Sunday, September 29, 2019

How Clinton & Kerry Used Office To Enrich Their Families

Deep State Scandals At State Dept: How Clinton & Kerry Used Office To Enrich Their Families
Excerpt: When do the real investigations into Democrat crime and corruption begin? The President blew the lid off their racketeering, it’s why they are hellbent on punishing him.

Nancy Pelosi’s December 2018 Rule Changes Block Republicans From Participating In Impeachment Process

Nancy Pelosi’s December 2018 Rule Changes Block Republicans From Participating In Impeachment Process
Excerpt: In December 2018, the soon-to-be Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, was busy making changes in the House rules for the incoming 116th Congress. She was actually setting the stage for her anticipated impeachment of President Trump. At the time, The Conservative Treehouse’s “Sundance” wrote, “Remember when we warned [November 8th, 2018] that a convergence of left-wing groups, activists, DNC donors and specifically the Lawfare team, would align with (and meet) incoming Democrat leadership to construct a road-map for the “resistance” priorities?

Random Thoughts for October 2019


Random Thoughts for October 2019
By Robert A. Hall
Feel free to post or forward.  

Bumper sticker at the VA: YOU! Out of the gene pool!

For some people their significant other is their smart phone.

Congress may be a sheltered workshop.

I told a VA nurse that I was 73 and had had a lung transplant. She said, “You look good.” I said, “For certain values of good.” (Swiped that “certain values” line from one of Tom Kratman’s great military science fiction books.)

From Facebook: “When someone tells you to get a grip, apparently they didn’t mean around their neck. Who knew?

You wouldn’t think assholes (or “anal-apertures” for the more genteel) would be in high demand in the workforce. But if you are looking for bureaucrats, censors, or other who will enjoy meticulously restricting people’s freedom, that’s where to get them.

Some people don’t even have a nodding acquaintance with reality.

The war with Islamic Jihadists will end when we are all Muslim—their kind of Muslim—or all dead, or they are all dead. It is truly called, “The Forever War.”

If you want to appreciate every day, grow old. Young folks don’t.

The more “official” a piece of mail looks, the more likely they are trying to get money from you.

Facebook Meme: “Remember when you had to line up at the fair and pay money to see the tattooed fat lady? Now they’re everywhere!”

It would be a great step towards equality for transgender people if the Obamas and other leading progressives would encourage their children to marry one.

If you think life should be fair, you may expect to be disappointed on a very regular basis.

From my friend, MasterGuns John Lewis: I recently took a pole and found out 100% of the occupants were angry with me when their tent collapsed.”

From Facebook: “What Democrats still don’t get—and may never understand—is that there are good, decent people who voted for Trump because they have genuine hesitations about the direction the left is headed. Trump may not be a beacon of morality or even a champion of conservatism, but he is, whether progressives like it or not, indicative of more than “white fragility.” He represents the concerns of millions of Americans who feel that their country is being overtaken by postmodern, morally relative cynics who favor socialism, hate religion, deprioritize the family and stifle patriotism—people who are against many of the principles and institutions many argue have made America so successful.” - Allie Stuckey

Some people need stress and drams in their lives like plants need sunlight.

Not one in 10,000 “Woke Progressives” has read The Gulag Archipelago, but they are hell-bent on taking our country there.

When you are young, you change a lot, but you don’t notice it. When you are old, you notice every little change.

A bureaucrats first answer is always no.

There is (for now) no longer a Democratic Party. Instead, it is a revolutionary Jacobin movement that believes socialism is our salvation, that identity politics is our creed, that gun confiscation is our duty, that the abrupt end of fossil fuels is coming very soon, that open borders is our new demography, and that the archetypical unmarried, childless, urban hipster is our model woke citizen.” –Victor Davis Hanson

What you want, what you expect, and what you get are very often different things.

Power becomes paranoia.

People knock public colleges. But today your kids can get just as bad, biased, and screwed up an education from a state university as they can get from Harvard or Yale.

I don’t own an AR-15, but the more negative crap about it that flies around, the more I think of buying one.

Watch historical movies for the entertainment, but never think they teach you anything about history. Fact always bows to Hollywood drama.

