BY JOHN SHAFFER As the trendy parlance has it, President Trump continues to live rent-free in the heads of his critics, who can’t seem to talk about anyone or anything else without digging him with their spurs. As we, and many others have been saying for over two and a half years, the President’s texts and tweets and off-hand remarks seem to get him more attention, and into more trouble, than any of the policy changes he has made. An apt example came on July 14, when the President tweeted this: “Democrat Congresswomen, who originally came from countries whose governments are a complete and total catastrophe, the worst, most corrupt and inept anywhere in the world (if they even have a functioning government at all), now loudly...... ....and viciously telling the people of the United States, the greatest and most powerful Nation on earth, how our government is to be run. Why don’t they go back and help fix the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came. Then come back and show us how.... ....it is done. These places need your help badly, you can’t leave fast enough. I’m sure that Nancy Pelosi would be very happy to quickly work out free travel arrangements!” Of course, such remarks are the type often made by politicians, and are seldom taken very seriously, but the progressives have a pretty high opinion of themselves, are always looking for insults, and don’t have much of a sense of humor, so they took this very seriously. The US House voted to condemn the President’s remarks, although the circumstances of that vote saw the Speaker of the House also chastened by the House, and her temporary successor gave up the gavel at his inability to accomplish anything, but few care about that.
BY JOHN SHAFFER Yes, we were surprised at the recent Supreme Court ruling which prevented the Trump Administration from asking the “are you a citizen?” question on the 2020 census form. After all, the court said that the administration had the constitutional authority to ask the question, which in normal times should have led to a 9-0 decision in favor of the administration. But needless to say, these are not normal times, for the court, by a 5-4 vote,decided by Chief Justice John Roberts, determined that the administration’s “sole stated reason” for including the question was “pretextual” or “contrived.” Again, it should be obvious that an administration has the power to include any question that it has the power to include. Pardon the tautology, but if it has the power to include the question, but cannot include it, then it doesn’t really have the power, does it? And what was the “pretext”? Enforcement of the Voting Rights Act. The government said that it wanted the question on the form in order to obtain an accurate count of the citizens in order to protect citizens against discrimination, namely, using gerrymandering to dilute their votes. It was noted that numerous federal court decisions have said that the population of citizens of voting age should be the means for determining if a district has been properly apportioned and drawn. However, the court decided that although the authority exists, the rationale for the question was insufficient. Up to this point, each Commerce Department of each Administration has prepared the census forms according to its own motivations, within limits expressed by Congress. Never has a court prohibited a question, nor does the court generally review each question on the form. To do so would be a violation of the separation of powers. Our hypothesis that President Trump gets in more trouble and causes himself more grief by tweeting, texting or making unguarded comments than he does for the policies he implements and for the changes he makes received support this week from, as usual, the President himself. Mr. Trump, in an interview with former Democratic Party and Clinton Administration insider George Stephanopoulos, allowed that he would want to listen to negative allegations concerning opposition politicians, even if those allegations came from foreign sources. Perhaps this is the same motivation that drives people to read People magazine, or “Page Six” in the tabloids, or watch reality TV – hoping to see something juicy or naughty. Or it could be that the information is accurate and verified, which could indeed prove useful to any politician or prosecutor under certain circumstances. Or, the information might be inaccurate and unverified – such as for example the information that the Clinton campaign “obtained” on Mr. Trump. No need to remind anyone how useful that phony information was to certain politicians or prosecutors in 2016.
In the Stephanopoulos interview, the President did not say he would purchase such information, nor did he say he would make use of the information; he also was not asked about “stolen” or “hacked” information. Of course, the hearing of the Democrats running for President is far more acute than that of the average person, for every one of them heard that the President would condone stolen or hacked information – you know, much as the Democrats and the Clinton campaign condoned and in some case paid for, from foreign sources, in 2016. They all swear up and down that they would instantly refer directly and immediately to the FBI such an attempt to “interfere with the election,” just as they did in 2016 – when they sicced the Justice Department, through FISA warrants and by other means, on the Trump Campaign – even though the information in question was false, and was, “dirt” accusing Mr. Trump of various malfeasance and improper behavior. Of course, then it was “their” Justice Department, and fresh from its recent clearing of Hillary Clinton even though it was conceded that she had done wrong, the FBI was primed to find someone guilty, even if they had done nothing wrong. By John Shaffer The House Democrats had John Dean, corrupt player in the Watergate scandal from 47 years ago, to “testify” on parallels between that Watergate scandal and the Trump/Russia collusion scandal. No two scandals, it may be said, are the same, but Mr. Dean didn’t have to exercise his imagination very much to come up with comparison likening Mr. Trump to Mr. Nixon. Of course, it was Nixon and Dean who did the Watergate spying, and Trump was the one spied on in the present scandal, but everyone is entitled to an opinion. From where we sit, Mr. Dean (who was convicted of obstruction of justice and was disbarred as an attorney for his “involvement” in Watergate) missed the most obvious and most significant comparison of all: both the Watergate scandal and the Trump/Russia collusion scandal illustrate the dangers when a powerful government decides to conduct an investigation of its political opponents. Just as the Nixon administration did to the Democrats back in 1972, so too did the Obama administration do to the Trump campaign in 2016 – and the Obama effort made Watergate look like a “third-rate burglary.”
