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Sherrod Brown: If Stacey Abrams Doesn’t Win, GOP ‘Stole It’ By Mairead McArdle

Posted By on November 14th, 2018

https://www.nationalreview.com/news/sherrod-brown-if-stacey-abrams-doesnt-win-gop-stole-it/

Senator Sherrod Brown said Wednesday that if Democrat Stacey Abrams loses her bid for governor of Georgia, Republicans “stole” the election.

“If Stacey Abrams doesn’t win in Georgia, they stole it,” the Ohio Democrat said. “It’s clear. It’s clear. I say that publicly and it’s clear.”

Brown went on to say that there are “way more” Democrats than Republicans, so the GOP has to cheat to win elections.

“They win elections by redistricting and reapportionment and voter suppression and all the ways they try to scare people, particularly people of color,” he said at the National Action Network conference in Washington.

Throughout the campaign, Republican nominee Brian Kemp was accused of using his position as Georgia’s secretary of state to suppress votes, in particular by putting tens of thousands of African-American voter registrations on hold. Kemp in turn accused the Democratic party just before Election Day of attempting to hack Georgia’s voter registration system, saying he had opened an investigation into it but refusing to provide any evidence for his claims.

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Social Media Have Been Captured by Elitists, Demagogues, and Mobs By Fred Bauer

Posted By on November 14th, 2018

https://www.nationalreview.com/2018/11/social-media-elitists-mobs-killed-dream-of-digitial-egalitarianism/

How the dream of digital equality became a nightmare

As has become increasingly evident in recent years, the utopian hope of early Internet proponents has, like that of starry-eyed enthusiasts of similar projects, sometimes led to surprising reversals in reality. One of the claims of early Internet culture is that the World Wide Web would help connect diverse communities and lead to a more democratic culture. Social media have in some ways fulfilled that promise. Everyone can have a platform now, accessible to people across the world. The user-friendly format of modern social networks is a lot more accessible than HTML coding. Varieties of online simulacra of communities have proliferated.

However, the growth of social-media platforms has also led to the creation of a few centralized nodes. A relatively small number of players (Facebook, Twitter, Google, etc.) have gained immense power in determining which voices can be heard through community standards and ever-shifting (and opaque) algorithms. Social-media companies have built attractive “walled gardens” and pretend that such manicured zones can be the public square as a whole.

In recent months, that pretension to universality has become less and less plausible. In part in response to the ongoing populist disruption, social-media companies have taken a much more aggressive approach in de-platforming users. That such community standards are not equally enforced across the ideological spectrum only increases the quasi-editorial power of these platforms. The power of these community standards can be seen in the fact that a fair amount of political energy is expended on battles over who can even have a voice on the platforms in the first place. The flamewars that used to happen on discussion boards and blogs across the Internet have now been funneled to a few places, which gives the moderators of such locations increasing power. Now the purported digital public square increasingly resembles a first-grade classroom, echoing with shrill volleys of “I’m telling!” (That some media corporations have led various efforts to de-platform rogue media outlets is another sign of how the currently entrenched power elite can use the digital landscape to protect its own power.)

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UK Reaches Draft Brexit Deal with EU By Rick Moran

Posted By on November 14th, 2018

https://pjmedia.com/trending/uk-reaches-draft-brexit-deal-with-eu/

The United Kingdom has agreed to a draft agreement with the EU to withdraw from the European Union. But analysts warn that there is much uncertainty over whether the deal will be accepted by a majority of Prime Minister Theresa May’s cabinet and Tories in parliament.

The New York Times explains May’s dilemma:

Details of the agreement were not immediately available. Presumably, it contains language pertaining to the “backstop” plan to settle the contentious issue of the Irish border, the part of the agreement that is likely to set off the most sparks in the cabinet discussions.

The breakthrough followed months of discussions over an issue that has divided Britons and split the governing Conservative Party. But the prime minister’s problems are far from over.

