What the Democrats Have Learned: Nothing

There is great news for Republicans!

Yes, Trump won the election, but while that is certainly good news, it is not the BEST news. The best news is that Democrats have learned exactly NOTHING from their humiliating defeat.

Hillary Clinton (The Most Qualified Person Ever to Run for President) has attributed her loss to James Comey. Let her think that. Let ALL Democrats think that. It will prevent them from seeing the real reason. Namely that they are out of touch with America. Well, technically, America outside of Hollywood and Manhattan.  

So because we want nothing more than to see future Democrat defeats, our advice for them includes the following:

-- Continue to seek support from Hollywood Liberals and use them to broadcast your message. There is nothing that middle America likes more than to be lectured by these nitwits.

-- Embrace Black Lives Matter....even more tightly. The average American enjoys watching lawless thugs burning and looting while accusing peace officers of murder.

-- Keep pushing the LGBTQRST agenda. Try to come up with something even more outrageous than allowing guys into the ladies bathroom. Then accuse those who object of bigotry. 

There was a time - and it was not that long ago - that Democrats held positions nearly identical to those held by today's Republicans. Bill Clinton said that marriage was between a man and a woman. Now a Republican who voices that view supports "hate." 

Clinton also said that abortion should be "rare, safe and legal." Undoubtedly, many Republicans who are not interested in refighting the abortion issue would silently acquiesce if this were the case. Instead, we get the current Democrat party position that abortion should be omnipresent and financed by the Catholic Church. 

By the way, here is a sidebar that we have been pondering. Democrats want publicly financed birth control AND publicly financed abortion. Shouldn't a transitional Republican position be something along the following lines? Hey, you can't have it both ways! You can't say: give me free birth control AND free abortions. Choose one.

In closing, we salute Democrats for their stunning inability to learn from their mistakes and urge them on. Elizabeth Warren for President! 

The Clintons Get Away With It

Again.

The Clintons ALWAYS get away with it.

Prepare for eight more years of this.

Common Sense Gun Reform

RedStateVT presents here for the first time a common sense idea for gun control that Liberals should be able to rally around. Here goes....

Conservatives will agree to ban AR-15 rifles if Liberals agree to outlaw abortion.

Brilliant isn't it?

Of course, more lives would be saved by banning abortion, but we are hoping that Liberals will abide.


Who said it?

“I will suspend immigration from areas of the world when there is a proven history of terrorism against the United States, Europe or our allies, until we understand how to end these threats.”

The answer, of course, is Donald Trump. A mere ten years ago, Democrats would have signed on to this statement in a heartbeat. Now, it is considered bigoted. Weep for America.

Liberals and Orlando

Since the Orlando shootings Liberals have scrambled to come up with an explanation that does not involve saying the word "muslim." And so we initially got the blame-the-gun excuse.  MSNBC anchors queried local reporters endlessly about the number of rounds that Omar Mateen's weapon could fire. Liberals have never really grasped the calculus that a determined killer could bring four or five or six guns or four or five or six ammunition clips and kill just as many people as they could with an assault rifle.  Focusing on the gun gives them the moral high ground, so they think, because they naively believe the answer is legislative. Ban that gun and these killings will stop!

Perhaps sensing some leakage in this approach, Liberals turned next to a convenient bogey man: the NRA. And so the New York Daily News outrageously blamed the carnage on a legal organization made up of law-abiding citizens. The NRA can defend itself and did.

Meanwhile President Obama played true to form, scolding Americans who even so much as thought the words "radical Islam." The best take on the matter came from whoever first said: Obama was madder at Trump than he was at the killer. These horrific events have always presented an American president with a brief opportunity to console and calm the country. Not so with Obama. He uses them to criticize Republicans.

Unable to conjure up a coherent narrative, more than a few Liberals latched on to a truly bizarre argument: Fundamentalist Christians are just as bad. We are not making this up!  There is simply no way to respond to that and so we won't.

Along the way Liberals tried out a few more story lines including that Mateen was a self-loathing gay and/or that this was a hate crime against the Bisexual-Lesbian-Transvestite (BLT) community. None of these generated too much traction.

Which leaves us now with the emerging Liberal explanation (and one that they have tried to downplay in the past in order to keep the focus on the AR-15): mental illness. RedStateVT has written many times of the role that mental illness plays in mass killings and it absolutely deserves to be examined here. 

Also worth examining further, of course, is radical Islamic-inspired terrorism.

Congratulations America! You Are Pre-Qualified for a New President

The Hillary Clinton campaign has settled on its over-arching rationale for why she merits the presidency. She is QUALIFIED. More than that, though, she is the MOST qualified. Arguably the most qualified EVER. Even Obama has now admitted this. And if there is anything that Obama knows about it is the qualifications for the presidency. Having had none of them. 

The sum total of Obama's qualifications were:

He is black.

He was raised by a single mother.

He had an exotic name.

For a political party absolutely obsessed with identity politics, Obama was the dream candidate.

During his time as a junior senator Obama had no legislative accomplishments.  In lieu of taking a position on proposed legislation, he usually voted "present." This was the candidate that Democrats foisted on America in 2008. Now they want to talk about qualifications.

So let's look at Hillary Clinton's qualifications. 

She is a former first lady. So we've got a bit of the Eva Peron thing going. 

She was handed the job of senator from New York having had zero connection to the state during her entire life. In preparation for the job, she went on a "listening tour." Based on her legislative efforts, New Yorkers apparently told her not to do anything. 

Obama then made Clinton his secretary of state. In that role, she helped to bring stability to the Middle East, tamed Vlad Putin's territorial ambitions and negotiated a strict deal with the Iranian mullahs curbing their nuclear program. 

Well, not really. Although she did travel a lot. Over a million miles, they say. 

Donald Trump may or may not be qualified to be president. But the fact of the matter is that Democrats have lost the right to talk about "being qualified" as a requirement for the job.

Hillary Clinton: First Female Woman to Capture Major Party Nomination!

