Ronna McDaniel Won’t Defend Uncle Mitt Romney Against GOP Reprisal

GOP Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel was asked on CBS’ Face The Nation how she felt about her uncle Sen Mitt Romney (R-UT), being banned from an upcoming CPAC event and specifically whether this was retaliation for Sen Romney not always siding with President Trump. Shockingly, Ronna McDaniels showed no sympathy for her uncle and instead made excuses for the decision to ban him from the CPAC event.

Host Margaret Brennan(video at 6:00 onwards):“The Conservative Political Action Conference [CPAC] has disinvited him [Mitt Romney] from an upcoming meeting. They’ve put up this ad online, there are TV ads against him. Do you think this is proper, political retaliation?”

GOP Chair Ronna McDaniel:“That’s the grassroots part of our party and they are upset. They are upset when people aren’t supporting the president and supporting our party, and they think if you’re not supporting him [Trump], you’re helping a Democrat get elected. That’s a very common belief among the grassroots of our party.” Basically nobody can ever disagree with Trump in Ronna McDaniel’s GOP.

Bottom line folks, American democracy is the envy of the world in large part because of its tolerace for dissent. Where, as here, GOP Chairwoman Ronna McDaniel and Trump are trying to normalize stiffling of political dissent and excusing it as normal grassroots outrage, all democracy-loving Americans have a duty to forcefully push back and call out their third-world dictatorship tactics.

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Barr’s DOJ Refuses To Release Notes Of Kushner’s Interview With Mueller

A federal judge recently granted a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request filed by CNN and Buzzfeed and ordered the Justice Department to release documents currently in its possession related to the now concluded investigation into Russian election interference in 2016 (Mueller probe)

Among the documents media houses CNN and Buzzfeed are most interested in, are the notes from the various interviews Mueller conducted with witnesses–known in legal circles as “302 notes”. Needless to say, such notes can be very important in determining whether a particular witness lied to/misled/withheld material information from investigators.

Ever since the federal judge granted CNN and Buzzfeed’s FOIA request, Barr’s DOJ has largely complied and released several 302 notes. Conspiquously absent from the 302 notes however, are those related to Trump’s son-in-law Jared Kushner–a prime target of CNN and Buzzfeed’s FOIA request.

Equally troubling is the fact that Barr’s DOJ is yet to provide the legal justification for its refusal to comply with the federal judge’s order on 302 notes related to Jared Kushner. Is there something very bad in Kushner’s 302 notes that Barr’s DOJ is so intent on keeping away from the public even if that means violating a federal judge’s order?

Bottom line folks, it is now quite evident that AG Barr considers his position as one intended primarily to protect/defend President Trump and his family. Where, as here, his Justice Dept refuses to release 302 notes related to Trump’s son-in-law Kushner, and giving no legal justification for the refusal, a reasonable inference can be made that AG Barr is hiding from the public Kushner’s 302 notes because they contain information he thinks will cast Trump and his family in negative light. Congressional Democrats and the mainstream media must demand that DOJ comply with the federal judge’s order and release Kushner’s 302 notes.

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Lev Parnas Says It Was All About Biden, Not Corruption

In an explosive interview on MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow show, Lev Parnas, the indicted Ukrainian-American at the very center of President Trump’s impeachment saga, appears to have dealt a death blow to Trump’s defense when he told host Maddow that all Trump wanted from President Zelensky of Ukraine was dirt on Biden and that he was never interested in rooting out corruption in the country.

Parnas told Maddow, “It[Ukrainegate]was all about Joe Biden, Hunter Biden and also Rudy [Giuliani]had a personal thing with the Manafort stuff, the black ledger. That was another thing that they were looking into. But it was never about corruption, it was strictly about Burisma which included Hunter Biden and Joe Biden.”

This is a very problematic revelation for the Trump team because their entire defense has been that as President, Trump had every right to deny aid to Ukraine if he felt that hard earned U.S. tax dollars would be misappropriated by corrupt Ukrainian officials.

Republican Senators, especially those from swing states who are up for reelection this year, have found it impossible to defend Trump against allegations that he sought help from a foreign country (Ukraine) to dig up dirt on his political opponent (Biden). These Senators have instead rested on the more palatable anti-corruption defense.

If Parnas’ allegation that this was all about Joe Biden pans out, and all indications are that they will, then the vulnerable Republican Senators who have relied on the anti-corruption defense will have no leg to stand on and may be forced to do the unthinkable–put the country’s interests over the GOP and vote to remove Trump from office .

