RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://amgreatness.com/2018/12/08/there-is-no-such

Americans are really beginning to sour on Obamacare, misleadingly titled the Affordable Care Act. Every year premiums go up, out of pocket costs go up, and care is only marginally better and in some cases worse, due to the influx of the sickest people into the healthcare system seeking generous, subsidized insurance.

Obamacare hasn’t delivered, even on its own terms. The most productive and enterprising Americans—small business owners and independent contractors—must foot monthly premiums of $1,000 or more in order to have the privilege of shelling out even more thousands in the event they get seriously ill.

In light of this debacle, some have resorted to magical thinking. Our favorite magician, young congresswoman-elect Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), tweeted the following in favor of “Medicare for All”:

While conservatives have generally rejected solutions like this, the impulse that drives the desire is understandable. Medical inflation is enormous and grossly disproportionate to improved outcomes. Medicare is a generous and expensive program, but one that mostly serves its clients well. The elderly, who often need substantial medical care, are generally able to partake with minimal personal expense.

Medicare costs incurred by patients are certainly a fraction of what self-employed, the young, and others pay for healthcare. And medicare remains more or less solvent because lots of healthy and younger people are paying into the pool. In other words, there are multiple payers for each recipient. The same is true of Tricare, the medical insurance plan for military service members and their dependents.

https://thehill.com/opinion/white-house/420408-comeys-confession-dossier-not-verified-before-or-after-fisa-warrant

Many people I know in law enforcement circles shuddered when James Comey tweeted recently that acting Attorney General Matt Whitaker “may not be the sharpest knife in the drawer.”

To them, Comey’s Twitter attack crossed that “blue line” – the one that real cops abide by, to never criticize fellow officers and to always have their backs.

I had a different reaction. I found it odd that a man who started his Twitter career by quoting Bible verses about justice might have forgotten one of the golden utterances from Jesus himself: “He that is without sin among you, let him cast the first stone.”

The failures of Comey’s remarkably turbulent and short tenure as FBI director were on display again Friday on Capitol Hill, when he was interviewed in a closed-door session by two House committees. Republican lawmakers were aghast at his sudden lack of recollection of key events.

He didn’t seem to know that his own FBI was using No. 4 Justice Department official Bruce Ohr as a conduit to keep collecting intelligence from Christopher Steele after the British intel operative was fired by the bureau for leaking and lying. In fact, Comey didn’t seem to remember knowing that Steele had been terminated, according to sources in the room.

“His memory was so bad I feared he might not remember how to get out of the room after the interview,” one lawmaker quipped. Lamented another: “It was like he suddenly developed dementia or Alzheimer’s, after conveniently remembering enough facts to sell his book.”

Faintness of memory is a common symptom for witnesses under the intense spotlight. But lawmakers were relieved when Comey could remember one fact that is essential to understanding if his FBI acted appropriately in the investigation of Donald Trump and Russia.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/point/272187/mueller-investigation-pretext-obstructing-daniel-greenfield

Mr. Comey went to Congress and did his usual Colonel Klink routine of knowing nothing about anything at all. But this time he had a fresh excuse for not answering questions about the abuse of the FISA process by the Obama administration in order to spy on the political opposition.

Answering such questions might interfere with the Mueller investigation.

Thus we had the fresh farce of a lawyer from a discredited arm of the government, which has lately taken to executing search warrants against its own whistleblowers (the sort of thing that the media would report on if it too wasn’t an arm of the same political faction) refusing to answer questions relevant to the House investigation of government abuses because it would interfere with a later investigation.

Please don’t ask questions about Obama’s Watergate because it might get in the way of our attempt to Watergate Trump.

The Mueller investigation serves many purposes

1. Helping the Democrats illegitimately reverse the 2016 election

2. Boosting sales of the Washington Post

and…

3. Obstructing any investigation of the FBI surveillance of the political opposition

And for guys like Mueller, it’s the latter that may be the most important. Every bit of oxygen that Mueller’s coup gets snuffs out any investigation of FISA abuses.

