Memorial Day: Heroes And Hypocrites

Today is Memorial Day, a day when we honor men and women fallen in the service of their country.

Back when America was more of a piece, such a day was universal it what it meant. Oddly enough, the holiday itself started from division after the Civil War, a conflict over 600,000 Americans never returned from.

Southern women, putting flowers on the graves of their fallen also decided to decorate the graves of the fallen Union soldiers as well, and the custom spread across the Mason-Dixon line. From such a great,painful division came unity.

In America today, we are now in the midst of another great division. And increasingly, we lack the common bonds of our ancestors.

Let's examine something.

At the present time, we have a volunteer military. What that means is that some young men in our society made a choice to restrict their own freedom and risk their lives to defend the rest of us.Increasingly, there is a socioeconomic and geographical divide between those whom chose to serve and those who don't. In the past, most Americans knew someone who was serving or had served in our military...vets like Dad, your uncle or grandpa, somebody's niece or nephew, the neighbors kid or perhaps your own. That's no longer true.

The fact is, most self-styled progressives despise the sort of people who serve in our military. Oh, they'll pay lip service to 'supporting the troops' because, you know, it sounds patriotic and provides them a fig leaf, but the attitude is fairly obvious. A few Memeorial Days ago, MSNBC host and Nation editor Chris Hayes had this to say



CHRIS HAYES: Thinking today and observing Memorial Day, that'll be happening tomorrow. Just talked with Lt. Col. Steve Burke, who was a casualty officer with the Marines and had to tell people [inaudible]. Um, I, I, ah, [Steve] Beck, sorry, um, I think it's interesting because I think it is very difficult to talk about the war dead and the fallen without invoking valor, without invoking the words "heroes." Um, and, ah, ah, why do I feel so comfortable [sic] about the word "hero"? I feel comfortable, ah, uncomfortable, about the word because it seems to me that it is so rhetorically proximate to justifications for more war. Um, and, I don't want to obviously desecrate or disrespect memory of anyone that's fallen, and obviously there are individual circumstances in which there is genuine, tremendous heroism: hail of gunfire, rescuing fellow soldiers and things like that. But it seems to me that we marshal this word in a way that is problematic. But maybe I'm wrong about that.

To people like Chris Hayes, the people that go into the military are suckers and dupes, and more than one of his comrades on the left have shown that this is exactly how they see it...especially when they think no one's listening too closely.



Chris Hayes isn't alone. And people like him don't understand this. Not only don't most of them not know anyone who has ever served, but to them, it seems like anyone who would volunteer for the military is someone beneath them socially and intellectually,someone who had no other option. Especially for patriotic motives, which they also think of as borderline neanderthal. I mean, why would someone risk his life at minimal pay for such a deeply flawed country like America if they were, you know, smart?



Today, I saw photos of Bill and Hillary Clinton marching in a Memorial Day parade in their home town Chautauqua, New York. Since Mrs. Clinton and her friends are now preparing the ground for a 2020 run, I suppose they though it made good optics, you know. A nice photo op.

Just yesterday, an Obama-appointed judge threw a lawsuit out of court against Mrs. Clinton for willful negligence in the death of their sons by the Benghazi families. Judge Amy Berman Jackson set aside their claims that her use of an illegal private server to send confidential intel out unprotected helped cause the death of their sons. Not to mention ignoring repeated pleas for more security from Ambassador Stevens.

The judges verdict? That Mrs. Clinton's activities, even the clearly illegal ones were, and I quote "that Secretary Clinton was acting in the scope of her employment when she transmitted the emails that are alleged to give rise to her liability,”

And here you have these people marching and smiling in a Memorial Day Parade.

Our last president actually attempted to charge our wounded warriors for the medical care they were receiving for free via the VA. He also used there were the Obama Department of Justice to disenfranchise military votes overseas during the 2010 midterms.

And he further showed his feelings about the kind of people whom serve in our military by using dead military bodies being flown back to American soil as a political photo-op in defiance of Department of Defense regulations,the wishes of the families and simple common decency.

Yet in spite of all that, we still breed men here in America who answer the call of freedom. They understand something far more important than the contempt of the elites, and the smug platitudes uttered on this day. It is these men and women who define patriotism.

They knew that our beloved republic is worth fighting, and sometimes dying for. They put their lives on the line for our homeland. And they know how much many of us honor their bravery and sacrifice, even if it's s simple gesture like flowers on a grave. They showed up and gave their all. That's what we really honor on Memorial Day. And recent events may signify that we have indeed turned the corner as a nation, back towards the values we once held in common.

Those heroes, dead and alive will live forever in our hearts and always have our deepest gratitude and respect. The Chris Hayses, and their ilk never will.

The UK Left: 'Europe Needs To Just Get Used to Attacks Like Manchester"

Apparently children are just meant to be sacrificed for the greater goal of multiculti according to Britain's Left. Can't do anything about it you know, just like the weather.

Katty Kay is a well known BBC anchorwoman, and she pretty much said exactly that in an interview with far Left MSNBC personality Mike Brzezinsky.

Here's a partial transcript:


MIKA BRZEZINSKI, MORNING JOE: Katty Kay, your reaction and also tell us about this part of the country.

KATTY KAY, BBC: Manchester is about three hours northeast of Britain. It's Britain's second biggest city. It has, of course, as do most British cities, a large immigrant, and large Muslim population. It is the kind of place where Ariana Grande would go and play up in the north of the country.

And now the investigation will try to be on whether this person acted alone or whether there is some kind of cell behind it. It's particularly awful, this one, because it was girls. My daughter is 11. Her greatest wish in life is to go to an Ariana Grande concert. Ariana Grande is coming to play in Washington, D.C. in September and she really wants tickets for it. And those are the kinds of kids that were at this concert. It was families. And the heartbreaking news that we're getting from the Manchester police this morning, the statements they're putting out of mothers they found who are still looking for their daughters and daughters they found still looking for their mothers and they can't find the rest of their families.

And I think that's what's making -- Europe is getting used to attacks like this, Mika. We have to because we are never going to be able to totally wipe this out. As ISIS gets squeezed in Syria and Iraq, we're going to see more of these kinds of attacks takes place in Europe. And Europe is starting to get used to that. None of us are used to having children targeted in this way, young girls targeted in this way.

Here's the full interview:



This, by the way, is pretty much what French President Macron said, that attacks like Bataclan and Nice were simply the price to pay for 'a truly multicultural society.'

This woman has already surrendered. She's prepared to become a dhimmi, a 'protected person' with no real rights except what her overlords decree. Perhaps someone ought to clue her in as to how many girls like her daughter fare in a number of Muslim dominated countries like Egypt and Pakistan. Non-Muslim girls there are routinely kidnapped, 'converted' to Islam and 'married' to their kidnappers, after which they are not even allowed contact with their families except on the whim of their new owner.

Her nonsense about the cause being pressure on ISIS in places like Iraq and Syria is ridiculous. Perhaps if the UK and other European countries weren't letting these people in, things like this just might not happen. You think? Even a child who touches a hot stove and gets burned has the brains to figure out that it's a bad idea to repeat the behavior.

And that goes for native born jihadis too. There's no reason not to have them face a deportation tribunal.And no reason not to subject jihadist Mosques and Imams to surveillance.

Salman Abedi, the suicide bomber who was actually set off the nail bomb at the Manchester auditorium, wasn't from Iraq or Syria. He was British born, and actually a so-called 'known wolf' who was already on the radar of British police with known ties to Islamist terrorism. Yet there the was, free as a bird.

Did I mention the weather earlier? Well there's little control over that. But what happened at Manchester could have been controlled and avoided, provided Britain's government wants it so.

The British Left in general is pretty much taking the same position Katty Kay is. Because there's a national election coming up in a week or two in which Labour is already trailing badly. So the spin is necessary.

And Katty Kay isn't alone here. The far Left Guardian is equally spinning the narrative, but in a more subtle, evil way. Prominent columnist George Monbiot's shtick is that we have to submerge our outrage and remember what he calls our common humanity:

The terrorists want to drive us apart, to sow suspicion and fear, to oblige us to replace liberty with security and answer them with bombs and bullets of our own. For a terrorist organisation any of this, if implemented, would mean mission accomplished. So we should do the opposite. We defy them by proving that this is not what we are. And the proof is everywhere. [...]

This is why terrorism happens: those who perpetrate it know that an attack on one is an attack on all. People are killed or injured in order to maximise the distress suffered by a far greater number – and to induce us, blinded by outrage, to forget our humanity and to lash out. This then cultivates a political environment in which terrorists prosper: a nation dominated by fear, a cycle of revenge, and the escalation of conflict.

Altruism and empathy are what binds us together, and what defines us. We should let no one distract us from this central fact of our nature: neither terrorists nor those who, in response to them, demand that we slam our doors in the faces of an entire community or an entire religion.

What a fine, humanitarian human being! Ummm, except when it comes to Jews and especially Israel. He's a prominent supporter of BDS and a pal to Labour's anti-semitic leader Jeremy Cobyn. He also was a founder of George Galloway's Hamas and Hezbollah friendly Respect Party.