“It would not have been possible for us to take power, or to use it as we have, without the radio.” –Joseph Goebbels. And now we have TV and in Internet to give the demagogues more tools.

Because someone says they are a professional doesn’t mean that are any good at what they do.

Many people seek short-term solutions to long-term problems.

It’s one thing to get up at the crack of dawn. It’s another to get up when dawn is two hours away.

Take joy where you find it. Hurts are the human condition.

Everything is temporary.

“(Hillary Clinton) is no maverick. She embodies the resilience and violence of a system whose vaunted ‘exceptionalism’ is totalitarian with an occasional liberal face.” -- John Pilger, 10/16, Liberal journalist and filmmaker.

NYT new motto: “All the news that’s shit, we print.”

Do shoplifters get buyer’s remorse?

Saw a tee-shirt (too high at $24.95!): “Death had a near-Marine experience.” Death had one with me on Memorial Day, 2014!


Get the collection! My “Random Thoughts” from 2009 through July, 2013 are collected in this book: The Old Jarhead's Journal: Random Thoughts on Life, Liberty, and Leadership by Robert A. Hall
The Old Jarhead’s Journal is a collection of Random Thoughts on politics and life and Conservative Political Essays, mostly published on the author’s blog, including the essay “I’m Tired” which went viral on the Internet in 2009, “The Hall Platform,” “This I Believe,” and “Why I’m a Republican.” While they will be of interest to conservative thinkers, they are collected here in book form as a service to readers who wish to give a copy to favorite liberals and watch their heads explode. All royalties are donated to the Injured Marine Semper Fi Fund.

*****

Robert A. Hall is a Marine Vietnam Veteran who served five terms in the Massachusetts State Senate. He is the author of The Coming Collapse of the American Republic. http://www.amazon.com/Coming-Collapse-American-Republic-prevent/dp/1461122538/ref=sr_1_5?s=booksandie=UTF8andqid=1304815980andsr=1-5 For a free PDF of Collapse, e-mail him at tartanmarine(at)gmail.com. Hall’s twelve books are listed here: http://tartanmarine.blogspot.com/2010/07/new-book-published.html. His blog of political news and conservative comment is www.tartanmarine.blogspot.com. He currently works part-time as a writer-editor in the My Life, My Story program as the Madison VA hospital, interviewing vets and writing up their life histories.

Learn more about Medieval Warm Period:

Learn more about Medieval Warm Period: Geologic Evidence of Recurring Climate Cycles and Their Implications for the Cause of Global Climate Changes—The Past is the Key to the Future

How about a Bipartisan Treaty against the Criminalization of Elections?

How about a Bipartisan Treaty against the Criminalization of Elections?
Excerpt: Trump detractors hyper-focus on the president’s request that President Zelensky provide Attorney General Barr with any information Ukraine might have about Biden twisting arms to quash an investigation involving his son’s cashing in on dad’s influence. I say “hyper-focus” because there was a lot more to it than that. Long before the conversation came around to the Biden topic, the “favor” that Trump asked for was Zelensky’s assistance in Barr’s ongoing investigation of the genesis of the Trump-Russia investigation. No matter how much Democrats seek to discredit that probe and the AG overseeing it, it is a legitimate investigation conducted by the United States Department of Justice, which has prosecutors assigned and grand jury subpoena power. It is examining questionable Justice Department and FBI conduct. It is considering whether irregularities rise to the level of crimes. It will be essential to Congress’s consideration of whether laws need to be enacted or modified to insulate our election campaigns from politicized use of the government’s counterintelligence and law-enforcement powers. I mention all this because it is a commonplace for the government to seek assistance from foreign counterparts for ongoing federal investigations.  (...) There is nothing wrong with our government’s requesting the assistance of foreign governments that have access to witnesses and evidence relevant to an ongoing Justice Department investigation. The president is the democratically elected, constitutionally empowered chief executive: There is nothing his subordinates may properly do that he may not do himself (it is his power that they exercise). And the president is never conflicted out of executive branch business due to his political interests.  [Wow. McCarthy really cuts through the BS and cuts directly to the heart of the matter. He also cuts no slack for my former Governor. I highly recommend reading this piece. It's also rare that I get TWO Andy McCarthy articles this close together; I suspect he's irritated.  I added emphasis to the central part of MccCarthy's argument.  Ron P.]