By John Shaffer Graduation speeches have the reputation of either being forgettable or being rehashes of platitudes, or a chore that the graduates must endure before they can receive that diploma, but the 2019 graduates of Morehouse College will always remember their address, not necessarily for the words spoken by billionaire investor Robert F. Smith, but for his amazing generosity, for he announced that his family would cover the student debt of each member of the class. The expected sum of this magnanimity is expected to be around $40 million. Mr. Smith's gift should be praised and appreciated, and if nothing else it proves that venture capitalists are not all evil and wicked.
It also shows that, given there were only 400 members of this year's Morehouse class, college education is way too expensive, and massive debt is too easily taken on. At $100,000 per graduate, that $40 million accumulates rapidly; and let's not forget that we are in a time of federalized student loans. Can’t blame this cost on the banks, although Congresswoman Maxine Walters did exactly that at a hearing last month. Confronting CEOs of several large banks, Cong. Walters demanded they explain why there was such a huge amount of student debt. Amused, one said that his bank hadn’t made a student loan since 2007; another politely reminded Madame Chairwoman that the federal government took over the student loan programs in 2009. Not quite sharp enough to understand the significance of their answers, Cong. Walters plowed ahead, oblivious, as she is in so many cases, to reality. BY JOHN SHAFFER The Mueller probe into possible means used by Russia to interfere in the 2016 presidential election via the Trump campaign lasted over two years, and for that entire period of time, as various Congressional committees found no such interference using the Trump campaign, the Democrats told one and all to “wait for the Mueller report,” “the Mueller report will be the final word,” or similar sentiments. Of course, at that time they fully expected that the Mueller report would show some type of malevolent relationship between the Trump campaign and Russia, and this gave them confidence that the Mueller report would be the blow that brought down the Trump administration. (And this is as good time as any for an aside – it was not only committees in the previous, Republican-led, Congress that refuted and invalidated the claim that the Russians changed the outcome of the election, but also several prominent Democrats, namely President Obama, Vice President Biden, Minority Leader Pelosi, Attorney General Lynch and Homeland Security Secretary Johnson, all of whom said that very thing.)
Lo and behold, when the Mueller report finally emerged, it completely cleared the Trump campaign of coordinating or conspiring with Russia (let’s face it, if the Mueller team couldn’t find any “collusion” after looking for about two years, there probably wasn’t any to find). That should have been the end of it, and might have been, except the Mueller report also discussed “obstruction of justice” charges. Now the facts that Mr. Mueller served his full term as Special Counsel and that his report was issued, indicates that the President did not obstruct his report. The fact that a report was issued is pretty good evidence that the subject of the report did not keep it from seeing the light of day. Mr. Mueller, for reasons that are baffling, discussed obstruction by saying that he could not make a determination as to whether the President’s conduct was obstructive; the report did not exonerate him nor did it charge him. The President’s enemies are making a big deal of the fact that the report did not “exonerate” him, but when has such a report ever “exonerated” anyone? That is not how such investigations work. Either the investigator(who had the power to indict and charge) finds enough evidence to bring a charge, or he does not. If he does find it, he makes the charge; if he doesn’t, he does not charge – but his purpose is not to “exonerate” but to investigate for the purpose of charging whatever crimes are discovered. The fact that Mr. Mueller neither charged nor indicted should be enough to convince anyone, not that Mr. Trump is “a good guy,” or “clean,” or “exonerated,” or “innocent,” but only that he was not charged. The typical language is that “there was no evidence” or “we were unable to make a charge,” not, “he is innocent.” There is a school of thought that says that Mr. Mueller was constrained by a legal opinion that a sitting president cannot be charged with obstruction of justice and therefore he explicitly left it up to Congress to do so – but we think what Mr. Mueller said was that Congress has the power to rewrite the laws to cover such a contingency that could arise in the future; not that he was kicking this specific case to Congress for it to look into the specifics of the charge against this president. BY JOHN SHAFFER There is a saying, “Where there’s life, there’s hope,” and although it may have been intended as an articulation of a never-give-up spirit, it also describes the attitude of those who oppose abortion, which includes the present author. We see abortion as “stilling a beating heart,” and that is the basis of a spate of recent legislation either passed or under consideration in Georgia, Mississippi, Louisiana, Missouri, Alabama, and Ohio, among other states. Those bills generally would ban abortions in instances where the unborn child’s heartbeat is detected. The bills typically protect the mother in that she would not be prosecuted for the abortion (although the abortionist would be). There also are exceptions for the life of the mother. These measures are in response to the spate of legislation earlier this year in states such as New York, New Mexico, Rhode Island, Virginia and Hawaii, among others, that would legalize abortion up to the moment of birth – and perhaps immediately afterwards.
