Back From Dagny and Blake's Joint Birthday Party. Posted A Variety Of Cartoons and Op Eds With Little Commentary From Me. You decide.

I  just returned from a joint birthday party for Blake and Dagny and this memo will have very little commentary from me.  Most of what I am posting is for you to think about .  It runs the gamut of pros and cons regarding current issues as well as the cartoons.

Our kids live in Maitland, some 10 or more miles north of Orlando and only a few miles from one of the most sane and beautiful downtown areas in the nation.  It is Park Avenue in Winter Park.

While Lynn shopped, I sat on a comfortable park bench, read more in my book, "Sapiens, " and then we had lunch in a favorite restaurant, sat outdoors and watched the people, with their dogs and baby carriages passing.  Winter Park is the home of Rollins College and reminds me of the old beautiful Florida I remember when I was young.

What a lovely place to visit, have a wonderful meal, hear all kind of foreign languages and forget about the news.  Winter Park is also home of the biggest collection of Tiffany objects (Morse Museum.)
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Communication skills are very important when we travel.

At a travel agency in Shanghai, I asked the Chinese girl behind the counter if she could escort me on a city tour and asked her for her mobile number so I could call her to make arrangements.

She gave me a big smile, nodded her head and said, "Sex sex sex, wan free sex for tonight".

I replied, "Wow, you Chinese women are really hospitable! ”

A guy standing next to me overheard, tapped me on the shoulder and said,  "What she really said was: 666136429".
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my doctor told me to put a bar in the shower.


Jane Fonda had a voice when it came to protesting  the Viet Nam War
but lost it when it came to the Weinstein war. More
Hollywood hypocrisy?

The Oscar Committee also paid homage to patriotic war movies in an attempt to regain public support for their general hypocrisy.

The audience of mostly anti-Trump far lefties seemed unenthused.

Viewing stank again.
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Celebrities: We flock to their concerts, devour their movies and TV Shows, shower them with adulation at every turn. No wonder they assume we care about their political opinions. But do we – really? In this week's video, Candace Owens, Director of Urban Development for Turning Point USA, lets oblivious celebs in on a secret. ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Incompetent and confused humans are to blame regarding Parkland not guns.(See 1 and 1a below.)

Then:

A hotel guest calls the front desk and the clerk answers, "May I help you?" 

The man says, "Yes, I'm in room 858. You need to send someone to my  room immediately. I'm having an argument with my wife and she says she's going to jump out the window." 

The desk clerk says, "I'm sorry, sir, but that's a personal issue." 

The man replies, "Listen, I can’t get the window open.. and that's a maintenance issue."

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I have a very dear friend who I play tennis with and he hates Trump and sends me reasons to support his feelings and beliefs.  This is the most recent. (See 2 below.)

And:

 (See 2a  and 2b below.)

Elect Maxine Waters president and allow Keith Ellison to control the DNC and you might get this in  America:

 White South African farmers to be removed from their land
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Another take on Sarah. (See 3 below.)
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Ross continues to rant. (See 4 below.)
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Today was the day Trump placed a marker before Congress challenging them to resolve the "Dreamer" issue but a liberal court decided the president  could not do what he proposed. Now Congress is off the hook and will do nothing which is their typical response to virtually all issues unless their feet can be held to the fire.
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Fight them now, fight them later when they are stronger and more dangerous. Hobson Choice? (See 5 below.)
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Why our State Department continues to fund terrorists is beyond ridiculous but in this case they use the cover tax payer money is going to the Lebanese Army which  has become a "Controlled Division" of  Hezbollah. (See 6 below.)
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Finally, everyone bashed Trump for his comment about confiscating guns of those who have acknowledged they wish to do harm or appear mentally deranged and then allow the person to appeal the decision.

The IRS can confiscate your  earnings first and then you have the right to appeal and the government has many legal instances where they can take action first and then allow you to appeal.

The government has unlimited resources as we are learning again from the Mueller "witch hunt?" and the cost to those attacked, subpoenaed, can force them to agree to laws they may not have broken because they cannot afford the cost of  fighting big government.  Is this justice?
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Dick
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1) How Did the Parkland Shooter Slip Through the Cracks?
Broward County’s effort to fight the “school-to-prison-pipeline” may have helped Nikolas Cruz stay under law enforcement’s radar.

By Max Eden

In the aftermath of the horrific shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Parkland, Florida, political debate has focused almost exclusively on the role of guns in American society. Largely ignored is the question of what role Broward County’s overhauled approach to school safety played in the total system failure leading up to the massacre, in which authorities took no action on repeated warnings about the eventual shooter.  

In an effort to combat the “school to prison pipeline,” schools across the country have come under pressure from the federal government and civil rights activists to reduce suspensions, expulsions, and in-school arrests. The unintended consequences of pressuring schools to produce ever-lower discipline statistics deserve much more examination.  

Florida’s Broward County, home to Marjory Stoneman Douglas High, was among the leaders in this nationwide policy shift. According to Washington Postreporting, Broward County schools once recorded more in-school arrests than any other Florida district. But in 2013, the school board and the sheriff’s office agreed on a new policy to discontinue police referrals for a dozen infractions ranging from drug use to assault. The number of school-based arrests plummeted by 63 percent from 2012 to 2016. The Obama administration lauded Broward’s reforms, and in 2015 invited the district’s superintendent to the White House for an event, “Rethink Discipline,” that would highlight the success of Broward and other localities’ success in “transforming policies and school climate.”

