RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/no-hope-presidential-candidates-and-the-emperors-new-clothes/

Today’s hot rumor is that Representative Eric Swalwell — the trying-too-hard, gun-confiscation-promoting, nuclear-strike-on-Americans endorsing, Biden-death-speculating white man who’s running to increase diversity —  will quit the presidential race today.

But Tom Steyer, the billionaire who financed a campaign calling for Trump’s impeachment, is reportedly jumping in. To paraphrase Andy Warhol, in the future, everyone will run for the Democratic presidential nomination for 15 minutes.

There are a lot of reasons why no-hopers jump in, but a big one is the fact that the vast majority of elected officials and wealthy people live in a bubble, where they are surrounded by brown-nosers who tell them their ideas are brilliant and constantly tell them things like, “Of course the American people are yearning for inspiring leadership like yours, sir.”

The moment you become an elected official, people start to look at you a little differently. Occasionally you’ll encounter protesters or an angry crowd at your town hall, but by and large, people usually seem happy to see you — particularly people who come into your office in government. Many of the people you encounter ask for favors or describe problems in their community and hope you are the one who can fix them. Often you are indeed a person who can help them — whether it’s getting the town zoning board to move a little faster or get that pothole filled, or help enact that legislative change your company has been hoping for, or even just get one of those nifty U.S. Capitol flags. You also become a valuable friend and a potentially dangerous enemy. Until you’re out of office and can no longer use the levers of government to help friends and punish foes, it’s best to avoid irking you too much.

https://pjmedia.com/trending/impeachment-obsessed-environmentalist-billionaire-tom-steyer-considering-2020-run/

Tom Steyer, the hedge fund billionaire who emerged as the biggest individual donor in American politics and launched a campaign demanding President Donald Trump’s impeachment, is reconsidering his decision not to run for president in 2020. Sources confirmed the 2020 consideration to The Atlantic and The Washington Post.

“You never know with Tom until he actually pulls the trigger, but he’s telling a lot of people he works with and trusts that he’s going to do it,” one of the Democrats with knowledge of Steyer’s plans told The Post. “He wants in.”

Last week in San Francisco, the billionaire told staffers at Need to Impeach and NextGen America — two organizations he funds — that he is launching a 2020 campaign and that he intends to make the formal announcement on Tuesday, The Atlantic reported.

Steyer has changed his mind before, however. In January, he told his people to expect a presidential run. He even took a trip to Iowa for the launch, only to reverse course at the last minute. Instead of starting a 2020 race, he hosted a Townhall for Need to Impeach, which has 8 million members and has become the largest liberal activist group in the country.

Steyer has emerged as one of the biggest single donors in American politics over the last decade. In 2013, he founded the NextGen Climate super PAC (now called NextGen America), which contributed about $74 million to Democratic causes in the 2014 midterms, making Steyer the single biggest individual donor in American politics that a year. The group also spent $96 million in 2016 and nearly $61 million in the 2018 midterms.

According to The Post’s Robert Costa, Steyer may already have a campaign manager lined up. Heather Hargreaves, a Democratic field organizer who worked on President Obama’s 2008 campaign and currently executive director of NextGen America, is expected the manage the campaign, according to Costa’s sources.

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2019/07/stupid_polling_propaganda_tricks_continue.html

They’re at it again.

Politico’s Playbook presents poll results showing that the 5 leading Democrats in their presidential field all beat Trump. Only a generic “socialist” fails to beat him… but even the socialist ties the president.

But Richard Baehr examines to poll’s internals and writes:

Note that they list the results for all voters.  That means including adults who are not registered.   Pollsters rarely even show these numbers.  Using registered voters, Trump does much better.  Among likely voters, better still.

So why does Politico highlight all adults?

I can’t imagine why….

Maybe the Government of Qatar knows?

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2019/07/the_amazing_deflatable_buttigieg.html

A scenario unfolded last week that has become boringly predictable.  Bad guy does bad things.  Good guy with authority shows up to stop him.  Bad guy attacks good guy with weapon.  Good guy shoots bad guy.  Bad guy’s “community” allege good guy is racist.  Craven politician holds town hall meeting.  Craven politician gets shouted down by angry mob.  Craven politician folds like wet paper to angry mob’s demands.  Craven politician appoints special prosecutor to investigate good guy, who determines good guy was justified in shooting the bad guy.  Angry mob insists the “system” is rigged against them.  Bad guy’s kindergarten graduation picture circulates Internet.  Bad guy’s relatives give interview explaining how much bad guy had always dreamed of being an astronaut.  Media salivates all over itself.  Other good guys question the sanity of risking their lives to stop bad guys.  Less good guys volunteer to do so.  Crime increases.  Angry mob blames the “system” for neglecting rising crime.  Meanwhile, another bad guy does bad things.  Good guy with authority shows up to stop him.  Rinse.  Repeat.

