VIDEO – INTERVIEW WITH ALL THREE NORTH CAROLINA ATTORNEY GENERAL CANDIDATES
www.wral.com/on-the-record-jan-18-republican-candidates-for-state-attorney-general/18892078/
Bernie Sanders, a top competitor in the Democratic primaries, has attacked Joe Biden for bringing “just a lot of baggage” into the race. But if past views are a major consideration, consider the baggage that Sanders drags into the campaign.
Go back over 40 years, to the start of Iran’s long conflict with the United States. On April 1, 1979, the theocratic Islamic Republic of Iran was proclaimed. Ayatollah Ruhollah Khomeini, who had returned to Iran from exile to assume command of the revolt, became Supreme Leader in December of that year. His rise was accelerated by the seizure on Nov. 4 of 52 American diplomats and citizens, and citizens of other countries, at the U.S. Embassy in Tehran. The hostage crisis became the means by which the Ayatollah crushed political opponents in Iran. Dealing with the hostage taking became the overwhelming political crisis for President Jimmy Carter. It lasted 444 days.
Virtually all Americans—Democrats, Republicans and independents—united in support of the hostages and the international call for their freedom. One prominent political figure on the 2020 stage, then almost completely unknown, stood apart by joining a Marxist-Leninist party that not only pledged support for the Iranian theocracy, but also justified the hostage taking by insisting the hostages were all likely CIA agents. Who was that person? It was Bernie Sanders.
This article by Karl Rove lists the numerous times Obama’s dubious tactics as president were never criticized by Democrats. One way to stop the Democrats at the senate trial, is to compare all the questionable tactics that Obama did as president to what they are alleging Trump has done. Nancy
Hypocrisy is common in Washington, but impeachment is bringing out more than its fair share. That’s true of some Republicans, and the mainstream media devotes countless hours to it. What gets much less attention is the hypocrisy of the party that to which most journalists are sympathetic: the Democrats.
Take Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer. On Tuesday he demanded the Senate call witnesses, claiming they’re required for a “fair trial” and slamming Republican opposition as a “coverup.” But the GOP position is exactly what Mr. Schumer’s was during President Bill Clinton’s impeachment trial in 1999. Back then he said it “doesn’t make sense” for the Senate to call witnesses.
More important than hypocrisy about the process of impeachment is hypocrisy about the substance. Removing a president is the most draconian act Congress can take. It ill serves America if the party opposed to the president uses impeachment as a political weapon to tarnish his standing and weaken him for the next election.
When considering the Democrats’ high-minded arguments, ask yourself: What if Hillary Clinton won in 2016? After she took office, it would have been revealed that her campaign hired the opposition-research firm Fusion GPS, which assigned Christopher Steele, a former British intelligence official, to reach out to Russian counterparts to solicit dirt on Donald Trump. Recall that the since-discredited dossier Mr. Steele peddled to the media in the fall of 2016 was made up of unsubstantiated rumors from former Russian agents.
It’s naive to believe the Kremlin was unaware that Mr. Steele asked Moscow pals for dirt on Mr. Trump. Those spies are retired, but they rely on Vladimir Putin for their pension checks. Who among congressional Democrats would now be calling for Mrs. Clinton’s removal if she were in the Oval Office? I doubt any. I’ve searched in vain for Democratic criticism for her soliciting foreign involvement in the 2016 election—the principal charge of their impeachment case against President Trump.
Furthermore, while Democrats say Mr. Trump should be removed for seeking a quid pro quo—a Ukrainian investigation of Joe and Hunter Biden in return for U.S. military aid—what about President Barack Obama’s March 2012 open-mic moment? At a summit in Seoul, he asked Russian President Dmitry Medvedev to tell his boss, then-Prime Minister Putin, that “on all these issues, but particularly missile defense, this can be solved but it’s important for him to give me space. . . . This is my last election. After my election I have more flexibility.” In other words, if Mr. Putin didn’t create problems during Mr. Obama’s re-election fight with Mitt Romney, Mr. Obama would show “flexibility” on missile defense and other important issues of national security and foreign policy after the election. Again, crickets when it comes to Democratic criticism.
Think the fog of partisan Trump investigations will lift once the President leaves office, either in 2021 or 2025? Not if Elizabeth Warren has anything to say about it. With the Iowa caucuses approaching and her campaign fortunes flagging, Senator Warren now says that as President she’d launch an open-ended criminal investigation into her predecessor and anyone who worked for him.
Ms. Warren’s latest “anti-corruption” plan says she would create “a Justice Department Task Force to investigate corruption during the Trump administration and to hold government officials accountable for illegal activity.” She would order Justice to look for violations of “federal bribery laws, insider trading laws, and other anti-corruption and public integrity laws” as well as immigration-enforcement offenses.
“This will be no ordinary transition between administrations,” the document says ominously. Team Warren won’t be satisfied with taking control of the executive branch in an election. They also want scalps of choice ex-officials. The plan links to news articles about Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross, White House Adviser KellyanneCon way and Secretary of Housing and Urban Development Ben Carson.
If there is evidence of a crime by a former Administration official, it should be investigated through the normal channels. Ms. Warren is proposing something different: A law-enforcement task force dedicated to searching for wrongdoing only by political opponents. This would be familiar in Latin American dictatorships where the party that loses an election may be jailed as retribution.
Pundits said Mr. Trump’s 2016 campaign threat to investigate Hillary Clinton for her email mismanagement was a chilling breach of democratic norms. We opposed such an investigation but at least the alleged misconduct was limited to specific conduct by one official, whereas Ms. Warren wants investigations of all Republican officials for any political offenses.
