Displaying posts published in

September 2022

Justice Department Desperate to Conceal ‘Classified’ Records It’s all just another campaign of deceit—with reliable assistance from the national news media—to get Trump. By Julie Kelly

https://amgreatness.com/2022/09/19/justice-department-desperate-to-conceal-classified-records/

With one sentence, U.S. District Court Judge Aileen Cannon spoke for the majority of Americans who no longer have faith in the nation’s top law enforcement agency. “It is also true, of course, that even-handed procedure does not demand unquestioning trust in the determinations of the Department of Justice,” she wrote in her September 15 order denying the government’s request to prevent a third-party review of allegedly “classified” documents seized by the FBI during the raid of Mar-a-Lago last month.

At issue is the validity of claims made by prosecutors that roughly 100 records taken in the unprecedented pillage of a former president’s home on August 8 have classified markings and therefore do not belong to him. The kerfuffle began earlier this year when the Justice Department acted on a criminal referral by the national archivist, who accused Trump of unlawfully keeping classified material at his home. 

Although Trump’s representatives cooperated with investigators for months, Attorney General Merrick Garland nonetheless authorized the nine-hour raid conducted by at least a dozen FBI agents resulting in the seizure of more than 11,000 pieces of evidence, including personal items such as books, medical files, tax information, apparel, and passports.

And his office has been backpedaling ever since.

The Myth of Clean Clean garbage, clean energy and a dirty utopia. by Daniel Greenfield

https://www.frontpagemag.com/the-myth-of-clean/

‘Clean’, like ‘smart’, has become the prerequisite for all technology. Both are myths.

Smart technology is surveillance technology. It is not smarter because of its inherent qualities, but because it sends and receives data that allows it to be ‘smarter’ in manipulating users. The smart part of smart technology comes from human beings. So does the stupid part when people sacrifice their privacy and independence for the benefits of technology being shaped to them.

Clean energy is even more of a myth. The Inflation Increase Act doles out another stream of billions toward the inefficient forms of energy generation that the government has been subsidizing for over 50 years because some Madison Avenue ad agency branded them ‘clean’.

Energy is inherently clean and dirty. Making the inherent forces of the universe useful requires mining metal, cutting down trees, and turning fossil fuels into plastic to assemble machines. Once those machines are running, they will shed heat because ‘clean’ or ‘dirty’, that is how the second law of thermodynamics works. Not even Al Gore can evade entropy and not even the shiniest solar panel, sleekest wind turbines or smoothly humming Tesla will prevent energy from being wasted as it is transferred, stored or used to do one thing or another locally or nationally.

The only truly energy efficient energy comes from bioluminescent creatures like fireflies. We didn’t make them and despite all the boasts from technocrats, we can’t duplicate them.

‘Administrative Bloat’ and Biden’s College Loan Forgiveness The destructive price of reckless and wasteful spending by diversity-obsessed administrators. Richard L. Cravatts

https://www.frontpagemag.com/administrative-bloat-and-bidens-college-loan-forgiveness/

In a nod to his progressive base and what seems to be a naked tactic to buy the votes of young, educated future Democrats, President Biden seems to have made good on at least one of his campaign promises.

In August, the White House announced a plan to eliminate for borrowers some of the “skyrocketing cumulative federal student loan debt—$1.6 trillion and rising for more than 45 million borrowers.”

“The Department of Education,” the statement read, “will provide up to $20,000 in debt cancellation to Pell Grant recipients [usually awarded only to undergraduate students who display ‘exceptional financial need’] . . , and up to $10,000 in debt cancellation to non-Pell Grant recipients. Borrowers are eligible for this relief if their individual income is less than $125,000 ($250,000 for married couples).”

Criticism of the loan relief program was immediate and ubiquitous, the cost to American taxpayers being foremost among it. Experts estimated the final amounts to range between $360 billion and $427 billion; a forecast from the National Taxpayer Union Foundation (NTUF) also “calculate[d] that the average burden per taxpayer in the U.S. is $2,503.22, up from [its] earlier estimate of $2,085.59.”

