NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

What Trump’s Acquittal Means for the Rule of Law By Dan McLaughlin

Posted By on February 6th, 2020

https://www.nationalreview.com/2020/02/trump-impeachment-what-acquittal-means-for-rule-of-law/

It will go on. Meanwhile, Congress ought to get back to its business.

I n Wednesday’s final impeachment vote in the Senate, only one Senate Republican, Mitt Romney, crossed party lines to vote to remove Donald Trump from office. No Senate Democrat bucked party-line discipline to vote for Trump’s acquittal. This followed last Friday’s 51–49 vote to conclude the trial on the basis of the evidence heard in the House, without live witness testimony. Only two Republicans (Romney and Susan Collins), and no Democrats, crossed party lines in that vote.

There has been a great deal of hand-wringing about what it means that Senate Republicans kept enough of a united front to dispose of the charges against Trump without even a full trial. In fact, acquittal is a reasonable political judgment by Republican senators that reflects the preexisting standards for presidential impeachments, rather than a change to them.

Impeachment for abuse of power is political. A great deal of the commentary and political argument on impeachment takes a wrong turn from the very start. The mistake is treating presidential impeachment as a purely legal question in which it is somehow inappropriate to consider politics. Taking this view, Democrats argue that if any impeachable “high Crimes and Misdemeanors” are proven, there is a solemn duty to remove the president, and it is a violation of the senators’ oaths and an offense against the rule of law to acquit. The president’s defenders, for their part, argue that no impeachable “high Crimes and Misdemeanors” are even alleged, and therefore the entire process amounts to an assault by the House on the rule of law and something like a coup. Both views are wrong.

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Mitt Romney gives a disgraceful display of petty vindictiveness on impeachment By Andrea Widburg

Posted By on February 6th, 2020

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2020/02/mitt_romney_gives_a_disgraceful_display_of_petty_vindictiveness_on_impeachment.html

Mitt Romney was a staunch, aggressive NeverTrumper, right up until he needed President Trump’s endorsement when he ran for Senator in Utah in 2018. Despite Mitt’s nastiness, Trump gracefully gave him that endorsement. Mitt responded like the scorpion he is, immediately turning around and stinging Trump during the impeachment process.

The first Article of Impeachment against Trump was for the hitherto unknown wrongdoing called “Abuse of Power.” It represents no legal standard and the proceedings in the House made it clear that “abuse of power” really meant that Trump was conducting foreign policy in a way that offended Democrats. Investigating criminal wrongdoing by a past Vice President is not an impeachable offense, even if it involves wrongdoing in a foreign country. Still, that wasn’t enough for Mitt.

Nor did it matter to Mitt that, just a week ago, he insisted that there was not enough evidence to convict Trump unless he was able to hear from additional witnesses, especially Mitt’s partner-in-spitefulness, John Bolton.

“I, of course, will make a final decision on witnesses after we’ve heard from not only the prosecution, but also the defense,” Romney told reporters. “But I think at this stage, it’s pretty fair to say that John Bolton has a relevant testimony to provide to those of us who are sitting in impartial justice.”

HISTORY, WORLD NEWS Comments turned off

Islam’s Hidden Role in the Transatlantic Slave Trade By Raymond Ibrahim

Posted By on February 6th, 2020

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2020/02/islams_hidden_role_in_the_transatlantic_slave_trade.html

From its inception, Islam’s history with the West has been one of unwavering antagonism and seismic clashes, often initiated by the former.  By the standards of history, nothing between the two civilizations is as well documented as this long war.  Accordingly, for more than a millennium, both educated and not so educated Europeans knew — the latter perhaps instinctively — that Islam was a militant creed that for centuries attacked and committed atrocities in their homelands, all in the name of “holy war,” or jihad.

These facts have been radically “updated” in recent times.  According to the dominant narrative — as upheld by mainstream media and Hollywood, pundits and politicians, academics and “experts” of all stripes — Islam was historically progressive and peaceful, whereas premodern Europe was fanatical and predatory. 

Whatever else can be said about such topsy-turvy claims — and there is much — they raise the question: if such a formerly well known, well documented, and bloody history could be revised in a manner that presents its antithesis as the truth — with little objection or challenge — what then of Islam’s more subtle but also negative influences on history, the sort that, unlike the aforementioned centuries of violence, are not copiously documented or readily obvious but require serious historical investigation?

Take Islam’s role in facilitating the transatlantic slave trade — which is otherwise almost always presented as an exclusively European enterprise.

POLITICS Comments turned off

SOTU: Trump’s boom means ka-boom for Dem hopes By Karin McQuillan

Posted By on February 6th, 2020

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2020/02/sotu_trumps_boom_means_kaboom_for_dem_hopes.html

Trump has poached all the Democrat’s core constituencies.  He has outperformed them in their self-assigned territory.  He is going right at their core strength, the black voting bloc.

In President Trump’s beautiful words, he has created a ‘blue-collar boom.’

This boom means ka-boom to Democrat chances of holding on to the working-class vote.  Ka-boom to Democrat chances of keeping 95% of blacks in lockstep voting for their failed policies.  Ka-boom to the lies that Republicans are racists who only care about rich white people.

