Adam Schiff Saying Something About Russia Doesn’t Make It True

Rep. Adam Schiff, the top Democrat on the House Intelligence Committee, writes in the Wall Street Journal that evidence abounds of the Trump campaign colluding with Russia to steal the 2016 election from Hillary Clinton.
But rather than providing evidence, he proves the opposite: Democrats have absolutely no proof of President Trump colluding with Russia. And Schiff harms himself and the country by making such wild claims. To see why, take Schiff’s points in turn.
First, Schiff claims that because the probe by Special Counsel Robert Mueller has led to charges, this must mean Mueller is on to something. Really? Paul Manafort was charged with crimes unrelated to his time as Trump’s campaign chair, and Manafort’s brief time as the campaign chair was only due to a lack of GOP operatives willing to work with Trump who understood the Byzantine process of a floor-fight at the Republican National Convention. As soon as Trump realized Manafort was problematic, he dropped him like a hot potato.
The charges against Manafort are related to him failing to disclose work for, and payments received by, foreign governments. Yes, this is a problem, but many in DC who violate this statute go unprosecuted. During the time in question—before Manafort was Trump campaign chair—Manafort was working with Tony Podesta, the brother of Hillary Clinton’s campaign chair John Podesta. We are all patiently waiting for Democrat Tony Podesta, and many others who ran afoul of this law, to be charged.

http://thefederalist.com/2017/12/22/adam-schiff-saying-something-russia-doesnt-make-true/

AG Sessions Orders DOJ To Put FBI’s Evidence Under The Microscope

So, last month, there were rumors that Attorney General Jeff Sessions was looking into whether a special counsel would be necessary to look into Clinton-Uranium One transaction. In his testimony to Congress in November, he threw cold water on it, saying there wasn’t enough evidence to appoint one. Now, NBC News is reporting that Sessions has instructed prosecutors at the Justice Department to interview the FBI agents who were involved in the Uranium One probe and explain the evidence they obtained [emphasis mine]:
On the orders of Attorney General Jeff Sessions, Justice Department prosecutors have begun asking FBI agents to explain the evidence they found in a now dormant criminal investigation into a controversial uranium deal that critics have linked to Bill and Hillary Clinton, multiple law enforcement officials told NBC News.
The interviews with FBI agents are part of the Justice Department's effort to fulfill a promise an assistant attorney general made to Congress last month to examine whether a special counsel was warranted to look into what has become known as the Uranium One deal, a senior Justice Department official said.

https://townhall.com/tipsheet/mattvespa/2017/12/21/ag-sessions-ive-asked-doj-prosecutors-to-ask-the-fbi-what-theyve-got-on-uranium-one-n2425851 

List of United Nations resolutions concerning Israel

The following is a list of United Nations resolutions concerning Israel. As of 2013, Israel had been condemned in 45 resolutions by United Nations Human Rights Council. Since its creation in 2006—the Council had resolved almost more resolutions condemning Israel than on the rest of the world combined. The 45 resolutions comprised almost half (45.9%) of all country-specific resolutions passed by the Council, not counting those under Agenda Item 10 (countries requiring technical assistance).^[1] From 1967 to 1989 the UN Security Council adopted 131 resolutions directly addressing the Arab–Israeli conflict. In early Security Council practice, resolutions did not directly invoke Chapter VII. They made an explicit determination of a threat, breach of the peace, or act of aggression, and ordered an action in accordance with Article 39 or 40. Resolution 54 determined that a threat to peace existed within the meaning of Article 39 of the Charter, reiterated the need for a truce, and ordered a cease-fire pursuant to Article 40 of the Charter. Although the phrase "Acting under Chapter VII" was never mentioned as the basis for the action taken, the chapter's authority was being used.^[2]
The United Nations General Assembly has adopted a number of resolutions saying that the strategic relationship with the United States encourages Israel to pursue aggressive and expansionist policies and practices.^[3] The 9th Emergency Session of the General Assembly was convened at the request of the Security Council when the United States blocked efforts to adopt sanctions against Israel.^[4] The United States responded to the frequent criticism from UN organs by adopting the Negroponte doctrine of opposing any Security Council resolutions criticizing Israel that did not also denounce Palestinian militant activity.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_United_Nations_resolutions_concerning_Israel 

