Governance

by

Trump impeachment effort: The Swamp strikes (again) to deflect attention | RT.com

Editor’s Note: Excellent analysis of the misguided, self-sabotaging behavior of the Democrats to destroy the President regardless of the consequences to their own political futures and the integrity of the USA.
Robert Bridge is an American writer and journalist. Former Editor-in-Chief of The Moscow News, he is author of the book, ‘Midnight in the American Empire,’ released in 2013.
Washington’s political football has taken another bounce, skipping from Russia to Ukraine in just days. Democrats made the move to impeach Trump, but why only now?

Like some rogue cyborg responding to a programmed ‘terminate’ command, the Democratic Party has shown a relentless, laser-guided determination to destroy Donald Trump regardless of the consequences not only to their own political fortunes, but to the very integrity and viability of the nation.

Indeed, rather than humbly accept defeat following the Russiagate debacle, which held the Republic in a suspended state of mind-numbing animation for three tortuous years, the malevolent machine was merely rebooted. Today, the Democrats and their liberal gimp media are no longer obsessed by the Kremlin, Wikileaks, and a pee-stained hotel bed somewhere in central Moscow, but rather a phone call between Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky.

Hello Russiagate 2.0

For those who have lost the plot for this latest DC thriller, here is the abridged version.

During a July 25 telephone conversation, the full transcript of which is accessible here, Trump asked Zelensky to “do us a favor,” which involved digging up dirt on Joe Biden, a leading Democratic contender in the 2020 presidential race. The task wouldn’t require a very large shovel, of course, since Biden had already implicated himself when he publicly bragged about forcing Ukraine to terminate its chief prosecutor Viktor Shokin, or risk losing a cool billion dollars in US financial aid. Who is Viktor Shokin? None other than the guy leading an investigation of Biden’s son, Hunter, who received millions of dollars for the pleasure of squatting on the board of a Ukrainian gas company.

In other words, Biden offered Ukraine a bald-faced quid pro quo, exactly what the Democrats are accusing Trump of doing. There’s just one glaring problem, however, with the Democratic charges: nowhere in the transcript of the call does Trump ever suggest he will compensate Kiev for carrying out his requests.

That nagging detail, however, did not stop the Democratic crazy train, with 300 million jaded American passengers on board, from departing the station for a non-stop ride to impeachment proceedings.

This latest rush by the Democrats to bring down Trump seems less of an effort based on sound political strategy than one that is driven by raw desperation. How else to explain the decision by the Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi to announce an impeachment inquiry against the president when she hadn’t even read the transcript? That is an incredible admission, especially considering what the country has already been through for the past three years. Moreover, impeaching a sitting president is a radical, almost unheard of step that has only occurred twice in the nation’s history, against Andrew Jackson and Bill Clinton. Neither effort resulted in those leaders being forced from office. So, why on earth risk it?

There are other telltale signs that the Democrats, with no small help from the fawning media, are spinning yet another tale of intrigue every bit as Clancy-esque as Russiagate. Not unlike Pelosi, the White House whistle-blower – alleged to have been a CIA ‘conscientious objector,’ quite possibly a historic first in the dark underworld of espionage – issued a complaint based on second-hand sources. And the plot keeps thickening.

Until just days before the transcript was made public, such ‘evidence’ would have been considered inadmissible since only firsthand knowledge was deemed worthy of consideration. Some bureaucrat, however, showed amazing acuity in altering those conditions just before the Democrats would lower the hammer. Now, just in time for the impeachment show trial, the intelligent community’s new and improved complaint form, as reported by the Federalist, “no longer requires potential whistleblowers… to have direct, first-hand knowledge of the alleged wrongdoing that they are reporting.”

In other words, it looks like the Democrats are up to their usual dirty tricks. At this point it must be asked, what is the driving force behind their obsessive hatred of Trump, which has provoked a dire situation in the country that conservative commentator Rush Limbaugh has dubbed a “cold civil war” between the two parties?

Is Democratic desperation a sign of guilt?

Without bothering to educate herself first on the Trump-Zelensky conversation, Pelosi has disgraced her office, while, at the same time, opening up the Democrats to the possibility of massive setbacks, possibly even self-destruction, on the political front.