NIGERIAN PASTOR PLEADS FOR HELP! 120 SLAUGHTERED BY RADICAL MUSLIMS SINCE FEBRUARY 2019

NIGERIAN PASTOR PLEADS FOR HELP! 120 SLAUGHTERED BY RADICAL MUSLIMS SINCE FEBRUARY 2019

Couple Tries to Dispel Iran’s “Bad Rap,” Goes to Jail

Couple Tries to Dispel Iran’s “Bad Rap,” Goes to Jail
Excerpt: The latest victims of the Left’s fantasy world. The story has invited more ridicule than sympathy: an Australian couple has been arrested in Iran after only traveling there in the first place to “try to break the stigma around travelling to countries which get a bad wrap [sic] in the media.” Jolie King and Mark Firkin should have known better, but they are by no means the first naïve Westerners that ridiculed the idea that “the world is a big, scary place” and then place themselves in harm’s way. Those were the words of Jay Austin and Lauren Geoghegan, an American couple that was murdered by Islamic State (ISIS) jihadis last year while biking through Tajikistan. As naïve as all four of these people certainly are or were, the responsibility for their plight lies not just with the Islamic Republic of Iran or ISIS, but also with the Leftist world in which they moved and lived. The Left’s leaders constructed a fantasy world, because Leftist ideas are dead on the drawing board without it.

Saturday, September 28, 2019

No, Trump Is Not Facing the Death Penalty over Ukraine

No, Trump Is Not Facing the Death Penalty over Ukraine
Excerpt: Bill Weld used to be a serious guy. A scholar graduated from Harvard and Oxford, a man with gravitas in the legal community. Before he began seeking elective office in the late 1980s, Weld was a high-ranking and extremely knowledgeable federal prosecutor. For a time, he was the chief of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division under President Reagan. I have not been a fan of his post-DOJ political career, but I’ve never thought of him as a clown. (I voted for Bill Weld for Governor twice and for Vice President, once. I was proud of those votes. I’m so shocked by this comment I wouldn’t now vote for him to be allowed to voluntarily pick up trash on the common. Weld’s comment is beyond stupid or merely immoral, it’s actively evil. I’m ashamed of him; he should be ashamed of himself. Ron P.)

Lenin Think

Lenin Think
EXCERPT: Recently Attorney General William Barr asked how his critics would have reacted had the fbi secretly interfered with the Obama campaign: “What if the shoe were on the other foot?” From a Leninist perspective, this question demonstrates befuddlement. In his book Terrorism and Communism, Trotsky imagines “the high priests of liberalism” asking how Bolshevik use of arbitrary power differs from tsarist practices. Trotsky sneers: You do not understand this, holy men? We shall explain it to you. The terror of Tsarism was directed against the proletariat. . . . Our Extraordinary Commissions shoot landlords, capitalists, and generals . . . . Do you grasp this—distinction? For us Communists it is quite sufficient. What is reprehensible for them is proper for us, and that’s all there is to it. For a Leninist, the shoe is never on the other foot because he has no other foot.

Evers’ assault on the First Amendment.

Evers’ assault on the First Amendment. By M.D. Kittle
Excerpt: Nearly 10 months into is his first year in office, Gov. Tony Evers has compiled a woeful record on open government. Now the Democrat’s administration is doubling down on a “deeply troubling” policy that is closing the door to even more members of the media. Attorney General Josh Kaul, defending Evers in a First Amendment federal lawsuit brought by the MacIver Institute, argues that only what the administration deems to be “bona fide” journalists and news organizations are entitled to attend certain press events with the governor. The MacIver Institute, according to Kaul’s motion to dismiss the lawsuit, is not a “bona fide” news outlet. Never mind the fact that the conservative MacIver News Service’s reporters have been covering policy as credentialed members of the Capitol press corps for years.

