BY JOHN SHAFFER On Saturday, The FBI released a Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) application. It was 412 pages long, and perhaps because it was so verily heavily redacted, opponents of and proponents of President Trump each claim it supports their positions. The application had been filed so the FBI could receive a warrant to conduct surveillance on Carter Page. Mr. Page was, briefly, an advisor to the Trump Campaign. The warrant was granted in October 2016, about a month before the election. Republicans have always had suspicions about the entire process, and we think Democrats would have as well, were the shoe on the other foot. The mere fact that a warrant was sought at that point should have raised plenty of red flags, because America does not have a mechanism to investigate “political crimes,” nor do we have a police force to investigate them. At least we didn’t, until the Obama Administration began this investigation. Any law enforcement official who believed in his oath of office should have been very wary of sniffing around a political campaign, especially so close to the election. Also, the same FBI that was profoundly concerned about Carter Page and a few other Trump operatives and their “connections” to Russia was shockingly uninterested in many other things, such as Hillary Clinton’s 30,000 missing emails, or in actually inspecting the Democratic National Committee’s server that reportedly was “hacked.” Come to think of it, the FBI didn’t care very much about the several hundred thousand dollars that Mrs. Clinton’s husband received from Russians for making a not very lengthy speech. In our opinion, the FBI should not have been concerned about any of those things – from the Clinton Campaign or the Clinton Family, nor from the Trump Campaign nor the Trump family, because American law enforcement agencies should not be fishing for intelligence that might lead to theories from which they could derive information that might be interpreted as perhaps being potentially illegal behavior.
BY JOHN SHAFFER What to make of President Trump? Some voters hoped he would be different; others feared he would be different. His comments at his Helsinki joint-press conference with Russian dictator Vladimir Putin have been excoriated by the folks who disliked the President; they have been harshly criticized by most of the folks who support him; and they definitely play into the point that has been made on many occasions: President Trump is his own worst enemy – that he, by careless and casual, unclear and incomplete, eruptive and evidently thoughtless ways he says things - upsets the people who want to be his supporters, outrages the people who already disagree with him; and worries the people who just want to get along with him or with America.
Let us be clear: Russia is not our friend. They, and China, are the two largest threats to peace, and generally speaking in one way or another they have been suborning or bankrolling or giving material support to most of the “bad guys” in the world: North Korea, Iran, Cuba, and many of the international terrorism groups that have inflicted so much misery on the rest of us. They have been doing those things for decades, and American presidents of both parties have often gone out of their way not to "offend" Russia or China, and on those occasions when our Presidents have challenged them, it’s a safe bet that the Democratic Party, the mainstream media, academia, and “intelligent opinion” have taken the side of – Russia. They did so against Ronald Reagan; considering him a bigger danger than Communism. It really is laughable to hear many of the voices accusing President Trump of “treason” or “being in Putin’s pocket” or worse, because we remember that just a few months or a few years ago they were dismissing the threats from Russia and were more worried that American Presidents were “provocative” or “had a Cold War mentality” than that they were too friendly to Russia or failed to take such threats seriously. It was nearly eight weeks after the 2016 election that President Obama made any serious sanctions on Russia for its behavior in that election. John Brennan, the former CIA Director who has accused President Trump of treason for his press conference performance, himself voted for a Communist candidate for US President in 1976 and did not seem very concerned about Russian aggression or territorial ambitions or geopolitical threats when he was in office. Many of the Democrat members of Congress who have assailed President Trump for being too weak against Russia blasted Ronald Reagan for being too harsh. The Obama administration pulled, at the last minute, defensive missiles from Poland and others of our allies, and did so abruptly, unraveling years of patient diplomacy that had prepared the way for their installation. Was this because the Obama administration saw Russia as a threat? It also stood by as Russia annexed the Crimea and part of Georgia, and as it threatened other American allies – successor states of the former Soviet Union who truly understood the danger posed by Russia. This after the “reset” of our relations from the dark days of the Bush administration, which was seen as failing to appreciate Russia’s geopolitical needs. BY JOHN SHAFFER President Trump has nominated Brett Kavanaugh to the Supreme Court seat vacated by Justice Anthony Kennedy, and to listen to the hyberbolic, hysterical, overblown remarks made in opposition to the nomination that Donald Trump was nominating Satan, Stalin, Hitler or some equally loathsome person. Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell cleverly played the almost equally apocalyptic criticisms that the progressive left had of Justice Kennedy himself and of Justice David Souter at the time of their nominations. Both men were appointed by Republican Presidents and both were excoriated as evil. Neither proved to be the doctrinaire Conservative that the critics were excited about. As it turned out, Justice Kennedy was known for most of his court career as “The Swing Vote” and Justice Souter would retire with a reputation as a liberal. Both Justices disappointed Republicans far more often than they upset the Democrats.
