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Read MoreCommentary: The ‘Blue’ Print for Zuckerberg’s Center for Technology and Civic Life’s Election Intervention in Wisconsin 2020
Tag: Democrats
Analysis: Democrats in D.C. Brace for Two Winter Storms as Voting Bills Near Certain Failure
As Washington, D.C., prepares for its second winter storm in as many weeks, Democrats in Congress are all-in on their bid to pass their voting legislation and, if it fails, to abolish the Senate filibuster to advance it.
Their strategy has almost zero chance of success. Though Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer has brought his party’s voting bills to the floor throughout 2021, they have faced insurmountable opposition from Senate Republicans every time, who have relied on the filibuster to tank the legislation that they describe as a federal takeover of elections that could invite voter fraud.
In response, Schumer and most Senate Democrats have endorsed scrapping the 60-vote threshold, but in their way stand Sens. Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema. The two centrist Democrats have said time and time again that they will not support abolishing the filibuster, denying Democrats the unanimous support they need to adopt the change even though they support their party’s voting legislation.
Read MoreRepublicans Notch Big Win as Court Upholds North Carolina’s New Congressional Map
A North Carolina court Tuesday upheld the state’s new congressional and state legislative lines, rejecting claims from Democratic groups that it was an unfair gerrymander giving Republicans in the state a big win.
While the case may be appealed, the decision as it stands now could impact the 2022 midterm elections, where Republicans are seeking to reverse Democrats’ narrow House majority. North Carolina is gaining a 14th seat, and the new congressional lines could give Republicans an 11-3 advantage, up from the 8-5 split now.
The Democrats’ lawyers argued during last week’s trial that the map chosen was an extreme outlier that Republicans picked solely for political gain. Republicans, however, said that the new lines were drawn legally and that the court was incapable of determining whether it was too partisan to stand.
Read MoreRepublicans Hold the Population Edge over Democrats in States with One-Party Majorities in the Gov and State House
At the start of 2022, 36.5% (120 million) of Americans lived in a state with a Democratic trifecta, while 41.8% (137 million) lived in a state with a Republican trifecta. The other 71 million Americans lived in a state with a divided government.
A state government trifecta is a term to describe single-party government, when one political party holds the governorship and majorities in both chambers of the state legislature. At the start of 2022, there were 38 trifectas—15 Democratic and 23 Republican.
Virginia’s will change from a Democratic trifecta to a state with divided government when legislators and Governor-elect Glenn Youngkin (R) are sworn into office on Jan. 12. In the 2021 elections, Republicans won control of the Virginia House of Delegates and the governor’s office, currently held by Democrat Ralph Northam. Democrats still control the Virginia State Senate.
When this happens, 33.9 percent of Americans (112 million) will live in a state with a Democratic trifecta, 41.8 percent (137 million) will live in a state with a Republican trifecta, and 24.3 percent (78 million) will live in a state with divided government.
Read MoreOne Year After Disputed 2020 Election, Many Practices That Riled Conservatives Still in Effect
Just a year after the disputed 2020 election, states are in various stages of reforming election laws. Many of the same practices that angered conservatives are still in effect.
The Heritage Foundation published an Election Integrity Scorecard of all 50 states and the District of Columbia on their election laws. The scorecard examines voter ID implementation, the accuracy of voter registration lists, absentee ballot management, vote harvesting/trafficking restrictions, access of election observers, verification of citizenship, identification for voter assistance, vote counting practices, election litigation procedures, restriction of same-day registration, restriction of automatic registration, restriction of private funding of election officials or government agencies.
During a Just the News Special Report with Heritage Action for America and Real America’s Voice, HAFA Executive Director Jessica Anderson praised Arizona, Florida, Georgia, Iowa, and Texas for their efforts on election integrity reform this past year. Those states currently rank at no. 19 (tied with Mississippi and Pennsylvania), 4 (tied with Arkansas), 1, 11 (tied with Kentucky), and 6, respectively.
Read MoreCommentary: Republicans on College Campuses Struggle to Find Dates in Today’s Political Climate
Political polarization in the United States is bad. Americans don’t just dislike the other party; we hate anyone associated with it. We increasingly indulge our worst impulses. We grow ever-more biased against people with different political perspectives. Hatred for those in an opposition political party in the U.S. has risen steadily since 2000 – when around 10% to 20% of Democrats and Republicans said they despised the other party – to today, when about half say so.
There’s no end in sight. Generation Lab/Axios polling just released some disturbing new findings: Young Democrats really hate Republicans.
The poll asked 850 college students nationwide from Nov. 18 to 22 whether they would date someone who voted for the opposing presidential candidate. Seventy-one percent of Democrats said they would not date someone who voted for a Republican for president; 31% of Republicans said the same. Forty-one percent of Democrats said they would not shop at or support a business of someone who voted for the opposing presidential candidate; 7% of Republicans said the same. Thirty-seven percent of Democrats said that they would not be friends with someone who voted for the opposing presidential candidate; 5% of Republicans said the same. And 30% of Democrats said they would not work for someone who voted for the opposing presidential candidate; 7% of Republicans agreed.
