazie Hirono of Hawaii, Edward Markey of Massachusetts, Chris Murphy of Connecticut, Bernie Sanders of Vermont, Brian Schatz of Hawaii, Chris Van Hollen of Maryland, Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts and Peter Welch of Vermont also voted against the amendment.

Draining down the strategic petroleum reserve (SPR) to lower the cost of gasoline at the pump for political reasons is questionable at best, but to then sell some of that oil to people who want to destroy us is totally insane. Who do these people represent?

Peace Would Be Better Than Escalation

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It is unfortunate that we keep throwing money and arms into an endless war that is doing nothing but kill large numbers of people on both sides. It is unfortunate that no one seems to be interested in finding a peaceful solution.

On Saturday, The Daily Caller reported:

Political leaders from Spain and the United Kingdom voiced their disagreement Saturday with President Joe Biden’s change of heart over providing widely-banned cluster munitions to Ukrainian forces, according to Politico.

U.K. Prime Minister Rishi Sunak and Spain’s Defense Minister Margarita Robles each voiced their disagreement with the Biden administration’s decision to provide cluster munitions to Ukrainian forces in Saturday remarks to reporters, according to Politico. Biden’s decision to send the munitions marks the latest reversal of U.S. policy to send weapons to the Ukrainians that had previously been deemed too sensitive.

Former White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki stated the administration’s view that Russia’s use of cluster munitions in the war “would potentially be a war crime” in February 2022. Biden said that the choice to change his mind and send cluster munitions to the Ukrainians was “a difficult decision” in a Friday interview with CNN.

The article notes:

“Spain, based on the firm commitment it has with Ukraine, also has a firm commitment that certain weapons and bombs cannot be delivered under any circumstances,” Robles said Saturday, according to Reuters. “No to cluster bombs and yes to the legitimate defense of Ukraine, which we understand should not be carried out with cluster bombs.”

The munitions are banned by numerous other U.S. allies, including Germany, France, Japan and Australia, because the submunitions they contain often do not detonate right away, leaving the dangerous duds on the ground and posing high casualty risk to civilians, according to the Cluster Munition Coalition’s website.

On July 8, CNN reported:

Cluster munitions scatter “bomblets” across large areas that can fail to explode on impact and can pose a long-term risk to anyone who encounters them, similar to landmines. Over 100 countries, including the UK, France and Germany, have outlawed the munitions under the Convention on Cluster Munitions, but the US and Ukraine are not signatories to the ban.

I can’t help believe that this is a decision that America will regret in the future.

 

 

Being Too Woke Gets You Into Trouble

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On Friday, MSN reported that Ben & Jerry’s Ice Cream suffered significant losses on the stock market after a tweet that called for Americans to return U.S. land to Native Americans.

The article reports:

The fallout of Ben & Jerry’s Fourth of July tweet became evident as soon as the close of the stock market on Thursday, which reflected a loss of almost $1 per share.

Unilever, Ben & Jerry’s parent company, had its shares listed at $52.28 at the end of the day on Monday, before the tweet called for the return of U.S. land to Native Americans. By Thursday, when about 30 million Twitter users had read the ice cream company’s claim that “the US was founded on stolen Indigenous land” and opted to boycott the brand, its share price had fallen to $51.31.

But that’s only part of the story.

On Friday, The Daily Caller reported the following:

Ben & Jerry’s headquarters is located on land originally controlled by a Native American tribe in Vermont, and the chief of this tribe expressed interest in reclaiming the property on Friday.

Ben & Jerry’s marked Independence Day on Tuesday by tweeting that the U.S. should “commit to returning” land to Native Americans. In response, Don Stevens, chief of the Nulhegan Band of The Coosuk Abenaki Nation said his tribe would be willing to take back the land currently owned by Ben & Jerry’s, according to Newsweek.

The article at The Daily Caller concludes:

In a statement, Ben & Jerry’s claims that the best place to start returning land to Native Americans  is Mount Rushmore. They call for the United States to return the South Dakota land to the Lakota Sioux.

“From there, in 1927, they watched as their holy mountain, now located on land known as South Dakota, was desecrated and dynamited to honor their colonizers, four white men—two of whom enslaved people and all of whom were hostile to Indigenous people and values,” the statement reads.

Ben & Jerry’s hasn’t yet publicly responded to Steven’s comments.

Ben & Jerry’s did not immediately respond to the Daily Caller News Foundation’s request for comment.

