RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://thefederalist.com/2019/07/15/john-roberts-citizenship-decision-legally-politically-corrupt/

Are we a nation of laws or a nation of men? Previously, the most radically leftist federal judges had failed this test on cases pertaining to the Trump administration. Now the highest court in the land has joined them.

The fight over whether the simple question, “Is this person a citizen of the United States?” could appear on the 2020 U.S. census already implicated major issues of public policy, including immigration, national sovereignty, and voting rights. But the Supreme Court’s recent ruling on the matter has now transcended these issues to challenge the rule of law itself, once again raising the question: Who is really “violating norms,” “undermining institutions” and creating “constitutional crises”—President Trump, or his Resisters?

The majority opinion in Department of Commerce v. New York, delivered by Chief Justice John Roberts, reads like former FBI director James Comey’s infamous statement regarding former secretary of state Hillary Clinton’s email server. It presents a methodical, compelling case that should result in a just decision, only to undo the case on the most baseless of grounds.

It’s Constitutional, But We Don’t Care

Roberts’ opinion affirms that including a question about citizenship in the decennial census is constitutional, writing that the “Enumeration Clause…permits Congress, and by extension the Secretary [of Commerce], to inquire about citizenship on the census questionnaire.” It affirms that the process by which it was to be reinstated was “reasonable, and reasonably explained,” consistent with the Administrative Procedures Act (APA). That should have been the end of it.

As Justice Clarence Thomas put it in a separate opinion: “Our only role in this case is to decide whether the Secretary complied with the law and gave a reasoned explanation for his decision. The Court correctly answers these questions in the affirmative…That ought to end our inquiry.”

But just as Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s finding of “no collusion” did not end his inquiry into obstruction, in the case of the census citizenship question, the Supreme Court soldiered on in its farcical quest. Stealing defeat from the jaws of victory for the Constitution and the country, Roberts said that in spite of the census citizenship question’s lawfulness, the Trump administration could not ask it.

http://www.israelnationalnews.com/News/News.aspx/265965

US President fires back following tweets in which he told Democratic congresswomen to “go back” to the countries that they came from.

US President Donald Trump on Sunday night doubled down on tweets telling a group of Democratic congresswomen that they should “go back” to the countries that they came from.

“So sad to see the Democrats sticking up for people who speak so badly of our country and who, in addition, hate Israel with a true and unbridled passion. Whenever confronted, they call their adversaries, including Nancy Pelosi, ‘RACIST,'” Trump wrote.

“Their disgusting language and the many terrible things they say about the United States must not be allowed to go unchallenged. If the Democrat Party wants to continue to condone such disgraceful behavior, then we look even more forward to seeing you at the ballot box in 2020!” he added.

The furor over Trump’s tweets offered an increasingly fractious Democratic Party the chance to unify in its criticism of the president. The party has been riven by infighting over the past week, sparked by an interview given to the New York Times by Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-CA) last Sunday in which she made remarks about the freshman congresswomen that were seen by some as dismissive.

The tensions within the party escalated after Ocasio-Cortez told the Washington Post that she felt Pelosi was targeting women of color, though the New York Democrat said she doesn’t believe the Speaker is racist.

Trump’s tweets, however, provided Democrats with an opportunity to show a united front, however temporary, noted The Hill.

Democrats across the spectrum, from Ocasio-Cortez’s fellow progressives to close Pelosi allies like Rep. Hakeem Jeffries (D-NY), condemned the tweets, with Jeffries calling Trump a “racial arsonist.”

https://pjmedia.com/trending/trump-to-aoc-omar-and-tlaib-go-back-to-the-totally-broken-and-crime-infested-places-you-came-from/

President Donald Trump has angrily responded to Democratic Congresswoman Ilhan Omar’s and Congresswoman’s Alexandria Ocasio Cortez’s ridiculous accusations against the American people, calling them “racists” who treat “dogs” better than immigrants, and of forcing immigrant children to drink from toilets. In what’s truly an epic Twitter-rant, the president tells Omar and AOC that they’d do better to “go back” to the country they came from.