Once Again, Progressive Anti-Christian Bigotry Carries a Steep Legal Cost

Once Again, Progressive Anti-Christian Bigotry Carries a Steep Legal Cost
Excerpt: In the United States District Court for the Western District of Michigan, it turns out that such rhetoric has cost the state a crucial court ruling, granted a Catholic adoption agency a vital victory, and demonstrated — once again — that anti-religious bigotry can (and should) carry substantial legal costs. The case is called Buck v. Gordon. My friends at Becket represent St. Vincent Catholic Charities, a former foster child, and the adoptive parents of five special-needs kids. The facts are relatively complicated, but here’s the short version: St. Vincent upholds Catholic teaching by referring same-sex and unmarried families who seek foster and adoption recommendations and endorsements to agencies that have no objection to providing those services. There is no evidence that St. Vincent has prevented any legally qualified family from adopting or fostering a child. In fact, same-sex couples “certified through different agencies” have been able to adopt children in St. Vincent’s care.

Friday, September 27, 2019

DOH! Did You Know There’s a Treaty Between the USA & Ukraine Regarding Cooperation For Prosecuting Crimes?

DOH! Did You Know There’s a Treaty Between the USA & Ukraine Regarding Cooperation For Prosecuting Crimes?
Excerpt: My goodness. It was passed when Joe Biden was a member of the U.S. Senate and then signed by then-President Bill Clinton. A comprehensive treaty agreement that allows cooperation between both the United States and Ukraine in the investigation and prosecution of crimes. It appears President Trump was following the law to the letter when it comes to unearthing the long-standing corruption that has swirled in Ukraine and allegedly involves powerful Democrats like Joe Biden and others.

WWI

Forwarded:

I just viewed "They Shall Not Grow Old" - a very powerful WW I film by the great Kiwi director, Peter Jackson (director of "Lord of the Rings”), whose own grandfather and several other family members fought in that war. 


He and his brilliant team viewed hundreds of hours of contemporary WW I video footage, and hundreds of hours of recordings of the veterans telling their own stories, and using the amazing computer graphics now available, combined with a great deal of research, accurately repaired, corrected, and colorized a great deal of the footage they used, and put together what may be the best documentary on that war ever made.

Some of my relatives were in that war, as was the pipe major of the band I played in as a boy, and when I was growing up, there were still many WW I veterans alive who I had the privilege of speaking with and gathering some of their stories. (One had been in the German Army, but later emigrated to the US, and another who was a first cousin of W. C. Fields, the comedian - but that is a story for another day.)

This film is an amazing piece of work, as these once dark, faded, jerky and jittery images come alive in full color, and appear on screen, not as the quaint images we so often associate with that war, but the real thing. 
Jackson paid a great deal of attention to detail, and even employed forensic lip readers to figure out what was being said in some shots, and had an actor from the appropriate area of the UK speak the words. 

The only other use of actors or others was in the making of the sounds of that war - the artillery being loaded and fired, and the shells whistling in and exploding, the “scrunch” of mud in the trenches, and the music and songs used. (Most of the music and songs were authentic from the period, though a few tracks were composed for the film in period style.)

(For those of us who were in the trenches at KS, the trench war in WW I was eerily similar to ours in several ways -  the mud, the discomfort, the regular bombardments, the rats, the stench of death and unwashed Marines, the lack of adequate sanitation or often even food and water - all resonated with my experience in the trenches - and interestingly, with the stories I heard from the WW I veterans over the years.

One of my favorite aspects is how they juxtaposed the recordings of the veterans with the action in the film, almost as though the participants were doing a “voice-over” of photos of the actions they are describing.

There is a wide range of views expressed by the veterans, just as their is among our own number (and I suspect among soldiers in all times and places), and Jackson makes no attempt to interject his own views, instead wisely allowing the men to tell their own stories. 

It has enjoyed not only the commercial success it deserves, but great critical acclaim as well.

This film is currently available on Apple TV for $20 (and doubtless other film suppliers).

