Here are my observations and opinions of my selected news of the day for your Thanksgiving Day enlightenment. Happy Thanksgiving Day to all of my readers.
SURELY, YOU’VE NOTICED when elections don’t go the way Democrats want or expect, they claim fraud, voter suppression or voter disenfranchisement and racism. And how about those mysterious ballots that appear after the initial counting … they always seem to favor Democrat candidates.
I highly recommend your reading an insightful piece, “When Republicans win close elections, the results are illegitimate,” in the blog, NEO.
We don’t hear such claims from Republicans. Yes, during the 2016 presidential campaign Donald Trump often said the system was rigged, but he was referring to the DNC torpedoing Bernie Sanders’ campaign against Hillary Clinton, and it was the truth.
“MOURNING JOE” – The hypocrisy of Joe Scarborough, the host of MSNBC’s “Morning Joe,” was revealed in a tweet from The Reagan Battalion @ReaganBattalion in which readers are reminded of a bill he sponsored when he was in Congress on March 5. 2000 – House Concurrent Resolution 270: Condemning the Racist and Anti-Semitic views of the Reverend Al Sharpton.
The resolution “strongly rejects the racist incendiary actions of the Reverend Al Sharpton” and cites his references to those of the Jewish faith as “bloodsucking Jews” and “Jew bastards,” and in addition “referred to members of the Jewish faith as “white interlopers” and “diamond merchants.”
“(Joe) now has him (Sharpton) on his “Morning Joe” show to decry racism,” the tweet ends.
TAKING ANOTHER LOOK at how Michigan flipped Democrat in the midterms. In my November 8, 2018 post, I wrote of Michigan being labelled the pride of the Great Lakes by the Wall Street Journal citing it as a case study in pro-growth under Republican Gov. Rick Snyder.
Stating that my original home state doesn’t get it, I told of my embarrassment in it, electing Democrat Gretchen Whitmer as its governor and returning Democrat Sen. Debbie Stabenow to the U.S. Senate. It was the highly-populated Macomb County that flipped the state, after voting to elect Donald Trump by 12 points over Hillary Clinton in 2016.
“In both Pennsylvania and Michigan … Republicans ran what were widely considered to be weak candidates for governor,” writes Gerald F. Seib in his outlook for the Midwest in 2020. Snyder was term-limited and the GOP candidate, Bill Schuette, fell short.
With Whitmer as Michigan’s new governor, one can expect an economic downslide that usually accompanies Democrat leadership. As a state senator, Whitmer voted for gasoline and diesel tax hikes, and an increase in the minimum wage.
She opposed drug testing and community service for certain welfare recipients; opposed the requirement for a photo ID and proof of citizenship to vote; and opposed a ban on partial birth and late term abortions.
(Courtesy John James for Senator.)
REGULAR READERS WILL RECALL that I endorsed John James, the Republican candidate who challenged Democrat Sen. Debbie Stabenow in Michigan. A West Point graduate, a former Army helicopter pilot who served in Iraq, and a successful businessman, James was the first black nominee running for a statewide office from Michigan in 30 years.
Stabenow, who has been in the Senate for 18 years, claims that “creating jobs in Michigan (is her) top priority, having committed herself to bringing jobs back to Michigan and to ensuring that Michigan is a destination for the jobs of the future.”
The leadership of outgoing Michigan Gov. Rick Snyder, lowering business taxes, and the reduction of job-killing regulations by President Trump did more for jobs in Michigan than Stabenow could ever dream to do.
Clearly, we have not seen and heard the last of John James.
THE PRESIDENT’S PROPENCITY to speak his mind on everyone and everything is quite refreshing, but even for his supporters he occasionally goes too far, like his early criticism of John McCain, having been captured.
The president’s jabs at the opposition, like “Cryin Chuck Schumer,” are okay, as was his response to a reporter – “that’s a stupid question” – during an impromptu meeting with the media on the White House lawn before boarding the helicopter. Some may call this “unpresidential,” but it’s Trump being Trump, an openness that got him elected.
