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I appeared on Silvio Canto Jr's talk show from Dallas yesterday.  It's here.

JULY 10,  2017

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – AT 11:56 P.M. ET:

SAY IT AIN'T SO, BERNIE – FROM FOX:   A federal probe into allegations that Sen. Bernie Sanders’ wife fraudulently obtained a nearly $10 million loan for a land expansion at a Vermont college has intensified, with prosecutors reportedly calling a state official to testify before a grand jury.  The federal investigation is focused on actions by Jane Sanders in 2010, when she was president of Burlington College. 
At the time, she sought a multi-million dollar loan for a new campus on 33 acres along Lake Champlain. Sanders reportedly told college trustees and bank lenders that the college had millions of dollars in donations that could be used to repay the loan.   But The Washington Post reported Monday that trustees said they discovered many of the donors had not agreed to the amounts or the timing of donations listed in materials Mrs. Sanders provided.  Gee, I don't see much outrage about this in the liberal media.  I wonder why.

UNBELIEVABLE – FROM THE NEW YORK POST:   The city Conflicts of Interest Board gave Mayor de Blasio the green light for a free trip to Germany because it achieved a “city purpose” — of opposing President Trump, a spokesman said Monday.  An email from the conflicts board’s lawyer, sent at 10 p.m. Friday — more than a day after de Blasio flew to Germany — said the board approved his itinerary based on a rule that allows acceptance of travel-related gifts if “the trip is for a city purpose and therefore could properly be paid for with city funds.”  Asked what city purpose was achieved by de Blasio giving the keynote speech at a G20 protest rally in Hamburg, spokesman Eric Phillips cited Hizzoner’s self-appointed role as a progressive foil to the president.  “He was representing New York City and our values, and providing an alternate American viewpoint to the deeply problematic vision of President Trump,” Phillips said.  This is complete garbage and a major scandal.  But New Yorkers will still go to the polls in November and re-elect this Marxist.  The once-great city is in a sad state.

DON'T WORRY, IT'S A PENTAGON PROJECT, AND WILL TAKE 75 YEARS TO DEVELOP – FROM THE DAILY MAIL:   The US military has revealed $65 of funding for a programme to develop a 'brain chip' allowing humans to simply plug into a computer.  They say the system could give soldiers supersenses and even help treat people with blindness, paralysis and speech disorders.  The goal is 'developing an implantable system able to provide precision communication between the brain and the digital world,' DARPA officials said.  And if the computer freezes during a presidential address?  Will there be a RESTART button on the Oval Office desk?

July 10,  2017     Permalink

LET'S GET THIS FIXED – AT 10:21 A.M. ET:   In order for President Trump to succeed, and for the Republican Party to triumph in next year's crucial midterm elections, the GOP Congress must get things done.  You know done, don't you?  As in repeal and replace Obamacare, and give the American people a tax cut.

Right now this Congress is batting zero on the big items.  And there doesn't seem to be much sense of urgency.  From Fox: 

Two Republican lawmakers admitted Sunday the initial GOP bill to repeal and replace the nation’s health law is probably “dead” and President Trump’s proposal to solely repeal it appears to be a “non-starter.”

Sen. John McCain, R-Ariz., said in a televised interview on CBS it may now be time for Republicans to come up with a new proposal with support from Democrats.

"I think my view is it's probably going to be dead," McCain said of the GOP bill. If Democrats are included, he said, it doesn't mean "they control it. It means they can have amendments considered. And even when they lose, then they're part of the process. That's what democracy is supposed to be all about."

Sen. Bill Cassidy, R-La, speaking on “Fox News Sunday,” told Chris Wallace “We don’t know what the plan is. Clearly, the draft plan is dead. Is the serious rewrite plan dead? I don't know."

Sen. Chuck Grassley, R-Iowa, signaled pessimism as well. He wrote on Twitter late Saturday that Republicans will lose their Senate majority if they don’t pass health care legislation. Grassley added the party should be "ashamed" that it hasn't been able to repeal and replace the Affordable Care Act, or Obamacare.

