The Democrats Won’t Find a Savior in Michael Bloomberg

Conrad Black

The former New York City mayor should not imagine the country is waiting for him, or that the anti-Trump sniggering of the Upper East Side and the Hamptons has the least connection to the broader American electorate.

     "The best aspect of Michael Bloomberg’s potential presidential run is that if he were elected, we may be reasonably confident that he would be a competent president, which should be an immense relief to anyone who takes seriously the possibility that any of the four remaining Democratic candidates with appreciable support—Joe Biden, Elizabeth Warren, Bernie Sanders and Pete Buttigieg—could be elected.

     "On a previous presidential campaign, Biden cribbed a silly assertion by Neil Kinnock, the leader of the British opposition at the time, and he joined enthusiastically in Teddy Kennedy’s crucifixion of President Reagan’s outstanding Supreme Court nominee Robert Bork. He has much to answer for in Ukraine, and is a seriously unimpressive candidate. It gets worse from there.

     "Senator Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) is everyone’s nightmare of a nasty kindergarten teacher, terrorizing the class with a wooden spoon. She is a quasi-Marxist who lied about her ethnicity to advance her career, lied about being fired for pregnancy, and she advocates impossible policies—especially in health care—that would not work and could not be financed. She can’t tell the truth, in words or numbers, and the United States is not a Marxist country.

     "Senator Bernie Sanders (D-Vt.—until he switches back to independent) is a cranky old Communist, but one who believes in free elections; he endlessly proclaims fatuous revolutions in a manner as irritating in content as it is acoustically. Pete Buttigieg is the indifferent mayor of an under-achieving town. He is advancing the gay cause but is the personification of glibness. But he would be a completely infeasible president.

The Most Sensible of the Lot

     "Given this fearsome drought, it is small wonder that Michael Bloomberg is coming down with Potomac Fever again. He built an immense and magnificent commercial news business from scratch; his career is one of the most illustrious of any businessman or industrialist now living. He was, on balance, an excellent mayor of New York. He promoted charter schools, showing some appreciation of the ruination of state schools accomplished by the teachers’ unions, who have turned a huge number of schools into crime-ridden day-care centers that don’t teach anything useful and waste billions of dollars. His “stop and frisk” authorization to police reduced crime in New York, which justified the disagreeable infringement of human liberties, and demonstrates that alone among the possible serious Democratic contenders, he is prepared to dissent from oppressive political correctness." . . .

Why Bloomberg’s presidential run doesn’t have a hope in hell  . . "Now Bloomberg is testing the waters as a Democratic presidential candidate in 2020. But there’s a reason no New York City mayor gets to move up to a higher office, ever, and Bloomberg embodies it: He has annoyed far too many people. My fellow conservatives despise him because of his loud support for abortion and gun control and his unabashed nanny-statism. (Bloomberg cheerfully played Mary Poppins at the Inner Circle show for politicians and journalists.) Meanwhile, liberals hate him because of his loud support for stop-and-frisk programs and because he loves capitalism and Wall Street, not to mention the Iraq War.

"Furthermore, in a Democratic Party that genuflects before the altar of political correctness, he seems almost Trumpishly insensitive. " . . .

Rep. Stefanik Reads Out Loud the Many Times Schiff Said the Whistleblower Would Testify

News Thud 

 "On day 2 of the impeachment hearings, GOP Rep. Stefanik attempted to expose hypocrisy on the part of House Intel Chair Adam Schiff by reading out loumultiple times he said he’d have the whistleblower would testify.
"Sept 24th, Schiff tweeted:

"We have been informed by the whistleblower’s counsel that their client would like to speak to our committee and has requested guidance from the Acting DNI as to how to do so."We‘re in touch with counsel and look forward to the whistleblower’s testimony as soon as this week.

Dem Senator Warner Comes Clean: Trump Unlike Obama Let Us Punch Back At Russia, Use Offensive Cyber Capabilities

Obama, like the kid afraid of the schoolyard bully, gave America's adversaries our lunch money ahead of time in the hope they wouldn't bother us. TD

NewsThud   "In a stunning admission a top Democrat in the Senate, Mark Warner, told the truth about how tough Trump has been on our adversaries, including Russia, while contrasting how weak Obama and Bush were.
"Will the mainstream media pick this up and run it 24/7? No, because it shatters their neat and mostly false narrative about Trump.
"The truth, according to Warner, is that Trump deserves credit for unleashing our ability to punch back and hit Russia and China when they overstep with certain cyber actions.
"Quotes From The Daily Wire:
"“There are two main issues: There is the integrity of the election infrastructure, and then there’s the disinformation campaigns,” Hoover said. “In your view, which is more important?”
"“I think they’re equally important and I think we have gotten better in both areas,” Warner responded.  “To give the Trump administration some credit here, [they allowed] for us to punch back in the cyber domain, which, both under Obama and Bush, we were reluctant to do.”
“ 'You just said you want to give the Trump administration credit for going on the offense in the cyber domain,” Hoover responded."

