Friday, November 30, 2018

Will This Election Result Finally Put an End to Liberals' Hang-wringing Over Gerrymandering?

Democrats play the exact same games when they're empowered to do so, yet the media doesn't typically frame those machinations as an emergency in need of rectification because the media is heavily composed of Democrats and liberals.

The reason the howling over gerrymandering has grown so loud in recent years is that Republicans controlled much of the process across the country, thanks to sweeping state-level wins in the 2010 midterm election blowout.

With Democrats mounting their own blue wave this year, they're in a much stronger position to exert far greater influence over redistricting following the 2020 census - at which point the gerrymandering panic may mysteriously subside.

Even with Democrats' strong gains, liberal media outlets are still working to undermine the legitimacy of the results, suggesting that districts drawn by the GOP unfairly mitigated further victories to which Democrats were entitled.

So for all the talk about gerrymandering and the structural favoritism for the GOP, Dems won 53.8% of the House seats.

These additional factoids show that Democrats won precisely the share of House seats that they "Should" have, based on their aggregate vote total.

For all the bellyaching from liberals about fiendish Republicans' grotesque contortions of the process in order to distort the results in their favor, Democrats won exactly the number of House seats under the GOP-dominated map as they would have if every House vote in the country were poured into a single pot, then seats were divvied up proportionally.

https://townhall.com/tipsheet/guybenson/2018/11/30/will-this-new-statistic-finally-put-an-end-to-liberals-hangwringing-over-gerrymandering-n2536724

California’s Election Laws Are Vulnerable To Fraud

  1. Mailing a ballot to every voter in the county, allowing these ballots to arrive up to a week after Election Day, and allowing individuals to register to vote and cast a ballot on the day of an election give ample opportunity for an individual intent on committing voter fraud to do so.
  2. And what about low-information voters who hadn't been planning to cast a ballot? If someone showed up at their door asking for their ballot, would they feel obligated to quickly fill it out and give it to them? There seems to be very little benefit for the actual voter (I mean, how hard is it to drop a filled-out ballot in one's mailbox on election day?) and a huge incentive for the harvester to act shady.
  3. On Election Day, one can show up to a polling location and register to vote and cast a ballot all on the same day by taking advantage of the Conditional Voter Registration process, which is explained in this YouTube video featuring millennials with pastel-colored hair who could not get it together and register to vote on time like the rest of us.
  4. While waiting for the official ballot tally, Kim flew to Washington D.C. to attend orientation events for freshmen members of Congress, including the class photo op, but as ballots continued to pour in up to a week after the election, the results flipped and she ultimately lost.
  5. Six Republican candidates were leading in congressional races across California on Election Night, only to see the results flip to Democratic victories weeks later due to California's lax election laws.
  6. California allows voters to register to vote and cast a ballot on Election Day.
  7. This election, every voter in Madera, Napa, Nevada, Sacramento and San Mateo counties received an absentee ballot — whether they requested one or not, Shawn Steel writes for The Washington Times.


http://thefederalist.com/2018/11/30/paul-ryan-right-californias-election-laws-vulnerable-fraud/

The Incoming Congress May Look Diverse, but Diversity of Thought Is Dwindling

If diversity is about how people look, this Congress is very diverse.

If diversity means diversity of thought, it's practically nonexistent.

The celebration about alleged diversity is really a celebration of one, uniform voice on the left, dressed in different colors, calling in unison for moving America further toward socialism and secular humanism.

All the politics of today's Democratic Party, which is as far left as it has ever been, is about how people look and where they come from.

They claim to enhance individual dignity by expanding government to dictate our health care, how we save and retire, our relationship with our employer, how and what we can say to others and what they can say to us, and just about every detail of our private lives and decisions.

Hispanics voted 69 percent for Democrats; blacks, 90 percent; and Asians, 77 percent.

Republicans and all Americans who care about bequeathing a free nation to their children and grandchildren need to think long and hard about how to communicate the importance of freedom to Americans of color.

https://www.dailysignal.com/2018/11/29/the-incoming-congress-may-look-diverse-but-diversity-of-thought-is-dwindling/

Trump is Right to Confront China

Those who argue for a more aggressive stance against China are obligated to make the case as compelling as possible because an assertive approach to China has many risks.

Yes, the Chinese manufacture many goods for the United States or assemble high tech products for consumption, but the United States is not dependent on China for the underlying high technology.

Technology-intensive products such as iPhones are indeed assembled in China and China manufactures memory chips and other common components, but these are not considered exceptionally high tech.

Since we import so many electronic items from China, it would be easy to assume that the US relies on China to make the highly advanced central processing units that act as the brains for the manufactured common electronic devices.

The United States remains an economic competitor against China specifically because we independently develop and sell advanced technology products or components.