COMMENT:  And Grassley is correct.  Right now the Republican Party isn't a governing party.  It's an opposition party that is temporarily in charge.  It's got to light a fire. 

If the Republicans lose the Senate next year, say goodbye to conservative Supreme Court appointments.  That's how serious this non-record is.

July 10, 2017       Permalink

WONDERFUL – QUOTE OF THE DAY – AT 9:51 A.M. ET:   The president has returned from Europe.  The big item of this trip was a magnificent speech he gave in Poland in defense of Western values.  Well, I thought it was magnificent.  The "progressive" media, however, is having fits.  How dare the president of the United States defend our civilization!  Is he a fascist?  Racist?  Psycho?  All three?  From townhall.com:

Let me throw down this marker: The West is superior to the rest of the world in every significant way, we should aggressively back our allies over our enemies, and the guiding principle of our foreign policy should always be America’s interests. No apologies. No equivocation. No doubt.

What are your questions?

Well, if you're a normal American, you won't have any questions - these truths are self-evident. But if you're a progressive, you're gonna have a little sissy snit fit like so many libs did in the wake of the president’s triumphant Warsaw speech. There’s one thing that always sets them off - uttering the truth/heresy that not only is Western civilization the best and most advanced culture in the history of humanity, but the United States of America is its greatest manifestation.

The immigrants and refugees get it. Which way are they always headed? North, to the comparative paradise of the Western world, or south, to the hellscape of the Third World? That's a gimme. They are never headed south, and everyone knows it. Yet the left still insists that we stop believing our lying eyes and start believing the liberal Fifth Column of multicultural liars infesting America’s alleged elite.

Except our eyes aren’t lying, and now we have a President who won’t lie either. It makes them nuts.

Can you imagine Felonia von Pantsuit uttering the glorious words our Commander-In-Chief spoke to our steadfast, loyal Polish brothers-in-arms? No, she would have continued Obama’s despicable sellout of these sturdy heroes, leaving them to the mercy of her reset buddy Vlad.

COMMENT:   Well said.  I know a teacher who instructs a number of immigrant kids.  And she told me of an incident where one of those kids could barely control his laughter at some speaker who was talking about the sublime "cultures" the immigrant students came from. 

"Why are you laughing?" this teacher asked.

The student replied, "Does that guy understand what it's like to live in the countries he's talking about?"

No, those multiculturalist hucksters know nothing of the real lives these immigrants lived.  They came to America to escape those "cultures," not to celebrate them.  Too many American elitists haven't gotten that message.

July 10, 2017       Permalink 

I LOVE IT – JUST READ THIS – AT 9:14 A.M. ET:  Ah, the television business.  Home of high ethics, dear hearts and gentle people.  From Don Surber: 

Unlike their cable brethren, the broadcast newsers seem to be losing customers. I say seem because we have no way of telling as they have so gamed the ratings system that no honest person can say how many people watch them.

From the Wall Street Journal:

Boosting TV ratings is easy for networks that don’t mind playing dumb.

In a game largely sanctioned by TV-ratings firm Nielsen, television networks try to hide their shows’ poor performances on any given night by forgetting how to spell.

That explains the appearance of “NBC Nitely News,” which apparently aired on the Friday of Memorial Day weekend this year, when a lot of people were away from their TVs. The retitling of “NBC Nightly News” fooled Nielsen’s automated system, which listed “Nitely” as a separate show.

Hiding the May 26 program from Nielsen dramatically improved the show’s average viewership that week. Instead of falling further behind first-place rival “ABC World News Tonight,” NBC news narrowed the gap.

Walt Disney Co.’s ABC declined to comment. The network, though, groused last month when NBC News intentionally misspelled an entire week of “Nightly News” broadcasts. Altogether, NBC, which is ranked second behind ABC in ratings, has played the misspell card 14 times since the start of the 2016-17 television season last fall.

