Good morning! Here is your news briefing for Tuesday February 11, 2020
THE DAILY SIGNAL
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THE EPOCH TIMES
Shen Yun Performing Arts is the world’s premier classical Chinese dance and music company. Get your tickets for the 2020 season today.
“An ounce of action is worth a ton of theory.”
RALPH WALDO EMERSON
New York Sues Trump Admin Over Policy Barring Residents From Trusted Traveler Programs
Fed’s Michelle Bowman: ‘Very Favorable’ Economic Backdrop Should Boost Local Growth
More Officials May Be Ousted After Trump’s Acquittal, Says Kellyanne Conway
Sanders, Buttigieg Campaigns File for Partial Recanvass of Iowa Caucuses
U.S. authorities have indicted four members of the Chinese military on charges of hacking the credit-reporting agency Equifax, stealing the sensitive personal information of roughly 145 million Americans and Equifax’s trade secrets, the Department of Justice said on Jan. 10. Read more
Attorney General William Barr confirmed on Feb. 10 that the Department of Justice is currently receiving and evaluating information on Ukraine, including from former New York Mayor Rudy Giuliani, as part of an “intake process,” while noting that officials have to be “very careful” about information coming from that country. Read more
Prosecutors on the case against Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn asked the court to give them access to Flynn’s communications with his former lawyers. The prosecutors suggested they are interested in information that could help them level additional charges against Flynn. Read more
Americans are leaving states with higher taxes and deficit spending, as well as more lawyers per capita, and moving to those with lower levies, more balanced budgets, and fewer attorneys, according to a new analysis of Internal Revenue Service data. Read more
President Donald Trump released his $4.8 trillion budget proposal on Feb. 10, calling for steep reductions to foreign aid, in line with previous years. Read more
Iran unveiled a new short-range ballistic missile on Feb. 9, adding to its arsenal of missiles—the greatest in the Middle East—which it relies on for military muscle. Read more
See More Top Stories
A Journey through 5,000 years!
Shen Yun takes you on an extraordinary journey through China’s 5,000 years of divinely inspired civilization. Exquisite beauty from the heavens, profound wisdom from dynasties past, timeless legends and ethnic traditions all spring to life through classical Chinese dance, enchanting live orchestral music, authentic costumes, and patented interactive backdrops. It is an immersive experience that will uplift your spirit and transport you to a magical world. It’s 5,000 years of civilization reborn!
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We Have Never Been Closer to a Free-Market Revolution in Health Care
By Chad Savage
It certainly does not feel this way at times, but we have never been closer to a true free-market health care revolution than we are right now. Read more
Content Knowledge and Critical Thinking Go Hand-in-Hand
By Michael Zwaagstra
Suppose you want some healthy lifestyle advice. A dietary consultant suggests that instead of identifying specific foods to include in your diet, you should develop a healthier way of thinking about food. Is this good advice? Read more
See More Opinions
China’s Xiaomi Imitator Not Innovator
By Valentin Schmid
(October 30, 2014)
Xiaomi is the up and coming smartphone company. It is now ranked in third place behind Samsung and Apple. Boston Consulting Group even ranked it 35th of the 50 most innovative companies in the world. Read more
What is “woke capitalism”? In the eyes of David Azerrad, why are large corporations now taking stances on highly controversial topics that they would have previously avoided? Why does Azerrad think that the radical left has abandoned its push for egalitarian utopia? And what does he see as the way out of the “culture wars” in America today?
On “Woke Capitalism,” the Culture Wars, and the Push for Ideological Conformity—David Azerrad
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POLITICO PLAYBOOK
POLITICO Playbook: Election Day: Will New Hampshire surprise us?
Presented by
DRIVING THE DAY
G’MORNING from New Hampshire, where it’s Election Day. We wrapped up Monday in Milford, N.H., at a PETE BUTTIGIEG rally at the Hampshire Hills Athletic Club. Longtime Pete watchers said it was smaller than his usual crowds.
A FEW PETE HIGHLIGHTS: He said President DONALD TRUMP says he’s for the forgotten man but “he seems to have forgotten most of us.” Speaking of his Dem rivals, he said he rejected the theory that you have to be for a revolution, or the status quo.
PETE WAS ASKED the No. 1 thing he’d do on the first day of his presidency. He decided to use that as an opportunity to name a bunch of priorities: “make our democracy more democratic,” get money out of politics, make it easier to vote, rejoin the Paris climate accord — “a floor, not a ceiling,” he said.
HERE IS WHERE THE RACE STANDS: BERNIE SANDERS is the front-runner. He basically won Iowa. He will win here tonight. The Q poll has him as the prohibitive favorite nationally (take that for whatever you want). WaPo’s Dave Weigel on how Dems aren’t exactly ready to get behind him
ABOUT TONIGHT: “9 places to watch in New Hampshire,” by Trent Spiner … “How to watch the New Hampshire primary like a pro,” by Steven Shepard
AND THAT BRINGS US TO THE REST OF THE FIELD …
— MIKE BLOOMBERG. He’s rising in national surveys, although everyone we talk to really has no idea what all of that means. He’s running such an unconventional campaign that it’s difficult to have any sort of useful commentary on it. What we do know is he’s spending piles of money and it’s having impact: He’s climbing in the polls, and gaining relevance. Everywhere we go, the question is asked: How much impact with Bloomberg have? It will be very interesting how he handles his appearance Wednesday in Tennessee, where he will make stops in Chattanooga and Nashville. Will he go for Bernie’s jugular, now that the Vermonter is No. 1?
BTW: BLOOMBERG was the leading vote getter in the tiny, much-watched New Hampshire hamlet of Dixville Notch. He got three write-in votes. Meanwhile, he’s on his way to $1 billion in spending. (For those keeping tabs, Klobuchar got the most votes in Hart’s Location and Millsfield — 6 and 2, respectively.)
— JOE BIDEN continues to flail, and, as we noted in Playbook PM on Monday, there’s a decent chance he will come in fifth tonight here. Biden world seems to firmly believe that they need to get to some states where minority voters have their say — South Carolina and Nevada. But caucus day in Nevada is 11 days from now. Subpar finishes by Biden and ELIZABETH WARREN would place the pair on the outskirts of this race, while a third-place finish by AMY KLOBUCHAR would give her some juice going forward. More from David Siders on Klobuchar roaring into contention
BIDEN on his path forward, on NBC’s “Nightly News”: “I’m going down to two very diverse states next, and I expect to do very well there. And still nationally, I’m still leading in all polls that I’m aware of, number one. Number two, the endorsements keep coming in.” (FWIW: He is not leading in the Quinnipiac national poll. Sanders is.)
LET’S CALL BIDEN’S STRATEGY the white-knuckle strategy. Hold on and try to navigate the turbulence until Super Tuesday, which he seems to believe will give him calmer air. He’s going to Nevada on Friday, his campaign announced.
— NATASHA KORECKI: “Biden super PAC warns of ‘doomsday scenario’”: “A memo from the Unite the Country super PAC to donors, obtained by POLITICO, asserts that the party could pay a steep price if Bernie Sanders, Pete Buttigieg or Amy Klobuchar is chosen as the nominee. Most ominously, it raises the specter of Sanders and billionaire Mike Bloomberg squaring off at a split convention.
“Democrats must stand by Biden through the early stretch of the primary calendar to avoid that fate, the group implores. ‘Donors hedging their bets on Biden because of Bloomberg could be creating a doomsday scenario for Democrats everywhere,’ the group’s treasurer, Larry Rasky, wrote. ‘The Sanders-Warren wing of the Party is ready for the Bloomberg fight. Democrats cannot afford a split Convention.’”
MARC CAPUTO nails it, writing from Manchester: “A noun, a verb and South Carolina: Joe Biden’s last-ditch primary strategy”: “Joe Biden’s campaign has one answer to questions about whether his candidacy is collapsing: A noun, a verb and South Carolina.
“The state was always Biden’s campaign’s firewall, but now it’s a final hope, his rhetorical device to change the narrative of back-to-back losses and still plausibly argue his electability. The first Southern primary is now the rallying point where he dispatched a top adviser Monday, and where his campaign’s co-chairman will hold a ‘launch party’ Tuesday, when the campaign is bracing for a blow-out defeat in New Hampshire’s primary.” More on Biden’s struggles from NYT’s Katie Glueck and Tom Kaplan
RYAN LIZZA in Manchester: “This Democratic field is so flawed that even Biden still has a chance”
THE BIG PICTURE, via NYT’s Jonathan Martin and Alex Burns in Exeter, N.H.: “With the extraordinary possibility of five leading candidates surviving beyond New Hampshire, and two self-funding billionaires awaiting them in later states, the contest appeared more unsettled than ever on the eve of a primary that usually ends presidential aspirations.” NYT, A18
EXPECTATION SETTING … SAVANNAH GUTHRIE sat down with BUTTIGIEG on Monday night in New Hampshire, and the interview will air on the “Today” show this morning. GUTHRIE: “Going to predict a win for Tuesday night?” BUTTIGIEG: “I think we’re going to have a great night. Look, we are competing against home region competition, two New England senators, I recognize that, but I still think we’re going to have a great night.”
COUNTERPROGRAMMING … UNION LEADER: “Trump plays to another capacity crowd in New Hampshire”
Good Tuesday morning. Happy New Hampshire primary day.
HAPPENING TODAY — SENATE MINORITY LEADER CHUCK SCHUMER will try to pass election security bills on the floor, starting at noon.
NEW … THE NRCC raised $12.6 million in January. It’s the first time they’ve topped the DCCC, which raised $12.1 million. That was the DCCC’s largest January haul ever. There’s not been much great news for the NRCC this cycle, so this is a welcome sign for the folks on First Street SE — especially since DCCC aides said they looked forward to seeing the numbers.
— ERIC KUHN, the co-founder of Layer 3 TV, has joined Hawkfish — Bloomberg’s digital arm. He is the senior adviser for social media and influencers. Kuhn previously ran social media at CNN and was a social media agent at UTA.
COURT WATCH — “Prosecutors seek 7 to 9 years in prison for Roger Stone,” by Josh Gerstein and Kyle Cheney: “Federal prosecutors are urging that longtime Donald Trump adviser and Republican political provocateur Roger Stone be sent to prison for about seven to nine years for his conviction on charges of lying and witness tampering during investigations of ties between Russia and the Trump campaign. The stern recommendation is starkly at odds with a suggestion from Stone’s defense team that he should be sentenced to probation — and no jail time — in the case.” POLITICO
— WSJ: “Justice Department Sues New Jersey, Washington County Over Sanctuary Policies,” by Michelle Hackman: “The Justice Department sued New Jersey and a Washington county Monday over their laws and policies limiting local cooperation with Immigration and Customs Enforcement. The moves escalated a Trump administration battle with liberal states and localities that adopt so-called sanctuary policies intended to protect unauthorized immigrants from deportation.”
TRUMP’S TUESDAY — The president will sign the Supporting Veterans in STEM Careers Act at 3:45 p.m.
PLAYBOOK READS
E-RING READING — “Philippines Tells U.S. It Will End Military Cooperation Deal,” by NYT’s Jason Gutierrez in Manila: “The Philippines said Tuesday it had officially informed the United States that it was scrapping a military pact that has given the longtime American ally a security blanket for the past two decades.
“The notice to terminate the pact, the Visiting Forces Agreement, comes as President Rodrigo Duterte has warmed up to China while distancing himself from the United States, the Philippines’ former colonial ruler. The move also comes as the Philippines has shown increasing reluctance to stand up to China over its territorial claims in the South China Sea.
“The agreement lets the United States rotate its forces through Philippine military bases. It has allowed for roughly 300 joint exercises annually between the American and Philippine militaries, said R. Clarke Cooper, the assistant secretary of state for political-military affairs. He told reporters Monday that the termination of the agreement would put those operations ‘at risk.’” NYT
— “Pentagon: 109 troops suffer brain injuries from Iran strike,” by AP’s Lolita Baldor
CORONAVIRUS LATEST … AP/BEIJING: “China’s daily death toll from virus tops 100 for first time”: “China’s daily death toll from a new virus topped 100 for the first time and pushed the total past 1,000 dead, authorities said Tuesday after leader Xi Jinping visited a health center to rally public morale amid little sign the contagion is abating.
“Though more offices and stores in China were reopening after the extended Lunar New Year break, many people appear to be staying home. Public health authorities are closely monitoring whether workers’ returning to cities and businesses resuming worsens the spread of the virus.
“In a bid to boost morale, Xi was featured on state broadcaster CCTV’s main news report Tuesday night visiting a community health center in Beijing and expressing confidence in the ‘war against the disease.’”
ACROSS THE POND — “Merkel’s job and Germany’s future up for grabs again,” by POLITICO Europe’s Matthew Karnitschnig in Berlin
— “5 takeaways from the Irish election,” by Naomi O’Leary in Dublin: “A seismic election in Ireland has reshaped the traditional electoral landscape, with the left-wing nationalist party Sinn Féin surging into first place ahead of the traditionally dominant Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil for the first time in the history of the republic. …
“Counting is still underway and with the race so close, the ultimate seat breakdown may not be known for days. But with almost all first-preference votes tallied, Sinn Féin had won the popular vote with 24.1 percent ahead of Fianna Fáil on 22.2 percent and Fine Gael on 22.1 percent. No party will have enough seats to easily form a government, but the fallout is already becoming apparent.”
BUSINESS BURST — “Federal Judge Expected to Clear Way for T-Mobile and Sprint Merger,” by WSJ’s Cara Lombardo and Drew FitzGerald: “The decision, which these people said is expected to be made public Tuesday, would hand the carriers a victory over a group of state attorneys general who argued the merger could result in higher cellphone bills for customers.
“The parties have been notified of the imminent ruling, the people said. It is unclear whether the ruling could require the parties to make additional concessions beyond what they already agreed to offer the federal government.” WSJ
PLAYBOOKERS
Send tips to Eli Okun and Garrett Ross at politicoplaybook@politico.com.
SPOTTED at the inaugural Bipartisan Cause for a Cure event at the Georgetown Club on Monday night in support of the Michael J. Fox Foundation — the event raised $100,000 for Parkinson’s research: hosts Justin Griffin and Matt Keswick, Massachusetts Gov. Charlie Baker and Lauren Baker, Reps. Jim McGovern (D-Mass.) and Peter King (R-N.Y.), Jack Quinn, Phil Cox, Fritz and Brooke Brogan, Win Huffman, Tyler and Fleming Boyd, Alyssa Farah, Pat and Sally Griffin, Ed Rendell, Ray Lahood, Matt Leonardo, Ed Cash, Brian Dodge, Taylor Price, Tim O’Leary, Mike and Laura Rigas, Matt Trant, Peter Morgan, Tyler Griffin and Kirsten Fedewa.
TRANSITIONS — Five former Cory Booker campaign staffers are moving to his Senate office, four of them returning to their pre-campaign roles. Matt Klapper will be COS, Tamia Booker will be deputy COS, Jeff Giertz will be communications director, Sarah Rojas will be director of special projects, and Andrew Serrano will be director of scheduling. … Jeff Wilson is now director of legislative affairs at the Aerospace Industries Association. He most recently was deputy COS and legislative director for Rep. Mike Turner (R-Ohio).
WELCOME TO THE WORLD — Bert Kaufman, head of corporate and regulatory affairs at Zoox and an Obama Commerce alum, and Zoe Friedland, social justice and impact litigation fellow at the Office of the Santa Clara County Counsel, on Feb. 4 welcomed Eliza Sloane Kaufland, who came in at 7 lbs, 3oz. Pic … Another pic
BIRTHWEEK (was Monday): National Journal’s Matt Holt (h/t Zach Cohen) … Kylie Toscano, digital strategist at Stand Up America (h/t J. Toscano)
BIRTHDAY OF THE DAY: James Hewitt, State Department senior adviser. A trend he thinks doesn’t get enough attention: “Since July, Argentina, Paraguay, Honduras, Guatemala and Colombia have all designated or announced their intention to designate Iran-backed Hezbollah a terrorist organization — an underreported success story for the Trump administration’s efforts in Latin America.” Playbook Q&A
BIRTHDAYS: Sen. Tammy Baldwin (D-Wis.) is 58 … Rep. Rob Woodall (R-Ga.) is 5-0 … Matt Bennett, co-founder and SVP of public affairs at Third Way, is 55 … former Florida Gov. Jeb Bush is 67 … former Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin is 56 … former HHS Secretary Mike Leavitt is 69 … Rick Tyler … Dan Barry … Alex Conant, partner at Firehouse Strategies, is 4-0 (h/t wife Caitlin) … James Gleeson, comms director at SpaceX … Steven V. Roberts is 77 … POLITICO’s Michelle Zar and Rachel Kosberg … Nathan Wurtzel … Wes Barrett … Johanna Maska … Chris Hensman … Rob Hendin … Jimmy Dahman … Alicia Mundy … Airbnb’s Casey Aden-Wansbury … Jess Sarmiento of World Food Program USA (h/ts Jon Haber) … Shannon Beckham and Alejandro Rosenkranz of Michael Bennet’s campaign, celebrating in New Hampshire for primary day (h/ts Samantha Greene) … BBC’s Pascale Puthod …
… Evan Siegfried, president of Somm Consulting … Stephen Engelberg, editor-in-chief at ProPublica … Elizabeth Patton … Nicole L’Esperance … Sean McCluskie … Liechtenstein PM Adrian Hasler is 56 … Hawaii Lt. Gov. Josh Green is 5-0 … Ilana Ozernoy, global head of communications at Bloomberg … Andrew Springer, consultant for Voice of America … David Stern, VP at Bank of America … Will Smith, SVP at Cornerstone Government Affairs … Francis Potter is 53 … Concerned Veterans for America’s Kyle Buckles … HBO’s Ashley Morton … Kate Sachse … Scott Berkowitz … Burleson Smith … Jerri Ann Henry … Ryan Steusloff … Elizabeth Heng … Emily Kirlin, partner at Peck Madigan Jones … Jay Reich … Brian Kaveney … Theodora Blanchfield … Olga Davidson … Mark M. Palmer … Sarah Basha … Andrea Mares … Amanda Hamilton … Addie Patterson … Fernando Ruiz … Chris Mather
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AXIOS
🗳️ Happy Tuesday! It’s “first in the nation” primary day in New Hampshire. It’s 266 days until Election Day.
- 🇿🇦 30 years ago today, Nelson Mandela walked out of prison after 27 years, a key event in ending South Africa’s apartheid system of racial oppression. Read AP’s story from Feb. 11, 1990.
Illustration: Aïda Amer/Axios. Photos: Spencer Platt, Joe Raedle/Getty Images
The political market is rendering two unambiguous trend lines: Mike Bloomberg’s TV monopoly is fueling his surge into the top tier of Democratic presidential rivals, and cash-strapped Joe Biden is crashing.
- Bloomberg’s air war has vaulted him into 2020’s top tier in national polls, media attention, insider/establishment buzz and the betting markets.
- And Biden is dropping in those same metrics, Axios’ Margaret Talev and Alexi McCammond report from Manchester, N.H.
Bernie Sanders and Pete Buttigieg are the favorites going into today’s New Hampshire primary. Beneath the surface, here are the Bloomberg and Biden trends to watch:
- State polling and our conversations with voters and campaigns show Biden at risk of finishing as low as fifth, behind Elizabeth Warren and Amy Klobuchar. That could imperil the firewall he’s always counted on from black voters in the South Carolina primary at the end of the month.
- Bloomberg, who jumped in late, is skipping the first four states to focus on Super Tuesday and beyond.
A Quinnipiac University poll out yesterday found “Biden no longer dominates on the key question of electability,” with 27% of national Democratic or Dem-leaning voters giving Biden the best chance of beating President Trump — a steep drop from 44% just two weeks ago.
- Sanders was second with 24%. Bloomberg was third with 17% — up from 9% in late January, and ahead of Buttigieg, Warren and Klobuchar.
- Among black primary voters, the poll found Biden’s lead has dropped to 27% from 51% in December, with Bloomberg jumping to the second spot, at 22%, slightly ahead of Sanders.
Oddsmakers see Bloomberg in second, behind Sanders.
- Biden has tanked in the PredictIt online market, where his shares cost 43¢ on Jan. 8 and now go for 11¢. Bernie goes for 48¢, Mike for 28¢ and Pete is 14¢.
Biden deputy campaign manager Kate Bedingfield told reporters that if this were the World Series, “I would say this is Game 2 and we’re going all the way to Game 7.”
🥊 DIXVILLE NOTCH, N.H. (AP) — Mike Bloomberg carried a tiny New Hampshire community that votes at the stroke of midnight: Bloomberg received three write-in votes. The others went to Pete Buttigieg and Bernie Sanders.
Campaigns are already deploying staff, surrogates and even the candidates themselves to South Carolina to get a jump start on what many view as the most important of the early-voting states, Axios’ Alexi McCammond reports.
- Symone Sanders, a senior advisor on Joe Biden’s campaign, spent yesterday in the Palmetto State doing TV hits, and canvassing across the state to rally black voters ahead of the Feb. 29 primary.
- Pete Buttigieg’s campaign says he’ll be in South Carolina later this week before heading to Nevada, where the caucuses are Feb. 22.
The state of play: Biden once had a 31-point lead in South Carolina. A (Charleston) Post and Courier/Change Research poll out Feb. 2 shows him still in first, but with a five-point lead on Bernie Sanders (25%/20%).
- Tom Steyer was in third (18%).
Mike Bloomberg is funneling more than a third of his massive advertising war chest into the 14 states voting on Super Tuesday (March 3), according to data from Advertising Analytics, Axios’ Stef Kight and Sara Fischer report.
- 35% of Bloomberg’s ad money has been spent on the four states with the largest number of Democratic delegates — California, New York, Texas and Florida. Nearly half has been spent on Super Tuesday and Rust Belt states.
- Pete Buttigieg, Bernie Sanders, Joe Biden, and Elizabeth Warren have spent more than half of all their ad dollars since last January on early voting states.
Below, President Trump taunted Dems with a “Keep America Great” rally at Southern New Hampshire University Arena in Manchester last evening:
109 U.S. troops suffered traumatic brain injuries as a result of Iran’s Jan. 8 missile attack on U.S. bases in Iraq, the Pentagon said, and 76 have returned to duty.
- Why it matters: President Trump brushed the injuries off as “headaches.”
Illustration: Aïda Amer/Axios
“A federal judge is expected to approve T-Mobile US Inc.’s merger with Sprint Corp.,” overcoming a state antitrust challenge to a tie-up of the two wireless carriers, which rank #3 and #4 by subscribers, the Wall Street Journal reports (subscription).
