The United States, Mexico, and Canada sign NAFTA replacement deal
Back in August Donald Trump and Mexico reached an agreement on a new trade deal which would replace NAFTA. The mainstream media and the Democrats, unwilling to wait to see how the whole thing would play out, attacked the deal because it did not include Canada. Then in October Donald Trump made good on his promise to negotiate a new trade deal with Canada and our neighbors to the North signed onto the USMCA.
With the mainstream media running interference over the last couple of days with the Russia investigation you might have missed it but today the leaders of the three countries officially signed the USMCA, here is more:
The leaders of the United States, Canada and Mexico signed a new trade agreement here Friday, a development that President Donald Trump called “a truly groundbreaking achievement.”
The USMCA pact, largely a modernization of the nearly 25-year-old North America Free Trade Agreement, still must be approved by Congress — a potential challenge for Trump because Democrats take control of the House in less than five weeks.
Trump, Mexican President Enrique Peña Nieto and Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau took turns praising the pact’s market access provisions, as well as its labor and environmental standards, before sitting down at a table to affix their signatures to the deal.
“All of our countries will benefit greatly,” Trump said at the signing ceremony, which was held on the margins of a G-20 summit here.
This fulfills Donald Trump’s campaign promise to renegotiate NAFTA and he has pledged to redo other trade deals as well. Of course this is not official until the legislations of all three countries sign off on it, and you know that the Democrats who have vowed to oppose and resist everything the President does are going to fight tooth and nail to bring take deal down and deny Donald Trump a victory, even if it means hurting the United States.
malo periculosam libertatem quam quietum servitium
Donald Trump to sign bump stock ban
Back in February Donald Trump directed Jeff Sessions to create regulations banning bump stocks and other similar devices. Now, according to this story, the new regulations are complete and Donald Trump will be signing the ban shortly. And just for the record, this new ban includes confiscation.
Here is more:
The Trump administration plans to announce the long-anticipated federal rule officially banning bump stocks in the coming days, according to US officials familiar with the matter.
Bump stocks gained national attention last year after a gunman in Las Vegas rigged his weapons with the devices to fire on concertgoers, killing 58 people. President Donald Trump vowed to outlaw the devices soon after the tragedy, and some lawmakers on Capitol Hill urged him to back a permanent legislative fix.
But opposition from lawmakers and the National Rifle Association ultimately made a regulatory change the only realistic path forward to accomplishing the President’s goal.
Under the new rule, bump stock owners would be required to destroy or surrender the devices to authorities. Members of the public will be given 90 days to turn in or otherwise discard their bump stocks, according to a source familiar with the final rule.
I hate to say it but if you ask me it looks like Donald Trump pulled a Barack Obama; he used his pen and his phone to create a law where none existed because he could not get it through the Congress.
However there could be an upside because if you remember correctly Donald Trump promised to repeal two older regulations for each new regulation his administration wrote. I will not be holding my breath…
malo periculosam libertatem quam quietum servitium
Robert Mueller accuses Paul Manafort of lying after agreeing to cooperate with the investigation
According to this article Paul Manafort’s lawyer was briefing Donald Trump’s lawyer about his interviews with the investigators after he had struck a deal to cooperate with Robert Mueller. The article goes on to say that although this is unusual there is nothing illegal about it.
A lawyer for Paul Manafort, the president’s onetime campaign chairman, repeatedly briefed President Trump’s lawyers on his client’s discussions with federal investigators after Manafort agreed to cooperate with the special counsel, according to one of Trump’s lawyers and two other people familiar with the conversations.
The arrangement was highly unusual and inflamed tensions with Mueller’s office when prosecutors discovered it after Manafort began cooperating two months ago, the people said. Some legal specialists speculated it was a bid by Manafort for a presidential pardon even as he worked with the special counsel, Robert S. Mueller III, in hopes of a lighter sentence.
I would say, yeah he was playing both sides of the fence but if there is nothing illegal about it why wouldn’t he? It seems like the smart thing to do, however because of this Robert Mueller’s investigative team is accusing Paul Manafort of lying to them and breaking the plea deal.
