The Attack On Paul Pelosi

The attack on Paul Pelosi, husband of House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, was horrific.  Pelosi is an 82 year old man, and was viciously assaulted by someone who was in the country illegally.  Someone who clearly has mental health issues.  The perpetrator was supposedly yelling "where's Nancy?"  Congressional leaders on both sides of the aisle have appropriately condemned the attack and wished Pelosi a complete and speedy recovery.

Rand Paul Tweeted this:  "No one deserves to be assaulted.  Unlike Nancy Pelosi's daughter who celebrated my assault, I condemn this attack and wish Mr Pelosi a speedy recovery."  Recall that Rand Paul was himself viciously attacked by his neighbor in 2017.  He suffered six broken ribs.  One of his lungs was also damaged, and in 2019 part of his lung had to be surgically removed.  But the Pelosi's daughter Tweeted at the time that Rand Paul's neighbor "was right."  Sick.

But the Left always objects to being called out for their hypocrisy.  They don't want to hear about it.  Sometimes, they will make the accusation of "whataboutism."  Here was a comment by independent journalist Aaron Rupar:  "That Rand Paul can't bring himself to either just say nothing or condemn the assault without resorting to whataboutism speaks volumes about him."  

After the assault on Rand Paul, Kasie Hunt, of MSNBC, said:  "New details today on the incident that left Senator Rand Paul with six broken ribs.  This might be one of my favorite stories..."  More recently, Democrat Senate candidate in Iowa, Mike Franken, Tweeted last year:  "Wasn't Rand's neighbor more than a little in the right?"  

What about the mainstream media?  Here was the Washington Post:  "Attack on Nancy Pelosi's husband follows years of GOP demonizing her."  The New York Times had this headline:  "Years of efforts to vilify Pelosi preceded brutal attack in home."  Here was Hillary Clinton:  "The Republican Party and its mouthpieces now regularly spread hate and deranged conspiracy theories.  It is shocking, but not surprising, that violence is the result."  

That's it, make Republicans responsible.  So who was responsible for the shooting at the Republican baseball game in 2017, which nearly killed Congressman Steve Scalise.  The shooter was a Bernie Sanders supporter, and follower of Rachel Maddow.  Were they responsible for the shooting?  Were all Democrats responsible?  

Who is responsible for the beatdown of  someone who was canvassing for Republican Senator Marco Rubio?  That person was wearing a Rubio T-shirt and a DeSantis hat, and suffered internal bleeding and a broken jaw.  But one of the attackers allegedly said:  "you can't pass by here, this is my neighborhood."  Very likely that was a Democrat.  Are the Democrats at fault?

Pat Harrigan is a Republican candidate for Congress in North Carolina.  Just recently, his parent's home was shot at, while his children were sleeping upstairs.  While he has been on the campaign trail, Harrigan's children, ages 3 and 5, have been sleeping at his parents.  The bullet entered the first floor of the home, directly under the room where the children were sleeping.  A random attack?  Maybe.  But maybe a targeted attack.  A number of news articles describe Harrigan as "a firearms manufacturer and U.S. Army Special Forces Veteran."  

And, of course, we have the attempted assassination of Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh.  In that case, a young man from California was said to be angry over the school shooting in Uvalde, Texas (who wasn't) and over the leaked draft of the Supreme Court opinion that overturned Roe vs Wade.  Very likely that man is a Democrat.  So, yes, I want to discuss "whataboutism."  I want to point out the hypocrisy of the Democrats and the Left, who lie about political violence all being one-sided.   They lie when they say all political violence is encouraged or instigated by Republicans.  And, yes, I'm sick of their lies and hypocrisy, and the support given to those lies and that hypocrisy by the mainstream media. 

The 2022 Midterm Election

Last week, President Biden gave a major speech regarding the upcoming midterms.  He started out talking about the attack on Paul Pelosi, then switching to January 6, of course.  He next discussed voter intimidation (is that a big issue?), and followed up with threats against election officials.  After glossing over the real issues of the economy, crime and the like, he got to the substance and focus of his speech:  "But there's something else at stake, democracy itself."  The implication is clear:  if Republicans win, it is the end of our democracy.  

