Senate Dems Beggar the Nation for $1.9T
On June 17, 2015, Dylann Roof walked into Emanuel African Methodist Episcopal Church in Charleston, South Carolina, and murdered nine of his fellow Americans, all of them black.
Roof is a legit white supremacist and neo-Nazi (as opposed to all the imaginary ones that Democrats claim as the reason for keeping our nation’s capital decked out in razor wire and patrolled by National Guardsmen), and he’s rightfully on death row for his crimes.
But, as Arkansas Republican Senator Tom Cotton pointed out on Saturday, Roof will still be getting a $1,400 stimulus check someday soon thanks to the Democrats’ just-passed $1.9 trillion COVID-19 “relief” bill, deceitfully dubbed the “American Rescue Plan.”
Dzhokhar Tsarnaev, who in 2013 murdered three and wounded more than 260 with pressure-cooker shrapnel bombs at the Boston Marathon (in addition to ambushing and killing a cop), will also be getting a $1,400 check. So will Aaron Shamo, the drug kingpin who last year was sentenced to life in prison for killing countless Americans with the million fentanyl-laced fake oxycodone pills he sold to unsuspecting buyers.
You get the idea.
The Senate could’ve easily nixed this abomination from its bill by voting for Louisiana Senator Bill Cassidy’s amendment, whose stupid-simple statement of purpose was “to ensure that the 2021 Recovery Rebates are not provided to prisoners.” They could have, except all 50 Democrats voted against the amendment and in favor of sending taxpayer-funded checks to murderers.
“Only a small part of what Democrats passed is for pandemic or economic relief,” notes the Wall Street Journal editorial board. “It’s mainly a way station on their high-speed train to a cradle-to-grave welfare-entitlement state. Most of the $1.9 trillion will flow to government unions or supposedly temporary income transfers that Democrats intend to make permanent later this year.”
As if the bill needed to be any more appealing to the socialists who now control the Democrat Party, socialist/ scumbag/liar-Joe Biden shared this telling endorsement during his remarks on Saturday: “commie-Bernie Sanders said this is the most progressive bill he’s ever seen passed since he’s been here. And the compromises were all compromises that didn’t affect the substance and the essence of what the bill is.”
socialist/scumbag/liar-Biden also said his boondoggle “puts us on the path to beating the virus,” which is flat wrong, because we’re already beating it. The vaccine rollout is accelerating, new infections are way down, we’re building up herd immunity, and, as our Nate Jackson pointed out Friday, “American businesses hired new workers at an impressive clip in February, adding an expectation-shattering 379,000 jobs. Headline unemployment dropped to 6.2%. This comes after recent news that fourth-quarter GDP growth was revised up to 4.1%, with expectations at 5% or higher for the first quarter of 2021.”
Clearly, we don’t need economic stimulus — especially the Democrats’ version of it, which is little more than a massive bailout for fiscally profligate blue states like New York and California.
And if Republicans thought West Virginia Democrat Senator Joe Manchin would be an ally in their efforts to ward off this spending orgy, they were sorely disappointed. Manchin dressed up some windows by arguing for a drop in the bill’s weekly jobless benefit from $400 to $300, but little else. So much for the guy who told Fox News’s Bret Baier last month that he wouldn’t vote for a bill that didn’t have bipartisan support.
“The goal of this Democratic program isn’t Covid relief,” as the Journal’s editors conclude. “The point is to expand and solidify the role of government as the guarantor of every American’s income unlinked to any obligation to work.”
Every citizenry gets the government they deserve, and we’re getting ours good and hard these days. If there’s a bright side to the American Rescue Plan, it’s that every single House and Senate Republican voted against it, which means they’ll be able to hang it around the Democrats’ necks going forward, just like they did with Barack scumbag/liar-nObama’s comparatively puny $787 billion “stimulus” in 2009.
~The Patriot Post
On March 2, Texas and Mississippi decided that the time to end draconian lockdown measures was at hand, and both states eliminated mask mandates and other coronavirus-related restrictions on businesses. Texas Governor Greg Abbott, who stated that Texas is 100% open for business, expects Texans to behave like adults, making the restrictions unnecessary. “Make no mistake, COVID has not suddenly disappeared,” he stated. “COVID still exists in Texas, in the United States and across the globe. But it is clear from the recoveries, the vaccinations, the reduced hospitalizations and the safe practices that Texans are using, that state mandates are no longer needed.”