Confessed killer Nikolas Cruz, a notorious and emotionally disturbed student, was suspended from Stoneman Douglas High. He was even expelled for bringing weapons to school. Yet he was never arrested before the shooting. In a county less devoted to undoing school disciplinary policies, perhaps Cruz would have been arrested for one of his many violent or threatening incidents. When Cruz got into a fight in September of 2016, he was referred to social workers rather than to the police. When he allegedly assaulted a student in January 2017, it triggered a school-based threat assessment—but no police involvement. The Washington Post notes that Cruz “was well-known to school and mental health authorities and was entrenched in the process for getting students help rather than referring them to law enforcement.”

Would an arrest record have changed the judgment of the FBI agents who ignored the tip that Cruz wanted to kill his classmates? Certainly Cruz could not have legally purchased a gun if the 2016 social-services investigation determined that he was a threat to himself and others. That year, according to the Washington Post, the sheriff’s office was informed that Cruz “planned to shoot up the school.” The office determined that Cruz had knives and a BB gun and sent this information to the school resource officer (presumably the now-infamous Scot Peterson). It’s unclear whether Peterson investigated; if he did, neither he nor anyone else evidently filed a report. When social services approached Peterson in its investigation of Cruz, the officer “refused to share any information . . . regarding [an] incident that took place.” Peterson and his colleagues appear to have been under pressure to post lower statistics on school-safety problems. This climate of disengagement could have allowed Cruz to slip through the cracks in the system.

CNN’s Jake Tapper pressed Broward County Sheriff Scott Israel about what role the new policies might have played in the county’s failure to respond to the many red flags that Cruz’s behavior had raised. “Were there not incidents committed by the shooter as a student,” Tapper asked, “had this new policy not been in place that otherwise he would have been arrested for and not able to legally buy a gun?” The sheriff praised the program. “It’s an excellent program,” he said. “It’s helping many, many people. What this program does is not put a person at 14, 15, 16 years old into the criminal justice system.” The police, he said, can’t be faulted here because “there’s no malfeasance or misfeasance if you don’t know about something.”

Perhaps not. But the explicit aim of Broward’s new approach to school safety was to keep students like Cruz off the police’s radar. If the Sheriff’s department didn’t know about his deeply troubling behavior, perhaps it was because they were no longer supposed to know about it.

Reporters should dig deeper into the implementation of a policy that prevented school officials from contacting the police, even when common sense would call for it, as it surely did in Cruz’s case. There remain more questions than answers at this point, but we owe the families of Cruz’s 17 victims better than another scripted culture war, with each side voicing the usual talking points. Hundreds of school districts, serving millions of students across the country, have followed Broward County’s dubious lead on school safety. Parents across the country need more answers about how this could happen, so let’s start asking the questions now.

Max Eden is a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute. Twitter: @MaxEden99


1a)SOLUTION  TO GUN  CONTROL

In 1865, a  Democrat shot and killed Abraham Lincoln, President of the United States  .

In 1881, a  left wing radical Democrat shot James Garfield, President of the United  States - who later died from the wound.

In 1963, a  radical left wing socialist shot and killed John F. Kennedy, President  of the United States.

In 1975, a  left wing radical Democrat fired shots at Gerald Ford, President of the  United States.

In 1983, a  registered Democrat shot and wounded Ronald Reagan, President of the  United States.

In 1984,  James Hubert, a disgruntled Democrat, shot and killed 22 people in a  McDonalds restaurant.

In 1986,  Patrick Sherrill, a disgruntled Democrat, shot and killed 15 people in  an Oklahoma post office.

In 1990,  James Pough, a disgruntled Democrat, shot and killed 10 people at a GMAC  office.

In 1991,  George Hennard, a disgruntled Democrat, shot and killed 23 people in a  Luby's cafeteria in Killeen , TX.

In 1995,  James Daniel Simpson, a disgruntled Democrat, shot and killed 5  coworkers in a Texas laboratory.

In 1999,  Larry Asbrook, a disgruntled Democrat, shot and killed 8 people at a  church service.

In 2001, a  left wing radical Democrat fired shots at the White House in a failed  attempt to kill George W. Bush, President of the US.

In 2003,  Douglas Williams, a disgruntled Democrat, shot and killed 7 people at a  Lockheed Martin plant.

In 2007, a  registered Democrat named Seung - Hui Cho, shot and killed 32 people in Virginia Tech.

In 2010, a  mentally ill registered Democrat named Jared Lee Loughner, shot Rep.  Gabrielle Giffords and killed 6 others.

In 2011, a  registered Democrat named James Holmes, went into a movie theater and  shot and killed 12 people.

In 2012,  Andrew Engeldinger, a disgruntled Democrat, shot and killed 7 people in  Minneapolis.

In 2013, a  registered Democrat named Adam Lanza, shot and killed 26 people in a  school in Newtown ,CT.

As  recently as Sept 2013, an angry Democrat shot 12 at a Navy ship yard.  

And just last year a crazy Democrat attacked the Senators Baseball game and wounded republican Senators! “

Clearly,  there is a problem with Democrats and guns”.