“So interesting to see ‘Progressive’ Democrat Congresswomen, who originally came from countries whose governments are a complete and total catastrophe, the worst, and most corrupt and inept anywhere in the world (if they even have a functioning government at all), now loudly and viciously telling the people of the United States, the greatest and most powerful Nation on earth, how our government is to be run. Why don’t they go back and help fils the totally broken and crime infested places from which they came. Then come back and show us how it is done.”

“These places need your help badly,” he continued. Adding that “you can’t leave fast enough. I’m sure that Nancy Pelosi would be very happy to quickly work out free travel arrangements.”

It is not exactly presidential in the traditional interpretation of that phrase, but who cares? This is glorious — and it’s also precisely why Trump won the elections in 2016 and will be reelected in 2020. He’s not sugarcoating any of it. Reps. Ilhan Omar and AOC hate America and routinely insult the American people; the very same people and country to whom they owe everything they have.

https://us20.campaign-archive.com/?u=2cf2a73e6220e59e3c1c4a60c&id=0a8b28dab1&e=0c8ccf8e98

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https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/07/jeffrey-epstein-case-double-jeopardy-rules/Double-jeopardy rules almost certainly prohibit settling a federal case and then prosecuting it again in federal court.

A lex Acosta did a bad job on the Jeffrey Epstein case. This column was nearly finished when news broke Friday that he would resign as labor secretary. I was going to argue that his lapses did not justify joining the nakedly political mau-mauing by Democrats who have no interest in exploring the behavior of Democrats who are neck-deep in a monstrous pedophile’s activities. My friend Jennifer Braceras has ably addressed that point in a Washington Examiner column. I was also going to add that I’d shed no tears if President Trump forced Acosta out — easy for me to say, since I think (a) he should never have been nominated in the first place, and (b) his commitment to Trump’s deregulation agenda has never been sufficiently ardent.

Under the circumstances, I’ll spare you a few hundred words of critique on Acosta’s indecorous performance. Instead, to cut to the chase, I do not believe we can yet total up the wages of the sweetheart deal he cut for Epstein while he was U.S. attorney for the Southern District of Florida (SD-Florida). The commentariat is glibly assuming the courts will give the feds a second bite at the apple by allowing the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York (SDNY) to prosecute the charges that Acosta forfeited. I don’t think so.

Double Jeopardy
On Monday, Geoffrey Berman, the U.S. attorney for the Southern District of New York, announced that his office has now charged Epstein. While the SDNY indictment may be new, Epstein’s crimes are not. They are the same offenses from which Acosta agreed to spare Epstein from federal prosecution if he pled guilty to state prostitution charges — which Epstein proceeded to do, in reliance on Acosta’s commitment. There is thus a very good chance, based on the Constitution’s guarantee against double jeopardy, that the SDNY case against Epstein will be voided by the SD-Florida non-prosecution agreement (non-pros).

To be sure, the SDNY has a counterargument, and it will be vigorously made. It has two components. First, there is language in the non-pros that appears to limit the agreement to SD-Florida, to wit: “prosecution in this District for these offenses shall be deferred in favor of prosecution by the State of Florida” (emphasis added). Here, “deferred” effectively means forfeited — the same effect for double-jeopardy purposes as a conviction or acquittal — because of Epstein’s compliance with the requirement that he plead guilty in the state case. Second, there is jurisprudence in the Second Circuit (which controls in the SDNY) holding that one federal district’s agreement does not bind another.

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/14536/epstein-acosta-resignation

Experienced lawyers with whom I have discussed the case — both prosecutors and defense attorneys — worry that the thumb of media and political pressure will be placed on the scales of justice when it comes to the exercise of prosecutorial discretion and the decision to try or settle a case.