Obamanet vs. Net Neutrality

On December 14, the Federal Communications Commission voted to repeal another Obama legacy: the Orwellian-named “Open Internet Order” FCC-15-24, or Obamanet. Prepared by far-left groups and Eric Schmidt, the chairman of Google and a member of Obama’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology, it was adopted by Obama’s FCC in February 2015. The repeal goes in effect in sixty days after official publication unless it's held up in courts. Howls from the left sound as if a horde of demons is being doused with holy water while the broad public, including many conservatives, is confused. Most people mistakenly believe that Obamanet protected some “net neutrality” (in quotes because the term appeared only in 2003 and the meaning has been changing). On the contrary, Obamanet canceled net neutrality. Conservatives think that the order was redistributing wealth from those who created the internet infrastructure to Obama and Al Gore’s cronies in Silicon Valley. This is correct, but just scratching the surface.

Obamanet has probably been the worst violation of freedom of speech and religion that this country has ever known. The confusion is excusable. The Obamanet order was rewritten secretly after a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking presented an entirely different proposal. Like ObamaCare, Obamanet was extremely lengthy and sprawled on 300+ pages (the original 2005 FCC policy statement, establishing net neutrality as FCC policy, was only three pages long). And there was a repetition of the “We [need] to pass the bill in order to find out what [is] in it” (Nancy Pelosi about ObamaCare) moment. But unlike ObamaCare, Obamanet was presented as a small regulation that was intended to preserve what already existed. Furthermore, Obamanet exploited the technical nature of the subject not understood by commentators, most of the public, and even legal experts. And it received wall-to-wall support from the “tech” monopolies in Silicon Valley that benefited from it.

Obamanet banned freedoms in the name of “protections.” Its language is directed at ISPs, but the target is all citizens, especially children. One of the banned things is family-friendly internet access.

http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2017/12/obamanet_vs_net_neutrality.html#ixzz51zvNuAOo 

Sally Yates, One of the Biggest Frauds of the Year

Drunk on the ruling class’s praise of her subversive hackery at the Justice Department, Sally Yates evidently conceives of herself as a very august presence in American public life. How else to explain her state of the union-style address in USA Today this week?

The piece is full of third-rate partisan cant dressed up as deep thoughts on “who we are as a country.” Yates has taken it upon herself to inform us of America’s “core values.” Full of the usual jargon about “inflection points” and laughable liberal sanctimony (“our country’s strength comes from honoring, not weaponizing, the diversity that springs from being a nation of Native Americans and immigrants of different races, religions and nationalities”), the piece is only notable for its audacious hypocrisy on the subject of “apolitical law enforcement.”

It is hard to imagine a less credible commentator on this subject than Yates. She deserves a special place in the annals of wholly politicized law enforcement. Were it not for the safety net the media and ruling class held beneath her, the political high-wire act she performed during the transition period after the election would have been unfathomable. Yates was an Obama appointee whose husband had run for the Democrats and donated to the Democrats. Obviously ambitious, she was rooting for Trump’s loss and hoping for a plum position in the Hillary administration. That desire thwarted, she then set to work shafting the incoming administration. First, she joined forces with other embittered Obama holdovers and deep-state subversives to entrap Michael Flynn and criminally leak details of the entrapment to the media. Then, out of nothing more than ideological pique, she told the entire Justice Department to block the president on his manifestly constitutional travel ban that even a wobbly Supreme Court has upheld. As acts of political presumption go, those couldn’t rank higher.

https://spectator.org/sally-yates-one-of-the-biggest-frauds-of-the-year/ 

The GOP Tax Bill Isn’t the End of the World. Far From It.

Sometime today, both the House and the Senate will hold final votes on the tax legislation that has been working its way through Congress this year. And then, tomorrow, President Trump will sign it into law.

Democrats have treated the bill's passage as an apocalyptic event. Earlier this month, when a previous iteration of the bill passed in the Senate, Nancy Pelosi, the Democratic House Minority Leader, declared that it was literally the apocalypse. "It is the end of the world," she said, singling out the bill's repeal of the individual mandate. "This is Armageddon." How perilous the world must seem to her that this muddled bit of tax cutting could bring it all down.

Pelosi's apoplectic reaction offers, among other things, a reminder of how long it has been since Republicans last passed major legislation, and how unhinged the responses to such an event can be. The Tax Cuts and Jobs Act (TCJA) is not the end of the world, nor anything close. It is not even, unfortunately, the end of the tax code as we know it.