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2018/12/pathetic_clintons_resort_to_groupon_trying_to_get_people_to_show_up_and_fill_some_seats_on_their_stadium_tour.html

We now have the first acknowledgment from their side that the Clintons vastly overestimated their personal popularity and the public’s interest in hearing them talk about themselves.

The Clintons and their stadium tour promoter are officially responding to the public’s refusal to show up in sufficient numbers for them to avoid embarrassment (and financial loss) at the level of ticket prices that seemed realistic when the tour was announced only two months ago. The UK Daily Mail noticed this offer on Groupon:

(source)

This is pathetic on a couple of levels. First of all, notice that this is not some last-minute sale, but rather for an event half a year in the future. In other words, they have given up on the price list that seemed realistic to them just a couple of months ago. They are admitting they are not worth (to the public) what they were charging.

Secondly, they are turning to a company, Groupon, that has also discovered that its stock price was too expensive for the public. Check out its stock chart since its IPO:

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2018/12/no_way_out_for_clinton_inc_corruption_this_time.html

The legal dodge used by James Comey to exonerate Hillary Clinton from her prima facie crimes in using an unsecured server for official business won’t be any help to the Clinton Foundation as it faces charges coming from whistleblowers.

Clinton Inc. criminal defense lawyers trying to hide behind the word “intent” won’t work because the Clintons were previously warned early and often about improper compliance:

.. internal legal reviews that the foundation conducted on itself in 2008 and 2011.

Those reviews flagged serious concerns about legal compliance, improper commingling of personal and charity business and “quid pro quo” promises made to donors while Hillary Clinton was secretary of State.

“With a cloth?”

There is a great line in the fun movie, National Treasure, spoken by the accomplished, former Marine, Harvey Keitel, who was playing a very solid FBI Special Agent “Someone has to go to prison Ben.”

Sadly, as both the first Assistant Secretary for Congressional and Public Affairs and then in a reorganization as being in charge of Public and Intergovernmental Affairs for the Veterans Administration, I did experience many scammers and real criminal types that actually did not go to prison but walked away without being charged after running truly horrific veteran charity scams.

The lesson I learned in trying to bring many veteran charity scams to justice was, sadly, that a legal strategy adopted by defendants often worked. Two FBI Special Agents who were investigating a $ 6 million scam out of the $ 7 million collected said DOJ Attorneys prosecuting charity cases have to respect the power of the word “intent”. Thus the cases were often dropped.

But now the FBI/DOJ does not have that excuse to withhold a prosecution going forward.

One of the elements of a crime is that the criminal behavior has to be documented as being undertaken knowingly and purposeful which is exactly what the whistleblower documents prove.

Often, charity scammers walk away clean because the Government cannot prove “intent” because the defendant if taken to court will simply say; look at our good work we are just bad managers.

https://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2018/dec/5/editorial-settling-a-score-is-what-robert-mueller-/

Friends don’t let friends go to the clink. The conclusion that the nation is currently running on a dual justice system — a gentler, privileged system for Hillary Clinton and her cronies, and a harsh and unforgiving system for everyone else — is coming evident to everyone.

Robert Mueller’s search for a collusion between President Trump and Vladimir Putin to cook the 2016 presidential election to a Republican recipe has been covered in exhausting but not exhaustive detail by the Democratic media, from Paul Manafort’s choice of designer neckties suitable for wearing to court to whether Michael Cohen told the FBI his work for a Trump construction project ended in January or June of 2016. It’s hard to say exactly on which side of the yellow line separating titillation and tedium the Mueller squad car runs, but it hasn’t yet picked up anyone linking Russian collusion to the president.

Out of public view, U.S. Attorney John Huber has been working with Justice Department Inspector General Michael Horowitz in investigating what Mr. Mueller could not or would not investigate. Did Obama administration officials use falsified intelligence to obtain warrants to spy on Trump associates? Did such authorities give Hillary and Bill Clinton and their associates a pass for corruption in return for contributions to the Clinton Foundation?

