READER COMMENT OF THE DAY
From Joseph:
I used to work for a lead mining company here in Missouri. We had a man who worked there everyone nicknamed "Lyin' Sam." At one point I had the opportunity to work at the same mine he did. I had been there for a few weeks and a man who used to work there asked me if Sam had lied to me yet and I replied that I didn't know if he had or not. He then asked if Sam had spoken to me and I yes. He then said,"If he spoke to you, he lied." This is just about how I feel right now concerning most of those in D.C., and it's not just the politicians.
From the Gov:
Sadly, you speak the truth! You know, I'll bet that guy's name wasn't even Sam.
BASKETS OF LETTERS
Matt Vespa at Townhall.com summed up well my reaction to that letter signed by 2,000 former Justice Department officials, demanding that Attorney General Barr resign for dropping the prosecution of Lt. Gen. Michael Flynn, just because it was a malicious, politicized perjury trap based on a falsified 302, illegally hidden exculpatory evidence and other outrageous prosecutorial misconduct. Pardon my understatement.
I also appreciate Eli Lake’s comment that we are fortunate they’re “former” DOJ officials, and Sean Davis of the Federalist’s observation that “It was awfully nice of them to put in one place a list of corrupt, lawless hacks who have no business serving in government ever again.” The Instapundit blog also put it well: “Deep state swamp rats self-identify.”
Personally, I couldn’t help thinking of the great moment in “Mr. Smith Goes to Washington” where Jimmy Stewart, as a naïve honest Congress member fighting a corrupt machine, is urged to end his filibuster when he’s shown baskets full of letters demanding he stand down, ginned up by slanted coverage in partisan newspapers. He replies that he will not stop fighting, “even if this room gets filled with lies like these.”
He then scatters them on the floor like the trash they are. That would also be an appropriate reaction to this letter. But please aim for the wastebasket, Mr. Barr. No sense in making extra work for the janitor.
SPECIAL ELECTION
UPDATE: In Tuesday’s special election for California’s 25th Congressional District, Republican Mike Garcia beat Democrat Christy Smith by about 56-44%.
The election grabbed national attention, with President Trump endorsing Garcia and Obama and Hillary Clinton backing Smith, because much importance was put on it as a bell weather for November’s national elections. That’s almost never true of local elections, but that doesn’t stop the media from doing it, just as they never stop obsessing over early polls, no matter how useless they later prove to be (polls last month showed this race was “too close to call!”)
This seat was taken from the GOP in 2018 by Democrat Katie Hill, who promptly had to resign over a sordid “throuple” scandal involving a female staffer. So much outside money poured into the race last time (something Democrats rail against, unless it’s their outside money) that Hill outspent the GOP incumbent by more than 3-1.
Democrats wanted to hold that seat as a sign of a coming “blue wave,” proving voters are buying their attempts to blame President Trump for a virus unleashed on the whole world by China, and that they approve of the Democratic response to the virus: release criminals from jail and fill them with people who are trying to go back to work to feed their families. Apparently, they think following orders, sitting at home on the couch forever and living off the government is as popular an idea with the general public as it is with Democratic Party leaders. This race suggests it’s not.
Republicans wanted to win the seat back not only as one more vote to pry Nancy Pelosi’s hands off the levers of power, but also to stop the dangerous leftward lurch of the once Golden State. That district voted for Romney in 2012, then Hillary in 2016, then the GOP lost it by 8 points in 2018. Garcia's win marks the first Democrat-to-Republican flip in California since 1998, and the first House Republican to represent a district Hillary Clinton won with over 50% of the vote.
The Dems were so desperate to hold it, they opened last minute public polling places in heavily minority areas, as usual under the guise of “making it easier for everyone (in our strongholds) to vote.” I suggested that they could be surprised to find that Hispanics and African-Americans might not line up to support the party of sex scandals, job destruction, endless forced lockdowns and the Russia Collusion/impeachment hysteria. We’ll see if that was correct when the vote is broken down by demographics later.
Also Tuesday, Trump-backed Republican Tom Tiffany easily won a special state senate election in Wisconsin’s 7th District over a Democrat backed by big Dem names like Elizabeth Warren, but that’s a very conservative rural area, so no surprise.
