RUTHFULLY YOURS

Using funerals for political purposes has a long, but not distinguished, tradition. In 44 B.C. eulogist Mark Antony claimed to Roman mourners that he came to bury Caesar. But his speech created a frenzy and ended up ensuring a death warrant for the once “honorable” Brutus.

In contrast, aside from the commemoration of the deceased, Americans mostly have seen funerals as solemn reminders of how frail and transitory life is for all of us, and how our shared fates should unite even the bitterest of enemies.

Sixteen years ago, on the eve of the 2002 midterm election, and at a time when the United States was beginning to divide over the Afghanistan intervention and a looming Iraq war, Sen. Paul Wellstone (D-Minn.) tragically died in a plane crash.

Wellstone’s Minnesota funeral was meant to be a commemoration of a life of public servant well lived. But the funeral service was soon hijacked by partisan speakers and ended up a loud and often grating political pep rally.

The message to mourners of all beliefs and persuasions was to translate their grief into votes for progressive candidates like Wellstone. Popular discontent over news of the politicalized funeral may well have explained why, two weeks later, the in-power Republicans actually picked up seats in George W. Bush’s first midterm election.

At the recent eight-hour, televised funeral of iconic singer Aretha Franklin, many of the speakers such as Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson turned the event into a political wake—calling for everything from increased voter registration to tighter standards on drinking water.

Activist and professor Michael Eric Dyson embarrassed himself with adolescent hits against President Donald Trump: “You lugubrious leach, you dopey doppelganger of deceit and deviance, you lethal liar, you dimwitted dictator, you foolish fascist.”

On the next day, the televised state funeral for Sen. John McCain likewise soon became just as political.

https://pjmedia.com/trending/kamala-harris-harasses-kavanaugh-on-robert-mueller-charlottesville-white-supremacist-terms/

On Tuesday, Sen. Kamala Harris (D-Calif.) accused Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh of speaking with President Trump’s lawyer’s law firm about the Robert Mueller investigation. She did so without evidence, and while refusing to provide a list of lawyers at the firm. After this, the senator jumped down Kavanaugh’s throat with a question about the white nationalist riots in Charlottesville last year.

“Judge, have you ever discussed Special Counsel Mueller or his investigation with anyone?” Harris asked. After the nominee responded that he had, the senator asked, “Have you discussed it with anyone at Kasowitz, Benson, and Torres, the law firm founded by Marc Kasowitz, President Trump’s personal lawyer? Be sure about your answer, sir.”

Kavanaugh, perplexed, could not remember if he knew anyone at that law firm. “Is there a person you’re talking about?” The senator responded, “I’m asking you a very direct question, yes or no.”

“I’m not sure, I need to know anyone who works at that law firm,” the nominee explained. As the senator continued to push him, he said, “I’m just trying to think, do I know anyone at that firm.” Kamala Harris cut him off, saying, “That’s not my question.”

“I would like to know the person you’re thinking of,” Kavanaugh said. “I think you’re thinking of someone and you don’t want to tell us,” Harris countered. Can she read his mind?!

“Who did you have a conversation with?” Kamala Harris asked, acting as though the nominee’s perplexed face revealed his complicity.

At this point, Sen. Mike Lee (R-Utah) chimed in with a point of order, explaining that Washington, D.C. is full of law firms, that law firms are full of people, and it is not reasonable for Harris to assume Kavanaugh automatically knows everyone who works at this one specific law firm. He joked, “They’re like rabbits, they form new firms.” CONTINUE AT SITE

https://www.nationalreview.com/news/atlanta-mayor-announces-city-jails-no-longer-hold-ice-detainees/

Atlanta mayor Keisha Lance Bottoms signed an executive order Thursday requiring that all Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detainees be transferred out of city custody immediately.

“Atlanta will no longer be complicit in a policy that intentionally inflicts misery on a vulnerable population without giving any thought to the horrific fallout,” Bottoms said at a City Hall news conference, according to the Atlanta Journal Constitution. “As the birthplace of the civil-rights movement we are called to be better than this.”

The announcement comes roughly two months after a previous executive order, issued in the wake of the Trump administration’s adoption of a “zero tolerance” immigration-enforcement policy, declared that city jails would not accept any new ICE detainees.