Not  one NRA member, Tea Party member, or Republican conservative was  involved in any of these shootings and murders.

SOLUTION: 

It  should be illegal for Democrats to own guns!

We  don't need gun control, we need Democrat control.

Guns  don't kill people, Democrats do!

If the person reading this note is a Democrat, please change the term Democrat in this note to Liberal (or worse, Progressive.)

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2)Trump’s White House Is a Black Hole

By Peter Wehner (NYT's)

Character is fate. That’s as true for a president as it is for anyone else, and so it’s no surprise that the Trump presidency is engulfed in chaos.

The policy process is broken and incoherent, with the White House lurching from one position to another. Factions are warring. Top aides are embroiled in scandal and bailing out. President Trump is escalating his attacks on his own advisers, especially his attorney general, and is increasingly isolated and embittered.

The Republican Party is learning what should have been obvious from the outset: Mr. Trump’s chaotic personality can’t be contained. Indeed, combining it with the awesome power of the presidency virtually guaranteed he would become more volatile and transgressive. His presidency is infecting the entire party. 

In the realm of policy, Mr. Trump is reshaping some traditional Republican views. A party that was once firmly in favor of free trade is now home to a president who just announced plans to impose tariffs on steel and aluminum and declared: “Trade wars are good, and easy to win. Example, when we are down $100 billion with a certain country and they get cute, don’t trade anymore — we win big. It’s easy!”

The Republican Party once championed the principles of liberty and limited government, yet Mr. Trump is indifferent to them. 

Republicans once sought to strengthen relations with Mexico; today they delight in antagonizing our neighbor. Not long ago, Republicans made outreach to Hispanics a top priority; today the signals that the president and his party send are that Hispanics are alien, unwelcome, nothing but trouble. 

In 2012, Republicans defended Mitt Romney when he said Russia was our biggest geopolitical threat; today they are wholly untroubled by its effort to subvert the 2016 presidential election. While they may not have always lived up to their own ideals, Republicans have long argued that human rights should play a central role in American foreign policy, from the presidency of Ronald Reagan through George W. Bush’s. Today human rights are viewed at most as an afterthought. 

On the flip side, Mr. Trump has embraced conventional Republican positions on taxes and deregulation, on judicial appointments and social policy, on health care and funding the military. On policy, then, the marriage between Mr. Trump and the Republican Party has become what marriages often are, with each partner changing the other in some significant respects. 

But policy is hardly the whole story. When it comes to the Republican Party and Mr. Trump, the most profound and dangerous shift has occurred not in policy but in the province of disposition and demeanor, temperament and cast of mind. This arena is more amorphous than policy but can be at least as important.

At the national level the Republican Party has become a destructive and anarchic political force in American life. 

The president and his acolytes are championing conspiracy theories and a sweeping, uncalibrated, all-out assault on our institutions. There is reckless talk by Republicans about “secret societies,” “silent coups” and the “deep state.” Trump supporters have engaged in a desperate effort to discredit the Mueller investigation.

The president dehumanizes and belittles his opponents and (at best half-jokingly) accuses Democrats of being “treasonous” for not applauding him during his State of the Union speech. Rather than nourishing a sense of gratitude, he stokes grievances. And he tells lie after lie after lie after lie. 

One White House aide, asked by The Washington Post whether John Kelly, the president’s chief of staff, could have been more truthful or transparent about the dismissal of the staff secretary Rob Porter, answered honestly: “In this White House, it’s simply not in our DNA. Truthful and transparent is great, but we don’t even have a coherent strategy to obfuscate.” Could there be a more emblematic statement of the low point we have reached?

Yet most Republicans are silent, their moral and civic reflexes seemingly dead.

All of this is antithetical to conservatism. On balance, Republicans are seeking to conserve very little; instead they have become the courtiers and court pastors of a man who delights in tearing things down. It calls to mind the line spoken by Alfred in “The Dark Knight”: “Some men just want to watch the world burn.”

Now consider this: The Republican Party once prided itself as a defender of objective truth against postmodernism. Today, it has become the party of perspectivism — the view, articulated by Nietzsche, that all truth claims are contingent on a person’s perspective rather than on fundamental reality. “It is our needs that interpret the world,” Nietzsche wrote in “The Will to Power.  

Evangelicals who once professed the importance of personal character and “family values” now eagerly give the president a mulligan for his immorality.

The national Republican Party, at least for now, has become a vehicle less for advancing high ideals than for exercising raw power. Of course, political parties have always been about the business of pursuing power, and there’s nothing inherently wrong in doing so. Power used in the right way can advance justice. But something very different is going on in the Republican Party today. It has become the institutional expression of Donald Trump’s distorted and impulsive personality.

There are notable exceptions to this in the Republican Party, but that’s the point. They are the exception rather than the rule. Party leaders who were once willing to challenge Mr. Trump, to call him out now and then, are now far more compliant and therefore far more complicit. That’s because among the Republican base, Mr. Trump was and remains the people’s choice — evidence that, while the president has accelerated the worst tendencies of the Republican Party, he is not solely responsible for them. He did not appear out of thin air. 

The problem for the Republican Party is that while President Trump is popular with Republicans — 85 percent approve of his performance so far — for most of the rest of the country, he’s toxic. The trauma of the Trump presidency is creating pushback. Americans are longing for a more ennobling, less exhausting political leader.