Instead, it is a predictable, conventional piece of Republican tax legislation, one that cuts taxes for corporations and individuals while sharply increasing the deficit. It is the sort of thing you can imagine passing, more or less, under Mitt Romney or John McCain or Jeb Bush. Which means, of course, that it has all the problems, and benefits, of conventional Republican thinking about taxes.

Among those benefits is the bill's centerpiece: a permanent reduction in the corporate tax rate, from 35 percent, the highest in the developed world, down to 21 percent. There is little serious disagreement amongst mainstream economists that America's corporate tax rate is too high. In 2012, President Obama proposed slashing it to 28 percent. Predictably, the Republican plan goes further, but it still leaves America with a rate that is higher than the European average of 18.8 percent. Cutting corporate taxes may not provide the sort of quick boost to job creation or economic growth that some of its more enthusiastic backers claim. But it positions the nation to be more competitive internationally in the long term by permanently reducing the cost of doing business in the United States.

http://reason.com/blog/2017/12/19/gop-tax-bill-not-apocalypse-end-world 

Here's What Jill Stein Had to Say About Her Dinner With Putin

Former Green Party presidential nominee Jill Stein spoke out Thursday about why she’s the latest target in a congressional inquiry into Russia’s interference in the 2016 election.

Stein called the 2015 RT dinner she attended with Russian President Vladimir Putin in Moscow a “non-event” because there wasn’t even a translator at the table.

"There was no translator at the table," Stein said on CNN’s “OutFront with Erin Burnett.” "Vladimir Putin came in very late, with three, four people that I thought were his bodyguards, turns out they were core people in his administration, but you never would have known that."

"There were no introductions, no conversations," she added. "Russians spoke Russian, I spoke to the only person in earshot who spoke English, who was a German diplomat that was sitting to my right. So it was really quite a non-event."

The most “significant” part of the dinner was shaking Putin’s hand, she explained.

https://townhall.com/tipsheet/leahbarkoukis/2017/12/22/jill-stein-speaks-out-n2426134

ObamaCare Mandate Killed. What Does This Do to ObamaCare?

The tax bill kills the ObamaCare mandate. How did that happen? And what does this do to ObamaCare?

“The individual mandate is being repealed,” crowed President Trump during a Wednesday cabinet meeting at the White House, in response to news that the final version of the tax “reform” bill was in the process of passing the House of Representatives. With House passage, the bill now goes to Trump’s desk for his signature, and Trump rightly raised the significance of the repeal of the ObamaCare mandate, which had required American citizens to purchase health insurance.

“When the individual mandate is being repealed, that means Obamacare is being repealed,” Trump explained. “So, the individual mandate is being repealed.... In this bill, not only do we have massive tax cuts and tax reform, we have essentially repealed Obamacare, and we’ll come up with something that will be much better, whether it’s block grants or whether it’s taking what we have and doing something terrific. But Obamacare has been repealed in this bill.”

Not much was said about the inclusion of the mandate repeal in the tax bill, and Trump said that was the way he wanted it. “I told people specifically, ‘Be quiet with the fake news media,’ because I don’t want them talking too much about it. But now that it’s approved, I can say.”

https://www.thenewamerican.com/usnews/health-care/item/27630-obamacare-mandate-killed-what-does-this-do-to-obamacare 

Can the FBI Get Away With Getting Trump Team Emails?

Within hours of his victory in last year's presidential election, Donald Trump dispatched his lawyers to establish a nonprofit corporation to manage his transition from private life to the presidency. This was done pursuant to a federal statute that provides for taxpayer-funded assistance to the newly elected — but not yet inaugurated — president. The statutory term for the corporation is the presidential transition team, or PTT.

In addition to paying the PTT's bills, the General Services Administration, which manages all nonmilitary federal property, provided the PTT with government computers, software and a computer service provider. During the course of the PTT's existence, the folks who worked for it sent or received tens of thousands of emails. The PTT ceased to exist upon Trump's inauguration, and a receiver was hired to wind it down.

Last weekend, a lawyer for the receiver revealed a letter he sent to Congress complaining that special counsel Robert Mueller — who is investigating whether there was any agreement between the Trump campaign and the Kremlin that resulted in the now-well-known efforts by Russian intelligence to affect the outcome of the 2016 presidential election — dispatched FBI agents to the GSA looking for copies of all the PTT's emails and that the GSA surrendered them.

How did this happen?