Biden:  "We the people must decide whether we will have fair and free elections, and every vote counts."  Yet, later on in his speech, Biden tells us:  "Once again we're seeing record turnout all over the country."  So, which is it?  Voter suppression or record voter turnout?  Georgia has reported record early voter turnout.  The same Georgia that passed a voting law to insure integrity of elections, the one that Biden called Jim Crow 2.0, somehow still resulted in early record turnout.  That's because Biden's attack, as well as the attacks of others on the Left, were nothing but lies.  Recall that Major League Baseball moved their All Star game from Atlanta to Denver over those lies.  Any apologies by Biden?  No, he continues to double down.

Biden:  "We the people must decide whether the rule of law will prevail..."  I know I'm not alone in wishing the rule of law applied when leftist groups such as Antifa and BLM were causing $2 billion worth of damage across the country.  I wish the rule of law applied in our cities, instead of criminals not being prosecuted by left-wing district attorneys.  I wish the rule of law was applied evenly in this country.  Recently, Steve Bannon was sentenced to 4 months in prison for contempt of Congress.  Obama's Attorney General, Eric Holder, was also held in contempt of Congress.  His prison sentence?  Please, he was not even prosecuted.

Biden:  "The great irony about the 2020 election is that it's the most attacked election in our history."  There's a whopper of a lie!  Hillary Clinton said the 2016 election was stolen from her.  Many Democrats said that Trump was an illegitimate President.  There was talk of impeaching Trump from the day he assumed office.  Then they made up the Russian collusion story, which was used as a vehicle for non-stop harassment of Trump during his entire term.  I cannot recall, at least not during my lifetime, of another president being so hounded during his entire term in office.  I was disappointed when Trump did not attend Biden's inauguration.  But just two days prior to Trump's inauguration, 55 Congressional Democrats had already announced that they would not attend.  

Biden's speech was non-stop about the threat to democracy if the people do not vote as he wants.  Ironically, Democrat candidates are claiming that Republicans are engaging in fear-mongering by talking about the rise in crime.  But Biden and the Democrats are trying to scare people into believing a Republican victory in the midterms means the end of democracy.  Didn't Biden promise to be the great unifier in his inaugural address?  Just another lie.    

Israel Votes - And The Issues Are Similar To Here In The US

First, the results.  Recall that Israel has a parliamentary system.  The people vote for a party, not for individuals.  The Knesset, the parliament, has 120 seats.  Any future government needs to put together a coalition of the many parties to total at least 61 seats - a majority.  After four rather indecisive elections, the Israeli public chose a conservative path.  

Benjamin Netanyahu, already Israel's longest serving prime minister, won.  More accurately, his party, Likud, won; and he is the leader of that party.  Likud got 32 seats in the Knesset.  The religious parties did well also.  The Religious Zionist party got 14 seats, Shas got 11 seats and United Torah Judaism got 7 seats.  It is expected that Israeli President Isaac Hertzog will shortly give Netanyahu the authority to form a government, if he can.  Bibi (Netanyahu) is a shrewd politician, and I am confident he will be able to put together a ruling coalition, with himself as prime minister.  And Meretz, a far left party, got zero seats.  Labor, a left-wing party, and the ruling party for many years after Israel's reestablishment in 1948, got only 4 seats.

Caroline Glick is one of the best commentators on Israeli affairs and the Middle East.  She had a very interesting article prior to the election, discussing the issues that voters should be focused on.  As you read some of the quotes from her article, you will see that it is amazingly similar to our issues in the U.S.  But maybe not that amazing, because the Left everywhere is the same.

Glick wrote that under Netanyahu Israel's economy grew.  And that "Israel was at the pinnacle of its regional power and global stature."  But under the current government there has been a backsliding.  Australia announced that it was rescinding its recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital.  And under the recent governments (of Bennett, Lapid and Gantz) "Israel surrendered its operational independence."  Glick points out that there have fewer attacks of sabotage on Iranian nuclear facilities.  