I will also be viewing two about the current wars, “Restrepo” and “Korengal” about a unit posted to the dangerous and deadly Korengal Valley. I haven’t seen them yet, but from the trailers, they look authentic, and I am interested in hearing about the current wars from the young men who are fighting them. From the bit that I have heard, their experience, though different in some ways, is also very similar to ours - but perhaps it is the same for all soldiers in all wars, countries, and eras - rather like the "Universal Soldier” (by Buffy St.-Marie) which had many elements of truth.

SF,

Bagpipes

F. J. Taylor
USMC (Ret.)

Not All Trump Critics Are Sold on Impeachment

Not All Trump Critics Are Sold on Impeachment. By JIM GERAGHTY
Excerpt: Raise your hand if you expected the argument against the impeachment of Trump to be led by . . . David Brooks in the New York Times. "This is completely elitist. We’re in the middle of an election campaign. If Democrats proceed with the impeachment process, it will happen amid candidate debates, primaries and caucuses. Elections give millions and millions of Americans a voice in selecting the president. This process gives 100 mostly millionaire senators a voice in selecting the president. As these two processes unfold simultaneously, the contrast will be obvious. People will conclude that Democrats are going ahead with impeachment in an election year because they don’t trust the democratic process to yield the right outcome. Democratic elites to voters: We don’t trust you. Too many of you are racists!"

ABC News Forced to Correct ‘Bombshell’ About Trump’s Ukraine Call

Nolte: ABC News Forced to Correct ‘Bombshell’ About Trump’s Ukraine Call
Reportedly only corrected half of their fictitious reporting. Don't believe their ads that they are "Truthful News." BS. Sad state of affairs when more REAL news reporting on NBC than ABC (or CBS)....not much, but a bit more. I've heard Newsmax is good.... Fox is now making Obama's fantasies happy. --Barb

Thursday, September 26, 2019

Air Force awards contract for $16M drone-killing microwave weapon

Air Force awards contract for $16M drone-killing microwave weapon
Excerpt:  “It's not a thermal effect, it's an electric-field effect that is basically imposed on the electronics to either upset or permanently damage them. And the effect is essentially instantaneous,"  Raytheon's missile systems' chief technologist for directed energy, Don Sullivan told the outlet.  (...)  “It is a remarkable coincidence because this has been in the works between the Air Force and Raytheon essentially since an experiment at White Sands [Missile Range] late last year,” Sullivan said. "Those who sell drone-killing weapons keep a sharp eye on the warning signs, and there were many that preceded the attack in Saudi Arabia." [While this test system works only on small, relatively low-flying drones; no doubt it can–and will–be scaled up for larger drones, if successful. Ron P.]

What’s Behind the Democrats’ Impeachment Gambit?

What’s Behind the Democrats’ Impeachment Gambit?
Excerpt: Or you could insist that the 2016 election was illegitimate, not because of any real procedural questions but because of its outcome. And that, more or less, is what Democrats did. It is worth keeping in mind that the effort to impeach Donald Trump began before he was even sworn in, with Senator Elizabeth Warren et al. beginning to lay the legal groundwork in December of 2016. Since that time, there have been demands to impeach Trump over this or that real or imagined offense every few weeks. This is Red Queen politics: sentence first, trial later. The Democrats have a solution in mind — impeachment — and have been searching since Election Day 2016 for a problem to which to apply it. This week’s renewed enthusiasm for impeachment would be a great deal more persuasive if it were not No. 6,782 in a series. (...) The cynic in me guesses that the Ukrainian gambit serves a dual purpose: First: It provides a pretext for a pre-election impeachment inquiry against the incumbent president — which, given the current composition of the Senate, is unlikely to end in action before the election, or after that, either, unless there is a Democratic majority seated in the Senate. Second: The likely collateral damage to Joe Biden probably is not entirely unwelcome in some Democratic circles — he already is sliding vis-à-vis Senator Warren, and to many Democrats he already has the look of a likely loser should he be the nominee. If somebody has to be put on an ice floe, it’s going to be Joe Biden. There are many problems with this approach, one of which is this: Americans in possession of even a modest political memory must recall that not only did Democrats insist that the 2016 election was illegitimate, they also insisted that the last election that brought a Republican to the White House was illegitimate. [I really like Williamson. I think he’s right on the mark in this piece. Ron P.]