Of course, many of the folks criticized for their conservative, Constitutionalist philosophy in fact turned out to be conservatives, but the court’s four liberals rarely cast a non-liberal vote (although all of them assented to unanimous decisions overturned several of President Obama’s unconstitutional overreaches). Americans do not share the same opinion on any subject, and we should not expect Justices to do so – but we deserve to have Justices that are rigorous champions of the Constitution, who apply the laws fairly and make decisions on merit, not on politics. The present court in a series of 5-4 decisions, overturned several decisions made by US District Court Judges who sought to stop (or resist) Trump Administration policy on the travel ban from seven countries, and in cases purging voter rolls, Congressional redistricting (although not in Pennsylvania), public unions collecting fees from non-members, and ruling a baker did not discriminate illegally when he refused to cater a gay wedding. BY JOHN SHAFFER Political parties hold primary elections to determine their nominees for the general elections, and typically, in both major parties, an incumbent who seeks another term is renominated. No, it doesn’t happen every time; and incumbents do lose general elections, but sometimes an “outsider” victor in a primary can tell us more about the direction that party is taking than the outcome of a general election.
Back in 2010, Mike Lee took on incumbent Republican Senator Bob Bennett, a three-term, “establishment” candidate – and he defeated him in the caucus and went on to win a resounding victory in the general election. Mr. Bennett was a conservative Republican, and a reliable one on almost every issue – but he was not an articulate champion of causes but instead a standard politician. Mr. Lee’s unseating of an incumbent was an indication that the voters were prepared to turn away from an “old guard” candidate and move toward a more active, and activist outsider who emphasized core principles over political clout and the powers of the office. Similarly, last week Democrats in New York State’s 14th Congressional district unseated incumbent Congressman Joe Crowley, giving the nomination to 28-year old Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez. Cong. Crowley was a liberal Democrat, and, a reliable one; He had served since 1999, had risen to be the fourth-ranking Democrat in the US House and was considered a smart money alternative to Nancy Pelosi the next time the party chose its leader. Cong. Crowley was expected to roll to a decisive victory, especially considering that his opponent, Ms. Ocasio-Cortez was a Democratic Socialist. But she also was much younger, more active and energetic, and was an outsider challenging the “Old Guard.” She won. BY JOHN SHAFFER The party of tolerance and compassion has been in rare form the past few days – and before anyone takes offense, your editor knows that President Trump has spoken some inflammatory words and has acted way too often more as a street fighter from the big city than as the President of the United States. He has told some tasteless jokes and made some thoughtless remarks. By the way so have many other politicians of both parties – but it seems that when the President does it, the social justice warriors take offense, while when someone on the progressive left does it. . . the general reaction is it’s true and he had it coming. But the theme of this essay is not the President, but those who voted for, work for, support or at least tolerate him, because it seems that the left decided to take direct action.