Bottom line folks, we all know that Washington and indeed the rest of the country has become deeply polarized as a result of the Trump presidency. Under any other normal administration, the revelations brought forward by Ukrainegate would be enough to garner bipartisan support both in the House and Senate for a president’s impeachment and removal from office. It will be interesting to see whether partisanship in Washington has become so bad under Trump, that he is allowed to get away with his very troubling conduct re Ukrainegate–the quintessential “high crimes and misdemeanors.”

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Did Saudis Bribe Trump For Military Support?

In a recent sit down interview with Fox News’ Laura Ingraham, President Trump made a startling revelation about his dealings with the Saudi government that has left many people wondering whether the oil rich kingdom is bribing Trump for U.S. military assistance.

Trump told Laura Ingraham, “We’re sending more [troops] to Saudi Arabia and Saudi Arabia is paying us for it. We’re doing something that nobody has ever done. I said to Saudi Arabia,….listen, you are a very rich country, you want more troops, I’m going to send them to you but you have to pay us. They are paying us. They’ve already deposited $1 billion in the bank. We are going to help them but these rich countries have to pay for them.”

There is no other way to interpret Trump’s remarks other than the Saudi’s requested U.S. military assistance and Trump, cogniizant of their immense wealth, asked the Kingdom to pay for the militsry assistance–essentially a bribe. According to Trump, the Saudis have already deposited $1 billion in some unspecified account.

You don’t have to take Yours Truly’s word for it. It appears AM Joy’s host Joy Reid came away with the same impression after watching Trump’s interview with Laura Ingraham. Joy Reid told her guest Rep Barbara Lee (D-CA) that Trump “talks about the military as if they are a mercenary force that he can loan out or sell out to other countries for money.”

Because this is a serious issue that involves the military, the U.S. Congress has a duty to get to the bottom of Trump’s startling revelation. Was this just another Trump bald-faced lie, or did he accidentally reveal a real scandal?

Bottom line folks, we ask and demand so much from our precious men and women in the armed forces. We owe them a solemn commitment that when we send them overseas to risk their lives and limbs for us, it will strictly be for our national security purposes and not as security guards for rich foreign tyrants as, this current situation suggests. Members of congress must get to the bottom of this $1 billion bank deposit.

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Sec Pompeo Says Iraqis Are Not Protesting Soleimani’s Killing

U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo today appeared on CBS’ Face The Nation show and made the shocking assertion that Iraqi’s are not protesting the recent U.S. killing of a top Iranian military general Qassim Soleimani in their country (Iraq).

What’s even more startling about Sec Pompeo’s assertion is the fact that just today, the Iraqi parliament voted for a resolution to remove U.S. forces from Iraq as a result of Soleimani’s killing, a point which host Margaret Brennan correctly emphasized. Reasonable people will agree that the very fact that the Iraqi parliament was considering removing U.S. troops from their country is a sign of significant displeasure/protest against the U.S.

Specifically, Sec Pompeo told host Margaret Brennan when asked about the Iraqi parliament vote to kick out U.S. troops. “Make no mistake about it. The Iraqi people too are protesting, but not against America. What you are seeing on TV is happening at the direction of [Iran]..” To host Margaret Brennan’s credit, she did not blindly accept Sec Pompeo’s ridiculous assertion that the Iraqi’s are not protesting against the U.S. or that the vote in the Iraqi parliament was at the direction of Iran.

Bottom line folks, the Trump administration has never taken seriously the public’s demands that it tells them the truth about issues of great public concern. The administration’s blatant disregard for the truth is coming back to bite them as it now confronts the serious Iran crisis. The public has come to a point where they no longer believe anything the administration says–including the justification for Soleimani’s strike. It certainly doesn’t help when Sec Pompeo shows up on a leading Sunday political show and makes a demonstrably false assertion. Hopefully for everybody’s sake, the Trump administration will change course and level with the public about the Iran crisis. This is serious business.

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Drain The Swamp?Yeah Right. How Lobbyists Are Helping Trump Roll Back Regulations

Bombshell NYT piece goes into details of how the Trump administration, with the help of lobbyists tied to the fossil fuel industry (oil and gas), is rolling back environmental regulations and in so doing, seriously jeopardizing the public’s health and safety. These environmental regulations affect everything– from the air we breathe, the water we drink, to the toxic(potentially carcinogenic) substances we may be exposed to as a result of petrochemical processes.

Trump who was elected President largely because of his signature promise to “drain the swamp”(end corruption) in Washington, has apparently created his own swamp of oil and gas lobbyists who are tearing down environmental regulations they deem a hindrance to maximizing profits.

Yeah, you read that right–oil and gas lobbyists are helping the Trump administration to tear down environmental regulations so that the companies they represent can maximize profits–public health and safety be damned. This is public corruption at its worst and as “swampy” as it gets.

According to the New York Times piece the Trump admin has to date rolled back 95 environmental regulations, 58 of them completely and 37 still in the roll back process.