Read MoreCommentary: Securing America’s Border and Communities Is Our Government’s First Duty
Remember when President George W. Bush said this?
I’ve had a lot of experience with dealing with borders, as the Governor of Texas. I know there’s a compassionate, humane way to deal with this issue. I want to remind people that family values do not stop at the Rio Grande River.
It was January 2005. Bush had just won reelection with a campaign strong on national security. Then after narrowly defeating John Kerry, Bush did what Bushes tend to do when they think they’re secure: He lurched to the Left and betrayed the base of his own party. He cast Americans who want a strong, secure border as racists—just four years after we had been attacked by international terrorists who exploited our weak immigration system to kill thousands of us. Bush behaved as if Americans didn’t know that Mexicans living south of the Rio Grande believe in family. Millions of Americans have Mexican heritage themselves. But they or their ancestors chose to be Americans.
Read MoreCommentary: Democrats’ 2020 Tactics in Philadelphia Part of a Failing Attempt to Keep Control
Pennsylvania was by far one of the most contentious battleground states in the 2020 election, but new analysis shows even in Philadelphia Democrats are only treading water.
In 2020, both Democrat and anti-Trump groups dumped millions into Philadelphia and surrounding suburbs, with roving food vans that would extract votes out of people in exchange for a meal, or the use of “street money” to incentivize election-day door knockers to push people to the polls.
Despite these borderline-bribery efforts to drag people out to vote against Trump in 2020, Democrats gained less than 20,000 votes in Philly compared to 2016 numbers.
Read MoreManchin Reportedly Told the White House He Supports a Billionaire Tax
West Virginia Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin told the White House last week that he was willing to endorse some type of billionaire tax in President Joe Biden’s domestic spending package before coming out against it days later, The Washington Post reported.
Manchin said that a tax on billionaires’ wealth could be a means to pay for the package, according to the Post, citing three people familiar with his offer to the White House. The outlet reported that it was unclear whether Manchin provided an estimate of how much money the provision would raise.
Programs in Manchin’s $1.8 trillion counteroffer included universal pre-K for ten years, expansions to the Affordable Care Act and billions of dollars for climate change mitigation measures, according to the Post, but it did not include the child tax credit, which many Democrats have touted as one of the single biggest policy achievements of the year.
Read MoreCommentary: Lump of Coal Awards 2021, January 6 Edition
Aside from the pandemic, no other issue has dominated the daily news cycle and collective fixation of the ruling class more than the alleged “insurrection” on January 6, 2021.
The events of that day were a gift to the Biden regime and the Democratic Party—which should instantly disabuse anyone of the notion that the Capitol protest was legitimately an organic uprising instead of an inside job orchestrated by House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.), D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser, and the FBI to name just a few accomplices.
Since then, every lever of government power in Washington, D.C. has been wielded in a vengeful way against American citizens who dared to protest the rigged 2020 presidential election. The conduct of those in charge has exposed the moral depravity of the people who populate the power center of the world’s greatest country, showing a stark chasm between the inherent goodness and decency of the American people and the sadistic ghouls who call the shots from the Beltway.
Read More‘They Know the Real Reason’: Manchin Fires Back at the White House After Gloves-off Statement Criticizes His Opposition to Build Back Better
West Virginia Democratic Sen. Joe Manchin fired back at the White House Monday after it put out a blistering statement criticizing him for opposing President Joe Biden’s domestic spending package.
In an interview with West Virginia’s Hoppy Kercheval, Manchin said that while he “figured they would come back strong,” they knew that Manchin could not support the bill they were backing.
“You know me, always willing to work and listen and try. I just got to the wit’s end and they know the real reason” things fell apart, Manchin said, referring to the White House.
Read MoreCommentary: Democrats Promised An Insurrection But All They Got Was a Lousy Obstruction Case
History, it appears, is repeating itself—at least when it comes to the latest crusade to destroy Donald Trump and everyone around him.
For nearly three years, the American people were warned that Donald Trump had been in cahoots with the Kremlin to rig the 2016 presidential election. Trump-Russia election collusion, the original “stop the steal” campaign—that is, until questioning the outcome of American elections was designated a criminal conspiracy after November 2020—dominated the attention of the ruling class and the entirety of the national news media.
Every instrument of power—the FBI, a secret surveillance court, congressional committees, a special counsel—was leveraged to uncover the “truth” about the Trump campaign’s alleged dirty dealings with Mother Russia.
Read MoreManchin Says He Won’t Vote for Mass Spending, Climate Bill, Dealing Blow to Biden
Sen. Joe Manchin, D-W.V., declared Sunday he won’t vote for President Joe Biden’s Build Back Better Act, saying he feared the bill’s mass spending and climate provisions may worsen inflation.
“This is a no,” Manchin told Fox News Sunday, “I have tried everything I know to do.”
The West Virginia Democrat’s decision all but dooms Biden’s signature legislation in an evenly divided Senate.
Manchin said he was concerned about the continuing effects of the pandemic, inflation, and geopolitical unrest. His decision came after an intense lobbying campaign by the president and fellow Democrats failed to change his mind.