In a groundbreaking and historic event, Hillary Clinton became the first female woman to win a major party nomination for president. While other female women have run as vice presidential candidates (Geraldine Ferraro and Sarah somebody...) Clinton has now broken through a once seemingly impenetrable barrier, no doubt opening the door for other female women to follow.  

And by the way, can we add that in addition to being a female woman, Clinton shattered another barrier?

Clinton is also a female woman grandmother!

History will long remember the moment that a soon-to-be-indicted female woman grandmother did the impossible. For today, let us just savor the moment.

Berning Down The House

Even Bernie Sanders cannot believe his success. Sanders entered the presidential race after Elizabeth (Talking Bull) Warren declined to do so. Likely, the Bernster thought he could push the Democrat party platform a bit into Socialist territory. Little did he guess that he would be nipping at Hillary's heels.

Sanders has effectively tapped into the psyche of America's malcontents and grievance-mongers who believe the country has not given them enough. One of the surprises of this election season is just how large that group has become. Weep for America.

So - given that he will not get the nomination - what does Sanders do now? Well, if you were an aging Socialist with bad teeth, what would you do? We believe that Sanders will go for broke. 

Despite the early niceties, it is our view that Sanders despises the Clintons. Is a man who basically has one issue - Wall Street is evil - going to accept someone who has engorged herself on Wall Street's largess? Of course not. Look for Sanders to take the gloves off and Pillory Hillary!

Despite the inconvenient fact that Sanders is not even a Democrat, he will force a convention floor fight for the soul of the Democrat party, soon to be renamed the Democratic Socialist Party. Bern and his sycophants will take the gloves off.  Socialists have never shied from protest, never mind violence. It should make for quite spectacle.  

Is Your Candidate Qualified? A Simple Test

Is your candidate qualified to be president? Here is a simple test to determine the answer to that very important question. How does your preferred choice for president answer the following questions?

1) You are face-to-face with an Islamic jihadist. Each of you is holding gun pointed at the other. Do you....
   
   a) Engage the jihadist in a discussion of historical grievances

   b) Ask the jihadist if he would like to come to America

   c) Pull the trigger


2) As president would you...

   a) Enforce only the laws that you agree with

   b) Interpret existing laws as you see fit

   c) Enforce all the laws


3) With respect to immigration, America should do which of the following?

   a) Allow anyone from foreign countries to enter the country

   b) Allow those who have broken the law and entered the country illegally to stay and ensure that they receive full government benefits

   c) Enforce immigration laws and protect the borders



Only those candidates who get 100% are qualified to be the next president. 


Answer Key: 1) c  2) c 3) c

The Man Who Gave Rise to Trump

Who made it possible for Donald Trump - egotistical billionaire, silly reality TV star, bad hair day-of-the-year candidate - to become the GOP frontrunner? One man and one man only: Barack Obama.  

Think what you will about Trump, but he seized upon the very things that Americans (including a majority of Republicans and perhaps a healthy percentage of Democrats) object to the most about President Obama. These include Obama's worldview that America is NOT necessarily special. That it is just one of the world's nations, not the "last great hope of mankind." With a Kenyan father and an upbringing in Indonesia, Obama has never been fully American. Deep inside, he sympathizes with at least some of the jealousies and bitterness that citizens of failed or dysfunctional countries have toward America's success. Hence, his foreign policy which includes apologies (yes, it's true) and "leading from behind" (whatever that means). Obama fancies himself a student of history. He believes that the details of day-to-day foreign policy are trivial and that in the grand sweep of time evil will be defeated and peace will reign. In and of itself it is an incredibly childish and naive view. Ronald Reagan actually believed the same thing, but he knew that boots on the ground were required to keep the bad actors on the world stage in check. Would Reagan have stood down while Russian aircraft buzz American ships on a daily basis? You know the answer. Obama thinks that Putin is just posturing. But then again, Putin took the Crimea....

Trump has read the mood of America and knows that people are frustrated by seven plus years of namby-pamby dithering. Americans don't want war, but they do want America to project strength. And they are not apologetic about it because they know that America is at its core a great and virtuous nation. Obama, along with his spiritual side-kick Bernie Sanders, believe that America was, like ancient Rome, founded on a crime. 

Likewise, Trump knows that America and American values need to be protected. Hence his signature issue of immigration. Whether or not a wall ever gets built, Trump has read the mood of the country. We are not a third world country. We do not want to become a third world country. We have the right to determine who comes here and who does not. And we have nothing to apologize for. All of which are antithetical to Obama who has embraced and championed open borders and amnesty. Trump supporters believe that immigrants have to assimilate American values. Obama believes that America needs more diversity. At least half of the country disagrees. 

Don't like Trump? Blame Obama.


Tid-Bits
Not a single member of the White House press corps is a registered Republican, according to survey results recently published by Politico. (freebeacon.com, 4/29/2016)

Wow! Did not see this one coming....


Hillary Clinton came to campaign in coal country — and she had her feet held to the fire.

As Mrs. Clinton stepped onto the sidewalk on Monday to tour a health and wellness center here, a crowd of protesters stood in the rain, many of them holding signs supporting the leading Republican candidate, Donald J. Trump, and chanted, “Go home!” (New York Times, 5/3/2016)

Obama and Democrats have waged a war on coal. Now the chickens have come home to roost. 


Detroit public schools were shut for a second straight day Tuesday as teachers stayed away in protest of the possibility that they won’t be paid after June 30. (Wall Street Journal, 5/3/2016)

Why are Detroit teachers striking? Why, it is for the children!

Question That We Wish We Had Asked!

After 87 months of Obama, why are young liberals asking for ‘change’? 
(Headline, Daniel Henninger, Wall Street Journal, April 20, 2016)

From the article:

The 2015 federal budget spent about $3.8 trillion, or 21% of the U.S. economy. Year in and year out, that $3 trillion to $4 trillion underwrites programs.

As listed at federalsafetynet.com, the programs delivering welfare include: the negative income tax, SNAP (supplemental nutrition), housing assistance, SSI, Pell Grants, TANF (temporary assistance for needy families), child nutrition, Head Start, job training programs, WIC (food for women and children), child care and Liheap (energy subsidies).