Okay, only the first half of this scenario has happened so far, but who wants to bet against the second half playing out as predicted?  In this specific biopunk performance, the role of the craven politician who succumbed to the mob of his own creation was none other than America’s Aww Shucks Mayor, Pete Buttigieg.  In his charming hometown of South Bend, Indiana, a white police officer shot a black car burglar Eric Logan who, ignoring the officer’s verbal instructions to halt, came at him with a knife.  In a move he now certainly regrets, Buttigieg took a break from his presidential campaign to return to South Bend to chaperone a grotesque orgy of racist invective, during which was made evident that his constituents have determined the officer’s guilt solely based on his skin color (as well as Logan’s innocence, for the same reason).  There was zero interest in factual evidence, and even less in the presumption of innocence.  Not one to get hung up on such trivialities, Buttigieg made clear from his more passionate ripostes that his sole interest was placating the mob.  Everyone, it’s all my fault.  I might as well have pulled the trigger myself.  I’ll try to do better.  I’m calling in everyone from DOJ to Scotland Yard to come investigate.  The Stasi?  Yeah, I can call them too.  Your wish is my command, but please just stop yelling at me.  (I paraphrase, but that was basically the gist).  From the opening gambit he allowed the inmates to run the asylum, and with every panicked concession he gave, the circling sharks simply grew more frenzied at the scent of blood.

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2019/07/03/dems_want_to_insure_illegals_dont_care_about_vets_and_middle_class_140698.html

It’s official. Democratic Party Chair Tom Perez confirms the Party fully endorses free health care for illegal immigrants. That puts illegals ahead of veterans struggling to qualify for civilian care, middle-class working stiffs priced out of Obamacare and baby boomers facing the likelihood of Medicare cuts.

At last Thursday’s Democratic presidential debate, all 10 candidates on the stage flung up their hands when asked whether they’d cover illegal aliens.

Not one of the debate moderators went on to ask the obvious: How much will it cost, and who will pay for it? Why spoil a Kumbaya moment?

The costs would be huge. According to Pew Foundation researchers, there were 10.5 million illegals in the nation in 2017. In 2018, Yale University and MIT demographers estimated there are double.

If the entire illegal population were enrolled in Medicaid, the tab would range from a whopping $84 billion a year (10.5 million times $8,015 per person Medicaid cost) to more than double that, $176 billion. But that estimate needs to be pared to reflect the millions of illegals who work and already get insurance through an employer. Covering uninsured illegals is likely to cost $40 billion to $80 billion a year.

https://www.nationalreview.com/news/buttigieg-proposes-national-service-program-to-fight-climate-change-addiction/

Southbend, Ind. mayor Pete Buttigieg on Wednesday proposed the creation of new voluntary-service programs to combat climate change and increasing rates of mental-health issues, among other objectives.

The plan, released by Buttigieg’s presidential campaign, calls for the recruitment of 250,000 young people in the coming years with a possible expansion to 1 million by 2026. It would expand programs such as AmeriCorps and the Peace Corps, while also creating new programs, to fight climate change, treat mental illness, and reduce rates of addiction.

Buttigieg has emphasized the power of national service throughout his upstart bid for the Democratic nomination, returning often to his service as a Naval Reserve officer in Afghanistan during stump speeches and interviews.

“At a moment when our social fabric is being torn apart, where people increasingly only hear voices that are like their own, it’s a really important time to build social capital through giving people opportunities to work in service in ways that are also going to deliver value to the country,” Buttigieg told the New York Times . “I also think you shouldn’t have to go to war to have that experience.”

A spokeswoman for the campaign said the program would cost $20 billion over ten years.

https://issuesinsights.com/2019/07/03/kamala

With the first primary still eight long months away, making any sort of prediction about the Democratic candidates is pointless. Nevertheless, some have noticed an interesting parallel shaping up, one that involves an old Democrat with plenty of establishment backing and a formidable lead in the polls, and a young, biracial newcomer with a winning smile and an exotic first name.

Except that where Barack Obama tried to portray himself as a sensible centrist in 2008, Sen. Kamala Harris is among the most radical in the large crop of far-left Democratic candidates hoping to run against President Trump. 

Consider the striking contrast between positions Obama espoused and those Harris has embraced.

In 2008, Obama complained about “the orgy of spending” under President George W. Bush. He pledged that all his spending plans would be more than offset with expenditure reductions.

“What I’ve done throughout this campaign is to propose a net spending cut,” he said.

https://www.nationalreview.com/2019/07/democratic-party-debate-intellectual-shallowness-demagoguery/

Open borders, student-loan forgiveness, Iranian nuke deal — and that’s just for starters

If you watched either or both of the two Democratic-party presidential-candidate debates, and if you are a liberal, a conservative, or a centrist, you had to have been depressed. The intellectual shallowness, the demagoguery, and the alienation from reality were probably unprecedented in American political history. Only a leftist, a socialist, or a Communist could have gone to bed a happy person on either night.

If you think this is a baseless generalization, here are a few of myriad examples from the first night:

Senator Elizabeth Warren (D., Mass.): The economy is not doing great “for the African Americans and Latinx whose families are torn apart, whose lives are destroyed, and whose communities are ruined.”

Two things stand out: First is Warren’s morally reprehensible and false description of the economy. She never explains how the American economy is tearing families apart, destroying lives, or ruining communities. Aside from being baseless, it is another left-wing libel against America.

She went on to explain economic inequality in America: “Corruption, pure and simple. We need to call it out.” It is difficult to overstate the contempt she and the rest of the Left have for America.

Even more troubling was Warren’s use of the term “Latinx.” When leftist Orwellian newspeak makes its way into the United States Senate and into the vocabulary of a presidential candidate, the country is in trouble.