Read MoreProgressive Lawmakers Offer Unwitting Path for January 6 Prisoners to Sue Federal Government
Some of the most progressive Democrats in Congress are supporting new legislation that could help an unexpected group: those who were arrested and imprisoned without trial for playing a role in the Jan. 6 Capitol riot.
Democratic Reps. Hank Johnson (Ga.) and Jamie Raskin (Md.) on Wednesday reintroduced the Bivens Act, which would allow citizens to recover damages for constitutional violations committed against them by federal law enforcement officials.
The bill, which the lawmakers first introduced last year, seeks “to provide a civil remedy for an individual whose rights have been violated by a person acting under federal authority.” It would do this by adding five words — “of the United States or” — to a longstanding provision enacted in 1871, known as Section 1983, which gives individuals the right to sue state or local officials who violate their civil and constitutional rights. The additional words would include federal officials in the statute.
Read MoreCongressman Mark Green on Biden Army Navy No-Show, Tennessee Tornados, and Democrat Thirst for Authoritarianism
Monday morning on the Tennessee Star Report, host Michael Patrick Leahy welcomed Congressman Mark Green of Tennessee’s 7th District to the newsmakers line to weigh in on Biden’s absence from the Army-Navy football game, Build Back Better bill, and the Democrat desire for an authoritarian government.
Read MoreSenate Clears Way for Democrats to Lift the Debt Ceiling After Agreement Between Schumer, McConnell
A bill that would enable Democrats to raise the debt ceiling without overcoming a Senate filibuster passed the chamber Thursday afternoon with bipartisan support.
The debt ceiling provisions were attached to a bill that prevents automatic cuts to Medicare. Ironically, the legislation, which passed the House on near party lines Tuesday, required 60 votes to overcome a filibuster, and passed after 14 Republicans joined Democrats in advancing it.
The provision was the product of a deal struck Tuesday between Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer and Minority Leader Mitch McConnell. Under it, Congress would pass a law allowing the debt ceiling to be raised with a simple majority this one time, and the bill’s passage puts the limit on a glade path to be lifted by Democrats alone ahead of Dec. 15, when Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen warned a default could occur.
Read MoreCongress Wants to Make Big Tech Responsible for Online Speech
While there is agreement between large factions of both Republicans and Democrats that social media companies should be liable for certain third-party content hosted on their platforms, the parties differ on what that content should be, and why platforms should be liable in the first place.
Congress appeared no closer to finding common ground following a House Energy and Commerce hearing Wednesday, in which lawmakers considered several bills seeking to reform Section 230 of the Communications Decency Act.
“Wednesday’s hearing made clear that Republicans and Democrats have drastically different solutions to hold Big Tech accountable,” Republican Rep. Cathy McMorris Rodgers, who serves as Ranking Member on the House Energy and Commerce Committee, told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “Republicans are fighting for free speech, while Democrats continue to push for more censorship and control. Bipartisanship will not be possible until Democrats agree that we need less censorship, not more.”
Read MorePlurality of Hispanic Voters Offended by New Gender-Neutral Term ‘Latinx’
Recent polling data has found that Hispanic voters may not be nearly as receptive to the new gender-neutral term “Latinx” as Democrats may have originally imagined, as reported by the New York Post.
The word, which first began being used just a few years ago, is meant to address the rising left-wing notion that gender is simply a “social construct,” as well as the scientifically-debunked claim that there are more than two genders. In the Spanish language, many words are “gendered,” with adjectives often ending with a letter that signifies whether they are addressing a male or a female; words meant to address men end with an “o,” while words addressing women end with an “a.” As such, in the case of the widely-used words “Latino” and “Latina,” the far-left sought to eliminate the inclusion of the gendered letter by replacing both with “Latinx.”
However, a new poll conducted by the Democratic firm Bendixen & Amandi International finds that 40 percent of registered Hispanic, Latino, and Latina voters are offended by the use of the word. Another 30 percent said they are “less likely to support” any political candidate or party that seriously uses the word.
Read MoreCook Political Report Shifts Eight Governor’s Races Toward GOP
The nonpartisan Cook Political Report on Friday shifted eight high-stakes gubernatorial races toward Republicans as Democrats continue to face political headwinds.
Ratings in Michigan, Wisconsin and Nevada, three pivotal battleground states, shifted from “Lean Democratic” to “Toss Up.” Each has a first-term Democratic incumbent — Govs. Gretchen Whitmer, Tony Evers and Steve Sisolak, respectively — fighting to win reelection in a state that President Joe Biden won by fewer than four points in 2020.
Other states that saw changes were Maine, New Mexico, Oregon, Iowa and South Carolina. While Democrats remain favorites in the first three, Cook noted, the ratings in Iowa and South Carolina both moved from “Likely Republican” to “Solid Republican.”
Read MoreDemocrat Anti-‘Disinformation’ Group Still Funding Organizations Behind Steele Dossier
A Democrat-backed nonprofit intended to combat alleged “disinformation” paid large sums of money to organizations responsible for the Steele dossier, which advanced false claims regarding former President Donald Trump’s relationship with Russia.
The Democracy Integrity Project (TDIP) is nonprofit run by Daniel J. Jones, a former staffer of Democratic California Sen. Dianne Feinstein, that has received funding from prominent Democrat and left-wing donors, including George Soros.