And, as Biden did in his recent speech (see the next post), Glick also discusses "democracy" as an issue in their election.  She says that the Left's version of democracy is "substantive democracy...where unelected. 'enlightened' members of the judiciary and the permanent bureaucracy decide Israel's course."  (Akin to our deep state.)  And Glick says that under Gantz Israel's boundaries (borders) were loosened because he allowed illegal construction of Palestinian homes in parts of Judea and Samaria (the West Bank).  The result is the creation of a de facto Palestinian state.  (Akin to Biden's and the Left's open borders here.)

Glick:  "In place of Jewish and Zionist education (the Education Minister) has introduced gender studies and other progressive nostrums, beginning in pre-school."  (That definitely sounds familiar.)  Glick also takes issue with the prior governing coalition on the fundamental nature of the country:  "Lapid and Gantz have both expressed their desire to gut Israel's basic law, which defines Israel as the nation state of the Jewish people."  It is amazing to me that this should even be an issue.  When the UN voted partition of Mandatory Palestine in 1947, they did it expressly to create a Jewish state and an Arab state,  The land is the Jewish homeland, with centuries - millenniums actually - of Jewish history.

Glick ends with this very astute observation (which, again, can easily apply to the US):  "Do we believe in our nation state and wish to preserve and defend it, or do we reject our national identity and national rights, and aspire to replace both with a globalist, progressive identity, devoid of Zionism and of Jewish sovereignty?"  (Do we wish to preserve our national identity of a constitutional republic of 50 states?  That post about our upcoming midterms is next.)

  

The Left Wishes To Fundamentally Transform America - Part II

In today's New York Times is an Op-Ed by regular columnist Jamelle Bouie, titled "The Constitution Is in Tension With Democracy."  When things are not going the way the Left wants, all the rules of the game need to change.  Even the fundamental rules in the Constitution.  Yet, they told us it was Trump who was the dictator, who didn't care about the rules.  

So what are the threats to democracy?  The election deniers, of course.  But only the Republican election deniers.  Not Gore, not Clinton, not Abrams, and not the many others in the Democratic Party.  The other threat to our democracy is the Constitution itself, the very structure of our government.  First, Bouie tells us about the "democratic backsliding of the past six years;" although she is only referring to the Trump years.  Why?  Aside from the fact that the Left hated Trump, there is the assertion that "Donald Trump was selected constitutionally, not elected democratically."  

I get it.  Clinton got nearly 3 million more popular votes than did Trump, but Trump won the electoral college vote and therefore became president.  Many people are unhappy with the fact that we are a republic of 50 states, and not a pure democracy.  I suspect there are some who are even unhappy with our representative form of government in the House.  Those people would like to see the people vote on everything.  

Why do we need an electoral college anyway?  Shouldn't every person's vote count equally?  There are fair arguments to make.  But the other argument is that we are a republic of 50 states.  It would be ridiculous to assert that all 50 states have the same or even similar interests.  How are the interests of those different 50 states best taken into account?  By both the electoral college and the Senate, where each state is represented equally regardless of population.  

Bouie tells us that we have "a system the basic structure of which fuels dysfunction and undermines American democracy, from how it enables minority rule to how it helps inculcate a certain kind of political chauvinism among some of the voters who benefit from lopsided representation in the Senate and the Electoral College."  Well, yes, there is lopsided representation in the Senate and the Electoral College by the smaller states.  

But I cannot help but wonder if that lopsided representation would be of any concern to the Left if it always favored Democrats.  The Left does not ask if our country is best served by a popular vote, which would likely result in the two coasts dictating the outcomes.  Tell me, are the big cities in those coastal states doing so well that we should allow them to set the agenda for the rest of the country?   

Our Constitution has been in effect since 1789.  Of course, some say that is the problem - it is old and outdated.  I hear the same thing said about the Bible.  Our Constitution has the distinction of being the oldest and most enduring governing document on earth.  It has survived a civil war, and numerous other societal challenges.  And it has been amended to meet the needs and the mores of the times.  