Obviously, nail bombs in pizza parlors that kill and maim Jewish children aren't something to condemn at all for Mr. Monbiot. After all, it's the Jew's fault isn't it? Always is.

If the European Left has its way, Europe's people will simply be limited to the options Mohammed told his followers to give them in Qur'an 9:5, also known as 'The verse of the Sword'; to become corpses, Muslims,or tribute paying slaves.

The Brits, the French, all of the free people of Europe are going to have to decide whether what they believe in is worth fighting for.

Forum:What Would You Say To President Trump if You Had His Ear For A Few Minutes?

Every week on Monday, the WoW! community and our invited guests weigh in at the Watcher's Forum, short takes on a major issue of the day, the culture, or daily living. This week's question: What Would You Say To President Trump if You Had His Ear For A Few Minutes?


Fausta Rodriquez Wertz: First and foremost, Pres. Trump needs to STOP TALKING. He can do it – think of the press conference with Peña Nieto in Mexico. He walked in and was pitch-perfect.

The White House staff must focus its message and drive it through as many outlets as they can find, including Pres. Trump’s own Twitter feed, as the news cycle will be dominated by all sorts of Special Counsel scuttlebutt.

The Republican legislators must, at this point, legislate all the Republican agenda items that got them elected, especially tax reform. Our country needs growth now.

Form the Testudo, guys. Get your act together.

The battle’s on.

 Rob Miller:   Mr. President, It's an honor to meet you and to speak with you. Since we seem to have a few minutes, I hope you won't mind if I share a few things with you.

First off, I want to say how proud I am of you and all you've accomplished so far.  You have Mar-a-Lago, Melania, your children and grandchildren, and you could have chosen to sit back  to enjoy them and a pleasant life. Instead, like the patriot you are, you saw the country in grave danger and chose to answer that call.  George Washington made a similar decision, but at a younger age and a bit more risk of his own neck. But you showed up, and no one can take that away from you.  The hatred you and your family have reaped as a result should be a badge of honor considering where it comes from, and some day more Americans will realize that, just as they did with Ronald Reagan. Don't let the naysayers on your own side distract you from achieving what you set out to do. Thomas Paine in Common Sense had a few words to say about people like that. This is usually what happens in any revolution when things look dark. Some people expect quick results and forget you are dealing with  undoing a quarter century of American decline, not to mention a whole infrastructure of people who want to continue it for their own selfish reasons.

Remember that you are the president and were elected against all odds because G-d, who rules over nations willed it so. You are part of His divine plan. Take strength from that realization.

Practical stuff?  OK. Remember how successful you were with the media when you held them in open contempt? Go back to what worked. There's no need for so many press conferences or even so much access. Most of the American people realize what liars they are. Court your allies in the press and the media. Make sure you drive the news cycle rather than them.  If you are going to have a press secretary, you need to find something else for Sean Spicer to do. He lacks the moxie and self-confidence to deal with these swine. Remember what Ben Rhodes,  Obama's spinmeister said about the average reporter, that  they're 27 and know nothing? You need someone who can show them exactly how little they know when necessary.

The leaks? Well, first off we both know a lot of this stuff is made up. 'Sources say' is the giveaway. But you can use that to your advantage. Anyone who reveals classified information or conversations between you, your staff  or world leaders is breaking the law. Don't be afraid to throw a few reporters in jail as accessories for awhile until they reveal where they got their information. Remember Judith Miller? At the least, it will reveal a lot of Fake news when the reporters confess they have no source, while at best it will show these people you mean business, and make them think twice before doing it again. At the optimum, it will allow you to put some leakers in jail.

Cleaning house is a necessity. Don't make the same mistake you did with Comey. Fire the Obama appointees or move them to positions where they can't do any damage until you can dump them. And you might think about a new Chief of Staff. Reince Pribus is a good political strategist and a hard worker but he lacks the fear factor. You need someone who can communicate top the troops that he's someone who can literally ruin their career in DC. And an FBI director who will apply the law and work with you to achieve your agenda. Oh, and one thing...find someone who knows a great deal about civil service and the laws governing it. Aside from the vast amount of money to be saved there, a trusty, knowledgeable advisor can show you how to reform the arcane laws to make it easier to get rid of people or at least move them somewhere they can't do any harm.

Please don't forget why people elected you. It was to stop our economic decline, get rid of ObamaCare and other facets of Obama's failed policies and get rid of a substantial number of illegal migrants. You've made a good start on the first, and a decent beginning on the second and on the third.  Eventually people will see that, but unfortunately the media isn't reporting it.  So you need to cultivate acolytes and advocates to help spread the news of what's actually going on. Your website is a fine idea. Publicize it. And think about the allies you have in the blogosphere. Utilize them and finance them. Learn from George Soros.

Foreign Policy? A few quick ideas, if you don't mind. Your speech today was magnificent. At first I thought you were simply appeasing the Arabs again, but you built the thing and  in the middle, you made it quite clear that it is their responsibility  to combat terrorism based on Islam in their own countries, to deny them financing, support and havens. And it appears that the Saudis are on board. They lack the old oil weapon these days, and they need us far more then we need them. But you were gracious in welcoming them  and their cooperation,  you saved their face, and you put out a vision of what could be.

All the economic deals that got made and the jobs they will create wasn't too bad either.

The focus on Islamist terrorism and on Iran  is welcome. We'll see how much the Sunni Arabs really cooperate.

Keep in mind that the Sunnis are being cooperative only because they are petrified of the Iranians, and need U.S. support badly.  That's no guarantee of future behavior or of actual military support, except maybe by Egypt.  You'll recall that George H.W. Bush found that out in the first Gulf War with his 'coalition.'. The Arabs like the infidels to do their fighting for them. The only real allies we have in the region are Israel and al-Sissi in Egypt, which is one more than we had when you took over.

Also, realize  that Mahmoud Abbas has neither the desire or ability to  deliver peace. He's a corrupt, 82-year-old Soviet-trained dictator and anything he agrees to will not be accepted by Hamas, PFLP, Palestinian Islamic Jihad or most of the Arab inhabitants of Judea and Samaria. And that he's been imbuing his people with hatred and making terrorism profitable for three generations. You understand deal making. While the Israelis have a lot Abbas wants, he has nothing to give them that they don't have  already or don't need.

We have allies in Europe, and it makes sense to concentrate of them. But we also have enemies. Be aware that the Germans are livid about anyone attacking the EU, the scam by which they have been able to dominate Europe in a way Hitler never did. The German press is about as fair and balanced where you are concerned as MSNBC. On the other hand, I see real promise  in our relationship with the UK.

Your balancing act with Russia and China is exactly what you should be doing. Take Dr. Kissinger's advice on that.

Please make sure that you take care of your health. And remember that you could be Jesus incarnate and the same people would still hate you,spread lies and slander and try to obstruct you at every turn. There's no sense getting angry or upset about how these creatures behave or complaining about it. Concentrate on fighting them and destroying them. As I'm sure you know, victory is the best revenge.

May the Almighty watch over and protect you and our beloved Republic in accordance with His Divine will.

 Don Surber: My advice to The Donald is simply this:

Keep on truckin', baby. Draining a swamp is hard, messy work. The stench would knock out the best of men, and you smell it every day when they deliver the Washington Post. The mud is deep and quite a bit of the mud isn't mud at all. But nothing worthwhile happens without a lot of sweat, blood, toil, and tears. They lie all the time. You divulged no secrets to the Russians. Comey wrote no memo. And the bust of Martin Luther King Jr. is still in the Oval Office.

Keep talking -- directly to your people. They are called Americans. They see through the lies. Keep talking to them. Make the media pay for its lies.

 Mike McDaniel: Mr. President, keep draining the swamp, never relent. But as you do, keep these things in mind:

You are fighting the last political battle for America. If you lose, there will be no future peaceful transfers of power, and America is lost.

You are hearing a great many “conservative” commentators complaining about what you say--actually about what the New York Times, Washington Post, CNN, etc. claim you might have said. They think you’re destroying your presidency. They’re wrong.

Even so, you would be wise to remove “I” from your vocabulary. That’s what Barack Obama’s presidency was all about. Speak instead about the principles that put you in office. You’re the symbol, but it’s those principles--lower taxes, limited government power, the rule of law, the Constitution, all men are equal and all lives matter, our military is our salvation and not a vessel for social experimentation--you know the rest--that have Democrats, the media and many republican plotting a coup against you. Relentlessly identify and call out those that are the very lifeblood of the swamp.

Be very careful what you say, even in private, and to whom you say it. Record everything. Set traps to expose leakers. As Shakespeare--through Octavius--said in Julius Caesar:

“For we are at the stake, and bayed about with many enemies. And some that smile have, in their hearts, I fear, millions of mischiefs.”

Of course the Media will merely make things up, but there’s nothing to be gained in helping them.

Immediately fire every federal bureaucrat--starting with the head of the IRS--that is disloyal to the Constitution. They will also, by their very nature, be disloyal to you--they would be disloyal to any Republican. If they’re a member of The Resistance, if they have resistance sympathies, fire them. They are working against America and Americans. They are working against the peaceful transfer of power and republican ideals that make America possible. If you lose, if you’re run out of office, they win, and there will never again be a Republican president, at least not in principles. America will be a one-party dictatorship with Venezuela’s future.