- Why it matters, from Axios’ Ina Fried: The move creates a much larger rival to AT&T and Verizon — and was seen as vital for Sprint, which has continued to lose market share during the deal’s long approval process.
In a new issue of Foreign Affairs devoted to debate over calls for retrenchment from the global role the U.S. once embraced, the great Graham Allison of Harvard’s Kennedy School writes in “The New Spheres of Influence: Sharing the Globe With Other Great Powers”:
[T]he time has come for an alliance-focused version of the stress tests for banks used after the 2008 financial crisis.
The basic view of the United States’ role in the world held by most of today’s foreign-policy makers was imprinted in the quarter century that followed the U.S. victory in the Cold War. That world is now gone. The consequences are as profound as those that Americans confronted in the late 1940s.
In their 2020 annual letter, Bill and Melinda Gates take stock of the 20 years since they founded the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation, which has since spent $53.8 billion on global health and development:
Twenty years later, we’re just as optimistic — and we’re still swinging for the fences. But we now have a much deeper understanding of how important it is to ensure that innovation is distributed equitably. If only some people in some places are benefitting from new advances, then others are falling even further behind. …
We believe that progress should benefit everyone, everywhere.
Read the letter, with the Gates’ handwritten annotations.
“Until Nov. 1, 1864, the day Maryland lawmakers officially approved emancipation, fugitive slaves Harriet Tubman and Frederick Douglass could not legally enter their home state of Maryland, let alone the State House in Annapolis,” the Baltimore Sun’s Emily Opilo writes.
- Now, they’re in places of honor.
- “Statues of the two leaders were unveiled and dedicated during a joint legislative session held [yesterday] outside the Old House Chamber, where slavery in Maryland was formally abolished.”
Major League Baseball is considering expanding the postseason to nearly half the 30 teams and allowing higher-seeded wild-card teams to choose opponents, AP’s Ronald Blum reports.
- The playoffs would grow from 10 clubs to 14, with four wild cards in each league, up from two.
- The selections would be made on a televised show.
- The proposal would have to be negotiated with the players’ association. The current collective bargaining agreement runs through the 2021 season.
The context: A 14-team postseason would include 47% of franchises.
- Twelve of the 32 NFL teams (38%) reach the playoffs … 16 of 30 in the NBA (53%) … and 16 of 31 in the NHL (52%), which expands to 32 franchises next season.
📬 Thanks for starting your day with us. Please tell a friend about AM/PM.
PJ MEDIA
The Morning Briefing: Let’s Stop Calling Them Never Trump ‘Republicans’
Clean Up On Aisle Failure
My various misgivings with the mainstream media and liberal bias are never-ending and well-chronicled. There are cyclical variations on a theme, with some themes cropping up more than others.
A recent peeve of mine is the continued use in the political press of the phrase “Never Trump Republicans.”
It’s been popping up more often, most recently in the news that “Never Trump Republicans” are trying to defibrillate Crazy Joe the Wonder Veep’s campaign in New Hampshire:
Embittered “Never Trump” Republicans tied to former Ohio Gov. John Kasich have secretly schemed to assist Joe Biden’s campaign — because they think he’s the only Democrat who can beat the president and help them get “revenge,” The Post has learned.
Emails obtained by The Post show that two top staffers from Kasich’s failed, 2016 primary campaign and Ohio’s former GOP chairman, a Kasich ally, were among those involved in efforts to boost support for the former vice president in last week’s botched Iowa caucus and Tuesday’s New Hampshire primary.
It’s rich that this group is tied to Kasich, who was the worst kind of Republican before Never Trump became a thing. That a group of failed, flailing Republicans from 2016 are now trying to help a Democrat in 2020 only to see him fall apart is particularly delightful.
Here was my initial reaction to seeing this news about this group trying to save Biden:
SFK@stephenkruiserUse your words. If they’re backing a Democrat they aren’t “Republicans.” Glad we cleared that up. https://twitter.com/nypost/status/1227006238430552065 …
New York Post
✔@nypost
‘Never Trump’ Republicans backing Joe Biden in NH primary, emails show https://trib.al/oYcqY1B
The faux “Republicans” behind the Never Trump tantrum “Lincoln Project” are so desperate to destroy Trump and real Republicans running for office that they’re OK “even if that means Democratic control of the Senate and an expanded Democratic majority in the House.”
That’s not principled opposition, that’s backstabbing.
The media and the Nevers insist on using the word “Republicans” is that they want to create the illusion of some statistically significant, allegedly principled, resistance to the president from within his own party.
As the kids say, LOLOLOLOLOL.
Trump’s approval rating has risen because of higher ratings among both Republicans and independents. His 94% approval rating among Republicans is up six percentage points from early January and is three points higher than his previous best among his fellow partisans.
Ninety-four percent.
The Nevers aren’t a resistance movement, they’re a statistical gnat, continually being swatted away by reality.
And they are most definitely not Republicans.
Commenting Rules
I am going to be taking an active role in moderating comments from now on, so I thought I would establish some rules for interaction in this benevolent dictatorship of mine.
I don’t mind differing opinions — I’m a lifelong conservative who’s spent his career in the entertainment industry. It’s not like I’ve never had a lively political discussion with people who don’t agree with me. If, however, anyone wanders in just to troll with expletive-laden playground taunts, they’re out. For good.
I think we know who I’m talking about here.
Regarding the expletives: I have no language restrictions whatsoever on stage, so if I can keep it clean here, everyone else can.
Other things I won’t tolerate:
Racism.
Anti-Semitism.
San Francisco Giants fans.
That about covers it.
The one downside, of course, to throwing the ban hammer at people who act like tools in the comments is that, in their fevered little minds, they view being banned as some sort of victory.
That’s only because none of them have ever actually won anything.
Let’s have some fun now.
PJM Linktank
Shot: Obama Film Director Quotes Communist Manifesto at the Oscars
Chaser: The Ratings Are in for the Oscars—and They’re Not Pretty
GOP Sen. Cotton Takes on Chicoms: ‘Burden of Proof for Coronavirus Outbreak Is on You’
GO TO SCHOOL YOU LITTLE BRAT. Great Exploitations: Greta Thunberg to Get Her Own BBC Show
This Tweet from Gen. Flynn’s Wife Will Break Your Heart
Deval Patrick Says Biden’s Black Support Is ‘Soft,’ So Where Are Those Voters Going?
VodkaPundit: Biden 2020: A Pre-Post Mortem
Crazy Bernie Heads Into NH With 7-Point Lead on Buttigieg; Biden Nowhere in Sight
REPORT: The White House Has Identified and Will Cut Ties With ‘Anonymous’ Resistance Official
VIP
VodkaPundit, Part Deux: Coronavirus, Xi Jinping, and the Mandate of Heaven
Is America In the Civil War Phase of Ancient Roman History?
From the Mothership and Beyond
Kira: Anti-Trump Univision Host Jorge Ramos: Trump Got His Wish, Mexico Is Now the Wall
Uh, Are Nevada Dems Going To Have A Meltdown On Caucus Night Too?
Bernie: On Second Thought, You Don’t Need To See My Medical Records
It’s Time To Think About Reducing The Deficit, Says Pete Buttigieg. Wait, What?
Uber Returning To Driverless Car Testing
A-Klo: You’d Better Believe I’m Troubled By A Socialist At The Top Of The Ticket
Bloomberg-funded fascism. How moms are quietly passing gun safety policy through school boards
Palestinians struggle to rally opposition to Trump plan at UN Security Council
Biden Talks About Using Hellfire Missiles Against American Gun Owners
Trump Describes His Experience With Pelosi Behind Him During His SOTU Address
WATCH: Gavin Newsom Reveals Why Most Democratic Governors Have ‘Deep Anxiety’ Heading Into 2020
‘Enjoy your new party’! Panicked Jennifer Rubin is desperately seeking a ‘moderate to stop Bernie’
New Hampshire Usually Winnows the Field. This Year May Be Different.
The Collapse Begins in South Carolina: Clay Aiken Abandons Biden For Klobuchar
Trump unsure of weakest Democrat but supporters say Biden and Warren easiest to beat
Robot with coronavirus advice hits Times Square
Bee Me
The Babylon Bee@TheBabylonBeeClimate Crisis Solved By New Jet That Runs On Liberal Hypocrisy https://buff.ly/2tQib4k
Climate Crisis Solved By New Jet That Runs On Liberal Hypocrisy
U.S.—The climate crisis has been getting worse, despite liberal elites’ best efforts to fly all over the country in their private jets lecturing everybody about it.There seemed to be no end in sight…
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The Kruiser Kabana
The Unexplained@Unexplained
Working on a bucket list that would frighten a therapist.
___
PJ Media Associate Editor Stephen Kruiser is the author of “Don’t Let the Hippies Shower” and “Straight Outta Feelings: Political Zen in the Age of Outrage,” both of which address serious subjects in a humorous way. Monday through Friday he edits PJ Media’s “Morning Briefing.”
THE DISPATCH
The Morning Dispatch: New Hampshire’s Turn
Plus, we review Tevi Troy’s new book on the history of White House infighting.
| The Dispatch Staff | 1 hr | 4 | 2 |
Happy Tuesday! New Hampshire’s first-in-the-nation primary is today, and Bernie Sanders—who placed just behind Pete Buttigieg in the delegate count in Iowa—is the favorite to win. A free Strokes concert got 7,500 of his supporters out to a rally last night; can it get them to the polls today?
Quick Hits: Today’s Top Stories
- The Justice Department has accused the Chinese military of orchestrating 2017’s colossal Equifax data breach, which compromised the financial data of millions of Americans.
- The White House has released its budget proposal for the 2021 fiscal year. The document proposes substantial cuts to federal spending, including caps on future growth of entitlement programs—although no one seriously expects Trump, who consistently pledges not to touch programs like Medicare and Social Security in speeches and on social media, to actually push Congress to pass such cuts.
- Sen. Josh Hawley has unveiled the latest of his policy proposals designed to combat the U.S. tech industry: bringing the Federal Trade Commission into the Department of Justice and beefing it up with new tools to go after Big Tech.
- President Trump continues to lash out at Mitt Romney over his impeachment conviction vote. The latest strategy: Accusing Romney of being involved with Burisma, the energy company at the middle of the scandal on whose board Hunter Biden previously served.
New Hampshire and the Art of the Possible
Declan has spent the last week up in New Hampshire eating Burger King and zigging around talking to voters at Buttigieg, Sanders, Warren, and Klobuchar events. On the site today, he takes a look at what he sees as one of the fundamental fault lines in the race: practicality vs. aspiration:
“A criteria for me is somebody who could speak to independents,” Helen Honorow said at a Rotary Club meeting in Nashua. “Yes, you need to speak to Democrats. But you need to speak to independents, you need to speak to moderate Republicans who want to preserve what we have in our country.”
“In 2016 I was all for Bernie, and still think the world of him,” Liz Richter disclosed at a Pete Buttigieg rally on Sunday night. “But I don’t think somebody as progressive as Bernie or Elizabeth will appeal to enough percentage of the country.”
She very well could have gotten this idea from Buttigieg himself. Just half an hour earlier, the former South Bend mayor warned a crowd of 914 packed into a middle school cafeteria about the perils of nominating his chief rival in the Granite State.
“At a moment like this, the one thing we cannot afford to do is to further divide a divided, polarized nation. We have got to get this right,” Buttigieg said. “I respect Sen. Sanders and I think a lot of the ideas that he’s calling for tie to values that we all share. But at a moment like this, telling Americans that you’ve either got to be for a revolution or you’ve got to be for the status quo, is telling most of us we don’t belong. And we need a political movement where everybody can find a home.”
“When you see $50 trillion worth of spending proposed, but only $25 trillion worth of ideas on how to pay for it,” he added, “the American people are going to want to know where the other $25 trillion is supposed to come from.”
At a country club in Nashua on Monday, Sen. Klobuchar made a similar pitch.
“My campaign has always been about reaching out, and not shutting people out, but bringing them with me,” she said, referring, presumably, to voters on her right, not her left. “When we were asked in the last debate if we thought a socialist should lead the ticket, I was the only one who raised my hand and said, ‘no, I don’t think so.’”
“Many of my colleagues have the free-college-for-all slogan, and that sounds great on a bumper sticker,” Klobuchar continued. “I don’t think that’s what’s best for the economy.”
Buttigieg and Klobuchar are practicing in New Hampshire what Otto von Bismarck—the man who unified a myriad of states in the 1860s and 1870s into what is now Germany—might refer to as “the art of the possible.”
Bismarck allegedly described politics as “the art of the possible, the attainable—the art of the next best.” Sometimes, in order to govern, you have to compromise, or water down your positions, or grant your opponent a victory.
And in New Hampshire, there’s a market for that kind of message—it might even be a winning one. “He’s not going to do everything that everybody wants,” Anne Fenn said of Buttigieg, whom she supports. “But he also doesn’t promise the universe to everybody and not be able to fulfill that. And that’s what I’m kind of worried about with Bernie folks.”
White House Sniping Is Nothing New
There’s a lot of fighting in politics today. Democrats vs. Republicans. Socialists vs. Pragmatists. Trumpists vs. NonTrumpists. And, if you talk to anyone who works closely with the White House, lots of White House staff vs. White House staff. A new book, by friend of The Dispatch, Tevi Troy, explores the history of the internecine fighting at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, in Fight House: Rivalries in the White House from Truman to Trump. We got our hands on an advanced copy and it’s quite a read.
The book opens with the Truman quip, “the only thing new in this world is the history you haven’t read yet.” And in this well-researched and entertaining stroll through administrations past, Troy seeks to make the case that the “Trump White House is comfortably in the mainstream of recent history—though a little more colorful” when it comes to the staff infighting, rampant leaking, and backstabbing in the West Wing that has come to define the last three years.
Some things never change, and power struggles are nothing new to the White House. During the Kennedy years, for example, Troy describes the kind of “drama and fury that would make an excellent Netflix series” not between staff, but between President Kennedy, Vice President Johnson, and the president’s brother and attorney general, Robert.
Some tactics just evolve. Playground taunts and nicknames are nothing new to the White House. Troy recounts an Obama senior staffer who took to calling a band of troublesome younger aides “waterbugs.” David Gergen became known simply as “the tall guy” during the Reagan years. The Trump administration, Troy argues, simply updated the approach, employing emojis to diminish rivals, including a cartoon reindeer to refer to Reince Priebus as “prancer.”
Troy’s thesis is that “[n]ot only has White House infighting been a relative constant since the advent of the White House staff, the tactics themselves are time-tested. There is just more media attention than ever today, since with the proliferation of smartphones and other electronic means of communication there are more platforms for unscrupulous aides to share their insider perspectives with the media and others.”
That may well be, but after reading about internal dissension going back to the Truman years, one can be forgiven for thinking that perhaps there is some distinction between Bobby referring to LBJ as “Uncle Cornpone” at a dinner party and the White House communications director telling a reporter, “I’m not Steve Bannon, I’m not …” trying to perform an unnatural act of self-pleasure.
Worth Your Time
- Just how bad is America’s prescription drugs pricing problem? Get a load of this remarkable AP story about a new program in Utah that regularly flies state employees to Mexico to fill their prescriptions because the same medications are so much more affordable there: “The cost difference is so large that the state’s insurance program for public employees can pay for each patient’s flight, give them a $500-per-trip bonus, and still save tens of thousands of dollars.”
- In a true must-read, The Atlantic’s McKay Coppins takes a deep dive into the Trump-propagandist sector of the internet, immersing himself in the deep pool of fake news available to unsuspecting news consumers. “I was surprised by the effect it had on me. I’d assumed that my skepticism and media literacy would inoculate me against such distortions. But I soon found myself reflexively questioning every headline. It wasn’t that I believed Trump and his boosters were telling the truth. It was that, in this state of heightened suspicion, truth itself—about Ukraine, impeachment, or anything else—felt more and more difficult to locate. With each swipe, the notion of observable reality drifted further out of reach.”
- With more and more states implementing some form of red flag law over the last few years as a means of dealing with possible mass shootings before they can occur, we’re starting to see data come in. In this CNN piece, David Shortell writes about the red-flag operation put into place in Broward County following the 2018 Parkland school shooting, where, according to a new study, law enforcement has seized more than 400 guns in the first year of the law’s existence.
Presented Without Comment
Something Fun
When an Ontario teen found $30,000 in cash and checks in a parking lot, she immediately turned the bag over to police — her tale thus avoiding becoming the spiritual successor to No Country for Old Men. It’s a much less gripping story than Cormac McCarthy’s novel, but boasts a more cheery ending. Instead of being forced to flee for her life before getting gunned down in a cheap motel, she got a $500 reward and some fun write-ups in the press.
Toeing the Company Line
- Over on the site this morning, James Kirchick contrasts two pieces of LGBT anti-discrimination legislation currently before Congress: The Equality Act, which would broadly prohibit discrimination on the basis of sexual orientation and gender identity but runs roughshod over religious freedom, and the Fairness for All Act, which comes closer than any previously proposed legislation to actually striking a balance between the two warring ideological forces.
- In the latest episode of Advisory Opinions, David and Sarah speak with Nikki Neily, president of Speech First, about bias response teams on college campuses and the history of speech codes. Give it a listen.
Let Us Know
Sound the alarm: They’re making baseball worse again. The MLB is weighing an overhaul to the current playoff system that would expand the number of playoff teams from 10 to 14 and—horror of horrors—implement a reality-TV-style element in which the highest-seeded teams would choose which lower-seeded teams they wanted to face in the divisional round.
Naturally, this is wretched and we hate it. But it also got us thinking: Baseball’s one of those things that only gets worse when the suits start monkeying with the rules. Which of these changes marked the point at which the formerly glorious national pastime was besmirched forever?
- 2017: In an anxious attempt to speed up games, MLB puts a cap on mound visits and implements auto-intentional walks. (What fun is baseball without beautiful nonsense like this!)
- 2014: MLB finally bows to the march of technology and implements widespread instant replay. (If the game’s happening in St. Louis, why should a bunch of slo-mo eggheads in New York get the final say?)
- 1971: The use of batting helmets becomes mandatory league-wide. (If we keep coddling our athletes like this, how are we gonna knock off Cuba in the Olympics?)
- 1920: The spitball is outlawed. (No ball game for me but a dead ball game!)
Reporting by Declan Garvey (@declanpgarvey), Andrew Egger (@EggerDC), Sarah Isgur (@whignewtons), and Steve Hayes (@stephenfhayes).
Photograph of Amy Klobuchar by Scott Eisen/Getty Images.
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ROLL CALL
Morning Headlines
Five years ago, the nascent House Freedom Caucus irritated Republican leaders to the point that some of its members got kicked off key committees. Now two of the group’s founding members have risen the ranks to the top of two prominent panels. Read More…
Despite his own reelection battle in November, President Donald Trump isn’t holding back when it comes to proposing budget cuts that are easy to pillory in 30-second campaign ads. Read More…
Annual budget release triggers annual budget politics
President Donald Trump’s new budget plan, featuring proposals to reduce the social safety net, has kicked off another round of budget politics. The cuts proposed Monday played into a line of attack that Democratic groups have been honing for weeks. Read More…
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Outside groups flock to Wisconsin race to replace Sean Duffy
It’s not often that the Club for Growth, the House Freedom Caucus and the Chamber of Commerce are on the same side of a Republican primary, but that’s the case in the race to replace former Rep. Sean P. Duffy. All three groups are backing Republican state Sen. Tom Tiffany in Wisconsin’s 7th District. Read More…
3 political handicapping mistakes to avoid
ANALYSIS — A few days ago, I heard a reporter who isn’t an authority on elections or voting behavior say that former Vice President Joe Biden’s problem is that his “message” hasn’t worked. Behold the first of three common political handicapping mistakes: putting too much weight into the message and not the messenger. Read More…
It’s time to retire the term “election night.” The semiannual national tradition of staying up a few hours past bedtime to know who will control our government is over. From close races to “vote by mail” to human error, it’s becoming clear that counting votes no longer fits neatly into prime-time television windows. Read More…
Former Oklahoma Rep. J.C. Watts launches black news channel
J.C. Watts doesn’t want a black version of Fox News, CNN or MSNBC. Launching in the middle of Black History Month, the Black News Channel aims to fill the gap between African American interest channels and mainstream cable news networks. Read More…
Capitol Police, Architect of the Capitol both get boost under proposed budget
President Donald Trump’s budget for fiscal 2021 would boost spending for the Capitol Police, an agency whose leader has said security threats are increasing. According to the proposal released Monday, the Capitol Police would get a salary boost from $379 million to $417.1 million over the previous year, with overtime not to exceed $50.2 million. Read More…
After GAO critique, DHS releases 2020 election security plan
The government’s top cybersecurity agency will focus on four key objectives to secure this year’s elections from hacking and other interference: protecting election infrastructure, assisting political campaigns, increasing public awareness about foreign intrusion, and facilitating the flow of information on vulnerabilities and potential threats between the public and private sectors. Read More…
New Hampshire voting law bewilders college students
A New Hampshire law tightening the rules around residency is spurring confusion in the state that hosts the country’s first primary Tuesday, with Democrats and advocates saying they’re worried the law might prompt college students to sit out Election Day. Read More…
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“The whole world will be looking here at New Hampshire.”
“I hope this outbreak or this event may be over in something like April.”
“It’s just too fantastic.”
“This is a horrible and very unfair situation.”
The following explains some key changes.
“It is a necessary part of making sure Iowans can trust the final results of the caucus.”THE RESURGENT
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February 11, 2020 Trending now
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From NBC’s Chuck Todd, Mark Murray and Carrie Dann FIRST READ: How 2020 took away the most important role of Iowa and New Hampshire MANCHESTER, N.H. – It’s possible – maybe even likely – that a single top-tier candidate WON’T drop out from the Democratic presidential race after tonight’s primary here.
Even if he finishes fourth (again), Joe Biden can plausibly take his campaign to South Carolina, where he hopes African-American voters can save him. (Then again, yesterday’s Quinnipiac poll showed Biden already losing altitude with African Americans.)  REUTERS/Brian Snyder And even if she comes in fifth (again), Amy Klobuchar might have every incentive to keep trucking along. After all, her single delegate out of Iowa gets her a spot in the next Democratic debate in Las Vegas.
One explanation why the current field might stick around through Nevada and South Carolina is because the field already got winnowed – not by Iowa and New Hampshire, but instead by the DNC’s debate-qualification process.
Those polling, fundraising and now delegate requirements took a gigantic field of 20-plus candidates and whittled it down to five major ones: Bernie Sanders, Pete Buttigieg, Elizabeth Warren, Biden and Klobuchar.
In the most recent Democratic cycles – 2004, 2008 and especially 2016 – the starting field was smaller, and it was Iowa and New Hampshire that played the role of winnower.
