RUTHFULLY YOURS

Law-enforcement officials across the nation are taking extraordinary new precautions against a growing threat to their ranks: fentanyl, a drug so toxic that just a few grains can kill.

Kevin Phillips, a deputy sheriff in Harford County, Md., recently felt the drug’s wrath when he responded to an increasingly routine call of drug overdose, opening a nightstand in the home while searching for heroin.

“About two or three seconds after I shut it, my face started burning. I broke out in a sweat,” said Cpl. Phillips, who was rushed to the hospital for treatment after overdosing on fentanyl that had been mixed into the heroin.

Authorities swiftly set a new policy: deputy sheriffs must treat drug seizures like an active shooter incident—to slow down and evaluate the scene—in this case ensuring they have elbow-length gloves, protective masks and safety glasses.

Law-enforcement encounters with fentanyl nationwide rose to more than 14,000 in 2015 from about 1,000 in 2013, according to federal data. Fentanyl, which is 50 times more powerful than heroin, has been used legally for decades, including as a painkiller for cancer patients. But in the past five years, illegal forms of the drug, often produced in China and Mexico, have quickly spread throughout the country and contributed to a broader opioid epidemic that has killed tens of thousands of people.

Two to three milligrams of fentanyl—the equivalent of five to seven grains of table salt—is enough to cause respiratory depression, cardiac arrest or death, according to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration, which issued new guidelines for first responders in June. Overdosing can occur from inhaling or touching fentanyl, which drug dealers often mix with heroin because it is cheaper and has a higher potency.

“[Fentanyl] is a new challenge, a game changer for law enforcement,” said Harford County Sheriff Jeffrey Gahler. “It could be anyone exposed.”
Deadly MenaceLike law enforcement agencies across the U.S., the New York City Police Department isincreasingly coming into contact with fentanyl. Number of times the NYPD found the drugin narcotics cases.THE WALL STREET JOURNALSource: New York Police DepartmentNote: 2017 data is projected.
2014’15’16’1702505007501,0001,2501,5001,7502,0002,2502,5002016×1,383

It’s not just humans at risk.

While executing a narcotics search warrant in October, officers from Broward County Sheriff’s Office in Florida directed three trained dogs—Primus, Finn and Packer—to sniff around a house. The dogs soon because drowsy, found it difficult to stand and eventually adopted blank stares and became unable to move, said Det. Andy Weiman, the head dog trainer. The dogs were later determined to have overdosed in a house where fentanyl was found. They were treated at an animal hospital and were back at work the next day, he said.

Law-enforcement officials are quickly overhauling their procedures for handling fentanyl and other forms of the drug.

THE KOREAN WAR Jun 25, 1950 – Jul 27, 1953

The news is full of commentary, policy suggestions and criticisms of the present crisis with aggressive and dangerous behavior by North Korea’s present leader Kim Jong-un. The Korean War fought from June 25th, 1950 until July 27,1953 is hardly mentioned, although the latest records indicate that 36,574 were killed and 103,284 wounded in action and as late as 2017, 7,800 soldiers remain unaccounted for. In the aftermath of World War 11, In August 1945, Korea was liberated from Japan which had invaded and annexed Korea in 1910. Stalin’s demands for “buffer zones” in Asia, created the 38th parallel, which divided the nation into the People’s Republic of (North)Korea and the Republic of (South)Korea, to be administered by the Russians and the Americans respectively. The Communist regime in the north was run by then 33-year-old Kim Il Sung (the grand-father of North Korea’s present dictator) whose patrons were Stalin and Mao Tse-Tung.

When thousands of North Korean troops who fought on Mao’s side in the Chinese Civil War returned to North Korea, Kim Il Sung redeployed them along the 38th parallel, and escalated provocations which resulted in an invasion of the Republic of South Korea on June 25, 1950.

On June 27th, at the urging of the United States, the UN Security Council voted in favor of armed resistance to North Korea which persuaded President Truman who was reluctant to enter into armed conflict so soon upon the heels of World War 11 to commence the defense of South Korea. There were armed contingents from Turkey, England Canada and Australia, but America sent 90% of troops so it was really America’s war.The United States would deploy the Seventh Fleet of the U.S. Navy in the Taiwan Strait and send massive air and naval power to the area. In spite of warnings and caveats from The Joint Chiefs of Staff, troops were committed on June 30th and the draft, still in place, increased the numbers of active duty troops to roughly 700,000 Army and 90,000 battle-ready Marines.

