RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2020/12/unfair-criticism-aimed-trumps-pardons-joseph-klein/

President Trump is coming under fire by the usual Trump-hating naysayers for issuing pre-Christmas pardons on December 23rd to several of his associates who were caught up in the Russia collusion hoax. They were treated unfairly by the FBI and prosecutors involved in the Mueller investigation. One of the most notable pardons went to Paul Manafort, President Trump’s former campaign manager who received an overly harsh sentence and even spent some time in solitary confinement for white collar crimes.  Another pardon went to Roger J. Stone Jr., a political ally and longtime friend of Trump’s who was arrested following a pre-dawn raid of his home by more than a dozen FBI agents. CNN just happened to be there to capture this outrageous exercise of overkill.  President Trump had previously pardoned retired United States Army lieutenant general Michael T. Flynn and former Trump campaign aide George Papadopoulos, both of whom were hounded for what are known as process crimes.

President Trump is also being criticized for pardoning his son-in-law Jared Kushner’s father, Charles Kushner, who served two years in prison after pleading guilty in 2004 to tax evasion, retaliating against a federal witness and lying to the Federal Election Commission.

The New York Times editorial board claimed that Trump had abused his pardon powers and “made a mockery of mercy, doling out clemency to some of the most deplorable people in the country.” As usual, the Times’ editors have it all wrong. President Trump’s grants of pardons and clemency are well within his broad constitutional authority. There are also plenty of precedents for what Trump has done from the acts of prior presidents. The Times editorial acknowledged only two prior presidential pardons that it put in the abusive category – Gerald Ford’s pardon of Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton’s pardon of the fugitive financier Marc Rich. The editors neglected to mention Bill Clinton’s pardon of his half-brother Roger Clinton Jr.

And then there is the darling of the mainstream press, Barack Obama. Obama commuted sentences for a member of the U.S. Army convicted of violating the Espionage Act and a convicted terrorist.

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2020/12/of_merit_and_melanin_identity_politics_and_the_balkanization_of_america.html

On May 22, 2019, Democratic gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams gave a speech at the Center for American Progress. Ms. Abrams spoke out strongly in her defense of Identity Politics, stating that “Identity Politics is exactly who we are and exactly how we won,” and arguing that Identity Politics “brought new folks to the process.” That is untrue.

America is based on the idea of pluralism, the notion that, regardless of our race, religion, creed, or national origin, we would all co-exist within one nation. Countless millions migrated here from every continent and continue to do so. They retained their ethnic, religious, and cultural identity, but regarded themselves as Americans. Most worked and studied hard, going to school in the evening to master English and prepare for the difficult citizenship exam. Many have said that the proudest moment of their lives was when they were sworn in as American citizens.

To this day, many families still retain old and worn naturalization certificates as part of their family heirlooms. To them, and for hundreds of millions around the world, America was and is, a source of hope and inspiration. This is the reason why protesters in Hong Kong wave American, not Chinese flags. It is why, from Central America to China, families give all they have to smugglers, sometimes having to resort to selling themselves into virtual slavery to get here. Probably, half the world’s population would emigrate here right now if they had the wherewithal to do so.

Identity Politics strips away the idea that we are all Americans first. It places race, religion, creed, sexuality, and most importantly, skin pigmentation at the forefront of one’s identity. It maintains that America is a horrible place, filled with racists, sexists, and xenophobes, and is, in fact, the source of most of the world’s problems. This is a reversion to tribalism. It repudiates everything that America stands for and could ultimately have catastrophic consequences.

Just ask the former citizens of what used to be called Yugoslavia. That nation devolved into civil war and anarchy with various ethnic and religious groups, mainly Serbs, Muslims, and Croats, competing for power and control. It ruined the city of Sarajevo and, ultimately, the nation of Yugoslavia and introduced two new terms to our language: “Ethnic Cleansing” and “Balkanization.”