Up until the US Supreme Court’s 1973 decisions of Roe v. Wade (which legalized abortion up to the point of viability) and Doe v. Bolton (which effectively legalized it after viability), all of those state legislatures would have have the power to decide – the progressive states such as New York or Rhode Island could have abortion on demand, and the conservative states such as Mississippi or Louisiana could have restricted the practice. Those freedoms ended when the Court effectively federalized the issue, and over 50 million aborted babies later, the issue is no less emotional, passionate and intense than it was 46 years ago. The 1973 Court may have hoped that by deciding in favor of abortion, the issue would be unchallengeable and thus less politically charged. However, the issue of abortion, more it seems than any other twenty issues combined, has turned each US Judicial nomination into a potential battleground, and has sharpened the partisanship and anger in Congress, the Courts, and America. The political left has opposed any restriction on abortion and has sought to pass laws that secure the practice; and the political right has opposed any extension of abortion, and has sought to pass laws to limit abortion; and each side fights tooth and nail for or against court nominees based on their opinion on abortion, or their likelihood of overturning Roe or Doe. BY JOHN SHAFFER One trait that is common to Americans is pride in America. At least it always was a common trait, until recent years, when the progressive left, heady on its injection of political correctness, found their nation’s flaws to be greater than its attributes. It used to be that practically everyone, from schoolchildren to the aged, from all races and beliefs, from all occupations and all origins, had an understanding that America was a force for good, a beacon for freedom, and an engine of enterprise and liberty. There existed a core of prominent Americans whom all of us agreed were “great,” and even though Americans knew that none of those “greats” were perfect, everyone appreciated their contributions, which, in combination with the ordinary, unspectacular efforts and sacrifices of millions of individuals, made America a great nation.
But nowadays, not everyone agrees that America is a “great” nation, deserving of respect. A significant number of prominent Democrats don’t think so. Pete Buttigieg says, “America was never as great as advertised.” New York Governor Andrew Cuomo says, “America was never great.” Congressperson Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez laments that she “never experienced prosperity in her adult life” (a period of time that includes the Obama years). Former Attorney General Eric Holder asks sarcastically, “When do you think America was great?” Former First Lady Michelle Obama said that she had never been as proud of America as when her husband won the Presidential nomination. Her pride lasted the eight years of his administration, and since then she has expressed the opinion that we have reverted from greatness. Even President Trump, whose slogan “Make America Great Again” implies that America’s greatness has not been constant, may be guilty of selling America short. BY JOHN SHAFFER The realization that Jihadists were at war with America, even if America wasn’t at war with them, came with a shocking abruptness on September 11, 2001, so much so that the phrase “everything changed after September 11” (or some variant thereof) has melded into the popular consciousness. But there is another date on which “everything changed,” and if we are not well aware of the specific date of the change (November 8, 2016), we all should be cognizant of the effect that took place when Donald Trump was elected President of the United States. Not so much for the changes he made, for Barack Obama, George Bush, Bill Clinton, Ronald Reagan, Jimmy Carter, John Kennedy and almost every other President made his share of changes; but more for the reaction to Mr. Trump’s election. That is where big changes were made, for many things that were barely noticed during the Obama years (such as “children in cages” at the border, or illegal immigrant “families being separated”) suddenly became the moral equivalent of war crimes in the eyes of the progressive left, which, we emphasize, was very little concerned about the issue if at all, prior to his election.