Joe Trippi, the chief media strategist for Doug Jones, the Alabama Democrat who defeated Roy Moore last year in a special Senate election, agreed recently in an interview with Vox’s Ezra Klein that people are tiring of the incessant conflict created by politics these days. “They don’t want to feel this way,” Mr. Trippi said.

But as long as Mr. Trump is president, they will feel this way. He won’t change, and neither will the Republican Party. That’s how institutional corruption happens, from the top down.

 Peter Wehner (@Peter_Wehner), a senior fellow at the Ethics and Public Policy Center, served in the previous three Republican administrations and is a contributing opinion writer.

2a) California Dems’ hard-left turn could be the whole party’s future

How far left is the Democratic Party headed? Look to California, where last month’s state party convention went off the deep end.

The first sign of lunacy was the delegates’ refusal to endorse impeccably liberal Sen. Dianne Feinstein.

She lost out by 37 percent to 54 percent to Kevin de Leon, president pro tempore of the state Senate, who promises mainly to be obsessively anti-Trump.

Similarly, the delegates put former Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa last among the party’s four candidates for governor — even though he’s tied in polls of Democratic voters with former San Francisco Mayor Gavin Newsom, who came out on top at the convention.

Villaraigosa’s sin? As mayor, he supported charter schools and jousted with the teachers unions, rightly calling them “the largest obstacle to creating quality schools.”

Finally, the convention took a sharp anti-Israel turn, adopting planks in support of the Boycott, Divest and Sanctions movement and slapping the Israel Defense Forces.

Historically, the Golden State has been a harbinger of national trends. If that holds true, the whole Democratic Party is headed right . . . er, left . . . off the cliff.

2b) 2020 Vision: Huge field of Democrats forming for contest to take on Trump

Something rare is happening ahead of the 2020 Democratic presidential primaries: There are no Clintons or Obamas running, or waiting in the wings.

“It really is the first time since 1992 there isn’t sort of an 800-pound gorilla,” said Ray Buckley, chairman of the Democratic Party in New Hampshire, which hosts the first-in-the-nation primary.

The absence of a clear frontrunner, in turn, has dozens of Democrats from across the ideological spectrum weighing their options, creating the possibility that the primary season could see upwards of 20-plus candidates vying to take on President Trump two years from now.

“The good thing is, we just built two or three new hotels in Des Moines, and I think we are going to need them leading up to the caucuses, because there are going to be a lot of candidates,” Matt Paul, Hillary Clinton’s former Iowa chairman, told Fox News.

While there’s no Obama or Clinton on the ballot, candidates with ties to the 44th president could enjoy an early advantage – at least while others are trying to build national name recognition.

TRUMP FACES RUMBLING OF GOP PRIMARY CHALLENGE, AS HE ROLLS OUT 2020 TEAM

At the top of that list is former Vice President Joe Biden, who leads in a recent Quinnipiac poll of Democrats. Meanwhile, Obama’s Attorney General Eric Holder told The Washington Post he’s got the “guts” to be president. And the former Massachusetts governor Obama himself has suggested would be a worthy successor, Deval Patrick, isn’t taking his name out of contention.

The nascent field also includes several current and former governors: former Virginia Gov. Terry McAuliffe, quoted several days ago by the Washington Free Beacon saying “Who better to take on Trump than me?”; New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who wrapped up at least one recent set of anti-Trump remarks by borrowing the president’s famous slogan, “we’re going to make America great again;” and California Gov. Jerry Brown, who isn’t ruling out a run even though he’ll be 82 in 2020.

If there’s a premium on liberal candidates, though, the governors will face serious competition. Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt.; Sen. Kamala Harris, D-Calif.; Sen. Elizabeth Warren, D-Mass.; Sen. Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio; Sen. Kirsten Gillibrand, D-N.Y.; Sen. Amy Klobuchar, D-Minn.; and Sen. Cory Booker, D-N.J., all seem to be treating every vote as an opportunity to earn street-cred with the party’s most liberal voters.

Most lawmakers remain non-committal about seeking higher office. 

When Fox News tried to ask Booker about 2020 during a December rally for now-Sen. Doug Jones, D-Ala., in Birmingham, the Garden State senator quickly answered, “I am up for re-election in 2020 as United States Senator. I’ll see you there.”

Because congressional approval ratings aren’t likely to skyrocket between now and Election Day 2020, a trio of local lawmakers may have an opening: South Bend, Ind., Mayor Pete Buttigieg, Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti, and former New Orleans Mayor Mitch Landrieu.

Another group of Democrats has been drawing attention mostly because they’ve booked flights to New Hampshire or Iowa. Among them: former Missouri Secretary of State Jason Kander; Montana Gov. Steve Bullock; former HUD Secretary Julian Castro; Rep. Seth Moulton, D-Mass.; and Rep. John Delaney, D-Md.  Delaney is the only Democrat to have officially declared his candidacy, and is already running campaign ads.

CPAC ATTENDEES SEE ELIZABETH WARREN AS MOST BEATABLE DEM IN 2020

Republican operatives are expressing relief at the crowded field of Trump challengers.

“With so many people running, Democrats will be tripping over themselves to prove they’re liberal enough for their far left base,” RNC Spokesman Michael Ahrens told Fox News in a statement. “Most Americans already think the Democratic Party has gotten too extreme, and an overcrowded field is only going to make it worse.”