Beyond the high projected cost to taxpayers, and even the ability of the President to unilaterally and legally forgive loans in the first place, is the issue of fairness. Why should taxpayers who may have never even attended college themselves be responsible for paying the indebtedness of someone who chose to go to college and signed a loan to make that possible?

Illegals Practice Law in New Mexico A blue state’s courts roll out the red carpet for illegal aliens. by Matthew Vadum

https://www.frontpagemag.com/illegals-practice-law-in-new-mexico/

“It is “bizarre” that in New Mexico “you can be here illegally, subject to arrest and deportation, and yet at the same time, you could be representing as a lawyer another illegal alien who’s facing the same thing.”

New Mexico has become the latest state to welcome illegal aliens as attorneys.

In other words, those who are breaking U.S. law by their presence in the country, will now be allowed to practice law in the Land of Enchantment. These illegal-alien lawyers will now be allowed to try to prevent their fellow illegal aliens from being deported.

A lawyer is an officer of the court and should at a minimum not be a lawbreaker.

The new policy helps to blur the line between illegal aliens, lawfully present aliens, and U.S. citizens, which has long be a goal of the open-borders Left. The Left wants to devalue and abolish citizenship and what it means to be American, and confer all the benefits of being legal on people who are illegal – and it is succeeding.

The Left deliberately obscures the distinction between illegal aliens and people who immigrated lawfully to the United States. It is part of the leftist war not only on American values but on the English language.

Don’t Believe the Hype About Antarctica’s Melting Glaciers Two studies carefully explore the factors at play, but the headlines are only meant to raise alarm.Two studies carefully explore the factors at play, but the headlines are only meant to raise alarm. By Steven Koonin

https://www.wsj.com/articles/dont-believe-the-hype-about-antarcticas-melting-glaciers-ice-sheet-climate-change-global-warming-sea-levels-greenland-iceberg-ocean-11663618509?mod=opinion_lead_pos6

Alarming reports that the Antarctic ice sheet is shrinking misrepresent the science under way to understand a very complex situation. Antarctica has been ice-covered for at least 30 million years. The ice sheet holds about 26.5 million gigatons of water (a gigaton is a billion metric tons, or about 2.2 trillion pounds). If it were to melt completely, sea levels would rise 190 feet. Such a change is many millennia in the future, if it comes at all.

Much more modest ice loss is normal in Antarctica. Each year, some 2,200 gigatons (or 0.01%) of the ice is discharged in the form of melt and icebergs, while snowfall adds almost the same amount. The difference between the discharge and addition each year is the ice sheet’s annual loss. That figure has been increasing in recent decades, from 40 gigatons a year in the 1980s to 250 gigatons a year in the 2010s.

But the increase is a small change in a complex and highly variable process. For example, Greenland’s annual loss has fluctuated significantly over the past century. And while the Antarctic losses seem stupendously large, the recent annual losses amount to 0.001% of the total ice and, if they continued at that rate, would raise sea level by only 3 inches over 100 years.

Joe Biden Puts Humpty Dumpty To Shame

https://issuesinsights.com/2022/09/20/joe-biden-puts-humpty-dumpty-to-shame/

‘When I use a word, it means just what I choose it to mean — neither more nor less.’ — Humpty Dumpty, ‘Through the Looking Glass‘

Last week, the Biden administration tried to convince the public that inflation was a thing of the past and the southern border was secure. Before that, the president attempted to redefine inflation. It’s been a running theme of this administration, one Joe Biden never gets called on because the press is too busy accepting whatever meaning he chooses.

So here, as a reader service, is a collection of how Humpty Dumpty Biden is choosing what words will mean.