Trump’s approach to the economy is not the dry old Republican message that tax cuts boost investment.  Trump puts people first, always.  It is the not the message of a politician, staying in the safe zone of what everyone always does and says.  It is the message of a businessman and warrior, with the courage to defy conventional thinking on trade, manufacturing and domestic energy.

YouTube screen grab

Trump’s message is full of heart for ordinary people.  It is signature Trump: “Our agenda is relentlessly pro-worker, pro-family, pro-growth, and, most of all, pro-American.”  

Trump’s economy eats the Democrats’ lunch.  Trump has poached all the Democrat’s core constituencies.  He has outperformed them in their self-assigned territory.  He is going right at their core strength, the black voting bloc.  He is winning people over on the on merits. 

President Trump’s SOTUS theatrics are so effective because they are not merely theatrics.  He is bringing home the bacon.  It’s not boasting when you are reporting on what you have actually achieved. 

The first segment of the SOTUS, the list of economic achievements, was a “Wow!”

POLITICS Comments turned off

Trump Critics Denounce Pro-Trump Blacks as ‘Sellouts’ — While Criticizing Trump for Not Having More ‘Sellouts’ By Larry Elder

Posted By on February 6th, 2020

https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/trump-critics-denounce-pro-trump-blacks-as-sellouts-while-criticizing-trump-for-not-having-more-sellouts/

The Donald Trump White House put out a photograph of the president’s task force on the coronavirus. CNN promptly showed its displeasure, not with the task force’s effort, but with its racial composition. There was insufficient “diversity” in the photo.

In a piece called “Coronavirus Task Force Another Example of Trump Administration’s Lack of Diversity,” CNN national political writer Brandon Tensley wrote: “Who are these experts? They’re largely the same sorts of white men (and a couple women on the sidelines) who’ve dominated the Trump administration from the very beginning.

“By contrast, former President Barack Obama’s circle of advisers in the face of the 2014 Ebola outbreak in West Africa was hardly so monochromatic. Neither was it so abysmal in terms of gender diversity. (Of course, to contextualize, Obama’s administration, on the whole, was far more diverse than Trump’s.)

“And yet, as unsurprising as the diversity issue in the Trump era has become, it’s still worth pointing out from time to time, especially as the country approaches the 2020 presidential election in earnest.

“That’s partly because the recent photos of ‘the best experts’ telegraph the kinds of people the administration deems worthy of holding power — and even being in close proximity to it.”

That’s a mouthful.

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Senate Acquits Trump on Both Impeachment Articles By Natalie Andrews and Rebecca Ballhaus

Posted By on February 5th, 2020

https://www.wsj.com/articles/senate-expected-to-vote-to-acquit-trump-on-impeachment-11580908525

WASHINGTON—The Republican-led Senate acquitted President Trump of charges stemming from his efforts to pressure Ukraine to announce investigations that would benefit him in this year’s election, concluding a four-month drama that has consumed Washington and intensified the nation’s sharp divide over his presidency.

On the first article of impeachment, abuse of power, all 47 Democrats and one Republican voted to convict the president, falling short of the 67 needed to remove the president from office. On the second article of impeachment, obstruction of Congress, the vote also failed, with all Democrats and no Republicans finding the president guilty.

The presidential impeachment trial, the nation’s third in its history, grew out of a July 25 phone call in which Mr. Trump asked Ukraine’s president to announce certain investigations just as he was holding up U.S. aid to the country. Mr. Trump has defended the call as “perfect” and has said he did nothing wrong regarding Ukraine. The aid was later released after bipartisan outcry from lawmakers.

“The American people, and frankly, people all over the world, know it’s a hoax,” he told supporters at a recent rally in Des Moines, Iowa.

Mr. Trump had hoped for vindication in the Senate trial after a House investigation that he had decried as politically motivated. What he got was something less: Amid strong support for his acquittal from his own party, several Republicans also said Democrats had proved that he acted improperly regarding Ukraine.

POLITICS Comments turned off

Impeachment Theater Could Not Have Gone Worse For Democrats Since removal was never a realistic outcome, impeachment was about harming Trump in an election year. By that standard, it could not have gone worse. By Mollie Hemingway

Posted By on February 5th, 2020

http://www.ruthfullyyours.com/wp-admin/post-new.php

Democrats’ impeachment effort was never about removing President Donald Trump from office. If it had been, it would not have been rushed through the House of Representatives without a proper predicate or investigation.

No reasonable person expected the Republican-controlled Senate to remove a sitting president for anything Rep. Adam Schiff repeatedly alleged, no matter how unfairly he characterized Trump’s thoughts, words, or actions.

Impeachment was about satisfying the corporate media and Democratic base that had demanded it for years. And since removal was never a realistic outcome, it was about harming Trump in an election year.

By that standard, it could not have gone worse. Here are three ways that Pelosi’s gambit backfired bigly.