There’s ample reason to suspect that none of the old friends of Hillary and Bill at the Justice Department are on the scout for evidence that would lead to measuring Hillary for stripes. The lawyer for one whistleblower told The Daily Caller last week that he has firsthand knowledge of the crusade to defend Hillary at all costs. Michael Socarras says his client, Dennis Nathan Cain, provided information to the Justice Department and House and Senate Intelligence Committees about unsavory deals involving the Clinton Foundation, Uranium One, the company that enabled Russians to get control of a share of the U.S. uranium market, and the Russian nuclear energy company Rosatom.

http://www.ilanamercer.com/phprunner/public_article_list_view.php?editid1=996
In the title of his magisterial book, Fyodor Dostoevsky paired “Crime and Punishment,”not crime and pardons, or crime and “Civics lessons,” amnesty and asylum.

Punishment must closely follow a crime in order to be both effective as a deterrent, as well as to serve as a public declaration of values and norms.

In explaining Texas justice and its attendant values, stand-up satirist Ron White performed the public service no politician is prepared to perform. “In Texas, we have the death penalty and we use it. If you come to Texas and kill somebody, we will kill you back.”

So, where’s such clarity when you need it?

Something has gotten into the country’s lymphatic system. The infection is becoming more apparent by the day, not least in the way matters of life-and-death are debated (or not).

Again-and-again one hears boilerplate statements that fail to properly fix on the defining issues of our time, much less fix them.

Consider the flippancy over threats against persons and property, from within the country and from without it.

The home of Fox News personality Tucker Carlson is surrounded by a small, if menacing, mob, and his family threatened. Before dinging the man’s front door, the assailants chant out their criminal intentions:

“Tucker Carlson, we will fight. We know where you sleep at night. We know where you sleep.”

To which other talkers, even the wonderful Tucker, respond by vaporizing about rights to speech and protest vs. some or other watered-down peace and security to which private property owners are entitled.

Nobody alludes to the rights of private property or to the fulcrum that is law-and-order.

No demands for arrests are issued or voiced, publicly. No expectation for retribution is set-up. Follow-up is nonexistent in media. Police do not publicize any arrests. If they make them, none are reported by media.

No teachable moments occur.

https://www.nationalreview.com/2018/12/william-barr-attorney-general-nominee-excellent-choice/

In nominating William Barr for AG, the president could not have done better

In 2007, the Justice Department was in disarray. Though it was largely exaggerated, a controversy over the firing of some United States attorneys, the intrusion of politics into Justice Department hiring decisions, and White House contacts with Main Justice forced the resignation of an overmatched attorney general, Alberto Gonzales.

The Justice Department is not just any arm of government. It is a bulwark of the rule of law on which our domestic tranquility and prosperity depend. It is a watchman against terrorists and hostile foreign powers, ensuring our domestic security. When it is reeling, the nation is reeling. In 2007, it was reeling.

Then, in a masterstroke, President Bush named Michael B. Mukasey as the new attorney general. A distinguished former Justice Department prosecutor, Judge Mukasey had been as accomplished and exemplary a jurist as the nation could produce. His nomination was exactly the shot in the arm the Justice Department needed. Order was restored, thanks to the respect he’d earned from all quarters, including both sides of the congressional aisle, for his legal acumen and scrupulousness.

In a time of similar tumult, President Trump has hit a similar home run, nominating William P. Barr to be the next attorney general. Bill Barr will restore order.

Barr brings much-needed experience and instant credibility to the task. After all, he has already been the nation’s chief federal law-enforcement officer, serving as attorney general in the last years of President George H. W. Bush’s term. He is a lawyer’s lawyer, having led the Department’s Office of Legal Counsel before being elevated by Bush 41 to deputy AG and, ultimately, the top job. He has rightly been adamant that, while an attorney general is a consequential administration official, the AG’s first allegiance is to the Constitution and the laws.