Even assuming she gains the cabinet’s approval on Wednesday without a politically damaging raft of resignations — not a given — Mrs. May faces daunting odds in pushing the compromise plan through Parliament, where it has many opponents.

Britain is scheduled to quit the European Union on March 29. The draft agreement, if approved, would at least avert the prospect of a disorderly and chaotic departure without any deal — something that could clog ports and lead to shortages of food and some medicines.

If Mrs. May’s cabinet signs off on the draft agreement, the next step is for European Union leaders to give it their blessing at a meeting at the end of the month.

It would then need the approval of the European Parliament and of British lawmakers in London. If that is forthcoming, the agreement would lead to a standstill transition period during which very little would change before the end of 2020.

This is a long, slow, treacherous path to a Brexit. If May can convince her cabinet to back the deal — a big if — the parliamentary brawl to approve it could very easily lead to May’s ouster. If that happens, Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson, a hardline Brexiteer , is waiting in the wings to replace her.

A change in Conservative leadership at this point would almost certainly lead to a “no deal” Brexit and widespread chaos, the effects of which could plunge the UK into an economic and political crisis that would drive the Tories from power and hand the government to the odious ant-Semites of the Labor Party. CONTINUE AT SITE

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Cory Booker ‘Absolutely’ Considering a Presidential Run in 2020, Deciding in ‘Coming Months’ By Nicholas Ballasy

Posted By on November 14th, 2018

https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/cory-booker-absolutely-considering-a-presidential-run-in-2020-deciding-in-coming-months/

Sen. Cory Booker (D-N.J.) said he’s “absolutely” considering a run for president in 2020 and will take some time “over the coming months” to decide.

“I’ll consider that. I’m focused right now on my re-election but is that something I’ll consider? Absolutely,” Booker said at Yahoo! Finance’s All Markets Summit today.

“Now is not the time to do that. We’ve got re-elections in the field. I’ve got a lot of work to do. I’ve just come off an election. I will do my best over the coming months,” he added.

When asked when he would make his decision, Booker replied, “My decision’s made right now. I’m running for re-election [in 2020], but will I take some time over the coming months to consider it? I absolutely will but let’s, like, this is bothersome to me that we’re two years out… it is too early to say.”

Booker continued, “Honestly, right now, this is those wonderful moments in Washington where we should be able to come together and get good work done before we start vulcanizing ourselves for presidential ambitions. I am so excited.”

Booker, a member of the Senate Judiciary Committee, called for a federal investigation of the Georgia gubernatorial race between Stacey Abrams and Brian Kemp.

“I mean, I don’t understand how you can have a guy who’s running for an office, who’s currently holding office, supposed to be policing and protecting elections, using that office to disenfranchise people, to remove people from the polls. I mean, there should be a federal investigation,” he said, referring to Kemp, who resigned as Georgia’s secretary of state after Election Day.

“The Justice Department should be investigating that election to make sure it was fair and the decisions that were made were not to politically advantage someone, but to protect voters and the voting process,” he added.

Booker argued that the governorship is being “stolen” from Abrams and said the situation goes beyond impropriety. A federal judge ordered a review of thousands of provisional ballots this week as Abrams has not conceded.

“I’m saying this from a perspective where I have not been in the weeds, but I think that Stacey Abrams’ election is being stolen from her, using what I think are insidious measures to disenfranchise certain groups of people,” the senator said.

“And that’s something I think that all of us should be calling for is the Trump Justice Department should conduct an investigation into what happened, because on the on the appearance of it that’s not just appearance of impropriety. To me, it’s the appearance of voter fraud, voter disenfranchisement, voter suppression,” he added.

Booker recently proposed a bill that would create federally funded savings accounts for children born in the U.S. as a way to address the “racial wealth gap” in the country. He estimated that the legislation, called the “American Opportunity Accounts Act,” would cost $50-$70 billion depending on how the program is managed. CONTINUE AT SITE

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Macron Is Picking A Fight With Trump Out Of Empty Arrogance By Paul Bonicelli

Posted By on November 14th, 2018

http://thefederalist.com/2018/11/14/macron-picking-fight-trump-empty-arrogance/
Trump and Macron alternate between clashing with and fawning over one another, because although they are quite different people, they seek similar goals.