The number of ICE detainees in Atlanta jails has fallen from 205 in June, when the initial executive order was issued, to just five as of Wednesday. Of the 200 detainees removed from Atlanta jails in the interim, some have been released, some have been deported, and some have been transferred to various nearby detention centers.

Georgia secretary of state Brian Kemp, the state’s Republican gubernatorial nominee, issued a harshly critical statement in response to the order.

“The City of Atlanta should focus on cleaning up corruption and stopping crime — not creating more of it,” Kemp said.

A number of other localities, including Sacramento County, Calif. and Springfield, Ore. previously discontinued, or chose not to renew, federal contracts that required they imprison ICE detainees.

http://thehill.com/opinion/white-house/405242-the-mueller-probes-troubling-reliance-on-journalists-as-sources

Special counsel Robert Mueller’s team has sent a subpoena to veteran writer Jerome Corsi — the first publicly known effort to compel a journalist’s testimony in the Trump-Russia collusion investigation.

Corsi, whose work has been showcased for years in conservative outlets such as Human Events, World Net Daily and the InfoWars conspiracy site, says he will not fight the subpoena and plans to appear before the grand jury on Friday.

The subpoena is a not-so-subtle reminder of just how much prosecutors, FBI agents, and the government’s confidential sources who launched and sustained the Russia probe all targeted, courted and leveraged the news media.

Mueller’s team reportedly wants to question Corsi about his contacts with longtime Trump friend Roger Stone and whether Stone ever asked Corsi to try to get WikiLeaks to release damaging emails on Hillary Clinton before the 2016 election ended. It’s expected that Corsi will tell prosecutors he did not bite on Stone’s overtures, in part because he suspected Julian Assange and WikiLeaks were monitored by U.S. intelligence after their past publications of classified U.S. secrets.

An anonymous op-ed published in The New York Times, penned by “a senior Trump administration official,” contends that a cabal of senior staffers have secretly schemed to undermine Donald Trump in an effort to protect the American people. “I work for the president,” claims the purported senior official, “but like-minded colleagues and I have vowed to thwart parts of his agenda and his worst inclinations.”

The problem with the much-discussed op-ed isn’t only that it fails to offer a single example of officials actually “thwarting” the Trump agenda or saving the republic from his capriciousness. It’s that it celebrates the idea of nullifying an election.

While I’m sure much of the op-ed is thematically accurate, it’s difficult to believe the author is a selfless public servant letting us know that our democratic institutions are safe in their nameless hands. Any member of the administration legitimately concerned about reigning in the president’s outbursts—and doubtlessly there are a number of them—would never have sent an article guaranteed to generate more White House chaos and paranoia.

It would make no sense. Trump, after all, is already dealing with interminable leaks. The piece will only further confirm his suspicions that a Fifth Column is undercutting the presidency, which will make him less likely to listen to advisors.

To be fair, if you were informed that a faction of “senior” staffers was actively subverting your “agenda”—not merely your tweeting or hyperbole about the media, but the policy items that you promised the electorate you would pursue—you might have some valid reasons to be suspicious, as well.

https://amgreatness.com/2018/09/06/christopher-steele

Who exactly is Christopher Steele? The answer depends on who you ask.

According to our media overlords, he is simply a former British spy, well-regarded by the international intelligence apparatus for his skill and deep connections, and someone whose “integrity, excellence and diligence” should not be questioned. Reporters portray him as an honest broker who tried to warn U.S. law enforcement officials about the Trump campaign’s ties to the Kremlin via his infamous dossier. Steele, we are warned, now is a victim of congressional Republicans desperate to undermine the special counsel’s investigation.

But as the real story emerges about who Christopher Steele is, it raises troubling questions about his influence in the 2016 presidential campaign and in the highest echelons of the U.S. government.

Who Really Colluded with the Russians?
During the 2016 election cycle, Steele was paid by three conflicting sources: The Hillary Clinton campaign; the FBI; and a Russian oligarch tied to Vladimir Putin. This confluence of fiduciary events is the closest evidence yet about legitimate collusion between a presidential campaign and Russian interests, aided by Steele’s pals in the U.S. Department of Justice and helpful reporters in the American news media.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/blame-congress-for-politicizing-the-court-1536189015
Mr. Sasse, a Nebraska Republican, is a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee. This is adapted from his opening statement at Judge Kavanaugh’s confirmation hearings.