16 environmental regulations related to air pollution and emissions have already been completely rolled back with 9 more still in the roll back process

10 regulations related to drilling and extractions have already been completely rolled back with 9 more still in the roll back process.

As for regulations related to infranstructure and planning, 11 regulations have already been completely rolled back with 1 more still in the roll back process.

7 regulations related to animals have already been completely rolled back with 3 more still in the roll back process. 5 regulations related to toxic substances have already been rolled back with 3 still in the roll back process.

4 regulations related to water pollution have already been completely rolled back with 6 more still in the roll back process. According to the NYT piece, there are 11 other environmental regulations the Trump administration has tinkered with, 5 of which have completely been rolled back and 6 still in the roll back process.

Bottom line folks, there are already very many reasons for America to adopt Rep Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s ( AOC) Green New Deal(GND). As gifted as Rep AOC is in promoting her GND, she rarely cites corruption in the oil and gas industry as one of the central reasons why the country should adopt her plan. Hopefully this bombshell NYT piece will make her highlight corruption in the oil and gas industry as one of the primary reasons why America needs the green new deal. Simply put, AOC’s GND will once and for all, drain the swamp that is the oil and gas lobby.

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Ivanka Noncommittal On DHS’ Family Separation Policy

Ivanka Trump appeared today on CBS’ Face the Nation where host Margaret Brennan asked her a direct question as to whether she was “personally engaged” in ensuring migrant families that were separated as a result of DHS’ zero tolerance policy(aka family separation policy) are reunited in a timely manner. Ivanka surprisingly gave a very generalized, even noncommittal answer that left one with the impression that she has never been personally involved in the issue as many including Yours Truly, had assumed.

Host Margaret Brennan said, “You were vocal in your opposition to the family separation policy when it came to immigration in the U.S. border. You said that was a low point for you. We[CBS] went and looked and Homeland Security[DHS] says there are still around 900 children who remain separated from their families. Is that something you continue to remain engaged on when it comes to immigration?” Any reasonable person reading this would conclude that this was a specific question as to whether Ivanka was personally/actively involved with the migrant family reunifications and not a general question about Trump administration’s immigration policy. Ivanka however treated it as a general question and cleverly dodged dealing with the issue at hand–her specific role in resolving the family separation crisis.

Specifically Ivanka replied, “Well immigration is not part of my portfolio obviously. I think everyone should be engaged, and the full force of the U.S. government is committed to this effort, to border security, to protecting the most vulnerable. That includes those being trafficked across our border which this president has committed to countering and combating human trafficking in an incredibly comprehensive aggressive way. So the full United States government has been focused on this issue starting with the president.”

It also bears pointing out that Ivanka takes a lot of heat on social media related to the family separation policy every time she shares pictures of her children. One would think such sustained public pressure would have moved her by now into taking a more active role in resolving the migrant family separation crisis, or at least creating a public impression that she has.

Bottom line even though immigration is not in Ivanka’s portfolio as she correctly pointed out in her Face the Nation interview, the child separation policy in particular, is a topic she cannot be seen to be noncommittal about if she expects the public to take her seriously in her other women empowerment campaigns. Reasonable people will agree that as a champion for women empowerment, Ivanka has a duty to get involved and actively push her father’s administration towards a timely resolution of the migrant family separation crisis. Ivanka herself has expressed frustration with the child separation policy so she has no excuse for looking the other way. Simply put, do something about the migrant family separation crisis Ivanka, it is the moral thing to do.

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GOP Senator John Kennedy Slams Trump For Tweeting

GOP Senator John Kennedy (LA) appearing on CNN’s State of the Union show, took a rare swipe at President Trump over his twitter habits saying Trump “tweeting a little less will not cause brain damage.”

Senator Kennedy was responding to a question by host Jake Tapper about Trump tweeting out the name of the alleged Ukrainegate whistleblower.

Sen Kennedy responded, “I have enough trouble paddling my own canoe but I do agree with Mrs Trump[Melania], and I’ve suggested before to the White House that if the President would tweet a little bit less, it won’t cause brain damage. But the President does not have to take my advice nor do I expect him to.”

If there’s one thing we can all agree on, it is that President Trump does not take kindly to criticism, regardless of its source or validity. It will be interesting to see how he handles Sen Kennedy’s clever jab about his tweeting habits.

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Trump says Putin Told Him Ukraine Meddled In U.S. Elections

In the midst of all the controversy surrounding Republican members of congress spreading Russia’s debunked conspiracy theory that it was Ukraine who meddled in our 2016 elections, a bombshell Washington Post piece now says President Trump actually told one of his aides that it was Putin himself who told him about Ukraine meddling in our 2016 elections.