“There are reports that, in 2018, the United States took an offensive posture in cyber and actually was able to shut down Russian troll farms.”

Vile: George Conway Attacks Rep. Elise Stefanik, Calls Her ‘Lying Trash’

But even that was mild compared to the person who really flipped out, George Conway, the Never Trump husband of Kellyanne Conway, whose hatred of Trump is well-known. He lost it on her completely, calling her “lying trash.”

RedState  "Rep. Elise Stefanik (R-NY) really lit it up with great questions of former Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch on Friday.

"Folks on the right praised her persistence, having to deal with the efforts of House Intel Committee Chair Adam Schiff (D-CA) trying to shut her down when she was yielded time by Rep. Devin Nunes (R-CA), the ranking member, and then bringing out two great points when she had her own time questioning – that under the Obama administration, U.S. officials had concerns and asked questions about Hunter Biden and Burisma and defensive lethal aid was provided to Ukraine not by the Obama Administration, but by the Trump Administration.  . . ."

But the true measure of how well she did was how angry the left was in response and how she was trashed by those on the left. Literally. Here’s Lawfare Executive Editor and CNN legal analyst Susan Hennessey saying that Stefanik had “trashed” her reputation.

Dem Leader: Give Trump Credit, He’s Done More to ‘Punch Back’ at Russia Than Bush, Obama . . . "Consequently   I feel like, for many years, particularly our near-peer adversaries, like Russia and China — they were able to attack America in the cyber domain with very little fear of us punching back,” Warner concluded on the issue. “I think we’ve taken off some of those restraints. I think that is good, long term. We need to realize these challenges, particularly in the cyber domain, will be where the first shots of 21st century conflict will take place." ” . . .

Elise Stefanik Stood Out on Day One of the Impeachment Hearings

National Review
The New York congresswoman was clearly the strongest Republican questioner of the day.

"Representative Elise Stefanik of New York earned high marks for her questioning of U.S. diplomats on Wednesday, the first day of public impeachment hearings.

"Bloomberg View columnist Eli Lake called Stefanik’s questioning “very impressive.” Fox News anchor Bret Baier agreed, as did former Obama administration official Michael McFaul and CNBC’s John Harwood. “None of them has much to work with, but Elise Stefanik is most effective GOP questioner by a wide margin,” Harwood tweeted.

"Stefanik opened her remarks by making two simple points: “Number one, Ukraine received the aid,” and “number two, there was in fact no investigation into Biden.” It was a concise, coherent “no harm, no foul” defense stronger than other arguments Trump’s allies have made, even if Democrats responded by pointing out that attempted murder and attempted robbery are still crimes. Then Stefanik emerged as the committee’s most effective anti-impeachment messenger in questioning U.S. diplomat George Kent about corruption at Burisma, the gas company that paid Joe Biden’s son, Hunter, $50,000 a month to sit on its board." . . .

Media criticizes Elise Stefanik during hearing after praising Warren's 'Nevertheless, she persisted' moment " 'This is the fifth time you have interrupted a duly-elected member of Congress," Stefanik told Schiff, who repeatedly told her she was "not recognized" to speak. 
"But as the sole GOP congresswoman on the committee continued to speak, Schiff slammed down the gavel: "The gentlewoman will suspend.' " . . .

Republican Rep. Stefanik Finally Allowed To Question Yovanovitch, And It’s Highly Effective "Republican New York Rep. Elise Stefanik was finally able to get her questioning in of former Ukraine Ambassador Marie Yovanovitch on Friday afternoon, after being repeatedly shut down from speaking by House Intelligence Committee Chairman Rep. Adam Schiff (D-CA).
"The effective questioning from Ms. Stefanik acted to underscore the fact that ambassadors serve at the pleasure of the president, to emphasize the Biden family’s shady business dealings within Ukraine, and finally, to highlight President Donald Trump’s support of Ukraine, particularly in relation to the lack of support provided under the Obama administration.
“Stefanik asked Yovanovitch to confirm that she believes she ‘serves at the pleasure of the president’ and that she is still an employee of the State Department on leave as a fellow at Georgetown. Yovanovitch did,” The Washington Post outlined." . . .