Consider the situation of a prosecutor today or tomorrow who has a weak federal case involving sexual allegations. He has two options: the first is he can try to make a deal based on the relative strength of his case and of the defense case. But if he makes that deal, he risks criticism for being too soft on sex offenders. His second option is to take the weak case to trial and risk losing. But even if he loses, the risks to him personally are less great because he can blame the loss on the judge or the jury. A deal, on the other hand, is totally attributed to the prosecutor, as evidenced by the Acosta resignation. So, a simple cost-benefit analysis will incline a prosecutor to litigate rather than settle.

In the post-Acosta world, prosecutors will bring cases to trial even if the likelihood of a conviction is questionable, as it was in the Epstein case. The result of this change will be more trials, more crowded courtroom dockets and fewer convictions. That is not good for defendants, victims or for the rule of law.

The forced resignation of Alex Acosta based on the plea deal that he made with Jeffrey Epstein’s lawyers (of which I was one) may have serious unintended effects on our system of criminal justice. The criticism of Acosta — whether warranted or not — for making the deal will cause other prosecutors to go to trial in relatively weak cases in which the chances of losing are considerable.

The deal accepted by Acosta was based on the weakness of the government’s federal case. In order for sex with underage persons to be prosecuted federally, as distinguished from prosecution by a state, there has to be compelling evidence of an interstate nexus. Merely having sex with underage females in a local context does not constitute a federal crime. In the Epstein case, this would have required credible testimony or documentary evidence proving transportation of underage females in interstate commerce, or the use of interstate communications such as telephone calls, emails, or the wiring of funds. There was scant evidence of such an interstate nexus in the Epstein case at the time the deal was made. Perhaps there is more now, but that remains to be seen.

https://www.latimes.com/health/la-he-millennials-religion-zodiac-tarot-crystals-astrology-20190710-story.html?utm_source=pocket-newtab

I love myself.

I am beautiful.

It was an unseasonably chilly night for June in Los Angeles. About three dozen people, mostly women in their 20s and 30s, were spending their Friday evening lying on yoga mats on the back patio of a shop a few blocks from Hollywood Forever Cemetery and the Paramount Pictures lot. Attendees had been invited to bring whatever they needed to make the space cozy: Blankets. Pillows. Crystals.

I am powerful.

Ana Lilia was leading them in affirmations, closing out a 90-minute breathwork session celebrating the summer solstice.

I am a bright light.

I am ready to be seen.

Most days, Lilia works with individual clients. In the evenings, she teaches classes or puts on events, such as the solstice gathering. She first got into breathwork four years ago and started taking classes to become a teacher six months later. If you’ve never done it before, it’s a mix of breathing exercises and guided meditations meant to relax you and help connect with your thoughts — a cross between the last 10 minutes of a yoga class and a therapy session that takes place entirely in your head.

A spiritual shift

She’s one of a growing number of young people — largely millennials, though the trend extends to younger Gen Xers, now cresting 40, and down to Gen Z, the oldest of whom are freshly minted college grads — who have turned away from traditional organized religion and are embracing more spiritual beliefs and practices like tarot, astrology, meditation, energy healing and crystals.

And no, they don’t particularly care if you think it’s “woo-woo” or weird. Most millennials claim to not take any of it too seriously themselves. They dabble, they find what they like, they take what works for them and leave the rest. Evoking consternation from buttoned-up outsiders is far from a drawback — it’s a fringe benefit.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/boycotting-home-depot-11562960186

Seems like it’s getting easier every day to enrage a segment of politically active Americans. Witness the current effort to boycott Home Depot because of co-founder Bernie Marcus’ comments about President Donald Trump.

Boycotts are a great way to express customer displeasure and influence corporate decision-making. Such voluntary action by consumers to enforce market discipline is infinitely superior to government regulatory discipline, which is conducted in the name of consumers but inevitably reduces their freedom to make choices.

