Wednesday, February 28, 2018

Rethinking Watergate

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Victor Davis Hanson  "The Watergate break-in is now 45 years old. The scandal is as distant from our own time as it was once from 1928. The median age of Americans is about 38 years old. Half of all Americans were likely born after the break-in. But Watergate is hardly ancient history.


"The fumes of Watergate waft around the current FISA-gate scandal. The now septuagenarians Carl Bernstein and Bob Woodward, of All the President’s Men fame, are back in the news. As seasoned crusading reporters, they currently offer admonitions that Donald Trump is replaying the role of a supposedly paranoid and imperious Richard Nixon.
"But is he? The two investigative journalists who first brought Watergate to public attention are certainly not wrong about parallels—but not in the way they imagine. FISA-gate is becoming Watergate turned upside down. The respective roles of the government, liberal Democrats, civil libertarians, and the White House are now reversed—and this turnaround is, in a strange way, redefining Watergate itself.
"In 1973-74, civil libertarians were shocked at White House efforts to use the CIA to suppress information about the break-in at the Watergate complex and the subsequent efforts to hide or misrepresent it. They were rightly outraged that the Nixon reelection campaign broke the law in efforts to find dirt on Democrats. They were incredulous that the White House used hush money to silence those charged with the crime, and to hide the origins and transference of such payments.
"In 2018, however, the FBI and the CIA were said to have good reason to have once trafficked in purchased campaign dirt. The Clinton campaign in 2016 paid a private law firm and Fusion/GPS consultants millions of dollars for myths supplied by the Russians to create pejorative fantasies about Trump-Russian collusion. Clinton-paid Fusion/GPS operatives, then sought to plant and authenticate their wild stories with the FBI, the State Department, perhaps the CIA, and certainly sympathetic news organizations. Only by dogged subpoenas and lawsuits has the public discovered who commissioned the Trump dossier, or how it was manipulated to obtain court-approved surveillance of American citizens." . . .
Full article at the Hoover Institution

Report: Deputies Were TOLD Not To Go Into High School



"Fox News’ Laura Ingraham reported Monday that Broward County deputies were told not to go into Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School during the mass shooting earlier this month.
"The alleged reason? They didn’t have any body cameras with them.
“ 'Now, our sources near the Broward County sheriff’s department are telling us that the deputies who arrived at the scene of the shooting were told not to enter the school unless their body cameras were turned on, and then we found out that the deputies did not have body cameras so they did not enter the building or engage the shooter,” Ingraham said.
“ 'Curiously, police also lost radio communications during the parkland shooting. And our source claims that radio communication also went dead during the Fort Lauderdale airport shooting in 2017 that he also got a lot of criticism for.” (RELATED: Broward County Deputy Scot Peterson: I Am Not A ‘Coward’)
"Ingraham did not say who issued the order to not go into the school."

In Case It Wasn’t Obvious, Major Progressive Anti-Gun Groups Are Pushing Parkland Kids Behind Scenes