The organization’s mission is to “educate the public on matters such as foreign election interference, global extremism, corruption, and coordinated disinformation,” according to filings with the Internal Revenue Service (IRS).
Read MoreCommentary: Natural Law Liberalism—An Ideology for the Republican Party
Do you ever wonder why Democratic politicians frequently resort to name calling when challenging Republicans? Why do the so-called mainstream media always seem to have the same anti-Republican talking points? Why are Republican judges consistently portrayed as evil? Why do progressive commentators and democratic policy makers always seem to “talk down” to their conservative opponents?
Alternatively, does it seem odd that most Republican politicians and conservative speakers often try to portray their arguments as policy disagreements and their opponents as “good people” with “differing views”? Republicans and most mainstream conservative pundits generally answer policy questions directly. They try to show respect and yield to opposing points when they make sense. Republicans in general just want to argue for practical solutions to problems.
The reason for this is simple: the Democratic Party over time has embraced an all-encompassing ideology that governs the way their politics and quest for power are shaped. All Democratic politicians and their pundits embrace at least some key aspects of this ideology. This fact is not readily apparent to everyone because Americans are not inclined to over-intellectualize politics. Most Americans view government and politics as a means of enacting the best common-sense policies to govern their daily lives. Each issue is viewed on its merits and Americans often split policy allegiance between Republican and Democratic ideas. Republican politicians subscribe to this concept as well, frequently supporting individual Democratic policies or at least trying for a compromise if the Democratic policies appear to have some stand-alone merit. Unfortunately, this is increasingly a losing proposition because they are fighting against a unified ideology bent on reshaping our constitution and imposing a totalitarian worldview. Democrats and the Left believe that the future is the collective and the collective is guided by an intellectual ruling class.
Read MoreCommentary: The New ‘Blue Confederacy’
Why are progressive regions of the country—especially in the old major liberal cities (e.g., Chicago, Los Angeles, Minneapolis, New York, Portland, San Francisco, Seattle)—institutionalizing de facto racial quotas through “proportional representation” based on “disparate impact”? Why are they promoting ethnic and racial chauvinism, such as allowing college students to select the race of their own roommates, calibrating graduation ceremonies by skin color and tribe, segregating campus “safe spaces” by race, and banning literature that does not meet commissariat diktats?
Why are they turning into one-party political fiefdoms separating the rich and poor, increasingly resembling feudal societies as members of the middle class flee or disappear? What does it mean that they are becoming more and more intolerant in their cancel culture, and quasi-religious intolerance of dissent, on issues from climate change and abortion-on-demand to critical race theory and wokeness?
Isn’t it strange that there are entire states and regions wholly reliant on the money and power of “one-crop” Big Tech monopolies? And why, in the 21st century no less, are Democratic-controlled counties, cities, and entire states nullifying federal law?
Read MoreBiden to Renominate Jerome Powell for Second Term as Federal Reserve Chair
President Joe Biden will renominate Federal Reserve Chairman Jerome Powell to a second term leading the central bank.
The president, who was elected as a moderate, has faced pushback on Powell, who progressives feel is not tough enough on bank regulations or climate change policy.
Also in contention for the top job was Lael Brainard, who Biden will nominate to become the vice chair of the central bank’s board of governors.
Read MoreDemocrats Boast That Their Donors’ Most Common Profession Is Teacher
The Democratic National Committee (DNC) tweeted that the most common DNC donor-reported occupation in 2021 is teacher.
The tweet sparked widespread mockery online, with commentators pointing out that teachers’ widespread alignment with Democrats is a root cause of conservatives’ distrust in public education.
Read MoreElection Handicapper Says Three Major 2022 Senate Races Now a ‘Toss-up,’ a Boon to Republicans
Hotly contested Senate seats in Georgia, Arizona and Nevada are now well within the realm of a “toss-up” in next year’s races, a notable political forecaster is predicting.
The Cook Political Report, a longtime newsletter that specializes in U.S. election predictions, this week moved those races to its toss-up column for the 2022 elections.
In Georgia, Democrat Sen. Raphael Warnock faces re-election after narrowly winning a special election this year. His victory helped tip the Senate in favor of Democrats.
Read MoreNational College Democrats Organization Implodes as Members Cancel Each Other over Old Tweets
The College Democrats of America (CDA) has been rocked by public accusations of bigotry against its leadership and calls for members to step down.
Nourhan Mesbah, the group’s vice president, is undergoing impeachment proceedings after a tweet she posted at age 13 was shared by the CDA Jewish Caucus, Politico reported. “I blame this debate on the yahood,” Mesbah tweeted during a 2016 presidential debate. “Yahood” is an Arabic word used as a slur against Jews, Politico wrote.
Mesbah apologized for the tweet, reportedly saying “my comment was in no way rooted in malice or anti-semitism, especially as a 13-year old, relatively new immigrant from North Africa, with a different regional dialectic linguist comprehension … while I take responsibility for my actions, I am hurt by the Islamophobia and xenophobia that continues to unfold.”