NBC News said it broke no rules. “As is standard industry practice, our broadcast is retitled when there are pre-emptions and inconsistencies or irregularities in the schedule, which can include holiday weekends and special sporting events,” a show spokesman said.

The network needn’t feel defensive. ABC took its own ratings mulligan seven times during the 2016-17 season with “Wrld New Tonite.” CBS misspelled “The CBS Evening News” as the “CBS Evening Nws” 12 times this season.

COMMENT:  How lovely.  These are the people who give us the news.  Or maybe its nws.  Or newz.  CNN may be the most trusted name in nooze.

You've got to be taught to lie.

July 10,  2017     Permalink

JULY 9,  2017

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – AT 11:55 P.M. ET: 

SLEEP WELL – FROM THE TELEGRAPH:   It is said that a clear conscience makes the softest pillow, but according to a new study the secret of a good night’s sleep is having something worth getting out of bed for the next day.  In the first research of its kind, US scientists found that having a purpose in life results in fewer nighttime disturbances and improved sleep quality.  Although all the participants in the study were elderly, researchers said the findings are likely to apply to people of all ages, suggesting that whether you will sleep well is already decided before you even get into bed.  So I guess this means that liberals will never sleep well.

I WANTED SO MUCH TO MEET THEM – FROM THE TELEGRAPH:   Hopes of finding life on Mars, at least on the surface, were dealt a blow on Thursday by a study revealing that salt minerals present on the Red Planet kill bacteria. In lab tests on Earth, the compounds known as perchlorates killed cultures of the bacteria Bacillus subtilis, a basic life form, a research duo from the University of Edinburgh's School of Physics and Astronomy reported. In the new study, Jennifer Wadsworth and Charles Cockell showed the compound can also be activated by UV light, without heat, in conditions mimicking those on the martian surface. It killed bacteria within minutes, said the team, implying the planet was "more uninhabitable than previously thought".   This is a major blow to the Martian real-estate market.  The Democrats are already blaming Trump.

NEW YORK'S FAR-LEFT MAYOR – FROM FOX:   Mayor de Blasio flew all the way to Hamburg, Germany, to praise that city’s police in a speech — while cops back home continued to mourn, without him, the assassination of one of their own in The Bronx.  “Our right to protest is directly related to the fact that our police protect us,” Hizzoner told a crowd of thousands at the outdoor Hamburg Shows Attitude rally protesting the G-20 summit Saturday. “So help me by joining in applause and thanks for the police,” he said as the crowd cheered.  “There have also been great acts of bravery and restraint,” he said. “Remember, our police are working men and women, too.”...And back home, the mayor missed an evening vigil honoring slain NYPD Officer Miosotis ­Familia at the 46th Precinct station house where she worked in The Bronx.  Familia, 48, a mother of three, was shot in the head early Wednesday by a cop-loathing ­parolee as she sat in a police command vehicle.  This mayor is a Castro-supporting leftist who was also a booster of the Sandinistas.   So why is he mayor of New York?  Because the Republican Party of New York City refuses to put up a good fight to replace him.  The mayor is up for re-election this fall, and will probably win.  We need another Rudy.

July 9, 2017       Permalink

EXPLAIN, ANGELA, EXPLAIN – AT 12:53 P.M. ET:  Angela Merkel is getting to be a pain in the neck.  She obviously considers herself the queen of the West, and regularly lectures President Trump.  But the G20 meeting she hosted in Hamburg was a mess.  From Bloomberg:

Chancellor Angela Merkel defended the decision to host the Group of 20 summit in Germany’s second-biggest city, promising government compensation for property damage in the wake of looting and rioting by anti-capitalist activists in Hamburg.

Speaking at the end of the summit on Saturday, Merkel told reporters that, from a pure logistical point of view, the two-day gathering had to be held in a large city, given the sheer number of leaders and guests needing housing. Hamburg was also chosen as a symbol of openness to trade because the city of 1.7 million is Germany’s largest port and richest state per capita.