President Donald Trump and French President Emmanuel Macron have a unique and often strained relationship. They alternate between clashing with and fawning over one another, because even though they are quite different people, they seek similar goals: the greatness of their countries.

The age difference and generational dynamic explain some of the ups and downs of this relationship, as do the different political cultures of the two countries. But there is more to it than that. There is the history of each country and our relationship across history; there is the current state of world affairs with the United States’s continuing dominance while France is in its second century of declining importance and influence; and there is the failure of the European Union to create the kind of home and institutions that would satisfy the great powers of Europe vis a vis a power like the United States.
Latest Battle in This War of Words: The United Nations

The latest clash between Trump and Macron was Macron’s strong rebuttal Saturday to Trump’s United Nations speech in September. That Trump speech was the clearest and starkest explanation of Trump’s views on international affairs and his plans for the U.S. role in the world. Trump rejected globalism and embraced patriotism, which many of his critics say is really nationalism. Trump seems to be fine with that term nationalism, too, because he has embraced it as meaning patriotism.

The globalism he rejects maintains that each nation-state should defer to international organizations or other nation-states when confronting challenges both at home and abroad. In the patriotism, or nationalism, he embraces, each nation-state naturally prefers itself and seeks its own interests above all others.

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Vengeance is Ours, Sayeth the Democrats….Edward Cline

Posted By on November 14th, 2018

https://edwardcline.blogspot.com/2018/11/vengeance-is-ours-sayeth-democrats.html

One way to understand the depthless malice exhibited by the Democrats, Social Justice Warriors, the MSM, Hollywood, and other anti-Trump trolls and activists over the last two years is to grasp that the urge to flood the country – and Europe – with “illegal’ immigrants and to swamp Western culture under the demands of arrogant, predatory non-citizens who promised to smother it is to wreck vengeance on those who either voted for Trump or opposed borderless nations, and to have a taste of rape and theft. Americans will learn the hard way to conform to Democratic priorities, or suffer if they don’t.

One variation of the vengeance quotation is from Deuteronomy 32:35

‘Vengeance is Mine, and retribution, In due time their foot will slip; For the day of their calamity is near, And the impending things are hastening upon them.’

Here in America, our vengeance is also to steal elections from the legitimate election of conservatives and other fascists by finding new Dem ballots behind soda vending machines, in secret storage facilities, and in Brenda Snipes’s purse.

Here in America, our first priority is to drown America and hold its head in the water until it dies. We can do that and not be called treasonous, even though that term means nothing to us, unless you suddenly advocate capitalism, individual rights, and the Constitution.

It is also to steal your guns and leave you helpless before our onslaught.

We’re going to encourage Antifa and other violent activists to harass Americans wherever they go to shop or eat, or at gas stations, or at home, and to make their lives miserable and unlivable. Pro-Trumpers will be mobbed and beaten in Wall-Marts, Targets, supermarkets, and churches. We’re going to sanction using bike locks and fists and acid to put them down and to experience the pain of being pro-Trump voters. They will be charged with opposing the “freedom of speech” of activists if they fight back and injure an ally of the Democrats. The feet of our enemies will slip, and we will “kick ‘em”when they’re down. We will implement Saul Alinsky’s Rules for Radicals to the maximum. Calling us Leftists or any other name will not hurt us. We’re taking our power back.

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“Purpose of Government and the Downside of Dependency” Sydney Williams

Posted By on November 14th, 2018

http://swtotd.blogspot.com/

“The purpose of government is to enable the people to live in safety and happiness. Government exists for the interests of the people, not the governors.”