Mississippi Governor Tate Reeves, who lifted all mask mandates in the state except for K-12 schools and indoor arenas, echoed that sentiment. “We are lifting all of our county mask mandates and businesses will be able to operate at full capacity without any state-imposed rules. Our hospitalizations and case numbers have plummeted, and the vaccine is being rapidly distributed. It is time!” the governor tweeted.
Naturally, those who wish to retain as much control over Americans’ lives as possible were apoplectic. America’s unelected national scold, better known as Dr. Anthony Fauci, led the charge. “It just is inexplicable why you would want to pull back now,” he huffed.
The CDC also warned against rolling back safeguards. CDC Director Rochelle Walensky insisted, “[Virus variants] are a very real threat to our people and our progress. Now is not the time to relax the critical safeguards that we know can stop the spread of COVID-19 in our communities, not when we are so close.”
President socialist/scumbag/liar-Joe Biden was equally chagrined. “We are on the cusp of being able to fundamentally change the nature of this disease because of the way in which we’re able to get vaccines in people’s arms,” he said. “The last thing we need is Neanderthal thinking that in the meantime, everything’s fine, take off your mask, forget it. It still matters.”
Whether it matters or not remains to be seen. Moreover, whether or not this nation will ever be apprised of the full scope of the societal damage precipitated by extended lockdowns also remains to be seen. For almost a year, the idea that life is a series of tradeoffs was completely ignored. The only deaths that really mattered were COVID-related, even as extended lockdowns also precipitated suicides, drug overdoses, murders, and the deaths of people who needed treatment but were terrified to visit doctors’ offices or hospitals.
That uncomfortable reality was buried under a blizzard of nonnegotiable mandates issued by those with both a lust for power and wholesale contempt for individual choice. Slogans like “14 days to flatten the curve” and “30 days to stop the spread” were used to rationalize mandates that were often unconstitutional and unscientific.
Yet amidst the blowback from the likes of Fauci, Walensky, socialist/scumbag/liar-Biden, and countless others, the aforementioned unprecedented level of hypocrisy unfolds. In one of the largest contradictions ever foisted on the American public — one that would even make a Neanderthal blush with embarrassment — the socialist/scumbag/liar-Biden administration has reinstituted a program that completely undermines every assertion it has made about containing the coronavirus:
Catch and Release.
How contradictory is Catch and Release? While millions of Americans remain locked down and several states still maintain travel restrictions, the administration is not only releasing COVID-positive illegals but dispersing them throughout the nation.
“Felipe Romero, a spokesperson for Brownsville [Texas], said Wednesday that the 108 positives represent 6.3% of the number of total migrants who have been rapid-tested at the city’s main bus station, where they are being released by the Border Patrol,” Fox New reports. “Rapid testing of the individuals began there on Jan. 25. He added that Brownsville does not have the authority to prevent those who test positive from traveling elsewhere in the U.S. — and are advising them to quarantine, follow the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) guidelines and socially distance.”
Does anyone seriously believe that “advising” quarantines for those who have already ignored laws and entered the nation illegally will suffice?
Miriam Izaguirre, an illegal from Honduras, was released by Border Patrol within hours of crossing the Rio Grande with her son. “Right now we were tested for COVID and they separated us … because we were positive,” Izaguirre stated. “We are waiting right now.”
Nonetheless, they were expected to board a bus to Houston, even as a bus company that operates out of the Brownsville station where they are located told the Noticias Telemundo Investiga news organization it cannot ask passengers for proof of coronavirus test results before boarding. Other COVID-positive illegals stated they were waiting to travel to Maryland, New Jersey, and North Carolina.
Remarkably, as of this writing, not a single member of the media has asked Fauci or socialist/scumbag/liar-Biden or any other member of this administration how they reconcile the irreconcilable. No one has asked the same CDC that advises against travel by Americans for spring break where it stands on wholly unrestricted travel by illegal aliens.