Congressional Democrats are not only your enemy, but America’s enemies. Know them for what they are and act accordingly.

If you thought by handing Hillary Clinton the olive branch of no prosecution, she would be grateful and leave America alone--well, you see how that worked out, don’t you? Bill Clinton and she are not good people. She is helping the coup. She is working against America. Unleash the Justice Department. If she and her toadies broke the law, prosecute them. If not, you’ve done your duty.

Mr. President, abandon any hope of brokering a Middle East Peace between the Palestinians and Israelis. The Israelis are God’s chosen people. Only a fool stands against God. They are our allies. You’ve already done great work in treating them as such, but do not waver. The Palestinians have poisoned their people, and their children. It will take three generations, if they begin with perfect intentions right now, to purge the hate they’ve bred into their bones, their very DNA. They have no intention of doing anything but murdering every Jew. They have played us for suckers and spent billions of our dollars on terrorism for decades. Remember this above all: If the Palestinians lay down their arms: peace. If the Israelis lay down their arms: genocide.

One final thought: Barack Obama is a traitor. Even now, he is plotting against America--against you. You will have to use overwhelming military force against Iran. Be smart enough to do it on our timetable, rather than at the last minute to try to stave off the genocide of the Jews, and nuclear attacks on our people. The Iran deal does nothing to prevent Iran from terrorism and developing nuclear weapons they will use against our allies and America. There is no deterrence. Anyone telling you differently is not advocating for America.

America is behind you Mr. President, and we know many Republicans and The Resistance aren’t. We don’t believe anything the Media says. Help us make supporting you, and frightening the hell out of them, easy. We’d rather do it peacefully and politically, but we’re ready if that fails. God bless the United States of America.

Oh yes: when Jerry Brown declares California a sanctuary state, when he spits in the face of America, in your face, and then demands billions of taxpayer dollars for high speed rail to nowhere…do I really have to tell you what to say to him? Give the Secret Service practice and let them launch him out the front door.

 Dave Schuler: I'd give him two short, simple pieces of advice:

1. Fire the Obama appointees. All of them. Now. Until you do they will be a continuing source of leaks and fighting a within-the-administration insurgency against you. Have your subordinates put together a plan for replacing them within 30 days.
2. You were hired to reduce the number of illegal immigrants. If you don't you'll be fired. That simple.

Laura Rambeau Lee : If I had his ear for a few minutes I would say: President Trump, find the leakers within your administration and prosecute them for their crimes. This must not be tolerated. And please make sure everyone is on the same page with the messaging coming out of the White House.

Bookworm Room : That's a good question. In no particular order, I would say the following:

1. Get rid of Obama-era holdovers in your administration. Better to be understaffed than to be staffed with a Fifth Column determined to undermine your presidency by undemocratic means.

2. Speak more to the American people and less to the media.

3. Give yourself a ten minute cooling period after writing a tweet before you publish the tweet.

4. If you can manage the balancing act, assume everything you do is being watched by political enemies . . . but do so without becoming paranoid. This is a variation, perhaps, on Reagan's "trust but verify" expression. D.C. is filled with sharks and, if it will keep them safe, even your closest friends and advisers will turn on you. Comporting yourself with dignity will provide some protection. And perhaps you might want to pull a Comey and memorialize or record everything.

5. Focus hard on the economy. People who are seeing a light at the end of an economic tunnel are inclined to view favorably the president in office at the time. That will give you breathing room.

6. Be careful about the appearance of impropriety when it comes to Ivanka and Jared Kushner. Leftists are convinced they're using their access to you to enrich themselves. Conservatives are concerned that these young people hew Left and will drag you away from your core principles.

7. Don't forget that the American people, not the media or the elite, elected you. If you stay true to the People, the People will stay true to you.


 Well, there it is!

Make sure to drop by every Monday for the WoW! Magazine Forum. And enjoy WoW! Magazine 24-7 with some of the best stuff written in the blogosphere. Take from me, you won't want to miss it.

Why Appointing A Special Counsel Will Backfire On The Left; The Real Story

 

Today’s big story is that Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein installed George W. Bush-appointed ex-FBI Director Robert Mueller as a special counsel Wednesday to oversee the FBI’s investigation into Russian interference in the 2016 presidential election.

Rosenstein got to name the special counsel because Attorney General Jeff Sessions recused himself from the investigation earlier based on incredibly flimsy grounds. Rosenstein’s decision came after the Washington Post and the New York Times came out with breathless stories that a “Comey Memo” showed that President Trump had suggested in a private conversation that now-ex-FBI Director James Comey “go easy on Micheal Flynn” after Flynn was fired back in February. The media is using what amounts to hearsay evidence to try to make the case that Trump was guilty of obstruction of justice.

According to Rosenstein’s press release,“unique circumstances” led to his appointment of a special counsel was required:

My decision is not a finding that crimes have been committed or that any prosecution is warranted. I have made no such determination. What I have determined is that based upon the unique circumstances, the public interest requires me to place this investigation under the authority of a person who exercises a degree of independence from the normal chain of command.

Needless to say the Democrats, their media and some renegade Republicans are celebrating this big time. Their joy is likely turn to anguish, their worst nightmare and just in time for Nov. 2018 elections. Keeping this ‘scandal alive is one thing, but an actual special counsel? The ‘resistance’ may very well have overstepped itself, a euphemism for a quaint Brooklynism my father (Z”l) used to use.

Rosenstein may even have been told by Trump to appoint a special counsel. It puts this garbage on the back burner somewhat, and will hopefully shut it down. That’s because there’s nothing for Mueller to find on the president and no crime. But just look at Mueller’s actual brief! To supervise the investigation of:

“(i) any links and/or coordination between the Russian government and individuals associated with the campaign of President Donald Trump; and (ii) any matters that arose or may arise directly from the investigation; and (iii) any other matters within the scope of 28 C.F.R. §600.4(a).”
Regulation 28 C.F.R. §600.4(a) is part of the federal regulations that authorize appointing a special counsel. It expands a special counsel’s jurisdiction to all crimes, such as perjury or obstruction of justice, that interfere with his original responsibility.To wit, (ii) any matters that arose or may arise directly from the investigation; and (iii) any other matters within the scope of 28 C.F.R. §600.4(a).”

Think of the ground that could cover! It could definitely include investigating Seth Rich’s murder* and reopening the investigation of the Clinton Foundation that FBI Director Comey closed on Obama AG Loretta Lynch’s orders after she met will Bill Clinton on that plane. It could include compelling testimony from Loretta Lynch herself. It could expand to exploring President Obama’s surveillance of the Trump campaign by President Obama and the clear violations of FISA laws that took place. Imagine some of these juicy scandals coming to light just in time for the midterms…talk about a total reversal of fortune.

In any event, the supposed ‘Comey memo’ if it even exists amounts to hearsay evidence no judge would take seriously. And even if Trump suggested Comey ‘go easy on Flynn’ after he had been fired, that is not obstruction of justice. That crime involves actual overt actions like destroying evidence, perjury, inducing other people to commit perjury, you know, the sort of felonies the Clintons did routinely.

And recall that both ranking member Senators Feinstein (D-CA) and Richard Burr (R-NC),the chairman both said that Trump was not under investigation based on the classified briefing they were given.

Another thing to consider. Comey is a lawyer. As such, he is an officer of the court who is legally obligated to report a crime like obstruction of justice. Yet he did not…until now. That could be grounds for disbarment.

In a way, this entire mess is Trump’s own fault. As I pointed out before, Comey was seriously incompetent and deeply tied to the Clintons. Trump should have known better than to leave someone like that in a sensitive position and canned him on January 20th.

Although one thing that must be said is that the president at least fired Comey in exactly the right way.He knew Comey likely had a real treasure trove of confidential, classified intel, perhaps even personal dirt not just on people in the administration but on both sides of the political spectrum. So the president changed Comey’s passwords and all the locks and fired him when he was out of town. Any attacks on the administration or plans Comey may had had to use this stuff as leverage for his own personal gain are history. Think of Comey as this year’s Joe Wilson of Valerie Plame fame. He’ll get a few brief moments of media adulation and a chance to testify in congress perhaps, but then he’ll be flushed like used toilet paper.

Trump’s real problem is that the Democrats and a certain number of genuinely stupid Republicans like the swamp just fine and don’t want it drained. But I don’t see the GOP going along with impeachment…it would destroy them as a party and alienate their base forever. And I doubt most of them are that stupid, although John McCain…

At the end of the road, there is indeed a crime here. It is an attempted coup d’état that has been underway since November 9th. The 2016 presidential election has been rejected by the left, and every day they demonstrate their contempt for our democracy. They have said so repeatedly, with the Democrat’s demanding for ‘resistance’. They attempted to intimidate the electors immediately after the election – remember those death threats? They have attacked this president and his family mercilessly, and they have knowingly lied and slandered. The Democrats in congress have indulged in juvenile tantrums and obstruction at every turn in an attempt to sabotage the new administration, something unheard of before. They have co-opted for their own use what should be an independent,ethical press, thus destroying an essential part of a free republic.

