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Ruth King

America’s Border: Cui Bono? – Who Benefits? by Chris Farrell and Shea Garrison *****

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/17344/america-border-benefits

The Biden administration has made a deliberate decision to abandon the application and enforcement of federal law. Why?

How will the Biden administration fulfill its sworn official duty to uphold and defend the Constitution and laws of the United States by willfully ignoring and failing to carry out legal obligations?

The only rational explanation for the Biden administration’s policy position is a crassly political one. Border policy decisions are all tied to the immigration question and the apparent desire to affect long-term voting demographics, skewing it in favor of the Democrat Party. This is a “long term investment strategy” at the expense of the American tax-paying citizen, for the political benefit of the current party in power.

Border communities bear the frontline brunt of Biden’s policies, but the total fabric of America’s healthcare, education, housing and social services are being shredded to pay for Biden’s new voters.

[T]he Biden border crisis will rise to the number one position when Americans go to the polls in November 2022. Its overt criminality and reckless disregard for the law will be remembered.

The administration’s sponsorship of outlaw behavior and endorsement of criminality cannot be talked away or excused. Too many communities… are already experiencing… the impact of Biden’s abandonment of the enforcement of the law.

It is essential for American citizens to deprive the Biden administration of its hoped-for “benefit”. An administration cannot politically distort law enforcement and compromise national security to pad their voter rolls. Justice demands equal enforcement under the law, not playing favorites and granting extraordinary benefits to non-citizens that ordinary Americans do not enjoy….

Each of us is called to demand attention and accountability on all matters pertaining to border security. This includes legal immigration enforcement, aggressive drug enforcement, and counterterrorism efforts to ensure U.S. national security.

President Biden has now moved the Mexican border to each American’s hometown.

The Latin expression “cui bono?” has been used by law enforcement officials and prosecutors for centuries to examine and evaluate criminal conduct in order to identify the most likely suspects and determine questions of motive.

Sunshine State Is A Shining Example In The Fight Against Big Tech Censorship by Chris Talgo

https://issuesinsights.com/2021/05/06/sunshine-state-is-shining-example-in-the-fight-against-big-tech-censorship/

Because the federal government appears unwilling to do anything about the ever-growing problem of big tech censorship, it is left to the states to fight this long-overdue battle.

Fortunately, the Sunshine State is stepping up to the plate, becoming the first state in the country to put a big tech censorship bill on the governor’s desk. Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a strong proponent of the bill, is expected to sign it into law soon.

So, how would the Florida bill (SB 7072) actually rein in big tech censorship?

First and foremost, SB 7072 would make it “a violation for social media deplatforming of a political candidate and requires a social medial platform to meet certain requirements when they restrict speech by users.”

More specifically, “The bill prohibits social media platforms from deplatforming candidates for political office and allows the Florida Elections Commission to fine a social media platform $100,000 per day for deplatforming statewide candidates and $10,000 per day for deplatforming all other candidates.”

The Party of Fear. Runaway Emotions and Myth-The Superstitious Democrats

https://issuesinsights.com/2021/05/06/those-superstitious-democrats/

Even when they’re vaccinated against the coronavirus, Democrats insist on wearing masks and social distancing. Think of the absurd scene in the House chamber when President Joe Biden addressed Congress last week, or when Biden wore a mask on a Zoom call. The Democrats say theirs is the party of science but in reality it’s the party of fear, runaway emotions, and myth.

Not a shred of science has established that mandatory mask wearing and stay-at-home orders have been effective prophylactics against the Chinese virus. Yet the Democrats, which includes nearly the entirety of the press, have embraced both with a zeal much like that of the Salemites who hunted witches in the 17th century.

While the Democrats nagged and threw wet blankets on facts, pleasure, and optimism, John Tierney, an authentic journalist not a member of the Democratic Party’s disinformation team, dug into some research. And what did he find?

“There’s still no convincing evidence that strict lockdowns reduced the death toll from Covid-19,” he wrote in March. “But one effect is clear: more deaths from other causes, especially among the young and middle-aged, minorities, and the less affluent.”

A National Bureau of Economic Research report published last month showed what many of us knew intuitively: Lockdown policies failed. It determined that “evidence suggests that ‘households show the highest transmission rates’ and that ‘households are high-risk settings for the transmission of’” the virus.

The CIA: Dead Spy Stumbling – This New Generation Is Self-Serving and Dysfunctional by Larry Johnson

https://www.thegatewaypundit.com/2021/05/cia-dead-spy-stumbling-new-generation-self-serving-dysfunctional

I entered on duty with the CIA in September 1985. I spent a year in the Career Trainee Program and then, in September 1986, took up my work as the lone Honduran analyst in the Central American Branch. That was a hot position that put me in the frontline of one of the top foreign policy priorities at the time of the Reagan Administration–the Central American Wars and Soviet interference in Nicaragua. When I write, “hot position,” I mean that I was writing two to three times a week for the Presidential Daily Brief (PDB) and the National Intelligence Daily (NID).