Pelosi admitted nearly as much when she said “it doesn’t matter” when asked by a reporter if the Democrats’ push for impeachment may damage their chances of holding onto the House down the road. “Our first responsibility is to protect and defend the Constitution of the United States,” she affirmed. Is anybody buying that explanation?

As much as we would all like to believe that modern US politicians are intrinsically guided by some patriotic and lyrical ‘love of country’ and ‘duty to the constitution,’ the evidence points to far less altruistic motives. Considering the collective wealth of congressional members alone suggests that the overwhelming majority of US politicians are in the political swamp known as Washington DC merely to enrich themselves.

Others may argue that the Democrats have essentially launched a preemptive strike against the 2020 presidential election, which they have a very narrow chance of winning given their lackluster field of contenders. Considering the high risks of pressing forward with impeachment, however, which the Democrats have admitted could even cost them the House, that suggestion also sounds implausible.

So, what is it? Why so much non-stop fear and loathing from the Democratic camp ever since Trump took over the White House in 2016?

Much of the Democratic angst goes back to the 2016 campaign trail when Trump boldly proclaimed that he would ‘drain the swamp.’ I don’t think he was just speaking rhetorically. Many Americans are unaware of it, simply because the mainstream media has concealed the news, but the Democrats are under investigation by the White House.

Back in May, Trump awarded sweeping powers to his Attorney General Bill Barr to investigate claims that the Democrats were “spying” on his campaign, a very serious charge that would make Watergate resemble a picnic by comparison. Meanwhile, in the same week that the Democrats were recklessly pushing forward with their impeachment inquiry, the New York Times reported that the US State Department had reopened its investigation into Hillary Clinton’s abuse of her email service, which compromised an untold number of classified government documents.

“As many as 130 officials have been contacted in recent weeks by State Department investigators — a list that includes senior officials who reported directly to Clinton…” The Washington Post reported.

In other words, the gloves have come off in the US capital. If you doubt that, consider this: if some Washington whistleblower, or “spy” as Trump has called the individual, was able to receive second-hand information about a classified phone call between Trump and a foreign leader, then it stands to reason that these same people knew for a long time that the Barr investigation had begun to focus on Clinton’s insecure email box. Thus, the Democrats could very well be engaged in ‘obstruction of justice’ while portraying Trump as the villain. Now, should the US president attempt to proceed with criminal charges against his opponents, the Democrats will scream in one media-backed voice that Trump is the one attempting to avoid persecution.

The Democrats, displaying incredible recklessness and impulsiveness in their latest effort to take down the House of Trump, may be less interested in winning back the White House in 2020 and far more interested in avoiding jail time. Nothing else adequately explains their crazed level of vindictiveness.

Source: RT.com

by

Court Forces Release of Clinton Wikileaks discussion email that confirms State Department knew about her email account | Judicial Watch

Editor’s Note: There is a long chain of events leading to this misguided impeachment inquiry initiated by the Democrats in the House of Representatives and it began during the Obama Administration when Hillary Clinton was Secretary of State. She was breaking with long-standing national security procedures by establishing a private server for her government and personal communications and the State Department knew she was doing this all along. Here’s the proof.

Judicial Watch announced today that the State Department provided a previously hidden email which shows that top State Department officials used and were aware of Hillary Clinton’s email account.

On December 24, 2010, Daniel Baer, an Obama State Department deputy assistant secretary of state, writes to Michael Posner, a then-assistant secretary of state about Clinton’s private email address:

Baer: “Be careful, you just gave the secretary’s personal email address to a bunch of folks …”

Posner answers: “Should I say don’t forward? Did not notice”

Baer responds: “Yeah-I just know that she guards it pretty closely”

Mr. Posner had forwarded Clinton’s email address, which was contained in an email sent to State Department senior leadership, about WikiLeaks.

It appears the State Department produced this email in 2016 in redacted form, blacking out Clinton’s personal email address and the discussion about Clinton’s wanting to keep her email address closely guarded.

Judicial Watch sought the email after a former top Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) State Department official testified to Judicial Watch about reviewing it between late 2013 and early 2014.

The testimony and the email production comes in discovery granted to Judicial Watch on the Clinton email issue in a FOIA lawsuit (Judicial Watch v. U.S. Department of State (No. 1:14-cv-01242)). Clinton also faces potential questioning under oath in this lawsuit.

Despite a recent court order requiring production of the email, the DOJ and State Departments only produced it 10 days ago after Judicial Watch threatened to seek a court order to compel its production.