But in 2020, due to the debate requirements, this Democratic field essentially winnowed weeks and months ago – to five major candidates.
There’s another thing the DNC’s debate requirements did: By using national polls as one polling metric, it nationalized the race, making Biden seem stronger than his Iowa and New Hampshire numbers indicated, and giving a billionaire like Michael Bloomberg the path he has now.
So if/when folks are wringing their hands later tonight why the Dem field hasn’t winnowed ENOUGH, or why it winnowed to THIS field, or why the race became TOO nationalized – you can look back at those debate requirements.
They took away Iowa’s and New Hampshire’s traditional role.
Setting tonight’s expectations Only one person has to win tonight, and that’s Bernie Sanders. For someone who won this contest four years ago with 61 percent of the vote, he’s got to get at least 30 percent of the vote in this larger field. Anything lower than that will only emphasize the size of the non-Bernie field.
For Buttigieg, the closer he gets to Sanders, the better. But ask yourself this question: Can you see him winning the Dem nomination without pulling off the win here?
Elizabeth Warren has gotten lost in the national narrative. And she will have a big problem on her hands if she can’t explain why she didn’t finish at least in third – since she hails from neighboring Massachusetts.
Amy Klobuchar will clearly move on if she finishes fourth, and she could even move on if she’s in fifth (as we mentioned above). But a surprising third-place finish for Klobuchar could be a big, big story.
And that brings us to Joe Biden. Here are the modern-day Democrats who finished in fourth in New Hampshire: Jesse Jackson (’84), Jackson again (’88), Tom Harkin (’92), John Edwards (’04) and Bill Richardson (’08).
And here are the fifth-place finishers: George McGovern (’84), Al Gore (’88), Jerry Brown (’92), Joe Lieberman (’04), Dennis Kucinich (’08).
Finally, be sure to watch the turnout. Dems can’t afford to have another middling night like they had in Iowa last week.
How the New Hampshire primary works Unlike the Iowa caucuses, the New Hampshire primary is a typical kind of election contest – with participants casting secret-ballot votes, and “the winner” is the candidate who gets the most votes.
Undeclared – or independent – voters may vote in either the Democratic or Republican primary, and they simply choose a Dem or GOP ballot. Afterwards, the voter becomes a registered member of that political party unless they specifically fill out a form confirming they wish to return to “undeclared” status.
Forty-two percent of the state’s voters are undeclared, more than any other voting bloc in the state.
Under state law, all polling places must open no later than 11:00 am ET and close no earlier than 7:00 pm ET. The earliest that NBC’s Decision Desk may be able to make a projection of the winner is at 8:00 pm ET.
2020 VISION: Dixville Notch goes to … Michael Bloomberg? Well, the first results from New Hampshire are in, and guess who got more votes than anyone else in tiny Dixville Notch?
Someone who’s not even on the ballot: Former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg.
Bloomberg got 2 write-in votes in the Democratic primary from Dixville Notch, while Sanders and Pete Buttigieg got one each. (Bloomberg also got the sole GOP vote in Dixville Notch – once again as a write-in.)
Overall, with three towns reporting so far (Dixville Notch, Hart’s Location and Millsfield), here are the early results so far in the Democratic race:
Klobuchar: 8 Sanders: 4 Warren: 4 Yang: 3 Buttigieg: 2 Bloomberg: 2 (write-in)
On the campaign trail today: Pete Buttigieg visits polling locations in Manchester, Nashua and Bedford before holding his primary night event in Nashua… That’s also where Joe Biden holds his election night party… Elizabeth Warren has hers in Manchester, as does Bernie Sanders… Amy Klobuchar does hers in Concord… Andrew Yang makes multiple stops in the state before holding his primary night party in Manchester… Outside of New Hampshire, Tom Steyer stumps in Nevada a day after campaigning in South Carolina.
Dispatches from NBC’s campaign embeds: NBC’s Gary Grumbach covers Bernie Sanders’ finale rally in New Hampshire last night: “Sanders made sure to alert the crowd to the historic nature of this evening. ‘There are three times more people here tonight than in any other Democratic rally in New Hampshire,’ Sanders boasted to deafening cheers. ‘This turnout tells me why we’re gonna win here in New Hampshire, why we’re gonna win the Democratic nomination, and why we are going to defeat the most dangerous president in the modern history of America, Donald Trump.'”
And Joe Biden is hoping that voters get ready to head south, per NBC’s Marianna Sotomayor: “Stick with me 24 more hours and I promise you we’re gonna do just fine heading south and across this country. We’re gonna win this nomination,” Biden said at his final event before the New Hampshire primary.
TWEET OF THE DAY: More confusion than clarity 
DATA DOWNLOAD: And the number of the day is… $305,629. $305,629.
That’s how much Joe Biden’s campaign has spent on the New Hampshire TV and radio airwaves during the state’s primary, according to Advertising Analytics.
That’s compared with $5.3 million for Bernie Sanders, $3.7 million for Pete Buttigieg, $3.4 million for Andrew Yang and $1.5 million apiece for Amy Klobuchar and Elizabeth Warren.
Biden’s spending has been augmented with about $720,000 from pro-Biden super PAC Unite the Country. But even with the two sums combined, the onetime frontrunner has been far outpaced by his main rivals on New Hampshire airwaves.
Tom Steyer: $19.2 million Bernie Sanders: $5.3 million Pete Buttigieg: $3.7 million Andrew Yang: $3.4 million Reason to Believe PAC (pro-Deval Patrick): $1.8 million Vote Vets (pro-Buttigieg): $1.5 million Amy Klobuchar: $1.5 million Elizabeth Warren: $1.5 million Tulsi Gabbard: $1 million Unite the Country (pro-Biden): $722K Joe Biden: $306K Deval Patrick: $107K Michael Bennet: $53K
Talking policy with Benjy Campaigning in New Hampshire on Sunday, Pete Buttigieg told voters that while confronting the deficit is “not fashionable in progressive circles,” it should be part of the Democratic pitch in 2020, NBC’s Benjy Sarlin writes.
The former South Bend mayor’s case is that $1 trillion deficits under Trump, fueled by tax cuts and new spending, mean Democrats should “get a lot more comfortable owning the issue” on offense. But as our own Sahil Kapur reports, the real target for Buttigieg at the moment is Sanders, who attacked for proposing a Medicare for All plan that could cost well over $30 trillion over ten years in new federal spending, per outside estimates.
Buttigieg’s language annoyed some Democrats who still feel burned after Republicans repeatedly threatened to shut down the government or crash through the debt ceiling over deficit fears under President Obama only to drop their demands under President Trump. Sanders tied Buttigieg’s comments to this era, which featured bipartisan talks on cutting entitlements in exchange for higher taxes, which Sanders and Warren each strongly opposed. In a statement, the Sanders campaign said Buttigieg was “parroting the same corporate talking points to justify cuts to Social Security and Medicare that have been used for decades.”
But Buttigieg’s comments about fiscal conservatism falling out of fashion with the party weren’t entirely accurate, either. While some on the left have made a tactical and economic case that Democrats should deliberately stop paying for their plans, the 2020 contenders and Democratic leaders in Washington have mostly stuck to including pay-fors with new proposals.
Warren famously has her wealth tax and an elaborate plan to finance Medicare for All. Sanders has proposed tens of trillions of dollars more in spending and is less forthcoming with budget specifics, but even he has made some rhetorical concessions by acknowledging Medicare for All will require higher middle class taxes and promising his $16 trillion Green New Deal plan will “pay for itself over 15 years” through spending cuts, tax hikes, and growth. As the top Democrat on the Senate Budget Committee, he’s never been above scolding Republicans on the deficit, either.
THE LID: Vacation nation Don’t miss the pod from yesterday, when we looked at the time-honored tradition of political tourism during primary season.
ICYMI: News clips you shouldn’t miss From Mike Memoli and Kristen Welker: “Struggling in New Hampshire, Biden looks to avoid a knockout punch.”
How does the New Hampshire primary work? Here’s our quick primer.
Alex Seitz-Wald and Sahil Kapur have five things to watch tonight.
Both the Sanders and Buttigieg campaigns are asking for partial recanvasses in Iowa.
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NOQ REPORT
NOQ Report Daily |
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- Blocked speech of Mike Bloomberg stereotyping criminals in 2015 will not endear him to minorities
- Are Democrats really going to go full Bernie?
- Mike Bloomberg is paying Instagram influencers to shill for his campaign. Seriously.
- Bernie will likely be robbed, but not by Biden, Buttigieg, Warren, or Klobuchar
- Joe diGenova: White House to remove ‘Anonymous’ op-ed writer soon
- Star Trek: Shadow Prime Book I – Chapter 13
- Border Patrol arrests two convicted sex offenders over the weekend
- UK: Brother who plotted terrorist attack and sister who kept his secret are convicted
- Changing the subject: Drudge avoids politics after mass exodus of Trump supporters
- Melania Trump is coming out to campaign and the left is terrified
| Blocked speech of Mike Bloomberg stereotyping criminals in 2015 will not endear him to minorities
Posted: 10 Feb 2020 08:51 PM PST Billionaire Mike Bloomberg has a problem with racism. His well-documented stop-and-frisk policy in New York City led him to apologize for and disavow his actions so he could run for president. But the audio of a speech he delivered after his time as mayor indicate his motivations for going after minorities were based on premises that are anathema to the modern Democratic Party. At a speaking engagement with the Aspen Institute in 2015, he had some very harsh words to justify not only stop-and-frisk but all of his policies geared towards stopping violent crime. But those words were only heard by around 400 attendees because he requested video of the event to not be released. This is extremely important to understand because it means he recognized at the time he was talking about putting most police officers in minority neighborhoods that his ideas wouldn’t be popular with Democrats. When he says today that his ideas have evolved, how can anyone possibly believe him knowing he was aware how unpopular his perspectives would be even when he was espousing them?
“95% of murders—murderers and murder victims—fit one M.O.,” he started. “You can just take the description, Xerox it and pass it out to all the cops. They are male minorities 16-25. That’s true in New York. It’s true in virtually every city.” Democrats have long decried the statistics and insinuations Bloomberg has made throughout his life regarding crime. They believe in a kinder, gentler style of law enforcement that is more community oriented and that ignores race altogether. Bloomberg’s policies of flooding minority neighborhoods with law enforcement officers run contrary to what modern day Democrats believe. Then, there’s this gem that will not get Democrats excited.
Supporters of Bernie Sanders, including progressive movement leader Benjamin Dixon who released this video, will do what they can to push this video out to Democrats. But it’s unlikely mainstream media will give them any assistance as Bloomberg seems to be the chosen one this election cycle that the DNC is going to promote once Joe Biden completes his self-destruction. Billions of dollars can buy you lots of things. It has bought Mike Bloomberg a serious chance at the Democratic nomination. It’s even buying him Instagram support. But it can’t always buy silence, especially with videos like this one in circulation. American Conservative MovementJoin fellow patriots as we form a grassroots movement to advance the cause of conservatism. We have two priorities until election day: Stopping Democrats and supporting strong conservative candidates. We currently have 7500+ patriots with us in a very short time. If you are interested, please join us to receive updates.
The post Blocked speech of Mike Bloomberg stereotyping criminals in 2015 will not endear him to minorities appeared first on NOQ Report – Conservative Christian News, Opinions, and Quotes. |
| Are Democrats really going to go full Bernie?
Posted: 10 Feb 2020 07:33 PM PST Elizabeth Warren’s moment seems to have passed, and progressive Democrats are beginning to coalesce around Bernie Sanders. Meanwhile, Joe Biden is languishing in “I thought I was the front-runner” land, dealing with a massive bleed of support going to Pete Buttigieg, the Mayor of South Bend. While all bets were off at the start of this “woke” primary, there were still very few who thought the Democratic nomination might actually go to the 78-year-old independent Senator who openly calls himself a socialist. The decision to end the “out-bernie Bernie” phase of the primary initially looked like it was going to surge Joe Biden to an early finish line. But one of the few clear results of the Iowa caucus debacle (I like the term debaucus, myself) was a severe weakness in Biden’s campaign. Fourth place doesn’t quite fit a front-runner narrative. No, it seems it all came back to Bernie in the end. Most election forecasters assume he will easily win New Hampshire, where he won in 2016, and the momentum garnered there may be enough to push him over the edge with Democrats who want to coalesce around a single candidate as soon as possible. It goes without saying that this is madness. Bernie Sanders is perhaps the strangest populist politician in American history. After all, he’s been serving in the government in one capacity or another for over thirty years. His signature disheveled hair and excited, eccentric way of talking are often mocked as an “old man yelling at passing clouds” with a “get these squirrels off of me” level of hysteria. If only his presentation were the most crackpot part about him. Bernie Sanders is a full-fledged believer in the idea of democratic socialism. He could be one of the first major political candidates nominated while openly promising to raise taxes. This is because he has offered a litany of stunning promises for increased “free” government services. The top of the list of free things he’s offering are free healthcare and free college for everyone. I’ve always found the idea of getting stuff from the government in exchange for higher taxes a curious notion of free. At the beginning of this whole Democratic Primary, I could scarcely believe just how much Bernie many of the candidates were willing to channel. Many, many voices shouted warning that Bernie’s influence on the Democratic Party was the biggest anchor dragging them down as a political party. Not only do the Democrats seem willing to ignore these warnings, they may actually go full Bernie. Image via Gage Skidmore American Conservative MovementJoin fellow patriots as we form a grassroots movement to advance the cause of conservatism. We have two priorities until election day: Stopping Democrats and supporting strong conservative candidates. We currently have 7500+ patriots with us in a very short time. If you are interested, please join us to receive updates.
The post Are Democrats really going to go full Bernie? appeared first on NOQ Report – Conservative Christian News, Opinions, and Quotes. |
| Mike Bloomberg is paying Instagram influencers to shill for his campaign. Seriously.
Posted: 10 Feb 2020 06:00 PM PST When I was in middle school, there was this one rich kid that nobody liked but who not only lived in a mansion with an indoor heated swimming pool, but who regularly gave stuff to some of the popular kids so they’d pretend to like him. He was snotty and treated everyone badly, and by everyone I mean he was as vile as a middle school student could be. But he had great pool parties (yes, I went to one, but only because my friends forced me to) and the kids tolerated his abusive nature because he bought them things. That’s billionaire presidential candidate Mike Bloomberg. It’s not literally him; I’m not in my late 70s. But it’s a valid representation of a man who has been buying loyalty since the 1980s. Unlike President Trump, Bloomberg’s relationships have rarely been seen as personal. He has a lot of acquaintances who are paid to be nice to him, which is exactly what his campaign is trying to do with Instagram influencers today.
Some have questioned the legality of paying people to act as if they’re voting for Bloomberg, but even if it’s not technically illegal, it’s one of the sleaziest moves we’ve seen from a presidential candidate in the modern era. How low does someone have to go to pay people to pretend to like and support him? It’s one thing to buy advertisements or pay to have content spread to the masses, but what the Bloomberg campaign is trying to do is to get people to endorse him for money. It’s no different than if he paid me to write a complimentary endorsement article about him. The endorsement wouldn’t be sincere and could be used to guide people in the wrong direction, which is what Bloomberg’s campaign wants. And no, I wouldn’t accept money to endorse Bloomberg or anyone. The other campaigns should get the word out as loudly as possible. We don’t support any of the Democrats and wouldn’t want to be thought of as giving any of them advice, but this is different. Ideological differences are one thing, but when a pompous candidate attempts to literally buy support, that’s low even for a Democrat. I looked up the kid from middle school. As fate would have it, he went to jail a decade ago after being convicted for charity fraud. Mike Bloomberg represents everything the Democratic Party claims to hate. Yet he’s one of the two favorites to win the nomination because some Democrats will set aside their supposed values if it means beating President Trump. He, too, will fail. American Conservative MovementJoin fellow patriots as we form a grassroots movement to advance the cause of conservatism. We have two priorities until election day: Stopping Democrats and supporting strong conservative candidates. We currently have 7500+ patriots with us in a very short time. If you are interested, please join us to receive updates.
The post Mike Bloomberg is paying Instagram influencers to shill for his campaign. Seriously. appeared first on NOQ Report – Conservative Christian News, Opinions, and Quotes. |
| Bernie will likely be robbed, but not by Biden, Buttigieg, Warren, or Klobuchar
Posted: 10 Feb 2020 01:29 PM PST With New Hampshire’s primary upon us, a victory by Senator Bernie Sanders will lock in his position as the frontrunner for the nomination. He’ll be going into tough battles in Nevada and South Carolina with momentum to challenge former Vice President Joe Biden and looking great in the money race ahead of Super Tuesday. But he’s probably going to be robbed of the nomination by the Democratic National Committee. Why? Because they fear that he not only cannot defeat President Trump, but he’ll also hamper voter turnout for down-ballot races. They’re certain they need a centrist, which means Biden, South Bend Mayor Pete Buttigieg, or one of the other Senators, Elizabeth Warren or Amy Klobuchar. Except, it doesn’t. That’s not their plan anymore. The DNC has its sights set on the other guy in the race. Billionaire Mike Bloomberg is the DNC’s new savior after abysmal performances by Biden. He’s the one who can unify the party. He’s the one with the massive bank account that can help the DNC focus on other races while he spends a couple billion dollars taking on President Trump one-on-one. He’s the person they’re banking on now. Despite looking good in national polls, the most recent of which put him at 15%, Bloomberg will have a difficult time getting to the magic number of delegates before the Democratic National Convention. In fact, all of them will. And that’s fine as far as the DNC is concerned. Their ultimate plan is to go into the convention with no clear winner, make deals with other candidates to try to hold their delegates in the first couple of voting rounds, then shift a majority of votes to Bloomberg in a brokered convention. This means the only chance Sanders has of winning the nomination is to win it outright. He needs to accumulate more than half of the delegates before the convention, enough to overcome the super-delegate advantage that will go to Bloomberg. If he can’t win the nomination convincingly, the chances of him winning at all are approaching zero. Before, there was an assumption that Warren’s delegates would be shifted to Sanders, but that seems less and less likely. Considering how badly her campaign is going, it seems more likely she’ll cut a deal ahead of the convention. She could parlay a VP spot under Bloomberg, though he’s much more likely to find a woman of color to be his running mate. But that doesn’t mean Secretary of State, Secretary of Commerce, or Chief of Staff are off the table. Sanders may come at her with a similar offer, but the DNC will paint his chances as zero and work her into making a Bloomberg endorsement. If this all sounds sketchy, it’s because it is. And though Bloomberg has the money and is rising in the polls, he’s unlikely to be able to win the nomination himself without a brokered convention. He’s just too distasteful to the radical progressives to earn the delegates necessary for a true victory. There’s still a chance that Bloomberg could stumble, in which case the DNC will go back to Biden, Buttigieg, or Klobuchar, right? No. They see too many weaknesses in all of these candidates. Their other choice, arguably their first choice, will be to call in Super Woman to save the day. Conspiracy theorists have been saying the plan all along was to keep flack off of former First Lady Michelle Obama, then swing her into the mix at a contested convention. But with Bloomberg already there, the chances of that happening are slim without a Bloomberg faux pas. If Bloomberg trips all over himself, which is distinctly possible considering his penchant for saying stupid things, then they’ll do everything they can to get Michelle Obama to take up the mantle. Plan C is Hillary Clinton, and if they go down that deep into their bag of tricks they might as well give up immediately following the convention. There’s a reason Mike Bloomberg has been spending like crazy. He’s not signaling voters per se, though that’s obviously part of it. His real target for the mega-ad buys is the delegates. He wants them to believe he’s the one to back in a contested convention. American Conservative MovementJoin fellow patriots as we form a grassroots movement to advance the cause of conservatism. We have two priorities until election day: Stopping Democrats and supporting strong conservative candidates. We currently have 7500+ patriots with us in a very short time. If you are interested, please join us to receive updates.
The post Bernie will likely be robbed, but not by Biden, Buttigieg, Warren, or Klobuchar appeared first on NOQ Report – Conservative Christian News, Opinions, and Quotes. |
| Joe diGenova: White House to remove ‘Anonymous’ op-ed writer soon
Posted: 10 Feb 2020 11:11 AM PST Well, there goes my theory it was H.R. McMaster. Conservative journalist and investigator Joe diGenova reported today on WMAL Mornings on the Mall with Mary Walter and Vince Coglianese that a “senior White House official” told him and his wife, Victoria Toensing, the identity of “Anonymous” is known and the person will be removed soon.
“Anonymous” wrote an op-ed in the NY Times in 2018 that claimed there was an internal resistance cabal within the White House working to subvert the Trump agenda and take down the President. The same author released a book last year that was supposed to be loaded with bombshells but was received with a shrug by most Americans. Some had speculated “Anonymous” was Vice President Mike Pence, former U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley, or Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, but all have denied being the author of the op-ed. Pence was given particular scrutiny because of the use of the word “lodestar” in the article, a word that is not commonly used by most but often invoked by the Vice President. As the White House continues to “clean house” of Deep State operatives and renegade administration officials, removing “Anonymous” will be a huge win for President Trump. The forces arrayed against him are being systematically flushed out. American Conservative MovementJoin fellow patriots as we form a grassroots movement to advance the cause of conservatism. We have two priorities until election day: Stopping Democrats and supporting strong conservative candidates. We currently have 7500+ patriots with us in a very short time. If you are interested, please join us to receive updates.
The post Joe diGenova: White House to remove ‘Anonymous’ op-ed writer soon appeared first on NOQ Report – Conservative Christian News, Opinions, and Quotes. |
| Star Trek: Shadow Prime Book I – Chapter 13
Posted: 10 Feb 2020 11:01 AM PST Welcome to the next exciting installment of Star Trek: Shadow Prime Book I. If you’ve ever wondered what Star Trek would be like as a modern, Tom Clancy-esque techno-thriller, you’ve come to the right place. Just in case you’ve missed the previous installments, you can find them here:
As I mentioned before, if you like this book and want to see it in print, ping Simon & Schuster and Pocket Books on social media and let them know!
Chapter ThirteenUSS Enterprise A cavalcade of bright white plumes fired in sequence across the bow of Enterprise’s primary hull, each burst lasting 2.3 seconds—a calculation rendered automatically by computer, then executed with such precision as to create an ephemeral show of beauty against the frozen darkness of space. At first the ship responded exactly as she had been commanded, beginning the slight climb that would maintain her orbit around the Bezzeret Home World; but then something changed—a subtle deviation at first, manifesting as a tremor that quickly traversed the length of her frame. A crewman stationed near the interior hull might have felt it as a deep, permeating surge, passing from stem to stern like a tsunami out at sea, the full power of that wave concealed deep beneath the surface. Then Enterprise fell quiet, deathly still. She held that way for a few more moments, adrift in her own momentum. A thruster quad popped off, seemingly by mistake, near the end of her port-side nacelle. The nudge started her on a slow, flat spin—easily corrected by a push in the opposite direction, which the ship’s computer executed in short order. Except that it didn’t stop there. One at a time, one after the other, more quads started firing. Streams of hot gas erupted forward and aft, seemingly at random, dotting the contours of the ship in a dazzling, schizophrenic display. The initial bursts were short, buffeting Enterprise back and forth, as if some prankster had taken the helm—but soon they came on harder and faster, sending the ship into a fit of convulsions. She began to tumble. Then she began to fall.
