Sunday, March 8th open thread: ‘Hero’
“This is the day which the Lord hath made; we will rejoice and be glad in it.” (Psalm 118:24 KJV)
Here is this week’s open thread. 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.
You can subscribe to America’s Watchtower to receive email updates and you can also follow America’s Watchtower on Facebook and Twitter by clicking the links on the right.
Here is Michael Kiwanuka performing “Hero” live:
Democratic National Committee changes rules to keep Tulsi Gabbard out of the next debate
We have seen over the course of this primary season the way the Democratic National Committee has used rule changes to manipulate which candidates qualify for the debates, thus limiting or expanding a candidate’s national exposure. We saw them do this to help Mike Bloomberg, although in the end giving him a national stage was the worst thing the party could have done for him, and now we are seeing the Democratic National Committee using its power to eliminate Tulsi Gabbard from the debate stage. Here is more:
The Democratic National Committee (DNC) on Friday announced new qualifying standards for the upcoming Arizona debate that will leave only the top two contenders on stage.
Rep. Tulsi Gabbard (D-Hawaii) did not meet the single qualifying factor: earning at least 20 percent of the delegates awarded as of March 15.
Tulsi Gabbard was not happy and she called out the Democratic National Committee for helping Michael Blommberg the last time around while changing the rules to hurt her this time around.
“To keep me off the stage, the DNC again arbitrarily changed the debate qualifications. Previously they changed the qualifications in the OPPOSITE direction so Bloomberg could debate. I ask that you stand w/ me against the DNC’s transparent effort to exclude me from the debates. #LetTulsiDebate,” she said.
I would love to take this opportunity to bash the Democratic National Committee for manipulating the rules again but the truth is that at this point there are only two candidates with legitimate chances to win the nomination and there is no reason to have any other candidate on the debate stage.
The truth is the blame for this lies with the Democratic voters themselves for rejecting every single candidate who was not a rich, white, straight, old man (and one who was) and I find that extremely ironic coming from the voters who consider themselves to be the people that accept diversity…
malo periculosam libertatem quam quietum servitium
Former Obama Homeland Security IG indicted for theft, wire fraud, and attempting to defraud the government
According to a release by the Department of Justice a former Obama era acting Homeland Security Inspector General and one other person have been charged with theft of government property, wire fraud, and attempting to defraud the government. Here is more:
A federal grand jury in the District of Columbia returned a 16-count indictment against a former Acting Inspector General for the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (DHS) and a former subordinate for their alleged theft of proprietary software and confidential databases from the U.S. government as part of a scheme to defraud the U.S. government.
The indictment charges Charles K. Edwards, 59, of Sandy Spring, Maryland, and Murali Yamazula Venkata, 54, of Aldie, Virginia, with conspiracy to commit theft of government property and to defraud the United States, theft of government property, wire fraud, and aggravated identity theft. The indictment also charges Venkata with destruction of records.
According to the allegations in the indictment, from October 2014 to April 2017, Edwards, Venkata, and others executed a scheme to defraud the U.S. government by stealing confidential and proprietary software from DHS Office of Inspector General (OIG), along with sensitive government databases containing personal identifying information (PII) of DHS and USPS employees, so that Edwards’s company, Delta Business Solutions, could later sell an enhanced version of DHS-OIG’s software to the Office of Inspector General for the U.S. Department of Agriculture at a profit. Although Edwards had left DHS-OIG in December 2013, he continued to leverage his relationship with Venkata and other DHS-OIG employees to steal the software and the sensitive government databases.
The indictment further alleges that, in addition to stealing DHS-OIG’s software and the sensitive government databases, Venkata and others also assisted Edwards by reconfiguring his laptop so that he could properly upload the stolen software and databases, provided troubleshooting support whenever Edwards required it, and helped him build a testing server at his residence with the stolen software and databases, which contained PII. As further part of the alleged scheme, Edwards retained software developers in India for the purpose of developing his commercial alternative of DHS-OIG’s software.
Move along, nothing to see here. There was not even a hint of corruption in the Obama administration…
malo periculosam libertatem quam quietum servitium
Yesterday Chuck Schumer stood on the steps of the Supreme Court and warned the penultimate court about consequences for Neil Gorsuch and Brett Kavanaugh if the court did not rule the way he wanted it to on an abortion case. He stated these two justices (both Trump appointees by the way) would “pay the price” unless they went along with his wishes.
This led to the highly unusual move of John Roberts speaking out publicly against a member of the government, here is what he said:
“Justices know that criticism comes with the territory, but threatening statements for this sort from the highest levels of government are not only inappropriate, but also dangerous. All members of the court will continue to do their job, without fear or favor, from whatever quarter.”
Chuck Schumer is defending his comments by claiming he was talking about political retribution or a backlash against conservatives in the election and not physical violence but John Roberts is right. This type of rhetoric is dangerous and can lead to violence even if it is not intended. Just ask Steve Scalice…
Now it looks like Senator Hawley is going to introduce a censure motion against Chuck Schumer for his dangerous comments, here is more:
I think you probably know how I feel about censure, it is nothing but a slap on the wrist and in the end Chuck Schumer will take it as a medal of honor for standing up to Republicans and for women’s rights but at the same time somebody has to let these people know that this temper tantrum the left is still on after almost four years is unacceptable.
malo periculosam libertatem quam quietum servitium
Believe it or not while everybody else has forgotten, Judicial Watch is still trying to get answers from Hillary Clinton about her email scandal and a Federal judge has now ruled that the former Secretary of State must sit down with the conservative watchdog group and give a sworn deposition.