“Zero Percent:” Last week Biden stood behind his presidential podium and declared that “we received news that our economy had 0% inflation in the month of July — 0%.” In a statement, he went further, saying “overall, prices have been essentially flat in our country these last two months: that is welcome news for American families.”

That depends on what 0% means. Food prices were up 1.1% in July and 0.8% in August. Housing costs climbed a total of 1.3% over those months. Medical care was up 1.2%. The only reason the overall inflation rate didn’t climb in July and August was because of a sharp drop in gasoline prices. That’s little comfort to those trying to put food on the table or pay rent.

Palestinians Cuddle up with Arabs Who Kill Palestinians by Khaled Abu Toameh

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/18923/palestinians-syria

A report published on September 18 revealed that 638 Palestinians have been tortured to death by Syrian intelligence officers in the past few years. The victims include 37 women.

“What is happening inside the Syrian detention centers against the Palestinians is a war crime by all standards.” — Action Group for Palestinians of Syria (AGPS), September 18, 2022.

AGPS also revealed that 4,121 Palestinians have been killed in Syria since the beginning of the civil war there.

The fate of 1,797 Palestinian detainees, including 110 women, remains unknown despite repeated appeals to the Syrian authorities.

By rushing to embrace the regime of Syrian President Bashar Assad, Hamas, whose leaders control the Gaza Strip from their luxurious villas, hotel suites and spas in Qatar and Turkey, has again shown its contempt for the Palestinians and other Arabs who have fallen victim to the atrocities committed by the Syrian authorities, especially over the past decade.

Iran’s mullahs want to make sure that their terrorist proxies and the Assad regime remain on good terms. The mullahs are hoping that the renewal of ties between Hamas and Syria will strengthen the Iranian-led “axis of resistance” in the Middle East. The “axis of resistance” refers to an anti-Western/anti-Israeli/anti-Saudi political and military alliance between Iran, the Palestinian terrorist groups Hamas and Islamic Jihad, the Syrian regime and Hezbollah.

Hamas… apparently has no problem embracing an Arab regime that has so much Palestinian blood on its hands.

The Hamas embrace of the Assad regime is yet another example of how Palestinian leaders care nothing about their own people, let alone the lives of other Arabs.

The leaders of Hamas, who are living the good life in Qatar and Turkey, are much more interested in stuffing their coffers with money from the mullahs in Iran than in seeing the suffering of their people in the Gaza Strip or in any Arab country, including Syria.

The leaders of the Palestinian Authority are not much different. They too are preoccupied with looking after their personal interests and making sure that they remain in power forever.

Shortly, Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas will head to the United Nations General Assembly to spew yet more venom against Israel. The plight of his people in Syria and other Arab countries will be at the very bottom of his list of priorities, if at all. Like Hamas, Abbas too does not seem to care if his people are being slaughtered by an Arab dictatorship.

A report published on September 18 revealed that 638 Palestinians have been tortured to death by Syrian intelligence officers in the past few years. The victims include 37 women, according to the report by the Action Group for Palestinians of Syria (AGPS), a human rights watchdog that monitors the situation of Palestinian refugees in war-torn Syria.

The Secret Schumer-Manchin Backroom Deal by Lawrence Kadish

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/18924/schumer-manchin-backroom-deal

Washington is a city that thrives on secrets. That is a good thing over at the CIA but it is a very bad thing when Congressional politics are practiced in the dark, far from public scrutiny and for purposes that could unravel our nation’s democracy.

No surprise then that published reports reveal seething lawmaker anger over the closed door deal cut between Senate Majority Leader Charles Schumer and Senator Joseph Manchin that will allow the White House to acquire and dispense some $700 billion dollars as it sees fit through the so-called “Inflation Reduction Act of 2022.”

“We don’t know what [the substance of their deal]… is. They haven’t released the text, they don’t give us the detailed explanation,” Sen. Shelley Moore Capito (R-WV) was quoted in the Washington insider publication, The Hill.

The Senator continued, “So, I don’t know how you could ask people to vote for something they don’t know what it is.”

