Monday Noon ~ TheFrontPageCover

TheFrontPageCover
~ Featuring ~
Israeli voters help Netanyahu 
defuse ethics inquiry
by Zev Chafets  
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Trump's immigration push muddies GOP's tax cut message
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by Sarah Westwood
{ washingtonexaminer.com } ~ President Trump has increasingly moved the national conversation toward immigration by working to send National Guard troops to border states... setting up a conundrum for congressional Republicans who were hoping to run on the tax cuts they successfully passed this year. Trump’s renewed immigration push could move vulnerable GOP lawmakers off the script that Republican groups have already spent millions of dollars writing through ad campaigns touting the benefits of tax reform. And it could put centrist Republicans in a difficult position if Trump demands his party revisit controversial restrictions on legal immigration while its members are trying to hold onto suburban districts that contain energized Democratic constituents. “This presents challenges for congressional Republicans. They don't defy political gravity on immigration the same way Trump does,” said Kevin Madden, a Republican strategist and former senior adviser to Mitt Romney. “In these suburban swing districts that make or break majorities in the House, you'd much rather be fighting on economic turf than immigration.”...  https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/news/white-house/trumps-immigration-push-muddies-gops-tax-cut-message 
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It Would Still Be Foolish for Trump to Talk to Mueller
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by ANDREW C. MCCARTHY
{ nationalreview.com } ~ According to the Washington Post, Robert Mueller says President Trump is not “a criminal target at this point.”... The Post’s anonymous sources claim that the special counsel has conveyed that assurance to the president’s private attorneys. That is good news for Trump. After all, between Mueller’s Gang of 17 alpha-prosecutors and the sundry scores of Justice Department lawyers and federal agents who were at this long before Mueller was appointed, the Russia investigation has been going on for nearly two years. By now, you would think that the focus of that effort would have become the formal “target” if there were any there there. The president shouldn’t get too giddy, though. It’s nice not to be designated a target, but then there are those three little words, at this point. Mueller is still investigating...  https://www.nationalreview.com/2018/04/it-would-still-be-foolish-for-trump-to-talk-to-mueller/?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=NR%20Daily%20Saturday%202018-04-07&utm_term=NR5PM%20Actives
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Federal Judge Refuses to Throw out Bogus Lawsuit against Trump
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by HANS A. VON SPAKOVSKY & JOHN-MICHAEL SEIBLER
{ nationalreview.com } ~ The legal warfare bent on disrupting the Trump presidency continues apace. Just before April Fool’s Day... a federal judge in Maryland refused to throw out the latest politically motivated lawsuit against the president, despite the fact that there is virtually no constitutional basis for it. Unfortunately, too many judges — in this case, federal judge Peter Messitte — place giving aid and comfort to the “Resistance” movement ahead of applying the rule of law.  Maryland and the District of Columbia sued the president claiming that his ownership of the Trump Hotel in Washington, D.C., violates the Foreign Emoluments Clause of the Constitution. That provision states, “No person holding any Office of Profit or Trust under the United States shall, without the Consent of Congress, accept of any present, Emolument, Office, or Title, of any kind whatever, from any King, Prince, or foreign State.”...He handed all his assets to his son. This judge it nuts.  https://www.nationalreview.com/2018/04/federal-judge-refuses-to-throw-out-bogus-lawsuit-against-trump/?utm_source=Sailthru&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=NR%20Daily%20Saturday%202018-04-07&utm_term=NR5PM%20Actives 
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Muslims Accused of Plotting Violence get Seven Times 
More Media Attention and Four Times Longer Sentences
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by Murtaza Hussain
{ theintercept.com } ~ AMERICAN COURTS TREAT Muslims differently, a new study says... Among perpetrators of ideologically motivated violent plots, those who were perceived to be Muslim received sentences that were four times longer than non-Muslims involved in similar cases. The disproportionality carried over into the court of public opinion, too: Cases of attempted violence by Muslims received 7 1/2 times more coverage from major media outlets, while successful plots were covered twice as much.  These findings are contained in a new report, titled “Equal Treatment? Measuring the Legal and Media Responses to Ideologically Motivated Violence in the United States,” released on Thursday by the Washington-based Institute for Social Policy and Understanding, or ISPU. Built on years of research on cases of planned or successfully executed acts of ideological violence in the U.S., the report highlights glaring discrepancies in the way the judicial system and media treat such acts, depending on the background of the suspected perpetrator...  https://theintercept.com/2018/04/05/muslims-violence-media-attention-prosecution/?utm_source=The+Intercept+Newsletter&utm_campaign=13f9e66b27-EMAIL_CAMPAIGN_2018_04_07&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_e00a5122d3-13f9e66b27-131896129 
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Judge Napolitano says the liar-Clintons,
 FISA, and the FBI are all going down 
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by JStone 
{ patriotnewsalerts.com } ~ The media were absolutely stunned when Attorney General Jeff Sessions announced the new investigation into liar-Hillary Clinton, the FBI, and the Justice Department... Sessions announced he was going to appoint the U.S. Attorney in Utah, John Huber, to head the investigation into the role the aforementioned played in spying on presidential candidate Donald Trump. Judge Napolitano explained exactly how the investigation will play out as well as why Huber needs to be in D.C. to conduct this investigation. First, the attorney general appoints someone to investigate the case. The first instance is the role liar-Hillary Clinton played in securing the Steele dossier...  https://www.patriotnewsalerts.com/clintons-fisa-fbi-going-down/?utm_source=boomtrain&utm_medium=manual&utm_campaign=pna1&utm_source=boomtrain&utm_medium=manual&utm_campaign=pna1
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Israeli voters help Netanyahu 
defuse ethics inquiry
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by Zev Chafets 
{ jewishworldreview.com } ~ Benjamin Netanyahu has now been under investigation for more than a year. The police have given immunity to two members of his inner circle. Perhaps these state's witnesses know things that will be incriminating. Or not. It's all under wraps for now.