Weasel Zippers

"But you’re not allowed to criticize them because, kids. Debbie Wasserman Schultz met with them the day after the shooting and arranged their trip to protest in Tallahassee and she’s been advising them on “communications strategy.”
Several large progressive organizations, donors, and a high-powered public relations firm are backing the March for Our Lives movement, which is quickly evolving from a student-run social media effort to end gun violence into one backed by some of the most influential activists in the country.
In the days after the shooting in Parkland, Florida, that killed 17 people, the teenage survivors of Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School were impossible to ignore. They blanketed cable news coverage, built a massive following on social media, and began to organize a rally in the country’s capital in support of gun reform.
Barely two weeks ago, the student survivors sat in a circle in the living room of one of their parents’ homes, planning a trip to Tallahassee to meet with lawmakers and handling nitty-gritty matters like which media outlets to talk to.
Since then, major players and organizations — including Everytown, Giffords, Move On, Planned Parenthood, and the Women’s March LA — told BuzzFeed News they are helping the students with logistics, strategy, and planning for next month’s March for Our Lives rally and beyond. Much of the specific resources the groups are providing to the Parkland students remains unclear — as is the full list of supporting organizations — but there are broad outlines.
The Parkland Teens Fighting For Gun Control Have The Backing Of These Huge Organizing Groups
. . . "AFT, as well as the growing contingent of organizations backing the student-led march, are working to cultivate and build upon the movement after the rally. Weingarten noted that the groups are also behind the “National School Walkout” taking place in April to commemorate the 20th anniversary of Columbine.
"After that, she says the goal is to carry that momentum until November — with some of the students already using the hashtag #VoteThemOut.
. . . "In addition to the millions of dollars raised by A-list celebrities including Oprah, George and Amal Clooney, Steven Spielberg, and Jeffrey Katzenberg, the March for Our Lives GoFundMepage has raised an additional $2.7 million as of Tuesday.
"Some of the highest GoFundMe donations have come from philanthropists such as Jeff Raikes — the former CEO of the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation — and his wife, Tricia, as well as Chris and Camille Bently, who run the Bently Foundation, which supports organizations in the areas of the environment, the arts, and animal welfare, according to its website.
. . . 
"Actress Sara Ramirez — best known for her role in Grey's Anatomy — donated $20,000 to the GoFundMe page.
"Ramirez, a vocal LGBTQ activist was inspired by the students, especially Emma Gonzalez, the actor's spokesperson told BuzzFeed News.
" 'Sara often supports other activists’ work on many issues especially those affecting the LGBTQ community, people of color, and those focused on improving the lives of our youth," the spokesperson said.
"Aaron Levie, the founder of the cloud company Box, who has been vocal on Twitter about the work the student survivors have been doing, donated $10,000, telling BuzzFeed News he won't be able to join the march on Washington but will be supporting the students from afar."
. . . "Since then, major players and organizations — including Everytown, Giffords, Move On, Planned Parenthood, and the Women’s March LA — told BuzzFeed News they are helping the students with logistics, strategy, and planning for next month’s March for Our Lives rally and beyond."
Political Cartoons by Gary Varvel

Nothing could embarrass Obama or his supporters


Jack Hellner  Entire article posted here. Quoting:

Former president Obama actually said the following at his secret MIT speech, according to the transcript obtained by Reason magazine: "We didn't have a scandal that embarrassed us.  I know that seems like a low bar."
It seems as though Obama set a tremendously high bar as to what would embarrass him.
It should have been embarrassing to Obama and his supporters when:
He continually lied by saying you could keep your doctor and your health plan and that premiums would go down when Obamacare passed.
He had a gun-running operation called Fast and Furious, where the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms, and Explosives lost track of over 2,000 guns it allowed to be sold to Mexican drug cartels and people died.  Obama claimed he had no idea about the project but claimed executive privilege to hide documents.
His IRS targeted political opponents, violating their free speech and freedom of association rights granted by the Constitution.
He sicced his Justice Department goons on the Little Sisters of the Poor, suing them for daring to believe they had religious freedom.
Planned Parenthood personnel were caught bragging that they crunched and crushed babies for profit.  Somehow, Obama, the media, and other Democrats didn't have any empathy for the babies and weren't embarrassed at all about this appalling practice.  Nor did they do anything to hold Planned Parenthood accountable, ignoring the law.
He left people to die in Libya while he and Hillary concocted a lie to protect their political power.  He even lied to the families of those who died and had Susan Rice continually lie to the public, showing that he and Hillary have zero empathy for those who died and their families.  His minions arrested and imprisoned a man they knowingly falsely blamed for an anti-Mohammed video.  And people say Trump has no empathy and doesn't discharge his duties as president.
He allowed Russia top get control of 20% of the U.S. uranium supply despite knowing about corrupt practices that manipulated the Russian access to the resources and how dangerous they were.  He allowed Hillary and her foundation to get massive kickbacks while being his secretary of state.
He allowed Hillary to continually violate the nation's security laws through her secret and unauthorized private server, situated in some guy's bathroom.  He lied when he claimed he didn't know because he actually emailed her at it under a fake name.
He and his administration continually lied to get the Iran deal done and even paid Iran's brutal mullahs a $1.7-billion ransom.
He let officials who worked for him – Attorney General Eric Holder; intelligence majordomos James Clapper and John Brennan; national security adviser Susan Rice; and FBI director James Comey, who committed perjury – off with no repercussions.
He had intelligence agencies illegally spy on thousands of Americans for years.
He had Attorneys General Eric Holder and Loretta Lynch do exactly as they were instructed, even when his orders crossed legal lines.  They failed to enforce immigration laws and never seriously investigated Hillary or the IRS.
He continually said he couldn't constitutionally change immigration laws unilaterally and did it anyway.
His attorney general, Lynch, met privately with Bill Clinton a few days before a pretend FBI interview with Hillary, in secret, out on a tarmac in Arizona.
His FBI director exonerated Hillary and her aides with a rigged investigation.  It was considered only a disciplinary matter.
He had staffers illegally unmask names and illegally leak conversations of innocent American political opponents caught up in intelligence surveillance dragnets under laws that were designed to protect them.
He had the FBI illegally spy on Donald Trump and his associates based on a fake dossier funded by the Democratic National Committee and Democratic presidential nominee Hillary Clinton.
He wrote regulations as fast as he could on climate change based on inaccurate computer models.  An intelligent person would have been ashamed that the global warming fear-mongers continually manipulated data when the data didn't match the predictions, but not Obama.  He continually said the science is settled and that people who said in all honesty that the climate had always changed naturally and cyclically should not be listened to.  He even had Loretta Lynch threaten legal action against those who dared disagree with him.
It is just so hard to think of any scandals under Obama that he and his supporters should be embarrassed about.  I am sure I have left off some.
It is easy to go through eight years and claim no scandals with a complicit media supporting him no matter what he did, along with a compromised and politicized Justice Department that was just as corrupt and partisan as its president.
If I were Obama, I would be embarrassed that I increased spending rapidly, ran up the public debt by $10 trillion, had a Federal Reserve that injected trillions and kept interest rates at near zero, and produced the slowest economic recovery in seventy years.  He thinks he did well because the supportive media and Democrats continually told him how smart he was and how well he did.
He's either deluded or lying – again.
End quote.


Trump-haters' karma coming due as White House Correspondents' Dinner loses its parties


Thomas Lifson "Hatefulness is not a good look, and face it: the White House Correspondents Association annual dinner is all about appearances.  Over the past two decades, the event, misleadingly nicknamed "The Nerd Prom" – as if the journalists were comparable wizards to the high-tech elite – has featured parades of Hollywood celebrities attending as guests of mainstream media outlets and adding glamour."


"But with Hollywood under a shroud of guilt over rampant sexual abuse and with hatred toward the president the dominant emotion, the fun quotient is tending in the direction of visiting a dentist to have a tooth pulled.  Last year, President Trump chose not to attend and allow himself to be verbally abused, and that started to kill off the glamour.  This year could be even worse."
. . . 
"Quite clearly, there is only one person who can save the evening: President Donald Trump.  I love the irony!  And I wouldn't put it past the president to shock everyone and attend, just to exercise the power he has, and maybe mess with the heads of his MSM foes.  Imagine  the tweets he could send out about his decision, tormenting the media swells.  Maybe something along the lines of "Media people who hate and denigrate me are now desperate for me to attend WHCA dinner.  Not sure I want to go and be insulted.' " . . .

"Media people"? I assume he means people like this?