These are heinous crimes committed against our country, and for the most part the worst punishment that can be meted out to those who have committed then is defeat.

I have confidence in the American people that ultimately, the perpetrators will fail utterly. But the damage that has been done will take a long time to repair.

* Seth Rich was a DNC staffer and a Bernie Sanders supporter. On Sunday, July 10, 2016, Rich was shot about a block from his home in the Bloomingdale neighborhood of Washington, D.C. He reportedly talked to several people about his disgust with the way the DNC had fixed the primaries for Hillary Clinton. 

 According to a new report from Fox News, it was Seth Rich who supplied 44,000 DNC emails to WikiLeaks.

According to Fox News, via an anonymous FBI source, Rich made contact with WikiLeaks through Gavin MacFadyen, an American investigative reporter and director of WikiLeaks who was living in London at the time. According to Fox News sources, federal law enforcement investigators found 44,053 emails and 17,761 attachments sent between DNC leaders from January 2015 to May 2016 that Rich shared with WikiLeaks before he was gunned down on July 10, 2016.

On July 22, just 12 days after Rich was murdered, WikiLeaks published internal DNC emails that showed how top party officials conspired to stop Bernie Sanders from becoming the party’s presidential nominee.

According to Rod Wheeler, a former DC homicide detective hired by Rich’s family to investigate the murder, there’s a number of things quite suspicious about the whole affair:

 “My investigation up to this point shows there was some degree of email exchange between Seth Rich and WikiLeaks,” Wheeler told Fox News. “I do believe that the answers to who murdered Seth Rich sits on his computer on a shelf at the DC police or FBI headquarters.” 
 
“My investigation shows someone within the D.C. government, Democratic National Committee or Clinton team is blocking the murder investigation from going forward,” Wheeler told Fox News. “That is unfortunate. Seth Rich’s murder is unsolved as a result of that.” 


The botched robbery theory, which police have stuck with for nearly a year, isn’t panning out, Wheeler said. Two assailants caught on a grainy video tape from a camera posted outside a grocery mart, shot Rich twice in his back, but did not take his wallet, cell phone, keys, watch or necklace worth about $2,000.

Julian Assange of Wikileaks has offered a $130,000 reward for information of Seth Rich’s killer.

The usual suspects have been doing their best to bury this and debunk this as a conspiracy theory in the rare instances they even mention it. And the DNC went into action, getting one of their spokesmen Democrat crisis PR consultant Brad Bauman from the Pastorus Group to to ‘represent the family’ and help quash this.

Definitely something a special counsel might look into

Who Should Replace James Comey At The FBI?

Every week on Monday, the WoW! writers, community and our invited guests weigh in at the Watcher's Forum, short takes on a major issue of the day, the culture, or daily living. This week's question : Who Should Replace James Comey At The FBI?


Don Surber: My candidate to replace James Comey at the FBI would be someone within the agency who is not Andy McCabe. The Hillary pardon — and that is what the non-indictment was — evidently tore the agency  apart.

Some agents resent giving her a pass. Some agents resent the October Surprise in which Comey, either by choice or stupidity, wrote a letter to Congress that re-opened the case.
Some agents also liked Comey. He was a good boss who made a helluva mistake last July.

Another possibility is someone from his list of 21 Supreme Court nominees. I would be fine with any of them.

Trump knows he needs to heal the FBI. Someone flashy will not do that. FBI agents are lawyers who would respect a judge. Perhaps that ultimately is the answer.

 Mike McDaniel: James Comey’s replacement at the FBI should be a seasoned FBI agent--an actual investigator, not an administrative drone; there are people who are great cops and great leaders as well--and a confirmed conservative.

But the Democrats will scream bloody murder! They’ll demand a Democrat they can be sure will do whatever is necessary to support whatever narrative they cook up.

Let them.

By “conservative,” I mean a man--or woman, whose true allegiance is to the Constitution and to the rule of law. Someone who not only does things right, but who does the right thing. Someone who will see that Hillary Clinton and all of her minions are properly and professionally investigated, and who, at the least sign of undue political influence, will follow the chain of command, and if such influence is not ended, resign. They will also be someone who will investigate the suppose collusion between Mr. Trump and Russia and if there is no there there, end the idiocy.

Such a person must be a straight arrow, and when pursuing criminals, terrorists and spies, absolutely indefatigable and ruthless. And they need to be a conservative--perhaps a Republican.

But won’t that show bad faith? Won’t that be partisan?

No, not if they possess the qualities I’ve described. In that case, their party affiliation won’t matter. But even if they were partisan, which party is “the resistance?” Which party is working assiduously to prevent government from working? Which party is trying to run a lawfully elected president out of office based on nothing? Which party is resisting the Constitution, the rule of law, and half, perhaps more, of the American people? Which party is building toward a paroxysm of rage, violence and hatred? Which party is working to destroy free speech?

Which party isn’t doing all those things?

Oh yes, we surely need a confirmed Democrat in charge of the FBI about now, don’t we?

It would take the Stupid Party to think they should give in to the Democrats in this or anything, because if they do, the Democrats will appreciate it and be nice to them. How many times do the Democrats have to pull away the football at the last moment before the Stupid Party learns? If Democrats were in power, Eric Holder, Janet Reno, Loretta Lynch, Van Jones, Valerie Jarrett, Perhaps Joe Biden would be put in charge of the FBI, and they would not hesitate to do their duty to their maximum leader and party, the Constitution and the rule of law be damned. Gratitude is not in them.

Appoint someone that will be loyal to the Constitution, first, last and always. Ignore the Democrat’s and the media’s wailing, gnashing of teeth, rending of garments, and screaming, spittle-flinging temper tantrums, and the rest will take care of itself.


 Rob Miller: We don't need a judge or a lawyer per se. We need a top cop and investigator who's smart,fearless, honest and isn't connected to the Clintons or Obama in any way, which leaves Andrew McCabe out. In short, we need someone along the lines of J Edgar Hoover. Regardless of some of his personal proclivities, he made the Bureau an effective force against crime as well as against foreign espionage and national security in a world war and a cold war.

Another thing to consider is that it's not just a matter of replacing a Director, important as that is. The whole Bureau needs to be revamped. Among other things, during the Bush and especially during the Obama years, people who focused too carefully on domestic Islamist terrorism and sedition were reprimanded, eased out of promotion tracks or out of the Bureau itself. Training and manuals were changed to minimize the Bureau's concentration on this area, often with the assistance of Muslim Brotherhood front groups like CAIR. And some agents were hired strictly for reasons of diversity. The entire culture and makeup of the FBI needs remaking. Anyone Trump chooses to lead the Bureau can expect some problems and even active resistance from some of the rank and file.  Some of it may be politically motivated while some of it maybe normal human dislike of change.  The new Director will have to be a real leader who inspires both respect and discipline.

Yucky Chucky Schumer is ranting about how the Dems won't vote for anyone Trump proposes for the position unless they get a special prosecutor.  If I were the president, I'd giggle and take that as carte blanche to appoint  whomever I wanted. And there's no way they can block Trump's choice anyway, despite the juvenile threats...thank you Harry Reid, for showing us the way!

And here's a fun fact. During his lame duck period, it was none other than Bill Clinton who changed the Special Prosecutor's office from being an independent entity to being part of the Department of Justice under the Attorney General. So the president can have another chuckle at Schumer and his playmates being stymied by the corrupt antics of one of their fellow Democrats.

Who to pick? Mike Rogers  seems like he might be a good pick.  He was a veteran FBI agent who  specialized in organized crime and public corruption. And a former Republican House Intelligence Committee Chairman, who introduced the Cyber Intelligence Sharing and Protection Act designed to facilitate cybersecurity, combat hacking and increase cooperation between government agencies and private companies towards that goal. He also has a fair amount of media savvy.

Whether his leadership abilities and personality are fitted to the job I can't say, but he certainly seems qualified in other respects.

 Bookworm Room : Sheriffs Joe Arpaio or David Clarke, both of whom are law enforcement agents with good values.

Laura Rambeau Lee : Ever since Edward Snowden revealed in 2013 the NSA was collecting massive quantities of metadata on unsuspecting citizens through their smart phones and computers, Americans have grown increasingly suspicious of our intelligence community. We had perhaps naively believed our government limited its intelligence collection to those suspected terrorists and bad actors who mean us harm. We knew about the secret FISA Court, but we believed the Fourth Amendment to the Constitution protected us from unreasonable search and seizure. The random gathering of our personal information came as quite a shock. Many of us have become increasingly concerned with what these agencies are doing with all of this data collected.

There is no doubt James Comey had to go. He created uncertainty in the rule of law when he made his comments about Hillary Clinton, holding a press conference listing all of her illegal activities and then declaring he would not recommend she be prosecuted. He overstepped his duties and responsibility. It’s been almost comical hearing the Democrats express outrage over Comey’s firing when a few months ago they said they lost all confidence in his role as FBI director. Of course they would have relished a president Hillary Clinton fire James Comey. It’s been over six months and they still cannot believe or accept she lost. They blame Comey as a major reason for her loss. Their hypocrisy is laughable.