While Downing’s discussions with the president’s team violated no laws, they helped contribute to a deteriorating relationship between lawyers for Manafort and Mueller’s prosecutors, who accused Manafort of holding out on them despite his pledge to assist them in any matter they deemed relevant, according to the people. That conflict spilled into public view on Monday when the prosecutors declared that Manafort had breached his plea deal by lying to them about several subjects.
Because of this Paul Manafort is most likely headed to jail but is it possible that maybe, just maybe, he did fully cooperate with the investigation and there is just nothing there and now he is going to pay the price for something that did not happen because he refused to say it did?
Somebody has to go to jail, it reminds me of that scene from National Treasure:
malo periculosam libertatem quam quietum servitium
House Republicans release new tax plan
During the campaign leading up to the mid-term elections Donald Trump stated that he and Republicans were working on a middle-class tax cut plan (which the right does not want to admit, but this was an admission that the middle-class got squat in Donald Trump’s lone legislative accomplishment) but this seemed to take the Republicans by surprise.
Now we are learning that the House Republicans have released a new tax bill which will fix some “glitches” in the previous tax cut bill, maybe this is what Donald Trump was talking about:
House Republicans on Monday evening unexpectedly released a 297-page tax bill they hope to move during the lame-duck session of Congress.
The legislation would revive a number of expired tax provisions known as “extenders,” address glitches in the Tax Cuts and Jobs Act and make a range of changes to savings- and retirement-related tax provisions.
Other parts of the bill would revamp the IRS, provide new tax breaks for start-up businesses and offer assistance to disaster victims.
The measure amounts to House Republicans’ opening bid in negotiations with the Senate.
Details are few and far between at this point but this certainly does not look like the aforementioned middle-class tax cut the President was speaking about during the mid-term campaign.
Republicans are claiming this has bipartisan support:
In a statement, Brady said, “This broad, bipartisan package builds on the economic successes we continue to see throughout our country.”
“The policy proposals in this package have the support of Republicans and Democrats in both chambers,” he said.
But I find this hard to believe: Why would the Democrats, who are thisclose to taking over control of the House after running on opposing everything the President wants to do, and after running on repealing the tax cuts, suddenly agree to fix whatever is wrong with the tax bill they oppose?
The Republicans have had two years with a majority in the House and Senate and they have been a disappointment, I would not expect it to end any other way.
malo periculosam libertatem quam quietum servitium
Sunday, November 25th open thread: ‘Lose Yourself’
“This is the day which the Lord hath made; we will rejoice and be glad in it.” (Psalm 118:24 KJV)
Here is the open thread for Sunday, November 25th. 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 Eminem performing “Lose Yourself” live, but I am not sure what year this is from:
House Republicans subpoena James Comey and Loretta Lynch
Last week it was reported that the Republican House Judiciary Committee would subpoena James Comey and Loretta Lynch and now it appears as if they have, here is more:
“Happy Thanksgiving. Got a subpoena from House Republicans,” Comey wrote. “I’m still happy to sit in the light and answer all questions. But I will resist a ‘closed door’ thing because I’ve seen enough of their selective leaking and distortion.”
“Let’s have a hearing and invite everyone to see,” the former law enforcement official added.
Additionally, former Attorney General Loretta Lynch received a subpoena from House Republicans. The Obama-era official has yet to comment publically on the matter. Goodlatte is requesting Comey and Lynch appear for private depositions on December 3 and December 4, respectively.
I think it is safe to put this one in the way too little to late column, now that they are just about out of power I guess they feel the need to bring this sham investigation to a close so they can write a report and issue recommendations before the Democrats take over and drop the whole thing. What a bunch of frauds…
malo periculosam libertatem quam quietum servitium
Happy Thanksgiving
“Make a joyful noise unto the LORD, all ye lands. Serve the LORD with gladness: come before his presence with singing. Know ye that the LORD he is God: it is he that hath made us, and not we ourselves; we are his people, and the sheep of his pasture. Enter into his gates with thanksgiving, and into his courts with praise: be thankful unto him, and bless his name. For the LORD is good; and his truth endureth to all generations.” (Psalm 100:1-5 KJV)
I would like to wish everybody a wonderful and happy Thanksgiving. I hope you spend it with family and friends but let us also take a minute to think about the people who are overseas serving the country who cannot be home this year.