Here’s a few examples: Sarah Sanders, Press Secretary to President Trump, was one of a party of eight who wanted to have a meal at a quaint restaurant in Lexington, VA. The owner, responding apparently to the demands from her staff, told Ms. Sanders that even though she already had ordered her meal, that as an employee of President Trump, she was-not-welcome-and-take-your-business-elsewhere. And, proving another difference between a conservative and a progressive, she did so, quietly and politely. The owner of the restaurant must have been especially excited with the headiness of the moment, for when Ms. Sanders’ family moved to the restaurant across the street, where they had hoped the standards weren’t as strict, the first owner followed and attempted to have service denied there as well. Now, this isn’t the sort of publicity that burnishes the image of the local Chamber of Commerce, and the owner has resigned from “Main Street Lexington.” The restaurant apparently displays, but does not understand, this quote from Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.: “Love is the only force capable of transforming an enemy into a friend.” BY JOHN SHAFFER The Trump administration has many opponents – dare we say enemies? – in both major political parties, in the mainstream news media, academia, Hollywood, the bureaucracy, most foreign governments, all living former Presidents, et al, et al; but the entity that causes the single most damage to the Trump agenda is none of those. No, it is President Trump himself, who seems always to be making some spur of the moment thoughtless comment that makes all of the above irate, and who has a skill for self-inflicting wounds that exceeds what most of us are capable of.
The tariff mess is a great example, for if there is one thing that could upset our roaring economy or detract from our record unemployment rate, a growth rate that exceeds anything that the previous administration could produce, and the highest “country is on the right track” rankings in 12 years, it would be a nasty trade war. Yep, nothing can get more people upset faster than reducing their job prospects, raising the prices of the goods they purchase, and (when the inevitable retaliation comes) making the goods they produce more expensive for customers living in other countries. Other than that, high protective tariffs also perpetuate inefficiencies and high prices in many industries that no longer have to worry about competition. Sure, we need to revamp the systems through which international trade is governed and regulated, but President Trump seems to be going about in about the worst way possible. Perhaps he is doing this to get everyone's attention - to establish a negotiating point that will be used to leverage major changes in current practices, but his style has been off-putting. BY JOHN SHAFFER President Trump's opening to North Korea may have advanced the cause of peace, and, just as Nixon may have been the only President who could have opened China, Mr. Trump may have been the only one who could have accomplished the North Korea initiative. The expectation is that if a leftish President, or an “establishment” President had done the reaching, there would have been an outcry from traditional anti-communist opinion; however, since it was done by a Republican, such opinion was muted or softened. It also took a Reagan to make a deal (and what effectively proved to be the final deal) with the Soviet Union. We presently are at a similar point in America’s dealings with North Korea: the “make America great again” President likely can get away with saying things and doing things that a Democrat President could not.
BY JOHN SHAFFER • Remember the campaign to raise the minimum wage? The “Fight for $15”? Well, it has been successful in many places, and we expect it eventually to be the industry standard in fast-food. This week’s news informs us that McDonald’s already has installed self-service kiosks in about 25% of its American restaurants and expects to install them in 1,000 stores every three months for the next two years, which means that almost every McDonald’s will have one by the end of 2020. Does anyone think that may have anything to do with a minimum wage twice what the present US minimum wage is? Well, it just might be that kiosks that can operate for far less than $15 an hour (and don’t have to be paid health care or benefits) would have taken over a lot of jobs sooner or later. We suspect the successful “Fight for $15” has made it happen much sooner.
• You probably have heard that the President cancelled his invitation to the Philadelphia Eagles for the “traditional” Rose Garden celebration for their championship. Apparently the Eagles had said that about 70 members of the team would be present, but this week said that only about ten or so could make it on the original date so asked the President to reschedule the event for a week later – BY JOHN SHAFFER We didn’t have the highest grade point average, or SAT scores, or IQ, so there are things that are beyond our comprehension. One example is the current flap over “spygate,” that is, the allegation that the Obama Administration gathered information on the Trump campaign. President Trump has made such an accusation on several occasions over the months since his election, and the Obama team and the mainstream media have instantly and loudly scoffed at and denied the charge as often as it has been made.