We cannot afford to lose any of our representatives in the House or Senate nor would they be able to be confirmed easily with such a polarized Senate. President Trump should choose someone removed from the political scene to become FBI director. We need a person with agency or law enforcement experience who has shown a commitment to and respect for the rule of law.

I would like to see someone like former New York City Police Commissioner Raymond Kelly become director of the FBI, although he is seventy-five years old. Another name mentioned outside of the beltway is Milwaukee Sheriff David Clarke.

If President Trump looks within the agency to replace the director, those who could step into the role are Paul Abbate, currently serving as assistant director in charge of the FBI Washington Field Office; or Adam Lee, special agent in charge of the Richmond office of the FBI.

We entrust our intelligence agencies with the power and resources necessary to protect us. We understand they work in secrecy. Whomever President Trump chooses, the FBI director must be able to restore the confidence of the American people with the agency. They must restore the morale within the agency as well.



Well, there it is!

Make sure to drop by every Monday for the WoW! Magazine Forum. And enjoy WoW! Magazine 24-7 with some of the best stuff written in the blogosphere. Take from me, you won't want to miss it.

IDF Paratroopers Who Liberated Kotel In Jerusalem Return 50 Years Later

According to Israel's Hebrew calendar, today marks the Jubilee celebration of Israel's Six Day War and the liberation of Jerusalem. Take a good look at the three men standing there, along with Israel's Deputy Foreign Minister Tzipi Hotovely, Dr. Yitzhak Yifat, Tzion Karasenti and Chaim Oshri.

they took a tour of the Old City as part of the festivities, retracing the exact steps these three men, then young paratroopers in the Tzahal took on that day, from the Lion's Gate until they reached the 2,000 year old stones of the Western Wall. They were the first Jews to stand before the Kotel in 19 years after Jordan seized it and ethnically cleansed every Jew from the Old City in 1948.

The picture they're holding is an iconic photo of these three men, taken originally by David Rubinger. They all signed it and gave the copy of it to Minister Hotovely. Here's a larger version of it:

 

When these men first saw the Kotel, it was not what is today. The Jordanians used it as a trash dump, and scribbled obscene graffiti on it. But the awe these three young soldiers had upon reaching it shows on their faces. Besmirched and vandalized, it was still the Kotel, the Western Wall. Afterwards, (and as some tell it, when there were still a few Jordanian snipers not yet dealt with) Chief IDF Chaplain Rabbi Shlomo Goren came to the Western Wall with Torah scrolls to thank G-d and blow the Shofar, celebrating the end of Israel's long exile from its holiest site.

 

One of them, Tzion Karasenti expressed exactly what that meant to a crowd of foreign students from around the world studying in Israel at the Interdisciplinary Center in Herziliya and at Hebrew University, who were invited to come along and participate in the tour. He told the students that that the moment they reached the Western Wall in 1967 was the moment when the beating heart of the State of Israel was restored.

Deputy Foreign Minister Hotovely also had some remarks to make. She said that "the longing to reach the Western Wall, and the tears of the paratroopers who returned to the Western Wall after 2,000 years of prayer, are the best answer to those who are trying to sever the deep connection between the Jewish people and their capital."

"We are celebrating a great period," she added. "The unification of the city under Israeli sovereignty was the moment when every person of every religion could walk in Jerusalem. Our duty to liberate the city is to preserve a united Jerusalem and to strengthen its status so that the world recognizes Jerusalem as the capital of Israel."

This celebration comes  just days after UNESCO passed yet another anti-Semitic UN  Resolution trying to deny the Jew's claim to Jerusalem.

They simply don't get it. Jerusalem, especially the Old City is united with the Jewish people again. All the UN resolutions, hatred and sophistry Israel's haters can muster isn't going to change that. No threats are going todo that. No bogus offers of 'peace' and 'full relations' are going to change that, because the Israelis have already seen what that means. Fifty years is not such a long time in the almost 6,000 years of Jewish history. It is barely yesterday.

Jerusalem is now what it once was, the beating heart of Israel and the Jewish people, just as Tzion Karasenti said. With G-d's help and Israel's strong right arm, it will remain so.

James Comey: The Real Story Behind His Firing

 

Well, FBI Director James Comey has finally been fired. I can't imagine why it took so long. Both Attorney General Jeff Sessions and Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein recommended that President Trump can him after he 'misstated' in front of the senate last week about Clinton's email practices that in their words, 'raised new questions about the director's competence and judgment.'

As we'll see, James Comey was not just incompetent. He was corrupt, owned, and what amounted to an enemy of the Trump administration. I'm surprised the president didn't fire him months ago.

Last March, when James Comey was pushing the Trump/Russia fable hard, he was hailed as “the most powerful person in Washington.” by the Lefty media's trained seals, the same folks that were referring to him as Satan in a power suit back in July when he put on his little show detailing exactly how Hillary Clinton committed multiple felonies with her antics concerning classified information on an unprotected bootleg server. Not to mention probable obstruction of justice by illegally wiping material after it had been subpoenaed by congress. And of course, that while he had reopened his investigation, she shouldn't be prosecuted for anything. Of course.

And then of course, he suddenly changed his mind two days before Election Day, after the FBI had supposedly reviewed the 49,000 potentially relevant emails the FBI had found on Anthony Weiner's laptop. 'Nothing to see here, move along.'

After which of course, James Comey was a Democrat hero again. And remained one, because he continued to drop coy little hints about the Democrat's favorite bedtime story, how Trump was Putin's puppet and Russia hacked the election. That gave the fairy tale some weight, so it could be repeated by the media over and over. More on that in a bit.

The real story's simple.First of all, James Comey let the attention go to his head and got a mistaken impression of his importance in the grand scheme of things. And second, more importantly, he forgot that he was simply another DC chiseler owned by the Clintons, and tried to cover his behind to give the public impression he was someone of integrity.

That was really the reason for his little show back in July. Most FBI agents are fairly straitlaced, patriotic fellas who really care about law and order, and they knew Mrs. Clinton had committed multiple felonies. On the other hand there was Obama's crooked Attorney General, just a few days after she met with Bill Clinton in a hot Phoenix airplane hanger telling Comey that there was no way her Department of Justice was going to prosecute Hillary Clinton and telling him it was his job to talk to the media and let them know that. Oh and by the way, I'm sure she mentioned that also applied to the ongoing investigation of the Clinton Foundation too, something I'm sure Comey understood because of his own ties to the Clinton Foundation.

So he came up with a cockamamie idea; detail the felonies, sort of, to show the agents and the public he was really on the job, and then recommend no prosecution to protect the Clintons as well as himself.That was odd in itself, since the FBI doesn't usually make those recommendations, at least not publicly. But after AG Lynch got caught at her secret meeting with Mr. Bill, she likely told Comey that it was his mess to clean up.

He used that lawyer's favorite trick , supposed lack of intent as a reason not to charge Mrs. Clinton in an attempt to divert us from the actual issue, which was criminal negligence. Intent isn't a factor in the laws she broke, and a good prosecutor could definitely make the case that simply having those illegal private servers showed intent. So did wiping all those e-mails, another felony according to the Federal Records Act.

The problem for James Comey was that no one bought his shtick. The agents were outraged, because they felt it reflected on the Bureau's credibility. Ever since, there's been a major morale problem at the Bureau according to various sources. It was at the point where, reportedly, a number of people won't even return his greetings and limit their interaction with him as much as possible.

As far as the public went, the True Believers and the media were fine with it, while the rest of us realized that the fix was in and that was that. And needless to say, the Clintons were certainly fine with the outcome.

So Comey's main job after that was to keep in good with his benefactors by pounding the Russia drum loud and often,Trump, Trump , Trump. There's no evidence Russia had anything to do with hacking the election, but the same old tune keeps playing and will continue to play, though perhaps without Comey's help in the future.

I particularly liked Dem Rep Adam Schiff's take on this... 'Well, it's been a long time, we haven't found a unicorn yet and there's no evidence they exist. But of course they might, so it's vital that we keep investigating.' And of course, keep pounding that narrative into people's heads. Herr Goebbels wound be so proud.

Just for giggles, ask yourself this,just three little words..where's the crime? Let's imagine someone from Putin's government met with someone from Trump's campaign or even the Donald himself and told him 'President Putin really hates Hillary and wants you to win, so we're going to do everything we can to help,da?' And Trump or a member of his team said 'Oh, OK.'

Is that a crime? Absolutely not, unless you can prove actual collusion that affected the election. And that's not going to remotely happen because there's no evidence whatsoever, nothing even remotely connecting any of Trump's team or the president with meetings with Russians. And that's even with clear violations of FISA laws and the Fourth Amendment being used to try and find something. Comey's FBI even goofed when they said Trump's attorney met with the Russians in Prague and it turned out to be the wrong person entirely! And this is going on while leaks of the president's private conversations with world leaders weren't being investigated at all. That was something else that didn't sit well.