Entitlement programs include Social Security, Medicare, Medicaid, unemployment insurance and the Affordable Care Act.

...

Why are 25-year-old liberals crying out for “change,” if you are spending $4 trillion every year on all this stuff? There’s hardly anything significant left to deliver, other than results, so maybe something is wrong with the delivery system.

The Liberal class rails endlessly about "corporate welfare" by which they mean tax breaks to businesses. At least corporations create jobs and produce goods and services that people want. Whether or not their needs are legitimate, the people receiving handouts of your money from the government produce nothing. But dare to raise these issues? You are a hater, a racist, a bigot. You are greedy or materialistic. 

Liberals deride the earners and extol the takers. 

Liberals can always find new ways to spend your money. 

In America Today

In America today you can lose your job for suggesting that men should use the men's bathroom and women should use the women's bathroom. Apparently, to use the bathroom of your choice all that is required is that you "identify" as belonging to a particular sex. 

Whatever that means. 

Anatomy no longer matters. 

Likewise, you can "identify" as belonging to another race. 

Skin color no longer matters. 

So today RedStateVT suggests pushing the boundaries even further to make all your dreams come true. Always wanted to be a doctor, but did not want to put in the time? Identify as a doctor! Dream of defending the victims of social injustice in court? Lucky for you, a law degree is no longer required. In America today, all you have to do is to "identify" as that to which you aspire. Nothing can stop you now.  

Why we are even thinking of heading to Washington D.C. We are going to "identify" as a member of Congress, a Supreme Court justice, or maybe even as the President of the United States.  

Watch them try to stop us!

It's Over, (for) America

A federal appeals court in Richmond has ruled that a transgender high school student who was born as a female can sue his school board on discrimination grounds because it banned him from the boys’ bathroom.

In backing high school junior Gavin Grimm, the U.S. Court of Appeals for the 4th Circuit deferred to the U.S. Education Department’s position that transgender students should have access to the bathrooms that match their gender identities rather than being forced to use bathrooms that match their biological sex. (Washington Post, 4/19/2016)


Do you want to get ahead in America? Of course you do, but you are going about it the wrong way. Hard work, dedication, perseverance? Sorry, these things don't cut it anymore. If you really truly want to get ahead, the answer is simple: declare yourself a victim. People will rush to defend you. Politicians will extol your struggle. The media will come running. Doors will open. 

Even better, the bar for victimhood is pretty low. Anyone can be a victim. Did a cop ever stop you for forgetting to put on your turn signal? You are a victim! Ever been laughed at by anyone for anything? Victim! Do you have a mental disorder? Are you a member of ANY group that might be classified as a minority? Have you been denied access to the bathrooms of the opposite sex? Victim! Victim! Victim!

This is what America has come to. President Obama goes to the penitentiary and consoles criminals. Black Lives Matters objects to the incarceration of crack dealers that were destroying black communities. Bernie Sanders runs a national campaign based entirely on victimhood. And Donald Trump is called a racist because he believes that illegal aliens are illegal. Sorry Donald, in today's America they are victims. 

Weep for America.

The Failures of Liberalism

Never have the failures of Liberalism been more apparent and never have Liberals been more oblivious. 

Pick an issue, any issue:

Yesterday a Russian war plane threatened a U.S. navy ship. This after Obama and Democrat presidential front runner Hillary Clinton confidently announced a "Russian Reset." Which meant the following: the opposite of whatever George Bush did. Apparently Putin believed the reset meant he could humiliate America at will. Think also: Crimea. It was President Obama who smugly chided Mitt Romney that "the 70s wants its foreign policy back." Maybe someday a journalist will ask Obama if his policy toward Russia was a mistake. But don't count on the question being asked or Obama coughing this one up.  

Obama and his political sycophants passed a sweeping reform of the U.S. health care system promising that 1) you could keep your health care plan and 2) health care premiums for the average family would decrease by $2500. Of course, you could not keep your health care plan and, of course, premiums went up. They continue to go up unchecked. Given that track record alone Obama should now be back in Chicago tending his garden and collecting a high six figure salary serving on the board of a "non-profit." But one of the defining characteristics of Liberalism is that there is never accountability for failure. Never. 

There is no area touched by Liberals that is not made worse. In places where Liberals rule unchecked, the disasters are unmitigated. Speaking of Chicago - Obama's adopted hometown - Liberal policies there have resulted in unrelenting black-on-black violence rivaling ethnic tribal warfare in Africa. The school system run by union toadies is beyond dysfunctional. And public sector pensions have brought the city close to bankruptcy. 

But because Liberalism has co-opted the American media there is no accountability. 

The Democrat Party is Now Governed by Black Lives Matter

Alternate Title: The Pain of Bill Clinton

“You are defending the people who kill the lives you say matter. Tell the truth.” (former President William Jefferson Clinton shouting down Black Lives Matter protesters)


It is hard to feel sorry for Bill Clinton. But just for a moment, feel sorry for him. The Democrat Party is no longer his party. His signature achievements, NAFTA, welfare reform, anti-crime legislation, have all been repudiated by his successors. Heck, they have even been repudiated by his very own wife! No, it is not his party. Instead it is the party of Barack Obama, of Elizabeth Warren, of Bernie Sanders. But even more, it is the party of Al Sharpton and Black Lives Matter. 

The media has been obsessed with the story of the supposed disintegration of the Republican Party because of Donald Trump. But Trump is a faux Republican who could just as easily run as a Democrat. If Trump is not elected he will fade from politics and never ever have anything to do with either Republicans or politics again other than to make political contributions to whichever legislators hold sway over his real estate dealings. The Republican Party will mend, albeit with a stronger conservative bent. 