I had a front-row seat to watch the struggle to present intelligence that cut against the grain of the political priorities of the Reagan Administration. I recall vividly sitting in a “Warning Meeting” that was chaired by the National Intelligence Officer (NIO) for Latin America. At one point during my briefing I referred to the Contras who were based in the Salient in southern Honduras. The NIO interrupted and ordered me to refer to them as “the Nicaraguan Democrat Resistance.” Me being me responded, “But the President calls them the Contras.” The NIO responded, “Yes, but he’s the President.”

When you start dictating politically correct language to an intelligence analyst you are on the threshold of Orwell’s 1984. I count myself fortunate to have worked at the CIA when it still had some shred of integrity intact. My experience was not the first time that a political agenda intruded on the intelligence process. Cuba in the 1960s and the Vietnam War preceded me as other dark examples of trying to cook the intelligence to match White House priorities.

Now we have this ridiculous recruiting video featuring the new generation of CIA officers:

The CIA has released its recruitment video that features an “intersectional” and “cisgender” Latina mother who says that her employment was not a slip through the cracks and wants to make it known she is “educated, qualified and competent.”

Instead of committing to serve America, this new generation is self-serving and dysfunctional.

Biden’s Vaccine Patent Theft Who will invest in future therapies when the White House helps other governments steal?

https://www.wsj.com/articles/bidens-vaccine-patent-theft-11620255362?mod=opinion_lead_pos3

President Biden genuflected again to progressives on Wednesday by endorsing an intellectual property waiver at the World Trade Organization for Covid vaccines and therapies. This patent heist won’t end well for the U.S. or the world.

South Africa and India have been pushing a resolution at the WTO that would force pharmaceutical companies to hand over their Covid vaccine and therapy IP to manufacturers in low-income countries. The waiver is backed by some 100 other low-income countries, progressive groups and more than 100 Democratic Congress Members.

Waiver proponents say breaking patent protections is necessary to expand global access to vaccines. This is false. WTO rules already allow low-income countries to force drug makers to license their patents during emergencies, though they must negotiate some agreements with developers. Liberals says this is slowing vaccine production.

Yet U.S. and European drug companies have already voluntarily entered into dozens of licensing agreements with other manufacturers, many in low-income countries, as they work to scale up production. Merck last week announced licensing agreements with several Indian manufacturers to produce its investigational antiviral drug.

But vaccine and drug makers first need to ensure their partners can safely manufacture the complex biologic products. This takes time. So does ramping up production of raw ingredients. Even so, global vaccine production is accelerating. The U.S. has also committed $4 billion to Covax, a World Health Organization initiative, which aims to distribute two billion doses to lower- and middle-income countries by the end of this year. Yet India, a global vaccine production powerhouse, recently restricted exports to serve its own population.

Pompeo on CIA recruitment: We can’t risk national security to appease ‘liberal, woke agenda’ By Dominick Mastrangelo

https://thehill.com/policy/national-security/cia/551856-pompeo-on-cia-recruitme

Former CIA Director Mike Pompeo criticized a video recently released by the agency, saying the country “can’t afford to risk our national security to appease some liberal, woke agenda.”

“When I was Director of the CIA, we valued individuals based on their talent and skill, not their race or sexuality,” Pompeo said in a tweet on Tuesday. “I’ll never forget what one female analyst said to me: ‘Thank you for valuing me for my work. I want my abilities and achievements to define me, not my sexuality.’”

He added in a subsequent post that the “collection of incredibly talented patriots serving America at the CIA is what makes it the best spy agency in the world — and we must continue to recruit the best and brightest.”

“We can’t afford to risk our national security to appease some liberal, woke agenda

Pompeo, who also served as secretary of State in the Trump administration, was referencing a “Humans of the CIA” video from the agency in which a first-generation Latin American agent discusses her “intersectional” identity.

 “I am a woman of color. I am a mom. I am a cisgender millennial who’s been diagnosed with generalized anxiety disorder. I am intersectional, but my existence is not a box-checking exercise,” the agent says. 

Democrats Are Killing the American Dream Joe Biden’s American Families Plan replaces individual striving with middle class entitlements. by Daniel Henninger

https://www.wsj.com/articles/democrats-are-killing-the-american-dream-11620251334?mod=opinion_lead_pos8

President Biden’s American Families Act makes one political reality officially clear: The Democratic Party has given up on the American dream.