Thomas Jefferson (1743-1826)

Last weeks’ election was a manifestation of the fortune that is ours to live in this country. Forty-seven percent of the electorate (110 million people) cast ballots. That would compare with 36.7% in 2014 and 41% in 2010. While results were not as I would have liked, especially here in Connecticut where voters are in denial as to the fiscal situation, they were a reminder of the first two parts of Lincoln’s famous sentence uttered at Gettysburg, “…a government of the people, by the people…” Now, it is incumbent on those elected to ensure it is “…for the people…”

It is important to remember that, while our government was forged from a cauldron of revolution, the Founders understood the need for order – for government – for without it a liberal, civil society cannot function. Its antithesis is either anarchy or tyranny. And the Founders, despite combatting the British, knew that what they sought was based on a philosophy derived from, among others, such British figures of the enlightenment as John Locke, David Hume and Thomas Hobbes and precedents drawn from English common law. As well, the Founders would have been familiar with Adam Smith through his Theory of Moral Sentiments, and a few may have read The Wealth of Nations, published in March 1776. While desirous of a country where people might pray as they choose, they recognized that the principles embedded in their Christian-Judeo heritage were fundamental to the morality and virtue they espoused and that they expected of those elected to serve.

Ronald Reagan once deadpanned that the nine most terrifying words in the English language are, “I’m from the government, and I’m here to help.” Humorless and patronizing Leftists, who always portrayed Mr. Reagan as a dunce, repeated his words, but without the whimsey. Mr. Reagan’s point was that people cannot live freely when government becomes too big, that people lose their sense of self-reliance as dependency on “Big Brother” grows – and that autocracies can emerge from the left, from those who operate from gift-giving platforms. President Obama’s “Life of Julia” was an Orwellian (and frightening) indication of the direction he wanted to take the country.

As I see it, the purpose of our federal government is:

To establish laws, so that a free people can live harmoniously in civil society under the rule of law, not men.
To protect all citizens against any diminution of natural rights, rooted in the Constitution and that bear fruit in the Bill of Rights.
To ensure that laws are obeyed, and to safe-guard the people against harm from home or abroad, (but not, as President Reagan once warned, to protect people against their own follies).
To ensure that a balance is maintained between government’s three branches – executive, legislative and judiciary.
To recognize that all citizens have equal rights – that the value of a vote is not determined by race, gender, religion, or the social and/or economic standing of the individual.
To establish treaties with foreign nations.
To enable interstate and international commerce through the building and maintaining of roads, bridges, tunnels, airports and sea ports, and to ensure that the skies and the seas remain free for the trade and transportation of goods and services.
To maintain a postal service and sound currency.
To promote the general welfare of the public.

a) To help provide for the elderly, the infirm and those unable to provide for themselves.
b) To conserve and protect national forests and parks, for the enjoyment of all people.
c) To help re-build communities when they have been devastated by natural disasters.
d) To regulate foods and medicines and other consumable products that may be harmful.
e) To ensure that youth is provided a basic education, including knowledge of history and civics, but leaving details to states and local governments

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NeverTrump’s Billionaire Leftist Benefactors By Julie Kelly

Posted By on November 14th, 2018

https://amgreatness.com/2018/11/14/nevertrumps

“At what point do others stand up and not just deny Kristol his “conservative” cred, but acknowledge that he is now on the other side? When you join the battlefield alongside partisan hacks like Adam Schiff and take payoffs from leftist billionaires to do their political dirty work, there is nothing Republican or conservative, or frankly, decent, about you.”

Just hours after Jeff Sessions resigned as attorney general last Wednesday at the president’s behest, #TheResistance found its newest target for destruction: Sessions’ interim replacement, Matthew Whitaker.

Negative coverage about the acting attorney general has dominated national publications and cable news outlets. Reporters have portrayed Whitaker as a Trump lackey, a crackpot, and an “attack dog”; Democratic leaders are demanding that he recuse himself from overseeing Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s investigation; on Tuesday, incoming House Intelligence Committee chairman Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) warned that if Whitaker fails to step aside from the probe, “his actions will be exposed.” (Of course, this is pure propaganda. As Andrew McCarthy explains, Whitaker is well-qualified and meets the legal requirements for an interim presidential cabinet appointment.)