Picard shot to his feet when the lights went out. All around him, station consoles flared in and out of life, illuminating the bridge with dizzying effect, while the bright planetside on the main viewscreen dumped into sporadic flurries of static. Overhead, the alert siren cut in and out, as if it couldn’t decide what to do before silencing itself completely: one failure after another, cascading through system after system. “Emergency power!” the captain ordered— —before an invisible hand yanked him back into his chair. Picard’s stomach dropped under the crushing weight of multiple g’s, his body now several times its own weight. Gasping for air, he tried to push himself back up, but his limbs felt heavier than lead. Making things even worse, a nauseating surge of vertigo turned him inside out as the entire bridge seemed to invert itself. In the graying tunnel of his vision, Picard didn’t even know which way was up. “Data!” he forced out in between breaths. “What’s happening?” The android didn’t respond. With one hand he held fast to the ops console, while the other tapped furiously at the interface in a vain attempt to get it working. Worf, meanwhile, stepped into another gravitational pocket and suddenly found himself catapulted into the ceiling. Blood exploded from his head as he cracked it against a support strut, right before a complete reversal sent him crashing to the floor again. “Lieutenant!” Picard called out, reaching for him. A human being would have been killed, but the Klingon somehow managed to get up. Dragging himself back over to tactical, he gritted his teeth and wiped away the streams of dark purple that gushed from the wound over his eyes. “Captain—” he grunted, reading from the bits of information that made it through to his panel. “Reading a subspace surge. . .off the scale. . .engineering—” “Isolate engineering!” Picard yelled as loud as he could, but even in his own head he sounded distant and slurred. “Shut it down if you have to!” “OMS thrusters on continuous fire,” Data reported. In front of him, the view screen showed the planet surface in fits and bursts, now spinning into an array of colors and motion. “Forty degrees down angle pitch. Ninety degrees roll to starboard. Thirty degrees yaw to port. Accelerating rapidly.” “Thrusters off line!” Picard ordered. “One quarter impulse out of orbit!” “Negative answer on ops,” Data shouted back. “Navigational controls off line, Captain!” the conn officer added. “I can’t get an answer from impulse or warp power!” That was when the deck shuddered, releasing a long, terrible groan like some leviathan rising up from the depths. The sound shocked everyone into a resonant silence, their faces already ashen with fear—and Picard was no different. He knew that sound, as much as he knew the steadily building tremors that now buffeted his ship. No form of energy making contact with Enterprise’s shields—assuming they still worked—produced that kind of effect. It was hard atmosphere, pounding against the outside of the hull. “We are losing altitude, Captain,” Data confirmed. “Orbital decay is imminent.” Picard barely heard. The strain of mounting g-forces dragged his mind down with his body, while his lungs fought to force oxygen into his brain. “Transfer operations to auxiliary control,” he ordered, pulling the last of his remaining options from the playbook. “Find us enough power to blast out of orbit.” Worf, lurching over to the engineering console, tried to initiate the transfer. The panel crashed on him as soon as he touched it, the display returning a stream of incoherent data. He smashed both fists against it, swearing in his native language. “The computer will not accept commands,” Worf said. “All three cores have been neutralized.” Picard’s jaw dropped. One word surged through his mind, unshakable in its denial: impossible. One word he had always believed, because that’s what he had been told: impossible. One word made true only by arrogance: impossible. And yet it was happening, spinning out of control like the planet surface on the viewscreen, while unconsciousness hung over him like the specter of death in waiting. Picard struggled to lift his right hand, its weight like an anchor, and hit the emergency comm on his chair. He desperately hoped that it still worked, that the crew might somehow hear him, but doubt had already arrested that notion. They were beyond help. The ship had been mortally wounded. But he wanted it said before the end. “All hands. . .initiate evacuation.” His hand then slipped off the armrest, falling into his lap. Picard struggled to stay awake, to stay in command, but his vision had already compressed into a gray tunnel—and in those last few seconds, he watched as the rest of the bridge crew succumbed one by one. In the midst of that shadowplay, while the deafening roar in his ears faded into echo, Picard thought he saw Data trying to revive them; but then sweet blackness enveloped him, like dark waters slipping over his head, and when the drowning began he almost welcomed it. Until he hear Geordi La Forge, his words broken and distant, like something out of a dream. “…warp core. . .containment. . .spike. . .failure…”
Then nothing. “Do you copy, bridge?” La Forge yelled, tapping his comm badge. All he got in return was a crackling burst of feedback, punctuated by a voice that could have been Data. The channel went dead before he could make any sense of it—not that it mattered. Engineering had descended into total chaos, his crew vaulting between stations in a mad attempt to keep everything together. “Stabilize those gravitational systems!” he told them. “And for God’s sake, somebody get me a picture of what’s happening out there!” “Internal comms are down,” somebody reported back. “We’re totally blind down here, Commander.” “I’m blind too, but I can see a hell of a lot better than most. Find me something!” La Forge had hoped with doomed desperation that there was some way—any way—that one of the computer cores had managed to survive; but he had seen the subspace pulse as it was unleashed, and how that power had decapitated Enterprise in an instant. A myriad of subsystems kept on firing off, however, playing havoc with life support and gravity. Every time he managed to lock one of them down, another one failed. It was like playing whack a mole while everything fell apart around him. Another explosion ripped through engineering. La Forge threw himself against the nearest console and held on, while one of his crew bounced off the thing and hit the deck next to him. He looked up just in time to see the reactor core sway on its bearings, wobbling back and forth as the ship rocked around it. For a moment La Forge thought it would split wide open, a piercing shriek of metal against metal sounding the call of their doom. Then the core racked itself back into place, horribly askew but still in one piece. The bearings held—at least for now. “Jesus,” he muttered, running toward an adjoining station. Lieutenant Barclay was already there, making use of one of the few consoles that hadn’t been completely fried during the power spike. He bled profusely from a deep gash over his left temple, his uniform torn and covered in soot. From the looks of things, he was damned lucky to still be alive. “What’s our status, Reg?” La Forge asked him. “Not good, Commander,” Barclay replied, unable to take his eyes off the screen. “We lost structural integrity for half a second after the initial spike, before the residual capacitors had a chance to kick in. I’m reading moderate to severe core deformation in over a dozen places.” “What about containment?” “We’ve got enough in reserves to keep it going, but that isn’t the problem.” Barclay pointed to a red warning that flashed over a graphic of the core, right at the juncture where the upper half joined the lower. “That’s a cracked injector casing. Right now the containment field is preventing leakage, but it’s only a matter of time before the EM wears thin enough for a stray molecule of antideuterium get loose. Once that happens—” “I get the picture,” La Forge said grimly. It meant swift annihilation of the ship—but even that wasn’t the worst of their problems. This close to the Bezzeret Home World, the resulting explosion would vaporize half the planet’s atmosphere. “We need to get clear and dump the core before it fails. Can you rig that from here?” The overheads flickered and then went dark. Barclay’s console went down at the same time, not coming back up when the emergency lights clicked on. Drawn in shadows, he turned his face to La Forge and shook his head. “That’s the last one we had, Commander.” La Forge looked at the core, which still pulsated with energy, its blue glow spilling into a hideous red as it crept toward them. “There’s a hotwire system in drydock access,” he decided, “insulated from outside systems. We can reroute thruster control and eject the core manually from there—if we have enough time.” “That’s a full three decks down through the hell hole,” Barclay pointed out. “You don’t want to be anywhere near there when the core goes overboard.” “If you have a better idea, now’s the time,” La Forge said—but they both knew there wasn’t any other choice. “Get everyone out and seal the hatch behind me. See the crew to their lifeboat stations.” He then turned away with every intention of going it alone, before he felt Barclay’s hand on his arm pulling him back. “You’re going to need help, Commander.” La Forge smiled at him and nodded. “Let’s go.” The two of them grabbed emergency oxygen packs off the wall and slung them over their shoulders, like mountain climbers preparing to scale a summit. As far as La Forge knew, he was the last ranking officer left on board—so as he and Barclay made their way to their destiny, he gave the final order any captain would give before he went down with his vessel. “All hands abandon ship!” he called out. “We’re going to blow the warp core! Everyone to the lifeboats, now!” A steady human tide surged toward the exit. La Forge didn’t look at any of them, not wanting to see their eyes. Instead he focused on the core, its glow even more sinister now, rending their shadows into a grotesque pastiche of movement. Stopping at the rail, he held it with both hands and stared down the length of the shaft—the hell hole, as the crew so aptly named it—and wondered for a moment what it felt like to die in a vacuum. He descended the ladder.
USS Dauntless At 0930 hours, FTB standard time, the Starship USS Enterprise, registry NCC-1701D, United Federation of Planets, officially died. To look at her from a distance was to not know the circumstances of her death, except for a bright stream of drive plasma that vented from the fractured base of her port side nacelle. For all the evil that had ravaged her on the inside, her exterior remained largely beautiful: all graceful lines and curves, pirouetting through space like a skater spinning faster and faster on the ice, until her OMS jets finally spent themselves and friction took her in its hold. Enterprise dove straight down. It seemed strange to watch her form merging with the gases of the Bezzeret atmosphere, ionizing them until they glowed dull red, then bright red, then blue and then finally white. They billowed around her in great clouds—intricate, irregular patterns that caressed the surface of her hull and making her take on a glow all of her own. She had become a meteorite, a falling star with a glory and a radiance like none she had ever known before. And her death, while tragic, left a mark across the cosmos befitting her legend. Quintax watched, transfixed. Zeus, thy will be done. The insistent howl of a standing red alert gradually penetrated that fugue, forcing Quintax into a bleak reckoning. His XO had ordered it after the captain had ignored his repeated warnings that Enterprise was in danger. One corner of Quintax’s mind—the part that remained sane—admired the man’s initiative, taking command in a crisis situation and all that. As for the rest of the bridge crew, they had become little more than annoying harlequins Zeus with their pallid faces and limited vision and jokes and laughter at the captain’s expense, vampires that attached themselves to him, drew the energy and drive from him, sucked the very blood out of him, and yes, oh yes, didn’t he realize exactly what they were now! The metamorphosis came so suddenly and was so complete that Quintax amazed himself for not seeing it before, and when his hand reached into his pocket and found the phaser there it felt like the most natural thing in the world. “Enterprise won’t acknowledge our signal!” Quintax ignored this. “Sensors showing a massive influx of subspace energy!” Quintax ignored this. “Close to tractor beam range!” the XO ordered. “Prepare to lock on!” Quintax did not ignore this. Mechanically, he jammed his phaser into the XO’s ear and whispered things he would not understand, could not understand, would never understand in a million years. But most of all: “Thy will be done.” Quintax pulled the trigger. The XO fell down on the deck, twitching. “Captain!” someone screamed, but Quintax was far beyond reach. He took aim at the first crewman in his field of vision, with the automated accuracy of a smart weapon—no hesitation, no sympathy, all prejudice. He fired, and ops slumped in her seat. Again, and the left side of tactical’s face melted. Then again. And again. And again and again and again— And all the time: “Thy will be done! Thy will be done! Thy will be done!”
Jerarche (The Bezzeret Capital City) Will Riker thought it was a thunderstorm at first. The rumblings reminded him of a week he had spent on a Nebraska farm as a kid, one of those throwback spreads that did things the old-fashioned way—his father’s idea of character building. Riker didn’t remember much about the place, but what he did recall with vivid clarity were the summer storms: fronts that rolled through from the northeast, black as night in the late afternoon, unleashing a fury that reminded him just how insignificant a single human life was in comparison to the forces of nature. But most of all, it was the thunder. Low rumble. Underneath his feet, over his head, everywhere at once. Thunder he could feel. It felt the same way now—except that it didn’t come in random bursts, or echo the eruption of lightning. This was continuous, starting out softly but then quickly growing into a deafening assault. Long before it had grabbed his attention, everyone else in the compound had heard it too. Across the compound, both the Federation personnel and their Bezzeret antagonists stopped what they were doing—loading, unloading, bickering, taunting—to look up into the sky and find the source of this unnatural disturbance. Riker did the same, while Beverly stepped in beside him, neither one of them seeing the expected approach of an encroaching storm. But there was something else—something that grew in size as the rumbling grew louder. It started as a red pin prick, barely visible in the orange of the early morning light. As the seconds passed, however, its dimensions became clearer—more solid, with a hard object at its center, trailing a wispy orange line of fire. “What is that?” Beverly asked. “I don’t know,” Riker muttered, suddenly dealing with a sick feeling that had settled into his gut. Reaching for his comm badge, he tapped it to open a channel. “Riker to Enterprise.” No response. The object, meanwhile, grew larger as it headed straight toward them. Riker turned to Beverly, whose face set into a mask of worry. She tried her comm badge as well, but had no more luck than Riker did. By then, the crowd of Bezzeret had become restless again. Pointing fingers into the sky, they joined the rising chorus of human voices puzzling out the cause of this phenomenon. “She was in geosynchronous orbit above the capital city,” Beverly suggested darkly. “If something went wrong—” Morton joined them before she could finish. The object was huge now, bigger than the sun, and bombarded them with a light and heat all its own. “What in God’s name?” he began. The thing exploded in an almost divine bloom of energy. Plumes of orange turned to blue and then turned to white, shooting off in every direction. At first it seemed unreal, happening in a detached silence that froze everyone in shock and wonder. Then gradually, inexorably, a hot wind began to ride in on the crest of that explosion, raising dust as it blew across their faces. Riker expected to see chunks of debris falling from the cloud, the pulverized remains of a starship raining down on them. Instead, he watched the fireball emerge intact. He heard the thunder again, the same as before—but louder, closer, a storm moving in fast. And then heard a voice—an alien voice, rising in a battle cry. “It’s an attack!” one of the Bezzeret shouted. “Kill the humans! Kill them all!” Running berserk, they closed in to make good on their threat.
USS Enterprise Barclay screamed as the explosion ripped up from the depths, both for the pain shredded his senses and for the concussion that knocked him off the ladder. He plummeted for over three rungs before his hand managed to grab hold, more dumb luck than anything else. Knuckles popping, his fingers felt as if they would tear from their sockets, sweat oiling skin and causing him to slip. “Commander!” he shouted, his voice echoing through the core chamber. Barclay’s eyes looked down, ignoring his mind’s pleas, vertigo stretching the perceived distance into an impossible length. Even if by some miracle he survived the fall, he knew all the radiation running loose down there would kill him. Got to. . .hang on… But that was a losing battle. The drag on his body felt so powerful, it was as if some ravenous force had drawn him in and meant to have him. Reaching, grasping blindly, Barclay contorted himself in a desperate attempt to gain some kind of purchase—until all at once, the world inverted and he found himself somersaulting through the air. He crashed against the outer wall of the warp core enclosure, his oxygen pack clanging hard against its rippled surface and slowing him down, although he could no longer tell which way was up. All he knew was that the pocket of zero-g he had found wouldn’t last long—and when it collapsed, he would be splashed all over the bottom of the chamber. Barclay kicked himself away from the core. He sailed straight back into the access ladder, arms and legs flailing like a man in free fall. Striking his head against one of the rungs, his vision blossomed into stars, the impact knocking him back toward the core and certain oblivion. That was when Barclay felt something clamp down on his shoulder—fingers digging into his flesh so hard they felt like hooks, but he didn’t care. They meant salvation. Barclay would have paid the devil for that. Another hand grabbed him by the arm and hauled him into an adjacent tunnel. Barclay landed on the deck hard, the fullness of his weight realized as gravity kicked back in. Looking up, he found Geordi La Forge slumped against the bulkhead across from him. The labored breaths of both men filled the narrow space. “Thanks, Commander,” Barclay said. La Forge nodded. “Don’t know how many more of those we can take,” the lieutenant continued. “We must be venting drive plasma into the atmosphere.” “Which means we’re burning up,” La Forge finished. “We need to hurry.” Motioning for Barclay to follow, the chief engineer crawled deeper into the tunnel. The way was short, but choked with debris, most of it piled up against what looked like a dead end. La Forge tore into the pieces, tossing them back to Barclay, quickly uncovering the hatch that led to drydock access. It was sealed tight, as per regulation—but as La Forge reached for the control for the magnetic lock, he found it smashed beyond repair. “Dammit,” he whispered. Barclay swallowed hard. “Can we rig a bypass?” “No time,” La Forge muttered, and pulled out his phaser. “You sure about that, Commander?” Barclay asked. “Without that hatch, there won’t be anything between us and open space after we dump the core.” “There’s another access tube, just past this one, that leads to the deflector array. With any luck, our oxygen packs will last long enough for us to make it through and seal the hatch on the other side.” “Still sounds like a rough ride.” “That’s why they pay us the big bucks.” La Forge nodded at him, and leveled his phaser at the door. “You ready?” The deck shuddered again. Barclay nodded. La Forge fired. A bright orange beam lit up the tunnel, the close walls amplifying its light and heat, a shower of hit cinders erupting from the lock as it disintegrated. The hatch then fell open, its hinges shrieking, revealing a small control room inside. The space was jammed with a single chair flanked by several consoles and screens, undamaged by all the havoc unleashed up above. Lights blinked back at them like the spires from a desert oasis. “Go,” La Forge ordered. Barclay climbed into the chair, while La Forge did his best to close the hatch behind them. Engaging the console in front of him, the lieutenant quickly flashed through a series of screens, bringing what rudimentary systems they had available to them online. It wasn’t much—just enough to guide ship’s operations while the vessel was in drydock—but at least it was something. La Forge fumbled with the latch until he finally got it closed. “That gonna hold?” Barclay asked. “Not a chance,” he replied. “What have we got?” “More master alarms than I’ve ever seen,” Barclay said, punching up a diagnostic display through one of the monitors. “That injector casing is deteriorating a lot faster than I thought. We got maybe three minutes before it goes—assuming we don’t burn up first.” “I can’t even get an accurate fix on our position,” La Forge said grimly, working the other console. “What’s our attitude?” Barclay tapped into a local data feed, taking information from a bank of gyroscopes and translating it into a graphic that showed Enterprise in three dimensions. She spun on all axes simultaneously, a slow death roll through the Bezzeret atmosphere. “We need thrusters,” La Forge said. “Feed in reserve fuel if the hydro tanks are empty.” “What about the core?” “If we don’t get this beast level, that won’t matter.” He tapped his comm badge. “La Forge to bridge or auxiliary control. Can anyone hear me?” More crackle. More static. “Come on, people,” he muttered. “You can’t all be dead.” Barclay’s panel beeped. “I have thruster control,” he said. La Forge took an even breath. “Level two hundred and seventy degrees relative pitch.” Slowly, painfully, Enterprise stopped pitching until her ventral surface pointed away from the planet and into open space. Barclay gave her a few more bursts until she leveled off, her broader profile making the ship buffet even harder. “Two hundred and seventy degrees,” he affirmed. “Level zero degrees relative roll.” Barclay poured on with full thrusters, quickly depleting the supply of reserve fuel. His eyes darted back and forth between Enterprise’s attitude and the plummeting hydrogen levels, praying that the former would reach zero before the latter. God listened. Enterprise stopped rolling. “Zero degrees,” Barclay said. “Time.” “No more than a minute. What’s our altitude?” “No way to tell,” La Forge said. “Can you get impulse back on line?” “Not with these controls. It’s taking all we got just to work the thrusters.” “No choice, then. We’re gonna have to risk it.” “This deep in the atmosphere,” Barclay told him, “the shock wave from an antimatter explosion will rip us apart.” “I’m aware of that, Reg,” La Forge said, looking him straight in the eyes. Barclay saw no hesitation there—just cold, determined resolution. That was when he fully understood: this wasn’t about saving the ship anymore. This was about saving the world beneath them. “Initiate the ejection sequence.” Barclay nodded, and did as ordered. “At your command, sir.” La Forge patted him on the shoulder. “Nice working with you, Reg.” He managed a smile. “The honor is all mine, sir.” La Forge took a moment to steel himself, then took his hands off the console. It was all up to Barclay now. “Now—” he began. “Bridge to engineering.” Data’s voice cut through the noise like a bullet shattering bone. “Belay that order!” La Forge shouted, tapping his comm badge. “Data, it’s Geordi. Engineering is down. We’re running ops through drydock access, but can’t get impulse power routed through here. Can you get the helm to answer?” “Affirmative,” Data replied. “I have rerouted the conn through my own neural network and have limited control over navigation. Impulse power is now responding.” “Hot damn,” La Forge intoned. “Plot us a course out of orbit and get us clear of the atmosphere—and make it quick, Data. We need to dump the core or we’re all dead.” For Data, it only took a few seconds. They felt Enterprise responding to his commands, her entire frame creaking under the strain of an impulse burst. Barclay watched his clock the whole time, ticking inexorably down to zero, a galaxy of alert lights consuming the monitor. “This is gonna be close,” he said. Finally, Data relayed the news. “We have cleared the Bezzeret atmosphere. Estimate fifteen seconds until we are free of orbit.” La Forge turned to Barclay. He shook his head. “Go,” the chief engineer said. Barclay’s hands moved across his panel like lightning. Only one more button awaited him to execute the final sequence. He and La Forge pulled their oxygen masks over their faces, the outer hatch rattling loosely against its latch. No protection at all from the wolf soon to be howling at their door. Barclay took a deep breath and held it. “EJECT!” He pressed the button.