The Biden proposals—coming as they do with the Democratic progressives’ rise to power—present the American people with a once-in-a-lifetime decision about what kind of country they want to live in for the next half-century.

This isn’t about the culture wars or standard Keynesian stimulus spending. The Biden plan is about public policies that will redesign American society.

The American Families Plan and other recent Democratic legislation implicitly pose several important questions. Is the traditional American idea of upward mobility still important? If so, how should upward mobility happen—through Washington or individual effort? Indeed, should the habit of individual striving give way to a presumably more important goal of nationalized paternalism?

It is no surprise that a liberalism that embraced the “1619 Project’s” rewriting of the U.S.’s founding history would not stop there and try now, despite its almost invisible congressional majority, to displace the country’s originating idea of individual opportunity with a broad birth-to-death entitlement state.

This transition began in March, when Democrats enacted a federal unemployment-insurance bonus of $300. That bonus, pushing benefits past market wage rates, indisputably is causing many to shun previously held jobs, which surely will do long-term damage to the notion of working to get ahead.

Black Lives Matter issues a new list of demands, including a permanent Trump ban from political office and social media Carlos Garcia

https://www.theblaze.com/news/black-lives-matter-demands-trump

https://blacklivesmatter.com/blm-demands/?__cf_chl_jschl_tk__=417c881ae

BLM’s 7 Demands
1. Convict and ban Trump from future political office:

We are joining Rep. Ilhan Omar, Rep. Ayanna Pressley, Rep. Cori Bush, Rep. Jamaal Bowman, and others who are demanding Trump be immediately convicted in the United States Senate. Trump must also be banned from holding elected office in the future. Call your members of Congress and demand they support conviction by dialing (202) 224-3121.

2. Expel Republican members of Congress who attempted to overturn the election and incited a white supremacist attack:

More than half the Republican representatives and multiple senators stoked Trump’s conspiracy theories and encouraged the white supremacists to take action to overturn the election. We are supporting Rep. Cori Bush’s resolution to expel them from Congress for their dangerous and traitorous actions. We also support steps to bar them from seeking another office.

3. Launch a full investigation into the ties between white supremacy and the Capitol Police, law enforcement, and the military:

The Capitol was able to be breached and overrun by white supremacists attempting to disrupt a political process that is fundamental to our democracy. We know that police departments have been a safe haven for white supremacists to hide malintent behind a badge, because the badge was created for that purpose. We also know off-duty cops and military were among the mob at the Capitol on January 6th. Guilty parties need to be held accountable and fired. We are supporting Rep. Jamaal Bowman’s COUP Act to investigate these connections.

4. Permanently ban Trump from all digital media platforms:

Trump has always used his digital media platforms recklessly and irresponsibly to spread lies and disinformation. Now it is clearer than ever that his digital media is also used to incite violence and promote its continuation. He must be stopped from encouraging his mob and further endangering our communities, even after inauguration.

5. Defund the police:

The police that met our BLM protestors this summer with assault rifles, teargas, and military-grade protective gear were the same police that, on Wednesday, met white supremacists with patience and the benefit of the doubt, going so far as to pose for selfies with rioters. The contrast was jarring, but not for Black people. We have always known who the police truly protect and serve. D.C. has the most police per capita in the country; more funding is not the solution.

6. Don’t let the coup be used as an excuse to crack down on our movement:

In response to the coup, Politicians have already introduced the Domestic Terrorism Prevention Act of 2021. We’ve seen this playbook before. These laws are used to target Black and brown communities for heightened surveillance. Republicans are already busy trying to create an equivalence between the mob on January 6th and our Freedom Summer. We don’t need new domestic terror laws, facial recognition, or any other new police power for the state. Our government should protect righteous protest and stay focused on the real issue: rooting out white supremacy. There are enough laws, resources, and intelligence, but they were not used to stop the coup. Our elected officials must uncover why.

7. Pass the BREATHE Act:

The police were born out of slave patrols. We cannot reform an institution built upon white supremacy. We need a new, radical approach to public safety and community investment. President Biden has already drawn on the BREATHE Act in his executive actions calling for racial equity screens in federal programs, investing in environmental justice at historic levels, and engaging with system-impacted communities. The BREATHE Act paints a vision of a world where Black lives matter through investments in housing, education, health, and environmental justice.

Classrooms Bulge with ‘Traumatized’ Migrants as Border Surge Hits the Schools By Ryan Mills

https://www.nationalreview.com/news/classrooms-bulge-with-traumatized-migrants-as-border-surge-hits-the-schools/

The kids tend to show up in Garrett Reed’s classroom in shock.