The Democrat Party has a bigger problem which is currently being ignored. The Sanders/Warren/Black Lives Matter wing of the Democrat Party represents an enormous existential threat. It is giving the Clintons, Bill and Hillary, heartache in a process that was supposed to be a spring training tune-up for a run against the Republican challenger. Somewhere along the way, however, things went awry. Fueled, no doubt, by Obama's tepid support for Hillary and his visceral hatred of Bill, an opening appeared. Obama probably never envisioned Bernie Sanders being the one to fill it. His choice was probably more along the lines of Joe Biden. Instead he got Sanders. Notwithstanding, the new Democrat axis has its own issues. Sanders is an aging socialist who favors massive new entitlement programs, the funding of which will hit the balance sheet of every American above the poverty line. Warren's demagoguery on Wall Street is undercut by her fabricated personal history and her Harvard Law elitism. And Black Lives Matter? Sorry, but there is simply too much video of BLM protesters shouting for dead cops. Yet this is who Democrats are aligning with. 

Yes Hillary will likely still get the nomination and has a good chance of being president. But she will not be taking her orders from Bill Clinton. Instead, she will be getting her marching orders from Black Lives Matter. 

The Most Dangerous Man in America

A dark cloud is gathering over America. Fueled by the rhetoric of one man, a dangerous horde has awakened. The malcontents, the lazy, the grievance-mongers and conspiracy theorists have emerged to express their collective discontent with their station in life and with a country they believe has not done enough FOR them. The man responsible is Bernie Sanders. The Sanders worldview is now infecting the American social discourse like a penicillin-resistant STD. 

Among the tenets of Sandersism are the following:

• Capital is static. If someone has a dollar, it is a dollar that you don't have. That is unfair.

• The Protocols of the Elders of Capitalism rule. They keep the average man from success.

• Despite having spent hundreds of billions of dollars on social welfare programs, America is a cruel country that has not done enough to help people.

• It is all a giant conspiracy being led by the oil companies, the insurance companies, the banks, and the pharmaceutical companies.

• Also part of the conspiracy: a group known as the billionaires. (With apparent exceptions for billionaires who give to Liberal causes.)

What Bernie Sanders has done is to empower people. But not to work harder. He empowers them to complain. He empowers them to envy others. He empowers them to blame everyone but themselves. Unfortunately, it is not just aging hippies from the 60s and other assorted bitter-clingers that Sanders speaks to. In addition, there is a new generation of clueless college students currently undergoing indoctrination by their professors who think Sanders has it right. And so this new generation will turn John F. Kennedy's words upside down and demand to know: What can America do for them.

For this, Sanders is to blame.

Let's Talk Trump

First a disclaimer: RedStateVT has - to date - not endorsed any Republican candidate for president. Our preferred candidate, former Vice President Dick Cheney, decided against running, no doubt due to health problems. So now let's take a look at the current front-runner, Donald Trump.

Here are a few things that give people - Republicans and Democrats alike - pause about Trump.

• First, he may not even be a real Republican. He used to be a Democrat, has given money to Democrats and has held policy positions that Democrats hold.
• Second, Trump says some seemingly outrageous things. Witness the uproar over his comments about immigration and abortion.
• Third, Trump has never held political office before.

Wow! With baggage like that one would think that Trump would have long ago (think Rick Perry) have fallen by the wayside and now be planning his next reality TV show. But - somehow - Trump has convinced MILLIONS of people to vote for him. We will opine in a minute on how that is likely to have happened, but first let's examine the items enumerated above: the reasons why Trump should NOT be where he is today.

Yes, it's true that Trump does not have that Republican feel about him. Neither the Republican-lite of a John McCain nor the Republican- noir of a Ted Cruz. Why it sort of reminds us of another candidate garnering millions of votes who - for his entire decades-long career - has eschewed the label of the party for which he is now running. Who could this be? If you said Comrade Bernie Sanders you would be correct! Sanders has labeled himself an Independent for as long as one can remember. Now he is running as a Democrat. The state-controlled media never questions him about this anomaly. So Trump's party affiliation apparently should not bother us any more than that of Sanders.

The Donald certainly gets a lot of attention whenever he speaks. His most outrageous comments were - apparently - on the subject of immigration. Trump dared to say - in the aftermath of a mass murder attack by Muslims - that maybe the country should reconsider its policy on Muslim immigration. For this apostasy, he was labeled a bigot and a hater. Apparently, suggesting that a country that had allowed the entry of 1.5 million Muslims since 9/11 and had seen an influx of tens of millions of Mexicans hit the pause button offended the Liberal elites. Of course, the record shows that Hillary Clinton once had a more aggressive position on immigration. Sorry, but rational minds (e.g. not Liberals) could hardly call Trump's comments controversial.

Finally, there is the question of Trump's experience. The only thing that Trump has been able to accomplish in his adult life is to grow his family fortune to north of a billion dollars. How did that happen? Meanwhile, Barack Obama rode to the presidency on a resume that includes the following: his brown skin, his experience as a community organizer and his abbreviated political career in which - when face with difficult decisions - he voted "present." No, previous political experience no longer matters. 

Trump's success is based on reading the political mood of the country. Namely, mass immigration, coupled with foreign policy appeasement is destroying America. Bill Clinton's advisers sold a deeply flawed candidate to the country with the tag line: It's the economy, stupid. Trump's tag line is: Make America Great Again. After almost eight years of Barack Obama, that sounds about right. 

March 25, 2016 -- RedStateVT Headline of the Day

Carpet Bombing: Perhaps a Good Idea After All

March 23, 2016 -- RedStateVT Headlines of the Day

Religion of Peace Claims New Victims


Obama Parties in Argentina, World Burns

March 21, 2016 -- RedStateVT Headline of the Day

Obama Visits Cuba, Castro Wins

It's Illegal Immigration, Stupid!

Convicted
Her conviction would be critical in persuading Mr. Obama to join allies in bombing Colonel Qaddafi’s forces. In fact, Mr. Obama’s defense secretary, Robert M. Gates, would later say that in a “51-49” decision, it was Mrs. Clinton’s support that put the ambivalent president over the line.

The consequences would be more far-reaching than anyone imagined, leaving Libya a failed state and a terrorist haven, a place where the direst answers to Mrs. Clinton’s questions have come to pass. (New York Times, 2/28/2016)

So even the New York Times believes that Hillary Clinton made a massive strategic mistake with respect to Libya. Wait a minute! Didn't they endorse her for president?

