[WSJ] Everybody knew. Everybody of consequence at the Federal Bureau of Investigation and Justice Department understood fully in the middle of 2016‐as the FBI embarked on its counterintelligence probe of Donald Trump‐that it was doing so based on disinformation provided by Hillary Clinton’s campaign. That’s the big revelation from the transcript of the testimony Justice Department official Bruce Ohr gave Congress in August. The transcripts haven’t been released, but parts were confirmed for me by congressional sources.
Mr. Ohr testified that he sat down with dossier author Christopher Steele on July 30, 2016, and received salacious information the opposition researcher had compiled on Mr. Trump. Mr. Ohr immediately took that to the FBI’s then-Deputy Director Andy McCabe and lawyer Lisa Page. In August he took it to Peter Strzok, the bureau’s lead investigator. In the same month, Mr. Ohr believes, he briefed senior personnel in the Justice Department’s criminal division: Deputy Assistant Attorney General Bruce Swartz, lawyer Zainab Ahmad and fraud unit head Andrew Weissman. The last two now work for special counsel Robert Mueller.
More important, Mr. Ohr told this team the information came from the Clinton camp and warned that it was likely biased, certainly unproven. "When I provided [the Steele information] to the FBI, I tried to be clear that this is source information," he testified. "I don’t know how reliable it is. You’re going to have to check it out and be aware. These guys were hired by somebody relating to‐who’s related to the Clinton campaign, and be aware."
Continued on Page 49
#2
Bureau's honesty? That ship sailed long ago. The top officials are the one's who generated the monumental clusterf*&%. I would think and hope the line agents are disappointed and offended by their leadership. There is some kindness in the government shutdown. It slows down the bullcrap a little bit. Now, where's the fleet of D-9 dozers to lop off a few agencies?
[PJ] If Oregon Governor Kate Brown has her way, the Beaver State will become the first to require universal home visits for newborn children in the care of their own parents.
Senate Bill 526, introduced this month in the Oregon Legislative Assembly as part of Brown's budget, orders the Oregon Health Authority to "study home visiting by licensed health care providers." Lawmakers went so far as to declare that SB 526 is an "emergency" measure ‐ one that requires a resolution by the end of the year. The intro to the bill, the language of which has not yet been crafted, reads:
The Oregon Health Authority shall study home visiting by licensed health care providers in this state. The authority shall submit findings and recommendations for legislation to an interim committee of the Legislative Assembly related to health care not later than December 31, 2019.
Moreover, the 18 sponsors of the bill claim that its passage is "necessary for the immediate preservation of the public peace, health and safety," and therefore "an emergency is declared to exist."
#1
Moreover, the 18 sponsors of the bill claim that its passage is "necessary for the immediate preservation of the public peace, health and safety," and therefore "an emergency is declared to exist."
No known specific crime. Unwarranted search and surveillance in private property. We don't need no stink'n Constitution.
Reichstag Fire -
The day after the fire, at Hitler's request, President Hindenburg signed the Reichstag Fire Decree into law by using Article 48 of the Weimar Constitution. The Reichstag Fire Decree suspended most civil liberties in Germany, including habeas corpus, freedom of expression, freedom of the press, the right of free association and public assembly, the secrecy of the post and telephone.
#3
Well. People who don't vote according to "community standards" will get extra attention. Members of protected minorities will be assiduously ignored...
Posted by: M. Murcek ||
01/18/2019 10:16 Comments ||
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[The Scotsman] Nicola Sturgeon has issued a rallying call to Scottish independence supporters to "get out there and make the case" as she told MSPs the Brexit turmoil now means Scots are ready to leave the UK.
The First Minister reiterated her promise to reveal plans for a second independence referendum in a "matter of weeks", regardless of what happens with the Brexit process.
She insisted Scots needed an alternative to the chaos engulfing Westminster politics after Theresa May’s EU withdrawal deal was overwhelmingly rejected by the Commons and given the absence of a clear way forward. The First Minister met Mrs May on Wednesday following the historic Commons defeat of the Prime Minister’s deal on Tuesday. Afterwards, Ms Sturgeon said she would announce the timing of a second independence vote "within weeks". "I think the Prime Minister is very well aware of my views on independence, I support independence and I think the sooner Scotland is independent the better for all of us," the First Minister told MSPs at Holyrood yesterday.