Many have never been to a big city like Houston before. But now they’re here, in the United States, in Reed’s Wisdom High School classroom, with its smart boards and online learning hub. A school administrator hands each kid a laptop. Many haven’t used a computer before.

None of them speak English. Many don’t even speak Spanish, but rather K’iche’ or maybe Mam, indigenous Mayan languages from the Guatemalan hinterlands.

Many of the kids have just made the dangerous journey to the U.S. through Mexico, enduring a gauntlet of crime filled with thugs, thieves, and predators of a variety of stripes – gangbangers who recruit the boys, sex traffickers who prey on the young girls.

“They’re traumatized. I mean, not all of them, but most of them,” Reed said. “A lot of them just put their head on the desk and cry. That’s what happens. That’s fine. Just cry.”

When these “newcomers” arrive at Wisdom High, it is Reed’s job to teach them English. Reed is one of two English as a Second Language teachers at the school. But, he acknowledges, his job is much bigger than just teaching English. He also is a mentor and a protector, keeping an eye out for potential threats to his vulnerable students inside and outside his classroom.

Author Q&A: ‘The Kennedys in the World’ . By Carl M. Cannon

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2021/05/05/author_qa_the_kennedys_in_the_world.html

I recently interviewed Lawrence J. Haas via email about his new book, subtitled “How Jack, Bobby, and Ted Remade America’s Empire” (Potomac Books). The exchanges have been edited for length.

Larry, hundreds of books have already been written on Kennedys, so what inspired you to write this one?

I knew a bit about Jack and Bobby from my readings over the years, and I watched Ted up close while I worked as a journalist in Washington. I became intrigued when I noticed how involved Ted was with America’s global role because, after all, he’s known overwhelmingly for his domestic achievements (civil rights, labor, health, and so on). I became further intrigued when I took a closer look at what Ted was doing on foreign affairs, which was sometimes consistent with what Jack and Bobby did and sometimes quite different. So, I began to do some research, and I discovered a new, rich, fascinating story about all three brothers.

Everybody knows that Joe and Rose Kennedy groomed their boys for success. But what nobody seems to know is that Joe and Rose pushed them toward a particular kind of success: not just to attain power, but to look beyond America’s borders — to learn about the world, to care about the world, and, once they attained power, to shape America’s role in the world. Joe and Rose led discussions about the world with the boys over breakfast and dinner; Joe invited prominent people, like Charles Lindbergh and Henry Luce, to dine with them and enrich the conversations; Joe wrote to the boys about global events when he or they were away; Joe sent them to travel overseas when they were old enough; Joe arranged meetings for them with the world’s leading figures; and Joe secured jobs for each of them as foreign correspondents when they were overseas so they could position themselves as global thinkers.

And, over time, the brothers developed a deep understanding of the world’s different peoples, and cultures, and ideologies; a keen appreciation for the challenges they presented for the United States; and a strong desire to reshape America’s response to them. Once the brothers assumed power, they each applied what they had learned from their education about the world, and their travels, to put a distinct mark on the American empire. They each shaped broad issues of war and peace as well as America’s response to almost every major global challenge of their times.

In the prologue, you relate an obscure incident from September 1939. Just days after World War II began in Europe, a British passenger ship was torpedoed by a German sub, killing 112 people and stranding some 300 Americans in Ireland and Scotland. The U.S. ambassador to the U.K. sent his 22-year-old son to console the Americans? What was Joseph Kennedy thinking?

Well, he certainly wasn’t thinking about who was the best, or most appropriate, person to send. Jack Kennedy, who was working for his father, the ambassador, in London at the time, was just 22, he looked even younger than that, and he held no official government position. So, all he could do was listen to the survivors and promise to relay their views to his father. To them, his arrival was as much insulting as reassuring.

But, as his highest priority, Joe Kennedy wasn’t all that interested in finding the best person to greet the survivors. He saw an opportunity to continue grooming Jack, as he would Bobby and Ted, for prominent roles on the world stage. As it turned out, Jack did a nice job as his father’s emissary. He visited the survivors in hotels and hospitals, and he charmed them with his warm smile and soft touch. The London newspapers labeled him the “schoolboy diplomat” and an “ambassador of mercy” who “displayed a wisdom and sympathy of a man twice his age.” After Jack returned to the embassy, he kept working for the survivors and clashed with the bureaucrats who didn’t seem to share his sense of urgency. Eventually, Joe Kennedy arranged for the survivors to return home safely on a U.S. merchant ship. 

In 1937, shortly after Franklin D. Roosevelt’s second inauguration, the two youngest sons, Bobby and Ted, along with the five Kennedy sisters, met Franklin Roosevelt in the White House. Did those children grow up with an expectation of having that proximity to power?