Barack Obama is fairly out and Donald Trump is fairly in
The title of this post is a paraphrase of what George Washington reportedly said to John Adams after he was sworn in as the second President. He then said “see which one of us will be happier.” When he said that last part he was inferring that he would be happier out of power than John Adams would be in power, somehow I do not think that is going to be the case this time around.
Of course the alt-left will say that Donald Trump is not fairly in and days before he even took office Maxine Waters called for his impeachment and I do not see this letting up any time soon. (Of course the alt-left is ignoring the fact that Hillary Clinton was not fairly in as the Democratic nominee in the first place.)
I have hopes for both men: I did not vote for Donald Trump but I hope he succeeds and is a good President who delivers on many of his promises, it is unrealistic to believe he will accomplish it all–especially if he tries to make spending cuts. Republican talk a good game during the elections but they rarely deliver, if at all.
I also hope that now that he is sworn in he will start acting more Presidential, especially with the Tweets. It is time for him to stop caring what Saturday Night Live does to him in their skits. He has much bigger issues to deal with and it astounds me he seems to care so much about this. It is time to stop being so thin-skinned.
My hope for Barack Obama? I hope that he is a big enough person to follow the lead of George Bush and other former Presidents by slipping into the background. I do not think that is going to be the case however, and I think that is evidenced by his unwillingness to say anything before today which would calm the protests which seem to be growing more violent by the day. He had a chance to calm all the “illegitimate” claims but if anything he added fuel to the fire.
Consider this an open thread…
malo periculosam libertatem quam quietum servitium
The New York Times ran a hit piece on Rick Perry yesterday claiming that he did not understand the role he would play as Donald Trump’s Energy Secretary. Of course several reporters got on Twitter to spread the news of Rick Perry’s ignorance but there was one small problem with the story–it was fake news.
Those embarrassed so-called reporters were forced to admit their mistake and issue retractions. Here is more:
I’m about to delete this tweet, which spread the rumor about Perry not knowing what energy sec does,” New York Magazine writer Jesse Singal wrote on Twitter, referring to an earlier tweet sharing the story. “I think it’s false.”
“I officially retract my snarky Rick Perry tweet c/o the NYT,” writer Andrew Heaton wrote on Twitter. “I stand by my snarky Dancing with the Stars tweets.” Asked why he was retracting in a reply to his tweet, he added: “It appears the NYT had a pre-existing opinion and then slopped some dubious reporting on top to confirm.”
“Im retracting last 2 tweets,” Vanity Fair editor and Newsweek senior writer Kurt Eichenwald Tweeted. “Someone pointed out there are now questions if NYT allegations on Rick Perry are true.”
“Since I tweeted the NYTimes story, I’ll tweet this repudiation from their source,” Huffington Post reporter Natalie Jackson Tweeted. “Deleting my initial tweet.”
As one of the reporters stated, the New York Times had a pre-existing opinion and ran with the story without really checking it out. Of course the same can be said for these so-called reporters but I have to give these reporters credit for realizing their mistake and at least making an effort to correct it, which is more than can be said for the New York Times.
malo periculosam libertatem quam quietum servitium
Barack Obama commuted the sentence of a FALN terrorist
Yesterday Barack Obama commuted the sentences of over 200 people and while most of the headlines were over his decision to free Chelsea Manning it turns out the President also commuted the sentence of a FALN terrorist who at his sentencing told the world he was an enemy of the United States.
Here is more:
Among the more than 200 commutations handed out yesterday, President Obama commuted the sentence of Oscar López Rivera, a member of Fuerzas Armadas de Liberación Nacional Puertorriqueña (FALN), a Marxist-Leninist terrorist group advocating Puerto Rican independence. He is set to be released May 17.
FALN was responsible for more than 130 bombings in the United States that killed four people and seriously injured police officers.
López Rivera was arrested in 1981 and got 55 years in prison, but later had his sentence extended another 15 years for trying to break out of Leavenworth. At the time he was sentenced, López Rivera told the court: “I am an enemy of the United States government.” (Other members of FALN went so far as to directly threaten judges and promise more acts of violence.) He wasn’t kidding. FALN, like other Marxist terrorist groups, had a typically frank and turgid manifesto that unreservedly endorsed violence in the name of destroying the “Yanki capitalist monopoly,” and the group quickly claimed credit for the bombings they committed via press release.
Barack Obama commutes Chelsea Manning’s sentence
I am sure you have all heard by now that Barack Obama has commuted the sentence of Chelsea Manning, who was tried and found guilty of leaking top secret United States documents to Julian Assange of Wikileaks and sentenced to 35 years in jail.
I just need somebody to help me through this one aspect of this: Wikileaks has been accused of working with Russia in an attempt to leak damaging material on Hillary Clinton before the election even though Julian Assange has repeatedly stated Russia was not the source of the information and Russia has been condemned for this. But here we have a person who actually did leak information to Wikileaks (in all likelihood not the information used in the attempt to take down Hillary Clinton) and he had his sentence commuted.
If what the Democrats are claiming is true about Russia coordinating with Wikileaks it means Chelsea Manning indirectly gave information to the Russians through Wikileaks.