According to the Washington Post piece, White House officials have been worried about President Trump’s insistence that it was Ukraine, not Russia who meddled in our 2016 elections and have long suspected that Russia’s President Vladimir Putin may have planted the idea in Trump’s mind. This was always their suspicion but they had no tangible evidence to prove it. However, according to the WaPo piece, their suspicion became reality when Trump, questioned about why he held on to the strange belief that Ukraine meddled in our elections, explicitly told one White House official, “Putin told me.” The shocked White House official reportedly shared this conversation with his/her peers.

Needless to say, this bombshell revelation raises a whole host of national security questions given the fact that Trump has repeatedly denigrated U.S. Intel officials as being unreliable because their “intelligence” erroneously led us to war with Iraq—a plausible argument that reasonable people can reasonably disagree about. Trump has repeated this argument to suggest that likewise, we should not believe everything we hear from U.S. intelligence agencies re Russia and Ukraine.

The troubling revelation in this Washington Post piece however will blow a huge hole in Trump’s argument because it demonstrates that he took Vladimir Putin’s word over that of U.S. intelligence officials regarding Ukraine. In other words, a lot of people who were were inclined to entertain Trump’s plausible skepticism of U.S. intelligence officials, will have a totally different reaction when they find out that it was Putin himself, who fed Trump this narrative.

This bombshell Washington Post piece also raises a lot of questions about Republican members of congress who have echoed Trump’s accusation of Ukraine. Have these Republican members of congress known all along that Putin said that to Trump directly? If so, their arguments about Ukraine meddling in our elections take a whole new turn and opens them up to accusations of knowingly spreading Putin’s propaganda.

Bottom line folks, House Speaker Nancy Pelosi was spot on when she recently pointed out that with Trump, “All roads lead to Putin.” This particular WaPo bombshell however raises the stakes dramatically because it leads to the inevitable question; “What else is Trump doing because Putin told him so?” If the accounts in this WaPo piece hold up, and there’s no reason to believe that they won’t, then Democrats and the mainstream media must actively pursue this question and insist that Trump release the transcripts/notes of all his meetings/phone calls with Vladimir Putin.

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San Francisco’s Homeless Are Pooping In Stores

A shocking segment on Fox News says homelessness in San Francisco California has gotten so out of control that people are defecating in stores–an absolute public health nightmare. Speaking to Fox News’ Tucker Carlson, Dr Marc Siegel pinned the blame squarely on California Governor Gavin Newsome, who he accused of failing to provide additional shelters to alleviate San Francisco’s high rate of homelessness.

Dr Siegel told Tucker Carlson, “The Governor of California has been asked repeatedly about building temporary shelters and they are not being built so as a result you have the sewage, you have the feces and you end up with all these health issues. This is a public health emergency, its a disgrace in San Francisco.”

As for the public health nightmare this presents, Dr Siegel said, “Isn’t it ironic that the city of germophobes, of exercise-conscious, environmental conscious are now the city that’s awash in human waste, which is spreading hepatitis A,….every year big outbreaks of hepatitis A, rats in the streets feeding off of the garbage and sewage, typhus, typhoid fever, bacterial infections and even the plague may be coming. What’s really ironic is that they have a poop control that goes around, 6 highly paid individuals in San Francisco according to the [SF]Chronicle that go around trying to clean up the streets. $65 million was spent last year trying to clean up the streets but the homeless have nowhere to go…….medieval diseases are resurfacing in California”

For the record , this is a Fox News segment and there is no question that host Tucker Carlson is using this story to cast liberal San Francisco, which is home to House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, in very negative light. Having said that, it is impossible to brush under the carpet the real and burgeoning homelessness problem in San Francisco and in this particular case, the serious public health issues defecating in stores and other public areas poses. San Francisco’s homelessness problem has to be immediately addressed for the public health’s sake.

Yours Truly is by no means a public health expert but would wager that using the $65 million dollars to build temporary shelters equipped with bathroom facilities would probably be more helpful than spending the money on 6 “poop control” agents as Dr Siegel suggests San Francisco does. San Francisco should also swallow its pride and start soliciting input from city managers nationwide on ways of effectively tackling homelessness in urban areas. Simply put, this should not be a partisan issue.

Bottom line folks, as we approach the 2020 general elections, issues like homelessness should be front and center in the various televised political debates. In the same way candidates are usually asked for solutions to climate change, healthcare etc, they should also be asked about their plans to combat the growing problem of homelessness in urban areas.

Some presidential candidates like Julian Castro have already taken a very active role in the fight against homelessness and should be commended for it. Maybe Julian Castro should step in and help San Francisco with the skills he learned as Mayor of San Antonio and as HUD Secretary under President Obama.

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