Read MoreCommentary: Biden Using Backdoor Rule to Pass Free College Agenda
Americans by and large oppose giveaways to the affluent or privileged, which explains why they consistently oppose forgiving college student-loan debt. Eighty percent of Americans have no student loan debt, and those who carry debt are disproportionately millennials with advanced degrees – and higher earning potential. Easy loan forgiveness falls under the umbrella of the free college agenda championed by most Democrats, but strong opposition led the Biden administration to drop free college from the spending bill it proposed last month.
Not to worry: Democrats discovered a backdoor to free college through an obscure and arcane Department of Education (DOE) rule. Known as Borrower Defense to Repayment (BDR), the rule existed as little more than a formality in the annals of the Federal Register, a stopgap to finalize the Federal Direct Loan Program. Through the first twenty years of its existence, it was implemented just five times, but it has now evolved into a battering ram for Democrats to get free college through the political barricades.
In 2015, Corinthian Colleges, which enrolled over 100,000 students at its 100 subsidiary campuses, filed for bankruptcy. The school’s collapse coincided with growing momentum for the “cancel college debt” and “free college” campaigns, which had evolved out of the Occupy Wall Street movement of the early 2010s and found friendly supporters in Congress, such as Senators Elizabeth Warren and Dick Durbin.
Read MoreFederal Indictment Alleging Iranian Hack Further Erodes Narrative of Perfect 2020 Election
During the dizzying days after the November 2020 election, the Homeland Security cyber-security chief was fired by a frustrated President Donald Trump, then went on national TV to insist the election was fully secure.
“There was no indication or evidence that there was any sort of hacking or compromise of election systems on, before or after November 3,” ex-Cyber-Security and Infrastructure Agency Chief Chris Krebs declared on “60 Minutes.”
On Thursday, nearly a year later, federal prosecutors in New York unsealed a dramatic indictment that conflicts with that clean bill of health.
Read MoreCommentary: Trump Is Necessary to Restore Two-Party Rule
In his most recent column, George Will, dean of serious American political commentators and high priest of Trump-hate, broke new ground in the reconciliation of buyer’s remorse over last year’s election and visceral aversion to Donald Trump. Will counseled Joe Biden’s entourage to tighten the cocoon that protects him from journalistic scrutiny or any form of spontaneity in public, lest Trump be reelected in 2024.
I have agreed with Will on almost everything between the 1964 and 2016 elections, and we have been cordial acquaintances for 40 years, although among its other regrettable side effects, the Trump phenomenon seems to have paused contact between us. George Will now purports to believe that the disappearance of Trump, which he had assured himself and his readers was inevitable if it were only possible to evict him from office last year, is necessary for the restoration of two-party rule.
With respect, I offer an alternative view. Trump is instrumental in the restoration of two-party rule.
Read MoreDemocrat-Led House Planning to Vote on Biden’s $2 Trillion Social Spending Bill by Friday: Hoyer
House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer told reporters on Tuesday that House leadership plans to hold a vote on final passage of President Biden’s $2 trillion Build Back Better Act by Friday at the latest.
Biden’s social spending bill contains new federal benefit programs and about $550 billion for climate change initiatives.
“I expect to consider most of the debate, perhaps not all, but most of the debate on Build Back Better on Tuesday, excuse me, on Wednesday, today’s Tuesday, on Wednesday, tomorrow,” Hoyer said during a news conference.
Read MoreCommentary: On Critical Race Theory, the Left’s Manipulations and Double Standards Are No Match for the Truth
People old enough to remember the academic culture wars of the late 1980s and early ’90s have a special insight into this year’s controversy over critical race theory. I don’t mean insight into the identity politics of the old days and into the identity politics of 2021, though the basic features are the same whether we are talking about the English syllabus in college in 1989 or the equity lesson in elementary school this fall. I mean, instead, the particular way in which liberals have handled the backlash once the trends in the higher education seminar of yore and in the 6th grade classroom of today have been made public.
Here’s what happened back then. In the 1970s and ’80s, a new political awareness crept into humanities teaching and research at elite universities, casting the old humanist ideals of beauty and genius and greatness as spurious myths, as socially constructed notions having a political purpose. We were told that they are not natural, neutral, or objective. No, they are Eurocentric, patriarchal, even theological (in that they presumed a transhistorical, universal character for select masterpieces). Shakespeare, Milton, Bernini, et al., were not on the syllabus because they were talents superior to all others. No, they were only there because the people in control were institutionalizing their biases. This whole canon thing, the revisionists insisted, was a fake. As Edward Said put it in “Secular Criticism,” “The realities of power and authority . . . are realities that make texts possible,” and any criticism that skirts the power and authority that put Shakespeare on the syllabus and not someone else is a dodge.
They could diversify, then. That’s what the skepticism enabled them to do. They could drop requirements in Western civilization. They needn’t force every student through a “great books” sequence. The “classics” are just one possibility among many others. That was the policy outcome at one tier-one campus after another.
Read MorePennsylvania Republicans Want to Create a New Bureau of Election Audits
Pennsylvania Republicans want to create a new Bureau of Election Audits to conduct result-confirming audits of every election, as well as performance audits of elections operations, systems and processes at least every five years.