You can bet your last nickel that when she goes up against Republican nominee Donald Trump the Times will talk about her foreign policy expertise and his lack thereof. 

When Liberals Fight

In an unusually public flare-up, one of MSNBC’s television personalities clashed with the network on Friday in a dispute about airtime and editorial freedom and said she was refusing to host the show that bears her name this weekend.

The host, Melissa Harris-Perry, wrote in an email to co-workers this week that her show had effectively been taken away from her and that she felt “worthless” in the eyes of NBC News executives, who are restructuring MSNBC. (New York Times, 2/27/2016)

No doubt the four people who watched Harris-Perry's show will be devastated.

First MSNBC ditches Sergeant Ed Schultz, then the Right Rev. Al Sharpton and now "Professor" Harris-Perry. The network grapples with an existential problem: what to do when no one watches. 

Pander Game

The Democratic candidates don’t want to be seen as “pandering” in South Carolina. (New York Times, 2/27/2016)

Well, Dems may not want to be "seen" as pandering to blacks, but that is exactly what they do.

RedStateVT Exclusive! Obama's SCOTUS Nominee List

RedStateVT has obtained a copy of the closely guarded secret list of President Obama's potential Supreme Court nominees. We present the list below along with our commentary explaining the likely rationale for Obama's choices.

1) Hillary Clinton (if she does not get the Democrat nomination for president)

Rationale: Consolation prize for Hillary. Plus Barack is tired of hearing that Bill and Hillary think he jumped the line in 2008 and squeezed Hillary out of her presidential birthright. Obama: I let you play at Secretary of State and now you can be a pretend Justice. The debt is paid. 

2) Bernie Sanders (if he does not get the Democrat nomination for president)

Rationale: Consolation prize for Bernie. Plus Barack wants to keep Sanders busy with something else besides disparaging the rich given that he (Obama) has every intention of getting rich after he leaves office. Also, it will give Sonia Sotomayer someone to have lunch with.

3) Johnnie Cochran

Rationale: No one has successfully used the court system more to gin up racial conflict in the U.S. than the flamboyant JC. If the Republican racists in Congress refuse to consider Cochran's nomination on the grounds that he is dead, Obama will default to the Rev. Al Sharpton. While Sharpton is not a lawyer, Obama will make the case that Sharpton knows the legal system well given his 'representation' of assorted criminals and his own legal travails. No Justice No Peace!

4) Barack H. Obama

Rationale: No one knows more about (shredding) the Constitution than the former constitutional law professor.


Not on the list:

President-in-Waiting Elizabeth Warren
Rationale: She is the President-in-Waiting.

Nevada Republican Gov. Brian Sandoval
Rationale: Obama's rope-a-dope about nominating a Republican didn't even fool the normally gullible Republicans.

Joe Biden
Rationale: Obama has finally had enough of Biden's mouth. The VP's comments arguing against filling a SC vacancy in an election year may have come decades ago, but Republicans are now calling it "the Biden rule." It's a no go for Joe. 

Why Democrats Should Like Donald Trump

In many regards, the persona of Donald Trump is entirely consistent with many of the things that Democrats have practiced over the years; things that have given Republicans pause, but which Democrats have insisted are (pick one) no big deal, nobody's business/private matters or representative of mainstream behavior. Far from criticizing Trump, Democrats should embrace him. Let's review several of the popular knocks on Trump and explain why.

The Donald has been married three times. 

In the distant past, anything other than a happily married candidate was a non-starter for political viability. While Ronald Reagan opened the door to a divorced president, it was Bill Clinton and his MoveOn supporters who ended the notion that a president's conduct in and around marriage mattered. 

The Donald may have engaged in some dubious real estate deals.

No doubt when faced with Republican nominee Trump Democrats will want to talk about real estate. Do they really want to go there? Democrats are heavily burdened with Whitewater, Harry Reid's Nevada shenanigans and, oh yeah, Barack and Michelle's dubious Chicago land deal. You remember, don't you? The one where they bought an adjoining parcel at a sweetheart price from a convicted felon. It doesn't get talked about that much, but if the Dems want to talk real estate, let's talk real estate. 

The Donald speaks off the cuff and sometimes says outrageous things. 

One name. Joe Biden. End of discussion.

The Donald changes his position. 

Most politicians do. Why Obama and Hillary were once even against gay marriage!

The Donald is rich.

Trump was born rich, but went out and made himself richer through hard work. So apparently Democrats believe that is worse than getting rich by giving six figure speeches to special interest groups seeking to curry favor? Like the previous issues, being rich is not a point on which Democrats can argue. In fact, Democrats should embrace their inner Trump. Why he can even be the country's first true consensus candidate! 

Make America Great Again!


Burn Down the Missions
The Plan to Shut Down Gitmo: Congress should carefully consider the Obama administration’s viable plan to shut down the prison at Guantánamo Bay by the end of the year. (New York Times editorial, 2/23/2016)

Imagining a Rikers Island With No Jail: The sensible thing to do with the jail complex is to close it. (New York Times editorial, 2/24/2016)

We are starting to see a pattern here. Do you? 

Liberals are NOT soft on crime (repeat ten times).

And here's another thought: With the New York Times closing down a prison a day, why do we even need to replace Justice Scalia? At this rate, there will be little for judges to do!


Strained
Mr. Sanders, those who know him say, exemplifies a distinct strain of Judaism, a secular offshoot at least 150 years old whose adherents in the shtetls of Eastern Europe and the jostling streets of the Lower East Side were socialists, anarchists, radicals and union organizers focused less on observance than on economic justice and repairing a broken world. (New York Times, 2/24/2016)

Yes, you read that correctly. Bernie comes from a long line of socialists and anarchists. 

Source: Obama Will Nominate Illegal Alien To Supreme Court

The Supremes
Democrats said that if Mr. McConnell persisted in trying to block a nomination, he should anticipate little cooperation from them moving forward, and that they would strive to frame the refusal to act as a radical and unprecedented move. (New York Times, 2/15/2016)

Why kind of like using reconciliation to pass Obamacare!