Experienced Democrats think the GOP’s calculus is off, though.  

Buckley is noticing a new energy generated by so many potential candidates in their 30’s and 40’s, and says that anything can happen.

“Just because they come up doesn’t necessarily mean they’re running this cycle, but you know in this day and age with Donald Trump, anyone can be president, so why not at least think about it?” Buckley said.

Peter Doocy is currently a Washington D.C.-based correspondent for FOX News Channel (FNC).  He joined the network in 2009 as a general assignment reporter based in the New York bureau.

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3)The Real Truth About Sarah Palin

OH WAIT, SINCE SNL AND HARDBALL SHOWS ALWAYS MAKE FUN OF SARAH PALIN, WE ARE SUPPOSED TO LAUGH WITH THEM BECAUSE THOSE SOURCES OF INFO ARE FUNNY AND OH SO SMART.  WHO CARES IF SHE DID WHAT SO MANY OF US KNOW IS THE RIGHT WAY TO SERVE THE PUBLIC (READ BELOW)?  JUST KEEP LISTENING AND BELIEVING WHAT THE EAST COAST MEDIA TELLS YOU UNTIL IT'S TOO LATE!  WE'LL SEE HOW MUCH EVERYONE LAUGHS THEN!!!

Sarah Palin

Democrat, Independent, or Republican....?

By Dewie Whetsell, Alaskan Fisherman.

As posted in comments on Greta's article referencing the MOVEON ad about Sarah Palin

.

The last 45 of my 66 years I've spent in a commercial fishing town in Alaska . I understand Alaska politics but never understood national politics well until this last year. Here's the breaking point: Neither side of the Palin controversy gets it. It's not about persona, style, rhetoric, it's about doing things. Even Palin supporters never mention the things that I'm about to mention here.

1. Democrats forget when Palin was the Darling of the Democrats, because as soon as Palin took the Governor's office away from a fellow Republican and tough SOB, Frank Murkowski, she tore into the Republican's "Corrupt Bastards Club" (CBC) and sent them packing. Many of them are now residing in State housing and wearing orange jump suits The Democrats reacted by skipping around the yard, throwing confetti and singing, "la la la la" (well, you know how they are). Name another governor in this country that has ever done anything similar.

2. Now with the CBC gone, there were fewer Alaskan politicians to protect the huge, giant oil companies here. So she constructed and enacted a new system of splitting the oil profits called "ACES." Exxon (the biggest corporation in the world) protested and Sarah told them, "don't let the door hit you in the stern on your way out." They stayed, and Alaska residents went from being merely wealthy to being filthy rich. Of course, the other huge international oil companies meekly fell in line. Again, give me the name of any other governor in the country that has done anything similar.

3. The other thing she did when she walked into the governor's office is she got the list of State requests for federal funding for projects, known as "pork." She went through the list, took 85% of them and placed them in the "when-hell-freezes-over" stack.  She let locals know that if we need something built, we'll pay for it ourselves. Maybe she figured she could use the money she got from selling the previous governor's jet because it was extravagant.

Maybe she could use the money she saved by dismissing the governor's cook (remarking that she could cook for her own family), giving back the State vehicle issued to her, maintaining that she already had a car, and dismissing her State provided security force (never mentioning - I imagine - that she's packing heat herself). I'm still waiting to hear the names of those other governors.

4. Now, even with her much-ridiculed "gosh and golly" mannerism, she also managed to put together a totally new approach to getting a natural gas pipeline built which will be the biggest private construction project in the history of North America. No one else could do it although they tried. If that doesn't impress you, then you're trying too hard to be unimpressed while watching her do things like this while baking up a batch of brownies with her other hand.

5. For 30 years, Exxon held a lease to do exploratory drilling at a place called Point Thompson. They made excuses the entire time why they couldn't start drilling. In truth they were holding it like an investment. No governor for 30 years could make them get started. Then, she told them she was revoking their lease and kicking them out. They protested and threatened court action. She shrugged and reminded them that she knew the way to the court house. Alaska won again.

6. President Obama wants the nation to be on 25% renewable resources for electricity by 2025. Sarah went to the legislature and submitted her plan for Alaska to be at 50% renewable by 2025. We are already at 25%. I can give you more specifics about things done, as opposed to style and persona. Everybody wants to be cool, sound cool, look cool. But that's just a cover-up. I'm still waiting to hear from liberals the names of other governors who can match what mine has done in two and a half years. I won't be holding my breath.

By the way, she was content to return to AK after the national election and go to work, but the haters wouldn't let her. Now these adolescent screechers are obviously not scuba divers. And no one ever told them what happens when you continually jab and pester a barracuda. Without warning, it will spin around and tear your face off. Shoulda known better!

You have just read the truth about Sarah Palin that sends the media, along with the democrat party, into a wild uncontrolled frenzy to discredit her. I guess they are only interested in skirt chasers, dishonesty, immoral people, liars, womanizers, murderers, and bitter ex-presidents' wives.

So "You go, Girl." I only wish the men in Washington had your guts, determination, honesty, and morals.

I rest my case. Only FOOLS listen to the biased media.

If you've read this far ...........now ,open your eyes..........