“Judicial Watch just caught the State Department and DOJ red-handed in another email cover-up – they all knew about the Clinton email account but covered up the smoking-gun email showing this guilty knowledge for years,” stated Judicial Watch President Tom Fitton.

The scope of court-ordered discovery that produces this email find includes: whether Secretary Clinton used private email in an effort to evade the Freedom of Information Act (FOIA); whether the State Department’s attempt to settle this FOIA case in 2014 and 2015 amounted to bad faith; and whether the State Department has adequately searched for records responsive to Judicial Watch’s FOIA request.

During a recent hearing, Judge Lamberth specifically raised concerns about a Clinton email cache, carterheavyindustries@gmail.com, discussed in a letter to Senator Charles Grassley (R-IA) and wants Judicial Watch to “shake this tree” on this issue.

Judge Lamberth also criticized the State Department’s handling and production of Clinton’s emails in this case stating, “There is no FOIA [Freedom of Information Act] exemption for political expedience, nor is there one for bureaucratic incompetence.” 

The court rejected DOJ and State efforts to derail further Judicial Watch discovery. Judge Lamberth called their arguments “preposterous” and cited a prior Judicial Watch FOIA case in which he ordered U.S. Marshals to seize records from a Clinton administration official.

Judge Lamberth detailed how the State Department “spent three months from November 2014 trying to make this case disappear,” and that after discovering the State Department’s actions and omissions, “Now we know more, but we have even more questions than answers. So I won’t hold it against Judicial Watch for expanding their initial discovery request now.”

Judge Lamberth stated his goal was to restore the public’s faith in their government, which may have been damaged because of the Clinton email investigation.

The court granted Judicial Watch seven additional depositions, three interrogatories and four document requests related to former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s use of a private email server. Hillary Clinton and her former top aide and current lawyer Cheryl Mills were given 30 days to oppose being deposed by Judicial Watch.

On December 6, 2018, Judge Lamberth ordered Obama administration senior State Department officials, lawyers and Clinton aides to be deposed or answer written questions under oath. The court ruled that the Clinton email system was “one of the gravest modern offenses to government transparency.”

This Judicial Watch FOIA lawsuit led directly to the disclosure of the Clinton email system in 2015.

Judicial Watch’s discovery over the last several months found many more details about the scope of the Clinton email scandal and cover-up:

  • John Hackett, former Director of Information Programs and Services (IPS) testified under oath that he had raised concerns that former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s staff may have “culled out 30,000” of the secretary’s “personal” emails without following strict National Archives standards. He also revealed that he believed there was interference with the formal FOIA review process related to the classification of Clinton’s Benghazi-related emails.
  • Heather Samuelson, Clinton’s White House liaison at the State Department, and later Clinton’s personal lawyer, admitted under oath that she was granted immunity by the Department of Justice in June 2016.
  • Justin Cooper, former aide to President Bill Clinton and Clinton Foundation employee who registered the domain name of the unsecure clintonemail.com server that Clinton used while serving as Secretary of State, testified he worked with Huma Abedin, Clinton’s deputy chief of staff, to create the non-government email system.
  • In the interrogatory responses of E.W. (Bill) Priestap, assistant director of the FBI Counterintelligence Division, he stated that the agency found Clinton email records in the Obama White House, specifically, the Executive Office of the President.
  • Jacob “Jake” Sullivan, Clinton’s senior advisor and deputy chief of staff when she was secretary of state, testified that both he and Clinton used her unsecure non-government email system to conduct official State Department business.
  • Eric Boswell, former assistant secretary of state for diplomatic security during Clinton’s tenure as secretary of state, testified that Clinton was warned twice against using unsecure BlackBerry’s and personal emails to transmit classified material.

Source: Judicial Watch

by

DOJ says Trump contacted foreign countries to assist Barr’s Russia inquiry | The Hill

Editor’s Note: The hypocrisy of our elected representatives never ceases to amaze and dazzle. Whereas the Democrats have accused Trump and Barr of pursuing a “politically motivated investigation” to defend the President against a possible impeachment proceeding what the heck have the Democrats been doing since before Trump was elected? They’ve been building a case for impeachment since before Trump took office.

The Department of Justice (DOJ) said Monday that President Trump contacted foreign countries at Attorney General William Barr’s request to ask them for assistance in an ongoing investigation into the origins of the Russian interference probe.