But the change that the Left seeks is one that they hope will insure their hold on political power for as long as is possible.  The Constitution, as written, does not do that.  And that is the problem.   

The Left Wishes To Fundamentally Transform America - Part I

You need not take my word for it.  Barack Obama told us back on October 30, 2008, that "we are five days away from fundamentally transforming the United States of America."  The Left applauded.  The mainstream media was all in.  Then we had the Trump years.  With the Democrats out of power, it was necessary to change the structure of government.  Get rid of the electoral college.  Add states that would be reliably Democratic, in order to increase the number of Democrats in the Senate.  Or, get rid of the Senate altogether.  Pack the Supreme Court.  Term limits for the Justices.  Reduce the Court's jurisdiction.  

Fast forward to now.  The first Monday in October starts a new session of the Supreme Court.  The day prior, on Sunday, October 2, the New York Times had a long editorial titled "The Supreme Court Has A Crisis Of Trust."  We all know why this so-called crisis has suddenly arisen - the Court's decision in Dobbs at the end of the last term, which overturned Roe v. Wade.  If trust in the Court has fallen, it is because papers like the Times and many others in the mainstream media and on the Left have done their best to discredit and malign the Court.

Says the Times:  "The actual cause of its (the Courts) historic unpopularity is no secret.  Over the past several years, the court has been transformed into a judicial arm of the Republican Party...Within four years, the court had a 6-to-3 right-wing supermajority..."  In other words, Trump got to appoint 3 justices to the Court, and the Left cannot tolerate that.  When the Court had 6-to-3 left-wing supermajorities?  No problem.  

At no time does the paper concern itself with whether Roe was decided on solid Constitutional grounds, even though some liberal scholars acknowledged that it was not.  At no time does the paper concern itself with what powers belong to the federal government versus state governments.  The reason, of course, is that the ends justify the means for the Left.  Actual legal and constitutional issues are of no consequence to the Left.   

Here is more from the Times:  "Election deniers in the Republican Party are undermining the integrity of the American electoral system."  If you tell them that Hillary Clinton continues to claim that the 2016 election was stolen from her, that's different.  The same for Stacey Abrams claiming the Georgia gubernatorial election was stolen from her.  Then, of course, we had the entire 4 years of the Trump Administration with a large segment of the Democratic Party not only claiming that he was an "illegitimate" president, but trying to remove him from office with their phony Russian collusion story.

The Times:  "Right-wing political violence is a present and growing threat."  Who shot up a Republican Congressional baseball game and nearly killed Rep. Steve Scalise?  That would be a left-wing political activist.  What about the threat on the life of Justice Kavanaugh?  And, how about the approximate $2 billion in property damage caused by various left-wing protesters and groups, in the summer of 2020.  Apparently, the Times is not concerned with political violence by Antifa or BLM or other left-wing groups.  

The Times quotes Justice Elena Kagan from a speech given in September at the Northwestern University School of Law:  "When courts become extensions of the political process, when people see them as extensions of the political process, when people see them as trying just to impose personal preferences on a society irrespective of the law, that's when there's a problem - and that's when there ought to be a problem."  Shame on Justice Kagan.  Here we have a sitting Justice of the highest court in the land, trying to undermine the legitimacy of that court, for the sole reason that the Dobbs decision did not go as she wanted.  

When Chief Justice John Roberts joined the 4 liberal justices in the initial decision upholding the Constitutionality of the Affordable Care Act (Obamacare), he did so by calling the individual mandate a "tax," which it clearly was not.  The then four liberal justices, including Kagan, made it clear that they  would have upheld the ACA under any legal theory.  In other words, they were willing to act as an "extension of the political process," and support Obama's signature piece of legislation no matter what. 

To this day, I am both amazed and dismayed that so many on the Left simply accept at face value what they read in the New York Times or LA Times or other mainstream papers.       