This reminds me of NIMBY (Not In My BackYard), only in this case it’s ‘Take someone else’s backyard first!’

Can we give the Native Americans back Manhattan?

Irony At Its Best!

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On Tuesday, The Daily Caller posted the following headline:

Every Living US President Except Donald Trump Is Descended From Slaveholders: REPORT

Wow.

The article reports:

A genealogical study carried out by Reuters found that every living president except Donald Trump is directly descended from slaveholders.

Reuters set out to examine the genealogical histories of America’s political elite, “many of whom have staked key positions on policies related to race.” Through their research, the investigators found that every living U.S. president — a group that comprises Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton, George W. Bush, Barack Obama, Donald Trump and Joe Biden — is directly descended from slaveholders, except Donald Trump, whose ancestors came to America after slavery was abolished.

Obama is directly descended from slaveholders on his mother’s side, the investigators found.

The investigative team traced the lineages of America’s elite by analyzing census records, tax documents, slave records, estate records and family Bibles, as well as birth and death certificates. Their findings were then vetted by board-certified genealogists.

In addition to U.S. presidents, investigators found that among the 536 sitting members of the last Congress, 100 were descended from slaveholders, including Republican Sens. Mitch McConnell, Lindsey Graham, Tom Cotton and James Lankford, and Democrats Elizabeth Warren, Tammy Duckworth, Jeanne Shaheen and Maggie Hassan.

This is hilarious, but actually makes sense. The majority of our political leaders come from families that have been in America for many generations. Slavery was an acceptable part of society around the world until the mid-nineteenth century. During the early days of America, it was acceptable to own slaves. If our political leadership extends back into the late 1700’s and the early 1800’s, it makes perfect sense that they would have owned slaves. Since Donald Trump’s family arrived in America after the Civil War, it makes sense that his family would not have owned slaves.

The article has a very wise conclusion:

Henry Louis Gates Jr, a professor at Harvard University who focuses on African and African American research and hosts the popular television genealogy show Finding Your Roots on PBS, stressed that the findings were not intended to cast blame, but rather to showcase how closely the nation is still linked to the institution of slavery.

“We do not inherit guilt for our ancestors’ actions,” Gates said, arguing this was instead a “learning opportunity for each individual.”

“It is also a learning opportunity for their constituency … and for the American people as a whole,” he added.

How Did We Get So Skewed?

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This is a screen shot from the Daily Caller on Twitter:

No. This is a story of a corrupt family and one son’s drug addiction enabled by the rest of the family. This is a story of corruption at the highest levels of government. This is a story of a family that sold out their country for their pocketbooks. Unfortunately, this also may be a story where no one is ever held accountable. Even if President Biden is removed from office, will he or anyone in his family be held accountable for the illegal business dealings and money laundering that they have engaged in for so long?

Moving Back To Fossil Fuel

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On Saturday, The Daily Caller posted the following:

Two of Europe’s largest energy firms are pivoting from green energy back to their core oil and gas businesses, a move that industry experts tell the Daily Caller News Foundation signals a willingness to take political hits as oil and gas continue to be major sources of revenue.

Both Shell and fellow U.K. energy firm BP opted against further cuts to oil production recently, in a bid to restore investor confidence as their renewable ventures struggled, according to Bloomberg. While the moves were met with criticism from climate-focused investors — activist investors and protestors attempted to storm the stage at Shell’s annual shareholder meeting in late May — the companies are likely to stay the course despite criticism, thanks to the reliability of oil and gas to drive profits despite the emergence of green energy, Dan Kish, senior research fellow at the Institute for Energy Research, told the DCNF.

“Smart energy executives looking at the long term recognize that politics are fleeting,” Kish said. “Politicians may be flighty and distracted by today’s shiny objects, but real business sense combined with a knowledge of engineering and physics shows that real energy makes good business because it is what people need and want.”

The article concludes:

“The EU’s oil majors have an even harder time than America’s trying to remain politically correct while continuing to produce the energy the world needs and make sufficient profits to satisfy shareholders and invest in new production,” Ebell told the DCNF. “They are faced with the reality that renewables produce little energy at a high cost.”

While Shell re-committed to its target of net-zero emissions by 2050 in a Wednesday press release, it also said in a footnote that such a change was dependent on societal factors. There would be “significant risk that Shell may not meet this target” if society at large had not made a shift to net zero by then, the company said.

Shell and BP did not immediately respond to a DCNF request for comment.