The Parkland teens and the media feed off each other now


From National Review: David Hogg Is Fair Game for Critics
"The Parkland survivor has chosen to insert himself into an important national policy debate. We who disagree with his views on guns have a duty to speak up against them."
. . . " For this advocacy — and that’s what it is — Hogg has been feted as a key leader within a “mass movement” that is determined to reform America; he has been praised for his attempt to “force change”; he has been cast, including by himself, as a lion who refuses to back down; and, in some of the more cunning quarters of the left, he has been turned into a walking demonstration of the need to lower the voting age. At no point has anyone hosting him suggested that his relevance is limited to his capacity to describe his experience; rather, he has in every instance been asked to join a public political fight — a fight, remember, that relates to nothing less foundational than the American Bill of Rights." . . .
"Even worse has been Hogg’s attitude toward those who have had the temerity to disagree with him." 
The peculiar case of David Hogg exposes media incompetence  "Is David Hogg, the post-Florida shooting media darling, the real deal or a Leftist plant? The New York Times provides no facts to help answer that question."

Parkland Kids: The Return of the Grieving Activist  . . . There's something truly reprehensible about this situation, and it's not conservatives criticizing the positions of activist Parkland students such as David Hogg and Emma Gonzalez.  It's that liberals are using the students as human props and human shields, letting them throw the punches and then condemning the assailed if they dare defend themselves." . . .
"But my sympathy for grieving ends when the use of grief as a political battering ram begins."

Student School Massacre Survivors 
and CBS Reporter Party Like Rock Stars   "Shocking photos posted to Twitter of a CBS News reporter and students who survived last Wednesday's high school massacre in Parkland, Florida, that killed seventeen students and faculty, show the reporter and students laughing uproariously and posing for the photos like they are partying rock stars. The photos, featuring CBS reporter Gisela Perez  (wearing yellow) and the students, were posted by CBS This Morning staffer Caroline West and student activist Cameron Kasky."

Obama to Skip Billy Graham Memorial Services

"Obama got in trouble with the left for tweeting out nice things about Graham when he died, so he’s not about to go to his funeral and catch more flack"   . . . "All living US presidents sent their regards to the Graham family, and at least three current or former Presidents will be attending funeral services for Graham. " . . .

CNS News  "Former President Barack Obama is not planning to attend memorial services for the late evangelist Rev. Billy Graham this week.


"Obama's office disclosed the former president's plans Monday, Yahoo! News reports, noting Graham’s support of desegregation and close ties to Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.:
“In 1952, he stopped segregating his crusades and began a friendship with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.”
"Former President George W. Bush paid his respects to Graham, who is lying in repose at the Graham Family Homeplace in Charlotte, NC, on Monday. President Donald Trump plans to attend Graham’s funeralservices in Charlotte on Friday.
"While president, Obama visited Graham in 2010 at his North Carolina retreat."
How Rev. Billy Graham fought for Civil Rights  "When the Rev. Billy Graham brought his large Crusade gatherings to the South in the 1950s, he was alarmed at what he saw: Ropes segregating white and black worshipers.
“ 'I was appalled at it and decided I had to speak out on it,” Graham says in a video discussing his work to advance Civil Rights. “I said, ‘No more of this.’ I went to the head usher and asked him if he would remove the ropes.'”  
"When the usher refused, Graham took the ropes down himself. The usher resigned in a huff, but Graham’s stand led to a friendship with the Rev. Martin Luther King Jr."
Below: screen grab only:


Exposing Mr. Trump for the type of person he really is!



Reddit  Examples of Trump being a HUGE JERK!TREMENDOUS!
Trump stops a bat-wielding mugger.
Trump takes over construction of ice rink in NYC's Central Park, saving Christmas.
Trump rescues a child with a rare illness on his private jet.
List of charities Trump has donated to.
Trump hires the first woman to be put in charge of building a skyscraper.
Trump writes a $25,000 check to a Marine who was jailed in Mexico.
Trump's butler describes him as "extremely generous."
...and more!