Jerarche (The Bezzeret Capital City) Riker opened fire with his phaser. He tried to keep the bursts short and controlled, but with all hell breaking loose it was damned near impossible. The entire compound had turned into a battlefield, with hundreds of Bezzeret still swarming in through the gate while the ones already inside fashioned weapons out of anything they could find—rocks, bricks, shards of broken glass. One of them picked up a steel rod and clubbed a member of the away team before Riker could drop him. After that, he just kept firing until the phaser overheated and quit. He ran. Up ahead, he spotted a few overturned tables—makeshift barricades thrown up by the Skid Row crew. Riker dove over one of them, hitting the ground like a bag of wet cement, before scrambling back against the barrier. Beverly was already there, cradling Morton’s head in her lap, running a med scanner over him. The scientist moaned weakly in between shallow breaths, a crude shank protruding from his chest. From the amount of bleeding, Riker knew it was bad. “We can’t stay here, Doctor,” he said, drawing his phaser. “The Bezzeret will overrun this position any second.” “I’m not moving him, Will,” she snapped, jamming a hypospray into a patch of skin just below the wound. “He’s already got a punctured lung. If we try to drag him out of here, it’ll kill him for sure.” Dammit, Riker thought, and tapped his comm badge. “Enterprise!” he signaled. “We are pinned down and under heavy attack! Request emergency beam out!” Riker heard shouts from the other side of the barricade, but no answer from the ship. “Dauntless, can you read me? We need immediate assistance!” Again, nothing. Up in the sky, the fireball that had ignited all the violence still loomed—but instead of tumbling out of control, it now seemed to be moving in a straight line away from them. Riker willed it to keep climbing, even if it meant stranding them here. Because he knew the alternative was much worse. “We’re on our own,” he told Beverly. “How’s your phaser?” “Three-quarter charge,” she said. “You?” “Half.” The weapon had cooled off, but the Bezzeret didn’t stun easily. Even after blasting everything in sight, Riker hadn’t even begun to put enough of them down to quell the riot. “We need to regroup our people and find some place to hole up until this blows over.” “Sounds good. Any idea how to pull it off?” Riker tightened the grip on his weapon. “No way we’re gonna make it playing nice,” he said, and switched the setting from STUN to KILL. “With any luck, they’ll back off when they see we mean business—but if not, you keep firing until we clear a way out of here. Understood?” Morton shivered. Beverly gently lowered his head to the ground and drew her own phaser. Her eyes were taciturn, but her jaw set in determination. “Understood,” she said. Riker nodded. “On three—” But then something in Beverly’s expression stopped him before he could finish. He followed her stare back toward the heavens, where the blazing trail stretched even longer—except that now, it diverged along two distinct paths. The second one popped off from the first like a flare, rocketing away at a high rate of speed, following a perpendicular course that put distance between the two in a hurry. It didn’t strike Riker as a random event, like some large piece of the ship breaking away. No, this seemed more deliberate. More controlled. It was almost as if— The warp core. The thought bolted through his nervous system like lightning. “GET DOWN!” Riker shouted. He threw himself on top of Beverly, just as the air caught fire. Out of the corner of one eye, it came on like a supernova: brightness augmented to infinity, everywhere in an instant but eerily silent. Riker squeezed his eyes shut, shielding himself and Beverly with his arms, before the light could burn out the back of his retinas. A low growl then followed, like some snarling animal bearing down on them from above, the sound echoing through the narrow streets of the surrounding city and gathering strength. By the time it reached them in full, it had risen to an unearthly howl—and pushed a hot wind that blew with all the force of a hurricane. Riker listened as one gust after another ripped through the compound. Metal screeched as it twisted and broke, followed by loud crashes as buildings collapsed around them. In the thick of that melee, he thought he heard muffled screams: some in pain, even more in terror, swallowed up by a beast intent on devouring human and Bezzeret alike. In those moments, Riker believed it would never stop—that it would just keep on spreading, across the entire face of the planet, until it had carried everything and everyone away with it; but then the winds gradually abated, their howl fading to a dull roar, a mere echo of their former fury. It hardly seemed possible that anybody survived—and yet the dust that Riker coughed out of his lungs assured him that it was true. Picking himself up, he blinked a few times and found Beverly safe—still breathing, still conscious, looking even more dazed than he felt. Morton, however, wasn’t so lucky. His eyes stared straight up, wide open but unresponsive, his face drained of all color. Beneath him was a thickening pool of red from where he had bled out. Nor was he the only one. Riker saw more bodies scattered about, dropped in their places after having been tossed like matchsticks. A few of them moved, but most lay still—some with limbs that stuck out at odd angles, one that smoldered after having been roasted alive. Shuffling to his feet, Riker turned his head skyward and saw the reason for it. From horizon to horizon, the entire sky burned bright orange, fading at the edges into a purple twilight. The blast from the antimatter explosion lingered on at the center, almost directly above them, parting clouds along the crest of its wave and opening a hole that appeared like a gateway to heaven. Contrasting that vision was a hell on the ground. Much of the Federation compound had been leveled, its temporary structures reduced to heaps of slag and rubble—but even that destruction paled in comparison to the the rest of the city. Off in the distance, towers continued to sway back and forth from the almost inconceivable force that had bombarded them, their windows blown out and their graceful lines buckled. A few had caught fire as well, their billowing smoke riding the wind into a coarse anvil that blackened the air. “My God,” Riker said, mesmerized. So much that he never saw the attack coming. Beverly screamed to warn him. Riker turned to see a lone Bezzeret leaping over the barricade, arms and legs spread wide like some gigantic insect, so fast that every motion seemed a blur. The alien went after the doctor first, clocking her across the head and knocking her unconscious. Riker reacted almost instantly, bringing his weapon to bear, but even that wasn’t quick enough. The Bezzeret hit him with a full body tackle before he could take proper aim, smacking the phaser out of his hand before taking him down completely. The Bezzeret’s body smothered him, an agonizing claustrophobia of sweat and darkness, the muscles beneath its skin rippling like a bag full of snakes. Pummeling him with punches, as vicious as they were clumsy, the alien inflicted harsh pain but missed the killing blow—a mistake that gave Riker just enough time to recover his senses. Striking back, he kicked the Bezzeret mercilessly, eliciting a cry of agony and rage before it rolled off him. Flat on his back, Riker found himself staring straight into the sun, the hot light searing his vision before he could blot it out with his hand—until a shadow passed back over him, a hulking presence that seemed a dozen meters tall. Riker squinted, and saw a Bezzeret with no face. What was left hung off its skull in fleshy knots: pink and orange in some places, black from where it had been burned beyond recognition. One of its eyes was missing, leaving only a hollow orbit with gristle and blood dripping; the other radiated insanity, and looked down at Riker with feral intent. The Bezzeret reached for Morton’s body and yanked the knife out of his chest, raising the blade over its head. And fell on Riker, making animal sounds.
USS Dauntless At over one hundred thousand kilometers distance, even with shields raised at full, the antimatter blast hit Dauntless like a tidal surge. Quintax, near catatonic from his murder spree, barely registered the danger until the deck heaved up in front of him, catapulting him over the center seat and straight toward the science station at the rear of the bridge. He crashed into a chair, still occupied by the dead science officer. The body rolled away, flopping on its back and staring with wide, bloodshot eyes up at the ceiling—though in Quintax’s mind, the explosion was the cause of death. He denied the smell of charred flesh and the gaping hole in the man’s chest, made from where the phaser had struck him down. That wouldn’t have happened—couldn’t have happened—not while the captain was in command. “Turn the ship into the wave!” he ordered. No one acknowledged. Whirling around, Quintax took in the entire bridge at once. An almost heavenly light flooded the view screen, matting in silhouette the navigation console and the two officers that still manned it. Their hands held fast to their stations, fingers curled into a rigorous grip, though their heads lolled back and forth with each lurch. Quintax knew at once that they were dead too, as was the weapons officer, his XO—even that asshole counselor who kept hounding him that it was well past time the two of them had a session. They were all gone. Just like that. Only he survived. “Zeus,” he whispered, “thy will is done.” The dead, however, refused to be quiet. Quintax heard their voices, chattering through a tinny speaker at the comm station, calling to him from all over the ship: God, how they sounded lost and desperate, as if shuffling off their mortal coil had been too great a shock to bear. “Bridge, engineering. Can you hear me?” The terror. The confusion. “Bridge, respond please!” Quintax closed his eyes and imagined their faces. All looking to him for leadership. To take them. To guide them. “Transferring operations to auxiliary control. Sickbay dispatching EMTs.” And Quintax vowed it: he would see them to the other side. Walking past the comm station, he brushed a hand against the master switch and silenced it once and for all. He then paid a visit to the engineering console and activated the intruder countermeasures, which sealed off the turbolift doors and locked out auxiliary control. Quintax smiled, wondering if they had ever been meant to defend against ghosts. He supposed not—but then they wouldn’t have to last for long, would they? With his work done, only one more duty remained. Quintax returned to the center seat, prepared to execute it, but took a moment to stare at the viewscreen—through it, beyond it, into the reaches of space where glowing clouds of energy spent themselves and dissipated. They reached so far and wide as to obscure the entirety of the planet below, while light from the Bezzeret sun stabbed through the gaps between. Stray atoms of hydrogen ignited sporadically, tiny but brilliant, like the souls of those consumed by that holy fire taking flight—and Quintax understood, he had to send his own people to be with them. “Computer,” he said. “This is Captain Steven Quintax. Destruct sequence—” Out of one ear, he heard a beeping sound. From tactical. Beneath what used to be the weapons officer. Quintax frowned. He went over to the station, careful not to look at the man whose face had melted under phaser fire. Quintax moved him aside, wiping off bits of skin and coagulated blood to get a look at the panel. There, on the monitor, a proximity alert flashed. The readings appeared scattershot from all the ionized gas and radiation in the area—but he saw at least one thing for certain. Something had emerged from the cloud. No! He ran back over to ops, fumbling with the panel until he found the control for the viewscreen. Pumping up the magnification, he searched through flotsam for any signs of movement within. Out there, near the epicenter of the explosion, streams of gas wrapped themselves around a solid object, the eddies and whorls assuming its curves and lines. Quintax at first denied that he had seen it, unable to believe he could have so utterly failed; but as the clouds fell away, and the object ascended from its hiding place, the shape of a Federation starship revealed itself. She was battered—almost a total wreck, perhaps beyond repair. The disc of her primary hull bent down at a lopsided angle, nearly separated from the pylon that supported it. Her port side nacelle had suffered even heavier damage, with its pylon cracked wide open and spewing an intermittent trail of high-energy plasma. By some miracle, however, she still made way under her own power, her main impulse engine flickering as it nudged her through space. Enterprise lived. Flying inverted relative to Dauntless’ position, the Galaxy-class presented the ventral side of her secondary hull as she limped away. There, Quintax spotted a gaping hole where the reactor plating used to be—and suddenly, with a frightening clarity that pierced the fog that enshrouded his mind, it became clear to him what had happened. And what he had to do before joining his crew. Quintax dropped into the seat behind the conn, routing fire control from the weapons console. He then had sensors measure Enterprise’s exact position, heading and and speed, and used that to plot a course of his own. With navigation and tactical now both at his fingertips, he had everything he needed to complete his mission. Zeus, after all, would settle for nothing less. Quintax fired the impulse engines. Dauntless moved to intercept. The post Star Trek: Shadow Prime Book I – Chapter 13 appeared first on NOQ Report – Conservative Christian News, Opinions, and Quotes. |
| Border Patrol arrests two convicted sex offenders over the weekend
Posted: 10 Feb 2020 10:19 AM PST CALEXICO, Calif. – U.S. Border Patrol agents assigned to the El Centro Sector arrested two previously deported sex offenders over the weekend. The first incident occurred Friday, at approximately 12:44 p.m., when agents assigned to the El Centro Station encountered a man suspected of illegally entering the United States approximately 13 miles west of the Calexico West Downtown Port of Entry. Agents arrested the man and transported him to the El Centro Station for immigration and criminal history screening. Agents conducted records checks, which revealed that the man identified as Ricardo Saucedo-Hernandez, a 52-year-old Mexican national, was convicted on April 16, 2003, for ‘Annoying or Molesting Child Under 18’ out of Perris. Saucedo received a fine and 120 days confinement for his conviction. Saucedo was previously ordered removed from the United States on September 11, 2017. Saucedo is being held in federal custody pending further criminal prosecution. The second incident occurred Sunday, at approximately 12 a.m., when agents assigned to the Calexico Station encountered a man suspected of illegally entering the United States approximately 16 miles east of the Calexico West Downtown Port of Entry. Agents arrested the man and transported him to the El Centro Station for immigration and criminal history screening. Agents conducted records checks, which revealed that the man identified as Armando Valenzuela-Salazar, a 37-year-old Mexican national, was convicted on February 3, 2011, for ‘Sexual Battery’ out of Greenville, North Carolina. Valenzuela served 60 days confinement for his conviction. An immigration judge previously removed Valenzuela on March 14, 2011. Valenzuela is being held in federal custody pending further criminal prosecution. In fiscal year 2020, El Centro Sector Border Patrol agents arrested and removed 23 individuals either convicted or wanted on sexual offense charges after they entered the United States illegally. American Conservative MovementJoin fellow patriots as we form a grassroots movement to advance the cause of conservatism. We have two priorities until election day: Stopping Democrats and supporting strong conservative candidates. We currently have 7500+ patriots with us in a very short time. If you are interested, please join us to receive updates.
The post Border Patrol arrests two convicted sex offenders over the weekend appeared first on NOQ Report – Conservative Christian News, Opinions, and Quotes. |
| UK: Brother who plotted terrorist attack and sister who kept his secret are convicted
Posted: 10 Feb 2020 10:10 AM PST Woolwich Crown Court heard how Mohuissunnath Chowdhury, 28, of Luton, confided his aspirations to men he thought were his friends, but who were in fact brave covert officers deployed as part of a Met Police Counter Terrorism Command investigation into his activities. He was also recorded at home telling his sister Sneha Chowdhury, 25, of Luton, that he was ‘doing another attack’, and asking her for help to practise stabbing people – alarming information which Sneha Chowdhury did not report to police. The Met Police Counter Terrorism Command launched an investigation – supported by the UK security service and Eastern Region Special Operations Unit – into Mohuissunnath Chowdhury’s activities after he began posting disturbing messages online, within days of his acquittal in relation to a separate charge of attack planning. Counter terrorism detectives identified that soon after being released from remand in December 2018, following his acquittal, Mohuissunnath Chowdhury began posting messages online that demonstrated his extremist mind-set. By the end of January 2019, he had bought a replica gun, which suggested to police that he could be planning a terrorist attack. Covert police officers were deployed to befriend Mohuissunnath Chowdhury, so they could find out what he was planning and determine how serious his intent was. An unsuspecting Mohuissunnath Chowdhury not only confessed to officers that he was considering targeting crowded central-London tourist attractions and the Pride in London event, but even sought advice on obtaining a real gun from a covert officer using the name ‘Mikael’. He thought Mikael shared his aspirations to murder innocent people and told the officer that, contrary to his claims of innocence in his previous trial, he had in fact intended to kill soldiers but succeeded in ‘deceiving’ the jury who found him not guilty. Having gathered a wealth of evidence that proved the Chowdhurys’ guilt, detectives arrested the siblings together on 3 July 2019, days before Pride in London. Commander Richard Smith, head of the Met Police Counter Terrorism Command, said: ‘The courage and professionalism of these covert officers meant they obtained evidence that was, I feel, crucial to us securing these convictions today. They, like so many officers working across counter terrorism policing every day, are carrying out dangerous and challenging work to ensure the public is kept safe.’ ‘In counter terrorism, we constantly balance the risk dangerous individuals pose to the public with the need to gather evidence strong enough to secure a conviction and ensure they are locked up. Mohuissunnath Chowdhury was determined to kill innocent people but we arrested him at the right time, having been able to gather sufficient evidence of his plans.’ Detectives witnessed a stark change in Mohuissunnath Chowdhury’s demeanour over the course of his time in police custody. In initial police interviews he was open and talkative with detectives. Police believe he thought he was keeping them distracted while ‘Mikael’ went ahead with an attack. Days later, when police revealed his ‘friend’ was in fact a covert officer, he became visibly withdrawn and refused to engage with detectives, answering ‘no comment’ to their questions. Mohuissunnath Chowdhury was subsequently charged with preparation of acts of terrorism. He was also charged with dissemination of a terrorist publication, in relation to a violent terrorist propaganda video he sent the covert officers, and possession of information useful to terrorism, for having a guide to carrying out terror attacks on his phone. Today he was found guilty of all these offences. Sneha Chowdhury was found guilty of one count of failing to disclose information regarding terrorist activity. She was found not guilty of another count of failing to disclose information regarding terrorist activity. Speaking of Sneha Chowdhury’s conviction, Commander Smith said: ‘There is no acceptable reason for listening to someone say they are planning to kill innocent people, and watching them practise how they will do that, then not reporting it to police. Sneha Chowdhury wilfully kept her brother’s horrific secret and is now facing the consequences. ‘However, not every case has to end this way. If relatives report indications that a loved one is becoming radicalised early on, there is an opportunity for authorities to intervene and help them before they become too deeply entrenched. All it takes is a phone call.’ American Conservative MovementJoin fellow patriots as we form a grassroots movement to advance the cause of conservatism. We have two priorities until election day: Stopping Democrats and supporting strong conservative candidates. We currently have 7500+ patriots with us in a very short time. If you are interested, please join us to receive updates.
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| Changing the subject: Drudge avoids politics after mass exodus of Trump supporters
Posted: 10 Feb 2020 08:53 AM PST In the early days of February, 2016, Drudge Report was the political hub that drew over 100 million visitors per month. 38% of its vaunted homepage was election news and nearly all of it was either pro-Trump or anti-everyone else. Fast forward four years and the now-anti-Trump Drudge Report is a different beast altogether. So far in February, 11% of the headlines have been about the election. How much of it was pro-Trump? Zero. It’s been well-documented that Matt Drudge, the king of American news aggregation, has flipped his tune about President Trump over the last couple of years. Signs of souring to the President were evident within days of his historic victory. Some have speculated he was and still is a Bernie Sanders supporter, that he feigned support for candidate Trump because he was getting massive traffic as a result and didn’t believe he’d actually win. Others take it a step further by saying he wanted Trump to win in 2016 so Bernie would have another shot in 2020. There’s even speculation he’s been bought out or blackmailed into turning against the President. Considering how reclusive he is, we’ll likely never know the truth. What we do know is the audience that supports the President has been leaving Drudge Report for months. In just the last six, they’ve hemorrhaged nearly 30% of their traffic as over 20 million visitors have sought redder pastures like The Liberty Daily, Whatfinger, 63red, Gab Trends, and Rantingly. Even Fox News contributor Dan Bongino has put out a Drudge competitor, though so far it has been a disappointment as it pulls exclusively from vanilla corporate media sources that one can get from a Republican establishment feedreader. For now, Drudge Report is only dipping its toe into election politics to promote Sanders or bash his competitors, preferring to focus on offbeat news and conspiracy theories. It will be interesting to see what tune they play if Sanders gets the nomination. Will Matt Drudge reveal himself as a full-blown socialist? The fact that Drudge still gets millions of conservative visitors every month is odd considering the abundance of quality alternatives. Perhaps Trump supporters are holding out for a return of the MAGA-Drudge. Word of advice: don’t hold your breath. American Conservative MovementJoin fellow patriots as we form a grassroots movement to advance the cause of conservatism. We have two priorities until election day: Stopping Democrats and supporting strong conservative candidates. We currently have 7500+ patriots with us in a very short time. If you are interested, please join us to receive updates.
The post Changing the subject: Drudge avoids politics after mass exodus of Trump supporters appeared first on NOQ Report – Conservative Christian News, Opinions, and Quotes. |
| Melania Trump is coming out to campaign and the left is terrified
Posted: 10 Feb 2020 07:45 AM PST There was a sharp spike in hatred from the left about Melania Trump on social media over the last couple of days. I wasn’t sure what all the noise was about until I was pointed to a story about her hitting the campaign trail soon. Dingdingding! No wonder they’re going after her hard on Twitter, something they haven’t done much of recently. They’re scared. Technically, it was two progressive news outlets who reported it. POLITICO launched it with a bland report about the First Lady hosting two fundraising events. Then, CNN took the story and turned it into a “Trump needs help” article. Of course. What neither seems to understand is the reason she’s likely going to be more personally invested this election than she was in 2016 is because of them. Fake news is finally being recognized as a real phenomenon outside of conservative circles. The First Lady needs to be out there humanizing her husband because mainstream media spends 24 of their allotted hours every day trying to dehumanize him. The campaign has her properly placed to make the most impact. Sure, she could go to rallies with her husband and draw raucous applause, but she’s not going to change anyone’s mind while she’s there. She could be a surrogate at rallies of her own as Michelle Obama did, but that tends to take away from the point of a rally when the person who’s going to be getting the vote isn’t even there. She’ll be shaking hands with donors at fundraising events where they’ll get to see and hear her make the case for something more tangible than a vote. She has to convince them to donate money, and that’s something that a First Lady is best for because of the human element. People vote for candidates, but they donate to people they like and trust. Melania Trump makes her husband more likable and trustworthy because she’s likable and trustworthy. We can expect challenges to the First Lady’s credibility, history, skills, and demeanor from progressive mainstream media and hateful social media posters. They will call everything about her into question to try to make her less likable and less trustworthy. It’s a fool’s errand, of course, not just because she’s very difficult to not like but because the audience who needs to like and trust her won’t be swayed by Tweets or Chris Cuomo. They’ll meet her, like her, and give their money to a president they were at least considering supporting all along. She’s not there to sell her husband to the donors. She’s there to close the deal and add zeroes to the ends of the checks. There are few things more concerning to Democrats than a strong, brilliant, beautiful First Lady coming out to help President Trump win reelection. They know she’ll resonate, and rightfully so. They’ll try to destroy her, but the truth will make her shine. American Conservative MovementJoin fellow patriots as we form a grassroots movement to advance the cause of conservatism. We have two priorities until election day: Stopping Democrats and supporting strong conservative candidates. We currently have 7500+ patriots with us in a very short time. If you are interested, please join us to receive updates.
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ARRA NEWS SERVICE
ARRA News Service (in this message: 18 new items) |
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- Fifth Third Time’s a Charm on Choice
- The Once and Future Scandal
- This Tweet from Gen. Flynn’s Wife Will Break Your Heart
- Pompeo vs. China, Mitt’s Mess, The Socialist Party Debate
- Medal Of Honor Recipient Says LTC Vindman Was A ‘Spotlighter’ Whose Own Peers Wanted Him Out
- The End Of Pro-Life Democrats
- Rules for Migrants
- Trump’s Unorthodox Policy Wins Are Gaining Steady Support
- Trump Is At The Top Of The Political Ladder
- If DOJ Fails To Indict, More Coups Coming
- Challenging Sanctuary Jurisdictions
- Republican Presidents Including Trump Will Have Appointed A Majority Of Federal Judges Before The End Of 2020
- Super Bowl of Dishonesty: Michael Bloomberg Spends Big to Lie to America
- Kickin’ It Old School . . .