At some point, as a businessman, you have to do the things that work for the benefit of your company. It should also be noted that the western countries have generally reduced carbon emissions with the use of scientific ways to limit pollution. The countries that are still polluting are not tightly bound by climate accords–China, India, and Russia.

The Lawsuit To Release The Records

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On Wednesday, The Daily Caller reported that the Delaware Supreme Court will hear arguments on June 14th regarding the release of President Joe Biden’s Senate records.

The article reports:

The Delaware Supreme Court is set to hear arguments Wednesday in a lawsuit brought by the Daily Caller News Foundation and Judicial Watch against the University of Delaware for the release of President Joe Biden’s Senate records.

The university claimed public funds were not used to support the papers, arguing the documents requested in the April 30, 2020 Freedom of Information Act requests filed by both organizations were not subject to release. The DCNF and Judicial Watch filed an appeal brief with the Delaware Supreme Court in January 2023 after the Superior Court issued an opinion siding with the university.

“No more obfuscation. No more excuses. It’s time for the University of Delaware to answer for its refusal to release Biden’s Senate records,” said Michael Bastasch, editor-in-chief of the Daily Caller News Foundation.

The DCNF requested agreements relating to the storage of 1,850 boxes and 415 gigabytes of records from 1973 to 2009, communications between university staff and Biden’s staff, log sheets of individuals who have visited the collection along with the records themselves.

The article notes:

The FBI searched the University of Delaware collection in connection with its investigation into President Biden’s handling of classified documents in February.

The DCNF and Judicial Watch initially filed the lawsuit in July 2020.

The Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) really doesn’t do anyone any good if the people holding the information can refuse to give up that information. I do wonder exactly what is in the records that the Bidens do not want the public to see. I also wonder if anything has been removed from those records since the initial lawsuit almost three years ago.

 

 

The Looming Carbon Tax

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On Sunday, The Daily Caller posted an article about the Democrat’s plan to determine the amount of energy used in the production of goods.

The article reports:

Fresh from the looming trainwreck that is the deal to increase the debt limit, four Republican senators recently signed onto legislation that would require the Biden administration to study the feasibility of . . . a national tax on energy that would be collected at the gas pump and in electricity and heating bills.

The four Republicans — Senator Cramer (R-ND), Senator Cassidy (R-LA), Senator Graham (R-SC), and Senator Murkowski (R-AK) — joined five Democrats in asking Team Biden to determine the amount of energy used — and carbon dioxide emitted — by various countries in the production of essentially everything that makes modern life possible (aluminum, iron, steel, plastic, crude oil, batteries, etc.).

Eventually, the information would be used to impose tariffs on those countries who — in the view of the Biden crew — emitted too much carbon dioxide while creating those products.

The article notes:

Unfortunately for American consumers — and this is the important part of the story — the process will lead inevitably to the federal government setting a price for carbon dioxide in these United States.

That means only one thing: a nationwide tax on carbon dioxide, which is, of course, really a tax on energy in all its forms. Such a tax would be incredibly regressive, would damage the economy, and make everything grown, made, or moved more expensive.

The sad, sick part of this story is that the Republican senators are fully aware of that conclusion; they are in fact counting on it. Senator Cramer told the Washington Post that: “We spend so much time as Republicans saying hell no to people who want to tax carbon . . . . this is the low-hanging fruit of climate policy or trade policy or whatever you want to call it.”

In August 2010 , I posted an article about carbon trading in America. The article was about the failure of the Chicago Climate Exchange (CCX), a trading place for carbon credits. The only thing you really need to know is who lost money when Congress failed to pass Cap and Trade legislation that would have necessitated the existence of the CCX.

I reported in August 2010:

“The biggest losers have been CCX’s two biggest investors – Al Gore’s Generation Investment Management and Goldman Sachs – and President Obama, who helped launch CCX with funding from the Joyce Foundation, where he and presidential advisor Valerie Jarrett once sat on the board of directors.”

Green energy is about money–not about ecology.

Why Are Environmentalists Killing Whales?

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On Friday, The Daily Caller reported the following:

  • A large offshore wind project off the coast of Martha’s Vineyard has begun nearly two years after federal regulators approved “take” permits for the project’s developer allowing for thousands of incidental killings of marine mammals, including dozens of whales protected under the Endangered Species Act (ESA) and up to 20 endangered North Atlantic right whales.
  • Federal regulation allows for the approval of take permits for marine life so long as the permitted number of incidental deaths has a minimal effect on the longer-term viability of the species.
  • The construction process for the turbines necessitates underwater blasts of noise which “are louder than a jet engine at 25 yards” of distance, New England Fishermen Stewardship Association (NEFSA) President Jerry Leeman told the Daily Caller News Foundation.