Brett Kavanaugh has been accused of hating women, hating children, hating clean air, wanting dirty water. He’s been declared an existential threat to the nation. Alumni of Yale Law School, incensed that faculty members at his alma mater praised his selection, wrote a public letter to the school saying: “People will die if Brett Kavanaugh is confirmed.”

It’s predictable now that every Supreme Court confirmation hearing will be a politicized circus. This is because Americans have accepted a bad new theory about how the three branches of government should work—and in particular about how the judiciary operates.

In the U.S. system, the legislative branch is supposed to be the center of politics. Why isn’t it? For the past century, more legislative authority has been delegated to the executive branch every year. Both parties do it. The legislature is weak, and most people here in Congress want their jobs more than they want to do legislative work. So they punt most of the work to the next branch.

The consequence of this transfer of power is that people yearn for a place where politics can actually be done. When we don’t do a lot of big political debating here in Congress, we transfer it to the Supreme Court. And that’s why the court is increasingly a substitute political battleground. We badly need to restore the proper duties and the balance of power to our constitutional system.

If there are lots of protests in front of the Supreme Court, that’s an indication that the republic isn’t healthy. People should be protesting in front of this body instead. The legislature is designed to be controversial, noisy, sometimes even rowdy—because making laws means we have to hash out matters about which we don’t all agree.

How did the legislature decide to give away its power? We’ve been doing it for a long time. Over the course of the past century, especially since the 1930s and ramping up since the 1960s, the legislative branch has kicked a lot of its responsibility to alphabet-soup bureaucracies. These are the places where most actual policy-making—in a way, lawmaking—happens now.

What we mostly do around this body is not pass laws but give permission to bureaucracy X, Y or Z to make lawlike regulations. We write giant pieces of legislation that people haven’t read, filled with terms that are undefined, and we say the secretary or administrator of such-and-such shall promulgate rules that do the rest of our jobs. That’s why there are so many fights about the executive branch and the judiciary—because Congress rarely finishes its work. CONTINUE AT SITE

https://pjmedia.com/trending/ben-sasses-tell-it-like-it-is-moment/

The Nebraska senator’s statement may wind up being the most blistering moment of the hearings.

As the hearings to confirm Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court generated a partisan circus — complete with protesters in Handmaid’s Tale garb — one man stood above the fray to deliver a splash of cold water to the face of Congress. That man was Ben Sasse.

Senator Sasse (R-Neb.) made one of the most impassioned statements of his career on Tuesday. In ten minutes, he held forth on what is wrong with the politicization of the Supreme Court nomination process.

The Washington Post’s Amber Phillips broke Sasse’s speech down into four bullet points:

1. Congress is set up to be the most po­lit­i­cal branch. “This is sup­posed to be the in­sti­tu­tion dedi­cat­ed to po­lit­i­cal fights,” Sasse said.

2.But in the name of politics, lawmakers have de­cid­ed to keep their jobs rath­er than take tough votes. “Most people here want their jobs more than they re­al­ly want to do legis­la­tive work, and so they punt their legis­la­tive work to the next branch,” Sasse said.

3. Be­cause Congress of­ten lets the ex­ec­u­tive branch write rules, and Americans aren’t sure who in the gov­ern­ment bureauc­ra­cy to talk to, that leaves Americans with no oth­er place than the courts to turn to ex­press their frus­tra­tion with poli­cies. And the Su­preme Court, with its nine vis­i­ble mem­bers, is a con­veni­ent out­let. Sasse: “This trans­fer of pow­er means people yearn for a place where politics can be done, and when we don’t do a lot of big po­lit­i­cal debate here, people trans­fer it to the Su­preme Court. And that’s why the Su­preme Court is in­creas­ing­ly a sub­sti­tute po­lit­i­cal battle­ground for America.”

4. Sasse’s final point is one you can prob­a­bly guess is com­ing by now: That this proc­ess needs to change. If Congress did more legis­lat­ing, these Su­preme Court nom­i­na­tion bat­tles would get less po­lit­i­cal, he ar­gues: “If we see lots and lots of pro­tests in front of the Su­preme Court, that’s a pret­ty good ba­rom­e­ter of the fact that our re­pub­lic isn’t heal­thy. They shouldn’t be pro­test­ing in front of the Su­preme Court, they should be pro­test­ing in front of this body.”