“As the Department of Justice has previously announced, a team led by U.S. Attorney John Durham is investigating the origins of the U.S. counterintelligence probe of the Trump 2016 presidential campaign. Mr. Durham is gathering information from numerous sources, including a number of foreign countries,” Justice Department spokeswoman Kerri Kupec said in a statement.

“At Attorney General Barr’s request, the President has contacted other countries to ask them to introduce the Attorney General and Mr. Durham to appropriate officials,” Kupec added.

The Justice Department statement quickly followed reports that Trump had asked Australia’s prime minister during a recent phone call to assist Barr in gathering information for the Russia inquiry and that Barr had held meetings overseas in Italy seeking the country’s help. Barr has also reportedly requested assistance from British intelligence officials in connection with the inquiry.

Democrats have accused Trump and Barr of pursuing a politically motivated investigation. Trump railed against former special counsel Robert Mueller’s probe as a “witch hunt” and has at times claimed the investigation into his campaign’s links to Russia was “illegal.”

White House spokesman Hogan Gidley said Monday that Barr asked Trump to “provide introductions to facilitate” the ongoing investigation, accusing Democrats of not wanting “the truth to come out.”

“This call relates to a DOJ inquiry publicly announced months ago to uncover exactly what happened,” Gidley said in a statement Monday. “The DOJ simply requested that the President provide introductions to facilitate that ongoing inquiry, and he did so, that’s all.”

Barr said earlier this year that he planned to investigate the intelligence collection on the Trump campaign to determine whether it was “adequately predicated.” Trump has given Barr sweeping powers in the investigation, including allowing the attorney general to declassify and release documents related to the probe.

The review spearheaded by Durham, the U.S. attorney in Connecticut, is separate from the Justice Department inspector general’s investigation into the FBI’s surveillance of ex-Trump campaign adviser Carter Page, on which a report is currently being prepared.

Mueller concluded his investigation in March; the former special counsel did not find sufficient evidence to accuse members or associates of Trump’s campaign with conspiring with Russia to interfere in the 2016 election.

The investigation ensnared six Trump associates on financial, false statements and other charges.

The revelations about Trump’s phone conversation with Australia come amid ongoing controversy over a July 25 call with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky during which Trump encouraged Zelensky to investigate 2016 election interference and unsubstantiated allegations about former Vice President Joe Biden, a 2020 Democratic presidential candidate.

A rough transcript of the call released by the White House showed that Trump offered to put Zelensky in touch with Barr and Trump’s personal attorney Rudy Giuliani.

The DOJ said last week that Barr did not learn of the call until several weeks after it took place and that the attorney general had not communicated with the Ukrainian government. The Justice Department also acknowledged that “certain Ukrainians” not part of the country’s government had volunteered information to Durham and that he was reviewing it.

The Zelensky call, which triggered an intelligence community whistleblower complaint, is at the heart of House Democrats’ impeachment inquiry into Trump announced last week by Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.).

Trump has insisted he did nothing wrong on the call, and his aides have dismissed allegations raised by the whistleblower that Trump was using his office to pressure a foreign government to help his reelection.

Source: The Hill

by

State Dept. ramps up probe into Clinton email server: report | The Hill

Editor’s Note: Getting to the source of the Democrats relentless hatred of President Trump begins with Hillary Clinton’s “reckless” use of a private server during her term as Secretary of State. What did she needed to hide and protect during the Obama Administration? When she lost the 2016 election fair and square with half the nation voting for Trump and the Electoral College casting its ballots as required by the U.S. Constitution, the Democrats began their relentless assault upon a duly elected President. 

The State Department reportedly intensified a probe into former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s private email server, contacting dozens of former aides involved in email exchanges that passed through her server.

The Washington Post reported Saturday that as many as 130 former Clinton aides have been contacted by State Department investigators in recent weeks, with many being informed that they have been found “culpable” for transmitting information that should have been classified at a higher level than it was originally sent.

Former Obama administration officials described the probe to the Post as an extraordinary investigation fueled by political animosity.

But current officials speaking on the condition of anonymity told the newspaper that the probe was structured to avoid the appearance of political bias.

The probe, which reportedly reached the stage where former officials began being contacted shortly after Trump’s inauguration, was described by one senior agency official to the Post as having nothing to do with President Trump’s vows to investigate Clinton if elected during the 2016 election.