If the United States continues to allow the People's Republic of China to steal American intellectual property, then China's ambition of "Made in China 2025" where the world is dependent on China for all cutting edge technology will come true.

China still relies on America for advanced technologies, not the other way around.

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2018/11/trump_is_right_to_confront_china.html

Sorry, You Can’t Protect Mueller

Mitch McConnell just did our constitutional order an enormous favor by burying the so-called Robert Mueller protection bill, hopefully never to rise again.

If the president can fire the attorney general, he certainly can fire Mueller.

In compelling Senate testimony, Yale law professor Akhil Amar explained the constitutional problems with the Mueller protection bill.

The Mueller protection bill would really represent a return to the constitutional anomaly of the old independent-counsel statute.

Yes, there's lots of criminal action in the Mueller probe - the Paul Manafort trial, the various plea deals - but current Justice Department guidance says that the president himself can't be indicted.

Trump has huffed and puffed about Mueller, yet cooperated - in some instances, quite fulsomely - with his investigation.

That's probably all the protection Mueller needs, and certainly all the protection he can legitimately be afforded.

https://www.nationalreview.com/2018/11/robert-mueller-protection-bill-trump-russia-probe/

You Don't Have to Love Assange to Fear His Prosecution

Though the new information makes clear that prosecution is planned if Assange can be delivered to American custody, no further details are available.

Assange is under scrutiny at a minimum for unauthorized possession of classified material going back to at least 2010, when Wikileaks burst onto the international scene with evidence of American war crimes in Iraq and exposed years' worth of classified State Department diplomatic cables.

More recently, Assange has been accused of trying to manipulate the 2016 U.S. presidential election with his release of emails from the Democratic National Committee server.

It's coming to a head now with the government's efforts to nail Julian Assange.

Assange had no national interest in mind, no sincere desire to inform the public.

They'll self-righteously proclaim that Assange going to jail is sad but unfortunately necessary, claiming he just took things too far.

Point between the government's need to protect information, the right to expose information, and the media's right to publish it, an Assange prosecution will create new precedents, weapons for clever future prosecutors.

https://www.theamericanconservative.com/articles/julian-assange-test-case-for-freedom-of-the-press/

Google Employees Debated Burying Conservative Media In Search

Google employees debated whether to bury The Daily Caller and other conservative media outlets in the company's search function as a response to President Donald Trump's election.

Google employees similarly sought to manipulate search results to combat Trump's travel ban.

Google employees debated whether to bury conservative media outlets in the company's search function as a response to President Donald Trump's election in 2016, internal Google communications obtained by The Daily Caller News Foundation reveal.

One Google engineer, Uri Dekel, identified himself as a Clinton supporter but argued that manipulating search results was the wrong route to take.

"Google has never manipulated its search results or modified any of its products to promote a particular political ideology. Our processes and policies do not allow for any manipulation of search results to promote political ideologies."

The discussion about whether to bury conservative media outlets isn't the first evidence that some Google employees have sought to manipulate search results for political ends.

After Trump announced his initial travel ban in January 2017, Google employees discussed ways to manipulate search results in order to push back against the president's order.

https://dailycaller.com/2018/11/29/google-censorship-conservative-media/

How World War I Changed Map of the World

Three Baltic countries, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia came into existence after World War I. However, these were not part of the post-war treaties.

Instead, each country used the chaos following the Russian Revolution and end of World War I to declare independence.

Stalin annexed these countries in 1940 following the outbreak of World War II. They remained part of the Soviet Union until its collapse in 1991, when the Baltic nations once again became independent.

Several of these border changes were issues leading up to World War II. Many ethnic Germans ended up within Czechoslovakia in an area called the Sudetenland.

Hitler used this as a pretense to invade Poland in 1939, starting World War II. Africa.

Most did not achieve independence until after World War II. Asia.

The cataclysm of World War I greatly shaped the borders of the world today.


https://www.realclearhistory.com/articles/2018/11/29/how_world_war_i_changed_map_of_the_world_389.html

How Trump Can Cut Spending If Congress Doesn't

At an Oct. 17 Cabinet meeting, President Trump directed department and agency heads to reduce spending by at least 5 percent in the fiscal year 2020 budget.

Time and again, Congress has ignored presidential cost-saving recommendations and plowed ahead with budgets that increase both spending and the size of government.

Just last year the president's budget sought to reduce non-defense discretionary spending by $54 billion.

The Democratic House can be expected to make much-needed defense spending increases contingent on increases in domestic spending.

Trump is not entirely powerless to cut excessive spending.

Welcome to the Administrative State, where departments and agencies are forever issuing new rules and clarifications about how they will run their programs.