"I think it is essential, given the catastrophe that Scotland faces ‐ to our economy, to our society, to living standards, to prospects for the next generation, to our reputation in the world ‐ that the option of independence must be open to people in Scotland.
"When people in Scotland have the ability to choose independence, I believe that the country will opt to be an independent country."
She will set out her proposals on the timing of a second Scottish referendum in coming weeks, regardless of any delay to the Brexit process.
#4
Excellent - without SNP support the Labor party will never have a majority in England again. And Scotland can enjoy paying social benefits without the largesse of the south covering the tab.
#6
The North Sea Oil Fields peaked production in 1999 and only "improved efficiencies" as well as adding a few fields on the periphery have slowed the decline in production. That source of revenue the Scotland Will Be Free™ is depending on for a secure/sustainable revenue source?
[Breitbart] Angel Mom Agnes Gibboney is blasting the hypocrisy of U.S. corporations who have vowed to help furloughed federal workers during the government shutdown, saying she "never" received an ounce of help when her son was murdered by an illegal alien.
Banks, wireless phone companies, and restaurants have set up hotlines where furloughed federal workers can call and receive help during the government shutdown as House and Senate Democrats refuse to fund a border wall to stop illegal immigration.
Gibboney ‐ whose 29-year-old son Ronald Da Silva was killed by an illegal alien in 2002 in El Monte, California ‐ says that help from corporate America was never extended to her when she lost her son.
#2
Since Congress passed a bill that requires reimbursement for missed paychecks of Federal Workers, it will be very easy for furloughed federal employees to get loans - there will be multiple companies to choose from
Posted by: lord garth ||
01/18/2019 6:41 Comments ||
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#4
Might be a good time for POTUS to form a group to decide who actually is a "key and essential gov't worker." Some jobs and personnel could be transferred to the States, Education and Agriculture being two.
#6
Apparently the Fed workers we see on TV lamenting their state have never learned to save money, either.
Posted by: Mullah Richard ||
01/18/2019 8:31 Comments ||
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#7
Seriously, it is nothing new at all for people in this country to lose their jobs. Not just be furloughed for a few weeks but kicked to the curb by some of these same corporations because it has been determined that their services are no longer required. And, as we have mentioned here previously, when that happens you go out and find another job. But when your son is murdered, how do you get past that?
Posted by: Abu Uluque ||
01/18/2019 12:39 Comments ||
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[Real Clear Politics] Conservative columnist Victor Davis Hanson opined on T.V. hosts accusing President Trump of racism on Wednesday's broadcast of 'Tucker Carlson Tonight.' Hanson said anyone who claims to be progressive and not racist gets a blank check on racism. He said the idea that Democrats couldn't possibly be guilty of racism is "dangerous" and a "window" into the soul of progressives.
[Townhall] In this era when there has been more information available to more people than at any time in the past, it is also true that there has been more misinformation from more different sources than ever. We are not talking about differences of opinion or inadequate verification, but about statements and catchwords in utter defiance of facts.
Among the most popular current catchwords are "climate change deniers." Stop and think. Have you ever -- even once in your entire life -- seen, heard or read even one human being who denied that climates change?
It is hard even to imagine how any minimally knowledgeable person could deny that climates change, when there are fossils of marine creatures in the Sahara Desert. Obviously there has been quite a climate change there.
The next time someone talks about "climate change deniers," ask them to name one -- and tell you just where specifically you can find their words, declaring that climates do not change. You can bet the rent money that they cannot tell you.
Why all this talk about these mythical creatures called "climate change deniers"? Because there are some meteorologists and other scientists who refuse to join the stampede toward drastic economic changes to prevent what others say will be catastrophic levels of "global warming."
[AmericanThinker] "James Watson, who discovered the double-helix structure of DNA alongside Francis Crick in the 1950s based on the work of British chemist Rosalind Franklin, Among many, many, many others - who, unfortunately, were all white males - and didn't actually notice Rosalind's (Jewish = bad, but the only female who could be history revised to have anything with the subject) contribution at the time.
said in a PBS film that genes cause a difference in intelligence between white and black people in IQ tests.
"The 90-year-old's comments were labeled 'reprehensible' by the Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL) on New York's Long Island, where Watson had been the director from 1968 to 1993.
The laboratory said it 'unequivocally rejects the unsubstantiated and reckless personal opinions Dr. James D. Watson expressed,' noting the statements were 'reprehensible [and] unsupported by science[.]'"