“This has nothing to do with who is in the White House,” the official said. “This is about the time it took to go through millions of emails, which is about 3½ years.”

“The process is set up in a manner to completely avoid any appearance of political bias,” another official told the Post.

Former officials involved in the probe described it as a political vendetta, with one telling the Post it was an “abuse of power” by the Trump administration.

“It is such an obscene abuse of power and time involving so many people for so many years,” they said. “This has just sucked up people’s lives for years and years.”

The State Department did not immediately return a request for comment from The Hill on the investigation. Trump frequently attacked Clinton during the 2016 campaign for her use of a private email server while at the State Department, with his fans frequently chanting, “Lock her up!” at rallies over her perceived criminal wrongdoing.

A review of Clinton’s email server conducted by the FBI in 2016 found that Clinton had not committed any crimes with her operation of a private server but described her email practices as “reckless.”

Source: The Hill

by

‘Impeachment’ is nothing less than a full-scale Communist coup attempt by treasonous Democrats who long ago sold out America and the American people for Globalism | Natural News

Editor’s Note: This article is a bit extreme in its wording, but I include it here to document the tenor of the partisan debate about who did what. Is this a conspiracy of the Deep State & Globalists to undermine a duly elected President of the United States and remove him from office? You decide.

In an excellent new story over at CD Media titled “If You Were The Dem Organized Crime Family And About To Be Prosecuted For An Illegal Coup, What Would You Do?” that Whatfinger News had linked to on Wednesday, author L. Todd Wood, a graduate of the U.S. Air Force Academy who flew special operations helicopters supporting SEAL Team 6 and Delta Force, argues that criminal Democrats and their enablers within the mainstream media know what is coming and, desperate beyond words, their doomed-to-fail impeachment attempt of President Trump might be the only way to get them out of the huge mess that they are in.

(Article by Stefan Stanford republished from AllNewsPipeline.com)

With Susan Duclos reporting in this story on ANP on Wednesday that ‘the beginning of the end‘ talk being babbled about by Democrats again in their drive to take down President Trump echoes that which they’ve been babbling on now about for nearly 3 years since President Trump took office, even House Democrat Jeff Van Drew knows that “at the end of the day, all we’re going to have is a failed impeachment“.

Yet as Tom Luongo so perfectly points out in this new story republished at Zero Hedge titled “The Coup Has Begun – The Empire Strikes Back Everywhere“, there are no coincidences in politics. Everything happens on a particular schedule. So when I see a day as crazy as today I have to ask the question, “Why this, why now?”

And as we see in his story, what’s happening politically is by no means just regional here in America – it’s happening all around the world, helping to prove the ‘global nature‘ of ‘globalism‘ and the fact that the globalists are ‘digging in‘ at a time when President Trump just ‘blistered‘ socialism and globalism at the United Nations. From Luongo’s story.:

Look at the headlines and you’ll see what I’m talking about. All of these things happened since I woke up at 7:30am Monday morning in Florida:

  • The British Supreme Court just arrogated unprecedented power to itself by inserting itself into any dispute between the Government and Parliament. This upends more than 300 years of constitutional process.
  • The Democrats have announced they will pursue impeachment charges against President Trump because an unverified, hearsay whistleblower made a complaint about a phone call between Trump and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenski. Impeachment odds soared overnight as someone was tipped off about the Democrats’ plan.
  • Bitcoin’s hashrate mysteriously flash-crashed more than 40% presaging a massive $1500 drop in price.
  • Donald Trump delivered a blistering critique of socialism at the United Nations General Assembly. Too bad he’s nearly as bad as the ones he’s fighting on the far left.
  • Europe’s Trio of Faded Glory — The UK, France and Germany — joined in the chorus of unverified condemnation of Iran in the attack on the Saudi oil field on the 14th.
  • The Federal Reserve continues to bail out banks to the tune of $65 to $75 billion per day through overnight repo operations that no one can give us an explanation as to why they’re needed.
  • This feels to me like a multi-level coup against those that dare stand athwart the global power structure. Both British and American leadership institutions are under sincere attack with these moves.