If wind energy is about saving the planet and preserving life on earth, why is it acceptable to kill whales that are protected under the Endangered Species Act? If you haven’t figured it out by now, green energy is not about green energy. Green energy is about nations losing their national sovereignty and granted authority to global bodies to determine how they generate energy, how they feed their populations, and how much energy they are allowed to use. It is also about transferring wealth.

The following is a quote from an article I posted on March 30, 2016:

Investor’s Business Daily posted an article yesterday about climate change scientists and the alarmism that seems to follow people who talk about climate change.

That article states:

If they were honest, the climate alarmists would admit that they are not working feverishly to hold down global temperatures — they would acknowledge that they are instead consumed with the goal of holding down capitalism and establishing a global welfare state.

Have doubts? Then listen to the words of former United Nations climate official Ottmar Edenhofer:

“One has to free oneself from the illusion that international climate policy is environmental policy. This has almost nothing to do with the environmental policy anymore, with problems such as deforestation or the ozone hole,” said Edenhofer, who co-chaired the U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change working group on Mitigation of Climate Change from 2008 to 2015.

So what is the goal of environmental policy?

“We redistribute de facto the world’s wealth by climate policy,” said Edenhofer.

Are you paying attention yet?

 

Indoctrinating Our Children

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In my younger years, I was a Girl Scout. At one point I was a Brownie leader. I even went to Girl Scout Camp. We sang songs, we made things, and we learned about nature. At Girl Scout Camp we learned the responsibility of setting tables, cleaning our cabins, etc.  It was fun. Well, things have changed.

On June 6th, The Daily Caller reported:

The Girl Scouts organization is encouraging its young members to participate in Pride Month by offering a special patch for scouts who complete a series of LGBT-themed activities.

Scouts can earn the rainbow-striped LGBTQ+ Pride Month segment of the multicultural community celebration patch by participating in LGBT educational activities and activism. Those activities include participation in pride celebrations and completion of educational assignments about gay and transgender activism.

“The Girl Scout LGBTQ+ Pride Month Celebration Fun Patch is designed for Girl Scouts of all levels and their leaders to honor LGBTQ+ history, to celebrate the diverse cultures and identities of LGBTQ+ people, and to acknowledge the many contributions of the LGBTQ+ community has made and continues to make across our nation,” the Girl Scouts website reads. “Girls and leaders have plenty of activities to choose from to earn this fun patch, and we encourage girls of all identities to participate.”

The organization offers a list of 20 activities through which scouts can earn the pride segment of their badge including attending pride celebrations, reading a book by an LGBTQ+ author and learning about LGBT history through documentaries and reading assignments. Some activities, such as watching a documentary about the creator of the Pride flag, are restricted to older grade levels, while participation in pride celebrations and several other activities are open to all levels.

I really don’t care about what anyone does in their bedroom. I am not interested in anyone else’s sex life–but please do not force the subject on my grandchildren. They don’t need to know or deal with these things at a young age. You are robbing them of their childhood by putting adult issues on them that they are not designed to handle. Let’s go back to letting children be children!

The Attack On Children Continues

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On June 6th, The Daily Caller reported that a federal judge has blocked the rule restricting minors from accessing surgical sex change procedures.

The article reports:

A federal judge sided Tuesday with families who sued over Florida’s ban on gender transition procedures for minors, declaring that “gender identity is real.”

A group of families, backed by several LGBT activist groups, sued Florida in March shortly after the rule restricting minors from accessing surgical sex change procedures, puberty blockers and hormone therapy took effect. Northern District of Florida Judge Robert L. Hinkle, a Clinton appointee, granted a preliminary injunction against the law to prohibit it from being enforced against the plaintiffs, and proceeded to make the claim that “great weight of medical authority supports these treatments.”

In much of the developed world, including many Scandinavian countries, sex change interventions for minors are seen as lacking evidence and as largely experimental treatments. Additionally, pioneers in gender dysphoria treatment have come out against modern philosophies that emphasize immediately “affirming” gender-confused minors, while experts have repeatedly poked holes in much of the scholarship claiming child sex changes are medically necessary.