In the meantime, the presumption of innocence is the Israeli prime minister's first line of defense, and so far it is working. 2019 is an election year and Bibi intends to run, indictment or not. If you believe the 10 separate opinion polls conducted recently, he and his center-right coalition will very likely win and continue to govern.

Unlike Donald Trump, Netanyahu can't shoot someone on a city street and still keep his loyal base. But Bibi isn't accused of shooting anyone. His alleged crimes are taking expensive cigars and champagne from "friends," exploring but not consummating a deal for better press coverage in a newspaper by undercutting its competitor, and awarding special treatment to a telecommunications magnate in return for what might be nothing more than positive coverage for Bibi's wife on the magnate's online news site.

Such offenses strike Likudniks as esoteric political misdemeanors, business as usual. As for the prime minister, he sees it all as a political witch hunt and is sticking to his mantra: "They won't find anything because there's nothing to find."

When the investigations heated up a few months ago, a couple of Bibi's coalition partners hinted they would force him to step down if he was indicted. The recent polls have convinced them to take a step back. Netanyahu is a proven winner after all. And, as they say in racing circles, you can't beat a horse with no horse.

He stands unchallenged in his own party, and faces a weak field of contenders on the center-left. In a recent prime-ministerial preference poll, he got more support than the major opposition party leaders combined. They finished third and fourth, behind "Don't Know/Other."

Bibi's appeal goes beyond the Israeli "deplorables" who make up his base and the coalition pols who want to ride him back into office. The general public regards him as an experienced and successful prime minister. Even his bitter enemies concede that Israel is more secure and prosperous than it was when he came to power. They tend to attribute this to luck.

Netanyahu, of course, sees it as the fruit of his wise and effective leadership. The slogan for his next campaign will be: "You've Never Had It So Good."

This boast has received international validation in recent weeks. In mid-March, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development issued its annual economic report card for its members, the industrialized democracies. Israel - with 3.3 percent annual growth, a "comfortable" external surplus and an enviable public-debt-to-GDP ratio - got a high grade.

Not only that, the OECD ascribed this stellar performance to Israel's "long history of effective micromanagement policy settings and bold structural reforms." Netanyahu instituted many of these reforms and policies during his tenure as finance minister (2003-2005), and he has presided over them during his near-decade as prime minister. Obviously he doesn't deserve all the credit, but incumbents get bragging rights. And an endorsement by the OECD makes a great talking point.

So does the annual Gallup Poll survey of Israel's standing with the American public, released in early February. For years, Netanyahu's critics have accused him of endangering American sympathies for Israel with his hard-line policies on Palestinian independence and strident opposition to Iranian expansion.

These accusations reached a crescendo in 2015, when he appeared before a joint session of Congress and openly called for a revolt against the Barack liar-nObama administration's nuclear deal with Iran. The Israeli commentariat overwhelming pronounced this a disastrous act of hubris certain to damage American public support.

Bibi dismissed the dire predictions as alarmist. And, according to Gallup, he was right; 74 percent of U.S. adults now have a favorable view of Israel - the highest rating since 1991, when Iraqi missiles were fired at Israeli cities by Saddam Hussein. And, despite Netanyahu's obvious Republican leanings and close ties to Trump, support is trans-partisan: 83 percent of Republicans, 72 percent of independents and 64 percent of Democrats.

The single most important piece of good news arrived in early March, courtesy of the U.N.'s annual "Happiness Report." The survey asks people in 156 nations to evaluate their lives, using criteria such as health care, life expectancy, social support and personal freedom. For the fifth year in a row, Israel finished in 11th place, just behind Australia and considerably ahead of the U.S., the U.K. and France. Happy voters are an incumbent's best friend.

Netanyahu is still not home free. Constant police interrogation is a drag on his time and attention. With his wife, Sara, and his son Yair implicated in some of the cases, it doesn't do much for his family life, either. If the cops come up with proof of serious criminal behavior rising to the level of moral turpitude, Bibi will almost certainly be indicted.

When his predecessor, Ehud Olmert, faced that prospect he resigned - and wound up in prison. Netanyahu is a tougher and more audacious character, and he has the public support Olmert lacked. Indicted or not, he intends to be on the ballot. And if he wins re-election, he'll face his legal troubles with another talking point: The people have spoken.
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