As we’ll explore in the rest of this ANP story, with everything else that we’ve been watching unfolding in America over the past decade+, one could easily argue that what we’ve been witnessing over the past several years since President Trump was voted into office has been a full-scale Communist coup attempt with Democrats and globalists never, ever believing that Hillary Clinton would lose in 2016 and their beliefs they’d be ‘protected’ from their crimes of treason and completely selling out America and the American people forever.

As ‘Doomer Doug‘ reported in this recent story titled “If Treason Prosper, Then None Dare Call It Treason“, the final gasps of the attempted ‘coup d’etat‘ to remove President Trump are now underway with Doug warning in his story that the end results of this could be complete chaos and anarchy in America, potentially leading to Civil War with Democrats insanely still believing they can do no wrong while attempting to overthrow the results of the US election for more than 2 years running now with the ‘coup attempt‘ led by people such as Communist-voting John Brennan.

Read more at: AllNewsPipeline.com

Source: Natural News

by

Trump goes to the United Nations to argue against everything it stands for — again | Vox

Editor’s Note: This article is a bit sarcastic, as we now expect from many jaded journalists these days, but it does convey the importance of national sovereignty. All nations should put themselves first, look after their own best interests and the welfare of their people instead of imagining that one day a global socialist state will provide for them. This is an important tide shift towards a United Nations of sovereign countries, independent and free. May it become so!

UNITED NATIONS, New York — In his third annual speech to the United Nations General Assembly, President Donald Trump delivered a clear message in favor of nationalism and national sovereignty and against globalism.

But three years into Trump’s presidency, that kind of rhetoric is no longer as shocking as it once was. Most of the world has heard it from him before.

Trump, in an oddly subdued speech in New York on Tuesday, reprised his case that all nations should exert their sovereignty, protect their borders, and reject any mutual and international cooperation that doesn’t put their country’s own interests first. For Trump, it’s “America First;” for everyone else it’s “[Insert Country Here] First.”

“If you want democracy, hold on to your sovereignty,” Trump said. “And if you want peace, love your nation.”

Trump touted the “great” new trade deals he’s working on and lambasted China’s trade practices. He criticized the Iranian regime for its “bloodlust.” He tried to elevate his stalled diplomacy with North Korea. He condemned the socialist regime of Nicolás Maduro in Venezuela. He denounced illegal immigration and even made time to complain about perceived censorship of conservative viewpoints by social media companies and to attack social justice advocates.

It was classic Trump — only without the enthusiasm he usually displays when discussing these pet topics. If anything, Trump seemed bored by his own speech.

There were two rare but notable exceptions: Trump’s stern notice to China that the US is closely watching how it handles the unrest in Hong Kong, and his call to end the criminalization of homosexuality around the world.

The rest, though, was standard Trump fare, and few of the world leaders gathered to hear him speak seemed surprised or rattled by his words. He couldn’t even manage to garner any of last year’s surprised laughs.

Trump’s schtick isn’t shocking anymore. But it shows just how much of an outlier the US is.

“The future does not belong to globalists; it belongs to patriots,” Trump said at the start of his speech.

It seemed like a throwaway line but it was actually a clear articulation of what Trump and leaders of his ilk have been arguing for the past few years: Populist nationalism is the future and multinational cooperation and mutual trust is the past — even if that’s the very vision the United Nations is trying to promote and protect.

And that message has permeated. Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro, who spoke shortly before Trump, cited the US president’s defense of the sanctity of national sovereignty to push back against worldwide criticism of Bolsonaro’s handling of the Amazon fires. “They even called into question that which we hold as a most sacred value, our sovereignty,” Bolsonaro said at one point.

Trump was sandwiched between a slew of authoritarians and wanna-be authoritarians (Bolsonaro before and Egypt’s Abdel Fattah el-Sisi and then Turkey’s Recep Tayyip Erdoğan afterward), and while the US president paid lip service to democracy, his defense of it didn’t fit with his nationalistic rhetoric.

Trump and some of these other speeches stood in stark contrast to that of UN Secretary-General António Guterres, who addressed the crowd before the world leaders began to take the stage and warned of the “disquiet” currently plaguing the world.

He was mostly referring to the world’s problems — armed conflicts, increasing inequality, the threat of climate change. But Guterres’s argument is that nations need to band together to address these challenges and to promote the rights of all citizens, no matter their homeland. Guterres believes the forum to do so is the United Nations.

Trump’s argument is, as it always has been, that every country needs to look after itself.