The idea that this is some kind of 'constitutional crisis' is ridiculous, although the usual suspects will of course go absolutely Batsh*t Crazy totryand convince the gullible that it is. That's to be expected. What happens if Trump appoints a real go getter who decides to investigate real criminal acts? What if he or she reopens the Clinton Foundation investigation, or actually gives Jeff Sessions what he needs to prosecute Hillary? What if they lean on Loretta Lynch or Huma Abedin and get her to spill the beans in exchange for immunity? Hence the manufactured hysteria.

So James Comey is gone. But don't cry too much for him. There will undoubtedly be a corporate sinecure for him somewhere, just like there was before as a reward for services rendered.

Good riddance.

L.A. City Council Votes To Back Trump Impeachment Investigation

 

CBS has reported that the L.A.  City Council voted 10-0 last Friday,May 5th to back an investigation of President Donald Trump in order to to find grounds to impeach him.

The city’s 2017-18 federal legislative program will be required to include support, financial or otherwise for any legislative action to investigate whether Trump is guilty of high crime or misdemeanors.

 

The L.A. City  Council is completely composed of Democrats except for one member, Councilman Mitchell Englander. He reportedly stepped out during the vote, but was present both before and after.

The resolution was presented by the West Valley Resistance to Council member Bob Blumenfield.

The focus is on an alleged violation of the the Foreign Emoluments Clause, because of the president's
real estate holdings in the form of hotels in foreign countries. That clause bars government officials from accepting gifts or benefits from foreign leaders or foreign states, something a little difficult to extend to things like renting hotel rooms, drinks at the bar or greens fees on a hotel golf course. That's especially true since President Trump is now no longer running his companies, in common with most presidents with outside investments, and has pledged to donate any foreign profits to to the U.S. Treasury on an annual basis to reduce the deficit. But if that doesn't pan out, the L.A. City Council is mandated to continue to back investigations into, well, anything as long as it might remotely involve impeaching President Trump.

The whole idea of invoking the  rather hypocritical in view of what Hillary Clinton was allowed to get away with while she was secretary of state. Talk about accepting money from Foreign governments! But I digress.

What the L.A. City Council has now endorsed is the use of taxpayer funded resources and funds to support the impeachment proceedings against a sitting president on partisan grounds, and that is a fascinating precedent.

Isn't the L.A. City Council and their respect for democracy touching?

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France’s Election – A Vote For the Failed Status Quo 

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France's Election - A Vote For the Failed Status Quo

The choice has been made, France's election is over and the French have chosen the status quo. Emmanuelle Macron won in a landslide over Marine Le Pen by better than two to one.

Marine Le Pen's astute and piercing observation, that France was going to be ruled by a woman regardless now has an answer. Rather than Marine Le Pen, France's new ruler will be Germany's Angela Merkel.

 

The joke is that while Merkel has a fairly subservient French president again, Macron's ascendancy to the Elysee Palace may actually do more than a little to help dissolve the EU. He's already seriously angered Poland by accusing them of being in cahoots with Putin to hack the French Election, something anyone even vaguely aware of Poland's history with Russia knows is an absolutely ludicrous idea. And his support for Merkel's threats of sanctions for any EU member that refuses to take in massive amounts of Muslim 'refugees' has angered Visograd EU members like Poland and Hungary as well as countries like Denmark.

France's election was noted for a record low turnout. Over a third of the voters simply sat home or turned in blank ballots as a protest vote. Abstention like this is unheard of in French elections.

France's socialist government did its bit with a certain amount of dirty tricks not seen before in French presidential elections, but in the end, they weren't really necessary. Macron not only had the government on his side but the media, which consistently described the long time socialist as a 'centrist' while always referring to Marine Le Pen as 'far-right.' For Marine Le Pen to win France's election, she would have had to attract a large chunk of Mélenchon's anti-EU far left followers, 19.5% of the voters in the first round. Instead, most of them decided sit home. So they will be stuck instead with an Eu-friendly banker in Macron.

What France's election was really about was a choice between a new, independent path and the Socialist status quo. In the end, they chose the status quo, which means increased outsourcing, increased globalization and open doors for a lot more Muslim 'refugees.' Macron actually said that the terrorist attacks in France were simply 'the price we must pay for a truly multicultural society.'

After numerous attacks and terrorist incidents, Macron still got almost 90 percent of the vote in Paris...encroyable!

One of the oddest things about this particular  election is that the winning candidate essentially has no political party! France's parliamentary elections come in about a month, and Macron's En Marche (Onwards) party has no list of candidates competing for seats. This again is something unheard of in any of France's elections.Most of the other parties except for the National Front and Mélenchon's followers endorsed Macron, but that was essentially a tactic to defeat Marine Le Pen at any cost. Now that's done, Macron will need to put together a coalition to govern effectively, and it remains to be seen whether he can do it, because the price is going to be high, mais oui. This is a recipe for sheer chaos.

And Marine Le Pen? She can console herself that she did better than any other National Front candidate by taking almost 34% of the vote. And she's already looking to the future.

Macron is essentially the failed Hollande government's second term. He will not improve France's security. In fact, he will worsen it considerably, since like Hollande he will likely be unwilling to risk alienating a key voting block that supported him in this election by taking real steps to do so. Outsourcing and globalization will continue, along with high taxation...Macron may be described by the media as a 'centrist' but he was a member of the Socialist Party until he decided to run for president and realized that running as the candidate of France's incumbent and now deeply unpopular Socialist Party was a quick road to failure.

 
Source: Twitter                    Hat tip: Gates of Vienna


If, as I expect, Macron is essentially Hollande II and events unfold as a consequence of that, France's Right is going to stand to gain quite a bit of political power. And Marine Le Pen's reaction to France's Election? That this was the start of new movement, one which would not be called the National Front. We haven't seen the last act of this play quite yet.

 




Rob Miller writes for Joshuapundit. His articles have appeared in The Jerusalem Post, The Washington Examiner, American Thinker, The Los Angeles Times, The Atlanta Journal-Constitution, The San Francisco Chronicle, Real Clear Politics, The Times Of Israel, Breitbart.Com and other publications.


Follow him on Twitter here

Forum: Are There Limits On Free Speech? Should There be?

Every week on Monday, the WoW! community and our invited guests weigh in at the Watcher's Forum, short takes on a major issue of the day, the culture, or daily living. This week's question : Are There Limits On Free Speech? Should There be?

Michael McDaniel: There are, of course, limits on free speech, the classic “shouting ‘fire’ in a crowded theater,” being the most obvious example. Theoretically, obscenity may be criminalized, though in practice, it seldom is. After all, Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart famously noted in an obscenity case (Jacobellis v. Ohio, 1964) he couldn’t describe it, but he knew it when he saw it. The Supreme Court has also decided exotic dancing, because it is a form of artistic expression, deserves the protection of the First Amendment. Apparently they’ve seen it, and that wasn’t it.

Therein lies much of the difficulty in proscribing speech. For any law to be constitutional, the reasonable man must be able to read it, and understand what is and is not unlawful. If one cannot gaze upon a given nude body, or a given sexual act without confusion about whether it is obscene, and therefore unlawful, or merely an expression of free speech, life becomes even more confusing than ever.

Clearly child pornography is beyond the pale, yet before the advent of digital photography, parents sending negatives of their children playing in a bathtub to the developer sometimes found themselves accused of child porn. Now, one must worry about the intrusion of cyber cops into their electronic devices. Will they think similar digital photos evidence of child porn? Will they seize my computers, throw me in prison, force me to deplete my bank accounts and retirement to defend myself against unwarranted and false charges?

I do not defend, for a moment, what is clearly the sexual exploitation of children. I merely point out the difficulty in applying a single, often politicized, standard to that which is hardly black and white.

Political speech deserves the greatest protection under the Constitution, yet it is precisely that which Democrats--and some Republicans--wish to restrict. They wanted to make criticizing Hillary Clinton unlawful. They wished to make criticizing any politician during election season a crime. Many still wish it.

And one cannot forget Academia, where the idea that unpopular speakers may not only be preemptively shut up, if they dare try to exercise their First Amendment rights, they may be--must be--physically attacked. This is not only the stance of lunatic special snowflakes, but the spineless administrators, and state politicians that aid and abet such insanity. “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words can never harm me,” is an axiom lost on such people, who believe the mere existence of words with which they disagree harmful, and they’ll be delighted to use the sticks and stones on anyone they don’t like.

The First Amendment like the Second, is the backbone of our society. Both establish and uphold the rule of law, where everyone can reasonably understand the limits of discourse and behavior. But civilization is a matter of informed consent and willing participation. Those seeking to limit the First Amendment, if they move beyond mere words, force us toward the exercise of the Second.

Any limitation on fundamental rights must be narrowly drawn and so simple as to be understood by the proverbial reasonable man. The antidote for “bad” speech, is good speech, and plenty of it. To do otherwise is to abandon civilized persuasion and reason in favor of brute force.

That’s precisely what the many--and growing in number--enemies of liberty, of America and Americans, seek. Many of them are too stupid, too unschooled in history and human nature, to understand the danger of the precipice to which they push us. Their leaders, however, understand precisely what they’re doing. They may well force us to abandon words, and rely instead on the Second Amendment. The pen is mightier than the sword only in a society wherein liberty and civilized discourse--free speech--reign. God help us all when that is no longer true in America.