Veteran Uses AR15 to stop Home Invaders – Two Killed, Two Arrested

Veteran Uses AR15 to stop Home Invaders – Two Killed, Two Arrested
Armed robbers went to the wrong house and started a firefight. They lost. I'm sure we'll see coverage of this in the major newspapers, on CNN, and it'll be discussed in Congress for sure. (OK, stop laughing.) --Del

Trump Administration to UNC and Duke: Quit Promoting Islam on Our Dime

Trump Administration to UNC and Duke: Quit Promoting Islam on Our Dime
I love this, but of course all of academia will close ranks and call it Right Wing extremism and abuse of governmental powers, etc. Still, I hope the goverment stays tough on this and the schools figure out that money supplied to teach languages is not for promoting any one religion. --Del

From a liberal: Democratic Candidates Are Misrepresenting Michael Brown’s Death.

Democratic Candidates Are Misrepresenting Michael Brown’s Death. Calling it a murder betrays the cause they hope to advance. By William Saletan
Excerpt: But at the core of the story, there was a problem: The original account of Brown’s death, that he had been shot in the back or while raising his hands in surrender, was false. The shooting was thoroughly investigated, first by a grand jury and then by the Obama Justice Department. The investigations found that Brown assaulted Wilson, tried to grab his gun, and was shot dead while advancing toward Wilson again. Despite these findings, three Democratic presidential candidates—Sen. Elizabeth Warren of Massachusetts, Sen. Kamala Harris of California, and billionaire Tom Steyer—said last month that Brown was murdered. These candidates haven’t backed down in the face of press queries and fact checks. Warren even dismissed a face-to-face question about the DOJ report that cleared Wilson. (Here is an article by a classic Liberal, certainly one concerned with racial bias and over use of force by police, and certainly no fan of Trump, but who cannot ignore the blatant false claims of people vying for the presidency. It is not just stupid of them to do this, it's damaging to us all, and it's disrespectful to Black Americans to try to manipulate them with an obvious lie, to fan more flames of anger and polarization. And for me, it says more than ever that no such person should ever be sitting in the Oval Office. --Del)

Former Soviet: Socialist Left would make America look like Russia.

Former Soviet: Socialist Left would make America look like Russia. By Matt Kittle
Excerpt: The economic professor joined the faculty of Kenosha-based Carthage College a couple of years later in 1991. Before he left his native land, Maltsev served on a senior Soviet economics team to move Mother Russia away from communism – the scourge that had killed millions as it devoured the wealthy nation. Forty years later, as the left works to transform his adopted capitalist country into a socialist administrative state, Maltsev half-jokingly asks a critical question. “What worries me now is – where to defect to again?,” the professor told grassroots conservatives at a recent event in Greenfield sponsored by the Wisconsin Conservative Digest and the Wisconsin Grandsons of Liberty. “It is absolutely unbelievable. This country has changed so much.”

Film Tells Story of Racial Hoax Surrounding Trayvon Martin’s Death

Film Tells Story of Racial Hoax Surrounding Trayvon Martin’s Death
I knew some of this, but not all of it. It sure did seem to be the kickoff of slanted news on racial killings. That mentality has been drummed into a lot of young Blacks since then, I read their comments about existing in fear every moment of their lives. While in college, which is kind of a "safe space"! --Del

Sheila Jackson Lee Claims An AR-15 Fires a .50-Caliber Round, Weighs As Much As ’10 Boxes’

Sheila Jackson Lee Claims An AR-15 Fires a .50-Caliber Round, Weighs As Much As ’10 Boxes’
In the running for dumbest member of Congress. This woman is pretty much a waste of oxygen. The quote is beautiful, the AR-15 fires a .50 cal bullet and weighs as much as ten moving boxes filled with your stuff. And she's part of drawing up bills and laws that affect the rest of us. That is beyond scary. --Del

Sanders Calls for ‘National Wealth Registry’ to Enforce New Tax

Sanders Calls for ‘National Wealth Registry’ to Enforce New Tax
Thy sound more Totalitarian every day. ~Bob