House Speaker Bryan Cutler, R-Lancaster, laid out the legislation during a hearing in the General Assembly’s State Government Committee this week, arguing the current system of allowing county election offices to audit themselves is not sufficient.
Local election officials “must be held to a standard of accountability,” Cutler said.
Read MoreGOP Alaska Senator Murkowski Announces Reelection Bid, Prepares for Battle with Trump Allies
Alaska GOP Sen. Lisa Murkowski announced Friday that she will seek reelection in 2022, setting up another tough primary battle that includes efforts by former President Trump to unseat her.
A campaign video for Murkowski does not directly mention the challenge from Trump but warns voters about the race attracting much outside interest.
“In this election, lower 48 outsiders are going to try to grab Alaska’s Senate seat for their partisan agendas. They don’t understand our state and frankly, they couldn’t care less about your future,” she says.
Read MoreCommentary: Trump Justice Department Official Invoked Executive Privilege at January 6 Select Committee
In a 15-page letter obtained by American Greatness and prepared by his attorney, Jeffery Clark, the acting assistant attorney general for the Justice Department’s civil division in President Trump’s last few months of office, invoked executive privilege today before the January 6 Select Committee.
Clark, who has been under intense media scrutiny for attempting to address election illegalities in the 2020 presidential election, was subpoenaed by the committee on October 13. Committee chairman Bennie Thompson (D- Miss.) claimed Clark thwarted “the peaceful transfer of power.” Democrats on the Senate Intelligence Committee last month prepared a lengthy report accusing Clark of working with Donald Trump to overturn the election results.
Harry W. MacDougald, Clark’s lawyer, explained to Thompson why Clark would not testify. “Because former President Trump was properly entitled, while he held office, to the confidential advice of lawyers like Mr. Clark, Mr. Clark is subject to a sacred trust—one that is particularly vital to the constitutional separation of powers,” MacDougald wrote. “As a result, any attempts—whether by the House or by the current President—to invade that sphere of confidentiality must be resisted.”
Read MoreCommentary: Joe Biden’s Domestic Terrorism Backstory
“Where are the real domestic terrorists?” wonders Julie Kelly. As it happens, the intrepid American Greatness reporter is in luck. Domestic terrorist Nidal Hasan is on military death row at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas. As embattled Americans might wonder, who is this guy? What did he do to land in prison? And what, if anything, does Joe Biden have to say about it?
Nidal Hasan, 51, is an American-born Muslim who earned a degree in psychiatry, joined the U.S. Army, and attained the rank of major. Trouble is, Hasan considered himself a “soldier of Allah” and in 2009 he was communicating with al Qaeda terrorist Anwar al-Awlaki about killing American soldiers. The FBI knew all about it, but as “Lessons from Fort Hood” confirms, the Washington office of the FBI dropped the surveillance on Hasan and took no action against him.
Major Hasan was a partisan of the Taliban and in November of 2009 Americans were being deployed from Fort Hood, Texas, for duty in Afghanistan. On November 5, 2009, Hasan yelled “Allahu Akbar!” as he opened fire. Hasan gunned down 13 unarmed American soldiers, including Private Francheska Velez, who was pregnant and died crying “my baby!”
Read MoreNewt Gingrich Commentary: 2021 Lessons for Republicans
The 2021 elections are filled with key lessons for Republicans.
Vice President Kamala Harris had already warned in a Virginia visit late in the campaign that “what happens in Virginia will in large part determine what happens in 2022, 2024 and on.”
If Republicans learn the lessons of 2021 – and apply them to 2022 and 2024 – they can prove Harris was truly prophetic.
It is already clear that the Democrats’ power structure in Washington has learned nothing. In 2009, after losing Virginia and New Jersey, then-Speaker Nancy Pelosi pushed through Obamacare four days later. Remember, she said cheerfully “Congress [has] to pass the bill so you can find out what’s in it.”
Read MoreRepublicans Vow to Fight White House Plan to Pay Migrants Who Entered Country Illegally
Congressional Republicans say they will fight a White House plan to pay up to $450,000 in reparations to migrants separated from their families under the Trump administration after entering the country illegally.
After The Wall Street Journal reported on the plan earlier this week, President Joe Biden called the report “garbage,” only to be corrected by his spokesperson the next day.
At issue is former President Donald Trump’s policy of prosecuting all adults who entered the country illegally, in accordance with federal immigration law, including those with children. The Biden administration rescinded the policy, along with many other immigration enforcement efforts.
Read MoreRadical Left-Wing Billionaire Funding Hunter Biden Art Shows, Raising Ethical Concerns
The latest round of art shows featuring paintings and other artwork by Hunter Biden are being funded by a radical far-left billionaire with a history of political activism, according to the Daily Caller.
An exhibition of Biden’s work took place on October 1st at the Milk Studios in Los Angeles; Milk Studios is owned by billionaire businessman Moishe Mana. Mana has repeatedly donated to the Democratic Party, and was also behind several vulgar art displays with political messages behind them, including an infamous nude sculpture of President Donald Trump.
