RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.gatestoneinstitute.org/19570/trump-trials

Red lights have to be flashing for the current administration and its supporters: “danger ahead.”

Inflation continues threatening to turn into a crushing recession. Iran is reportedly days away from a nuclear-weapons breakout. A Chinese spy balloon just spent a week doing figure-eights over America’s most sensitive nuclear sights while transmitting information back to Beijing in real time. Communist Chinese President Xi Jinping is telling his people to prepare for war. And the House Oversight Committee keeps finding more bank evidence that the Biden family appears compromised by foreign payments.

What do the current administration and its supporters do, then? Revert to the tried-and-true playbook of the Trump era and launch the latest “Trump trial” to distract from the administration’s challenges. The pattern has been consistent – create a false narrative that is more favorable to themselves and more problematic for whoever is challenging them.

After seeing multiple high-level Democrat operatives from candidate Hillary Clinton herself approving a disinformation operation against then-candidate Trump, her campaign and the DNC reportedly financing the Steele dossier, DNI James Clapper reportedly leaking info on the Steel dossier to the media, Adam Schiff misleading his colleagues about information leading to the first Trump impeachment, and 51 former intelligence officials signing a bogus letter about the Hunter Biden laptop, there should be little surprise that New York County District Attorney Alvin Bragg — whose campaign was indirectly supported by a million dollars from George Soros while Bragg “promised to put Trump behind bars” — decided to move forward with what ended up a totally fabricated, politically-motivated indictment of Trump. It did not even fulfill the constitutional requirement for Trump “to be informed of the nature and cause of the accusation” – meaning: Bragg did not even name the supposed federal crime.

Those now in charge will seemingly do almost anything to make the narrative leading up to the election once again about allegations against Trump instead of the geopolitical and economic shortcomings of Biden’s policies. If a presidential candidate, a Director of National Intelligence, and a Chairman of the House Intelligence Committee will engage in hyper-partisan political activities under the guise of legitimate government activities, why should we be surprised that a local prosecutor might do the same thing?

The bottom line is that every Republican potential candidate will have to address the “Trump issue,” probably multiple times during the upcoming weeks and months, rather than discussing their solutions and proposals to address the economic and national security concerns gripping Americans today. For the current administration, that is “mission accomplished.”

What’s a politician to do? Going into a presidential election year, the incumbent president looks to be facing a difficult reelection campaign. Persistently high inflation numbers remain a problem. Energy prices are still up. America’s southern border is being overrun with illegal border-crossers and fentanyl. Major bank failures have raised the specter of a banking crisis. There are multiple House of Representatives investigations covering Biden family finances, the weaponization of government agencies, China, and the origins of COVID. For the current administration and its supporters, the answer is as easy as it is familiar: change the subject to Donald Trump. It has been an oppositional go-to foil since Trump dared step onto the political stage in 2016.

https://amgreatness.com/2023/04/06/national-institute-of-standards-and-technology-forces-race-and-gender-speech-codes-on-scientists/

The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST), a federal agency for the study of science and technology, is now enforcing race- and gender-based speech codes on its scientists, having made a top priority out of the language-policing efforts.

As reported by Just The News, the guidance documents issued by NIST orders its federal employees to not use words such as “blacklist” or “whitelist,” allegedly due to these words carrying racial connotations. The document also forbids employees from “using terms that assign a gender to inanimate objects, such as male/female connectors.”

Other directives from the document include orders to “avoid terms such as master/slave that perpetuate negative stereotypes or unequal power relationships,” and “avoid descriptive terms that are condescending or reductive in favor of language that the groups being described would prefer.”

The guidance was largely implemented on the advice of Steven Lipner, chair of the Information Security and Privacy Advisory Board. Lipner sent a letter to NIST back in 2020 specifically demanding that the agency ban the use of the words “blacklist” and “whitelist,” as well as banning the use of the words “slave” and “master.”

“Many technology and security standards contain racially insensitive language that is both offensive to many of our colleagues and is also, in many respects, ambiguous – technically and culturally,” Lipner said in his letter. “Examples of such language include using the terms blacklist and whitelist instead of block-list and allow-list and using the terms master and slave.”

