RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://townhall.com/columnists/benshapiro/2019/10/30/the-j-street-democrats-n2555560

This week, four of the top candidates for the 2020 Democratic presidential nomination — Pete Buttigieg, Amy Klobuchar, Julian Castro and Bernie Sanders — gathered at the J Street Conference to explain why the United States ought to pressure the state of Israel to make concessions to terrorists, why the Obama administration was correct to appease the Iranian regime and why American Jews ought to value the opinions of Bernie Sanders over those of Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on the future of Jewish safety. Two other top Democrats — Elizabeth Warren and Joe Biden — sent video messages in support of the group.

By contrast, when the American Israel Public Affairs Committee held its annual conference in March, not a single Democratic presidential candidate showed up. The Democrats are, by and large, simply too ashamed to stand with an actual pro-Israel group, although prominent congressional leaders still show up to mouth nostrums about bipartisan support for Israel.

But the heart of the Democratic Party has moved against Israel. That’s because Israel is economically successful, while its enemies are not; Israel is liberal, while its enemies are not; Israel is the tip of the spear of Western civilization in an area known for its tribalism and brutality. This means that according to the radical left, Israel is an exploitative country hell-bent on domination, despite its lack of territorial ambition — Israel has signed over large swaths of land won through military victory to geopolitical enemies, and offered much more repeatedly.

So the Democrats built up and gave credence to J Street, a Trojan horse group dedicated to undermining American support for Israel and justifying left-wing hatred of the Jewish state. J Street was founded by Clinton operative Jeremy Ben-Ami and Israeli far-left political figure Daniel Levy in late 2007. One of its chief sources of funding — a source obscured in the early years by its founders — was anti-Israel radical George Soros.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/i-can-defeat-trump-and-the-clinton-doctrine-11572389508

Hillary Clinton emerged recently to claim, with no basis in fact, that I am being “groomed” by the Russian government to undermine America. As a major in the National Guard who served in Iraq—one of the many disastrous regime-change wars Mrs. Clinton championed over her career—I swore an oath to only one authority: the U.S. Constitution.

I’m running for president to undo Mrs. Clinton’s failed legacy. From Iraq to Libya to Syria, her record is replete with foreign-policy catastrophes. It’s a primary reason why I resigned as vice chairman of the Democratic National Committee in 2016 to endorse Bernie Sanders. Mrs. Clinton and the powerful media and political network she built up over decades have never forgiven this slight. The smears have been nonstop ever since.

Hardly a week goes by when I’m not asked a question about how I’m being secretly backed by Russia or other foreign powers—on top of countless other falsehoods intended to destroy my reputation. Those who are indebted to the war machine and the overreaching intelligence agencies, as well as their cheerleaders in the media, are determined to take me down because they know they can’t control me. I’m directly challenging their power.

This isn’t a petty “spat” between Mrs. Clinton and me. It’s a serious contrast in views about the choice voters face as they decide which Democratic candidate is best equipped to defeat President Trump. Mrs. Clinton already lost to Mr. Trump once. Why would Democrats think a Hillary 2.0 candidate would result in anything different?

https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/what-we-call-national-health-care-or-single-payer-is-a-crime-against-humanity/

When Bernie Sanders visited Canada’s national health care system on a fact-finding mission, he came away mightily impressed. “Somehow or another in Canada,” he said, “for a number of decades, they have provided quality care to all people without out-of-pocket expenses…And they do it for about 50 percent per capita of the cost that we spend.” His claims are not only debatable, they are fraudulent. Anyone who cites the Canadian model as a medical paradigm is guilty of special pleading.

For one thing, “quality care” does not exist in Canada; indeed, such “care” closely approximates Third-World levels, as we will see below.  For another, according to a 2018 Canadian government survey, out-of-pocket expenses constitute about $36 billion or 15 percent of health care spending. As we know, government reports regularly underestimate in their projections. Out-of-pocket expenses are far higher, not only for dental and many pharmaceuticals—the Canadian system does not cover essential medications—but with regard to value-added surcharges.

For example, in Quebec where I lived for many years, health care consumes 45 percent of all provincial program spending, which did not prevent government tacking on an extra $200 annually as a “solidarity tax.” In Ontario I paid exorbitantly for non-prescribed drugs, including a whopping mandatory payment every June. In British Columbia where I now make my home, every person pays an extra $37.50 monthly, which for my wife and me amounts to $900 per year over and above extortionate ancillary expenses and a massive tax gouge. In more than one way, Bernie is out in left field.

https://www.nationalreview.com/news/senate-democrats-warn-hillary-not-to-jump-into-2020-race/

In the wake of reports that Hillary Clinton is considering making a late entry into the 2020 presidential race, Senate Democrats are warning her against it, saying the party has moved on.

“She’s done a great service to our country and public service, and I supported her wholeheartedly, but I believe it’s time for another nominee,” Senate minority whip Dick Durbin said, according to a Politico report.

Senator Martin Heinrich of New Mexico called the move a “mistake.”

Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia, generally the most conservative Senate Democrat, said, “Absolutely not,” when asked about a possible Clinton 2020 run.

The senators’ expressions of doubt come after longtime Clinton adviser Philippe Reines said earlier this week that the former secretary of state has not ruled out running in 2020 and would consider doing so if she thought she had the best odds of beating President Trump.

“There might be a reason that she’d be the best person, not only to beat Donald Trump, but to govern after Donald Trump, which is a part we don’t talk about much,” Reines said. “You can make fun of her all you want, but 65 million people voted for her and that’s second more to anyone except Barack Obama.”