Just for the record–I am not opposed to any adult who wants transgender surgery, hormone treatments, etc., to accessing those treatments. I simply question the wisdom of making those treatments available to children under the age of 18. Adolescence is hard, and it is a confusing time for many teenagers. It is a time when teenagers are not necessarily making wise choices. One hopes that their parents would guide them into wise choices, but that is not always the case. Right now, transgender is a fad. Unfortunately it is a fad with lifelong consequences. Eating goldfish was also a fad at one time. It was not necessarily smart, but it generally did not have lifelong consequences.

There is a reason we do not allow teenagers to smoke or drink before age 21. Why in the world are we letting them make permanent life-altering decisions before they are mature enough to understand fully the consequences of those decisions?

A Move Toward Transparency

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When the Democrats put together January 6th Committee, they didn’t plan on the Republicans taking over the House of Representatives. The idea was that the information and video that did not support the narrative of a violent insurrection would never see the light of day. However, that plan ran into a snag when the Republicans took control of the House of Rerpresentatives.

On Wednesday, The Daily Caller reported:

Republican Rep. Marjorie Taylor Greene of Georgia announced Wednesday that the tapes showing the Jan. 6, 2021 riot at the Capitol building would be released to more journalists.

John Solomon of JustTheNews.com, Julie Kelly of American Greatness and an unnamed outlet will receive “unfettered access” to the over 41,000 hours of video footage of the Capitol riot, the Georgia congresswoman posted on Twitter.

“As I promised the J6 tapes will be released. @SpeakerMcCarthy will give @jsolomonReports, @Julie_kelly2, and a third outlet unfettered access to the J6 tapes,” Greene tweeted. “Their reporting on it starts tomorrow!”

Republican Rep. Kevin McCarthy of California, the Speaker of the House, previously provided then-Fox News host Tucker Carlson, a co-founder of the Daily Caller and Daily Caller News Foundation, access to the tapes, Axios reported. Previous reports indicated that the amount of footage was 14,000 hours.

I believe that showing the video tapes of January 6th was one of the reasons Tucker Carlson got fired. I also believe that the fact that only one or two sections of the video were ever shown on his show when he was granted access to the tapes was the result of pressure from Fox News not to show the video. It will be interesting to see if the media outlets that now have access to the videos have the courage to make them public.

Comments On The Debt Ceiling Deal

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One of the people in Washington that I trust to analyze financial things accurately is Larry Kudlow. On Tuesday, he posted an article at The Daily Caller explaining his views on the Debt Ceiling Deal.

The article reports:

Former Director of the National Economic Council Larry Kudlow said on Tuesday during his Fox Business program that the debt ceiling deal negotiated by House Speaker Kevin McCarthy was “a fiscal win” because it contains many conservative priorities, including regulatory provisions and work requirements for welfare.

McCarthy released the text of the Fiscal Responsibility Act on Sunday evening, which increases the debt ceiling through Jan. 1, 2025, taking it past the 2024 presidential election. “Let’s not forget there are no tax hikes, period, full stop,” Kudlow said. “So, I think this is a political win for Republicans and conservatives. It’s a fiscal win. It is a free-market capitalism win. Don’t let the perfect be the enemy of the good. Save America, pass the bill.”

I understand some conservatives’ reaction to the bill, but do they really believe that they can get anything better? The bill has to get through the Senate and be signed by the President. Compromise is the only way that is going to happen.

The article notes:

The law freezes discretionary spending on non-defense budgetary items at Fiscal Year 2022 levels, adds reforms to permitting for energy projects and includes new work requirements for some welfare programs. Many of those provisions were in  the Limit, Save, Grow Act, which passed the House of Representatives by a 217-215 vote on April 26.

The reforms to permitting for energy projects were promised to Senator Manchin by the Democrats if he voted for the Inflation Reduction Act. After the vote, the Democrats reneged on that promise.

The bill also has some other good things:

“Student loan payments will be restarted to the tune of $5 billion a month and Joe Biden’s massive regulatory assault on energy and business will be stopped with a pay-go provision that says any executive branch regulatory costs must be offset by regulatory cost reduction,” Kudlow said. “By the way, Biden’s modern socialism regulatory assault has cost something in the neighborhood of $1.5 trillion.”

It’s not a perfect bill, but it is a good bill.

I’m Glad I Went To School When I Did!

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On Monday, The Daily Caller reported:

Biden Admin Considers Banning Chocolate Milk From Elementary Schools

Is this currently the most important item on their agenda?

The article reports:

The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) is considering prohibiting elementary schools from offering chocolate milk to students in an effort to reduce kids’ sugar intake, according to The Wall Street Journal.

