RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/12/adam-schiff-attack-on-free-press/

Even if John Solomon’s reporting on Ukraine was misleading or destructive, it wouldn’t warrant being unmasked by the government.

Where are all the self-styled champions of the free press now that Adam Schiff has used the surveillance powers of the state to smear not only his political rivals but a journalist?

With the release of the House Intelligence Committee’s impeachment report Tuesday came the revelation that Giuliani and his Ukrainian affiliate Lev Parnas, whose metadata Schiff apparently subpoenaed, had exchanged calls with former The Hill columnist John Solomon, ranking Intelligence Republican Devin Nunes, and attorney Jay Sekulow. Even if we allow that the California congressman had genuine national-security concerns when he subpoenaed metadata from AT&T so he could snoop on his political opponents, what possible national-security concerns would justify unmasking them?

This was an impeachment inquiry, not a criminal investigation. If Nunes had conducted himself similarly with Hillary Clinton’s personal lawyers, the D.C. press corps would have exploded into a raging panic. Rest assured, if Schiff had unearthed anything meaningful — and the subpoenas reportedly went out before the impeachment inquiry even began — he would have shared the evidence during the inquiry rather than using it as partisan chum in a post-inquiry report.

None of those unmasked by Schiff were the target of the inquiry, and, as far as we know, none of their conversations he exposed were unlawful. Nor were any of these conversations relevant in making a case for the impeachment of Donald Trump, especially without information beyond the time, dates, and lengths of the phone calls.

Schiff’s decision to unmask a journalist, though, was especially disconcerting. It meets none of law enforcement’s typical standards.

https://www.foxbusiness.com/markets/november-jobs-report-employment-data

U.S. hiring surged in November, as the economy added 266,000 jobs and unemployment returned to a half-century low, a sign the U.S. is powering through a global slowdown.

The payroll number easily topped the estimate of 180,000 from economists surveyed by Refinitiv, who also saw the unemployment rate holding steady from October’s 3.6 percent.

It marks the 110th month of straight gains.

Unemployment ticked down slightly to 3.5 percent as more people were looking for work, matching a 50-year low. The labor force participation rate was little changed at 63.2 percent. Average hourly earnings, meanwhile, rose by 3.1 percent over the past year to $28.29.

Revisions, meanwhile, added 41,000 jobs for the prior two months, bringing the three-month average to 205,000, a 10-month high. (September increased by 13,000 to 193,000, and October jumped by 28,000 to 156,000). Still, job growth on average is slower than it was in 2018: The 2019 monthly average is 180,000 jobs per month, compared with an average gain of 223,000 last year.

https://amgreatness.com/2019/12/05/foggy-bottom-has-the-sadz-and-thats-a-very-good-thing/

The real “crisis” for former State Department bureaucrats and their colleagues who have been recycled back to the Ivy League campuses from whence they came is not that Trump poses an existential threat to national security—it’s that he poses a legitimate threat to their professional sinecures.

As House Democrats invited Ivy League shrews to publicly grind their Trump-hating axe during Wednesday’s disastrous impeachment charade, President Trump returned home after confronting our allies again about their lagging financial support of NATO. The stale pact turns 70 this year and like too many Boomers these days, NATO is out of fresh ideas and still listening to worn tracks of “Back in the U.S.S.R.” while the rest of the world is listening to Drake.

Also like so many Boomers, NATO members have made financial promises they won’t keep, stacking up IOUs for someone else to pay and hoping no one notices. But Trump, a Boomer himself, is having none of it.

Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau struggled to explain his country’s failure to fulfill the alliance’s agreement to earmark two percent of gross domestic product for defense spending—according to a NATO report, Canada only spent 1.2 percent of its GDP on defense in 2018: The United States spent nearly triple that amount. (While dismal, Canada’s expenditure last year is an improvement over 2014 when it only spent 1 percent.)

So Trump used a press conference to challenge Trudeau. “We’ll put Canada on a payment plan, I’m sure the prime minister would love that,” Trump jabbed when asked by a reporter about Canada’s reneging on their NATO pledge.

After Trump pressed for a percentage—Trudeau had to refer to an aide for the exact number—the Candians claimed they were at 1.4 percent. “They’ll get there. They know it’s important,” the president added.