Ian Macfarlane

Colbert Writer Who Said ‘I’m Just Glad We Ruined Brett Kavanaugh’s Life’ Promoted to ‘Late Show’ Head Writer

KTRH  740AM

Jerome Hudson is Breitbart News Entertainment Editor

. . . “ 'Whatever happens, I’m just glad we ruined Brett Kavanaugh’s life,” (Ariel) Dumas said in a now deleted tweet, amid a contentious Supreme Court confirmation process that saw Kavanaugh face unsubstantiated accusations of sexual misconduct, most notably, from Christine Blasey Ford.

“ 'The last couple of weeks have been hard for the country and for me personally,” Ariel Dumas said a day after her initial screed. “The complexity of frustration, anger and sadness can’t be accurately conveyed on twitter, and I regret my tone-deaf attempt at sarcasm in the wake of it.”

"I am thrilled that someone as funny and dedicated as Ariel will be my new head writer,” said Stephen Colbert of Dumas, who was also a joke writer on The Colbert Report at Comedy Central.

"The one-liners Dumas and her colleagues create often see Stephen Colbert smearing President Donald Trump, which has resulted in ratings success for the late-night host. In a particularly vulgar monologue last July, Colbert called President Trump a “racist, horny old burger-goblin who literally steals children from poor people.” A year earlier, the CBS show displayed an image of White House adviser Stephen Miller with his head on a spike.

"This week, Colbert celebrated the partisan impeachment inquiry against President Trump, saying this week’s House impeachment hearings marked “what we’ve been praying for since the beginning of the Trump presidency: the end of the Trump presidency.' ”

Ann Coulter: How to Get into Harvard Without Good S.A.T. Scores!

 After decades of recounting her sufferings since the robbery that left Brown dead, Kathy was told that Brown’s son still attended the memorial service held for his father and Sgt. O’Grady at 4 p.m. every Oct. 20. “Really?” Kathy said. “I never knew the guy had a son.”  According to our betters, that’s an “idealist.”

Breitbart  "If you’re looking for a shortcut to get your kid into a prestigious college, but your little one doesn’t have high enough cheekbones to claim to be an Indian, consider the petal-strewn path of the newly elected San Francisco district attorney, Chesa Boudin.

"Chesa’s sparkling credentials are: He is the son of celebrated cop-killers Kathy Boudin and David Gilbert!  That was enough to win him admission to Yale, Oxford, and Yale Law School.

"His mother consciously parlayed her way to success by becoming a violent revolutionary after realizing that she wasn’t going to set the world on fire with her SAT and LSAT scores.

"Poor Kathy couldn’t get into Oberlin — and then she couldn’t get into Yale Law. She was terrified of “losing her place” as her father Leonard Boudin’s “most cherished offspring,” as Susan Braudy put it in her book, Family Circle: The Boudins and the Aristocracy of the Left. (All this is covered in lascivious detail in my book, Demonic: How the Liberal Mob Is Endangering America.)

"By contrast, Kathy’s brother, Michael — the Republican — had nearly perfect board scores, graduated magna cum laude from Harvard College, went on to Harvard Law School, worked for a white-shoe law firm, then took a top position in the Reagan administration. Today, he is a federal appeals court judge, appointed by the first President Bush.

"The only thing Kathy could do to impress her father — and our nation’s elite institutions — was to become a domestic terrorist." . . .

Boudin was named Chesa by his parents, Kathy Boudin and David Gilbert, to honor convicted murderer Joanne Chesimard. She led the Black Liberation Army when it was a cop-hunting group that assassinated at least six police officers in the early 1970s. Now renamed Assata Shakur, she escaped from prison in 1979 and lives in Cuba, which refuses to extradite her. Kathy Boudin assisted in the armed robbery that funded Chesimard’s jail break.

Convicted killer Kathy Boudin accorded celebrity treatment at NYU Law School
Kathy Boudin in police custody after 1981 killings of guard and two cops  during Rockland County Brinks robbery.

The Lonely, Delusional World of Feminist Literature

"Why are women, who have the whole male world at their mercy, not funny?" Christopher Hitchens once famously asked.  Hitchens was not around to the see a day when morbidly obese women would hold signs that read, "No, you make me a sandwich."  Hitchens could never have imagined how unintentionally hilarious an entire women's movement could become. 