- Banned in Britain: Franklin Graham’s Tour Dates Canceled Over Christian Beliefs
- Only 4 of Glasgow’s 71 Muslim Refugee Child Rapists Have Gone to Prison
- God And A Glock: How Churchgoers Are Training To Fight Off Armed Attackers
- Hospital Admitting Privileges
| Fifth Third Time’s a Charm on Choice
Posted: 10 Feb 2020 07:11 PM PST  by Tony Perkins: 700 kids. That’s how many students would have lost their scholarships — and a chance at a better life — if Fifth Third Bank hadn’t come to its senses. Instead, after a week of uncertainty, the company sat down with Florida parents and pastors and decided not to listen to Florida’s cultural bullies. It’s one thing for a company to support LGBT extremism. It’s quite another, the bank agreed, to hurt needy children in the process. Most kids had already left school for the weekend when they got the good news: one of the biggest contributors to the Florida voucher program wasn’t dropping out after all. Fifth Third Bank — who’d joined Wells Fargo in abandoning the scholarships — had gotten an earful from the local community. And, after a few days of protests, rallies, and non-stop phone calls, the business finally relented: its $5.4 million investment in school choice for the state would go on — regardless of what the Orlando Sentinel and a handful of liberal lawmakers think. It was a major reversal for the bank, who threw the program into complete chaos earlier in the month — all because parents had the option of using those scholarships for religious schools, who (not surprisingly) have religious beliefs. Democratic Reps. Anna K. Eskamani (D) and Carlos Guillermo Smith (D) apparently object to that and have been harassing corporate donors to drop their contributions over those schools’ biblical views on marriage and sexuality. Local parents, pastors, and politicians were furious — including a good number of their Democratic colleagues. Members like Reps. James Bush III (D) and Rep. Al Jasquet (D) couldn’t believe their party would actually use children as pawns to appease the LGBT Left. “We have children that need these opportunities,” Bush said. When there’s a chance for parents to have a choice that will help their kids, “we should afford them that opportunity.” So when Fifth Third’s leaders finally listened to reason and reinstated their donations, Senator Marco Rubio (R-Fla.), who’s been an outspoken champion of the program, was thrilled. “I am glad to see Fifth Third Bank putting students and their families above destructive identity politics,” he said. “It shows people can raise their voice and overcome the insane ‘woke’ agenda that drives our politics and culture. School vouchers provide opportunities for low income and special needs students, and I am proud of all the Floridians that stood up for these children.” Other leaders from both parties, including Governor Ron DeSantis (R), also praised the company for seeing the bigger picture. As principals like Lakisha Robinson know better than anyone, this option is sometimes the only option for parents. Her Victory Christian Academy is right smack-dab in the inner-city of Orlando, an “oasis in the desert,” as she calls it. “We’re almost all minori[ties],” Lakisha explains. “We have mostly African-Americans… in an area that’s mostly impoverished.” When parents have the choice between a failing school or a private one, “it’s a whole other ballgame.” But Victory, like other schools in the program, is “unapologetically Christian,” so having bullies at the door is nothing new. “We catch a lot of different heat in this area,” explained on “Washington Watch.” But the reality is, Lakisha explains, no child is forced to go to their school — parents choose it. And they do so, she points out, even when they aren’t Christians themselves because “they love the positive environment of the academy” and its proven success. Sure, she agrees, they could get more money being a charter school (which is what a lot of liberals have tried to push Victory toward), but that would mean surrendering their values. “They [wouldn’t] allow us to use our Christian curriculum or… allow us to keep Christian in our name. And we want it to be Victory Christian Academy, not Victory Academy.” The state’s voucher program is one thing that helped her school keep its identity and offer a high-class education. “It means more to us to stand firm on God’s principles.” These needy neighborhoods, she insists “need the Word of God more than anything.” And the results speak for themselves. In these past 18 years, students are graduating and getting into good universities. “These are first generation college students,” she says. Their lives — and the lives of their families — will be forever impacted because of this program. If Fifth Third Bank can see that, surely Wells Fargo can too. Join us in calling on their leadership to put aside their petty agenda and support Florida’s children. Contact them by phone or email here. Schools like Lakisha’s depend on it! Tony Perkins (@tperkins) is President of the Family Research Council . This article was on Tony Perkin’s Washington Update and written with the aid of FRC senior writers. Tags: Tony Perkins, Family Research Center, FRC, Family Research Council, Fifth Third Time’s a Charm on Choice To share or post to your site, click on “Post Link”. Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service and “Like” Facebook Page – Thanks! |
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| The Once and Future Scandal
Posted: 10 Feb 2020 06:51 PM PST
by Dr. Victor Davis Hanson: Soon the worm may turn. The real scandal is back on the horizon, and at last, we may learn that no one is above the law—most certainly not a group of smug and mediocre apparatchiks who assumed they had the moral right to destroy a presidential candidate and later an elected president. Now that the four-and-a-half-month-long Ukraine impeachment bookend to the 22-month Mueller charade is over, it clearly accomplished nothing other than substantially raising the polls of both Donald Trump and the Republican Party. The public was reminded that Representative Gerald Nadler (D-N.Y.) and House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) are every bit as childish, peevish, and absurd as Rep. Adam Schiff (D-Calif.). So, we are now back to the existential issue of the entire Trump phenomenon: to what degree did the Hillary Clinton campaign collude with high-ranking Obama officials, and the top echelons of the FBI, CIA, and the national intelligence apparatus, to surveil, defame, and hope to derail Donald Trump’s 2016 presidential campaign by unlawful means? Who in the federal government then continued Clinton’s efforts after the 2016 election to disrupt and indeed attempt to destroy the Trump transition and presidency? Eventually, someone will sort out whether that post-election effort on the part of federal officials to abort the Trump presidency, abetted by the media and #TheResistance, was a simple follow-up to the Clinton-DNC-Perkins Coe-Fusion GPS collusion against candidate Trump—or a sick preemptive attempt of the administrative state to smear Trump as a “Russian asset” because of their worries about the exposure of their own prior criminality and Trump’s iconoclastic agenda. But for now, the following statements are irrefutable. Donald Trump, in concrete ways, has been far harder on Russia than was the “reset” Obama presidency, and far more helpful to Ukraine than Team Obama ever was.
Unlike his predecessor, Trump did not dismantle U.S.-joint European missile defense in order to coax Putin into behaving during his reelection bid. He did not push a big plastic red reset button in Geneva to mark outreach to Putin, in rejection of prior Bush sanctions on Russians. He did not forbid the shipment of anti-tank missiles to an endangered Ukraine. He did not invite the Russians into Syria after a 40-year hiatus from the Middle East. So the libel of Russian collusion was absurd from the get-go. It originated in 2015-16 when the deep state was terrified over the then unlikely possibility of a President Donald Trump. The “collusion” ruse involved the chief players of federal law enforcement and national intelligence agencies. All, of course, had assumed Hillary Clinton would be president and their extralegal efforts to “insure” her victory would soon be commensurately rewarded, regardless of the illegality and unethical behavior required. And both crimes and amorality were most certainly involved. See No Evil, Hear No Evil The FBI and the Justice Department deliberately misled Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court judges to spy on an American citizen as a way to monitor others in the Trump campaign. That crime is a charitable interpretation of Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz’s report, given that supposedly intelligent federal judges were told that the evidence for such state espionage was based on the “opposition research” of the 2016 campaign. And yet apparently in see-no-evil, hear-no-evil fashion, not one of the squishy judges ever asked the U.S. government, who exactly had paid for the Steele Dossier and why? After all, who was the “opposition” to Trump in late 2016? Top Obama officials, such as Samantha Power and Susan Rice, in a panic over the Trump candidacy and then victory, requested the unmasking of scores of redacted names of those surveilled by intelligence agencies. Some of those names mysteriously, but certainly illegally, were leaked to the media with the intent of defaming them. When Adam Schiff’s pernicious role in jump-starting the impeachment is finally fully known, he will likely be revealed as the prime schemer, along with minor Obama officials buried within the Trump National Security Council, dreaming up the entire Ukraine caper of the “whistleblower.” Over the past three years during the Russian and Ukrainian farces, Schiff variously lied to the public about impending “bombshell” revelations of Trump “collusion.” His minority House Intelligence Committee memo outrageously alleged that the Steele dossier was accurate and truthful and yet was not the prime evidence for the granting of FISA warrants—two more lies exposed by Horowitz. Schiff rigged the initial House impeachment hearings to exclude transparency and bipartisan access to witnesses. He read a false version of the Trump conversation with the Ukrainian president into the congressional record. He secretly data mined his own colleagues’ communications. And to the very last moments of the entire fraud, even in his dotage, he was still babbling in the Senate about the long-ago discredited “Russian collusion” and again stringing together absurd fantasies of Trump wishing to sell Alaska to the Russians. Justice for the Wrongdoers? The Mueller investigation—500 subpoenas, 22 months, $35 million—was one of the great travesties in American investigatory history. It was cooked up by fired, disgraced—and furious—former FBI Director James Comey. By his own admission, Comey conceded that he leaked confidential memos of private conversations he had with the president to create a large enough media and political storm to force the naming of a special prosecutor to investigate “Russian collusion.” Comey is not yet in jail, in part, because his cronies at the FBI, including the disgraced Peter Strzok and Lisa Page, post facto, announced that the leaked Comey versions of his one-on-one talks with the president of the United States were merely confidential rather than top secret and thus their dissemination to the media was not quite felonious. The rest is history. Comey’s leaking gambit paid off. It led to the appointment of his long-time friend and predecessor, former FBI Director Robert Mueller. Mueller then delighted the media by appointing mostly progressive activist lawyers, some with ties to Hillary Clinton and the Clinton Foundation, in what then giddy journalists called a “dream team,” of “all-stars” who in the fashion of a “hunter-killer” team would abort the Trump presidency. They would prove Trump was what former Director of National Intelligence James Clapper on television called a “Putin asset.” In surreal fashion, the main players, under suspicion for seeding and peddling the fraudulent Steele dossier among the high echelons of the U.S. government and using such smears to cripple Trump—John Brennan, James Clapper, and Andrew McCabe—were hired by liberal CNN and MSNBC as paid analysts to fob off on others the very scandals that they themselves had created. The proof of the pudding is in the eating, and the Mueller team finally had to concede that it was born out a conspiratorial hoax by finding after 88 weeks—punctuated by almost daily leaks to sympathetic progressive media—that there was no Trump-Russian collusion to warp the 2016 election. Nor did it find actionable obstruction of justice on the part of Trump to thwart the investigation of what was admittedly a non-crime. Yet Mueller’s team was marred with problems from the outset. The amorous and textually promiscuous pair of Peter Strzok and Lisa Page were both fired for their rank partisanship, although Mueller and his team initially hid the reasons for their departures and staggered their firings to suggest a natural rotation. Mysteriously, hundreds of their incriminating texts have disappeared from FBI smart devices—a weirdness reminiscent of the FBI’s willingness not to examine Hillary Clinton’s computers that were hacked, as well as apparent unconcern that she destroyed thousands of subpoenaed emails. Eric Clinesmith, another FBI lawyer, was fired by Mueller inter alia for his left-wing biases and tweeting out “Viva le [sic] Resistance”—as in long-live the World War II-like progressive resistance against the fascist and foreign occupier Trump. Clinesmith, according to the inspector general, altered an email presented as evidence before a FISA court to warp the request to surveil Carter Page. If there is any justice left in this sordid mess, he will end up in jail. Four Years of Fakery When Mueller’s legal ramrod, progressive Andrew Weissman, finished up running the day-to-day operations of the “Mueller investigation,” in parody fashion he went to work—but of course—as a paid analyst for CNN where he no longer publicly had to suppress his loathing of the former target of his investigations. The net effects of the Mueller and Horowitz investigations were variously to exonerate Trump, to expose a corrupt Justice Department, CIA, and FBI, to illustrate how the government hounded and ruined the lives of minor 2016 Trump campaign officials with largely process convictions and plea-bargained confessions, and to explain the peremptory resignations of more than a dozen top Washington officials of James Comey’s FBI—as well as the railroading General Michael Flynn. Some of that skullduggery and more are currently the subjects of a criminal investigation by U.S. Attorney John Durham. The American public has been assaulted for four years by an array of fake scandals, fake bombshells, and fake televised analyses that camouflaged a systematic and terrible assault on our constitutional freedoms But soon the worm may turn. The real scandal is back on the horizon, and at last, we may learn that no one is above the law, and most certainly not a group of smug and mediocre apparatchiks who assumed they had the moral right to destroy a presidential candidate and later an elected president. In sum, this real scandal, dormant for over four years, had been overshadowed by a series of progressive-government-media driven melodramas, aimed at both injuring the Trump presidency—and, in preemptive fashion, shielding a virtual coup to destroy an elected president. Tags: Victor Davis Hanson, The Once and Future Scandal To share or post to your site, click on “Post Link”. Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service and “Like” Facebook Page – Thanks! |
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| This Tweet from Gen. Flynn’s Wife Will Break Your Heart
Posted: 10 Feb 2020 06:13 PM PST
by Michael Van Der Galien: General Michael Flynn and his entire family have gone through hell for years. It all started with the Russia collusion hoax. The general was interrogated about his conversations with the Russian ambassador. When it became clear that they were going after him, Gen. Flynn and his family must have felt something close to panic; not because the three-star general did something wrong, but because they knew — probably better than most Americans — what they were up against. And, indeed, in the end, it looked like they were going to lose this battle. Gen. Flynn himself pleaded guilty to lying to the FBI. He hadn’t actually lied (as in purposefully telling a falsehood), but he was a) dead-tired and b) just about broke. What’s more, he had attorneys who didn’t seem to be interested in getting him out of this difficult situation. Just before it was too late, Gen. Flynn switched attorneys. He hired Sidney Powell, who — unlike his earlier “defenders” — is doing everything in her power to restore his good name. That a hopeful development, but still. The entire case has had a tremendous impact on Gen. Flynn and his entire family. You only have to read this tweet by his wife Lori to understand just how much they have suffered and continue to suffer:
“My husband is being treated like he’s public enemy #1,” Lori wrote on Twitter this Sunday. “All he did was help [Donald Trump] become POTUS & did his job as incoming NSA. Our GOV that he protected for 33 yrs turned against him. Sad.” That is exactly what has happened with Gen. Flynn. As Stacy L. Stiles points out, he is a “highly decorated, enormously respected, America-loving patriot.” I’ll also go ahead and agree with her when she writes that it’s “unforgivable” what has been done to him and his family. It is. There can be absolutely no doubt about it. General Flynn was set up. And why? What had he done to deserve the Swamp’s wrath? Two things. First of all, he supported Donald J. Trump for president. That was the final nail in his coffin. The other (first) nail, however, was his years-long criticism of the intelligence community (IC). As a patriot, Flynn was worried that the CIA had become “a very political organization.” He also frequently lambasted the military intelligence community for deficiencies in its approach to intelligence collection. In the Swamp, being honest about such matters is a big no-no. That’s what put him on the radar, and when he dared throw his support behind a candidate the Swamp truly hated, they went after him, thereby not only nearly destroying the general, but also his entire family. May God give Lori and the entire Flynn family the strength, courage, determination, and persistence to get through this. Tags: Michael Van Der Galien. PJ Media, Tweet from Gen. Flynn’s Wife, Will Break Your Heart To share or post to your site, click on “Post Link”. Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service and “Like” Facebook Page – Thanks! |
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| Pompeo vs. China, Mitt’s Mess, The Socialist Party Debate
Posted: 10 Feb 2020 06:12 PM PST
by Gary Bauer, Contributing Author: Pompeo Takes On China But Secretary Pompeo wanted to speak to this audience, and he had a stark warning for them: China’s Communist Party (CCP) is “working” them and their key advisors. Pompeo told the governors that the CCP has compiled a report with dossiers on all 50 governors labeling their positions toward China as “friendly,” “ambiguous” or “hardline.” In short, Pompeo warned the governors to be alert to the threats posed by Beijing, and to do what they can at the state level to safeguard America’s interests. He cited several examples of Chinese diplomats pressuring state and local officials, including a Chicago high school, over Taiwan. He urged governors to redirect state pension funds away from technology companies that aid Beijing’s brutal suppression of speech and religious liberty, and to avoid investing in companies that support the People’s Liberation Army. I was pleased to see that Secretary Pompeo also warned the governors about China’s Thousand Talents program and about the Confucius Institutes, funded by the Chinese Communist Party, on many of our college campuses. While trade with China certainly can be beneficial for American companies and workers, in the past it has rarely been free or fair. In fact, it has often come at a very high price. Kudos to the Trump Administration for continuing to call out the worst aspects of China’s predatory behavior. Fighting For Faith Much of my comments focused on rising anti-Semitism and Christian persecution in China. You can watch the event here. My remarks begin around the 1:38:30 mark. Draining The Swamp As the head of the executive branch, the president has the authority to dismiss people who work for him. Clearly, the president had no confidence in Vindman’s abilities, and for good reason. It’s also worth remembering Vindman’s testimony. He never accused the president of any crime and simply seemed upset that Trump was ignoring the “consensus policy” set by the National Security Council. Well, President Trump doesn’t work for the National Security Council. It’s the other way around! By the way, Vindman isn’t the only NSC staffer to be shown the door in recent days. The Trump White House has eliminated 70 NSC positions in an effort to reduce Obama’s bloated bureaucracy and drain the swamp, just as the president promised. Mitt’s Mess Not only are his poll numbers down significantly, there are efforts in the state legislature to censure Romney, to recall Romney and to distance the state from Romney by expressing support for President Trump. If he chooses to seek reelection, Romney doesn’t have to face the voters again until 2024. That’s a long time from now and perhaps voters will forget. Then again, they will be periodically reminded about his unique status in the party. For example, what does Romney do this November? It’s hard to see how he could endorse Trump for reelection after voting to impeach him. Romney was praised multiple times during Friday’s Democrat debate, and he will undoubtedly be featured prominently in Democrat attack ads against vulnerable Republican senators this November. Meanwhile, it’s worth remembering that Mike Lee is a senator today because he defeated an incumbent perceived to be out-of-touch by many Utah voters. The Socialist Party Debate To his credit, George Stephanopoulos pressed the candidates about whether they had any concerns with the Democrat Party being identified by Bernie Sanders and socialism. Only one candidate, Sen. Amy Klobuchar, expressed any reservation at all about the socialist stigma. The other candidates were too afraid of alienating the party’s socialist base. That didn’t sit well with liberal MSNBC host Chris Matthews, who slammed Sanders for his past support of communist regimes, and noted that socialism “isn’t free” and “doesn’t work.” Meanwhile, there’s been talk in recent days that former Mayor Pete Buttigieg is emerging as a “moderate” alternative to Sanders. Only in this leftist arena could he possibly be considered a moderate! Buttigieg is all in on the left’s “fundamental transformation of America.” He wants to abolish the Electoral College. He has also called for a court-packing scheme that would add another six left-wing ideologues to the Supreme Court, expanding it to 15 justices, making him more radical than Ruth Bader Ginsburg! By the way, Buttigieg once praised Bernie Sanders as “outstanding and inspiring” for having the “courage” to identify as a “socialist.” Abortion was another big topic at Friday’s debate. Joe Biden and others promised to appoint only pro-abortion judges. All the candidates support late-term abortions performed on innocent unborn babies, and yet they all opposed taking out Iranian terrorist Qassem Soleimani. Think about that! Incredibly, Buttigieg has even used his faith to suggest that life beings at first breath. Talk about unscientific! Any biology textbook will tell you that life begins at conception. What are doctors operating on in utero before birth, if not a human life? Buttigieg’s defense of third trimester abortion is a breathtaking distortion of science and faith. In other news, it seems like Joe Biden has given up trying to win New Hampshire. He insulted another voter, this time using another of his throwback phrases. Not long ago, Biden had millennials rushing to Google to learn the meaning of “malarkey.” He did it again yesterday when a woman questioned his electability after his poor showing in Iowa. Biden bizarrely responded by calling her, “a lying dog-faced pony soldier.” No one really knows what he meant by that. Biden told reporters it was a line from a John Wayne movie, but so far no one has been able to verify that. Final Results? Not Yet The Sanders campaign isn’t accepting the result and has demanded a recanvass. Meanwhile, the fallout from the caucus chaos continues. DNC chairman Tom Perez is fighting off calls for his resignation from members of the socialist Squad. In fact, the situation is so bad that even the left-wing media can’t ignore the growing “despair” caused by the growing “Democrat disarray & dysfunction.” Tags: Gary Bauer, Campaign for Working Families, Pompeo vs. China, Mitt’s Mess, The Socialist Party Debate To share or post to your site, click on “Post Link”. Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service and “Like” Facebook Page – Thanks! |
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| Medal Of Honor Recipient Says LTC Vindman Was A ‘Spotlighter’ Whose Own Peers Wanted Him Out
Posted: 10 Feb 2020 03:44 PM PST
by Virginia Kruta: Medal of Honor recipient MSG Leroy Petry defended President Donald Trump’s decision to fire LTC Alexander Vindman, saying that Vindman had shown he couldn’t be trusted. Petry made an appearance on Sunday morning’s “Fox & Friends” and responded to the news that Vindman had been fired from his post on the National Security Council and escorted from the White House. “I respect Donald Trump’s actions on escorting him out of the White House because he, as a team player, he should have brought it up through the chain of command and then blown the whistle if it didn’t get approved,” Petry began. “So, exactly my insight is, I would fired him too, I can’t trust you on my team, if you can’t bring me things you don’t agree with.” Petry went on to address the fact that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi and numerous others — including Vice President Joe Biden on the New Hampshire debate stage — had lauded Vindman as a hero. “I think this,” Petry said. “I respect his service, I understand he is Purple Heart recipient. Being a Purple Heart recipient doesn’t make somebody a hero. I’m sorry.” “I appreciate your candor,” host Pete Hegseth, also an Army veteran, jumped in. “Wearing the uniform doesn’t make you immune from criticism especially on the National Security Council, it has now been identified you’re probably a part of leaking, certainly a part of concerted effort to hurt the president.” Hegseth then pointed out what many have in the president’s defense: that every member of the National Security Council serves “at the pleasure of the president” and can be reassigned for any reason the White House chooses. Petry went on to explain that Vindman, according to friends who had been with the lieutenant colonel in Ranger School, had referred to him as a “chow thief” and had not thought highly of him even then. “In ranger school, [they] said he couldn’t be trusted. They tried peering him out. They said, ‘Well, I guess it hasn’t changed much.’ Usually folks that try to make a big statue of something, what we call spotlighters in the military, trying to highlight themselves as a hero or doing something great. and you could do something great just doing your job.” Hegseth jumped back in then to “translate” some of the military jargon Petry had used to describe Vindman, saying, “Chow thief, meaning that when there is limited food, you’re taking some so you can have some and your buddies don’t. Spotlight ranger is someone who, when the spotlight is on, you do a great job when spotlight is off, you’re not necessarily helping your buddies. And peered out means your fellow peers are voting against you to graduate from that particular school.” Tags: Virginia Krut, The Daily Caller, Medal of Honor recipient, MSG Leroy Petry, LTC Vindman, Own Peers Wanted Him Out To share or post to your site, click on “Post Link”. Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service and “Like” Facebook Page – Thanks! |
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| The End Of Pro-Life Democrats
Posted: 10 Feb 2020 03:11 PM PST  by Bill Donohue: When I taught in a Catholic elementary school in Spanish Harlem in the 1970s, I quoted to my African American and Puerto Rican students what Rev. Jesse Jackson said about abortion: It was genocide against black people. Senator Ted Kennedy also railed against abortion, as did virtually every Democrat. The pro-abortion party was the Republicans, home to WASP elites like the Rockefellers who saw abortion as a way to resolve “the urban problem.” That’s why their lavish funding of Planned Parenthood wound up establishing clinics in minority neighborhoods. But by the end of the 1970s, the parties flipped: Republicans became pro-life and the Democrats became pro-abortion. They did so because of religious reasons. Evangelicals, most of whom were Republicans, supported Roe v. Wade. They did so largely because Catholics, most of whom were Democrats, were pro-life. But they quickly got over their irrational opposition and, by the time Ronald Reagan became president, they joined the pro-life cause. In the Democratic party, feminists took command and drove out the pro-life Catholic leadership. This pushed more Catholics to join the Republican party. In the subsequent decades, the number of pro-abortion Republicans and the number of pro-life Democrats dwindled, though there was some room left for pro-life Democrats. Now that is over. What happened last week marked the end of pro-life Democrats. Charles Camosy is a pro-life Democrat who teaches at Fordham University. He resigned last week from the board of Democrats for Life in America because the party has left him with “no choice.” Bishop Thomas Tobin, who heads the Diocese of Providence, Rhode Island, asked on February 4, “Are pro-life voters not welcome in the Democratic party?” They are not. On Saturday, Senator Bernie Sanders said, “I think being pro-choice is an absolutely essential part of being a Democrat.” Does that mean that all abortions are justified, including those where the baby is just about to be born? Yes. Are there any Democrats running for president who draw the line when it comes to partial-birth abortion? No. During Friday’s debate, Senator Elizabeth Warren and Joe Biden both endorsed congressional legislation that would codify Roe v. Wade should the Supreme Court reverse this decision. Senator Amy Klobuchar said she would only appoint judges who supported Roe. Pete Buttigieg, who is unemployed, had a chance at a Fox News town hall to carve out a more moderate position, but refused to do so. He previously said that “life begins at breath,” and stuck to his guns regarding the moral legitimacy of killing a baby who is 80 percent born. In May 2018, a Gallup poll found that 13 percent support third-term abortions. Why, then, would not one Democrat running for president agree with the 87 percent of Americans who say late-term abortions are indefensible? Four years ago, Hillary Clinton hurt herself badly when she defended partial-birth abortion in a debate with Donald Trump. Apparently, nothing has been learned from that experience. There was a time when New York Senator Daniel Patrick Moynihan and New York City Mayor Ed Koch, both Democrats and supporters of Roe, said “count me out” when it comes to late-term abortions. Now the Democrats have become the “count me in” party, the consequences of which will soon be known. Tags: Bill Donohue, Catholic League, End Of Pro-Life Democrats To share or post to your site, click on “Post Link”. Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service and “Like” Facebook Page – Thanks! |