Does this make any sense? I am confused…
malo periculosam libertatem quam quietum servitium
John Kerry says it is ‘inappropriate’ for Donald Trump to ‘be stepping into’ the politics of foreign countries
Donald Trump is taking a little heat for wading into Germany’s politics by criticizing Angela Merkel’s refugee policy. John Kerry is the latest to wade in on this contrived controversy, here is more:
Secretary of State John Kerry said on Monday it was “inappropriate” for Donald Trump to insert himself into the politics of foreign countries, referencing the president-elect’s recent criticism over German Chancellor Angela Merkel’s refugee policy.
“I thought frankly it was inappropriate for a president-elect of the United States to be stepping into the politics of other countries in a quite direct manner,” Kerry said in an interview with CNN’s Christiane Amanpour, adding that he specifically disapproved of Trump’s attack on Merkel’s policy of accepting scores of migrants into Germany during the ongoing Syrian civil war.
“I think we have to be very careful about suggesting that one of the strongest leaders in Europe and most important players with respect to where we are heading … made one mistake or another, I don’t think it’s appropriate for us to be commenting on that,” Kerry said.
He did not like the “direct manner” in which Donald Trump stepped into the politics of “one of the strongest leaders in Europe.” Apparently he prefers the indirect manner Barack Obama used against one of the strongest leaders in the Middle East when he tried to influence the outcome of the Israeli election.
According to the U.S. Senate Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations (PSI), the State Department gave $349,276 in U.S. taxpayer-funded grants to a political group in Israel to build a campaign operation, which subsequently was used to try to influence Israelis to vote against conservative Benjamin Netanyahu in the March 2015 election for prime minister.
malo periculosam libertatem quam quietum servitium
Donald Trump may include bloggers in his press briefings
It is no secret that Donald Trump and the mainstream media do not get along, in fact that is quite the understatement to say the least as is evidenced by the press conference the President-elect held last week. There has been speculation that because of this Donald Trump would cancel press briefings or possibly just kick the White House press pool out of the White House but if this report is true he might actually be doing to opposite.
Here is more:
Sunday, January 15th open thread: ‘Porcupine Coat’
Here is the open thread for Sunday, January 15th. Please feel free to post links to interesting articles and to discuss whatever issues arise during the course of the day. Nothing is off-topic here.
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Back in the day Lauri and I used to go to check out the local Boston music scene every so often and my favorite unknown band was called Think Tree. They had a little local success but never really went anywhere. There is very little live footage of the band but here is “All We Like Sheep” and “Porcupine Coat.”
The Right Take: ‘Celebrity Meltdown’
Mark Tapson is out with his latest The Right Take video and it is entitled “Celebrity Meltdown.” He gives us his opinion on why Hollywood is so upset at Donald Trump’s election–they are losing their influence. Enjoy:
malo periculosam libertatem quam quietum servitium
Rosie O’Donnell calls for Martial Law to stop Donald Trump
As a general rule I do not care what celebrities think about anything however every once in awhile one of them says something that cannot be ignored and today is one of those times. A couple of weeks ago so-called comedienne Rosie O’Donnell warned the American people that there were only a few weeks left to stop Donald Trump’s inauguration. Many people claimed this sounded like a call for violence and that thought did cross my mind as well, however today she came up with a plan–Martial Law.
Here is what she tweeted:
I FULLY SUPPORT IMPOSING MARTIAL LAW – DELAYING THE INAUGURATION – UNTIL TRUMP IS “CLEARED” OF ALL CHARGES https://twitter.com/MasterMarquette/status/819386479587643392 …
She went on to say that she thought Donald Trump cheated and these are the charges she says he needs to be cleared of. This comes one day after the BuzzFeed/CNN fake news story which claimed Donald Trump sent Michael Cohen to Prague to meet with Kremlin officials, among other accusations. One can only assume this fake news story is what Rosie O’Donnell is referring to. I guess the left loves fake news after all…
malo periculosam libertatem quam quietum servitium
The Democratic National Committee was conspiring with Ukraine officials to try to influence the election
For all of the talk about Russia trying to influence the outcome of the election to help Donald Trump win the Presidency here is something you probably have not heard much of, if at all, in the mainstream media: If this story is true there was also political intrigue being conducted by Ukraine officials in at attempt to help Hillary Clinton. Here is more:
Donald Trump wasn’t the only presidential candidate whose campaign was boosted by officials of a former Soviet bloc country.
Ukrainian government officials tried to help Hillary Clinton and undermine Trump by publicly questioning his fitness for office. They also disseminated documents implicating a top Trump aide in corruption and suggested they were investigating the matter, only to back away after the election. And they helped Clinton’s allies research damaging information on Trump and his advisers, a Politico investigation found.
A Ukrainian-American operative who was consulting for the Democratic National Committee met with top officials in the Ukrainian Embassy in Washington in an effort to expose ties between Trump, top campaign aide Paul Manafort and Russia, according to people with direct knowledge of the situation.
The Ukrainian efforts had an impact in the race, helping to force Manafort’s resignation and advancing the narrative that Trump’s campaign was deeply connected to Ukraine’s foe to the east, Russia. But they were far less concerted or centrally directed than Russia’s alleged hacking and dissemination of Democratic emails.
Of course today was filled with the fake news story, which CNN ran with, about Donald Trump sending a person to Russia to conspire with the campaign and yet here we have the Democratic National Committee basically doing the same thing and there has been no mention of this story by the mainstream media.
Isn’t it funny how that works…
malo periculosam libertatem quam quietum servitium
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