Between 2015 and 2018, Mana donated over $115,000 to the Democratic National Committee (DNC) and various Democratic candidates around the country. He was a donor and strategist on the 2016 presidential campaign of Hillary Clinton, and co-hosted a fundraiser for Clinton in the closing weeks of the election where he auctioned off artwork to support her bid for president. One of Mana’s most infamous stunts was his public offer of $2,000,000 to a charity of then-candidate Donald Trump’s choice if he released his tax returns.
Read MoreNew Poll: 44 Percent of Democrats, Democratic-Leaning Independents Don’t Want Biden in 2024
Apoll released Monday shows that 44% of Democrats and Democratic-leaning independents want a Democratic nominee other than President Biden to run for the White House in 2024.
The results come amid sinking job-approval ratings for Biden, including those in the new national poll, by NPR/PBS NewsHour/Marist.
The poll showed 44% of Americans approve of the job Biden is doing as president and 49% disapprove. The numbers compare to 45% approve/46% disapprove in the group’s October poll.
Read MoreCommentary: Taking the Infrastructure Bill Hostage Didn’t Work
Back in August, New York magazine’s Jonathan Chait blessed the strategy of the Congressional Progressive Caucus to withhold their votes for the Senate’s bipartisan physical infrastructure plan until that bill was effectively linked to a bigger, broader, and surely partisan, measure investing in a range of items from climate protection to universal preschool. He argued that “ransoming the infrastructure bill” would turn the tables on the party’s moderates:
Historically, most partisan bills are shaped by the preferences of the members of Congress closest to the middle, and their colleagues on the political extreme simply have to go along with it. … This time, the left has real power. Progressives can credibly threaten to sink a priority that moderates care about more than they do.
Twice in the past two months, most recently last Thursday, the House progressives successfully executed this strategy, blocking attempts by Speaker Nancy Pelosi to pass the bipartisan infrastructure legislation before an agreement is reached on the larger “Build Back Better” bill.
Read MoreREVIEW: Hemingway’s ‘Rigged’ a Bone Chilling Page-Turner into the 2020 Election
We are a year overdue for the true story of the 2020 elections. Mollie Hemingway has at last delivered it to us in one tidy volume.
It’s a complex story, which makes for a weighty book. The research is thorough, the writing is evidentiary, the style is clinical—like investigative journalism and social science used to be. The endnotes alone run nearly 100 pages.
Reading Rigged, one isn’t jarred by hyperbole, conjecture, or spin. Hemingway is unequivocal on progressive malice, yet she can be scathing of Republicans, too. She is particularly critical of Rudy Giuliani’s attempts to publicize fraud nationally, thereby undermining prior case-by-case efforts to get particular state courts to recognize particular violations of particular state laws.
Read MoreCommentary: Low Characters of the Elites in Ludicrous Situations
Reflecting on the unfolding disaster that is our social and political life in the United States during the consulship of Biden, I cannot help but think of Aristotle’s description of the structure of Greek tragedy. Obviously, the parallels are not exact. For one thing, tragedy as Aristotle understood it was a quick affair, its action over within a single day. Our national tragedy, by contrast, seems to lumber on indefinitely.
Then there is the question of the character of the protagonist. Aristotle’s chap is “a man who is not eminently good and just, yet whose misfortune is brought about not by vice or depravity, but by some error or frailty.” Sound like Joe Biden? Almost, maybe, but not really. Rudy Giuliani was not talking through his hat when he invoked the specter of the “Biden crime family,” as the words “laptop,” “China,” and “10 percent for the big guy” remind us.
There are many other differences between tragedy in Aristotle’s sense and the disaster we are suffering through. Still, when I think about the development Aristotle traces from ἁμαρτία (the tragic flaw) through ἀναγνώρισις (recognition) to περιπέτεια (the sudden reversal of fortune) to καταστροφή, the “catastrophe” that ties up the loose ends and consummates the action, I think “We’re somewhere on that road,” though exactly where is hard to say. Have we achieved the enlightenment of recognition yet? I am not at all sure about that.
Read MoreCommentary: The Democratization of Information Threatens the Left
With the democratization of information, we are witnessing an immensely beneficial development for every American. This development is best recognized by the fascistic attempts of Big Tech, the Pravda media, and the Biden Administration to destroy it.
As many have noted, social media has empowered individuals to pursue their happiness and shape their destinies to an extent unimagined in human history. While many are more familiar with the economic and social aspects of the internet (hence, the term “social media”), it is the political dimension that most frightens the Left.
Given their perpetually failed, morally bankrupt, coercive agenda, the democratization of information is an existential threat for the Left and to its psychotic aim to “fundamentally transform” the most prosperous, powerful, and equitable nation ever known.
Read MoreReport: Facebook Lobbyists Are Being Ignored and Banned from Lawmakers’ Offices
Facebook lobbyists are struggling to meet with lawmakers, Politico reported, as the tech giant faces congressional scrutiny and negative press surrounding its business practices.
Several lawmakers’ offices are ignoring Facebook’s policy team and even refusing to meet with lobbyists, Politico reported. Several congressional aides told the outlet that recent news reports on Facebook’s business practices, including its knowledge of how its platform affects teen users and its amplification of “misinformation,” have contributed to lawmakers’ hostile attitudes.