Establishment Democratic donors have also reportedly been musing about what the 2020 race would look like if Clinton jumped in at the eleventh hour.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/point/2019/10/dems-panic-over-john-james-michigan-daniel-greenfield/

While the news is bad out of Colorado, a state that is starting to seem as unsalvageable as California, there’s good news out of Michigan.

Or bad news in this poll, if you’re a Democrat.

That “oh, oh” you hear from the Democratic camp of U.S. Senator Gary Peters is that, in one week, two polls are out showing his race against Republican challenger John James is a statistical dead heat and for an incumbent to be in that spot one year before the election is hardly good news.

In the Vanguard, Dennis, Pubic Sector Consultant poll  last May it was Mr. Peters 42% and Mr. James 37%.  It is now 39.5% for Mr. Peters and 39.3% for Mr. James.

James was one of the most promising candidates of the last cycle, he’s back in, and his numbers look very good. 

More party support last time around could have already seen Stabenow out and James in. Now, Democrats are scrambling to try and stop James in the lamest ways possible.

The Democrats are banging the drum to link Mr. James to the problems President Trump has.

They are showing a photo of Mr. James with Rudy Giuliani and a Ukrainian businessman charged by the Feds with campaign finance violations.

Do they really think anyone in Michigan is going to care? And deploying that, this early on, is a sloppy desperation tactic. Which doesn’t suggest that the Dems have a plan to stop James beyond appealing to Washington Post readers.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2019/10/will-hillary-run-ari-lieberman/

In 2016, we thought we had heard the last of Hillary Clinton. We thought wrong. Instead of engaging in humble introspection, the twice failed presidential candidate went on a whirlwind tour giving interviews and lectures, blaming everyone from former FBI director James Comey to the Macedonians for her 2016 rout. But Clinton hasn’t stopped with book tours. According to multiple reliable sources, she is considering a third run, lured by both the thirst for power and the prospect of defeating her arch nemeses, Donald Trump. 

Recently on Fox’s Tucker Carlson show, a close advisor to Hillary Clinton indicated that the architect of the Benghazi fiasco may yet have another go at proclaiming herself leader of the free world. Philippe Reines, who has been a close Clinton confidant since 2009 and prepped Hillary for debates with Trump in 2016, tellingly noted that Clinton has not foreclosed the possibility of joining the race.

Democrats are in serious trouble. Joe Biden, the supposed savior of the Democratic Party and the man who was expected to easily secure the nomination is lagging in both the polls and fundraising. According to the latest reports, Biden only has $8.9 million on hand. But anemic fundraising is only half the problem for Biden. He is now being eclipsed by Elizabeth Warren in the polls. That ominous development spells trouble not only for Biden but also for Democratic prospects for victory in 2020.

Despite being pulled to the left by his challengers, Biden is viewed by many as a centrist Democrat capable of securing Independents as well as causing defections among moderate Republicans. Crucially, his carefully crafted blue collar image and Pennsylvania origins gave him an advantage in the nation’s Rust Belt, an area secured by Trump in 2016. And his past association with Barack Obama gave him an advantage with African American voters.

https://www.nationalreview.com/news/orourke-defends-comments-comparing-trumps-america-to-nazi-germany/

Democratic presidential candidate Beto O’Rourke drew a comparison between 1930s Nazi Germany and America under the Trump administration during a Wednesday interview Wednesday with the Washington Post.

O’Rourke’s comments came after Costa pressed him over his ability to reach across the aisle to work with Republicans after making intensely disparaging comments about them on the campaign trail.

“I don’t think that speaking the truth and calling things by their right names is in any way disqualifying in being able to do work going forward. I think sooner rather than later, a majority of Americans — including Republicans — are going to see Trump for who he is, and this administration for what it’s done,” O’Rourke told the Washington Post’s Robert Costa when challenged.

“Outside of the Third Reich, give me another example of a Western leader who has called one people of one faith inherently defective, or dangerous, or disqualified from being successful in that country,” he continued. “ . . . How did a modern country, well educated, a source of innovation and ingenuity, and a source of moral leadership in the world, descend into that level of barbarity, producing a shame that lives with every single German to this day?”

O’Rourke also sparred with Meghan McCain in July over his characterization of a Trump rally in North Carolina as an “impromptu Nuremberg rally.”

https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-hillary-tulsi-fault-line-11571784603

Why would Hillary Clinton attack the 11th-place Democratic presidential candidate, currently polling at 1.2%? In an interview last week Mrs. Clinton said the Russians have “their eye on somebody who is currently in the Democratic primary and are grooming her to be the third-party candidate.”

Rep. Tulsi Gabbard of Hawaii replied on Twitter: “You, the queen of warmongers, embodiment of corruption, and personification of the rot that has sickened the Democratic Party for so long, have finally come out from behind the curtain.” The Clinton-Gabbard spat illuminates the underlying conflict between the grassroots progressive left and the centrists who still dominate the Democratic Party’s leadership and donor class.

Democrats want to avoid a repeat of 2016, when enough progressives didn’t vote for Mrs. Clinton to keep her from winning. Beating Mr. Trump is all that matters, the blue-no-matter-who corporatists insist. Progressives reply by asking how that worked out in 2016.

One nearly invisible Democratic fault line concerns the president. Progressives don’t like Mr. Trump and disagree with most of his policies. But there is important common ground. Like the president, progressives favor economic nationalism—putting American workers first and bringing back high-paid manufacturing jobs. They also want to end the post-9/11 forever wars, close overseas military bases, and avoid new wars of choice.