Despite all the apocalyptic think-pieces and high-minded books, America has not become an “autocracy” three years into Donald Trump’s Presidency. The opposition party won the House in the midterms, proceeded to impeach the President, and its leading candidates are ahead in the head-to-head 2020 presidential election polls.
Yet in polarized times the temptation to criminalize political differences is stronger than ever. It will be especially strong for Democrats once they are back in control of the Justice Department. Down Senator Warren’s road lies a real threat to liberty.
No. It doesn’t match his shrinking regulations and limiting government
by Allan H. Ryskind Allan H. Ryskind, a former editor and owner of Human Events, is the author of “Hollywood Traitors” (Regnery, 2015)
December 31, 2019
Prominent liberal Fareed Zakaria insists that Donald Trump “has been profoundly unconservative” because he’s abandoned what “Republicans used to call the core of their agenda — limited government.” But it’s hard to take the charge seriously, even though some conservatives have sent his piece around for comment to see if he’s onto something. Yet no politician in recent memory has restricted the reach of government at both the federal and state level more than the current occupant of the Oval Office.
Mr. Trump’s drastic shrinking of federal economic regulations, opening vast expanses of federal lands for energy exploration, drawing overseas businesses home with tax breaks and passing major tax cuts for corporations and individuals have generated an explosion of well-paying jobs, personal wealth and soaring wages, as well as the lowest level of unemployment for minorities on record. Some 7 million new jobs have been created during Mr. Trump’s presidency and more than 100 million American shareholders have watched the market jump 55 percent since his election.
You’d think Mr. Zakaria would be celebrating Mr. Trump’s low-tax, pro-growth economic agenda as not only core Republicanism but virtually Reaganesque. Increasing prosperity by stimulating market forces without enacting high taxes and big government programs is, of course, how conservatives try to keep government limited.
Mr. Zakaria concedes that Mr. Trump has delivered what conservatives have wanted in the realm of “social and cultural policy,” such as “appointing judges, tightening rules related to abortion and asylum, etc.” but suggests they have little to do with taming the Leviathan.
Really? Stacking the courts with judges steeped in the philosophy of federalism is, of course, precisely the way to limit government on both the economic and cultural fronts. Mr. Zakaria may ignore the threat, but Democratic Party presidential candidates, along with their media support groups, are panicked over the president’s court selections.
So that’s it? That’s all there is? After all the talk of obstruction of justice, collusion with Russia, bribery, extortion, profiting from the Presidency, and more, House Democrats have reduced their articles of impeachment against President Trump to two: abuse of power and obstruction of Congress. Honey, we shrunk the impeachment.
Democrats on the Judiciary Committee will vote as early as Thursday on the text of the two articles they unveiled Tuesday, and then they will rush it to the floor next week. It’s enough to suspect that Democrats understand they are offering the weakest case for impeachment since Andrew Johnson, that the public isn’t convinced, and so they simply want to get it over with.
At least Johnson was impeached for violating a specific statute, the Tenure of Office Act, by firing Edwin Stanton as Secretary of War. There was wide agreement that Richard Nixon and Bill Clinton violated criminal statutes. In this case Democrats don’t even try to allege a criminal act.
The Big Picture of Trump’s Rallies
The president is adept at connecting with audiences, which will help in 2020.
Seeing these crowds is so uplifting. Downside, Trump supporters were attacked by the Left. Keep calm, we’re going to win by a landslide.
The Big Picture of Trump’s Rallies
“Watching the President in [his rallies], I can’t help but think he needs to do a lot more of these,” says Erick Erickson. “Get him out of the White House, away from the TV, and with the crowds that love him. He feeds off their energy. He is deeply entertaining and funny on the stage. He drives the media crazy. … He needs to do more of these.”Erickson has a good point. President Donald Trump is a crowd pleaser and a man who loves connecting with people from the stage. His television persona gave Americans a familiarity with him long before he ran for president that made voters amenable to his brand of populism, and he played to that strength in “yuge” rallies across the nation in 2016. It will be a necessary part of his 2020 campaign, too.He doesn’t speak like a polished politician, rattling off the same old list of policy proposals. Instead, he hits his opponents with broadsides that connect with supporters. For instance, in a Louisiana rally Friday, he declared, “[Democrats have been] trying to stop us for more than three years with a lot of crap. They know they can’t win on Election Day so they’re pursuing an illegal, invalid, and unconstitutional bulls—t impeachment.” That’s salty language, but somehow it works for Trump — because he’s right on the merits.Not only do Trump’s rallies inspire his supporters, they infuriate his detractors. Gary Bauer writes of last Thursday’s rally in Minneapolis, “Sadly, there was violence after the rally ended. MAGA hats were burned. Trump supporters were assaulted. Leftists waved the flag of communist China. Police officers had to create a path for cars to leave because demonstrators were attacking vehicles in the parking garage. It was a striking contrast. Inside the Target Center, Trump praised our brave men and women in uniform, our soldiers, and police officers. He defended our flag and our country. Outside, the left-wing radicals, the activist base of the Democrat Party, were attacking cops, burning flags, yelling their hatred for America, and assaulting conservatives.”Furthermore, for those paying attention, that highlights the gross double standard of the mainstream media. Bauer notes, “If, after any speech by a leading Democrat, a mob formed outside and began punching people and attacking cars, every network would be running the footage non-stop. Every Republican would be forced to condemn it on the record. But no elected Democrat … will be asked to condemn what happened on the streets of Minneapolis.”The more Americans are exposed to the radicalism of the Left, the more Trump’s quirks and idiosyncrasies seem like the sane choice in 2020.