Elise Ehrhard  A few years ago, as the country entered into all-out post-election warfare, I decided to distract myself with non-political interests.  I loved literature and longed to encounter wonderful writers exploring the complex terrain of love, life, and art.  Instead, as I perused literary magazines online, I fell down another rabbit hole: the gender politics–obsessed world of mostly female MFA graduates who edit and publish on these sites. 

"Their essays are so bad that they are good.  The writings emanate from young women inspired by a movement sporting vagina-shaped hats and vulva costumes.  The authors themselves often sound lonely, miserable, and endlessly fixated on unhealed childhood wounds.  But no worries: They have a scapegoat.  Trump and the patriarchy are all to blame.  

"Here is a sampling of a classic tour-de-force by a creative writing professor from a liberal university.  A year after Trump's inauguration, she moaned about how even left-wing men could not take her or her friends anymore: 

" 'To a certain extent," she writes, "we expected it from the men who wear lobster-printed pants, the men from Connecticut, the Young Republicans of America with their gelled and parted hair, their summers in Nantucket, their LL Bean slippers worn on the porches of fraternities, 2pm on a Monday.  But when my friend pulls me aside in a hotel bar and tells me it's happening to her husband — a man who donates annually to NPR and voted twice for Barack Obama, who has a degree in Art History and works for a non-profit — neither one of us knows what to say." 

"When she and her friends all went nuts post-Trump, her boyfriend dumped her.  "All of you women with your labia hats, he said.  All of you with your clitoris signs."  This feminist writer concludes that the problem is the men.  She never wonders if her sisterhood has become insufferable.  She never asks how she would feel if her boyfriend walked around in public wearing a giant penis costume and then berated his beloved for being an insufficient ally. But modern feminists lack the self-awareness to see the comedy of their actions." . . . 

Today's charges: The Schiff Show Shifts Shamelessly

https://www.americanthinker.com/cartoons/

Hilarious takedown of Dems’ shifting accusations… ‘collusion’ to ‘quid pro quo’ to ‘extortion’ to ‘bribery’ "The Trump campaign rapid response team is on its toes. They just emailed a hilarious response to the start of hearings today:

"High Crimes (and Focus Groups!)

"Impeachment “is about patriotism. It’s not about politics,” a very sad and somber Nancy Pelosi insisted again yesterday. “It’s not about anything political. It’s about patriotism.”

"Actually, it’s about polling.

"The Washington Post reports today that “Democrats have stopped using the term ‘quid pro quo,’ instead describing ‘bribery’ as a more direct summation of Trump’s alleged conduct.” Why?

“The shift came after the Democratic Congressional Campaign Committee conducted focus groups in key House battlegrounds in recent weeks, testing messages related to impeachment. Among the questions put to participants was whether ‘quid pro quo,’ ‘extortion’ or ‘bribery’ was a more compelling description of Trump’s conduct. According to two people familiar with the results, which circulated among Democrats this week, the focus groups found ‘bribery’ to be most damning.”

"Got that? The impeachment of the President will be determined by testing various accusations on focus groups in key House battlegrounds. (Just as our nation’s Founders intended!)

"Democrats aren’t “following the facts”—they’re using polls to figure out what crimes to accuse the President of. What a joke.

- Matt Wolking, Deputy Communications Director - Rapid Response

The Seven Deadly Sins of California’s Political Establishment

American Greatness
In a world where truth, justice, and the American Way still exist—an America that still believes in some sort of ultimate accountability—what the Golden State’s elites are doing is literally sinful.

"California’s politicians are hardly alone in their quest to destroy America’s rights, freedoms, prosperity, culture, traditions, and pride. They just happen to be more advanced in their quest. But since what happens in California often ends up happening later in the rest of the country, it’s vital to highlight just how bad it’s gotten in the Golden State.
"Just as a theologian might argue there are more than seven deadly sins fatal to spiritual progress, there are more than seven policy areas where California’s political leadership has fatally undermined the aspirations of ordinary Californians. But in the interests of brevity and clarity, here are what might be the most damning seven deadly sins of California’s political establishment.

Law and Order: Californians have prided themselves on being trendsetters in human rights, but the pendulum has swung too far. Thanks to Proposition 47, the “Reduced Penalties for Some Crimes Initiative” which voters approved in 2014, it is nearly impossible to arrest and hold anyone for possession of hard drugs, so long as they claim the drugs are for personal use. Prop. 47 also downgraded the punishment for property crimes if the value of the stolen goods are under $950 per offense." . . .
The writer then discusses these issues: Environment,  Energy and Water, Transportation, Housing, Education
"In a world where truth, justice, and the American Way still exist, an America that believes in God, or at least believes in good, evil, and some sort of ultimate accountability, what California’s elites are doing is literally sinful. Their path to redemption is simple:
"Enforce common sense drug laws and punish thieves. Quit using environmentalism as a punitive religious faith and start logging the forests, building roads, drilling for oil and gas, and approving nuclear power plants instead of shutting them down. Stop extorting more money in permitting costs than it costs to construct homes, and start building them again on open land. Get vagrants off the streets, build cost-effective shelter for the truly needy, and put the mentally ill back into institutions. Fire incompetent teachers and hold our students to immutable, objective academic standards instead of filling their heads with divisive nonsense."