Nebraska also held its primary elections on Tuesday. Despite the coronavirus, Trump racked up stronger support than he did in 2016, while Joe Biden took only 77% of the Democratic vote. Large numbers of votes went to Sanders, Warren and Gabbard, who are no longer in the race, although they were still on the ballot. That would seem to bolster a new Rasmussen poll finding that only 54% of Democrats want Biden to be the nominee, and 28% believe he’ll be replaced.
So, would the media like to point to that story as a bell-weather for November? No? I didn’t think so…
"AS DEAD AS FRIED CHICKEN"
Tuesday, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi showed us why she’s been too busy to come back to DC and work: she and fellow Democrats have been making out their wish list to Santa, a.k.a., the fourth coronavirus relief bill.
The federal government has already approved spending $3.6 trillion to aid individuals, businesses and states laid low by the COVID-19 (Chinese) coronavirus, and Pelosi and her fellow Dems want to add another $3 trillion to that. She said, “We must think big for the people now,” and you certainly can’t accuse her of not spending big. As usual, the bill was given one of those names that make you sound like a heel for opposing it (“The Heroes Act”), and it does include hazard pay for “essential workers” and aid to people left unemployed.
But much of the money goes to state and local governments to assist with the “fiscal impacts” of the coronavirus, and therein lies the loophole. Who determines what qualifies as the “fiscal impacts” of the virus? For instance, if the virus caused a drop in tax revenues, can you use the federal money to pay government workers or cover lavish pension benefits that shouldn’t have been approved in the first place?
And here are nine pet liberal projects in the bill, most of which have zero to do with the virus, such as LGBT set-asides, hate crimes laws, repealing the Trump tax cuts, voter-fraud-by-mail and blocking Trump from firing partisan liberal inspector generals who are undermining his Administration.
But the bill isn’t likely to make it past the Senate. Republican Rep. Steve Scalise called it “a joke” and a liberal wish list. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell described it as “a far-left extreme makeover of our country.” And leave it to Louisiana Sen. John Kennedy to put it most colorfully, saying Pelosi had moved from folly to farce, and this bill is as “dead as fried chicken” in the Senate. He also quoted Jack Nicholson from “As Good As It Gets”: “Go sell crazy somewhere else, we’re all stocked up here.”
TRACE ACT
Speaking of horrifying Democratic legislation, it’s bad enough to come out with an alleged COVID-19 bill that greatly expands government surveillance powers, but it should be taken as a flashing light warning label to the public that it’s named the Testing, Reaching, And Contacting Everyone Act (“TRACE Act”) and it actually carries the number, H.R. 6666.
SENATOR PAUL QUESTIONS DR. FAUCI
Dr. Anthony Fauci testified to the Senate Tuesday, and while it wasn’t as big a waste of time as him testifying to the House would have been, I still can’t help thinking he must've had more important things he could have been doing. Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer had been practically drooling over the idea of Fauci attacking President Trump, and openly invited him to do so, claiming this would be a chance for Americans to hear Fauci when he didn’t have Trump looming over his shoulder. Apparently, Schumer doesn’t pay much attention to the news, since Fauci is out doing TV shots without Trump all the time.
But Dr. Fauci refused to take the bait, and instead repeated what he’s already said: that reopening for business in areas that have not yet reached the Administration’s checkpoints for containment of the virus could lead to a serious resurgence. Some Democrats, such as Tim Kaine, Patty Murray, and Elizabeth Warren, seemed more interested in making anti-Trump political speeches than discussing medicine, but the one interesting moment came when Fauci’s views were challenged by Sen. Rand Paul.
Paul noted that there are other schools of thought that question the effectiveness of “one-size-fits-all” national lockdowns and whether they are doing more harm than good, and reminded Fauci that the policy was based on dire predictions that have all proven to be wildly overstated and that he (Fauci) is not the “end-all,” the “one person who gets to make the decision.”
Naturally, Paul was savaged by liberal politicians and media figures for his arrogance in refusing to accept the views of an actual doctor on dealing with COVID-19.
Another reminder: Paul is a doctor with a degree from the Duke University School of Medicine. Also, he’s not only had and recovered from COVID-19 himself, but he’s also volunteered at a hospital in Bowling Green, Kentucky, helping COVID-19 patients.
Sen. Paul also got off the “Line of the Day” by tweeting, “Only the government could cause 1 million unemployed health care workers during a pandemic.”
DAILY BIBLE VERSE
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