Source: Vox

by

Marianne Williamson: ‘The system is even more corrupt than I knew’ | Fox News

Editor’s Note: We love Marianne for her fresh and insightful views originating from as an outsider to mainstream politics. In her appearance in the Democratic candidates debate she pointed out quite astutely that true health care cannot be achieved with the current system in place (whether it’s Obamacare or Medicare for All). The health care system is completely broken and must be rebuilt from the bottom up beginning with prevention and wellness. Thanks for contributing to this most important conversation and acknowledging the important of intelligent debate and civil discourse.

Marianne Williamson, a 2020 presidential hopeful and author, said she’s discovered the political system to be “even more corrupt” than she imagined, during a Tuesday interview with “Fox & Friends.”

“I was known in a world where people loved you and bought things from you. Now I’m in a world where a lot of people hate you,” she said. “I would say that I feel that I’ve learned the system is even more corrupt than I knew and people are even more wonderful than I hoped.”

Williamson also said there is a tendency in politics today to stifle opposing opinions, which weakens democracy and limits genuine debate.

“I have seen on the left as on the right, there are too many people who do not recognize how important honorable debate is in a democracy,” she said.

“You can disagree with somebody’s opinion but that doesn’t mean you should be shutting them down or lying about them or misrepresenting their views. That’s not a left-right issue. There’s a rough-and-tumble in politics.”

Co-host Lisa Boothe asked Williamson if she felt abandoned by the Democratic Party because she didn’t qualify for the upcoming debate, and she said that even if she did, she wouldn’t air her private grievances.

“No, I don’t feel abandoned,” she replied. “I’m a passionate Democrat… My mother always said if you have a problem with your family don’t talk about it outside the family. I’m not going to come on Fox and bad-mouth. The DNC has its rules and, listen, I signed up for this. And I’m playing by those rules”

Source: Fox News

by

The Net Worth Of Every 2020 Presidential Candidate | Forbes

Editor’s Note: Enough talk from the Democrats about identifying with the working class. Every one of these candidates are multi-millionaires, part of the 1% they so enthusiastically despise. So Bernie and Elizabeth, you might want to change your narrative and get real. Running for office and getting elected makes you pretty darn rich (especially with all those special congressional benefits). 

By Dan Alexander, Chase Peterson-Withorn and Michela Tindera

Everyone knows Donald Trump is rich. But how about the 25 people jockeying to replace him as president? Forbes dug into the details—examining financial disclosure statements, scouring local real estate records and calculating pension benefits—to figure out the finances of the 2020 candidates.

There were some surprises. Bernie is a millionaire. So is “middle-class Joe” Biden. Elizabeth Warren is richer than both of them, worth an estimated $12 million. But she’s a long way from John Delaney, whose $200 million fortune makes him twice as wealthy as every other Democratic candidate not named Tom Steyer. The hedge fund tycoon, who announced his candidacy in July 2019, is worth an estimated $1.6 billion.

Aside from Trump and Steyer, the average net worth is $12.9 million—the same as it was for the 2016 contenders. The median net worth is $2 million. The poorest is Pete Buttigieg, who has an estimated $100,000—or about 0.003% of Trump’s fortune.

We reached out to all of the candidates. No one, not even the Democrats who spend the most time bashing Trump for his financial dealings, answered every question. So we ranked the entire field on transparency, assigning scores ranging from 0 (lips sealed) to 5 (full disclosure). In the end, we uncovered the money, regardless of whether the candidates wanted it out in the open.

 

by

Congressional Progressive Caucus | Wikipedia

Editor’s Note: The 98-member Congressional Progressive Caucus is closely allied with the Democratic Socialists of America. The Communist Party USA identifies Progressive Caucus members as its “allies in Congress.”

The Congressional Progressive Caucus (CPC) is a caucus within the Democratic congressional caucus in the United States Congress.[6] The CPC is a left-leaning organization that works to advance progressive and liberalissues and positions and represents the progressive faction of the Democratic Party.[7][8] It was founded in 1991 and has grown steadily since then.

Entering the 116th United States Congress, the CPC has 98 members, making it the second largest caucus within the Democratic Party and the third largest caucus in Congress. The CPC is currently co-chaired by U.S. Representatives Mark Pocan (D-WI) and Pramila Jayapal (D-WA).

Source: Wikipedia