There were military triumphs and an equal number of serious reversals.In July 1950, when General Douglas MacArthur was given command of U.S. troops in Korean The North Korean Army drove south to the nation’s capital Seoul.On September 15th, approximately 80,000 marines landed at Inchon with minimal losses. Supported with massive air power the United States forces halted the advances of Kim Il Sung and by end of September they recaptured the capital and North Korea’s forces retreated.

However, Chinese/North Korean forces swiftly responded with a massive counterattack which Secretary of State Dean Acheson described as the worst American defeat since the battle of Bull Run during the Civil War. By December the North Korean armies pushed American troops southward and reoccupied Seoul in early 1951. This was a major defeat for the American forces subsequently blamed on “poor intelligence.”

In late January American strategy was reassessed, and under the command of General Matthew Ridgeway, who had been called in after the landing in Inchon, and after intense fighting American/Korean forces retook Seoul and again, pushed north of the 38th parallel. By April 1951 the fighting stabilized along what ultimately became the “demilitarized” zone and the South was secured.

On April 11, 1951, Truman demanded MacArthur’s resignation and the Supreme Command was turned over to General Ridgeway. Most historians agree that MacArthur was insubordinate and declassified documents have indicated that Truman distrusted him. Others posit that Truman was determined to wind down an increasingly unpopular war.

The war settled into the pattern it would follow for the next two years: Although formal negotiations to end the conflict actually commenced on July 10th of 1951, bloody fighting along the 38th parallel continued until 1953. U.S. forces engaged in several battles known as “active defense.” By this time, under the capable command of Generals Ridgeway and Van Fleet the US forces had already gained ground and in operations named “Roundup” “Killer” and “Ripper” had successfully repelled all Chinese/Korean forays. Fighting continued on hills called Pork Chop, T-Bone, Heartbreak Ridge and Old Baldy and the US forces continued their gains on the combined forces of North Korea and China, whose offensives all subsequently failed. The North Korean army was rapidly disintegrating and the Chinese turned their full attention to their land redistribution and “re-education” policies.

When Harry Truman announced that he would not run for another term. NATO’s Supreme Commander, General Dwight D. Eisenhower, decided to run for the presidency on the Republican ticket.

The Democrat nominee Adlai Stevenson, Harry Truman’s choice, failed to gain momentum or populist support against a war hero. The war became so unpopular that the New York Times endorsed Eisenhower, whose platform promised a quick end to the war. He won by a landslide.

In November, 1952, a victorious Eisenhower fulfilled his campaign vow and traveled to Korea to help pave the way for the armistice which formally ended the war.

On July 27, 1953 the 38th parallel remained the front line of both north and south and a final armistice was signed. The Americans whose determination and military prowess had decimated and dispirited North Korea, had the ability and intention to “roll back Communism” but instead, they rolled back the war.

July 27th is the 64th anniversary of that armistice.

There was no conclusive victory, no surrender, and nothing gained for the West or Korea. It is also important to note that America’s hand picked President of South Korea Syngman Rhee refused to sign the agreement. Kim Il Sung consolidated one of the most brutal regimes in Asia. On his death in 1994, his son took control and has catapulted North Korea into a bellicose nuclear power which exports weapons and technology to all America’s enemies. And his son Kim Jong-un continues the Kim legacy of tyranny.

On January 23, 1968 after literally hundreds of violations of the armistice, North Korean torpedo ships seized the American spy vessel The Pueblo. The captain surrendered after stalling in an effort to destroy classified documents. The crew members were imprisoned, tortured, humiliated and forced to praise their captors. All efforts to free them were considered “unworkable” by President Johnson who was beset by the Vietnam War. The crisis ended 10 months later after the United States signed a letter of contrition and apology.

That is the pitiful legacy of America’s first unfinished war, establishing a pattern which haunts the free world and our allies today leaving thugs and despots in place. Wars are now fought until nations get tired of them.