First Lady Michelle Obama's Servant List and Pay Scale

First Lady Required More Than Twenty Attendants

1. $172,200 - Sher, Susan (Chief Of Staff)
2. $140,000 - Frye, Jocelyn C. (Deputy Ass’t. to the President and Dir. of Policy And Projects For The First Lady)
3. $113,000 - Rogers, Desiree G. (Special Assistant to the President and White House Social Secretary)
4. $102,000 - Johnston, Camille Y. (Special Ass’t. to the President and Dir. of Communications for the First Lady)
5. $100,000 - Winter, Melissa E. (Special Assistant to the President and Deputy Chief Of Staff to the First Lady)
6. $ 90,000 - Medina , David S. (Deputy Chief Of Staff to the First Lady)
7. $ 84,000 - Lelyveld, Catherine M. (Director and Press Secretary to the First Lady)
8. $ 75,000 - Starkey, Frances M. (Director of Scheduling and Advance for the First Lady)
9. $ 70,000 - Sanders, Trooper (Deputy Director of Policy and Projects for the First Lady)
10. $ 65,000 - Burnough, Erinn J. (Deputy Director and Deputy Social Secretary)
11. $ 64,000 - Reinstein, Joseph B. (Deputy Director and Deputy Social Secretary)
12. $ 62,000 - Goodman, Jennifer R. (Deputy Director of Scheduling and Events Coordinator For The First Lady)
13. $ 60,000 - Fitts, Alan O. (Deputy Director of Advance and Trip Director for the First Lady)
14. $ 57,500 - Lewis, Dana M. (Special Assistant and Personal Aide to the First Lady)
15. $ 52,500 - Mustaphi, Semonti M. (Associate Director and Deputy Press Secretary to The First Lady)
16. $ 50,000 - Jarvis, Kristen E. (Special=2 0Assistant for Scheduling and Traveling Aide to The First Lady)
17. $ 45,000 - Lechtenberg, Tyler A. (Associate Director of Correspondence For The First Lady)
18. $ 43,000 - Tubman, Samantha (Deputy Associate Director, Social Office)
19. $ 40,000 - Boswell, Joseph J. (Executive Assistant to the Chief Of Staff to the First Lady)
20. $ 36,000 - Armbruster, Sally M. (Staff Assistant to the Social Secretary)
21. $35,000 - Bookey, Natalie (Staff Assistant)
22. $35,000 - Jackson, Deilia A. (Deputy Associate Director of Correspondence for the First Lady)
(This is community organizing at it's finest.)

There has NEVER been anyone in the White House at any time who has created such an army of staffers whose sole duties are the facilitation of the First Lady's social life. One wonders why she needs so much help, at taxpayer expense, when even Hillary, only had three; Jackie Kennedy one; Laura Bush one; and prior to Mamie Eisenhower social help came from the President's own pocket.

Note: This does not include makeup artist Ingrid Grimes-Miles, 49, and "First Hairstylist" Johnny Wright, 31, both of whom traveled aboard Air Force One to Europe .

FRIENDS.....THESE SALARIES ADD UP TO SIX MILLION, THREE HUNDRED SIXTY FOUR THOUSAND DOLLARS ($6,364,000) FOR THE 4 YEARS OF OFFICE????? AND WE ARE IN A RECESSION????? WELL....MOST OF US ARE. I GUESS IT'S OK TO SPEND WILDLY WHEN IT'S NOT YOUR OWN MONEY?????

Copyright 2009 CanadaFreePress.Com <http://freepress.com/> 

Yes, I know, The Canadian Free Press has to publish this because the USA media is too scared they might be considered racist. Sorry USA !

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4) As I have cautioned on some other matters, everyone needs to take a deep breath on the tariff issue. It is complex. I was always taught tariffs are bad, and they can cause trade wars and economic problems as did Smoot Hawley. It is not clear today that the same theories apply. China, with whom we have the real problem, has used the steel industry as a strategic industry for both national security reasons, but also as a way to employ millions even if they have no productive role in the factory. China uses state owned companies as a place to employ tens of millions who may otherwise be unemployed were it not for the state owned companies. As a result these monster entities are subsidized and inefficient, and produce goods that, if priced properly, might not be competitive. However, they have huge subsidies so they can export their goods and underprice us and everyone else. The US has tried to rectify this for years, but to no avail. In addition, China and Japan have many non tariff trade barriers that keep out US products that nobody in the press talks about. The EU has some as well. So while they may not be called tariffs, they effectively are trade barriers to US made goods. So on the basic concept, Trump is spot on. The question then becomes, what is the best way to rectify this. For years there have been talks that went nowhere.  Meantime the US steel and aluminum companies folded.  We cannot have a safe national security program to build military weapons without these industries being here and capable to produce the materials needed to build weapons. We cannot depend on China if there is a war. That is a simple fact.  

It is also unclear what other countries really can do or will do other than bloviate.  The US is a critical market for all of them. They cannot start a trade war without killing their own economies. Maybe Trump is merely bluffing and using this to gain leverage in some negotiation to change the way trade barriers are erected in other countries. His comments about trade wars being good and we will win is classic Trump staking out an extreme position from which to start a negotiation. You have to understand how he deals and not take his opening comments as what he really thinks. He is right that we have been suckers for decades and allowed China, Japan and the EU to erect these other barriers while we just buy their products with no barriers. One thing that has happened here is Peter Navarro, the lead US trade representative, and a hard liner, has been elevated by Trump to a much more influential position in the White House. Many traditional economist type people feel he is too hard line and a problem. Maybe that is true. Maybe that is what is needed to rectify the issues. It is unclear yet. Trump ran on a policy of changing the trade balance and that got him elected, so he is doing what voters wanted. Even the Dems agree with him on this one.