The Democrats' Attacks on Republicans Continue

Big News!  48 illegal immigrants were flown to the island of Martha's Vineyard, which has a population of about 17,000 people, and is part-time home to many of the rich and famous.  California Governor, Gavin Newsom, was just beside himself.  Although, these immigrants were not sent to the French Laundry, so what's his problem?  Anyway, Newsom decided to send a letter to the DOJ, because, as is obvious, he wants to run for president in 2024.

Newsom wrote:  "Several of the individuals who were transported to Martha's Vineyard have alleged that a recruiter induced them to accept the offer of travel based on false representations that they would be transported to Boston and would receive expedited access to work authorization...I urge US DOJ to investigate whether the alleged fraudulent inducement would support charges of kidnapping under relevant state laws."  Hmm.  Is Newsom the governor of Massachusetts?  How is this his business?  Oh, that's right, he's running for president.  

"Charges of kidnapping under relevant state laws."  Why would the US DOJ be involved in enforcing state laws?  Who "induced" these illegal immigrants to travel to the United States in the first place?  That would be Joe Biden, giving an assist to the cartels involved in human smuggling.  Newsom is just another left-wing Democrat who is more than happy to see the criminalization of politics - as long as it is always directed against Republicans.  I would love to see a poll showing how many Democrats would approve of Governors Abbott, DeSantis and Ducey being locked up with President Trump.  Let's be honest.  Today's Democrats have no interest in the two party system that has been the source of great stability in our country.  No, these people prefer a one party system, no different from the former USSR or Communist China.  

Newsom need not worry.  The Guardian reports that 30 of the 48 illegal immigrants are already represented by counsel.  The firm's name is Lawyers for Civil Rights, and is based in Boston.  How coincidental that 30 of these illegal immigrants have counsel.  And, no surprise, these attorneys are seeking a criminal investigation of Governors Abbott and DeSantis.  Here was Dick Durbin, chair of the Senate Judiciary Committee:  "It is pathetic that these governors are taking advantage of these helpless people." 

Helpless people?  Just more elitist nonsense.  Many of these "helpless" people managed to travel the approximate 2,700 miles from Venezuela to Texas.  But they can't manage an additional 100 miles to Boston?  Sometimes, CNN has the funniest online headlines.  Here's one:  "'They enriched us.'  Migrants' 44-hour visit leave indelible mark on Martha's Vineyard."  44 hours.  I'm impressed.  How many were thinking:  "We were able to get rid of the riff-raff in under two days."  That's right.  These "migrants" were shipped off to Joint Base Cape Cod.  CNN asserted:  "The migrants sent to Martha's Vineyard have been voluntarily taken to a military base for support, officials say."  Voluntarily taken to a military base?  I thought they expected to go to Boston.  CNN also told us that these migrants "cheered" when told of the move.   

President Biden threatened to sue the Republican governors.  Biden:  "Republicans are playing politics with human beings, using them as props.  What they're doing is simply wrong, it's un-American, it's reckless."  Actually, what it's doing is bringing attention to a border crisis that Biden and Harris have ignored for nearly two years.  And outrageous that Biden says Republicans are playing politics with human beings, when he is the one that invited millions of immigrants to come here illegally.  Besides, why aren't sanctuary cities and states asking to receive all the illegal immigrants flooding into Texas?  

Many of us remember how, on 9/11, US airspace was closed to all but military aircraft.  We remember how the small town of Gander in Newfoundland, Canada, welcomed 38 airplanes, with approximately 6600 to 6700 people, into their town of about 10,000 people.  Many of those people were stranded in Gander for five days or more.  Yet, the tiny town fed and housed their unexpected guests.  Martha's Vineyard managed to deal with 48 illegal immigrants for 44 hours.  Very impressive.

G-d bless the people of Gander; and credit to Governors Abbott, DeSantis and Ducey, for bringing attention to a problem that can no longer be ignored.