Thanksgiving would not be complete here on America’s Watchtower without this Johnny Cash classic:
Florida Democratic party under investigation for voter fraud
We all watched with amazement as Florida totally botched the ballot counting a couple of weeks ago, but in addition to the incompetency we saw in Florida there were also some suspicious activities reported such as “finding” ballots that were not counted. But I think the most troubling story of all was the report that Florida officials altered ballots by changing the date until two days after the election hoping to get those votes counted when the recounts started.
Now, according to this story, the Florida Democratic party is under investigation for election fraud because of this. Here is more:
Democrats conceded in the races for U.S. Senate and governor, but not before Florida asked federal authorities to investigate possible election fraud conducted by the party.
The U.S. Department of Justice declined, but the Florida Department of Law Enforcement and the Office of Statewide Prosecution say they have an opened a criminal investigation into the allegations.
Evidence reported to the Department of State suggests a possible effort by Democrats to have voters fix ballots after the state’s deadline in at least four counties.
Cure forms for mail ballots sent to voters by the party show the return date changed from the day before the election to two days afterwards.
Here is what Florida Republicans had to say:
Republicans point to the fact Democrats successfully sued to extend the deadline after the fact.
“It looks like they were just planning on a judge siding with them because of the bias towards trying to allow as many votes as possible to count that were legally cast,” said Eric Eggers, author of the book Fraud. “It’s the first evidence we have of systemic efforts to undercut or subvert election law as it was on the book.”
The Democrats are claiming it was a simple mistake made by some young people which actually hurt the Democrats they were trying to help:
“Some 23-year-old staffer probably got two dates mixed up,” said Schale. “They put the date down for the provisional ballot cure, not the absentee ballot cure, and actually by doing it, all they did was make it harder for their own voters to vote.”
This sounds like an eerily similar excuse in the IRS targeting scandal and of course we know the IRS finally admitted guilt.
But here is a question I would like to have answered, why did the Department of Justice decide not to investigate this story?
malo periculosam libertatem quam quietum servitium
Ocasio-Cortez urges challengers to run against incumbent Democrats
With Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez–who today said she hoped Democrats could take back all three chambers of government–it looks like the Democratic establishment might have gotten more than it bargained for when she won a seat to the House in the mid-term elections.
In addition to her Biden-esque gaffes, since heading to Washington she has joined protesters outside of Nancy Pelosi’s office and now, according to this story, she is joining an alt-left group called the “Justice Democrats” and urging them to vote out all incumbent Democrats who are not as radical as she.
Rep.-elect Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez (D-N.Y.), implored more than 700 attendees of a Justice Democrats strategy call to run for office against incumbent Democrats as well as Republicans in their home districts.
During the video call with supporters Saturday evening, Ocasio-Cortez remarked that her own journey to the House began on the other end of a Justice Democrats strategy call while calling on supporters to mount similar bids in their own districts around the country.
The incoming lawmaker added that she and other members of the Justice Democrats, a group of progressives seeking to shift the Democratic Party left, would support challenges to incumbent Democrats they view as insufficiently aligned with the views of progressives in the party, particularly on the issue of corporate campaign donations.
Of course she won her seat by first knocking off an establishment Democrat in the New York primary so it is not surprising she is making this stand but this cannot be sitting well with the Democratic leadership and I would expect them to try to reign her in as soon as possible. Until and unless the Democratic leadership gets her in control I think she could make for a fun ride.
malo periculosam libertatem quam quietum servitium
Sunday, November 18th open thread: ‘Pressure’
“This is the day which the Lord hath made; we will rejoice and be glad in it.” (Psalm 118:24 KJV)
Here is the open thread for Sunday, November 4th. 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 Muse performing a new song entitled “Pressure” live on The Tonight Show:
America's Watchtower 