So I suggest let’s just wait a while to see how this really plays out over several months, and ignore all the bluster from the EU and other nations. Their leaders of course are upset that now maybe these countries will not enjoy the unfair trade practices, and that will lead to more economic pain for them. Reality is the US is the dominant market in the world, and we have the strong hand in trade negotiations. If Trump handles this well, and we get a rebalancing of trade rules that are much more level playing field for US products, then that will be great. We just have to see what happens. These tariffs are just the start of a long round of negotiations with many countries to change the rules. All the emotional crap about creating inflation, costing jobs etc is nonsense at this point.  The extra cost of a car will be $45, the extra cost of a pack of beer or soda is 1 cent. And maybe not even that because maybe the producers overseas will lower prices a little to offset the tariffs. The state owned companies in China need to keep all those millions employed, so they can lower prices by using more government subsidies. It is unclear how this will unfold. Wild comments that all the workers in car plants and aluminum canning plants will lose jobs now is ridiculous.

So just take a breath, sit back, and wait to see what actually happens when the emotions calm down. We do not even have the tariff rules yet, so jumping to conclusions and predicting trade wars, unemployment and inflation, is utterly absurd at this point. The game has just begun. There is no question the US has made a number of stupid trade deals, and is in a bad position on numerous products like steel. Trump’s position that we need to rectify the trade imbalances with China, Japan, and the EU is right.  How it happens is what we do not yet know. Like on other major issues, his approach is from a business and NY real estate developers tough negotiating position, and it is outside the accepted norm of decades.  Maybe we need this type of tipping the cart approach to finally make something happen. The other way failed up to now.  Most world leaders get very upset because he is actually calling their bluff and challenging the way things have been done to our detriment and their benefit for decades. We will see. So far Europe has increased what they spend on defense after they all got so upset at Trump. China is sort of cooperating against N Korea for the first time. Russia has not moved against any new EU countries as they did in Ukraine. ISIS is mostly defeated in Iraq and Syria. NAFTA is being renegotiated. The Iran Nuke deal is coming to a head as it becomes more clear it has been a disaster for the world. Tax reform happened and the economy is booming again after so many said there would be no tax bill, and we would never have 3% growth again. Black unemployment is the lowest in history, the stock market, even with the recent decline, is at record highs, wages are starting to rise, and now there will be some gun control changes and mental health changes that will possibly prevent the next massacre. Trade is just the next item on the to do list.

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5) The World Must Unite to Stop Iran

Israel, the U.S. and some Arab states have stepped up. Europe needs to show much more resolve.

By  Jose María Aznar and Stephen Harper

The Israeli military was forced last month to engage an Iranian drone launched into Israeli airspace from Syria. Israel’s defensive actions in this case were limited, but the world should take note. There will be more such incidents if Tehran is permitted to continue projecting force throughout the Middle East. To prevent a full-scale crisis, North America and Europe must join Israel in stopping Iran.

Iran is a revolutionary theocratic state committed to spreading religious extremism throughout the Islamic world. It combines this ideological mission with pragmatic tactics, projecting political and military power from the Persian Gulf to the Mediterranean and Red seas. To support its ambition, Iran has illegally pursued nuclear weapons and fought wars using terrorist proxies. Iran’s leaders have threatened Israel time and again with total destruction, and now, for the first time since the Islamist revolution of 1979, Iranian power has arrived at Israel’s border.

Despite Tehran’s quest for regional control, popular protests in December and January showed that most of the nation’s citizens don’t share their leaders’ designs. The regime’s destabilizing actions have also triggered resistance from Saudi Arabia and other regional powers. Iran’s own citizens and neighbors are convinced of Tehran’s malice, and all concerned nations should heed their warning.

The first objective must be to prevent Iran from developing a nuclear weapon. The Friends of Israel Initiative, of which we are members, has always maintained that the 2015 Iran nuclear agreement does not adequately prevent the regime’s progress. The nuclear inspections for which the agreement provides grant Iran too much time to conceal evidence of illicit activity. And the agreement doesn’t prohibit the development of delivery mechanisms such as ballistic and cruise missiles. Worst of all, the agreement’s sunset clause provides a clear horizon for Iran to resume its race toward a nuclear bomb.

Rather than preventing Iran’s nuclear ambitions, the 2015 agreement gave the regime a road map to achieving them. Predictions that the agreement would de-escalate tensions and improve cooperation have proved wrong. Since signing the agreement, Iran’s aggression and hostility have increased.

But fixing the agreement and stopping Iran from going nuclear would not eliminate the threat. The U.S. and its allies must also roll back Iran’s aggression and influence throughout the Middle East. Tehran continues to wage war using terrorist proxies in Lebanon, Syria and Yemen.