Here is more:
A federal judge Monday granted a request from conservative watchdog group Judicial Watch to have former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton sit for a sworn deposition to answer questions about her use of a private email server to conduct government business.
Clinton has argued that she has already answered questions about this and should not have to do so again — the matter did not result in any charges for the then-presidential candidate in 2016 after a high-profile investigation — but D.C. District Court Judge Royce C. Lamberth said in his ruling that her past responses left much to be desired.
“As extensive as the existing record is, it does not sufficiently explain Secretary Clinton’s state of mind when she decided it would be an acceptable practice to set up and use a private server to conduct State Department business,” Lamberth said.
The judge went on to recognize that while Clinton responded to written questions in a separate case, “those responses were either incomplete, unhelpful, or cursory at best. Simply put her responses left many more questions than answers.” Lamberth said that using written questions this time “will only muddle any understanding of Secretary Clinton’s state of mind and fail to capture the full picture, thus delaying the final disposition of this case even further.”
There you have it, according to the judge Hillary Clinton’s response left more questions remaining than answers provided and while I have to give Judicial Watch credit for still trying to get to the bottom of this scandal at this point I have to paraphrase Hillary Clinton and ask what difference does it make any more?
Nothing is ever going to come from this and she is never going to be held accountable for her actions so at this point I take solace in the fact that it might have helped prevent her from becoming President.
malo periculosam libertatem quam quietum servitium
A couple of weeks ago a contributor on MSNBC made the claim that Bernie Sanders supporters were “racist, liberal whites” and while I enjoy seeing the left turn on each other the comment did seem to come out of the blue and without reason or explanation.
However after seeing the reaction from some Bernie Sanders supporters after the Vermont socialist lost to Joe Biden is South Carolina yesterday I am beginning to understand that this MSNBC contributor was actually ahead of the curve on this one.
Racist liberal supporters were out in full throat on Twitter after the loss calling South Carolina voters “rodents” (which we know is a racist dog whistle after Donald Trump called Baltimore “rodent infested”) who were “uneducated” and claimed the votes of black people in South Carolina should not count.
They even went so far as to claim they should suppress the black vote in the south because once Bernie Sanders is elected black people will realize it was for their own good.
This is just the tip of the iceberg, you can read more at The Right Scoop to see the full scope of Bernie Sanders supporters self-important and racist reaction to a single loss in a southern state.
Can you imagine if anybody else called for the suppression of the black vote under the guise of doing it for their own good?! In fact the left has been claiming for years that the Republicans want to suppress the black vote and that is what the voter ID laws are all about, yet here we have them actively calling for voter suppression and all I hear is crickets.
If Sanders supporters are this upset over a single primary loss so early in the contest I can only imagine the sky-screaming that is going to happen after the Democratic party leaders steal the nomination from Bernie Sanders at the convention.
malo periculosam libertatem quam quietum servitium
Sunday, March 1st open thread: ‘Someone You Loved’
“This is the day which the Lord hath made; we will rejoice and be glad in it.” (Psalm 118:24 KJV)
Here is this week’s open thread. 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.
You can subscribe to America’s Watchtower to receive email updates and you can also follow America’s Watchtower on Facebook and Twitter by clicking the links on the right.
Here is Lewis Capaldi performing “Someone You Loved” live from last year:
9th Circuit Court rules against Donald Trump’s asylum policies
I wrote in another post on a court decision that it was getting hard to follow all the lawsuits Democrats and left-leaning organizations have pending in the court against everything Donald Trump is trying to do and this is what I am talking about:
Back in May of last year the 9th Circuit Court of Appeals handed Donald Trump a victory on the President’s policy of sending migrants who did not pass through a port of entry back to Mexico to await their asylum hearing, reversing a Federal court decision, and yesterday the same court ruled against two of the President’s policies, including this very same one. Here is more:
A California appeals court has rejected two of the Trump administration’s efforts to curtail asylum.
The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals sided with a coalition of immigrant legal services groups in ruling against a Trump administration rule barring asylum claims from people who cross the US-Mexico border without presenting themselves at an official port of entry.
In a separate ruling, the appeals court backed a lower court’s preliminary injunction against the administration’s Migrant Protection Protocol requiring asylum-seekers to remain in Mexico while their cases are adjudicated.
Judge William A. Fletcher argued in an opinion that the policy imperils immigrants in violation of legal protections by exposing them to “targeted discrimination, physical violence, sexual assault, overwhelmed and corrupt law enforcement, lack of food and shelter, and practical obstacles to participation in court proceedings in the United States.”
“Uncontested evidence in the record establishes that non-Mexicans returned to Mexico under the MPP risk substantial harm, even death, while they await adjudication of their applications for asylum,” Fletcher wrote.