Jennifer Huergo, a spokeswoman for the NIST, defended the guidance by claiming that it “was created primarily for the benefit of NIST staff experts who participate in the development of documentary standards as expert collaborators and leaders.”

https://amgreatness.com/2023/04/06/the-gathering-storm/

The first grand jury indictment against Donald Trump, like so many highly-anticipated gotcha moments involving the former president, landed with a thud this week.

Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg’s 34-count bill of goods failed to impress legal and political observers across the spectrum. Even Ruth Marcus, associate editor for the Washington Post, admitted the legal basis for the charges is “unnervingly flimsy at worst.”

News coverage of Bragg’s faceplant is quickly disappearing from the front pages as all desperate eyes now turn to Jack Smith, the mysterious figure appointed by Attorney General Merrick Garland last year ostensibly to take over the Justice Department’s investigation into Trump’s culpability for January 6 and alleged mishandling of classified documents. As I explained here, Smith is special counsel in name only; the team of investigators and prosecutors who initiated the first set of inquiries simply changed letterhead.

Given the targets of Smith’s recent subpoenas, we can surmise there is nothing independent or impartial about his behind-the-scenes work. In rapid succession, Smith has successfully sought testimony from Trump’s inner circle, including former chief of staff Mark Meadows and White House lawyer Evan Corcoran. 

For the first time in history, a vice president will testify before a grand jury considering evidence of crimes committed by his former boss. Mike Pence, after winning partial immunity, reportedly will answer questions about his exchanges with Trump in the weeks leading up to the protest at the Capitol. Oddly, Pence will not be compelled to discuss what he did on January 6—a dubious protection considering his key presence throughout the day and into the next morning.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/a-nation-divided-and-a-world-in-turmoil/

A happy, upbeat friend does not watch television news, whether national or local, does not read a newspaper and avoids discussing politics, religion or even sports. Self-employed, he found out about something called the coronavirus while driving to work the day the California lockdown mandate began. That morning he encountered no traffic on the normally busy streets of Los Angeles and said, “What’s going on?!” It seems unthinkable that someone in his mid-to-late 30s could erect news blinders, especially when he, like most everyone else, uses a smartphone for personal and business matters. He even maintains a Facebook page to keep up with friends and family.

He does not know that since Joe Biden became president, five million illegal aliens entered the U.S. from over 100 foreign countries, their whereabouts now mostly unknown. Border patrol arrested dozens of border crossers on the terror watch list, with no telling how many entered undetected.

He does not know that America faces a crisis of fentanyl, a synthetic opioid more potent than heroin by as much as a factor of 50, and morphine by as much as a factor of 100, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. China supplies the precursor chemicals and Mexican cartels process, manufacture and bring the fentanyl into the United States. At 64,000 deaths among those aged 18 to 49 in 2021, fentanyl killed more than those who died from COVID-19, cancer and car accidents combined.

He knows nothing about a Donald Trump-hating Manhattan district attorney who might arrest and indict the former president under a legal theory that even The New York Times called “untested.” He does not know about the “weaponization” and collusion of the DOJ and Big Tech social media platforms to attack conservatives, stifle dissent about vaccine and mask mandates and suppress the cost-benefit debate about COVID-19 lockdowns. Among other things, the student learning loss suffered due to virtual versus in-school learning.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/murder-manifesto-mystery/

On Monday, March 27, as the April 1 “Trans Day of Vengeance” approached, Audrey Hale, a woman who thinks she’s a man, shot open a locked door and entered the Covenant School in Nashville, Tennessee.

In 14 minutes, Hale fired 152 rounds from an AR-15–style rifle and 9mm Kel-Tec SUB2000. Hale shot dead Evelyn Dieckhaus, 9, Mike Hill, 61, William Kinney, 9, Katherine Koonce, 60, Cynthia Peak, 61, and Hallie Scruggs. That nine-year-old was the daughter of Chad Scruggs, senior pastor at the Covenant Presbyterian Church, on the same site as the school.