Thankfully, the U.S. has demonstrated its ability to rally its Middle Eastern partners in stabilizing the region. Iranian theocracy appeals mainly to a few neighboring Shiite Islamic factions, and Iran’s long-term conflicts with other sects have made many states eager to cooperate in restraining its influence. Numerous allies can be mobilized in the struggle against Iran, from the Kurds and tribal elements to many Sunni Arabs and Shiite forces not co-opted by Tehran. These factions must collaborate to contain Iran’s hegemonic ambitions.

Israel remains the greatest bulwark against Iran, and Iran remains committed to destroying the Jewish state. The recent border skirmish was the first time Iranian weapons directly infiltrated Israeli space. Iranian operatives have established themselves ever closer to Israel’s northern border and pose a growing threat to Israeli security.

President Trump seems to understand instinctively how poorly the Iran deal is playing out. He also seems to understand that the U.S. and its allies have a broad interest in standing firmly behind Israel. And he is right to say that the nuclear agreement must be renegotiated. The U.S. must demonstrate its leadership by increasing the pressure on Iran and resisting the interference of countries, including many in Europe, that prefer the status quo.

Applying halfhearted diplomatic fixes to grand-strategic problems creates impossible situations like the one in North Korea. Iran is already emulating North Korea by using Hezbollah’s missiles to hold Israeli cities hostage. If left unchecked, Iran’s aggression will ultimately threaten Europe and North America as well. All should urgently work together to counter this threat to global security.

Mr. Aznar is a former prime minister of Spain. Mr. Harper is a former prime minister of Canada. Both are members of the global Friends of Israel Initiative.

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6)

U.S. and Israel Sharply at Odds on Military Aid to Lebanon By P. David Hornik

Posted By Ruth King 

Last month during a conference at Israel’s Institute for National Security Studies, the State Department’s David Satterfield said the administration would keep “bolster[ing] the elements of state security in Lebanon, with an emphasis on the Lebanese army.”

So reports Eldad Shavit, a researcher at the institute. Yet at the same conference another State Department official, Nathan Sales, argued “that the Lebanese army is currently a tool of Hezbollah and …  it is therefore pointless to strengthen it.”

Which of those two diametrically opposed views, coming from the same State Department, is accurate?

If Sales is right, it is troubling that since 2006, as Shavit notes, the U.S. has given the Lebanese army “more than $1.6 billion in military aid,” and that “recent months have witnessed an expansion in U.S. aid, some of which has already reached Lebanon.” This aid included attack planes and helicopters as well as drones.

The official Israeli view is that it’s all a big mistake. Defense Minister Avigdor Liberman says:

[T]he Lebanese army has lost its independence and is another unit in Hezbollah’s apparatus, and therefore, as far as we are concerned, the infrastructure of the Lebanese army and the Lebanese state is one with the infrastructure of Hezbollah.

Shavit, a former high-ranking intelligence official, spells it out in more detail:

Close cooperation continues between the Lebanese army and Hezbollah. Therefore, the working assumption must be that weapons and knowledge that reach the Lebanese army will find their way into the hands of Hezbollah. This means that all aid to the Lebanese army is liable to strengthen the military capabilities of Hezbollah.

Hezbollah, officially listed as a terror organization by the State Department, is an enemy of the West that is sworn to Israel’s destruction.

And yet:

Lebanese authorities are taking no action to prevent Hezbollah from increasing its military capabilities, and no efforts were made to prevent the group from deploying surface-to-surface missiles and rockets intended for striking at Israel and taking measures to improve the systems’ accuracy.

Tony Badran, an expert at the Foundation for Defense of Democracies, takes an outright acerbic view of the U.S. aid to the Lebanese military. He notes what occurred during Secretary of State Rex Tillerson’s visit to Lebanon last month:

Tillerson was made to sit alone in a room with no American flag in sight and wait, as photographers took pictures and video, before Hezbollah’s chief allies in Lebanon’s government, President Michel Aoun and his son-in-law the foreign minister, finally came out to greet him. Images of the U.S. Secretary of State fidgeting in front of an empty chair were then broadcast across the Middle East to symbolize American impotence at a fateful moment for the region.

Hezbollah, in Badran’s phrasing:

[A]n Iranian trained-and-financed army that has negated the legitimate political institutions of the Lebanese state through force while it brutally murders and ethnically cleanse[s] people in Syria and keeps 150,000 missiles targeted at Israel. … By supporting “Lebanon,” or “Lebanese state institutions,” the United States is in fact supporting a government dominated by a U.S.-designated terrorist group.

Washington’s ongoing delusory policy toward Lebanon comes at a time when some see an imminent possibility of war between Israel and its foes to the north. Despite repeated Israeli airstrikes on Iranian, Syrian, and Hezbollah targets in Syria, Iranian entrenchment in Syria appears to be continuing, with Iran reportedly building a new permanent military base near Damascus.

In case of a confrontation, Israel — facing not only Hezbollah’s 150,000 missiles in Lebanon but possibly also a Syrian front — will not have the luxury of pussyfooting in its response. Attempting to deter such a conflict, Israel has repeatedly warned (for instance, here and here) that war on Hezbollah will also mean war on Lebanon — since the two have merged into the same military and political entity.

If deterrence fails and war breaks out, Hezbollah’s deployment in the midst of population centerswill make civilian casualties inevitable — which, in turn, will make international pressure on Israel inevitable.

In such a scenario, Israel will need clear-sighted U.S. support based on the understanding that Israel will be fighting a no-choice war against a single, united enemy.

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