Time To Catch Up On Some News

(First, an apology, and a correction.  Obviously, I always want to be factually accurate in the blog.  The opinions are, of course, mine.  But I made a huge error in the August 28, 2022 post, "Growing Up In 2001 - Part II."  I incorrectly stated that 2996 people were murdered on 9/11.  In fact, 2977 people were murdered.  The additional 19 were the rat bastard terrorist a-holes who died.  My apologies for that error, and shame on me for relying on a mainstream media source for the numbers.)  

On 9/11 this year I picked up a copy of the New York Times.  As I searched through the news pages for a story about the 21st anniversary of the terrorist attacks, I did not find anything.  There was clearly nothing on the front page.  On the assumption that I must have overlooked it, I went through the news pages a second time.  Nothing.  On 9/11/01, 2753 people were murdered in and around the Twin Towers of the World Trade Center.  In New York City.  And many more have since died, from 9/11 related illnesses.  Yet, the so-called "paper of record," whose motto is "All the News That's Fit to Print," could not bother remembering those souls who were lost that day in their city.  They could not be bothered honoring the memory of the 343 members of the FDNY who died that day.  That could not be bothered honoring the memory of the 71 NYPD and other law enforcement officers who died that day.  

But, they did manage a front page anti-Trump story.  In the Opinion section was an Op-Ed titled "'America's Mayor' Finds Himself Alone."  Other than a few sentences of admiration for Rudy Giuliani's leadership on that fateful day, the rest of the Op-Ed was essentially a hit piece attacking Giuliani.  It is hardly a surprise that the New York Times has proven, yet again, to be such a big disappointment.  For those on the West Coast, the editors at the Los Angeles Times could not trouble themselves to write about the anniversary of 9/11 either.   

Remember how every word out of the mouths of every person in the Trump Administration, especially the White House Press Secretary, was fact-checked?  Not so for the lucky Karine Jean-Pierre, Press Secretary to Biden.  Fox News reported that there was no fact-checking by "Factcheck.org, Reuters, The Associated Press, The Washington Post's Glenn Kessler, and CNN's Daniel Dale."  The same report says that Snopes fact-checked her one time regarding a prior comment, and Politifact fact-checked her twice.

Maybe you believe that Jean-Pierre just does not lie.  Or, maybe you understand that the mainstream media is all in on Biden's behalf, and has no interest in disputing anything out of the Biden White House.  After all, she did say people are not just walking across the border.  If you do not watch Fox, then you probably think she is correct, because you've never seen the thousands of people walking into our country across the southern border.  Jean-Pierre asserted that Biden has done more to secure the border than Trump did.  Can you see me laughing?  

Here is a good one from Karine Jean-Pierre:  "From day one, when the Supreme Court made this extreme decision to take away a constitutional right (overturning Roe v. Wade), it was an unconstitutional action by them."  Oh, really?  And notice how every action of which they disapprove is to be deemed "extreme."  

According to a group known as The Bowery Mission, there are now 80,000 homeless people in New York City.  Another group, The Coalition for the Homeless, says that "Homelessness in New York City has reached the highest levels since the Great Depression of the 1930s."  There are parts of Los Angeles that look like the streets of a third world country, or worse.   

Recently, Rep. Alexandria Ocasio Cortez (D-NY) gave an interview to GQ.  She spoke of little girls telling her that they want her to be president.  But AOC opined that "...my experience here has given me a front-row seat to how deeply and unconsciously, as well as consciously, so many people in this country hate women."   I recall hearing similar nonsense from people on the left in 2008, when Obama was running for the first time.  He could never win.  Too many people are racist and hate blacks.  Except, Obama won.  Twice.  As for women, in 2016 Hillary Clinton received 65,853,514 votes compared to Trump's 62,984,828.  

Both the 2008 and 2016 elections proved that people do not hate blacks or women.  What AOC's comment about women (and the comments by leftists about Obama in 2008), does demonstrate is the utter disregard that these leftists have for their fellow Americans.  It is not just Hillary's basket of deplorables, when referring to Republicans.  It's pretty much how they think of all Americans - racists, sexists, etc. etc.