But, more and more information is coming out, specifically, that the Obama administration had placed an informant in the Trump Campaign. We aren’t even going to speculate on what the reaction would have been had the Bush administration placed an informant in the Obama campaign, but we can guess the response would be several degrees more fierce and indignant than the response to the spying on the Trump campaign has been. Well, gosh, they don’t even use the word “spy.” Former CIA Director John Brennan, former NSA director James Clapper, and various folks a bit lower on the organizational flow chart have used words such as “seeking insight,” or “observing”; and they insist on the term “confidential human source” instead of spy. To mangle an old saying, a rose by any other name still might smell bad. BY JOHN SHAFFER We have said that President Trump seems to raise more hackles over things he says than over things he does; in other words, he generates more dislike over his words and his ways of expressing himself than over the actual policies he is implementing. How many of us have lamented that if only he would stay off Twitter, or curb his tongue a bit more, or even decide not to respond. Ah, well, we have been wishing that for more than two years, and it has not come true yet, so it is unlikely that he will change this habit. But quite often the President is assailed not for something he said, but for something that his political opponents thought he said or wanted him to say or pretended he said. An example of this is the meeting the President has last week with some Chiefs of Police. The topic turned to the vicious gang MS-13, and the President referred to them as “animals.” No one who was in the room with the President thought he said anything else, and no one who reads the transcript of the meeting could possibly believe he said anything else, but not the progressive left, who variously heard President Trump refer to “immigrants” or “Illegal immigrants” as “animals."
BY JOHN SHAFFER OK, we know Republicans oppose Democratic nominations and Democrats oppose almost all of President Trump’s nominees. So do people who served in President Obama’s administration. So do most of the Washington DC careerists who have expressed opinions. So do fashionable people, whether from Park Avenue, Hollywood, or the tony suburbs from almost everywhere. And we can always count on a few liberal Republicans to cast nay votes, if for no other reason than to prove to everybody in “The Resistance” that they resist him, too.
All of the above as expected have come out against Gina Haspel, the President’s nominee for CIA Director. But there is one other prominent person who has come out against her nomination, and he is one we would not have expected. Kahlid Sheik Muhammed (perhaps more frequently referred to as KSM), is perhaps better known by the sobriquet “Mastermind of the 9-11 attacks.” Yes, that KSM, who planned and plotted and executed the destruction of the World Trade Center and the rest of the terror attacks on September 11, 2001, and the murders of over 3,000 people; he has come out in opposition to Ms. Haspel’s nomination. Well, it seems likely that the nomination will squeak through despite the opposition of Republican Senators Rand Paul (on libertarian grounds) and John McCain (more on that later) because a handful of Democrat Senators, moderates to begin with and who have been made more so because they represent states carried by President Trump in 2016 and they are up for re-election this fall, have come out in support of Ms. Haspel. One would imagine that disgust over being on the same side of anything as KSM would be sufficient to cause at least a few others to vote in favor of the nominee, and maybe it will, but if the tenor, tone and direction of most of the questions from most of the Democrats on the Senate Intelligence Committee is any indication, their membership in the Resistance assures they won’t stray over to the pro-Trump camp. BY JOHN SHAFFER President Obama’s administration promulgated many regulations that were contrary to the regulations of previous presidents. Then, the progressives applauded, and the conservatives lamented. But, those regulations went through, because President Obama had the power to implement them.