Homeland Security Secretary Alejandro Mayorkas insists what is occurring at the border is not a crisis, despite the reality that the number of unaccompanied illegal alien children entering America is on pace to exceed the all-time record by 45%. The Department of Homeland Security is projecting a yearly total of 117,000 unaccompanied minors crossing the border, including 6,000 migrants aged 16 and 17 caught just this month alone. Moreover, the Department of Health and Human Services is expected to reach its shelter capacity this month, meaning even more illegals will be released. And because socialist/scumbag/liar-Biden rolled back Donald Trump’s border-protection protocols and asked the Supreme Court to dismiss Trump administration challenges to withhold funds from sanctuary jurisdictions, thousands of additional migrants will be further incentivized by an administration that has quickly made a complete mockery of legal immigration and secure borders.
In short, the same collection of hacks more than willing to take American governors to task are precipitating what amounts to a fully coordinated super-spreader agenda of their own making.
Toward what end? A cynic — or is that Neanderthal? — might suspect that it’s a purposeful effort by our Ruling Class to make sure virus-related restrictions become permanent.
In the meantime, the CDC is hiring Coronavirus Quarantine Officers to help prevent the importation of communicable diseases from abroad, and their spread domestically. Its ad states, “The incumbents will be required to wear a uniform.”
Brownshirts would be very apropos. ~The Patriot Post
socialist/scumbag/liar-Biden Injects Race into HR 1
Democrats have long had a knack for twisting language in order to promote an agenda item that often accomplishes exactly the opposite of what the language they’re using suggests. HR 1, which passed the House last Wednesday, is a classic example of this language game. The “For the People Act” is anything but. In reality, it’s the “For the Leftist Tyranny Act.”
Our Louis DeBroux dug into just how terrible this bill is for securing Americans’ freedom. Suffice it to say, the bill would essentially eradicate any checks against election fraud, ensuring that Americans have no confidence in the integrity of future elections. As if 2020 wasn’t bad enough, HR 1 would essentially put it on steroids.
In an effort to combat the Democrats’ gambit, several state legislatures have introduced over 250 bills with the aim of ensuring election integrity. These bills are designed to correct and prevent the myriad of election abuses largely perpetrated by Democrats in 2020. Naturally, Democrats portray the GOP effort as attempted voter suppression, so it came as little surprise that Joe Biden on Sunday issued yet another executive order on the subject, intentionally timed to coincide with the Civil Rights anniversary of “Bloody Sunday.”
Democrats often call for legislation that blatantly steps all over the Constitution by claiming that it’s “urgently needed” to strengthen and protect democracy. In the same vein, socialist/scumbag/liar-Biden’s EO will expand “access” to voter registration, which, again, is intentionally designed to create the false narrative that Republicans are trying to “suppress” the vote.
Responding to the Democrats’ passage of HR 1, some 20 state attorneys general sent a letter to the U.S. House and Senate blasting HR 1 as unconstitutional and “alarming” because it would usurp the states’ constitutional rights and authority to manage their own elections. The AGs contend that the Founding Fathers intentionally sought to divide power between the federal government and the states to determine “how presidential electors would be chosen in order to avoid presidential dependence on Congress for position and authority.” Therefore, “Congress may not force states to permit presidential voting by mail or curbside voting, for example.” The letter, citing HR 1’s unconstitutional infringements, noted, “Perhaps the most egregious is [HR 1’s] limitations on voter ID laws,” of which 35 states currently require and HR 1 expressly eliminates.
Meanwhile, four months after the election, Georgia has still failed to produce chain-of-custody documents for more than 400,000 absentee ballots submitted in drop boxes. In a state where the 2020 presidential election was decided by fewer than 12,000 votes, the lack of these documents is disconcerting. The Georgia Star News reports, “In all, chain of custody documents for more than two-thirds — 67.5 percent — 404,691, of the total 600,000 votes cast via drop boxes have not been provided by county officials.”
With HR 1, Democrats are working to make situations like that the norm. Less oversight and less assurance of election integrity, all while socialist/scumbag/liar-Biden is playing the race card in an effort to browbeat the Senate into enshrining this type of election abuse.
~The Patriot Post
Climate Lockdowns?