Clearly, in the senator’s eyes, Congress isn’t doing what the public has elected them to do, and this failure of the body to do its job has led directly to the divided, heated hearings we see every time a potential Supreme Court justice is up for confirmation these days. CONTINUE AT SITE

https://pjmedia.com/trending/capitol-police-arrested-143-protesters-in-the-first-two-days-of-the-kavanaugh-hearings/

From the very first moments of the Senate Judiciary Committee hearing for Trump’s second Supreme Court nominee, Judge Brett Kavanaugh, Democrats and protesters interrupted and shouted down the proceedings. Senate Majority Whip John Cornyn (R-Texas) likened the situation to “mob rule,” and the Capitol Police reported that in the first two days, they have arrested 143 protesters.

“The United States Capitol Police responded to numerous incidents of unlawful demonstration activities within the Senate Office Buildings that were associated with today’s Senate Judiciary Committee hearing,” the police said in a statement on Wednesday evening.

“Sixty-six individuals were removed from the Committee room in the Hart Senate Office Building, and were charged with D.C. Code §22–1321 – Disorderly conduct,” the statement reported. “In addition, six individuals were removed from the fourth floor of the Russell Senate Office Building for unlawful demonstration activities and were charged with D.C. Code §22-1307 – Crowding, Obstructing, or Incommoding.”

Finally, one person “was arrested in the Hart Atrium and was charged with D.C. Code §22-1307 – Crowding, Obstructing, or Incommoding, and D.C. Code §22-405.01 – Resisting Arrest.”

These 73 protesters joined the 70 arrested on Tuesday. The Capitol Police reported removing 61 people on the first day of the hearings, and charging them with disorderly conduct. They also removed nine more protesters from the second floor of the Dirksen Senate Office Building for unlawful demonstration.

The hearings are ongoing, with no sign that the protests will stop.

As Law & Crime’s Ron Blitzer reported, three medical doctors have claimed that the protesters are being paid to stand up in the middle of the hearings and start shouting, only to be escorted out and charged by police.

Adam Schindler, president of Schindler Digital, tweeted two photos: one showing a woman getting paid while in line to enter the hearing, and another showing the same woman escorted out of the hearing.

Schindler presented the photos as “proof the protesters were paid off in line.” CONTINUE AT SITE

https://amgreatness.com/2018/09/05/the

The New York Times hit a new journalistic low on Wednesday with the publication of an anonymous op-ed, purportedly by a senior member of the Trump Administration, that reveals the existence of a sapper within the president’s circle. No doubt commissioned to coincide with the release of Bob Woodward’s latest exercise in Washington fiction, Fear, as well the orgy of crocodile tears occasioned by the passing of John McCain, it portrays an erratic, amoral president entirely unmoored from previous notions of ideological or party fidelity, whose impulsive behavior his aides are trying, with only some success, to contain and correct.

“This isn’t the work of the so-called deep state,” writes the author. “It’s the work of the steady state.”

The erratic behavior would be more concerning if it weren’t for unsung heroes in and around the White House. Some of his aides have been cast as villains by the media. But in private, they have gone to great lengths to keep bad decisions contained to the West Wing, though they are clearly not always successful. It may be cold comfort in this chaotic era, but Americans should know that there are adults in the room. We fully recognize what is happening. And we are trying to do what’s right even when Donald Trump won’t.

Not for the first time, what’s going on in Washington brings to mind not the late Roman Empire, but the early one—the Julian line that began with Caesar, passed through Augustus and Tiberius, and then degenerated into the reigns of Caligula, Claudius, and ended with Nero. As the Republic morphed into the Empire, the Senate receded in importance, as did the twin consuls, annually elected. Powerful women—the mothers, wives, and mistresses of the emperors—wielded great power. And yet, in the end, nearly all died unnatural deaths, assassinated (all but Augustus, in fact), murdered, executed, or forced to suicide. To spare you reading Gibbon in his magnificent entirety: the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire was written in the stars, right from the start, just as Shakespeare said.