Unfortunately, his tendency to want to comment on just about everything, sometimes puts him in a bad light, like when he criticized McCain. Such was his remark about Adm. Bill McCraven, who led the Bin Laden raid, suggesting that it would have been nice if we had gotten Bin Laden sooner.
Of course, the media leaped at this, another opportunity to attack the president, and even though the point of his comment was not to criticize McCraven, but to point out the Obama administration’s policy of not wanting to disturb its relationship with Pakistan, with whom we gave $1.3 billion a year, was his primary complaint.
When pressed during his interview with Fox’s Chris Wallace, however, he referred to McCraven being a “Clinton fan” and an “Obama backer,” and that gave the media red meat, even though it was known that McCraven was on Hillary’s short list for vice president. The president’s comment came off in the press as an attack on our military, while his support of the military has been strong.
I guess those sometimes-inappropriate comments come under the heading of “tone,” a personality quirk the president needs to better control. However, it’s a quirk, an honesty if you will, that ingratiated him with voters in 2016, and dramatically changing that is not advisable in my opinion.
McCraven hasn’t been a saint. You may recall that when the president revoked the security clearance of former CIA Director John Brennan, McRaven, too, felt the need to respond, saying that the president had “embarrassed” and “humiliated” the country.
THERE’S MORE – Chief Justice John Roberts doesn’t approve of the president’s description of the 9th Circuit judge who ruled against his migrant asylum policy as an “Obama judge.” Too bad. Liberals often use disparaging remarks referring to judges appointed by Republicans.
Speaking of the 9th Circuit, did you hear that California’s Democrat Senators Dianne Feinstein and Kamala Harris sent a letter to President Trump outlining conditions by which they would be willing to compromise on nominees.
“It’s like a light bulb went on in their head,” writes Beth Baumann in Townhall, “and suddenly they want to try to reduce the impact conservatives will have on the court system.”
DANGER, FLYOVER STATE VOTERS – To borrow the catch phrase of the 1960 TV show Lost in Space – “Danger! Will Robinson” – I want to warn you about what to expect from the next Congress in 2019.
“Nearly 7 in 10 Democrats in the new House majority are from the East and West coasts, the latest sign of the party’s lack of connection with the heartland and South,” reports Paul Bedard in the Washington Examiner.
Even more dramatic, there will be more Democrat members from liberal California (45) than from these states combined -AK, AR, ID, MT, NE, ND, SD, WV, WYU, KS, OK, UT, AL, DE, KY, LA, ME, MS, VT, HI, IN, MO, NH, NM, RI, TN, IA, SC, NV, NC, WI, and ME.
ATTENTION TEXANS – Reportedly 60,000 Californians, on average, left that state for Texas every year from 2011 to 2015, with 80 percent settling in counties more conservative than where they came from, escaping the high taxation of the left coast. However, beware, they come with liberal views.
FAIRNESS IN ADJUDICATING campus sexual misconduct was introduced by Educations Secretary Betsy DeVos last week. She proposed changes for how schools handle Title IX cases, allowing the accused student’s lawyer or support person to conduct the cross examination.
Colleges may use a higher burden of proof than the “preponderance of evidence” in the Obama era regulations. The new rules will give students more options for seeking justice.
Activist groups seem to “want everyone accused of sexual misconduct to be subjected to life-ruining sanction,” writes Cheriss May of ZUMA Press/Newscom, “but I get the sense that some victims are not actually keen on such an outcome. They may want the accused to acknowledge wrongdoing, learn about consent, set things right, and pledge to behave better.”
What better reminder can we have of unproven sexual conduct and how it can ruin someone’s life than what we witnessed during the Kavanaugh confirmation hearings.
JOURNALISM’S DEATH KNELL continues. Leeds Trinity School of Journalism in the U.K. has banned its lecturers from using capital letters when setting assignments because … are you ready for this? … “it might frighten students.”
Further, they have been told to “write in a helpful, warm tone, avoiding officious language and negative instruction,” and to avoid the overuse of “do” and especially “don’t.”
Leeds journalism student Tyler @TylerSavagee wrote in response: “DO NOT ATTEND LEEDS TRINITY SCHOOL OF JOURNALISM.”
May God bless the United States of America.