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| Rules for Migrants
Posted: 10 Feb 2020 03:01 PM PST  by Kerby Anderson, Contributing Author: Last month the Supreme Court allowed the Trump administration to enforce a rule concerning foreign nationals. A separate opinion raised important questions about how one federal judge can stop the government by merely ordering an injunction. The new rule would deny green cards to foreign nationals who use taxpayers-funded social services. As you might imagine, the decision was controversial as evidenced by the fact that it fell along typical 5-4 liberal-conservative lines. The Immigration and Nationality Act dictates that foreign nationals should not receive green cards if they are likely “to become a public charge.” The administration attempted to more accurately define “public charge” to include such things as food stamps, housing benefits, and Medicaid. And the rule does not apply to migrants who are refugees or asylum-seekers. What if you disagree with that rule? That brings me to the other equally important aspect of the Supreme Court ruling. If you disagree with the rule, then you have an opportunity to change that rule in the next election. The next president and the next Congress can address that issue as the debate on immigration rules takes place. I would argue that unelected judges should not decide the fate of this rule or any other rule or regulation involving immigration or a myriad of other political issues. Of course, that is actually what is happening. After the administration promulgated the rule in August, a district court judge ruled against it and issued an injunction. Then the circuit court of appeals affirmed that decision. Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch, in a separate opinion, expressed his concern that the rise of nationwide injunctions is forcing “judges into making rushed, high-stakes low-information decisions.” This is the wrong way to decide important issues in America. Tags: Kerby Anderson, Viewpoints, Point of View, Rules for Migrants To share or post to your site, click on “Post Link”. Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service and “Like” Facebook Page – Thanks! |
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| Trump’s Unorthodox Policy Wins Are Gaining Steady Support
Posted: 10 Feb 2020 02:51 PM PST
by Dr. Victor Davis Hanson: When candidate Donald Trump campaigned on calling China to account for its trade piracy, observers thought he was either crazy or dangerous. Conventional Washington wisdom had assumed that an ascendant Beijing was almost preordained to world hegemony. Trump’s tariffs and polarization of China were considered about the worst thing an American president could do. The accepted bipartisan strategy was to accommodate, not oppose, China’s growing power. The hope was that its newfound wealth and global influence would liberalize the ruling communist government. Four years later, only a naif believes that. Instead, there is an emerging consensus that China’s cutthroat violations of international norms were long ago overdue for an accounting. China’s reeducation camps, its Orwellian internal surveillance, its crackdown on Hong Kong democracy activists, and its secrecy about the deadly coronavirus outbreak have all convinced the world that China has now become a dangerous international outlier. Trump courted moderate Arab nations in forming an anti-Iranian coalition opposed to Iran’s terrorist and nuclear agendas. His policies utterly reversed the Obama administration’s estrangement from Israel and outreach to Tehran. Last week, Trump nonchalantly offered the Palestinians a take-it-or-leave-it independent state on the West Bank, but without believing that a West Bank settlement was the key to peace in the entire Middle East. Trump’s cancellation of the Iran deal, in particular, was met with international outrage. More global anger followed after the targeted killing of Iranian terrorist leader Gen. Qassim Suleimani. In short, Trump’s Middle East recalibrations won few supporters among the bipartisan establishment. But recently, Europeans have privately started to agree that more sanctions are needed on Iran, that the world is better off with Suleimani gone, and that the West Bank is not central to regional peace. Iran has now become a pariah. U.S.-sponsored sanctions have reduced the theocracy to near-bankruptcy. Most nations understand that if Iran kills Americans or openly starts up its nuclear program, the U.S. will inflict disproportional damage on its infrastructure—a warning that at first baffled, then angered, and now has humiliated Iran. In other words, there is now an entirely new Middle East orthodoxy that was unimaginable just three years ago. Suddenly the pro-Iranian, anti-Western Palestinians have few supporters. Israel and a number of prominent Arab nations are unspoken allies of convenience against Iran. And Iran itself is seemingly weaker than at any other time in the theocracy’s history. Stranger still, instead of demanding that the U.S. leave the region, many Middle Eastern nations privately seem eager for more of a now-reluctant U.S. presence. For the last 20 years, much of the American orthodoxy had agreed with Europe that the increasingly anti-democratic, pan-continental, and borderless European Union was the remedy to all of Europe’s past 20th-century catastrophes. As a result, American presidents did not do much when EU nations typically racked up large trade surpluses with the U.S., often a result of asymmetrical fees, tariffs, and fines. The U.S. largely ignored the increasingly anti-democratic and anti-American tone of the EU. Nor did Americans object much when lackadaisical European NATO nations habitually welched on their defense spending commitments. Apparently, past U.S. administrations supposed that a paternalistic America would always be more eager to defend Europe than Europe would be to defend itself. But then Trump again blew up more old assumptions. NATO will now only survive if its members keep their word and meet their spending promises. An economically stagnant, oil-hungry, and top-heavy EU will have to make radical changes, or it will sink into irrelevance and eventually break apart. Trump got little credit for these revolutionary changes because he is, after all, Trump—a wheeler-dealer, an ostentatious outsider, unpredictable in action, and not shy about rude talk. But his paradoxical and successful policies—the product of conservative, antiwar, and pro-worker agendas—are gradually winning supporters and uniting disparate groups. After all, the U.S. is beefing up its military but using it only sparingly. It hits back hard at enemies but does not hit first. For Trump, being conventional is dangerous; being unpredictable is far safer. For all Trump’s tough talk, his ace in the hole is American soft power—based on a globally dominant economy, its global lead in the production of gas and oil, and an omnipresent cultural juggernaut. For Trump, the ex-television star, wars translate into bad ratings and worse optics. As a businessman, he believes needless conflicts get in the way of money-making and win-win deals. The result of the new orthodoxy is that the U.S. has become no better friend to an increasing number of allies and neutrals, and no worse an adversary to a shrinking group of enemies. And yet Trump’s paradox is that America’s successful new foreign policy is as praised privately as it is caricatured publicly—at least for now. Tags: Victor Davis Hanson, President Trump, Unorthodox Policy Wins, Are Gaining Steady Support, The Daily signal To share or post to your site, click on “Post Link”. Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service and “Like” Facebook Page – Thanks! |
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| Trump Is At The Top Of The Political Ladder
Posted: 10 Feb 2020 02:41 PM PST
by Fred Barnes: The ladder of American politics has a top and a bottom. It took President Trump two weeks, maybe three, to climb to the top. During that time, Democrats tripped and fell to the bottom. The causes of change can pile up quickly in politics, and indeed they have. But their consequences have yet to be understood by the media, Democrats, and even many Republicans. One thing, though, is clear: Trump is now in the strongest position of his presidency, and while he’s hardly a shoo-in to win a second term, his reelection prospects are better than ever. Think about what’s driven Trump’s rise, starting with impeachment. That the president has gained from the ordeal unleashed by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is more than a lucky break. It’s an amazing development that was foreseen by very few. It not only hurt Democrats; it has prompted an increase in approval of Republicans. Pelosi turns out to be the most agonized victim of her decision to impeach Trump. She seemed agitated and unhappy during his State of the Union address. And Democratic members of Congress looked like a ragtag army stranded on the House floor, unsure when to sit, stand, or chant “H.R. 3,” a bill to cut prescription drug prices. While the economy continues to boost Trump, there are special reasons why it makes Democrats miserable. Liberal economists, notably New York Times columnist Paul Krugman, assured them Trump and recessions were synonymous. With Trump in charge, the well-being of the public would become a thing of the past. The economists were wrong. Trump has leapfrogged mere boasting about economic growth. He loves to talk about how minorities, whom Democrats see as their loyalists, have fared in the three years of his presidency. Here’s the White House transcript of his State of the Union speech: “The unemployment rate for African Americans, Hispanic Americans, and Asian Americans has reached the lowest levels in history. (Applause.) African American youth unemployment has reached an all-time low. (Applause.) African American poverty has declined to the lowest rate ever recorded. (Applause.)” In foreign policy, Trump’s greatest success is the humbling of Iran’s ruling mullahs. His decision to kill Qassem Soleimani, the Iranian terrorist chief, and the slapping of sanctions on Iran have crippled its economy and weakened its role in the world. Another result: The president’s stature, or at least his prowess, has increased. This has led Trump to a new tack in dealing with the mullahs. If Iran abandons “its pursuit of nuclear weapons” and stops “spreading terror,” he promises to help revive its economy. “Perhaps they are too proud or too foolish to ask for that help,” he said in the State of the Union. “We are here. Let’s see which road they choose. It is totally up to them.” Roger Kimball, the editor of the New Criterion, assessed Trump’s standing after the address to Congress. “The irony … is that despite the endless carping of his opponents in the government, the media, and the corridors of elite power, Donald Trump has emerged from the unremitting ad hominem attacks stronger and more persuasive.” His reelection effort is far ahead of the campaign of any Democratic presidential rival, including billionaire Michael Bloomberg. And if the nominee is not decided until the Democratic convention in July, all the better for Trump. But if he believes he can cruise to reelection, he is mistaken. He will be opposed by most of the media. Democrats are likely to vote in record numbers. And his enemies will finance a national dragnet to uncover unsavory tales, offensive comments, or questionable actions to use against him. Scott Reed, manager of Republican Bob Dole’s bid for president in 1996, says the Trump campaign must deal with two priorities: message control and the suburban vote. And both involve Trump’s personality and tendency to cause trouble with off-the-cuff remarks and tweets. He can’t afford to alienate college-educated voters, women especially, as he did in 2016. In the 2018 midterm elections, Trump’s behavior was a cause of sweeping defeats in suburbs and the loss of the House. Reed believes Trump “touched all the right political buttons” in the State of the Union address. Of those he introduced in the balcony, there was an emphasis on African Americans and Hispanics. It was a disciplined performance by the president. He read the speech from the teleprompters. He didn’t ad-lib. He rarely smiled. He was disciplined. “It was a tour de force,” Reed said, the kind that will keep Trump at the top of the political ladder. Tags: Fred Barnes, Washington Examiner, President Trump, At The Top, The Political Ladder To share or post to your site, click on “Post Link”. Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service and “Like” Facebook Page – Thanks! |
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| If DOJ Fails To Indict, More Coups Coming
Posted: 10 Feb 2020 02:09 PM PST
by Free Press International: If those responsible for instigating the Trump-Russia collusion hoax are not held accountable, it will only encourage more partisan political “coups” in the future, an investigative journalist said. “The important thing to remember here is that even though Attorney General William Barr is going to have all of these new rules in place in an effort to avoid this happening in the future, I talked to sources today: Former senior FBI officials that say if there aren’t indictments — if people don’t actually pay the price for what happened here — which was an attempted coup, basically, on the president of the United States, and also just destroying the civil liberties of an American citizen, Carter Page, then what’s going to stop the next person?” Sara Carter told Fox News host Sean Hannity on Friday. Hannity frequently reminds his audience that Hillary Clinton “bought and paid for” the bogus Christopher Steele dossier that served as the FBI’s basis for obtaining a warrant to spy on Trump campaign associate Page, claiming that the file was “premeditated fraud” on the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Court. Sara Carter agreed, remarking that a future attorney general could and would approve a similar application to the one presented to the FISA Court. Harvard Law Professor Alan Dershowitz said the congressionally-established FISA court should be “reshuffled.” Under the current court setup, Dershowitz said, a “low-level” FBI official with an ax to grind against another person could claim they were working with a foreign government, and there wouldn’t be an opposition entity to play “devil’s advocate.” “I think we have the joint, hopefully, bipartisan support for changing FISA to protect all American citizens, not just politicians,” he said. Barr last May named Connecticut U.S. Attorney John Durham to review the FBI’s Russia investigation, looking specifically at whether the U.S. government’s “intelligence collection activities” were “lawful and appropriate.” “Those who damaged America and broke the law to spread this hoax are about to face accountability,” Rep. Mark Meadows, North Carolina Republican, tweeted at the time. Tags: Free Press International, News Service, Free Pressers, If DOJ Fails To Indict, More Coups Coming To share or post to your site, click on “Post Link”. Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service and “Like” Facebook Page – Thanks! |
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| Challenging Sanctuary Jurisdictions
Posted: 10 Feb 2020 02:00 PM PST . . . DHS and New York face off over the issuing of driver’s licenses to illegals.  by Arnold Ahlert: For as long as most Americans can remember, Democrats have made it clear that any law inimical to their agenda can be blithely ignored. Nothing makes this clearer than the hundreds of locales across the nation known as “sanctuary” jurisdictions, where policies forbid local law enforcement from cooperating with U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE). New York state is one such place, and for the first time America has an administration willing to force the political class to choose between maintaining a haven for illegal aliens or keeping access to programs that help state residents move through customs lines more quickly. Acting Homeland Security Secretary Chad Wolf revealed the administration’s agenda last Wednesday. Wolf explained the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) was immediately suspending enrollment in Global Entry and several other Trusted Traveler Programs (TTP), including NEXUS, SENTRI, and FAST. Thousands of New Yorkers are members of these programs, because they allow people to bypass typically long Customs and Border Protection (CPB) lines. The state’s recently enacted “Green Light Law,” which gives illegal aliens access to drivers’ licenses — but also blocks federal agencies like ICE and CPB from accessing the state’s DMV records without a court order — was the tipping point. In a letter provided to state officials, Wolf noted the law “compromises CPB’s ability to confirm whether an individual applying to TTP membership meets the program’s eligibility requirement.” Why is that important? “In New York alone, last year ICE arrested 149 child predators, identified or rescued 105 victims of exploitation and human trafficking, arrested 230 gang members, and seized 6,487 pounds of illegal narcotics, including fentanyl and opioids,” Wolf added. “In the vast majority of these cases, ICE relied on New York DMV records to fulfill its mission.” And that was before the law took effect in December, precipitating a surge of illegals rushing to New York DMVs to obtain their new identification, using foreign documents such as passports or a driver’s license to get it. Not all New Yorkers were on board. Lawsuits filed by Rensselaer County Clerk Frank Merola and Erie County Clerk Mickey Kearns, both of whom argued the law would put him in conflict with federal immigration law, were dismissed separately by U.S. district judges, Gary Sharpe and Elizabeth Wolford, for the same reason: Both judges deemed the clerks lacked standing to challenge the law. New York Attorney General Letitia James was pleased the courts dismissed “meritless claims.”And last Friday she announced her intent to sue the DHS. “Despite President Trump’s attempt to punish New Yorkers for passing our own laws and standing up to his xenophobic policies, we will not back down,” she said. Xenophobic policies? During his State of the Union Address, President Trump made it clear what sanctuary jurisdictions are really all about. “Just 29 days ago, a criminal alien freed by the sanctuary city of New York was charged with the brutal rape and murder of a 92-year-old woman,” Trump stated. “The killer had been previously arrested for assault, but under New York’s sanctuary policies, he was set free. If the city had honored ICE’s detainer request, his victim would be alive today.” CNN’s Van Jones, who was once the Obama administration’s “green jobs” czar until he was forced to resign due in large part to his association with the 9/11 conspiracy truthers, provided the typically progressive response to such inconvenient realities. After asserting that Trump is “managing” racial issues as a “tradeoff between the Latinos and the African Americans,” Jones insisted, “Sanctuary cities are safer than non-sanctuary cities. The Cato Institute, which is libertarian, has come out and said immigrants are committing less crime.” He added, “So, for some reason he thinks that doubling down on the anti-immigrant piece is a big part of this thing.” Remarkably, no one ever challenges the utter bankruptcy of such an absurd contention. If the Rule of Law were upheld, crimes committed by illegals would be almost wholly avoidable. Thus, it would be truly enlightening to know what Jones and other sanctuary supporters consider a “reasonable” level of murders, rapes, robberies, etc., Americans must endure, not just for accommodating illegal immigration, but seeing it incentivized by “woke” politicians. Trump addressed that reality as well. “No issue better illustrates the divide between America’s working class and America’s political class than illegal immigration,” he stated. “Wealthy politicians and donors push for open borders while living their lives behind walls, gates, and guards. Meanwhile, working-class Americans are left to pay the price for mass illegal immigration.” One political-class member, Richard Azzopardi, a senior adviser to New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, was annoyed by the crackdown. “This is obviously political retaliation by the federal government and we’re going to review our legal options,” he said. Cuomo echoed those sentiments, calling the crackdown “pure politics.” He also asserted the federal government is “anti-immigrant.” Nothing is more political — or more dishonest — than the ongoing and highly orchestrated effort by progressives to conflate illegal and legal immigration, as if the difference between the two is somehow irrelevant. It is not, and the Trump administration is making that crystal clear. Moreover, Ken Cuccinelli, the senior official performing the duties of acting secretary at the DHS reminded Americans what Cuomo and his illegal-immigration-supporting allies have either forgotten or don’t care about: “[A] majority of 9/11 terrorists used Virginia driver’s licenses to help accomplish their evil mission,” Cuccinelli stated. Moreover, unlike Virginia, which addressed the problem, Cuccinelli added that New York is “walking backwards, quite intentionally, in the other direction to bar the sharing of law-enforcement-relevant information like vehicle registration, matching driver’s licenses to identifications, and, critically, criminal records which are kept up to date, and DMV databases.” Access to records is only part of the equation. The Real ID Act of 2005 requires states to establish an applicant’s date of birth, Social Security number, proof of residence, and citizenship or lawful status to obtain a driver’s license compliant with that law. It also empowers the DHS secretary to define “official purposes” for which those licenses can be used, including the boarding of commercially operated airline flights, or entering federal buildings and nuclear power plants. Nonetheless, The Washington Post reveals the administration’s efforts are rather modest: “A DHS official with knowledge of the deliberations said the department does not plan to take immediate steps against other states and cities.” Really? Why not? Fifteen states, the District of Columbia, and Puerto Rico offer driver’s licenses to illegals, and it’s well past time to have the courts decide if this practice — asserted to be a states rights’ issue — is really another effort to nullify federal immigration law. Furthermore, this administration should explore every option available to undermine sanctuary policies — including demands that Congress enact laws making officials who harbor illegals subject to civil and criminal liabilities when those illegals commit crimes that harm American citizens. Hopefully, making it inconvenient to travel is the first in a series of initiatives that would ultimately make sanctuary jurisdictions politically untenable. Americans have abided de facto anarchy long enough. Tags: Arnold Ahlert, The Patriot Post, Challenging Sanctuary Jurisdictions To share or post to your site, click on “Post Link”. Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service and “Like” Facebook Page – Thanks! |
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| Republican Presidents Including Trump Will Have Appointed A Majority Of Federal Judges Before The End Of 2020
Posted: 10 Feb 2020 01:32 PM PST  by Robert Romano: One of the effects of the Senate impeachment’s abrupt conclusion in President Donald Trump’s favor is that the Republican Senate can get right on with the business of confirming constitutionalists to federal court, of which Trump recently touted 191 having been confirmed. Since 1952, presidents have averaged 163 judges confirmed per term of office, which puts Trump well ahead of the game compared to other presidents. There are only 81 vacancies now, and 25 nominations pending, giving the President and Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell (R-Ky.) a clear window to get even more judges confirmed this year. Now, almost 50.8 percent of current federal judges have been appointed by Democratic presidents — 404 to 390 — according to the latest data from the Federal Judicial Center. Just consider that, to get to parity between the political parties on federal courts has taken three years of a Republican president, just to get it even. And even then, Republicans still don’t have a majority of judges, but they will soon. If the remaining 81 vacancies are filled, that number will fall to 46 percent, giving Republicans 54 percent of federal judges. Maybe that’s why Democrats wanted to slow down the Senate in 2020 with an endless impeachment trial. If Senate Democrats had had their way, the impeachment trial would be still be ongoing, with an endless parade of new witnesses to be called to occupy the Senate floor’s time — time not spent confirming judges and other executive branch appointments. Take former National Security Advisor John Bolton’s prospective testimony. First, his lawyer said that he wouldn’t testify unless ordered to by a federal court while House proceedings were still ongoing. So Democrats didn’t bother to subpoena him. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) then made a show of holding back Articles of Impeachment from the Senate until there was a pretrial agreement on witnesses. While that delayed the trial for about a week, it ultimately failed. Then, Bolton’s lawyer turned around and suddenly said that Bolton would testify at the Senate trial if subpoenaed, a move designed to pressure Republican Senators to break with their party and hand the floor over to Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer (D-N.Y.), to call as many witnesses as possible, dragging on the trial for as long as possible to do maximum damage politically to President Trump. Was Bolton’s testimony ploy coordinated? What we know is that the House never subpoenaed Bolton, and only after the House sent the Articles to the Senate did Bolton say he would testify if subpoenaed. At that stage, Senate Republicans had a choice to make. Either allow the trial to continue indefinitely, harming Republicans politically because a few in their conference chose to extend the trial, or to just end it then and there. Mercifully for the nation, they opted for the latter. Instead, the GOP Senate got its job done. No witnesses. And then a prompt acquittal for President Trump. And now onto more judges. It is worth noting that if a Republican House impeached a Democratic president with a Democratic Senate in power — say if this had been attempted in 2011 or 2012 — the charges would have been promptly, similarly defeated. Meaning, the GOP Senate never had any good incentives politically to lengthen the trial, since there is zero likelihood they would be able to ever force a similar trial on a Democratic president in an election year when the roles were reversed. Particularly, when there are far more pressing matters from the Senate Majority Leader’s perspective, regardless of political party McConnell did not want to waste months in 2020 on a Senate trial that would eventually acquit Trump anyway. As soon as he had the votes to end the trial, he did, and a clear majority of federal judges being appointed by Republican presidents before the end of the year will be his legacy. Tags: Robert Romano, americans for Limited Government, Republican Presidents, Including Trump, Will Have Appointed, A Majority Of Federal Judges, Before The End Of 2020 To share or post to your site, click on “Post Link”. Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service and “Like” Facebook Page – Thanks! |
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| Super Bowl of Dishonesty: Michael Bloomberg Spends Big to Lie to America
Posted: 10 Feb 2020 01:22 PM PST  by NRA-ILA: Earlier this month, Michael Bloomberg added to the quarter billion dollar tally he has spent pursuing the Democrat presidential nomination with an $11 million ad that aired during the Super Bowl. It was his highest-profile effort to date in a relentless media blitz meant to familiarize Americans with his name and a “life story” that is more PR ad copy than actual biography. But the ad was perhaps more revealing than Bloomberg intended, showing him to be long on dishonesty and emotional manipulation and short on facts and substance. Bloomberg himself barely appears in the 60 second commercial. Most of the airtime features the mother of an aspiring football player whose son was killed. There is no question that a grieving mother has compelling emotional impact, and no one can blame the woman for wanting to tell her son’s story or to try to make a difference that will spare others a similar experience. What is blameworthy, however, is Bloomberg’s exploitation of the woman’s personal tragedy to intentionally mislead the public. While the woman described her loss, a graphic then appeared on the screen, stating, “2,900 CHILDREN DIE FROM GUN VIOLENCE EVERY YEAR.” There is nothing in the commercial that explains what policies Michael Bloomberg is promoting that would have prevented the family’s tragedy or that would prevent similar tragedies in the future. The ad gives no information on the circumstances of the son’s death, other than that someone shot him. But the obvious takeaway is that children like this young athlete are at a high risk of being killed, and only Michael Bloomberg has the moxie and know-how to stop it. It’s clear that Michael Bloomberg himself knows next to nothing about firearms. In fact, when he began his political career with a run for New York City Mayor in 2001, Bloomberg didn’t know how to answer a question about the Second Amendment because he didn’t know what it was. But even Michael Bloomberg knows that adults are not the same thing as children. And according to multiple media stories debunking his Super Bowl ad, his figure about “children” dying from “gun violence” inflates the number nearly 100% by including the high-risk category of 18- and 19-year-old adults. An article by FactCheck.org, for example, claims the misleading statistic is based on information from Everytown for Gun Safety, a gun control group that is funded primarily by the billionaire Michael Bloomberg. Bloomberg’s “source,” in other words, is actually propaganda that he himself paid to generate. But even Everytown was more honest than the ad itself, claiming in a 2019 fact sheet, “Annually, nearly 2,900 children and teens (ages 0 to 19) are shot and killed … .” That figure that comes from averaging Centers for Disease Control Data from 2013 to 2017. FactCheck.org explains that when 18- and 19-year-old adults are omitted from the data, the figure drops to 1,499. So the Bloomberg ad nearly doubles the number of minors who succumb annually to gunshot injuries to come up with a figure for “children.” Again, these deaths are lamentable, but they are not what Bloomberg claims. What the ad did establish is that Michael Bloomberg cannot be trusted to tell the truth even on his own signature policy issue and that he will in fact spend huge sums of money to lie to the American public for his own political benefit. Tags: NRA-ILA, Super Bowl of Dishonesty, Michael Bloomberg, Spends Big, to Lie, to America To share or post to your site, click on “Post Link”. Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service and “Like” Facebook Page – Thanks! |
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| Kickin’ It Old School . . .