When the FBI is looking for documents or tangible things, it has several legal tools available. They range in their disruptive nature from a simple request to a grand jury subpoena to a judicially authorized search warrant.

http://www.judgenap.com/post/can-the-fbi-get-away-with-getting-trump-team-emails 

Clinton’s Handling of Classified Information

An FBI investigation into former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s mishandling of classified information resulted in no criminal charges, but it revealed that Clinton and her campaign made statements in the past about her email use that have turned out to be false or misleading:

• Clinton repeatedly claimed that she did not send or receive any information that was marked classified in her personal emails. That’s false. FBI Director James Comey said more than 2,000 emails contained classified information and some of them “bore markings indicating the presence of classified information.”
• Clinton said her lawyers “went through every single email” to determine which ones were personal and which were work-related, and that they were “overly inclusive” in which ones were provided to the State Department. Comey said the lawyers did not go through every email. Rather, they used header information and search terms to identify work-related emails, and, he said, it is “highly likely” they missed some.

As we did in May, when the State Department’s inspector general issued a report on Clinton’s unusual email arrangement, we will take a look at past statements Clinton has made about her personal emails and private server and how they square with the results of the FBI investigation announced on July 5.

Classified Information 

Clinton, the presumptive Democratic presidential nominee, has denied mishandling classified information ever since the New York Times on March 2, 2015, disclosed that Clinton “exclusively used a personal email account to conduct government business as secretary of state.”

http://www.factcheck.org/2016/07/clintons-handling-of-classified-information/ 

'Nikki Haley may end up as our first female president'

Fox military analyst Ralph Peters hailed U.S. Ambassador to the United Nations Nikki Haley on Fox Business on Thursday, declaring that the former South Carolina governor "may end up our first female president."
Peters praised Haley for taking a tough stance following the U.N.'s opposition to U.S. recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital but also cautioned against the U.S. making threats it's "not prepared to carry out."
The U.N. in a 128–9 vote on Thursday overwhelmingly rebuked President Trump's decision to recognize Jerusalem as Israel's capital. Thirty-five countries abstained from voting.
"Is this like a game of chicken? They’re saying, ‘We don’t want you to do this,’ but we’re saying, ‘We have the money here. If you want to continue to be supported by us, you’re going to let us do what we want,’” said "Intelligence Report" host Trish Regan.
“Well, let me preface it by saying I think Nikki Haley may end up as our first female president," replied Peters, a retired U.S. Army lieutenant colonel and Fox contributor.
Peters also suggested that moving the embassy could have been handled more delicately.

http://thehill.com/homenews/media/366067-fox-military-analyst-nikki-haley-may-end-up-as-our-first-female-president 

BuzzFeed’s Trump Dossier Source Gets Closer To Being Identified Photo of Chuck Ross

A lawyer for a Russian businessman suing BuzzFeed over the infamous dossier suggested on Thursday that the website’s source for the salacious document has finally been identified.
Val Gurvits, a lawyer for Russian tech businessman Aleksej Gubarev, made the revelation in response to a federal magistrate judge’s ruling in favor of BuzzFeed.
Magistrate Judge John J. O’Sullivan ruled in a Miami court on Thursday that BuzzFeed was protected by reporter’s privilege from having to identify the person who provided it with the dossier.
Gubarev’s lawyers have battled for months to figure out who gave BuzzFeed the unverified document, which was written by former British spy Christopher Steele and published on Jan. 10.

http://dailycaller.com/2017/12/21/buzzfeeds-trump-dossier-source-gets-closer-to-being-identified/ 

Why Congress Shouldn’t Wait For Medicare Reform

In an interview with “Good Morning America” on Wednesday, House Speaker Paul Ryan (R-WI) cast doubt on the prospect for comprehensive Medicare reform on the congressional agenda in 2018: “There are some provider issues that we may be addressing as you know. Some providers in the Medicare field in some cases are getting overpaid. We want to make sure that’s being dealt with. But as far as you’re talking about beneficiaries, we’re not focused on that.”
Unfortunately, however, if Congress fails to address comprehensive Medicare reform, beneficiaries will miss out on significant savings in their pocketbooks, and taxpayers will miss out on the opportunity to slow the growth of the program’s expenses. This “win-win” proposition—seniors save money, as do taxpayers—could help the federal government solve its growing entitlement shortfalls, but only if Congress has the courage to act.