In war, only the continued application of overwhelming force and total surrender will subdue and destroy enemies. That is how the Nazis were defeated and how Japanese imperialistic Shinto was dismantled.

How we will deal with present enemies- Iran, North Korea, and radical Islamic Jihad is anyone’s guess.

The Democrats have sensed weakness, and chosen this moment to pounce. To capitalize on Donald Trump’s low approval ratings they are rolling out Elizabeth Warren (38 percent approval), Nancy Pelosi (29 percent), and Chuck Schumer (26 percent). Delivering the message that the party has fresh ideas are three emissaries who are a combined 211 years of age, deploying a phrase — “a better deal” — that harks back to the hottest policy proposals of 1933. To prove they’re in tune with the concerns of middle America the Democrats are dispatching emissaries from Harvard, San Francisco, and Brooklyn. Oh, and the Democrats’ chief problem, according to the Democrats? Americans just aren’t mentally supple enough to understand how great our program is for them.

“Too many Americans don’t know what we stand for,” Schumer declared in a Trump-voting county of Virginia on Monday. “Not after today.” Mark it down, kids: July 24, 2017, was the day the Democrats finally clarified their message. Democrats will no longer have to moan What’s the Matter with Kansas, Ohio, Michigan, Pennsylvania, Florida, and Wisconsin? Because Monday is the day the right-learning parts of the country learned that Schumer, et al., have better ideas than the Republicans do.

The latest Democratic anthropological field trip to establish contact with the alien life forms known as Trump voters is focused on economic issues. That sounds wise. But far from being too subtle for Meathead America to understand, the progressive economic agenda is, as always, simple: You get the goodies you want now, someone else will pay, and never mind the future consequences. Who wouldn’t find such a platform enticing? You might as well tell a junior-high school, “Free PlayStation and Mountain Dew.” If the Democrats could stick to buying votes with other people’s money, they’d be dangerous.

As a matter of fact they are dangerous, now and always, for precisely this reason. Raising the minimum wage, one of the Democrats’ cornerstone ideas in their latest re-re-re-rebranding, is popular because it’s a simple fix that provides tangible benefits with invisible costs. Lower-rung workers get a bigger paycheck and the pain is hidden from view in the accounting divisions of faceless corporations. Never mind that a $15 national minimum wage would backfire and render many working Americans unemployed in the future. Government-dictated lowering of drug prices is popular too, never mind the invisible follow-up cost of hampering innovation that will extend lives in the future. The Democrats’ economic policy is sufficiently tempting that if elections were held tomorrow, with generic Democrats on the ballot, they might well manage to retake the House and the White House.

We all knew what Watergate was. We knew what Iran-Contra was. And the Lewinsky scandal. And the purported outing of Valerie Plame. Up until now, each time a special prosecutor has been sicced on a presidential administration, we’ve known what the allegations were. Our views about whether the conduct involved warranted such debilitating scrutiny may have diverged sharply. But at least we knew what the investigations were about, what the presidents and/or their subordinates were accused of doing.

That’s because what they were accused of doing was criminal. You need a prosecutor only to investigate crime.

The id-in-chief is on the verge of forcing his attorney general out — and with him, much of the conservative base that got past its wariness of Donald Trump because of Jeff Sessions’s support. Yet, as the appearance of scandal engulfs the administration, we still don’t know what crimes Trump and his subordinates are suspected of committing. Or even if they are suspected of committing crimes at all.

Mind you, the “Russia investigation” — the investigation with no specified crime — has already factored heavily in the dismissals of a top White House staffer and the head of our country’s premier investigative agency. Now it seems the nation’s top federal law-enforcement officer is on the brink. There is background noise about indictments, pardons, and impeachment. But we still don’t know what the allegation is. Or if there is one.

At the risk of trying our readers’ patience, I am going to beat a dead horse I’ve been wailing on since the first days of the Trump-Russia controversy. I do it because someday we may look back and realize the debacle was driven by the confusing label of “counterintelligence investigation,” which has obscured, well, everything.

The confusion starts with the label itself. When you hear “investigation” you think crime. But counterintelligence is not about rooting out crime; it is about divining the intentions of foreign powers. It is not enough to say that crime is not its focus. Crime is not permitted to be its focus.