Fausta Rodriquez Wertz: No limits.



Don Surber: Answer: No.


 Rob Miller: I have to honestly confess myself perplexed on this one. In the America I grew up in, what was considered free speech was pretty well defined and the standard was relatively universal, based on the old Supreme Court 'fire in a crowded theater' definition.Neither is true anymore and in my opinion it is mostly the Left that has deliberately bastardized the concept.

What we have now is a situation where what constitutes free speech basically depends on whose talking and where. If you're on most of America's campuses, speech that is openly racist, disparages males, talks about assassinating the president or in some cases borderline incites violence against 'Republicans' or other select groups is considered free speech, while having someone like Milo Yiannopoulos,  Ann Coulter, Ben Shapiro, Charles Murray et al  speak by invitation on a college campus is not considered free speech at all, but something to be suppressed by any means necessary.

The same thing occurs almost daily in our public media and discourse. Someone like Bill Maher can gleefully accuse the president of the United States of incest with his own daughter, or a Stephen Corbet can lunch an obscene hateful rant from the safety of the CBS studios. Someone like Hasan Minhaj can attack the president viciously far beyond any pretense of a roast and call Steve Bannon a Nazi and it passes for protected speech and 'comedy.' Mention that Minhaj avidly supports Islamist Muslim Brotherhood front groups like CAIR and the Muslim Public Affairs Committee (MPAC) is apparently 'racist' beyond the pale and in need of suppression, at least according to the Left. And in fact, the Left does it's very best to suppress any realistic discussion of the Muslim Brotherhood and Islamist fascism on the channels of communication it controls.

 In 1942, the U.S. Supreme Court established the doctrine by a 9–0 decision in Chaplinsky v. New Hampshire. It held that "insulting or 'fighting words,' those that by their very utterance inflict injury or tend to incite an immediate breach of the peace" are among the "well-defined and narrowly limited classes of speech the prevention and punishment of [which] … have never been thought to raise any constitutional problem."

In that case, the fighting words were 'fascist' and 'racketeer.'  What would happen if Steve Bannon (who is definitely not a Nazi) were to sue Minhaj for libel? Based on our current libel laws, it's an open question. What if Bannon were to confront Minhaj and demand a public apology and when he didn't receive one, knock Mihaj to the pavement?  Again, an open question. And in Bannon's case, the position he holds in the Trump Administration pretty much precludes himfrom taking any action at all, something Minhaj in certainly aware of.


The First Amendment obviously only applies to certain people. And I don't think that's what our Founders intended.

I'm not really sure how we fix this. We could loosen up and redefine the libel laws, but we run the risk of the cure being worse than the disease, as much as I'd like to see certain people get the pants sued off them.  or we could wait for a case to amble its way to the Supreme Court (assuming they even agree to hear it) and hope for new guidelines that enforce the same tolerance on everyone. But given that there are now plenty of people wearing judicial robes out there whom are perfectly happy with the abuse of our First Amendment (including on our Supreme Court) depending on the  politics and  who the plaintiff is, that's essentially a coin toss.


Doug Hagin: Outside of libel? No.


Laura Rambeau Lee :Over the past several decades we have seen our First Amendment right to free speech become more restricted through a progressive campaign of political correctness. The left has deemed certain words and expressing certain beliefs as “offensive” and those who speak the truth are often attacked verbally and called racist, homophobic, Islamophobic, etc. Progressives know very well how destructive these labels can be and use them effectively to silence their opposition.

Today we are seeing the Antifa movement seeking to curtail the free speech of those with whom they disagree. These self-labeled anti-fascists are actually anti-First Amendment groups who are growing more violent and disruptive across the country. Their only purpose is to create chaos and widen the chasm of divisiveness the left has created in our country. Incitement to violence is not free speech, just as rioting and destroying private property or blocking traffic and businesses cannot be considered peaceably assembling or justifiably expressing grievances.

Speech itself should remain unlimited except for the common sense “don’t yell fire in a crowded theater” type of speech. While we may disagree with what someone says or even find it offensive, we must respect a person’s right to say it. But as with so many of our inherent rights we have to accept responsibility for our words and actions. Violent protesters and those who destroy property must be held accountable and punished for these crimes. This cannot be permitted and protected as free speech. The rule of law must be upheld and applied equally to all individuals.

The left must understand what free speech truly is and what it means to speak freely in a free society. We cannot allow them to dictate what viewpoints can or cannot be expressed. Tolerance goes both ways. Individuals in our society must be able to speak freely without fear of personal attack or injury by those who disagree with them. It is up to our elected officials and our law enforcement officers to assure that all of our rights are protected.



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WoW! Forum: :What Grade Does President Trump get For His First 100 days?

Every week on Monday, the WoW! writers, community and our invited guests weigh in at the Wow! Forum, short takes on a major issue of the day, the culture, or daily living. This week's question:What Grade Does President Trump get For His First 100 days?

Scott Kirwin:I give the President an “A” for one reason: Supreme Court Justice Neil Gorsuch.

If he fails to deliver on any of his promises he would still merit an “A” as long as he keeps the Supreme Court conservative during his term.

Conservatives should appreciate that.

Don Surber: A-plus

1. Neil Gorsuch

2. Cabinet of Competents. The stars are Mattis, Tillerson and Mnuchin. 

3. Executive orders rescinding some of the damage from Obama.

4. Getting Republicans to pass CRAs galore.

5. Taking out a Syrian base. MOABs. Message to the world DF w/USA

6. No TPP and negotiating trade

7. Hillary is not my president

Rob Miller: Hey it's the end first inning so let's analyze who won the game, shall we? And why not, when everyone else is?

But before we go there, lets keep two things in mind. President Trump (I still love the sound of that) has faced more insane opposition, disrespect and obstruction than any president in living memory. And that includes members of his own party who actually like the status quo, like Rat Ryan. You can't compare The Donald to other presidents who were given at least nominal respect. Even Dubyah never faced this kind of disgusting disrespect for our democracy, at least not nearly so openly. When the Left is deliberately stalling your cabinet appointees for no reason except 'resistance' just finally getting the most important of your appointees in place is a major accomplishment.

And second, that while he has a lot of concrete accomplishments, there are also a number of subtle ones that will bloom over the long haul. We're waging a civil war here. And this is going to be a Grant-style brutal slogging rather than a rapid Sherman-style March to the Sea.

So first, let's look at this president's accomplishments. First of all, he has totally revitalized the office. Rep. Jim Meadows, who heads the Freedom Caucus recently weighed in on that one. Even though he has been critical of The Donald from time to time, he's amazed at his work ethic and recently said so in an op-ed. Meadows wrote that President Trump is the kind of person you could have a conversation with at 2 AM yet at 6:30 he's in his office working. Is it any wonder the Freedom Caucus is starting to come around now that they understand what a revolutionary figure they're dealing with? We're not dealing with someone who saunters in at 10 AM and quits early to go play another round of golf.

And what is he spending his time doing? Destroying th e literally thousands of executive orders and ridiculous regulation handcuffing the country.

 
President Trump is a builder. He understand that in order to build something, the foundation comes first. To build a foundation to really jump start the amazing American economy, you have to release it from the chains it was shackled with over the last eight years. The Donald is doing exactly that. The results are already starting to show. And this is just his first 100 days, while battling headwinds.

Second, he has revitalized America's foreign policy. He is in the process of putting real muscle on NATO by insisting that they fulfill commitments for defense spending. The UK, for the first time in years is actually rebuilding its navy and starting to beef up the British Army. Germany and Mutti Merkel remain holdouts, mainly because they have U.S. bases there, but most of NATO is getting with the program. Even NATO chief Jens Stoltenberg endorsed Trump’s call for other nations to pay their fair share for defending themselves.

Having our Navy destroy a Syrian air base sent a clear message to Russia's Putin and Syria's Assad that there is a new sheriff in town and that they weren't dealing with Barack Hussein Obama anymore. And Trump's MOAB strike in AfPack is one of the first positive moves we've seen there in a long time. Not only did it take out 94 jihadis, but it destroyed a major tunnel network along with lots of supplies and weaponry.

President Trump also has had a pretty good record when it comes to revitalizing relationships with America's allies, especially Egypt, South Korea, Japan, Israel, the UK, and our allies in Eastern Europe.  And  a hugely successful meeting with  Chinese general secretary Xi Jinping that established the chemistry between the two leaders. Before that meeting, China was making threatening noises about the US giving South Korea a THAAD anti-missile system. Afterwards not a peep and it's obvious the twomen agreed that North Korea is getting out of hand. Another aspect is that the president and Xi obviously have come to a similar understanding to the one the U.S. and Japan came to inthe 1980s' ; no more one way trade deficit. Watch and see. China will end up building plants here and employing Americans, just like Japan did.

Legislative accomplishments? Here's a brief list:


The Keystone Pipeline

Reining in the EPA. No more war on coal.

Signing eleven Congressional Review Act bills to dump almost all of Obama’s end of term regulatory orgy. Not to mention requiring two regulations to be dumped for every one adopted.