“Mark Zuckerberg has done more to polarize the country probably than anyone else and yet despite that, the antipathy towards him is one of the most bipartisan things that remains in the country,” a Democratic House staffer told Politico.
Read MoreCommentary: The Freak-Out over Tucker’s January 6 Documentary Begins
Tucker Carlson on Wednesday night played a brief trailer for his three-part documentary looking at the events of January 6. “Patriot Purge” will premiere on Fox Nation, the network’s streaming service, on November 1.
Clips hint that the film compares the prosecution of Capitol protesters and anyone associated with the events of January 6 to the initial war on terror, a wholly legitimate comparison that my reporting confirms. For example, as I explained in April, Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines issued a report earlier this year warning “domestic violent extremists” pose a heightened threat to the nation. Not one for subtlety, Haines included a sketch of the U.S. Capitol in the document; House Republicans at the time blasted Haines for working outside her legal authority—the intelligence community is supposed to hunt foreign terrorists, not MAGA-supporting meemaws—to target American citizens.
Unfortunately, most Americans are unaware that the Biden regime, with a big assist from the news media, is indeed conducting a domestic war on terror aimed at the political Right.
Read MoreCommentary: Keep Slandering Red States, Corporate Media and We’ll Keep Winning
One of the delights of living in Montana under complete Republican governance is that even though your state can be mercilessly trashed by the arrogant blue state corporate media, they can’t do much to stop you or your neighbors from living your best lives.
I kept that in mind this week with the simultaneous appearance of not one, but two extended hit pieces on the poor, benighted, ignorant, awful, rednecks in Montana: one in Jeff Bezos’ propaganda fishwrap, the Washington Post, and the other in the failing New York Times.
I had low expectations before reading each, and in that sense the articles did not disappoint; but they are worthy of forensic examination, because both, in different ways, provide sterling examples of the arrogant ignorance that epitomizes our failing elite class, and the hysterical desperation they feel as both power and the narrative slip from their grasp.
Read MoreCommentary: This Is Obama’s Third Term
On October 30, 2008, five days before Barack Obama won that year’s presidential election, he promised to “fundamentally transform the United States of America.” He nearly lived up to that promise.
Obama doubled the federal debt. He oversaw the worst economic growth of any president since Herbert Hoover. Under Obama, Americans experienced a stagnant median household income, a decline in homeownership, an increase in health insurance rates, and an increase in the number of Americans on food stamps, to mention just a few lowlights.
By every metric that should have mattered to Americans, Obama had failed. But from Obama’s point of view, he had succeeded. American prosperity is anathema to Obama and the modern-day Democratic Party. The Democratic Party’s power doesn’t come from happy, successful, and independent Americans; but rather from miserable, forlorn, desperate, and impoverished Americans who are dependent upon the government for their salvation.
Read MoreCommentary: If Demography Is Destiny, So Are Suburbs and Small Towns
Policy and politics often collide at the intersection of geography and demographics. The non-urban, non-college-educated white voter causing concern among Democrats these days, the suburban voter of 2018, and the heartland voter of 2016 are all profiles built on the common interests of certain people in certain types of places.
After 18 months of domestic migration prompted by a pandemic, another interest in addition to where people live has emerged in this equation: where people wish they lived.
Americans of all stripes, including young people, have long preferred suburban to urban living despite the prevailing (mis)conception in the media, but the twin crises of Covid and urban unrest in 2020 have clearly accentuated Americans’ desire to leave denser places. Not only have Americans continued apace in their usual migration from cities to suburbs, they also now aspire to live in towns and hinterlands more than one might expect.
Read MoreCommentary: Schiff, Democrats Pivot Hard on Justice Department Election Interference
For five years, U.S. Representative Adam Schiff (D-Calif.) insisted, without evidence, that the Russians helped Donald Trump win the White House in 2016. Schiff, along with Senator Dianne Feinstein (D-Calif.), first seeded the collusion narrative in July 2016—the same month James Comey’s FBI launched Crossfire Hurricane—by falsely claiming Kremlin hackers confiscated thousands of emails off the Democratic National Committee’s server, correspondence damaging to Hillary Clinton.
From that point forward, Schiff leveraged his political power and newfound cable news stardom to perpetuate the lie that the 2016 presidential election was illegitimate.
So it’s beyond ironic that Schiff now sits on the January 6 select committee, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s latest weapon to annihilate TrumpWorld. After spending every waking minute during Trump’s presidency to conduct what author Lee Smith called The Permanent Coup, Schiff is flipping his coup-plotting script on anyone who questions the legitimacy of Joe Biden’s presidency.
Read MoreGeorge Soros Teams Up with Billionaire Who Backed Liberal Disinformation Efforts to Fund Anti-Disinformation Media Venture
Liberal tech billionaire Reid Hoffman, a funder of numerous disinformation projects, is backing a new media venture launched Tuesday that seeks to combat disinformation, according to a report.
Hoffman, the founder of LinkedIn, joined ranks with financier George Soros to fund Good Information Inc., which will “fund and scale businesses that cut through eco chambers with fact-based information,” Axios reported.
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