Mr. McConnell’s threat to block a confirmation could complicate the re-election chances of Republican senators in swing states. (New York Times, 2/15/2016)

And President Obama's insistence on nominating someone could complicate re-election chances of Democrats in other swing states. 


Reid to GOP: For the good of the country, stop your nakedly partisan obstruction: Mr. McConnell’s threat to block a confirmation could complicate the re-election chances of Republican senators in swing states. (Harry Reid, Washington Post, 2/16/2016)

Has there ever been a more hypocritical politician in the United States than Harry Reid? The same Harry Reid who used parlor tricks to pass Obamacare. Who obstructed at every turn. Who accused Mitt Romney of not paying his taxes. Who never submitted a budget. Who has gotten wealthy through a career in politics. 

We think not. 

The Democrat attack line on the brewing fight over the Supreme Court is that the public will turn on Republicans who obstruct Obama. No they won't. Fifty percent of the country will stand up and cheer. 


Appetizers
This attitude intensified the unappetizing solipsistic subtext of her campaign, which is “What is Hillary owed?” It turned out that female voters seem to be looking at Hillary as a candidate rather than as a historical imperative. And she’s coming up drastically short on trustworthiness. (Maureen Dowd, New York Times, 2/17/2016)

Maureen Dowd is as partisan as one can get. Her unending attacks on the Bush family long ago crossed the line of basic decency. We'll give her kudos, however, for this biting column on the Clintons. 


Singular
Mr. Sanders’s synecdoche for his idea is Wall Street. Everything wrong with American life can be charged up, in his telling, to a small neighborhood in lower Manhattan. Something old-fashioned there is about blaming Wall Street for all the country’s deficiencies. But, then, lunatics of one idea, basking in the pleasure of Manichaeism, like to focus all their enmity on one target. (Joseph Epstein, Wall Street Journal, 2/17/2016)

Must read column on One Trick Pony Bernie Sanders. 

Vintage

Coming From Reality
...the most persuasive repudiation of Mr. Obama’s economic record is coming from Democrats. Mr. Sanders and Mrs. Clinton are both campaigning against the economic status quo, deploring the lack of income growth, rising income inequality and unaffordable health care, among other problems. (Wall Street Journal, 2/11/2016)

One of the most striking things about Barack Obama's life story, and presidency, is the absence of accountability. He never has to answer for anything. Whether it be his early drug use, his "present" votes as a senator, rising - not falling - health care premiums or his economic stewardship over the past seven years. Both Sanders and Clinton deplore economic conditions in the U.S. at the same time that they argue over who loves Barack more.


Missing
Mr. Obama was otherwise in a reflective mood on the show, taking stock of his seven years in office and talking about what he will miss most when he leaves the White House. At the top of the list: Air Force One. When Ms. DeGeneres asked him if he would go back to flying on commercial airlines as a private citizen, he replied with an emphatic “No.” (New York Times, 2/12/2016)

Global climate change warrior Obama ain't going back to commercial air travel. It's private aviation only, proving yet again that Liberal hypocrisy knows no limits.


Entitled
His (Sanders) socialism is farcical in a country that can’t afford the entitlements it already has. (Holman W. Jenkins, Jr., Wall Street Journal, 2/12/2016)

One of the great services that Hillary Clinton can do for the country is to expose Bernie Sanders on the issue of how he intends to pay for the welfare state that he aims to create. She has done a bit so far, but she can certainly hammer him a lot harder. For his part, Bernie has two, equally ludicrous, responses. First, he denies the facts.*  For example, he is on the record already as saying that Social Security is fully funded for years into the future. Second, he is going to pay for it all by taxing stock trades which, of course, hurts anybody with a mutual fund.

*With the latest report of the Social Security and Medicare Trustees, the programs’ unfunded liabilities, in present value terms, are $60 trillion. The worker-to-retiree ratio, which was 5.0 when Medicare was created in the mid-1960s, today is 2.5, and headed for less than 2.0 after 2030. Left out of this calculation, of course, is the growing rank of non-retired entitlement recipients whom taxpayers must also support. (Wall Street Journal, 2/12/2016)


Face Lift
However, I do want to explain why I so firmly believe that, even today, women have an obligation to help one another. In a society where women often feel pressured to tear one another down, our saving grace lies in our willingness to lift one another up. (Madeline Albright, New York Times, 2/13/2016)

We are awaiting the correction which will read "...Liberal" women have an obligation to help one another." Because otherwise, how can Albright pass over the abuse suffered by Michelle Bachmann, Nikki Haley, Sarah Palin, Carly Fiorina and scores of other non-Liberal women?


Doctor My Eyes
Dr. Imani Perry of Princeton University (a transgender-friendly institution of higher learning!) was arrested on an outstanding warrant. Of course she insists that it was racially motivated and that she was mistreated by the police. Here is what the arresting officer said to her (as quoted in the New York Times yesterday) as evidenced by the video dashcam:

“Just give me a couple minutes; let me just look over everything, just make sure everything else is valid by checking your registration and everything, and we’ll get you out of here,” the officer told her, going back to his squad car.
...
“Unfortunately, anytime we transport anyone, because you’re under arrest because of the warrant, we have to put you in handcuffs, O.K., that’s anyone,” the male officer said.

“It’s just a parking offense, so nobody else has to know about it,” he added.
...
He said, “When we get there, you can call them, you can make as many phone calls and texts as you want.”
...
“We just gotta be sure that you’ve got nothing sharp, not saying you do,” the officer said.
...
“Are you O.K.?” he asked.
...
“No? Are you hyperventilating?” he asked. 
...
“As long as you have the money ... we’re just going to process you real quick.”

Sounds like yet another case of police brutality. How could the arresting officer fail to offer her a decaf cappuchino? 