Posted: 10 Feb 2020 01:05 PM PST . . . Like Lucy of Peanuts, the 2016 DNC pulled the football out from Bernie Sanders and now he’s back for more in 2020.
Tags: AF Branco, editorial cartoon, Kickin’ It Old School, Like Lucy of Peanuts, 2016 DNC, pulled the football Bernie Sanders To share or post to your site, click on “Post Link”. Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service and “Like” Facebook Page – Thanks! |
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| Banned in Britain: Franklin Graham’s Tour Dates Canceled Over Christian Beliefs
Posted: 10 Feb 2020 12:57 PM PST
by Nicole Russell: Evangelist and missionary Franklin Graham’s seven-city tour of the United Kingdom is now a trial, as all seven venues have dropped him. Graham’s canceled dates likely are due to an “an outcry over his homophobic and Islamophobic comments,” CNN reports. Although I don’t agree with everything Graham has said by any means, it’s disheartening to see that the United Kingdom, once a beacon of free speech, now leads the way in “cancel culture.” To be sure, Graham’s reputation has shifted over the years, and especially since President Donald Trump took office. Although it’s not unusual for Graham, son of the famous preacher Billy Graham, to venture into politics, he unabashedly has supported Trump, courting significant controversy. In these trying times, we must turn to the greatest document in the history of the world to promise freedom and opportunity to its citizens for guidance. Graham’s support of Trump never has wavered, even as the editorial board at Christianity Today said the president should be removed from office for unethical and immoral behavior. Graham has been outspoken about other cultural issues, including gay rights and radical Islam, both hot topics in the U.K., where Islam is the fastest growing religion. Graham has said gays should go to “conversion therapy” to change, and once called Islam “evil.” Interestingly, although multiple venues canceled Graham this year, this isn’t the first time the U.K. has had enough of the evangelist. In 2017, several members of Parliament moved to ban Graham from the U.K. for “hate speech” regarding gays and Muslims. At the time, a “petition against Graham being granted a visa” had gathered 4,600 signatures. Nina Parker, pastor of Liberty Church in Blackpool, who organized the petition, said Graham’s presence would be “extremely destructive.” Parker told The Guardian: “As a Christian and as a leader of a church that particularly welcomes LGBT people, I’m horrified that other local churches are inviting someone with this record of hate speech.” Censorship of free speech, discourse, and individual autonomy in the United Kingdom has increased in the past several years. British officials have cracked down on internet freedom. Even though several groups have pushed back against the government’s flagship internet regulation policy—which is so vague it covers nearly every kind of speech existent—it’s been an uphill battle. In several dramatic cases, parents have lost their rights to their sick children as the U.K.’s court system usurped them and decided what care was best—typically, a removal of life support against the parents’ wishes. Of course, any discourse offering a different perspective on LGBT groups or anything that might be seen as anti-transgender receives the most censorship—including being fired from one’s job, as J.K. Rowling bemoaned and I reported on recently. The United Kingdom has become so intolerant of traditional views and determined to be a global leader in progressive ideology—especially if it quashes all other beliefs. Instead of greeting Graham’s traditional views on LGBT issues with robust debate, or even empty halls for his speeches, the venues outright canceled him without any pushback whatsoever. Sure, a venue in England has the right to disinvite a pastor from America who is rabidly pro-Trump. But if everyone is so sure their views are correct, why are these groups simultaneously terrified of a preacher telling them what he thinks? It’s unsettlingly Orwellian to watch the United Kingdom muzzle ideas, traditional beliefs, and viewpoints of Americans in favor of a unified groupthink that promotes only progressive concepts. Not only is it unfortunate that certain strains of thought are promoted, but when other, more conservative or traditional ideas are censored, it leaves no room for originality or robust debate. This is something for which the United Kingdom used to be renowned. Tags: Banned in Britain, Franklin Graham, Tour Dates Canceled, Over Christian Beliefs To share or post to your site, click on “Post Link”. Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service and “Like” Facebook Page – Thanks! |
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| Only 4 of Glasgow’s 71 Muslim Refugee Child Rapists Have Gone to Prison
Posted: 10 Feb 2020 12:28 PM PST  by Daniel Greenfield: By the summer of last year, Glasgow had the highest number of housed refugees in the UK with almost 10% of the “asylum seekers” setting up shop in the Scottish city. The overflow of refugees, many of them from Pakistan, Iraq, and Afghanistan, has brought in government money, but also violence and crime. Refugees whose requests for asylum are rejected refuse to leave and remain on in Glasgow. Glasgow had been eager to cash in on asylum seekers, and in the last two decades was fundamentally transformed by the tide of migrants filling up its neighborhoods. As Pakistanis became the largest minority group in Scotland, 42% of the country’s Muslim population took up residence in Glasgow. By the 2011 census, a fifth of Glasgow’s population was non-Scottish. In Pollokshields, a quarter of the population is Pakistani. Pollokshields is also where Kriss Donald, a 15-year-old Scottish teenage boy, was kidnapped in the spring of 2004, stabbed all over his body and then set on fire by a Pakistani gang. “His violent death was a result of political correctness that has gripped the police in Scotland,” Mike Liddell, a senior police officer warned. “Crime within Glasgow’s Asian community has been allowed to grow unfettered for years. Why? Because the police have been afraid to fight it in case they are accused of racism.” Ayub Khan, a member of the Multi-faith Coalition group in Pollokshields, agreed, “people know that the police are too scared to come into the area and be accused of racism.” That was 15 years ago. Last year, Mohammed Maqsood, had his appeal thrown out. Maqsood had been accused of the Kriss Donald murder, but had remained free until he raped an 18-year-old girl, who got into what she thought was a taxi in Glasgow, before she was brutalized and left half-naked in the street. Mohammed then generously dumped her clothes in a charity bin to hide the evidence. The assault was one of many that involved taxis and Glasgow’s growing Muslim community. The taboo topic has been the subject of multiple police investigations after reports began to circulate in the press. A 2011 report in the Evening Times documented the story of a teenage girl who had been abused and prostituted by a man named Nasir. “One minute I was a normal teenage girl, the next, I was being forced to have sex with these old men,” she revealed. “I had never even kissed a boy before – they completely took my innocence from me.” Nasir raped her in front of his fellow gang members while they recorded the assault on their cell phones. After she was prostituted, harassment by the gang forced her family to flee from Glasgow’s immigrants. In 2011, Operation Cotswold was set up to focus on the Muslim refugees who were abusing young girls in care homes, facilities for children from broken families. The police identified 26 potential victims, but no one was prosecuted. In 2013, Operation Dash tracked the role of Muslim taxi services and fast food places in the grooming and sexual abuse of young girls. It focused on the Strathclyde area, a center of the city’s Pakistani population going back decades. That was where the police had launched and then shuttered Operation Gather a decade earlier because its focus on Muslim gangs had been deemed politically incorrect. Operation Dash found that girls as young as 10 years old were being abused. 84 victims were identified and 27 suspects were reported. Only three were reportedly actually sent to prison. And only one, Javaid Akhond, a refugee from Afghanistan working in a fast food place, was named. Akhond got only 6 years in prison for grooming and sexually abusing a 12-year-old girl, grooming and sexually abusing her 13-year-old friend, sexually abusing a 15-year-old girl, and then, raping a 16-year-old girl who tried to intervene. Then, once he was locked up, he tried to pressure the 15-year-old from prison to name him officially as the father of her child so that he could avoid deportation from Scotland. The Muslim refugee, like many foreign criminals, was hoping to rely on EU rules that prevent the deportation of even the worst criminals if they have left behind a child in a European country. The Muslim refugee gangs aren’t just raping young girls, they’re using them as asylum requests. In a familiar pattern, Cotswold and Dash turned up over 100 victims, but very few actual results. Operation Cerrar, the latest successor to these operations, identified 56 members of a Glasgow grooming gang. The perpetrators were Pakistani, Iraqi, Egyptian, Turkish, and Moroccan refugees. 44 girls were abused by these refugees. Many were abused many times. Including one who was assaulted by 28 of the perpetrators and another by 23 of them. 14 of the abusers have been deported. Only 1 is in prison. The police kept the investigation and its results secret. With results like these, it’s easy to see why. After three investigations that have taken place over a decade with 154 identified victims, and at least 71 perpetrators, there have been seemingly only four actual prison sentences. And the only one that has been made public amounted to a slap on the wrist. If British authorities prosecuted Muslim grooming gangs as vigorously as they do ‘Islamophobia’, then the countless thousands of girls abused across major cities would sleep soundly in their beds at night. Like many of these cities, Glasgow opened its doors to Muslim migrants for economic and political reasons. Labour and the Scottish National Party then fought eagerly over Muslim votes. The 154 abused girls paid the price for the UK’s migration policies, for Glasgow’s eagerness for the economic benefits of opening up to migrants and refugees, and of the Scottish National Party’s desire to achieve independence for Scotland, even if it had to do it by submitting to the EU and Islam, and replacing the native population with a more reliable voting base for its social welfare and green energy. In 2007, Bashir Ahmad became the first Muslim member of the Scottish Parliament for the SNP from Glasgow. He was followed by Humza Yousaf, his former assistant, who became the first Muslim cabinet minister holding down the justice portfolio and took his oath of allegiance in the Scottish Parliament in Urdu. Jahangir Hanif, a Glasgow SNP councilor, was caught teaching his children to fire an AK-47 at a training camp in Pakistan, near Kashmir. The SNP’s Islamic squad came through the Muslim Brotherhood’s local outlet, the Scottish Islamic Foundation. And the SNP generously funneled money to the SIF in recognition of their support. The SIF’s boss, Osama Saeed, who has cheered a return of the Caliphate, was an adviser to former First Minister Alex Salmond, the SNP’s dirty leader, who ran Scotland into the ground. Salmond is currently on trial for assaulting 10 women. The Scotland National Party’s answer to Harvey Weinstein even stands accused of trying to rape a woman in Bute House, the official residence of the First Minister, and in the Scottish Parliament. Is it really any wonder that Scottish authorities have managed to do an even worse job of tackling Muslim sex grooming gangs than their counterparts in Manchester, Rotherham, and Oxford? Tags: Daniel Greenfield, FrontPage Mag, Sultan Knish, Only 4, Glasgow’s 71 Muslim Refugee, Child Rapists, Have Gone to Prison To share or post to your site, click on “Post Link”. Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service and “Like” Facebook Page – Thanks! |
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| God And A Glock: How Churchgoers Are Training To Fight Off Armed Attackers
Posted: 10 Feb 2020 12:12 PM PST  by Allie Morris: Beneath the Christmas lights still hanging in the church’s fellowship room, Jack Mills pointed a Glock handgun at his enemy’s chest and pulled the trigger. A loud crack rang out as a shell casing flew from the weapon, but the man facing the gunfire didn’t fall. Instead a red light on his high-tech vest began blinking, signaling a hit from the laser in Mills’ gun. A U.S. Air Force veteran, Mills began designing the equipment a year ago to help armed churchgoers learn how to confront a gunman. Shooting a paper target is one thing, Mills said. Firing at a real person is another. “If you haven’t shot somebody in the face, how do you know you can?” he said. Mills is part of a growing cottage industry in Texas that uses police-like tactics to train churchgoers who fear the next attack could target their house of worship. Requests for help spike after each tragedy, businesses said. The most recent came in December, when a man opened fire during Sunday service at White Settlement church and killed two worshipers, before he was fatally shot by an armed congregant. There’s no official count of how many parishioners pack heat in Texas churches. But security businesses said the number is growing thanks to recent changes by the Legislature that make it easier for worshipers to carry guns in church and form teams of armed protectors. With few industry standards, however, the training offered in Texas runs the gamut from active shooter drills, to programs that demand congregants pass a psychological evaluation and train for hours in life-like scenarios. One Texas firm has a trainer walk the church halls shooting blanks, so parishioners learn what approaching gunfire sounds like in their own sanctuary. “What’s driving it is an awareness,” said Carl Chinn, president of the national Faith Based Security Network. “We were under some illusion that because we had a cross on the roof and a name over the door that we were somehow immune from these kinds of attacks.” Still, congregations grapple with whether to welcome guns in the door. Just under half of 1,000 Protestant pastors nationwide reported arming their members, according to a survey released in January by Lifeway Research. Roughly 6 percent of the pastors said they hire police or armed security during services, a step that can be out of reach for smaller churches that don’t have the funding. Some critics warn that letting congregants carry guns without any training could lead to catastrophe if a firefight erupts in a crowded church. It can be a delicate balance stationing armed congregants at the church doors, while still maintaining an atmosphere inviting to newcomers. “The gun is a false god as it gives the illusion of safety,” said Rev. Deanna Hollas, the Dallas-based gun violence prevention ministry coordinator with the Presbyterian Peace Fellowship. “When in fact the only way to truly be safe is to love our neighbors, help those that are struggling, to heal the underlying problems that lead to the violence in the first place.” Guns allowed Mills laid out the Glock firearms that are modified so they can’t accept live ammunition on a black folding table. Curious churchgoers held them in their hands, some aimed the guns at white mannequins wearing the high-tech vests. The equipment sells for $1,900 and Mills estimates an equal number of churches and police departments have used it to practice. The full cost of a training course in Texas can range from $55 for a half-day class, to over $800 for a 60-hour program. Trainees “might not have to shoot somebody,” said Mills, who owns Fort Worth-based Virtual Tactical Training Resources. “But if they have to, I want them to be as well trained as they possibly can.” Unless a house of worship posts a prohibition, all it takes to bring a loaded gun into a Texas church is a state-issued license to carry. To pass the one-time shooting test applicants must hit a paper target from 9 and 21 feet away, roughly the length of a cargo van. In a bid to make protection more accessible to small churches, the Legislature in 2017 waived state training requirements and fees for congregations that want to form their own armed safety teams. While many owners of church security businesses endorsed the change, they still stress that training is needed to avoid an accident. Jack Wilson, who drew his gun and shot an assailant at his White Settlement Church six seconds after the attack began, is a firearms instructor who trains his own congregation’s safety team on the gun range. The Texas Legislature should consider imposing some standards for training now that there have been a series of attacks at religious institutions, which can inform best practices, said Alex del Carmen, Associate Dean at the School of Criminology, Criminal Justice and Strategic Studies at Tarleton State University. “The concern is there’s such a variation across the state,” he said. “I am afraid we have individuals out there, in name only, to protect fellow worshipers and when the moment is needed to pull a gun and shoot at somebody, they are not going to do it.” … Read More Tags: American Military News, God And A Glock, How Churchgoers Are Training, To Fight Off Armed Attackers To share or post to your site, click on “Post Link”. Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service and “Like” Facebook Page – Thanks! |
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| Hospital Admitting Privileges
Posted: 10 Feb 2020 10:55 AM PST  by Penna Dexter: A pro-life state law authored by a Louisiana Democrat is set to be heard at the United States Supreme Court on March 4th. In June Medical Services v. Gee, the abortion industry is challenging legislation requiring that any doctor performing abortions have admitting privileges at a hospital located within thirty miles of the facility at which those abortions take place. State Representative Katrina Jackson, who has since been elected state senator, authored Act 620, which simply requires that abortion doctors live under the same regulations as other Louisiana outpatient physicians. Senator Jackson will actually join the Louisiana Attorney General’s office in arguing this case before the Supreme Court. She told The Stream that the bill addresses a woman’s health issue. She said, “Louisiana requires a certain standard of care for outpatient surgery, and we will not lower it for those electing to have an abortion.” When she learned that abortion laws were in a different section of Louisiana statutes, Senator Jackson acted to remedy the situation. To a question about how she reconciles her strong pro-life views with the overwhelming pro-abortion position of the Democrat party, Senator Jackson explained that she’s a Christian, adding: “when they’re right I stand with them, and when I believe they’re not, I cannot stand with them.” The fact that the Louisiana statute governing outpatient doctors has been on the books for years and was believed to apply to all doctors makes it different from a similar Texas law that was struck down by the Supreme Court in 2016. The Court’s ruling, in this case, could affect a bill that’s been introduced in both houses of Congress. John Kennedy, US Senator from Louisiana and Arizona Congressman Andy Biggs call their companion bills the Pregnant Women Health and Safety Act. How appropriate that these lawmakers introduced their bills just three days before the 47th annual Washington DC March for Life. The march’s theme this year was “Life Empowers: Pro-Life is Pro-Woman.” Tags: Penna Dexter, Viewpoints, Point of View, Hospital Admitting Privileges To share or post to your site, click on “Post Link”. Please mention / link to the ARRA News Service and “Like” Facebook Page – Thanks! |
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February 11 2020
Today brings the New Hampshire primary, and we’ll get to that in a moment, but the news out of China regarding the coronavirus is getting really ominous. Oh, and Nevada Democrats are starting to get nervous about how they’re going to count the votes in their caucus later this month. |
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“Makes an original and compelling case for nationalism . . . A fascinating, erudite—and much-needed—defense of a hallowed idea unfairly under current attack.” — Victor Davis Hanson
Episode 285: ‘Fight House’ by Tevi… 
Trump Attempts to Tie… 
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What about the designated hitter rule? That changed the tactics in baseball in the AL profoundly.