False climate predictions are, unfortunately, nothing new. “The world is gonna end in 12 years if we don’t address climate change,” declared climate expert commie/liar-Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez in 2019 while pushing the Green New Deal. Former Vice President scumbag/liar-Al Gore’s 2006 “An Inconvenient Truth” told the public there was about a decade of life remaining unless significant climate change measures were implemented. In 1989, Noel Brown, then director of one of the offices of the UN Environment division, espoused the warning that “entire nations could be wiped off the face of the Earth by rising sea levels if the global warming trend is not reversed by the year 2000.” Contrast these statements to the 1975 siren by Kenneth Watt, the UC Berkeley professor who predicted the world was going to be “eleven degrees colder in the year 2000 … about twice what it would take to put us into an ice age.”
Now the public is being told that lockdowns may be necessary to save the world from climate change. This is, they say, an existential problem.
Late last summer and early fall, the whispers of “climate lockdowns” first appeared. In an opinion article for MarketWatch, Mariana Mazzucato, an author and a professor in innovative economics at the University of London, opined that a climate lockdown would employ measures such as limiting private-vehicle use, banning consumption of red meat, and imposing rationing to force fossil fuel companies out of business. Mazzucato concluded, “To avoid such a scenario, we must overhaul our economic structures and do capitalism differently.”
Now, the UK Guardian trumpets, “The annual rate of emissions cuts must increase roughly tenfold from that recorded in high-income countries before the pandemic.” Furthermore, “Lockdowns around the world led to an unprecedented fall in emissions,” but similar reductions “are needed every year of the next decade to have a good chance of holding temperature rises to within 1.5C or 2C of pre-industrial levels, as required by the Paris agreement.”
Ironically, just last month, Science Daily published data by the National Center for Atmospheric Research that wrecked the premise of these lockdowns. As published, “The counterintuitive finding highlights the influence of airborne particles, or aerosols, that block incoming sunlight. When emissions of aerosols dropped last spring, more of the Sun’s warmth reached the planet, especially in heavily industrialized nations, such as the United States and Russia, that normally pump high amounts of aerosols into the atmosphere.”
But don’t get distracted by the inconvenient truths of selective science. Control of money, power, and policy is at the root of this entire cult of thinking aimed at “high-income countries.” It seems that a vow of poverty and Third World status is required.
According to the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the 2015 Paris Climate Accord goals are to limit the increase of the global average temperature to 1850 levels, when the U.S. population was around 23 million, Millard Fillmore was president, and there were no cars or personal vehicles outside of a good ole horse and wagon. True to his ideology, the newly appointed United States Special Presidential Envoy for Climate hanoi-John Kerry is even claiming the Paris Agreement’s goals are inadequate in reducing carbon emissions and that a climate tax, as supported by Joe socialist/scumbag/liar-Biden and lowlife/liar-Kamala Harris, is one of the most significant things that can be done to yield the greatest impact.
The late Dr. Walter Williams, renowned economist, author, and conservative, nailed it: “Communism and socialism have lost respectability, so it’s been repackaged as environmentalism.” The Center-Right needs to stop bickering internally and make a stand, or we’re headed back to before there was a Grand Old Party. ~The Patriot Post
God's Green Earth
Aren’t we supposed to be thinking about “climate lockdowns” to reduce emissions and combat global warming climate change? Maybe the folks pushing that idea missed the recent updated memo from NASA — the earth is still getting greener.
At the turn of the century, NASA explained its measurement technique: “By carefully measuring the wavelengths and intensity of visible and near-infrared light reflected by the land surface back up into space, scientists use an algorithm called a ‘Vegetation Index’ to quantify the concentrations of green leaf vegetation around the globe.”
We’re old enough to remember when the environmental problems threatening our existence were deforestation and holes in the ozone layer. As it turns out, there is 10% more vegetation now than there was in 2000, and the trend began at least 10 years before that. To add insult to injury for the ecofascists, the greening is because of human activity, and it offsets emissions and ozone holes far more effectively than mandates or carbon taxes. Another benefit is more food for an increasing world population.
This isn’t new information, of course, as our Jordan Candler wrote two years ago. But it’s worth highlighting once again amidst the renewed panic as the Biden administration rejoins the Paris Agreement.