The USDA is weighing a ban on flavored milk, including chocolate and strawberry, from elementary and middle school meals, a decision that could be finalized by the 2025-2026 school year, according to the WSJ. Whether the department decides to restrict the milk from elementary schools, the flavored drinks would have to meet new restrictions on the amount of added sugar allowed.

The USDA mandates that school districts serve a minimum of two types of milks, one of which must be skim, plain or 1%. School districts are not allowed to serve whole or 2% milk but can offer flavored milk if it is fat free or 1%.

Flavored milk was one of the main sources of sugar in students’ school meals, increasing the push to remove the beverage from the nation’s school districts, the WSJ reported.

“From a public-health perspective, it makes a lot of sense to try to limit the servings of these flavored milks because they do have quite a lot of added sugar,” Erica Lauren Kenney, a public-health and nutrition professor at the Harvard T. H. Chan School of Public Health, told the outlet.

Children drink milk because it is supposedly good for their bones. If a child has grown up on fat-free milk or 1% milk, I guess they will drink it, but it isn’t appetizing to a child who has never had it. School lunches should be decided on locally. Communities know what the local diet is and what children are used to eating. An uneaten lunch in the trash does no one any good,

The “Horrors” Of Free Speech

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Just when you thought you had heard everything…. On Wednesday, The Daily Caller posted an article that illustrates how far the mainstream media has wandered from the concept of informing the American people.

The article reports:

NBC’s Tom Costello worried Tuesday that Daily Caller co-founder and former Fox News host Tucker Carlson will not be policed for his speech on his new show.

Carlson announced Tuesday that his show will air exclusively on Twitter going forward.

“As of tonight, there aren’t many platforms left that allow free speech,” Carlson said in his announcement video. “The last big one remaining in the world, the only one, is Twitter, where we are now. Twitter has long served as the place where our national conversation incubates and develops. Twitter is not a partisan site – everybody’s allowed here, and we think that’s a good thing.”

Carlson said his show will air “soon.”

Costello grew animated over the news during Tuesday night’s segment of “Hallie Jackson NOW.”

“Okay, well listen, Twitter was already under fire for misinformation, disinformation, all-out lies, anti-Semitism [and] racism before Elon Musk took over, and now it’s gotten kind of crazy — seemingly unmoored, if you will. Will anybody be able to police what Carlson says, or is this the point? It’s just a free for all?” he wondered.

Twitter is a bit of a free-for-all right now, but that is good. It provides readers with a lot of information that they can evaluate. The interesting part of the article was former CNN host Brian Stelter stating that Tucker Carlson was a drag on Fox News’ profits. Well, that’s an interesting comment. Despite having the second most-watched show on Cable TV in 2022, Tucker Carlson’s show was not very profitable. Why? Because of a massive email and calling campaign by the political left threatening to boycott Tucker Carlson’s advertisers. The campaign was successful, and Tucker Carlson lost his first-tier advertisers. So what Brian Stelter said was true, but he forgot to mention the reason behind it.

 

Who Is Voting In Our Elections?

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On Thursday, The Daily Caller reported that Representative Chip Roy has introduced a bill into the House of Representatives to prevent non-citizens from voting in federal elections.

The article reports:

The Protecting American Voters Act, co-sponsored by Republican Reps. Matt Rosendale of Montana, Pete Sessions of Texas and Michael Burgess of Texas, would equip state officials with the information needed to verify citizenship upon voter registration, according to the bill obtained exclusively by the Daily Caller News Foundation. The bill also requires federal agencies to provide information upon states’ request, free of fees, from U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services’ SAVE system that confirms who is a naturalized citizen.

The legislation also enables states to check the citizenship status of those already registered to vote, allowing officials to amend current registration rolls by removing those who aren’t citizens.

That sounds like common sense to me. I don’t even understand why a bill should be necessary although I suspect that it is.

The article continues:

The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is required to provide states information about registrants’ citizenship status when asked, the bill reads. The Social Security Administration (SSA) must provide information to inquiring states about citizens who were born in the U.S.

Previously, the DHS had the ability to provide such information, but only at their discretion, and the SSA was not permitted to give details for matters of election integrity, according to a press release provided with the bill.

Noncitizens are banned from voting in federal elections, but some slip through the cracks. A Georgia election audit of the state’s registration rolls from 2022 indicates that 1,634 noncitizens registered to vote.

I don’t believe non-citizens should even be allowed to vote in local elections–if they are not citizens, why are they entitled to vote? Is there any country in the world that allows non-citizens to vote? I doubt it.