President Trump has unwound quite a few of the Obama-era regulations, and has sought to unwind many more; now, the conservatives applaud and the progressives lament – but they do more than lament – they “resist”; which includes in several prominent cases the opinions of federal judges, who have stopped the implementation of certain regulations or policies. This leads us to request an explanation of the following question: If one President has the power to promulgate regulations he likes and terminate ones he does not, why does his successor not possess the same power? Remember – we are not talking about laws, which of course cannot be changed without approval from Congress – but are speaking of regulations. And yes, there is a process and a procedure for starting and stopping regulations, and those rules should of course be followed – but the important thing is, the president has the power to change the decisions of his predecessors. President Obama used that power to undo certain regulations that were in place when he took office, and now President Trump wants to do the same thing. Does he have that power, or does that power apply to a progressive president only? BY JOHN SHAFFER President Trump has pulled out of the Iranian nuclear deal. He had promised that he would, and it was widely expected that he would, but there are people who wish he hadn’t. Specifically, the people who populated the Obama administration, which arranged the deal in the first place. If you think the the word “deal” is a bit too informal, call it an “agreement” instead. Just don’t call it a “treaty,” for that is expressly what it is not. A treaty formally binds its parties, and must be, under the US Constitution, approved by two-thirds of the US Senate. In the face of nearly universal opposition from Senate Republicans, and significant opposition from Senate Democrats as well, President Obama never even introduced it as a treaty – he knew he lacked the votes. Instead, it was his own executive agreement (officially, a Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action), and, the meaningless terminology is indicative that it might have a lifetime roughly equal to that of his own administration. Were it a treaty, it would be permanent and would require another treaty to undo; as a deal or an agreement, it could vanish, and it has done so.
BY JOHN SHAFFER The Great American Spending Machine known as the Federal Budget might not be spending quite as much as it would have been had Hillary Clinton been elected, or as much as it will spend if the Democrats regain the majority in Congress, but it still is cranking out the dough at a distressingly rapid pace. There are as many reasons for this as there are good causes to spend money on, or bad ones, and although the government’s spending keeps slipping further and further out of control, just because it has been out of control for fifty years or more doesn’t mean it can be out of control forever.
Perhaps the biggest strength of our free enterprise system is that, in a free market, the economy is self-correcting. It will adjust to adverse circumstances, and the less interference the government attempts on the price system, and the fewer restrictions it imposes on freedom, the better for us all – but it will adjust, even when government makes mistakes. Mistakes such as Obamacare, which was promoted as the nearest thing to heaven on earth but which raised costs without improving services or their delivery. And we could say similar things about almost every other effort to make the world perfect through government regulation, such as Dodd-Frank, and the “big government” candidates will always be promising a so-called panacea to the world’s ills, and it will almost always be enormously expensive, outrageously intrusive, and once set in motion, almost impossible to stop. BY JOHN SHAFFER OK here is the definition; see if you can guess the key word: “to involve oneself in a matter without right or invitation; interfere officiously and unwantedly.” And here is the bonus definition for “officious” – “objectionably forward in offering one’s unrequested and unwanted services.” And the key word is – that’s right: “meddle.” Definitions are from our favorite dictionary, the Random House Dictionary of the English Language, 1966 edition.
We wonder how many people who keep asserting that the Russians “meddled” in the 2016 presidential election know the meaning of the word. The Russians unquestionably "meddled," but they did not do anything that materially changed votes or the outcome anywhere. As noted above – there is no doubt that the Russians “meddled.” Its connotation is far more of a “sticking in one’s nose where it doesn’t belong” pestiness than of a dark, wicked evil form of manipulation or altering the outcome. The latter type of actions require a much stronger form of interference than mere “meddling.” Interestingly, the same people who downplayed the threat of the Soviet Union thirty years ago are today about ready to begin some form of hostilities against Russia for “meddling” in our election. Hold on – not only thirty years ago – the same people who mocked Mitt Romney in 2012 for claiming that Russian was a threat – remember “the 1980s called. They want their foreign policy back”? – and who ignored, downplayed, explained away or empathized just about every action that Russia took during the eight years of the Obama Administration, are today up in arms because they do not think President Trump is sufficiently up in arms over the Russian meddling. |
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