NeverTrump “conservatives” are aiding Schiff and the media in their campaign to paralyze if not remove Whitaker. Commercials attacking the acting attorney general were aired on several Sunday morning political shows. The ads were sponsored by “Republicans for the Rule of Law,” a group founded earlier this year by Bill Kristol, the editor-at-large of The Weekly Standard. The group’s primary role so far appears to be pimping for the Mueller probe, a political witch-hunt that Kristol and his fellow NeverTrumpers pray will lead to the impeachment and removal of the president. The Left and their NeverTrump footsoldiers fear Whitaker will thwart the special counsel’s investigation instead of rubber stamping Mueller’s ever-expanding investigation as Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein has done over the past 18 months.

Buying primo air time on network television doesn’t come cheap. So who is funding “Republicans for the Rule of Law” and their attacks on the Republican president and his acting attorney general? Is it big Republican donors?

We haven’t found any, but we have learned learned that one of Kristol’s benefactors is progressive billionaire Pierre Omidyar, the co-founder of eBay.

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The Women’s March’s Refusal to Condemn Farrakhan Daniel Greenfield

Posted By on November 14th, 2018

https://www.frontpagemag.com/point/271935/womens-marchs-refusal-condemn-farrakhan-daniel-greenfield

The Women’s March has put out yet another statement trying to act as if it’s condemning Farrakhan, without actually condemning him.

The statement by the lefty group, whose leaders, Tamika Mallory and Linda Sarsour have made anti-Semitic statements and expressed support for Farrakhan, is a masterpiece of careful wording.

Women’s March wouldn’t exist without the leadership of women of color, and we stand with Linda Sarsour and Tamika Mallory. Women’s March leaders reject anti-Semitism in all its forms.

We recognize the danger of hate rhetoric by public figures. We want to say emphatically that we do not support or endorse statements made by Minister Louis Farrakhan about women, Jewish and LGBTQ communities.

Then it quickly shifts over to attacking the right and pretending that anti-Semitism is just a problem of white supremacism.

But never mind that.

The Women’s March still can’t even condemn Farrakhan’s bigotry. Instead it does “not support or endorse statements made by Minister Louis Farrakhan about women, Jewish and LGBTQ communities.”

Does it support or endorse other statements by Farrakhan?

Does not “support or endorse” is very different than “reject and condemn.”

When you refer to the leader of a racist hate group who praised Hitler with a honorific, distancing yourself from his rhetoric, without condemning it, you’re cowardly and complicit.

POLITICS Comments turned off

Schumer Urges Florida to Ignore Ballot Deadlines By Mairead McArdle

Posted By on November 14th, 2018

https://www.nationalreview.com/news/chuck-schumer-urges-florida-to-ignore-ballot-deadlines/

Senator Chuck Schumer on Tuesday encouraged Florida to blow off fast-approaching deadlines to submit vote totals for the Senate race where Republican Rick Scott leads incumbent Democratic senator Bill Nelson by a tiny margin.

“The more time that passes since election day, the better things keep looking for Democrats,” Schumer said at a joint press conference with Nelson in Washington, D.C.

“Supervisors of the elections should have all the time they need to count every Floridan’s ballot,” the Senate minority leader said. “Even if the vote count has to go beyond Sunday.”

Schumer said the deadlines should be ignored since the Senate race does not have an electoral vote in Congress scheduled for December as the 2000 presidential race did when it underwent a recount in Florida.

“We will not have a rerun of 2000, when bullying and intimidation ruled and created a rush to judgement that, to this day, many Americans believe that election was unfairly decided,” Schumer said. “That cannot happen again.”

The Florida governor has a mere 12,562 more votes than Nelson according to the current count.