How Medicare Reform Would Work

Lost in the cacophony of debate surrounding Obamacare “repeal-and-replace” legislation, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) in October released an updated analysis of illustrative proposals to create a premium support program for Medicare. The report explained how and why premium support could save even more money than CBO had estimated just a few years ago.
To the uninitiated, premium support would transform Medicare into a program roughly akin to the federal employee health benefit plan, or the Obamacare exchanges established in 2014. Insurers, including traditional government-run Medicare, would bid against each other to offer the usual complement of Medicare services.

http://thefederalist.com/2017/12/21/congress-shouldnt-wait-medicare-reform/ 

 

U.N. Votes Overwhelmingly To Condemn U.S. Decision On Jerusalem

The United Nations General Assembly has overwhelmingly rejected the Trump administration's decision to recognize the disputed city of Jerusalem as Israel's capital. By a lopsided 128-9 vote Thursday, the diplomats gathered in New York City ignored U.S. objections and approved a nonbinding resolution calling on countries to avoid moving their embassies to Jerusalem.
Among the countries that voted in favor of the resolution are many traditional U.S. allies, including the United Kingdom and France. Israel, which celebrated Trump's decision earlier this month, joined the U.S. in voting against the measure. Thirty-five countries abstained, including other U.S. allies such as Canada and Australia.
Earlier in the day, before the assembly voted on the largely symbolic declaration, U.S. Ambassador to the U.N. Nikki Haley expressed her resistance in no uncertain terms.
"The United States will remember this day in which it was singled out for attack in the General Assembly for the very act of exercising our right as a sovereign nation," Haley said Thursday.

https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2017/12/21/572565091/u-n-votes-overwhelmingly-to-condemn-trumps-jerusalem-decision

Marie Harf Defends Obama's Aid to Hezb'allah

Only someone who worked in Hillary Clinton’s State Department and thought giving ISIS summer jobs would stop their beheadings and terrorist attacks could dispute Josh Meyer’s lengthy, well-researched article in Politico detailing “how Obama let Hezbollah off the hook” by undermining his own government’s efforts to take down the terrorist group’s drug trafficking operations:

“I was part of the negotiating team that got the Iran nuclear deal done,” the former Obama State Department spokeswoman told Fox News’ Brian Kilmeade on Tuesday.
“Until Politico wrote this piece, I had never even heard of this program. You know, the Politico story, this narrative in it is just false. And there’s no evidence in this story to back up their allegations,” Harf said.  “They quote a couple of low level ideological sources who clearly don’t like the Iran deal, but everything I know just doesn’t back up this narrative.”…
This story is a hit job, honestly, with no truth behind it,” Harf said.
 Meyer reacted to Harf’s comments in an appearance with Fox News’ Shannon Bream, stating that her claim that his sources were “low-level” people was “sort of ridiculous.”

http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2017/12/marie_harf_defends_obamas_aid_to_hizballah.html#ixzz51uiuFdZc 

The Democrats Stink of Weakness and Defeat, and Other Pre-Christmas News

Tax reform is passed without a single Democrat willing to part with the IRS’ filthy lucre.

Armageddon, she called it.

That was Nancy Pelosi, the insane woman who is somehow in charge of the Democrats’ House caucus, speaking about the just-passed Tax Cuts and Jobs Act. The bill would later pass in the House, largely on the same party lines it’s passed throughout the legislative process, due to procedural necessities, Wednesday. It now awaits President Trump’s signature.

But to Pelosi, who also described the bill as “theft,” because in the parlance of today’s Democrat Party the concept of private property is indistinguishable from theft, a bill which polled favorable by a 44-35 margin in a Morning Consult/POLITICO survey released Tuesday, is Armageddon.

We wouldn’t take Pelosi seriously, because it’s impossible to truly do so. After all, she’s completely crazy and it’s obvious to anyone who bothers to observe both the gibberish emanating from her lips and the unstable body language surrounding it. Except that the unhinged sentiments she offered as a reaction to the passage of a bill which will provide a tax cut to 80 percent of the American public aren’t just hers. They belong to the entire Democratic Party.

https://spectator.org/the-democrats-stink-of-weakness-and-defeat-and-other-pre-christmas-news/ 

Warren's Regulatory Expansion Is Wrong Answer to Equifax Breach

In September, we learned that Equifax had suffered a massive data breach that exposed the personal information—including names, addresses, birthdates and Social Security numbers—of 145 million Americans. It was the latest in a string of cybersecurity breaches in recent years. The frequency of such attacks -- with other prominent examples including breaches of systems belonging to Target, eBay, Yahoo and Home Depot—demonstrates the complexity of securing sensitive information in the internet age.