As for Home Depot, there’s nothing wrong with consumers deciding not to shop there. But in applying their new Marcus standard, such consumers may have trouble finding anywhere in America where they can shop. Here’s how Mr. Marcus triggered the latest political backlash against a U.S. business with a recent interview in the Atlanta Journal-Constitution:

In the course of describing how he plans to donate nearly all of his multi-billion-dollar fortune to charity—and also reflecting on the roughly $2 billion he’s already given to organizations concerned with the treatment of autism and traumatic brain injuries, among other causes—the Home Depot co-founder also mentioned that he planned to support President Donald Trump’s re-election campaign.

That was enough to light up social media with calls for shoppers to abandon Home Depot, even though Mr. Marcus hasn’t worked there in more than 15 years. It’s true that he remains a significant shareholder, but a closer look at his comments reveals that he was hardly offering an unqualified endorsement of Mr. Trump.

https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/07/democratic-presidental-candidates-big-government-proposals/

‘Free’ health care for all, including illegal aliens, will cost trillions.

When it comes to health care, the Democratic presidential candidates offer the same cure: Big Government. Their chief prescriptions are almost stereotypically statist. Their “remedies” include destruction of private property, huge tax hikes, and “freebies” — even to people who break into this country. This would be underwritten by the Democrats’ go-to source for funding their zany schemes: the beleaguered American taxpayer.

Decrying White House efforts to scuttle Obamacare, Senator Bernie Sanders (Socialist, Vt.) said at the June 27 Democratic debate in Miami: “President Trump, you’re not standing up for working families when you try to throw 32 million people off the health care that they have.”

What chutzpah.

As Medicare for All’s chief sponsor, Sanders would terminate, with extreme prejudice, the private health plans of roughly 180 million Americans — nearly six times as many cancellations as Sanders claims Trump wants.

“I’m with Bernie on Medicare for All,” Senator Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts chirped in her debate. Bill de Blasio, New York City’s breathtakingly inept mayor, gleefully concurred. California senator Kamala Harris raised her hand when NBC’s Lester Holt asked, “Who here would abolish their private health insurance in favor of a government-run plan?” She later reversed herself and said that she misheard the question. Regardless, she is a Senate co-sponsor of Sanders’s bill, as are New Jersey’s Cory Booker and New York’s Kirsten Gillibrand, also White House wannabes.

https://amgreatness.com/2019/07/10/street-smarts-in-the-white-house/

President Trump went to an Ivy League school, but he came out still talking like a New Yorker, with his street smarts intact. What does it mean to have street smarts? It’s knowledge of how to spot trouble coming, how to cope with mean bastards, and thrive. It is knowledge gained from gritty life, which gives you “a bank of courage to depend on when you are tested.” Your knowledge is based in your life experience, not conventional wisdom or academic notions, so it is actually real.

Street smarts combines common sense, self-preservation, and assertiveness. Think President Trump.

The person with street smarts has a great bullshit detector. You know how to deal with bullies and cheats, whether they be elite media or political opponents. As Willie Dixon put it, “You can’t mess with the messer, the messer’s gonna mess with you.”

Trump’s success dominating his dirty-dealing opponents has amazed and dumbfounded Democrats and the old GOP alike. They don’t understand his strengths. Like a martial arts master, Trump doesn’t absorb his enemies’ attacks. He transforms their assaults into his own energy to win.

President Trump’s street smarts go way beyond dealing with enemies. It is the key to how he carved his own successful path in life, and in the White House. The key to street smarts is noticing life as it is and dealing with it. In high falutin’ psychology terms, it is reality testing, the highest order of brain functioning.

Reality testing is essential to good judgment and effectiveness in life. It means dealing with the world as it is, not as you want it to be, nor as you fear it to be. No socialism, no global warming, no free lunch.

Good judgment requires facing things as they are. Democrats lack it almost entirely. President Trump has it in excess. Reality testing is a rare gift. It is called common sense, but it is not common.

This is why President Trump has managed to accomplish so much that was deemed impossible in the two difficult areas of the economy and foreign affairs. He pays no attention to the received truths of other people. He looks simply and without equivocation at what’s in front of him. Like any builder, President Trump has his two feet solidly on the ground at all times.