A similar phenomenon concerns the Trump administration’s desire to inquire of the citizenship of respondents to the 2020 US Census. Well, not citizenship per se, but specifically, “Are you a citizen of the United States?” That question, or a variant, was asked in almost every census from 1850 to 1950 (including those years when millions of LEGAL immigrants passed through Ellis Island and other places). In 1850 and 1860 respondents were asked to give their place of birth. In 1870 a citizenship question was asked, evidently for the purpose of learning if emancipated slaves were being given the rights due to them. Starting in 1900, the form asked if the respondent was a native-born citizen, a naturalized citizen, or a non-citizen. This continued through 1950. The form had grown to be quite long and intrusive, so at the next census, 1960, that question was dropped, along with many others, in order to make the form easier to use, fill out, and record. As our population expanded and the government’s thirst for information grew, the form was divided into long and short versions. The short version, which did not include a citizenship question, went to about 80% of the population. The long form, which went to about 20%, did ask the citizenship question. BY JOHN SHAFFER With their numbers already above the one score mark, it isn’t surprising that another Democrat has announced his candidacy for President, but the way that Mr. Joe Biden announced was especially unusual. The announcement was delayed a few days and instead of a splashy debut in Charlottesville, Virginia, the former Vice-President and Senator instead made a previously recorded video/internet announcement at 6 am on Friday, followed by a fawning “interview” on the View, where Democrats never have to fear an unsafe question. His “first public” appearance as a candidate came on Monday in Pittsburgh, arranged to display “blue-collar Joe” as he sees himself – champion of the workingman, etc.
We are more interested, however, in his taped announcement and his interview, because in them he told what in more civilized times were known as lies. The bulk of his video announcement had to do with the “riot” at Charlottesville, caused by a largely unsupervised clash between white supremacists on one side and on the other, thugs from Antifa and other violent groups from the far left. These two groups hijacked what would otherwise have been a peaceful demonstration by people who objected to the removal of a statue of Robert E. Lee, and by people who thought the statue should be removed. Sadly, those peaceful people were overwhelmed by others whose opinion on the statue was merely a shoehorn for a violent demonstration. Sadly, one of the peaceful opponents of the statue was killed when struck by an automobile driven by a white supremacist who was fleeing violent left-wing thugs. Sadly, Mr. Biden chose to lie about what President Trump said about that day’s events. BY JOHN SHAFFER The Mueller report has been released, and what were the conclusions of the Special Counsel on his investigation of the possible relationship between the Trump campaign and the Russians who sought to interfere with the 2016 election? Let us begin with this quote: “. . .the investigation did not establish that the Trump campaign coordinated with the Russian government in its election interference activities.” Although the report explains the reason it does not use the term “collusion,” that is the word that the Democrats, the news media and the never-Trump Republicans have been using for more than two years to describe Mr. Trump’s supposed offenses; the report makes crystal clear that there was no coordination, and there was no “collusion.” The actual words of the report can be (and are being) parsed for various nuances to bolster or to undercut various contentions that have been made by various people since late 2016 – but here is the most important point: Special Counsel Mueller did not charge or indict Donald Trump or any of his associates for “collusion” to interfere with the 2016 election. If Mr. Mueller had believed he could have made such a case, he would have made it. And let us also remember that under our system of justice, accused persons are considered innocent until proven guilty, no matter how much Adam Schiff, Jerry Nadler, and Chuck Schumer may believe that President Trump has to prove himself innocent.
Mr. Mueller also did not find the president guilty of obstructing justice. Oh, he listed ten or eleven instances that in the minds of his investigators could have possibly been considered to have been construed as some form of obstruction, but, again – Mr. Mueller did not so charge nor did he recommend that such charges be made. He had his chance, and he did not charge, he did not indict, he did not arrest. Under our justice system, one can’t be found guilty without a trial, and one can’t be tried without a charge, and if one isn’t charged. . .well, you get the idea. While Mr. Trump might not have been “exonerated” by the investigation, he also was not “convicted” by it. Mr. Mueller left that part out. BY JOHN SHAFFER Last week we referred to a few of the ideas that the Democrat candidates for president have been floating to outbid their fellow candidates. These include "free" everything it seems, from health care, child care, day care and college to guaranteed parental leave, vacations, jobs, and don't worry, whatever else one of them comes up with to pander to this or or that group, another of them will top it with an even wilder proposal.