With six people dead, including three children, Hale’s attack qualifies as a mass murder, and in any murder case, the question of motive is paramount. Hale left clues in a manifesto, but trans-friendly activists sought to suppress its release. For example, Charles Moran, of Log Cabin Republicans, advocates for equal rights for LGBTQ+ Americans, warned of “serious consequences” if the manifesto was released to the public.

Enter Nashville city councilman Robert Swope, who worked as Tennessee state director for Donald Trump in 2016 and now heads the city council’s Public Safety, Beer and Regulated Beverages Committee. Swope told the New York Post that the FBI’s Behavioral Analysis Unit is working “in tandem” with the Metro Nashville Police Department to complete “a very in-depth analysis of certain aspects of the shooter’s life.”

According to the councilman, “the manifesto is going to be released. It’s just a matter of when. There are some incredibly brilliant psychological minds and psychological analysts combing through her entire life.” While revelations await, one fact is perfectly clear.

The FBI, supposed on guard 24/7 against domestic terrorism and violent extremism, failed to prevent Audrey Hale’s attack. Relatives of the victims have reason to wonder what the FBI knew and when they knew it.

https://www.city-journal.org/chicagos-hard-left-choice

For several reasons, the election of Brandon Johnson as mayor is the most important in Chicago for generations and the most politically salient urban election this century. First, it represents the triumph of the hard Left not on one of the coasts but in the heart of the Midwest, in a city known for its pragmatic, if machine-Democratic, politics. Second, it displays the raw power of public-sector unions in Illinois and in today’s Democratic Party. Johnson was not just supported by the unions; he is the paid agent of the most powerful and radical of them all—the Chicago Teachers Union. Third, Johnson’s victory will have national reverberations for years to come because his administration will test the Left’s attempt to transform urban policy.

Johnson’s win shows the current might of the urban Left precisely because the political climate and the candidate himself were not optimal for victory. Chicago has suffered high crime rates since the George Floyd riots. Cab drivers spontaneously tell me of carjackings and shootings they have witnessed. A campaign that focused on public safety, like the one that Paul Vallas ran, seemed tailor made for the times. Moreover, Johnson was running as a progressive after the failed tenure of another self-proclaimed, if far more moderate, progressive, Lori Lightfoot. We might have expected Chicago voters to opt for an ideological change, as New York voters did when they chose Eric Adams after the disastrous mayoralty of Bill de Blasio.

Johnson, too, was an imperfect messenger for the Left. The teachers’ union provided him with much of his campaign funds and boots on the ground, but many parents were unhappy with the union’s long strike in 2019 and prolonged school closures during the pandemic.

https://www.thefp.com/p/a-prisoner-of-china-an-american-scandal?utm_source=substack&utm_medium=email

For 11 years, Mark Swidan has languished in a Chinese prison on charges no one believes. ‘If this were a politically connected person, he would have been out a long time ago.

There are at least 54 Americans being wrongly held overseas today. They haven’t broken any laws. They haven’t received a fair hearing. They have been rendered political pawns, detained in dingy cells in places like Cuba, Iran, Russia, and China.

Last week, Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich became one of them when he was taken by agents in Yekaterinburg, where he was working on a story. He was accused of espionage and taken to Lefortovo prison in Moscow. Bari Weiss

“In the fall of 2012, Mark Swidan was 37 and engaged to a Filipino woman named Mylene. Mark had met her on a trip to Manila in 2011. He loved Southeast Asia, and he’d built a small interior design business selling hand-carved knickknacks from Thailand, artworks from Vietnam—that kind of thing.

He had also just bought, with his mother Katherine Swidan, a fixer-upper outside Houston that the three of them planned to move into after the wedding. The house needed work, and Swidan googled a factory near Guangzhou that sold flooring and light fixtures for almost nothing.

So in October, Katherine said, her son jumped on a plane to buy housewares halfway across the world. This was an odd thing to do, but less so for a man who had a penchant for Asia. Katherine told me that her son also planned to visit Macau, the Las Vegas of China, which is a quick train trip away, before returning home.

He had been in Guangzhou a few weeks—Katherine wasn’t sure how long—and on his last night there, November 13, 2012, he took his driver and interpreter to dinner to thank them for carting him around.