Obama’s rule that forced states to send federal Title X family-planning funds to Planned Parenthood. President Trump's new executive order allows states who object to abortion on demand and bartering baby parts to opt out of doing so.

The VA scandal is finally being addressed, and while that's going on, thanks to President Trump, vets now have increased access to private sector health care. No more taking a number and waiting to die.

And just wait until tax reform kicks in.

ObamaCare? A temporary setback. The Donald is still transitioning a bit and learning that running a major corporation has its differences from running a government.Among those lessons is that in government, if someone in a key position is screwing up or sabotaging your policy, you can't just fire them. But this president is a quick study who rarely makes the same mistake twice. The ObamaCare failure is one that helped him, as we will see.

And then there's the major reduction in illegal migrants... over 60% from this time last year, when Barack Hussein Obama presided over a handcuffed ICE and the Border Patrol. Give it time. Trump's travel ban and AG Jeff Sessions' threat to defund sanctuary cities who don't follow U.S. immigration laws were stopped by two hyper-partisan judges. One of them is a long time crony of Obama's who knew him in Hawaii and was at the same Harvard Law class with him. The other was an Obama bundler. Both based their opinions on totally spurious legal grounds and both were confirmed because Mitch McConnell refused to use the nuclear option and block them. These judgments will be overturned in time because the law, the federal McCarran-Walter Act of 1952 makes it quite clear that the president has the authority to regulate immigration and selectively ban immigrants from specific areas. And as for the sanctuary city nonsense, because an injunction on something that hasn't even happened yet is a legal absurdity.

What we have in President Trump is a revolutionary figure. After a quarter century of decline, America is actually starting to function again, to awaken from that long slide to socialist despondency. What grade to give him? Hard to say, because of the obstruction he's been subjected to. But I'll say this. While I don't agree with everything he's done, I've never been more proud of a president, not since Ronaldus Magnus rode off into the sunset. And part of that, I'll have to admit, is because he infuriates the right people. You can take that as a solid "A" if you like.


Michael McDaniel: I, like many Americans, have been pleasantly, if guardedly, surprised by the performance of President Trump. I agree with him on much, including the idiocy of worrying about an arbitrary, 100 day-long period. It is ironically fitting he is ignoring the self-congratulatory dinner of the progressive press in favor of spending his time with actual Americans on the final day of his first 100 days. He has been masterfully trolling the press, and this is yet another example of his brilliance in not preventing them from behaving like the fools, liars and intellectual pretenders they are.

Above all, it’s clear Mr. Trump intends to fulfill his campaign promises, which suggests they are more than political fluff. They may actually be--dare I say it?---convictions. They may actually represent his core beliefs. All that stands in his way is the press, a bit less than half the Congress, a bit less than half the country, and congressional Republicans.

Everything about Donald Trump is horrifying to the left, but they’ve been knocked on their expansive asses, their heads spinning, by the reality of a president used to working for a living. And not only working, but working at a furious pace. Mr. Trump is a man whose fortune was made by hard work, attention to detail, and a canny understanding of his fellow man and what is and is not possible. Just as the sight of George W. Bush--an actual fighter pilot--in a flight suit outraged and horrified Democrats and the press, the sight of Mr. Trump sitting behind the Resolute Desk in his battle dress, looking entirely comfortable and presidential, does the same.

As the press and their fellow leftists obsess over individual issues, imagining that like them, no one can possibly do anything other than handle one thing at a time, Trump juggles, effortlessly, as many running chainsaws as he pleases, and surrounds himself with people capable of doing the same.

His executive orders have been uniformly within the law and the boundaries of executive power, his cabinet choices, superb, indicative of a keen intelligence and dedication to the rule of law. His choice of Neil Gorsuch for the Supreme Court appears to be an equally inspired choice, though it is always possible, as often happens with Republican presidents, Gorsuch will go native and adopt progressive principles.

His children and wife quietly go about their business, and Mrs. Trump seems unlikely to impose her will on the nation’s children by starving them to death rather than forcing them to eat unpalatable food for their own good.

His accomplishments, mostly ignored by the media unless they are criticizing what are plainly lawful and reasonable measures, are many and significant. Conservatives, however, continue to be surprised when the DOJ or the VA or other federal criminal conspiracies continue to push unlawful and abusive policies that were the hallmark of the Obama Administration. Those agencies have, for decades, been stacked with leftist revolutionaries, people whose hatred for America is exceeded only by their hatred of Americans. It will take some time to clean even a portion of them out, and as hard working as Mr. Trump is, there are only so many hours in the day.

Heartening to Americans is his determination to once again make America a nation to be respected and appreciated by her allies, and feared by her enemies. Because of decades old neglect and abject stupidity in foreign policy, we will not restore our rightful place in the world without the expenditure of blood and treasure, but if we don’t do it now, nothing but humiliation and the decline of western civilization is our future. Mr. Trump appears to understand that, while not for a moment appearing to desire unnecessary conflict.

His greatest challenge--America’s greatest challenge--is the feckless and fractious Republican Congress. Not only do they seem determined to resist Mr. Trump nearly as much as the Democrats, they seem determined--idiots--to destroy themselves. It won’t be long before formerly Republican Americans agree with them and give them what they want. If they can’t, when they control every lever of government, govern, the public is poised to end them, once and for all, and they seem too stupid--they’ve manifestly earned the title: the stupid party--to recognize that reality.

Overall, Mr. Trump has turned in an impressive performance, and has demonstrated much of his bluster during the campaign was a masterful act, calculated to win the White House. His tweets confound the press, Democrats, and Republicans alike, but for Americans, they work. As for the future, if the Secret Service can keep intruders out of the White House--not a certainty by any means--Mr. Trump may succeed in draining the swamp to an unprecedented degree. We had all better hope he does.


David Schuler :I had prepared a much longer disquisition but I think I'll limit my remarks to this. If you're going to try to assign a letter grade to President Trump's term of office so far, I think the only fair grade is Incomplete.

As of today his actual accomplishments are very few. The greatest are the nomination and confirmation of Neil Gorsuch and getting Chinese support in dealing with North Korea. How extensive that support will actually be remains to be seen.

He has no legislative accomplishments. Some of his executive orders are already having effects; others like the travel ban are running into fierce opposition.

The transition has been rough. It took until April 27 before he had a complete cabinet. He's made many fewer appointments at this point in his presidency than any of recent memory.

President Trump is already backpedaling on some of his campaign promises, notably the wall. That was to be expected from a president as transactional in his approach as Trump.

If you consider his not being Hillary Clinton to be enough, that's a pretty low bar. All of the other candidates and 300 million other Americans all fit the same description.

If you're going to assign a letter grade based on actual accomplishments to date, it would have to be a D. I'm more charitable than that so I say "Incomplete".

Laura Rambeau Lee : Contrary to mainstream media opinion, President Trump’s first one hundred days have been positive. Illegal immigration is down 67% since he was sworn into office on Inauguration Day. He has by executive order: dismantled President Obama’s climate change regulations; placed a hiring freeze on federal employees; approved the Keystone XL pipeline and other energy producing ventures; mandated for every new regulation created two must be eliminated; imposed travel bans from countries involved in terrorism and where vetting of people wanting to come in is difficult if not impossible. These are just a few of a total of sixty-six executive orders President Trump has signed making good on his promises as he campaigned for the presidency.

Although the attempt to repeal and replace Obamacare failed, this is a positive as President Trump promised to repeal it and many of us were against the new bill as it was written. Hopefully Congress will work out a better plan to repeal and replace Obamacare. We must make sure the fix will truly help the people who have suffered under the high premiums and co-pays mandated by the “Affordable” Care Act. The Democrats know it will implode unless something is done, so they too have an interest in making sure a good bill is passed. Their future elections may very well depend on fixing Obamacare.

On a different level President Trump has been uniquely positioned to expose the radical left in America like no one else has been able to do. Many of us have been aware of the expanding influence of the left, which includes socialists, Marxists, Islamists, and communists. They have been successful over the past couple of generations of infiltrating our politics at every level of government, our schools and universities, and the media. His win despite the odds against him has them outraged and incensed. Their plans, first under President Obama and continuing under a Hillary Clinton presidency, have been exposed and they are publicly showing their true intentions. Americans are now seeing how pervasive their influence and numbers have become. They realize we are in a fight to save our republic from those who want to destroy our country.

Finally, but most significant in my opinion, was the Senate approval of his nomination of Constitutionalist Judge Neil Gorsuch as a Supreme Court Justice. This alone was the reason many Americans voted for Trump for President. In the near term the Supreme Court will continue to lean ever so slightly to the right as Justice Gorsuch replaced Constitutionalist Justice Antonin Scalia. President Trump may well have the opportunity to appoint at least two more justices during his term which should bring the court more in keeping with the powers afforded to it within the framework of the Constitution for many decades.

All in all I give President Trump a grade of B for his first one hundred days in office. He has more to learn as all new presidents do, but it appears he is a quick study and up to the tasks before him.


Well, there it is!

Make sure to drop by every Monday for the WoW! Magazine Forum. And enjoy WoW! Magazine 24-7 with some of the best stuff written in the blogosphere. Take from me, you won't want to miss it.