In the counterintelligence context, because the government is not trying to build a criminal case, the constitutional protections that apply in criminal investigations are significantly diminished. Thus, if the government pretextually exploits its counterintelligence authorities to conduct criminal investigations, serious legal problems arise. The 9/11 controversy over “the wall” — the infamous regulations that prevented information-sharing between counterintelligence and criminal agents — occurred precisely because the Justice Department was overeager to demonstrate its determination to keep the two realms separate.

Counterintelligence work would be more accurately described as “information gathering and analysis” than as an “investigation.” Investigations are about collecting evidence in order to prosecute crimes.

This is expressly reflected in federal regulations — specifically, the ones that control when a “special counsel” should be appointed and when an attorney general should recuse himself. These things come into play only when criminal activity has occurred. They are not applicable to counterintelligence probes, which usually don’t involve prosecutors at all.

There is a need for an attorney general to disqualify himself, or for a special counsel to be appointed, only when the AG or the Justice Department at large is beset by a conflict of interest. How do we know whether there is such a conflict? We look at the known crime, or the factual basis for suspecting a crime. We then ask whether some political or personal connection to the criminal transaction under examination disqualifies the AG or the Justice Department from participation. To answer the question, “Is there a conflict?” we look at the criminality that must be investigated or prosecuted.

The American political system has never quite seen anything like the current opposition to President Trump and his unusual reaction to it.

We are no longer in the customary political landscape. Usually, the out-of-power opposition — in this case, the Democratic party — offers most of the criticism and all of the alternative policies in order to win in the next election. Instead, Trump has an entire circle of diverse critics shooting at him. But they just as often end up hitting one another — and themselves.

So far, Trump’s most furious Democratic opponents have not been able to offer alternative visions to Trump’s agenda that might help them win back Congress in the 2018 midterm elections. Higher taxes, more government regulations, less gas and oil production, loose immigration policies, and the promotion of identity politics are not really winning issues.

Instead, the aim is to either to remove Trump before his first term is up or to so delegitimize him that he is rendered powerless.

Yet obsessions with Trump often lead to boomerang excesses — mad talk and visuals, from obscene rants to decapitation art — that hurt the attackers more than Trump.

Republicans should have been delighted with control of both houses of Congress, the Supreme Court, state governorships and the legislatures, and the White House. In principle, they laud Trump’s efforts to appoint strict constructionists to the federal courts, to increase oil and gas production, to reform Obamacare and the tax code, and to restore deterrence abroad.

Yet the Republican-controlled Congress is nearly paralyzed. It simply cannot unite to deliver on promised major legislation. Some senators and representatives find Trump too uncouth to support his otherwise agreeable proposals, and they fear (or hope) that he may not finish out his term. Some worry that Trump’s low approval rating might hurt their own reelections. Some are careerists who value getting along more than fighting for the White House agenda.

The result is that when factions of the Republican Congress are not battling one another, they are feuding with Democrats and often with the Trump White House.

One reason Trump has been slow to make major appointments is that he cannot trust the establishment of his own party, many of whom in 2016 signed petitions declaring Trump unfit for office.

At best, some anti-Trump intellectuals and pundits still cannot separate Trump’s conservative agenda (which they privately support) from Trump’s reality-television persona (which they find boorish and beneath the dignity of the presidency). At worst, some are so invested in the idea that Trump would or should fail that their opposition threatens to become an obsessive self-fulfilling prophecy.

The anti-Trump conservative-intellectual establishment also does not quite know where to aim its fire. At Democrats whose agendas they used to oppose? At Congress for supporting or not supporting Trump? At the liberal media that court anti-Trumpers because they find their Trump hatred useful for the time being?

The media have given up on impartial news coverage. Some journalists have announced that Trump is so beyond the pale that he deserves only unapologetic critical treatment. Research has shown that network coverage has been overwhelmingly anti-Trump.

At the center of this directed fire is the flamboyant, sometimes polarizing but usually cunning Trump. He is not a stationary target. He constantly ducks and weaves, with a flurry of executive orders, major White House shakeups, and trips throughout Europe and the Middle East, where he often gives good speeches and sometimes is warmly greeted.

The result of the circular firing squad is a crazed shootout where everyone gets hit.