To sum up: "Americans would do well to look to California today, and whatever they’re doing, do the opposite."

Kellyanne Conway Is Having None of Wolf Blitzer’s Catty Commentary

The CNN pattern has always been to take a once-proud profession and once-dedicated journalists and turn them into far less than they should aspire to. TD

RedState  "Kellyanne Conway was on CNN this morning with Wolf Blitzer. At the end of the interview, Columbo Blitzer noted he had one last question:

“It’s a political question, it’s a substantive question and I don’t want to talk about your marriage because I know that there are issues there….”

"Kellyanne — never one to mince her words — stopped him in his tracks.

“What did you just say? Did you just say there are issues there? You don’t want to talk about… why did you say that?”

 "I don’t know if it qualifies as “sexist,” but it’s certainly condescending, catty, and unprofessional.

"During the ensuing back-and-forth, Blitzer tried to justify the question’s relevance, while carefully side-stepping Conway’s pointed question regarding his offhanded reference to “issues” in the marriage. Conway slyly parried with references to CNN’s Jeffrey Toobin’s analysis and continued to hammer Blitzer on the need to bring her husband into the equation.

“But you wanted to put it in my husband’s voice, because you think somehow that it will help your ratings or that you’re really sticking it to Kellyanne Conway. Let me be very clear, you didn’t stick it to Kellyanne Conway….I think you embarrassed yourself.”

"And for the coup de grâce:

“I’m embarrassed for you because this is CNN now. I looked up to you when I was in college and law school. I would turn on CNN to see what Wolf Blitzer had to say about war, famine, disruption abroad, I really respected you for all those years as somebody who would give us the news. Now the news is what somebody’s husband says on a different network.” . . .

The sound is bad no matter where the source for this video is from: 

Where does Schiff go from here?

Nancy Pelosi: They're afraid of the truth. They're afraid of competence, I'm so proud of the work of Chairman Adam Schiff.

http://www.terrellaftermath.com/

The Schiff Has Hit the Fan, says Rush Limbaugh   . . . "Now, you would think that after the opening day of the impeachment of the president of the United States, which is so rare it practically never happens — it has happened once in our lifetimes, Bill Clinton. Nixon was not impeached — you would think that after three years of all of the alleged crimes that Donald Trump has committed, all the alleged scams, the collusion with the Russians to steal the election in 2016, all of this that we have been subjected to daily, seven days a week, 31 days a month, 365 days a year for three years and counting, you would think that after the first day of impeachment hearings that there would be overwhelming, shocking oh, my God, what’s happened to our country news.

"Ladies and gentlemen, they don’t have anything. I’m trying to be very reasoned here and very serious. This is a Schiff show, and Pelosi is committed to it. And I am telling you right now that if she could find a way out of this, she would. They don’t have anything. They didn’t have anything to start with. They never had collusion with Russia. They never had any of the things they told us that Donald Trump did.

"After the first day we had two witnesses and neither of the two witnesses at any time in their lives have ever had direct contact with the president of the United States. They are the star witnesses. They were the witnesses that were going to create the inertia that would lead to the public clamoring for the removal of Donald Trump.

"There is no clamoring today for the removal of Donald Trump. The media doesn’t even have anything to make a bombshell out of. There literally was nothing yesterday. And I’m telling you that Schiff and Pelosi know exactly how bad this show is playing.  . . ."

Impeachment hearings! Is that all they've got?  . . . "Trump gave Ukraine weapons to repel the Russians.  Taylor and Kent, the two Wednesday "witnesses" surely know this.  One of them admitted that Ukraine is in much better shape under Trump than it was under Obama!

"Still, Schiff insists Trump is guilty of something, anything.  He is like a drowning man grasping for a life raft.  There is no life raft for Schiff.  He has become a joke, and his own Democrat colleagues know it.  He is an embarrassment.  If she were wise, which she is not, Pelosi would shut this faux inquiry down now.  But wisdom is not her strong point."