If there's one thing that all these breaches have taught us, it's that cybersecurity is hard. There's no easy legislative fix, and knee-jerk calls for new regulations on each industry that suffers from a breach offer no substitute for improving cybersecurity.

Nevertheless, a mere week after the Equifax breach, Sen. Elizabeth Warren, (D-Mass.), had the issue all sorted out. She introduced her legislative remedy, the Freedom from Equifax Exploitation, or FREE, Act, claiming that it "is a first step toward reforming the broken credit reporting industry."

http://reason.com/archives/2017/12/21/warrens-regulatory-expansion-is-wrong-an 

Nancy Pelosi on tax bill: Greedy, cruel, Republicans vote to kill Tiny Tim

Earlier today, before the House re-voted to pass the GOP tax bill, Nancy Pelosi was once again allowed to speak in public. I’m not sure why Democrats keep letting this embarrassment get in front of microphones but, as long as they’re willing to tolerate the embarrassment, we’re willing to keep spotlighting it. 

Earlier today, before the House re-voted to pass the GOP tax bill, Nancy Pelosi was once again allowed to speak in public. I’m not sure why Democrats keep letting this embarrassment get in front of microphones but, as long as they’re willing to tolerate the embarrassment, we’re willing to keep spotlighting it. 

http://canadafreepress.com/article/nancy-pelosi-on-tax-bill-greedy-cruel-republicans-vote-to-kill-tiny-tim

Another Accident That Could Have Been Avoided on Government-subsidized Amtrak

The National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) reports that the Amtrak train that derailed on Monday on its way to Portland from Seattle was going 80 mph on a 30 mph track. Sadly, Amtrak derailments are not particularly unusual and the transportation system has long been known for its incompetence and “weak safety culture,” which brings up the question, why does the government continue to subsidize Amtrak?

Three people were killed in Monday's train derailment and more than 100 were injured when one of two engines and 12 cars derailed, tumbling the cars onto a busy interstate highway below. The train had been making its inaugural run on a 14.5 mile stretch of refurbished track, the Washington Post reports. If an automatic braking system had been operating, the train would have been slowed down before reaching the curve where it derailed.

This is the second time in two years that an Amtrak train derailed because it was traveling at twice the speed limit. In May 2015, a train bound for New York derailed in Philadelphia after going 106 mph where the speed was restricted to 50 mph.

https://www.thenewamerican.com/economy/sectors/item/27627-another-accident-that-could-have-been-avoided-on-government-subsidized-amtrak 

Congress Demands DOJ Turn Over All Docs Related to Obama Scheme to Nix Hezbollah Terror Investigation

Congress instructed the Department of Justice on Thursday to turn over all documents and communications that may be related to newly disclosed efforts by the Obama administration to handicap an investigation into the terror group Hezbollah and its Iranian benefactors, according to a letter sent to Attorney General Jeff Sessions obtained by the Washington Free Beacon.

The letter represents the first salvo in a new investigation by congressional leaders into allegations senior Obama administration officials thwarted a decade-long Drug Enforcement Agency investigation into Hezbollah's illicit operations.

The Obama administration, in what congressional insiders described to the Free Beacon as a "potentially criminal" enterprise, interfered with the DEA's investigation into Hezbollah drug activities in order to avoid angering the terror group's chief patron Iran and preserve the landmark nuclear deal.

"I've long believed that the Obama administration could not have done any more to bend over backwards to appease the Iranian regime, yet news that the Obama administration killed the investigation into a billion dollar drug ring that lined the terrorist group Hezbollah's pockets in order to save its coveted Iran deal may very well take the cake," DeSantis said.

http://freebeacon.com/national-security/congress-demands-doj-turn-docs-related-obama-scheme-nix-hezbollah-terror-investigation/ 

AT&T Destroys Dems’ Claim With Big Promise To Workers After Tax Bill Passes

AT&T, a telecom giant that employs nearly 300,000 people, made a major announcement Wednesday following the passage of GOP tax reform.

The company pledged to give over 200,000 U.S. workers a $1,000 bonus after President Donald Trump makes the tax legislation the law of the land.