Recognizing the profound fiscal effect of administrative actions, the Office of Management and Budget under President George W. Bush issued a memo requiring departments and agencies planning to take administrative actions that would increase spending on entitlements to also come up with proposals for actions that would reduce mandatory spending by an equal amount.


https://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2018/11/29/how_trump_can_cut_spending_if_congress_doesnt_138784.html

Democrats use tear gas image as sentimental weapon to avoid clearheaded immigration debate

That's where we are now, aren't we? The caravan of thousands of Central American migrants is finally at the border.

The other day, after rocks were thrown at American border officials, several hundred migrants bolted through, trying to illegally rush their way into America, and some were hit with tear gas.

The American people who are concerned about their porous borders know this, which is one reason journalism is held in low regard.

The history of illegal immigration along the southern border has long been cynically bipartisan.

As liberal pundits wring their hands about the tear gas and bleat about Trump's stringent border enforcement, casually tossing words like "Fascist" and "Racist," something else is happening.

Where are the liberal Democratic solutions to address those in the migrant caravans determined to push illegally across the borders?

Democratic politicians insist they're not for open borders, but they don't support strict border enforcement.

https://tribunecontentagency.com/article/democrats-use-tear-gas-image-as-sentimental-weapon-to-avoid-clearheaded-immigration-debate/

Half-baked 'low-tax socialism' is getting us a whole progressive hell

Most of the growth in debt has come from the public share of the debt, not the so-called debt we owe ourselves.

Again, revenues would have been higher on the corporate side if not for the tax cuts, but there is evidence that much of the increase in payroll tax revenue was due to job growth, which was fueled, in part, by the tax cuts themselves.

Rather than discuss any plan to cut spending and actually reduce the harmful footprint of government in the private economy, Republicans are talking about another tax package and more spending, totaling $54.7 billion.

Tax cuts are good, but at some point, we've crossed the Rubicon where, if all Republicans do when in power is cut taxes, but at the same time they increase spending rather than cutting it, the tax cuts become counterproductive in many ways.

Until now, the low tax doctrine has been worthwhile, but any continued effort to only cut taxes while continuing to increase spending is counterproductive both policy-wise and politically.

The more we are desperate to service the debt, the higher the interest rates will rise, which will attract even more investments into treasury bonds and away from private investment, creating a perpetual death spiral of more debt, higher interest rates, increased debt payments, and less private investment.

It's time we promote free market reduction of government market interventions along with the tax cuts or no tax cuts at all.

https://www.conservativereview.com/news/half-baked-low-tax-socialism-is-getting-us-a-whole-progressive-hell/

Uncovering Corruption in the Mueller Inquisition

Government corruption doesn't end with a change in administrations.

The DOJ is protecting the Mueller probe-and Mueller is operating without proper oversight.

Judicial Watch, Inc., a conservative, non-partisan educational foundation, promotes transparency, accountability and integrity in government, politics and the law.

Through its educational endeavors, Judicial Watch advocates high standards of ethics and morality in our nation's public life and seeks to ensure that political and judicial officials do not abuse the powers entrusted to them by the American people.

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https://canadafreepress.com/article/uncovering-corruption-in-the-mueller-inquisition

Firm with $297 Million Government Contract to Boost Border Patrol Hires Only 15 Agents

In a fleecing of American taxpayers, a company with a $297 million government contract to hire Border Patrol agents has only managed to enlist 15.

A year ago, the Trump administration contracted the Arlington, Virginia-based firm, Accenture Federal Service, to recruit 7,500 new agents to help fortify the famously porous border.

Penned last November, the government's five-year contract with Accenture calls for bringing 5,000 Border Patrol agents, 2,000 CBP officers, and 500 air & marine officers.

The agency has doled out $43 million and the cash will keep flowing until it reaches the contract's nearly $300 million limit unless the government terminates the agreement.

The online news article that exposed this travesty quotes several unnamed sources at the Homeland Security agency, including a genderless CBP "Spokesperson" who said Accenture has 3,700 additional candidates in the hiring process and that the company expects a "Gradual increase of candidates." Another CBP source trashed the Accenture deal, saying the following in the story: "This really has been a huge waste of money since Accenture received a large up-front amount, regardless of if they hired anyone," said the person who called the deal "Flawed from the beginning." The reporter reached out to Accenture but a spokeswoman declined to comment and referred all inquiries to the government.

At the time the agency employed 19,437 Border Patrol agents, 947 Air and Marine interdiction agents, and 23,079 CBP officers.

CBP has long been plagued with corruption and many worry a hiring frenzy could make things worse because the agency will lower standards to meet President Donald Trump's executive order mandating thousands of new border agents.

https://www.judicialwatch.org/blog/2018/11/firm-with-297-mil-govt-contract-to-boost-border-patrol-hires-only-15-agents/