The entire environmental movement could stand to be actually more green and a whole lot less red. ~The Patriot Post
Chris Cuomo Is the Shame of CNN
scumbag/liar-Andrew Cuomo was no doubt hoping things would die down a bit this weekend. They didn’t. Two more accusers have come forward, bringing the total to five women who’ve now charged New York’s disgraced Democrat governor with sexual harassment or inappropriate behavior.
In this, the #MeToo era, and coupled with the far more serious allegations that he sentenced perhaps thousands of his state’s nursing home and long-term-care citizens to unnecessary death due to his disastrous policy of returning highly contagious COVID-positive patients back to those facilities, you’d think the Emmy Award-winning one-time media darling would have the decency to resign.
You’d think.
But with some 15,000 of the state’s long-term-care residents having died, and with scumbag/liar-Cuomo’s top aide, Melissa DeRosa, having recently admitted on a conference call with fellow Democrats that they’d refused to release the actual death count data due to their fear that Donald Trump might use it against Cuomo, and with more and more Democrats calling for his resignation, the governor seems utterly defiant.
“I was elected by the people of the state,” he said Sunday during a quick conference call with reporters. “I wasn’t elected by politicians. I’m not gonna resign because of allegations.”
A powerful fellow Democrat, State Senate Majority Leader Andrea Stewart-Cousins, was unimpressed. “Every day there is another account that is drawing away from the business of government,” she said. “We have allegations about sexual harassment, a toxic work environment, the loss of credibility surrounding the Covid-19 nursing home data and questions about the construction of a major infrastructure project.”
Cuomo, though, appears to have no shame.
And speaking of shameless guys named scumbag/liar-Cuomo, what’s with his younger brother Chris and his enablers over there at CNN? As columnist Maureen Callahan asked, “Is there a bigger joke in broadcast news than Chris Cuomo?”
Answer: No.
The CNN anchor repeatedly yukked it up on-air with his big brother during the pandemic’s early days, when Andy was writing books, winning Emmys, and doing victory laps. But now all he can say is that he’s “aware of what’s going on with my brother, and obviously, I cannot cover it because he is my brother.”
But it was okay for Chris to tell his brother, “No matter how hard you’re working, there’s always time to call Mom. She wants to hear from you.” And to ask him hard-hitting questions like, “Now I’ve seen you referred to a little bit recently as the LuvGuv and I’m wondering if that’s bleeding into your demeanor at all and making you a little soft on the president?” And to inquire, “Do you think you are an attractive person now because you’re single and ready to mingle?”
From a journalistic perspective, the obvious question arises: What did Chris know, and when did he know it? Or are we to believe that the younger brother and the “news” network that employs him had no idea about scumbag/ liar-Andrew Cuomo’s behavior in office, nor any inclination to find out?
“[ scumbag/liar-Andrew Cuomo is] an elected official standing up and reminding us that we’ve been in bad situations before and the way we’ve always persevered is by sticking together,” said CNN about the brother of one of its most high-profile employees. “That only by understanding we are all in this together — healthy, sick, old, young, health care worker, politician, whatever, will we get through it. That there is always a light at the end of the tunnel even if we can’t always see it. And that getting there won’t be easy, but we will get there. That is leadership. That is empathy in action. That is what we need.”
No wonder CNN calls itself “The Most Trusted Name in News.” ~The Patriot Post
HANS VON SPAKOVSKY
The so-called “mainstream” media, including CNN, is apoplectic over former Vice President Mike Pence’s recent commentary in The Daily Signal in which he says that “election integrity is a national imperative.”
Apparently, they disagree, and don’t like that he points out the serious problems with HR 1, which just passed the House of Representatives, that would “trample the First Amendment” and “increase opportunities for fraud.”
Pence is absolutely correct in that assessment. CNN published its supposed refutation by claiming that he got his facts wrong about what the legislation designated HR 1 does. But they are the ones who are wrong — and some of their claims border on the absurd.
For example, they assert that Pence is wrong when he said that HR 1 bans voter ID laws. But the bill requires states to allow individuals to vote who sign statements in which they claim they are who they say they are.