1. Donald Trump’s Numbers Went Up, Not Down

The latest Gallup poll of registered voters shows that Trump’s approval rating is the highest it’s been since his inauguration — 49 percent. That number went up from 39 percent in October, which was during the House’s impeachment process, such as it was.

During that same time, approval of the Democratic Party fell from 48 percent to 45 percent and approval of the Republican Party shot up from 43 percent to 51 percent. That’s the first time the GOP has had majority approval since 2005. The party also has a rare partisan-ID advantage.

EDUCATION Comments turned off

Mike Moon’s Missouri Campus Intellectual Diversity Act By Stanley Kurtz

Posted By on February 5th, 2020

https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/mike-moons-missouri-campus-intellectual-diversity-act/

The current atmosphere of crisis and conflict on America’s college campuses was kicked off by the troubles at the University of Missouri–Columbia (“Mizzou”) during the 2015–2016 academic year. Many will remember the infamous video of Professor Melissa Click calling for “some muscle” to prevent journalists from covering the protests, a harbinger of the campus free-speech crisis. In the wake of Mizzou’s 2015 debacle, university enrollment cratered, with a modest recovery beginning only recently.

It is in the interest of the citizens of Missouri to find a long-term solution to this problem — a way to encourage all sides on our divided college campuses to freely to speak their minds. We need to regularize civil debate over the issues that divide us. If students were accustomed to hosting and hearing civil debates over issues like immigration, abortion, religious liberty, health insurance, and criminal-justice reform, the effect would be to normalize disagreement and lower the emotional temperature on campus.

By introducing House Bill No. 2177, the Missouri Campus Intellectual Diversity Act, Representative Mike Moon aims to do exactly that. Moon’s bill is modeled on a proposal I made here at NRO last year. (See that proposal for a detailed explanation of the concept.) This proposal has been endorsed by the National Association of Scholars, and by Mark Bauerlein at Minding the Campus. Essentially, Moon’s bill instructs the state university system to set up a series of debates, public forums, and individual lectures that will explore our most hotly debated public-policy issues from competing perspectives. If experts willing and able to present and defend both sides of a given controversy are in short supply on campus, outside speakers could be invited in. Videos of public-policy debates arranged by the university would be made available to the public. Moon’s bill also instructs universities to keep detailed event calendars. This will provide a snapshot, so to speak, of the state of intellectual diversity on campus, at least with regard to public-policy events.

NATIONAL NEWS & OPINION Comments turned off

Bolton and the First Law of Leaks By Charlie Martin

Posted By on February 5th, 2020

https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/bolton-and-the-first-law-of-leaks/

I’d guess that the most common kind of news article out of Washington would be an article reporting something breathless that was leaked to the reporter by an anonymous source. This is usually gussied up with frills and flounces, like “a source close to the Administration” or “a source with knowledge of the situation”.

I’m not one to say that all leaks should be eliminated, even if they could be eliminated. Which they can’t. Leaks can serve a good purpose — there are a lot of times a leak makes public some real issue. But we always should keep in mind the First Law of Leaks:

Every leak is being leaked to promote the agenda of the leaker, and is being shaped to the leaker’s advantage.

So once you see something that’s been leaked, you should ask yourself five four questions:

How is it being reported?
Whose agenda does the leak serve?
How surprising is it?
So?

That last might be called the “Andrew Breitbart Answer.” Not too long before he died, Andrew made the point that often the right answer to the accusations of the left was “So?” or “So what?” Craig Biddle wrote excellently on Andrew’s question back in 2012. He has a lot more to say about it, but his central point is that “So?” directs the discussion to fundamental issues.

The recent leaks purported to be from John Bolton’s upcoming books — and, for that matter, Bolton’s book itself — have been just begging for someone to ask these questions, so let’s.

How is the leak being reported?

POLITICS Comments turned off

What Bloomberg’s Money Can Buy By Lance Trover

Posted By on February 5th, 2020

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2020/02/05/what_bloombergs_money_can_buy__142322.html

Former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg’s big-spending foray into the presidential race is getting noticed by millions of Americans. You can’t miss his seemingly ubiquitous television advertising, especially in states unaccustomed to seeing campaign commercials in primary season.

But a tiny, yet knowing, subsection of the public was captivated for an entirely different reason just days before Bloomberg spent $10 million to advertise during the Super Bowl. His year-end campaign finance report showed a free-spending organization that was met with a mix of disbelief and jealousy by political operatives throughout the country.

Most seasoned campaign workers and consultants can regale you with tales of boot-strapped campaigns, the proverbial uphill-both-ways-to-school story. Tales of campaign workers sleeping in the office and living off donated candy and booze are the stuff of lore.

While it may sound quaint in an era of super PACs and self-funders, the vast majority of campaigns today are still largely run on shoestring budgets. Ten grand for sushi you say? How about 10 bucks for pizza and we all chip in for the beer? An apartment in Midtown? How do you feel about staying in the basement of the candidate’s house? 

Don’t get me wrong — this is not passing judgment on a candidate or anyone working for wealthy candidates willing to spend their own money to get elected. As someone who toiled on several political campaigns, I’ve had the good fortune of experiencing both the well-funded and the not-so-well-funded.