Importantly, when Barr was attorney general, the chief of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division was a fellow by the name of Robert Mueller — now the special counsel running the investigation of Russia’s interference in the 2016 election, including any Trump-campaign “collusion” therein.

https://pjmedia.com/trending/womens-rights-activist-linda-sarsour-is-empowering-radical-islamic-torture-terror-rape/

Women’s March co-founder Linda Sarsour is “empowering” the radical Islam that oppresses women across the world, inspiring sex slavery, child marriage, and female genital mutilation, a best-selling author and women’s rights activist told PJ Media on Friday.

“Linda Sarsour is promoting Sharia law and misleading Americans,” Rabia Kazan, a best-selling author and president of the Middle Eastern Women’s Coalition, told PJ Media on Friday. “She never mentions child marriage, genital mutilation, or honor killings.”

“She’s empowering their side, not us,” Kazan said. “She’s encouraging these barbaric people. She’s encouraging them and contributing to them, to women being sold and girls being raped everyday.”

The Middle Eastern Women’s Coalition will endorse President Donald Trump for 2020 on Tuesday.

Kazan described the dire state of women in the Middle East. “Women and children are suffering under Sharia law and in the Middle East. Our girls are being sold into sexual slavery every single day,” she added. “Four-year-old babies are being sold to ISIS. Little girls aged seven to fourteen are being sold as child brides. This is pedophilia and rape by marriage.”

Under the influence of people warning about “Islamophobia,” the “whole world is thinking they are volunteers,” and Linda Sarsour is leading this effort.

“How many of us have to die?” she asked. “How many of us have to be raped before you take an action? Silence is killing us and President Trump is speaking.”

“Women like Linda Sarsour are misleading Americans to think that all women in the Middle East are happy to wear headscarves and to be slaves,” Kazan said. “She’s the one who is helping the people who are doing this to us.”

“She is encouraging those barbaric people in their torture, terror, rape,” the women’s rights advocate argued. “She’s helping them. She’s not defending our rights at all.”

“Shame on her. All the child brides and all honor killing victims, genital mutilation victims shame Linda Sarsour,” the Middle Eastern Women’s Coalition president declared. “She has done nothing for us.” CONTINUE AT SITE

https://amgreatness.com/2018/12/06/george-h-w-bush-and-the

Amidst the lavish praise for the late president, George H.W. Bush, allow me to offer a contrarian view.

As we learned from the funeral of the non-president, John McCain, the leftist media has rarely met an ineffective Republican politician they didn’t want to celebrate when he passed, no matter what they’d said about him during his time here on Earth. In the interests of “bipartisanship,” “comity,” and “civility,” the years the dearly departed moved among us are seen retrospectively as a kind of Golden Age, when Republicans lost graciously to the designated Democrat, whether as a first-time candidate or (even better) a defeated one-termer sent packing so the Democrat Restoration could be implemented, and the natural order of American politics restored.

In the case of Bush the Elder, however, Poppy’s defeat at the hands (sorry) of Bill Clinton was not only fully deserved—the man was a natural non-politician up against the best campaigner of his generation—but actually welcome. Not only did he—read my lips—betray the legacy of Ronald Reagan in his electorally fatal decision to welsh on his “no new taxes” pledge, not only did he cut the legs out from under the Reagan Revolution by calling for a “kinder, gentler America,” but he also egregiously mishandled the Gipper’s most important legacy: the defeat of the Soviet Union and the end of the Cold War.

Don’t argue with me: I was there. I was in Dresden in February of 1985 when Erich Honecker denounced the “Star Wars” missile defense program at the behest of his Soviet masters; I was in the USSR (Leningrad) when Chernobyl blew up in April 1986; I was in Berlin, sledgehammer in hand, when the Wall toppled in November 1989; and I wrapped up my sojourn in the East Bloc during the summer of 1991 in Moscow, just a week or so before the attempted coup against Gorbachev.