Reject
In nearly every speech, Bernie Sanders reminds voters that he doesn’t have a super PAC, doesn’t want money from Wall Street and rejects establishment politics. Yet the Vermont senator has benefited from at least $1.5 million in backing from super PACs and from political groups that don’t have to fully disclose their donors, according to filings with the Federal Election Commission. (Wall Street Journal, 2/13/2016)

So why doesn't Bernie disavow these efforts on his behalf?


Indications
The fact that emails sent on Mrs. Clinton’s unclassified server must now be reviewed on the department’s classified network — with hundreds being released only with redactions — could be viewed as an indication that at least some of the information in the roughly 33,000 emails turned over by Mrs. Clinton’s lawyers should never have been sent on an unclassified network. (New York Times, 2/14/2016)

Well yes, it could, couldn't it? You would have to read down to paragraph twenty-one of this twenty-four paragraph article to see this admission.

Hillary Clinton and the Art of the Smear

In the face of brutal attacks from Bernie Sanders about her use of Wall Street firms as her personal piggybank, Hillary Clinton hits back calling it an "artful smear." Hillary knows a thing or two about smears having engaged in a few of her own along the way. Knowing that a forceful rebuttal is required, Hillary's team  comes up with "artful smear." Not just a run-of-the-mill smear, mind you, an "artful" smear. Someone at Team Hillary will get something extra in their paycheck this week for that one. Even Geraldo Rivera was using it in her defense. 

Which leads us to ask Democrats the following: how would you characterize the attacks on Mitt Romney four years ago? Romney is a church elder, a tither, charity patron, successful businessman, a model husband and father. Dems made him out to be a rapacious capitalist whose business practices killed people. Harry Reid said on the Senate floor that he had it on good knowledge that Romney had not paid taxes for ten years. Now those are "artful smears."


Rolling
The evidence continues to roll in: Broad increases in the minimum wage destroy jobs and hurt the working-class Americans that they are supposed to help. The latest evidence is an announcement that Wal-Mart, America’s largest employer, will close more than 150 U.S. stores, a move that will affect 10,000 employees. (Andy Puzder, Wall Street Journal, 2/6/2016)

Liberals will probably criticize Wal-Mart for closing stores and laying off people. 

The same Liberals who complain when Wal-Mart opens a store. 

The same Liberals who complain that Wal-Mart does not pay its employees enough.  


Programmed
Hillary Clinton’s older feminist supporters have a message for young women who are not backing her candidacy: Shame on you. ...Two feminist icons of Mrs. Clinton’s generation made their frustration known over the weekend, calling on young women who view Mr. Sanders as their candidate to essentially grow up and get with the program. (New York Times, 2/7/2016)

So young females should support Hillary Clinton because she is a woman. Just as all blacks are supposed to support Barack Obama. Funny that no one is saying that blacks should support Ben Carson or Hispanics should support Ted Cruz or Marco Rubio. For that matter, what about Carly Fiorina? She fits the criteria. But Carly Fiorina does not run as a woman. Ben Carson does not run as a black candidate. Ted Cruz does not run as a Hispanic. The difference, of course, is that with Democrats it is all about identity politics. So Hillary Clinton runs as a woman. (Also a grandmother!) That is the Democrat "program." 


Whistle Stop
There were reports of secret waiting lists to hide long delays in care. Whistle-blowers said as many as 40 veterans had died waiting for appointments. And Congress was demanding answers.

Despite mounting evidence of trouble at the Department of Veterans Affairs, Senator Bernie Sanders, then the chairman of the Senate Veterans Affairs Committee, initially regarded the complaints as overblown, and as a play by conservatives to weaken one of the country’s largest social welfare institutions.

“There is, right now, as we speak, a concerted effort to undermine the V.A.,” Mr. Sanders said in May 2014, two weeks after the story was picked up by national news organizations. “You have folks out there now — Koch brothers and others — who want to radically change the nature of society, and either make major cuts in all of these institutions, or maybe do away with them entirely.” (New York Times, 2/7/2016)

The New York Times largely ignored the VA scandal when it was uncovered for several reasons. Most importantly. it could not be pinned on Republicans. A Democrat, Bernie Sanders was in charge of Senate oversight for the VA. Furthermore, the VA is the Democrat model for single payer, government run, health care. How would it look to expose any of that?

Now, of course, it is convenient for the Times to bring it up in order to check Sanders in the face of his challenge against their favored candidate.

Motif

Shifty
...Secretary Clinton’s public statements have shifted markedly. Initially, she maintained that no classified information had been communicated through her private system. This claim became untenable with the revelation that hundreds of her emails contained classified information (the current count exceeds 1,500). So Secretary Clinton adopted the similarly unsustainable position that this became classified only after she received it. Now, faced with the undeniable fact that much of the information was “born classified,” she claims that it was not “marked” classified, and that any mishandling may be the fault of underlings. (Andrew C. McCarthy, former federal prosecutor, New York Times, 2/4/2016)

A concise rendering of how Hillary has lied.


As They Say
Mrs. Clinton, lobbing her harshest assault yet in their race for the Democratic presidential nomination, said months of criticism by Mr. Sanders over her taking speaking fees from Wall Street banks amounted to a suggestion that she was corrupt — or, as she put it, a “very artful smear.” (New York Times, 2/5/2016)

Why is Hillary so mad at Berns over his bringing up her Wall Street speaking fees? It's simple. The Bern is breaking a cardinal rule among Liberals. Namely, Liberals are allowed to do the things that they criticize others for doing. Whether its trying to avoid taxes (John Kerry), flying around in private planes (any Hollywood actor), or taking money from Wall Street (B. Hussein Obama, Hillary Clinton), it is not a sin if Liberals do it. By the way, good for The Bern!


ICUed
Filmmaker Michael Moore is in an intensive-care unit with pneumonia, he said Thursday through his verified Twitter account. (USAtoday.com, 2/5/2016)

Oddly, Moore is rumored to be receiving care in the U.S. and not in a Cuban hospital... Another Liberal hypocrite.