The peculiar thing about all of that is that none of the candidates, including those who held office for decades, have objected to much of it. One would think that the best way to differentiate oneself from the pack would be to espouse or emphasize something that would highlight the differences, but they all seem determined to do what college kids did 100 years ago, 50 years ago, 20 years ago, and today: that is, prove their non-conformity by conforming to those around them. It is beyond us why one of the candidates hasn't been wise enough to call out the enormously expensive, economically foolish, counter-productive, and just plain harmful proposals, and to stand up for the policies, attitudes, and values that made America the great country it is. Candidates have always managed to find things wrong with current policies without chucking the whole structure away, but the current crop seems intent on radical transformation that would leave us with a completely different system, and would guarantee everything. Too bad not even one of those Democrats has the good sense to ask where the money comes from when our tax rates hit 70% and employers have to pay $15 an hour and grant multiple other goodies, and the government somehow makes up the difference; and we still have to maintain an Army, Navy, and Air Force, highways, parks, a court system, and all those other things government does. As Margaret Thatcher is supposed to have said, socialism works until one runs out of other people's money. And while a lot of these proposals might not be "pure socialism," they definitely trend in that direction, and enlarge the public sector by shrinking the private sector. We are hopeful that at least one will tell the others that all of those wish lists are impossible, but so far our hopes have been unrealized. BY JOHN SHAFFER "Tradition" is a fine old Broadway song, but to the modern progressive, its disqualifying word would be "old." And they pretty much have the same complaint about some key parts of our system of government --they're just so OLD!
Examples abound, but just as the candidates for the Democratic party's nomination for president are scrambling to outflank each other by proposing more and more giveaways and free stuff (including, but not limited to, health care, child care, day care, college, vacations, parental leave, abortion, guaranteed employment, no border walls - including the removal of the onesie already have), they also are outdoing each other on which Constitutional provision they would eliminate first. This reminds us of another Broadway song, "Anything You Can Do I Can Do Better." The various candidates want to eliminate the Electoral College; recast the Senate to reflect population; modify the First Amendment, the Second Amendment, and various other parts of the Bill of Rights; and probably a lot more. All this because their chosen candidate didn't win in 2016. BY JOHN SHAFFER Special Counsel Robert Mueller has released his report on his investigation of the accusation that President Trump colluded with Russia to sway the 2016 election, and has delivered that report to Attorney General William Barr, who has released a four-page summary of said report.
Here is the most important point: “The Special Counsel’s investigation did not find that the Trump campaign or anyone associated with it conspired or coordinated with Russia in its efforts to influence the 2016 presidential election.” Well, we guess that means exactly what it said, and that if after an investigation that lasted 22 months, employed 19 lawyers, assisted by 40 FBI agents, intelligence analysts, forensic accountants and other professional staff; that issued over 2,800 subpoenas, executed nearly 500 search warrants, obtained more than 230 orders for communication records, issued almost 50 orders authorizing use of pen registers; made 13 requests to foreign governments for evidence, and interviewed approximately 500 witness, couldn’t find any evidence of conspiracy or coordination with the Trump campaign and Russia that there was no conspiracy or coordination between the Trump campaign and Russia. All of those Democrats, news media types, and Obama administration officials who declared that not only was there “collusion” but that they had seen evidence of it should be explaining why the Mueller team somehow managed to miss whatever it was that they saw. And most of those folks continue to believe, with a faith that truly is defined as the “substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.” Well, the Book of Hebrews wasn’t referring to the Mueller report, but that verse sure fits the tenacious way the Democrats et al continue to cling to their belief that “Trump bad” and therefore “Trump colluded.” They all hoped for it, and, bless their little old hearts, they continue to hope for it even after no evidence has been found after 22 months, 19 lawyers, 40 FBI agents, etc. etc., etc. BY JOHN SHAFFER The mass murder by a white racist who killed 50 people at two mosques in Christchurch, New Zealand has prompted more calls for gun confiscation or bans. Of course, the President of the United States is being blamed for the incident because the murderer called President Trump “a symbol of renewed white identity.” The President has issued a statement in support of the victims and for the people of New Zealand.
The killer also said that he hated conservatives and was not one, and also was disparaging of blacks, but when he sarcastically claimed that black conservative Candace Owens was one of his inspirations, the left failed to see that he was spoofing and being provocative, and blamed her for the attack as well. The killer certainly hated Muslims, but according to the manifesto he published online, he hated a lot more, and killing Muslims was not his only motive. He claims to be an “eco-fascist,” is a huge believer in “global warming,” warns of the dangers of “overpopulation,” and says that communist China is his “ideal state.” He intentionally chose his weapons for the purpose of causing disruption in the United States, hoping to provoke politicians to call for confiscating weapons, thus leading to armed resistance and a civil war; and it goes one step further – he wanted that civil war in order to divide America racially and regionally, hoping that it so weakens our nation as to prevent the US from defending its interests. |
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