Watson was shortly relieved of his administrative duties, but not his title.
Among other "reckless" statements attributed to the Nobel winner, Watson implied what has been statistically proved over and over: that stupidity is linked to genes. In CNN's report, the word "unsubstantiated" stands out most glaringly, especially in light of the existence of a warehouseful of substantiation to support Watson ‐ for example, documented statistical IQ differences among the races among humanity. And he didn't even mention the differences between genders
[NYT] The internet expands the bounds of acceptable discourse, so ideas considered out of bounds not long ago now rocket toward widespread acceptability. See: cannabis legalization, government-run health care, white nationalism and, of course, the flat-earthers.
Yet there’s one political shore that remains stubbornly beyond the horizon. It’s an idea almost nobody in mainstream politics will address, other than to hurl the label as a bloody cudgel.
I’m talking about opening up America’s borders to everyone who wants to move here.
Imagine not just opposing President Trump’s wall but also opposing the nation’s cruel and expensive immigration and border-security apparatus in its entirety. Imagine radically shifting our stance toward outsiders from one of suspicion to one of warm embrace. Imagine that if you passed a minimal background check, you’d be free to live, work, pay taxes and die in the United States. Imagine moving from Nigeria to Nebraska as freely as one might move from Massachusetts to Maine.
There’s a witheringly obvious moral, economic, strategic and cultural case for open borders, and we have a political opportunity to push it. As Democrats jockey for the presidency, there’s room for a brave politician to oppose President Trump’s racist immigration rhetoric not just by fighting his wall and calling for the abolishment of I.C.E. but also by making a proactive and affirmative case for the vast expansion of immigration.
It would be a change from the stale politics of the modern era, in which both parties agreed on the supposed wisdom of "border security" and assumed that immigrants were to be feared.
As an immigrant, this idea confounds me. My family came to the United States from our native South Africa in the late 1980s. After jumping through lots of expensive and confusing legal hoops, we became citizens in 2000. Obviously, it was a blessing: In rescuing me from a society in which people of my color were systematically oppressed, America has given me a chance at liberty.
#1
NYT Columnist Farhad Manjoo has never heard of David Ricardo.
Here's a suggestion... Maybe he should let anyone who wants to work for the NYTs work there, they can dilute the wages of the current staff for every new person and cram a few more desks in here an' there. I'm sure Farhad wouldn't be opposed.
#3
Show some Charity, Farhad Manjoo! "Adopt A Migrant Family" and pay all of the Federal, State and Local benefits yourself so that taxes are not raised on the uninvolved. Don't be so quick to spend Other Peoples' Money™.
#4
After six months, 100 million Chinese would have moved here in the greatest human migration in history. They would vote for Chinese candidates and in general be separatist.
Posted by: Herb McCoy ||
01/18/2019 4:03 Comments ||
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#5
Imagine that if you passed a minimal background check, you’d be free to live, work, pay taxes and die in the United States.
So he's not really advocating open borders. He just wants a different entrance exam than the current law allows.
Posted by: Bobby ||
01/18/2019 9:46 Comments ||
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#6
Farhad Manjoo sounds like a real All-American name - maybe we should listen to him.
#7
Oddly enough, encountering his name almost always puts me in mind, briefly but vividly, of... an all-American charitable organization. Good to see them hanging in there.
Imagine you're a Disneyland shareholder and you hear them stating that they're going to end the entry fee and you realise that some of the board have a separate company that owns hotels inside and nearby...
A multi-volume chronology and reference guide set detailing three years of the Mexican Drug War between 2010 and 2012.
Rantburg.com and borderlandbeat.com correspondent and author Chris Covert presents his first non-fiction work detailing
the drug and gang related violence in Mexico.
Chris gives us Mexican press dispatches of drug and gang war violence
over three years, presented in a multi volume set intended to chronicle the death, violence and mayhem which has
dominated Mexico for six years.
Rantburg was assembled from recycled algorithms in the United States of America. No
trees were destroyed in the production of this weblog. We did hurt some, though. Sorry.
[NYT] The internet expands the bounds of acceptable discourse, so ideas considered out of bounds not long ago now rocket toward widespread acceptability. See: cannabis legalization, government-run health care, white nationalism and, of course, the flat-earthers.