AT&T leadership has hailed the Republican tax bill, long arguing that slashing corporate tax rates would lead to more benefits for its employees.

“Congress, working closely with the President, took a monumental step to bring taxes paid by U.S. businesses in line with the rest of the industrialized world,” AT&T CEO Randall Stephenson said in a statement.

“This tax reform will drive economic growth and create good-paying jobs. In fact, we will increase our U.S. investment and pay a special bonus to our U.S. employees.”

https://www.westernjournalism.com/att-made-big-promise-200000-employees-following-passage-gop-tax-bill/

Just Like Clockwork - Here Comes Another Government Shutdown

Oh, here we go again. Yet, another government shutdown is but a day away.

And once again there is talk of Armageddon.

How can we survive without a fully functioning federal leviathan?

The last threat of a shutdown was mere months ago, in April, when the leftist site, Vox.com wrote: “The House and Senate have until midnight on April 28 to pass a spending bill or the federal government will run out of money and close its doors.”

Now anyone who has been following this nonsense, read or listened to any conservative talkers, knows full well that this is a lie.

It’s hard to say whether those at Vox are disingenuous liars or just ill-informed.

But we on the right have been beating this dead horse for years, and I suppose must continue to do so.

In fact, the government does not “run out of money,” or “close its doors.”

But our logic and the reality of the situation has still not been able to cut through the fog of political theater.

https://freedomoutpost.com/clockwork-government-shutdown/ 

Congress Ready to Investigate Bombshell Report that Obama Derailed Hezbollah Investigation for Iran Deal

Some lawmakers are incensed, but not wholly surprised by this week's bombshell report from Politico that the Obama administration knowingly derailed an anti-Hezbollah investigation because it would have threatened the nuclear deal with Iran.
The Drug Enforcement Administration was so convinced that Hezbollah was amassing $1 billion a year from drug and weapons trafficking that it started Project Cassandra in 2008, an under cover investigation, to follow the money. Yet, according to Politico's sources, the Justice and Treasury departments "delayed, hindered or rejected" requests from project members as they sought answers.
Rep. Ron DeSantis (R-FL) expected such meddling from the Obama White House, but even he was surprised as to the extent of the interference.

"I've long believed that the Obama administration could not have done any more to bend over backwards to appease the Iranian regime, yet news that the Obama administration killed the investigation into a billion dollar drug ring that lined the terrorist group Hezbollah's pockets in order to save its coveted Iran deal may very well take the cake," DeSantis said.
"Hezbollah is a brutal terrorist group with American blood on its hands and it would be unconscionable for American policy to deliberately empower such a nefarious group," he said.

https://townhall.com/tipsheet/cortneyobrien/2017/12/21/obama-hezbollah-investigation-n2425609

Merry Christmas to you and your family. May the New Year bring much happiness.

At first, Democrats declared the end of the world due to a global cooling in the 1970s.  This declaration was succeeded by an even more terrible end of the world due to global warming in the 1990s (although this end of the world was briefly interrupted by the fleeting ends of the world due to the year 2000 computer problem and the end of the Mayan calendar in 2012).
Now the end of the world because of global warming has come to an end.  It has been succeeded by the end of the world due to Trump's tax policy.  This end of the world was also interrupted, now traditionally, by the Democrats, who briefly advocated the end of the world due to the cancelation of net neutrality and the end of the world due to the recognition of Jerusalem as the capital of Israel.
The Democrats both in the Senate and in the House of Representatives united against tax cuts.  Well, nobody expected anything else from the founding fathers of the Ku Klux Klan and the socialists' party.  Democrats tried to put sticks in the wheels of Trump's locomotive by using the "Byrd rule" (it's the same Democrat, Byrd, who once was one of the leaders of the KKK).  But it was not possible to keep America at a democratic plantation.
Nevertheless, twelve Republican congressmen joined Democrats.  The Republican dozen, except one, are from California, New York, and New Jersey – that is, from traditionally leftist states with the highest state and local taxes in America.  As a result (treacherous, of course) of the Trump plan, state taxes now must be paid not in lieu of, but (oh, the horror!) in addition to federal taxes.  There is nothing strange and personal about the behavior of the Republican dozen.  Just business.  After all, their votes could not change anything, and these congressmen...well, you know, are up for re-election next year.

http://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2017/12/the_latest_date_for_the_end_of_the_world_according_to_democrats.html#ixzz51ueJgiyV

The Sorcerer's Apprentices: FBI, DOJ, GPS, DNC

Disney's gloriously animated Fantasia of 1940, The Sorcerer's Apprentice tells the story of a magician's helper who is tasked with bringing water in buckets, two at a time on a broom handle, from a well into his master's cauldron.  To ease his workload, he put on the sorcerer's hat and commanded the broom to continue his job. Then he fell asleep.  When he awoke, the broom had brought so much water into the castle it was flooded.  The apprentice tried to stop the broom by using an axe to splinter it into pieces.   But the broom pieces, lots of them, came alive, got up and continued to bring the water into the castle.