A very brief refresher.

The Donald Trump Jr. meeting was about the Magnitsky Act which sanctions Russia. Obama and Hillary and Putin opposed the Act. So did Fusion GPS which was hired to go after it. It was also behind the Trump dossier. Bill Browder is the key surviving Magnitsky Act figure. He was set to testify against Fusion GPS.

And the Dems pulled the plug.

Senate Democrats used a parliamentary maneuver Wednesday to cut short a high-profile hearing, where a key witness was set to testify on Russia’s misdeeds and also raise fresh allegations against the company behind the infamous anti-Trump dossier.

Bill Browder, the CEO and co-founder of Hermitage Capital, was set to tell the Senate Judiciary Committee that the co-founder of the firm Fusion GPS was hired to conduct a “smear campaign” against him. Further, he planned to testify the campaign was orchestrated by Natalia Veselnitskaya — the Russian attorney who sought the highly scrutinized Trump Tower meeting with Donald Trump Jr., Jared Kushner, and then-campaign chairman Paul Manafort in June 2016.

Browder released written testimony ahead of the hearing but his public remarks were delayed when Democrats invoked the “two-hour rule” to protest Republican efforts to repeal ObamaCare. The seldom-used rule bars committees from meeting more than two hours after the full Senate begins a session.

“I don’t know if the minority is intentionally trying to block testimony that may be critical of a firm behind the unverified Trump dossier, but I’ll bet two bits that had Paul Manafort or Donald Trump, Jr. appeared at today’s hearing, it would not have been prematurely shut down,” Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, said in a statement. “The Democrat leadership is playing politics, plain and simple.”

The Dems really don’t want to touch the subject of Fusion GPS. Or delve into any details about the Magnitsky Act. That way lies accusations of collusion. And to protect themselves, they attempted a cover-up. And as they ought to remember, it’s not the crime, it’s the cover-up.

The ban on transgender service that President Trump reaffirmed was there for eight years under Obama. It was there in his first term and his second term. And the media said nothing.

Only in the summer of last year did the ban technically end. And, in practice, it remained in force. All the while there was no angry clamor about the suffering of potential recruits who couldn’t enlist. Those who are fuming with outrage now had hypocritically remained silent. Obama had done it. So it must be good.

Obama had kept the ban in place for almost his entire two terms in office. And he found a way to retain it throughout his final months. With a year’s review, the transgender recruits could only be accepted after he was out of the White House. That way he could have his social justice cake and eat it too. He would get the credit for ending the transgender ban without dealing with any of the problems.

And there were plenty of problems.

45% of transgender persons in the 18 to 44 age range are suicidal. This is a serious risk for personnel who are around weapons or operating machinery or aircraft. If this were the only issue, it would be enough to justify the medical ban.

Transgender operations and hormone therapy requires constant monitoring by a doctor. They carry serious health risks. Some of those risks require serious medications and ongoing management.

That is not what the military usually expects to deal with from recruits.

The Rand study being touted by transgender advocates who claim that medical expenses will only be in the millions relies on a statistical bait and switch. The actual cost is estimated to be in the billions.

The Army and Air Force wanted to delay implementation for another two years. That was on top of the original year review that was lapsing. The issue had become a heavy burden that we didn’t need.

So President Trump got rid of it. His policy is the same one that existed for most of Obama’s time in office. The televised outrage over it is shameless and cynical posturing by media hypocrites.

The transgender ban isn’t a moral or religious policy. It’s a medical one. The military doesn’t have the resources and isn’t equipped to deal with the complicated medical and social problems involved.

The Department of Defense fitness standards have an extensive list of disqualifiers. A “history of major abnormalities or defects of the genitalia such as change of sex” is there in between pelvic inflammatory disease and missing testicles. These medical issues are there alongside missing fingers, a history of gout and numerous other problems. They’re there because the military wants healthy and able recruits.

It’s that simple.

Military readiness demands personnel who can deploy on short notice without ongoing medical problems holding them back. It wants recruits in prime health who can give all they have. Medical issues don’t just drive up costs so that hard choices have to be made. They also cost lives.

Our armed forces run on teamwork. When members of the team can’t perform, they put lives at risk.