What we do know is that the Biden Administration will be offered the opportunity to channel money – huge amounts of money – to selected programs, agencies, and election districts throughout the nation at a time when Congressional campaigning is reaching its peak.

Some would wonder if Facebook multi-billionaire Mark Zuckerberg could spend close to a half billion dollars to boost Democratic candidates during the Trump-Biden race just imagine what $700 billion in taxpayer monies could accomplish in the hands of the White House.

Ebrahim Raisi’s predictable ‘CBS News’ performance By Ruthie Blum

https://www.jns.org/opinion/ebrahim-raisis-predictable-cbs-news-performance/

 The brouhaha surrounding Iranian President Ebrahim Raisi’s comments about the Nazi genocide of the Jews, during an interview that aired on Sunday with CBS News’s “60 Minutes,” is puzzling.
Anyone who expected the radical political figurehead of the mullah-ruled Islamic Republic to acknowledge, let alone denounce, the acts of the Third Reich—when his regime makes no bones about wanting to finish the job that Adolf Hitler started—is living in an alternate universe.

Nevertheless, the short exchange he had on the topic with correspondent Lesley Stahl made international headlines and was circulated widely on social media. When asked by Stahl whether he “believe[d] the Holocaust happened—that 6 million Jews were slaughtered,” Raisi replied, “Look, historical events should be investigated by researchers and historians. There are some signs that it happened. If so, they should allow it to be investigated and researched.”
The only thing noteworthy about this was his willingness to point to “some signs that it happened.” It was almost amusing of him to suggest that it be “investigated and researched.”

As though he had no idea that it’s been studied for decades and verified by historians and survivors. And as if his role-model ayatollahs aren’t keen to emulate the Holocaust, albeit Islamist-style: first, through terrorist proxies in Syria, Lebanon, Judea and Samaria and Gaza, and ultimately with nukes.

“So, you’re not sure; I’m getting that you’re not sure,” Stahl said quietly, being careful to avoid causing her interviewee to rue over having agreed to be challenged by a woman.
“What about Israel’s right to exist?” she then queried.

Here, Raisi didn’t hesitate or moderate his answer. But he did, however, refrain from repeating the name of the Jewish state that’s in the crosshairs of his massive arsenal of weapons, both in Iran and along Israel’s borders.

Weak Cons and Libs Can Clutch Their Pearls and Seethe Kurt Schlichter

https://townhall.com/columnists/kurtschlichter/2022/09/19/weak-cons-and-libs-can-clutch-their-pearls-and-seethe-n2613181

“Oh, well I never…we’re better than that…that’s not who we are!” is the high-pitched battle cry of the loser Fredocons who brought us to this juncture. Modern conservatives, by necessity and through their Andrew Breitbart-inspired understanding of Alinsky tactics, are owning the libs hard with mean, tacky, and utterly hilarious stunts and memes that the bow-tied virgin contingent would never consider exploiting. Their goal is to lose with dignity. They’ll get half their wish, and not the dignity half.

You’ve seen it, and admit it – you chuckled. Conservative performance art is drawing attention to the facts and outrages that our Establishment toe-sucking regime media has declared narrative non grata. For example:

The internet and now even TV is awash in discussions of whatever the hell is growing out of slumlord scion/ogre John Fetterman’s neck. Tumor? Second head? What the hell? Clearly, this dude is a mutated mess.

Comedian Alex Stein is out there hassling Democrat Congresscreeps, notably asking Eric Swalwell about exactly what he and Chi Com spy Fang Fang put where during their cheesy relationship (Caution: NSFW clip).

Governor DeSantis is dropping off illegal aliens in Martha’s Vineyard, sparking a mass freak out by the libs who have to now live with the consequences of their border inaction, while Governor Abbott one-ups him by dropping a bus load of the uninvited in front of Kamala Harris’s house just days after she looked into the camera and said that the border is not open.