Sprint under FCC investigation for ‘outrageous’ misuse of millions of dollars

Sprint under FCC investigation for ‘outrageous’ misuse of millions of dollars
Fraud under Obamaphone program? Say it ain’t so. -GS

Michigan City Clerk Charged with Altering Ballots in 2018 Midterms

Michigan City Clerk Charged with Altering Ballots in 2018 Midterms
Excerpt: Sherikia Hawkins was charged Monday with six felony counts for allegedly altering absentee ballots during the November 2018 election in her capacity as city clerk for the Detroit suburb of Southfield, Mich. Hawkins, a 38-year-old registered Democrat, stands accused of altering 193 absentee ballots. She was arraigned Monday in Southfield on charges including falsifying returns or records, forgery of a public record, misconduct in office, and multiple counts of using a computer to commit a crime. She was released on $15,000 bond. The alleged misconduct was discovered after the Oakland County Clerk’s Office noticed that 193 voter files had been changed to reflect that the voters failed to include a valid signature or return date, when all of the implicated voters had in fact included both items. The county clerk’s office later discovered the original voter files in the trash at the election-division office. The Michigan State Police then launched an investigation that resulted in Hawkins’s arrest. In a statement announcing the charges, Michigan attorney general Dana Nessel and secretary of state Jocelyn Benson, both of whom are Democrats, stressed that Hawkins’s behavior was anomalous and did not affect any election outcomes.

It Was Wrong for Trump to Push Ukraine on the Bidens

It Was Wrong for Trump to Push Ukraine on the Bidens
Excerpt: At this point, we do not know enough to conclude exactly what happened in President Trump’s conversations with the Ukrainian president, Volodymyr Zelensky. Trump says he did not improperly apply pressure, and Ukraine’s government has denied being pressured. Still, he wrongly and foolishly raised allegations against Biden at the same time his administration was slow-walking $250 million in congressionally approved military aid to Kyiv, which is so vulnerable to Russian aggression. The aid has now been released after bipartisan complaints, but the delay remains unexplained and, under the circumstances, raises legitimate questions. The way Democrats and the media now wish to proceed — starting with the public release of transcripts of conversations between Trump and foreign leaders — would set a perilous precedent. For the sake of American national security, it is vital that leaders communicate frankly and that their negotiations include the most sensitive matters. This can only happen if there is a reciprocal assurance of confidentiality. [It has just (like within the last 10 minutes) been announced by Speaker Pelosi that impeachment will be actively considered. In a way, this is no surprise; they’ve been singing it from the rooftops for the best part of three years, starting the morning after the election of 2016. At very best, this WILL be bloody and without quarter asked or given. At worst, it may make our betrayal of South Vietnam look amateurish. Putin has succeeded in dividing us beyond his wildest dreams. No matter how this plays out, it might be smart to look into “extended foreign travel” for the next two or three years. Katie, bar the door. I think we’re screwed. Ron P.]

The Sixth Circuit Pounds Another Nail in the Coffin of the University Speech Code

The Sixth Circuit Pounds Another Nail in the Coffin of the University Speech Code
Excerpt: The day when universities are forced to rediscover their historic role as guardians of open inquiry and debate is coming, whether they like it or not. There was a time, in the recent past, when universities were in the grip of a kind of speech-code fever. Even as recently ten years ago, after a wave of litigation striking down campus speech regulations, the vast majority of American colleges and universities still kept clearly unconstitutional speech codes on the books. They kept losing in court, yet they still couldn’t quit their codes.

Democrats Wrote to Ukraine in May 2018, Demanding It Investigate Trump

Impeach Yourselves: Democrats Wrote to Ukraine in May 2018, Demanding It Investigate Trump
Excerpt: Democrats wrote to the Ukrainian government in May 2018 urging it to continue investigations into President Donald Trump’s alleged collusion with Russia in the 2016 presidential campaign — collusion later found not to exist. The demand, which came from U.S. Senators Robert Menendez (D-NJ), Dick Durbin (D-IL), and Patrick Leahy (D-VT), resurfaced Wednesday in an opinion piece written by conservative Marc Thiessen in the Washington Post.