DOA
President Obama will propose a $10 fee for every barrel of oil to be paid by oil companies in order to fund clean energy transport system, the White House announced Thursday -- although Republicans were quick to declare the plan "dead on arrival" in Congress. (Foxnews.com, 2/5/2016)

Liberals still don't get it no matter how many times that we try to educate them. Obama's $10 tax is not going to be paid by the oil companies. It will be passed along to the consumer just like a carbon tax or any other brilliant Liberal idea for raising revenue to pay for the welfare state. Working people - who Liberals claim they want to help - will be penalized. 

Barack Goes to a Mosque

Spikey
Concerns about Muslims and Syrian refugees in the United States grew after terrorist attacks in Paris in November claimed the lives of 130 people and after a mass shooting by a husband-and-wife team in San Bernardino, Calif., in December killed 14 people and seriously wounded 22. Both sets of attackers were inspired by the Islamic State.

Since then, attacks on American Muslims and mosques have spiked, according to the Council on American-Islamic Relations. At a meeting at the White House last month, prominent Muslim Americans pleaded with senior administration officials to have the president visit a mosque in the hopes of stemming such attacks. (New York Times, 2/3/2016)

If the numbers are coming from CAIR, you can be absolutely convinced that they are bogus. We're guessing....between 3 and 5 attacks max. Whatever the number, you can bet that it is less than the number of attacks on Jews and synagogues. No matter, however, Brother Barack goes to the mosque anyway and apologizes to Muslims.

There is no truth to the rumor that Obama will then visit a Coptic church to express solidarity at the genocide being perpetrated on this ancient Christian sect at the hands of ISIS. 


Separately
As he and Mrs. Clinton took separate charter flights from Iowa to New Hampshire before dawn on Tuesday, Mr. Sanders and his team were making plans to spend more than $1 million on television commercials... (New York Times, 2/3/2016)

How do we know that Liberals are hypocrites when it comes to global warming? Because Bern and Hill took separate charter flights. Why couldn't they plane-pool and go together? For that matter, why didn't they take a commercial flight? The answer is simple: the prescriptions they tout for the common man do not apply to the Liberal political elite.

Bienvenida a Los Estados Unidos

Ann Coulter's latest smash best seller is entitled Adios America. The sub-title is The Left's Plan to Turn Our Country into a Third World Hellhole. The topic is America's immigration policies and Coulter's exhaustively researched analysis presents a truly frightening picture of how under the banner of diversity Liberals have endangered the country by admitting hoards of foreign welfare recipients and criminals. We have only one quibble with Coulter. Based on our recent experience returning to the U.S. at New York City's JFK airport recently, it may already be too late. JFK is already a Third World Hellhole, albeit one with marginally cleaner toilets. Here is what we found.

At JFK Customs and Immigration one enters a large brightly lit room with modern looking kiosks to scan your passport. But before you get to them you are forced to snake through miles of aisles. When one finally reaches the aforementioned kiosks, it is a free-for-all. Personnel from Customs are present, but they are quite obviously diversity hires. English does not appear to be their native language, they provide no direction, and they simply mill about in groups talking among themselves. You will long for the higher level of courtesy and efficiency found at the average post office. After you get your passport scanned... well you are basically on your own. There is a line that weaves randomly around and between the scanners, but it is not marked, the end of the line cannot be found, and there is no indication of where the line goes or what it is for. 

As luck would have it, this line eventually heads in the direction of the U.S. Immigration stations. It is worth noting that there are approximately ten or more such stations. Approximately eight are dedicated to handling non-U.S. citizens entering the country. Only two are solely for returning Americans. By our estimation, English speakers on the line for residents totaled no more than 40%. 

The entire experience reminds one of what movies depict of airports in the third world backwaters of Africa and the Middle East. The only thing missing were the AK-47 wielding armed guards.

Welcome to America. Or should we say Bienvenida a Los Estados Unidos. 

In Which We Get A Little Cynical

New York Times editorial headline, January 18, 2016: A Safer World, Thanks to the Iran Deal 
From the same editorial: And even if the Iranians were to attempt to produce enough nuclear fuel for a bomb, it will now take them more than a year to do so. Before the agreement, that breakout time was two to three months.

Don't know about you, but we feel safer. Much safer. How could you NOT feel safer? After all, Obama and Kerry extended the breakout time for Iran to produce a nuclear bomb from two months to, call it fourteen, months. Rest easy tonight, America.

Price for the deal? Iran gets $100 billion.


Berned
Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders said Sunday that he would pay for his plan for a single-payer health-care system with a suite of new taxes, including a 2.2% “premium” applied to all income, a new payroll tax paid by employers, and a variety of tax increases on the wealthiest Americans.

The plan would increase government spending by a total of nearly $14 trillion over 10 years, the campaign said, and together with his other proposals, would bring federal spending to its highest level since World War II. (Wall Street Journal, 1/17/2016)

Don't know about you, but the Sanders plan sounds like a winner to us. A big winner. How could you NOT embrace "a suite of new taxes?" 

Price for the Sanders plan? A $14 trillion increase in government spending.

Democrats React to the Market Sell-Off

Hillary Clinton: The economy was better when the Clintons were in the White House and Bill was diddling with the interns. Elect me and we will return to those glory days.

Bernie Sanders: Break up the banks. Break up the insurance companies. Break up the drug companies. Break up the oil companies. Break up military contractors. 

Barack Obama: I have not been following the news. What happened?


Hall Monitors
It is the consensus of many of us who monitor government behavior that the FBI will recommend indictment. That recommendation will go to Attorney General Loretta Lynch, who, given Clinton’s former status in the government and current status in the Democratic Party, will no doubt consult the White House. If a federal grand jury were to indict Clinton for espionage or corruption, that would be fatal to her political career. (Judge Andrew Napolitano, Foxnews.com, 1/14/2016)

The possible indictment of Hillary Clinton is a Republican pipe dream. It is NOT going to happen. The Clintons have skated around the law for most of their professional lives and they have always been given a pass. There is nothing that is going to stop Hillary Clinton from being the Democrat nominee and, quite likely, president. Not Bill and not Benghazi. Not an influence-peddling "foundation" or classified e-mails on the Chappaqua server.