The court felt that risk of “substantial harm” or “even death” was so great that the court issued an immediate stay of its own decision. This appears to be headed to the Supreme Court and it is anybody’s guess how this will turn out.
malo periculosam libertatem quam quietum servitium
It is beginning to look a lot like 2016 all over again for Bernie Sanders and his supporters. Well, actually it has been looking like 2016 all over again for quite some time with some of the stories we have been seeing, but it looks like it is about to get interesting for Bernie Sanders and his supporters who are still upset the Democratic party rigged the primary against him in 2016 because now the superdelegates are warning they could do it again this time around.
Here is more:
Senator Bernie Sanders’ issues with the Democratic establishment may continue past the nominating races and into the Democratic National Convention, according to a new report.
If Mr Sanders arrives at the convention with any less than a majority of delegates pledged to him, he may find himself with a wave of superdelegates voting against his nomination.
The New York Times reported Thursday that in interviews with 93 superdelegates, only nine said that Mr Sanders arriving at the convention with a plurality was reason enough to support him as nominee.
In the event that Mr Sanders does only win a plurality of pledged delegates, there could be a brokered convention and subsequent fight to choose a nominee.
The Times report was “based on interviews with the 93 superdelegates, out of 771 total, as well as party strategists and aides to senior Democrats about the thinking of party leaders.”
The magic number for Bernie Sanders is 1,991, anything less than that in the delegate count and the Democratic party leaders are willing to fight to deny Bernie Sanders the nomination and thwart the will of the Democratic voters. This is what the Democratic National Committee is banking on, which is why they are in the process of changing the rules regarding superdelegates again so that the superdelegates do not have to wait for the second ballot to cast their votes.
It would take some guts for the Democratic party leaders to rob Bernie Sanders of the nomination again, and they would be risking political suicide with their voters, but they are banking on their constituents being so filled with hatred of Donald Trump that it will trump their disdain at being screwed over again.
The Democratic party leaders hope their base will fall in line for what they believe is the greater good and disregard the fact that their party does not care who they want to be the nominee. We’ll see how it plays out if this comes to fruition but this sure is entertaining.
malo periculosam libertatem quam quietum servitium
AP fact checks Democrats’ claims Donald Trump gutted the CDC
We have not seen the mainstream media and the Democrats try to drum up so much pandemic fear since George W Bush was running for reelection in 2004. But they are dipping back into the playbook and they are hoping that this time around they will be able to scare Americans into voting for the Democrats by claiming the country is not ready for a pandemic because Donald Trump has already failed to protect us.
It did not work against George Bush but they are hoping this time around the second time will be a charm, there really is nothing new under the sun when it comes to the Democratic playbook. We have heard several Democratic leaders come out trashing the President for his lack of response to the coronavirus outbreak and during the debate the other night several candidates claimed that the President gutted the CDC and this has left the United States vulnerable. The Associated Press actually decided to do some investigative journalism and fact-checked this claim.
Here is what a couple of the candidates said during the debate:
MIKE BLOOMBERG: “There’s nobody here to figure out what the hell we should be doing. And he’s defunded — he’s defunded Centers for Disease Control, CDC, so we don’t have the organization we need. This is a very serious thing.” — debate Tuesday night.
JOE BIDEN, comparing the Obama-Biden administration with now: “We increased the budget of the CDC. We increased the NIH budget. … He’s wiped all that out. … He cut the funding for the entire effort.”
Here is what the AP found:
They’re both wrong to say the agencies have seen their money cut. Bloomberg is repeating the false allegation in a new ad that states the U.S. is unprepared for the virus because of “reckless cuts” to the CDC. Trump’s budgets have proposed cuts to public health, only to be overruled by Congress, where there’s strong bipartisan support for agencies such as the CDC and NIH. Instead, financing has increased.
The Congress has actually increased the funding for the CDC and while Donald Trump might have proposed cuts to the agency he signed an increase CDC spending into law.
As far as Michael Bloomberg’s claim that there is nobody at the CDC to oversea outbreak response here is what the AP found:
The broader point about there being “nobody here” to coordinate the response sells short what’s in place to handle an outbreak.
The public health system has a playbook to follow for pandemic preparation — regardless of who’s president or whether specific instructions are coming from the White House. Those plans were put into place in anticipation of another flu pandemic, but are designed to work for any respiratory-borne disease.
Among the health authorities overseeing the work are Dr. Anne Schuchat, CDC’s principal deputy director and a veteran of previous outbreaks, and Dr. Anthony Fauci, NIH’s infectious disease chief who has advised six presidents.
Another lie, here is the AP summary on these claims:
Democratic presidential contenders are describing the federal infectious-disease bureaucracy as rudderless and ill-prepared for the coronavirus threat because of budget cuts and ham-handed leadership by President Donald Trump. That’s a distorted picture.
In others words the Democrats are lying and twisting the truth to suit their personal agenda and even the Associated Press could not run cover for the Democrats on this issue. However the Democrats are shameless and they will continue to promote the big lie knowing that for the most part the mainstream media will swear to it.
malo periculosam libertatem quam quietum servitium
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