This federal requirement eviscerates state voter ID laws and, in essence, bans them; states obviously can’t enforce their voter ID requirements if federal law says they have to allow anyone who just signs a form to vote.
CNN’s characterization of the vice president’s claim as “not true” is disingenuous and should earn them a Pinocchio award.
Next, CNN claims that Pence is wrong over his concern that imposing automatic voter registration requirements on the states will lead to noncitizens, i.e., illegal aliens (although CNN follows the politically correct rule of referring to them as “undocumented immigrants”) being registered to vote. But there seems little doubt that will happen, and has already happened in places like California that have implemented automatic voter registration.
The complex sections of HR 1 on automatic voter registration require numerous state and federal agencies to send information on individuals to state election officials so they can be registered. Many state and federal agencies don’t have citizenship data on the individuals they deal with. In fact, most “public secondary schools” and “institution[s] of higher learning” that are included in this automatic voter registration requirement studiously avoid getting citizenship information on their students, especially illegal aliens.
So it is highly likely that they will send information on all of the individuals they deal with, regardless of their citizenship status, to state election officials. Moreover, HR 1 specifically states that no alien can be “prosecuted under any Federal or State law” or “adversely affected in any civil adjudication concerning immigration status or naturalization” due to being automatically registered.
CNN does acknowledge that Pence is correct about felons voting. While admitting that the legislation would require states to allow what CNN terms “formerly incarcerated persons” to vote “the moment they set foot out of prison,” as the former vice president said, CNN fails to add that this particular provision is blatantly unconstitutional.
The 14th Amendment specifically gives states the right to decide if felons lose their ability to vote and if and when they can get it back. You can’t override a constitutional amendment with a bill passed by Congress.
CNN says that the accuracy of Pence’s assertion that HR 1 “would force states to adopt universal mail-in-ballots” depends on how you “define” that term.
Wrong. By forcing states to allow anyone to vote using absentee ballots without an excuse — requiring states to mail an absentee ballot request form to every registered voter — and specifying that states must create a permanent absentee ballot list for any voter that wants to be sent an absentee ballot in all elections, the legislation, in essence, creates a nearly universal mail-in voting system.
CNN’s “fact check” on redistricting is also amusing in what it reveals about the network’s view of government. Pence said in his commentary that “congressional districts would be redrawn by unelected, unaccountable bureaucrats.”
CNN is forced to admit that HR 1 does take the power to redraw political boundaries away from state legislatures and forces states to set up so-called “independent” redistricting commissions. But CNN claims that what “constitutes” an unaccountable bureaucrat is “up for debate.”
Really? State legislators who redraw political boundaries after each census are accountable to the voters who put them in office — and voters can try to vote them out of office if they don’t like how those legislators conduct themselves, including the way they do redistricting.
But the members of the commissions required by the legislation all would be appointed. That means they would be unaccountable to voters who would have no recourse against commissioners whom they view as having drawn unfair, overly partisan, or inequitable political lines in the redistricting process.
That sounds like “unaccountable bureaucrats” to me — and any member of the public with common sense.
Finally, CNN admits that Pence was correct when he said that the bill requires that illegal aliens and citizens be given equal representation in Congress. But it tries to excuse that by saying “this is already the case,” and that President socialist/scumbag/liar-Joe Biden has ordered that the population used for reapportionment include aliens, legal and illegal.
This “equal representation” may be true relative to apportionment, but Pence’s comment had nothing to do with apportionment.
What CNN fails to explain is that Pence is talking about redistricting, and it is not currently a requirement under federal law for state legislatures to draw new congressional district lines using total population data that includes aliens. Each state sets its own criteria.
In fact, in the interest of fundamental fairness and equal protection principles, states legislatures should all switch to using citizen population rather than total population when drawing new congressional districts lines. If HR 1 becomes law, they won’t have that option.
Contrary to CNN’s biased, partisan review, Pence assessed the legislation accurately and succinctly. As he said, it “mandates the most questionable and abuse-prone election rules nationwide” and would “prevent states from implementing new, needed reforms.”
Pence added that we should be working to “restore public confidence in our elections.” He is absolutely right. If it becomes law, HR 1 will do the exact opposite of that. ~The Patriot Post
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