Instead, the image seared in the minds of many Germans was one of violent clashes, which left more than 200 police injured and resulted in about 260 protesters being detained. Scenes of chaos, looting and burning cars have played out live on German television since Thursday, shocking many in a country known for its orderliness. Merkel, who is running for re-election in September in part on a theme of public safety, fielded several questions from German media at her closing press conference on the protests and response.

“I condemn in the strongest terms the unchained violence and unrestrained brutality that the police faced repeatedly during the G-20,” Merkel told reporters. “Apparently, there are people who have no interest in the issues and instead go on a rampage of blind destruction in their own neighborhood. Tough police measures are the only response to that.” 

COMMENT:  Merkel's tough talk had no effect on the rioters.  The imagery was terrible.  Add to that Merkel's vastly over-liberal immigration policies, and you have a toxic brew.   She is probably better for us than the opposition party in Germany, but her re-election is not assured.

July 9, 2017       Permalink

AND PROGRESS IN IRAQ – AT 12:31 P.M. ET:  The growth of ISIS in Iraq came as a direct result of Obama's premature withdrawal of American forces.  ISIS took over whole parts of the country.

Now, with American help, the Iraqi army is recapturing its own nation.  And ISIS is being defeated.  From The New York Times:   

MOSUL, Iraq — Dressed in a military uniform, Prime Minister Haider al-Abadi arrived here in Mosul on Sunday to congratulate Iraq’s armed forces on their victory over the Islamic State and mark the formal end of a bloody campaign that lasted nearly nine months, left much of Iraq’s second-largest city in ruins, killed thousands of people and displaced nearly a million more.

While Iraqi troops were still mopping up the last pockets of resistance and Iraqi forces could be facing suicide bombers and guerrilla attacks for weeks, the military began to savor its win in the shattered alleyways of the old city, where the Islamic State, also known as ISIS or ISIL, put up a fierce last stand.

Hanging over the declaration of victory is the reality of the hard road ahead. The security forces in Mosul still face dangers, including ISIS sleeper cells and suicide bombers. And they must clear houses rigged with explosive booby traps so civilians can return and services can be restored. Nor is the broader fight over: Other cities and towns in Iraq remain under the militants’ control

“It’s going to continue to be hard every day,” said Col. Pat Work, the commanding officer of the Second Brigade, 82nd Airborne Division, which is carrying out the American advisory effort here.

COMMENT:  So unnecessary.  These are areas we fought for and controlled until Field Marshal Obama introduced his brilliant policies.  I'm sure Barack the poet will explain it all in his $65-million memoirs.

July 9, 2017       Permalink

MOVING FORWARD IN SYRIA? – AT 11:52 A.M. ET:  A new cease-fire went into effect in Syria.  If it holds, it could be a major step toward peace.  From Fox: 

An open-ended cease-fire in southern Syria brokered by the United States, Russia, and Jordan went into effect Sunday.

The agreement, announced Thursday after a meeting between President Donald Trump and Russian President Vladimir Putin, went into effect at noon, and is the first initiative by the Trump administration in collaboration with Russia to bring some stability to Syria.

Trump tweeted Sunday, "We negotiated a ceasefire in parts of Syria which will save lives. Now it is time to move forward in working constructively with Russia!"

The initiative followed weeks of talks in the Jordanian capital, Amman, to address the buildup of Iranian-backed forces, in support of the Syrian government, near the Jordanian and Israeli borders.

COMMENT:  We hope the cease-fire works.  Obama's policy in Syria was an abysmal failure, but Trump may succeed.

We also hope that Trump's Russia policy is wise.  But please note that he's playing good cop, bad cop with Moscow.  He smiles at Putin, yet bashes Russia in speeches, and has our wonderful UN ambassador, Nikki Haley, go to town on Russia at the UN.

Trump is a serious man – a man with defects, but a serious man – and I'm finding him fascinating as a president.

July 9,  2017     Permalink