In the original German poem by Goethe on which the segment is based, the apprentice implores the sorcerer to help him with the mess he has engendered.  The German line that translates as "The spirits that I called," is often used to describe situations that spin out of control because allies have been summoned that cannot be controlled.  

The spirits the Democratic Party put into service to defeat and unseat Donald Trump have indeed spun out of control and  exposed the Left's  nefarious schemes for all to see.  It's an ugly scenario.  Many people may, and should, go to prison if we still have a functioning legal system.

http://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2017/12/the_sorcerers_apprentices_fbi_doj_gps_dnc.html#ixzz51q3ggXnv 

The Unsilent Coup

The scolds of the chattering class have spent the last few days rebuking Fox News for wondering aloud if a “coup in America” is underway. Such talk is “irresponsible,” say the Brian Stelters. According to their estimate, warning of a coup is more “inflammatory” than engaging in one. All these suddenly prim nincompoops appear on networks or host shows that regularly feature pols calling for Trump’s impeachment on the most trivial grounds, former “intelligence” officials who encourage insubordination if not insurrection, and pundits who insist that Trump’s cabinet and executive agencies defy him.

Much of the media’s energy is devoted to calling for a de facto coup. The premise of practically every story, from the travel ban to the most basic executive appointments, is that it is somehow “controversial” for a duly elected president to use the powers vested in the executive branch. Trump is apparently not to hire or fire anybody, should never tell executive agencies what to do, should take, not give, orders from diplomats and bureaucrats, should submit to all acts of judicial activism, must never criticize Congress, and should in general stop offering any opinions at all. All of this is deemed “unpresidential” and “scandalous” by the media.

https://spectator.org/the-unsilent-coup/ 

Massive Fraud in Net Neutrality Process is a Crime Deserving of Justice Department Attention

If one was expecting to have a reasoned, adult debate over “Net Neutrality” in the lead-up to the Federal Communications Commission’s vote last week to roll-back the Obama-era regulations, they were surely disappointed. Rather than a logical look at the current state of how the internet works today (much of the anti-FCC rhetoric was not based in such a reality), or even a practical discussion about how the internet has evolved freely and robustly absent of such regulations, most of the “discussion” was a digital shouting match of partisan and anti-capitalism rhetoric. That, and a massive amount of fraud.

As I wrote earlier this month, hundreds of thousands of comments were submitted to the FCC in spikes during the public comment period about its proposal to eliminate the 2015 “Open Internet Order”; and, upon further investigation, were found to have been written not by humans, but by artificial intelligence programs using “natural language generators.” Wired.com reports that “over a third of the nearly 22 million comments that poured into the [FCC] . . . included one of seven identical messages,” and “more than half were associated with duplicate or temporary emails.” Additionally, the New York Attorney General is also investigating reports that as many as two-million fraudulent submissions used the names and addresses of real people, both living and dead, from multiple states in a scheme to sway the FCC’s vote.

https://townhall.com/columnists/bobbarr/2017/12/20/massive-fraud-in-net-neutrality-process-is-a-crime-deserving-of-justice-department-attention-n2424724 

Political winners and losers from the Trump tax-cut bill

The Republican tax plan won Congressional approval on Wednesday and will soon be signed by President Trump.

The law’s thicket of new provisions will affect families and businesses across the nation, in ways The Hill has previously reported upon.

But, when it comes to the politics of the bill, who notched a victory and who took a hit? 

Winners

President Trump

Trump badly needed a win on tax reform after the ignominious failure of the attempt to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act (ACA), also known as ObamaCare. He faced the very real risk of having no major legislative achievement by the end of his first calendar year in power.

http://thehill.com/homenews/administration/365837-political-winners-and-losers-from-the-trump-tax-cut-bill