Paper is not dead - ????? ?? ?? – YouTube
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Does not take a genius to understand why Trump won. There comes a time when enough is enough. That said, I also find what Bannon is doing is neither constructive nor healthy.(See 1 below.)
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If and when Trump's Attorney General allows the FBI informant, who wants to tell his story, is allowed to do so and his gag order is removed then we should be back on track to learn why Hillary and others approved the uranium deal, why her husband received twice his normal speaking fee from a Russian organization and why the Clinton Foundation allegedly received $145 million from various sources tied to Russia.
By definition this is collusion.
We might also learn why Attorney General's Holder and Lynch and FBI Director's Mueller and Comey kept this informant's testimony from Congress in contravention of the law because it is Congress' Constitutional duty/obligation to have oversight responsibility and no one can be prevented from providing Congress with information if they willingly wish to do so.
Was pay to play and bribery, kickbacks etc. involved? If so, why should they not be investigated? Does the public have a right to know what is happening at the highest level's of government by supposedly trusted and elected officials/ If not why not?
There seems to be two basic log jam problems which need to be broken:
First, it is inexplicable why Republican Leadership has been complicit and Second, why Atty. General Session's Department continues to be run by Obama holdovers, like Deputy Atty Rosenstein and others.
The mass media refuse to report on why Obama's State Department was willing to allow/validate the sale of 20% of our nation's uranium resources to come under the control of Russian entities.
What went on during Obama's tenure is insane. Never forget Obama told Russia's president to tell Putin 'once he was re-elected he would be in a position to be more flexible.' (See 1a below. Berkowitz no relative that I know about.)
http://insider.foxnews.com/
Naturally Hillary denied everything and said it was all bunk. This from Ms. Whitewater, Ms. Cattle Futures Deal, Ms. Travelgate, Ms. Bhengazi, Ms. Reset Button, Ms. Personal Computer and the list seems endless.
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Iran-Hamas are intent on destroying Israel according to my journalist friend, Toameh.. (See 2 below.)
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Prager on the necessity of a national identity. (See 3 below.)
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Corker Is a flake and Flake is a flop.
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Dick
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1)
Donald R. “Dick” Ivey, PhD, is a minister, educator, technology executive, entrepreneur, Marine Corp Veteran, and straight shooting Republican Patriot from Celina, Texas, who is Fed up! Here’s what he has to say .
Recently I received a questionnaire and request for money from the Republican Party and strongly agree with every question, as I have ever since Obama was elected.
Unfortunately, the one question that was missing is: What have the Republicans done for the American people?
We gave you a majority in the House and Senate, and you never listened to us. Now you want our money, my money, more money. You should be more concerned about our votes, not our money.
You are the establishment which means all you want is to save your jobs and line your pockets.
Well guess what? It's not going to happen.
So far, TRUMP hasn't asked for a dime.
You might think we are fools because you feel Trump is on a self-destruct course, but look beyond Washington and listen to the masses. Nobody has achieved what he has, especially in the state of New York.
Here's why I wanted Trump. Yes, he's a bit of an ass; yes, he's an egomaniac; but I don't care.
The country is a mess because politicians suck.
The Republican Party is two-faced and gutless, and illegals are everywhere. I want it all fixed!
I don't care that Trump is crude.
I don't care that he insults people.
I don't care that he has changed positions.
I don't care that he's been married 3 times.
I don't care that he fights with Megan Kelly and Rosie O’Donnell.
I don't care that he doesn't know the name of some Muslim terrorist.
Our country has become weak, and bankrupt. Our enemies are making fun of us. We are being invaded by illegals. We are becoming a nation of victims where every Tom, Ricardo and Hassid is a special group with special rights to a point where we don't even recognize the country we were born and raised in, "AND I JUST WANT IT FIXED."
And Trump is the only guy who seems to understand what We The People want and need.
I'm sick of politicians, sick of the Democratic Party, the Republican Party, and sick of illegals. I just want this thing fixed!
Trump may not be a saint, but he doesn't have lobbyist money controlling him; he doesn't have political correctness restraining him; all you know is that he has been very successful; a good negotiator; he has built a lot of things; and, he's not a politician.
And, he says he'll fix it. And, I believe him because he is too much of an egotist to be proven wrong or looked at and called a liar.
I don't care if the guy has bad hair.
Oh, and by the way, I don’t care is Sheriff Joe didn’t obey a zealot judge. He upheld the law on illegal immigration. So I’m glad Trump pardoned him.
"No country can sustain, in idleness, more than a small percentage of its numbers. The great majority must labor at something productive!"
No Borders, No Language, No Culture = No Country.
1a) James Comey and Robert Mueller Imperil the Rule of Law
The former FBI directors tend to investigate Republicans far more zealously than Democrats.
By Peter Berkowitz
News broke last week about possible Russian wrongdoing in the U.S., and it didn’t involve the Trump campaign. The Hill reported that in 2009 the FBI “gathered substantial evidence that Russian nuclear industry officials were engaged in bribery, kickbacks, extortion and money laundering designed to grow Vladimir Putin’s atomic energy business inside the United States.”
The FBI kept that information from Congress and the public, the Hill reported, even as Hillary Clinton’s State Department in 2010 approved a deal that transferred control of more than 20% of America’s uranium supply to a Russian company. The Hill also reported the FBI had documents showing that during this period Russia engineered the transmission of millions of dollars to the Clinton Foundation.
The FBI director at the time: Robert Mueller, now special counsel in charge of investigating “Russian interference with the 2016 presidential election and related matters.” The revelations can only heighten anxieties about Mr. Mueller, the FBI and the rule of law.
The special counsel’s open-ended mandate covers not only “any links and/or coordination between the Russian government and individuals associated with the campaign of President Donald Trump” but also “any matters that arose or may arise directly from the investigation.”
Because Mr. Mueller has interpreted his mandate expansively, his effort may become the most politically disruptive federal investigation of our young century—more than the FBI’s investigation of Mrs. Clinton’s private email server and mishandling of classified information, more than Special Counsel Patrick Fitzgerald’s investigation into the 2003 disclosure of CIA employee Valerie Plame’s identity.
All three investigations have one important characteristic in common: James Comey, Mr. Mueller’s successor as FBI director, played a dubious role in each.
In December 2003, after Attorney General John Ashcroft recused himself from the Plame matter, then-Deputy Attorney General Comey named Mr. Fitzgerald—a close friend who was godfather to one of Mr. Comey’s children—as special counsel to head the Justice Department’s “investigation into the alleged unauthorized disclosure” of Ms. Plame’s employment.
Unknown to the public then, and still not widely known, that potential crime had already been solved. By early fall 2003, the CIA had determined that revealing Ms. Plame’s identity caused no injury to national security, while the FBI knew it was not a White House official—as many Democrats and liberal pundits ardently believed—but rather Deputy Secretary of State Richard Armitage who was columnist Robert Novak’s source for the original Plame story.
Mr. Fitzgerald declined to prosecute Mr. Armitage, but he played hardball with the Bush White House. Over several years, Mr. Fitzgerald inflicted severe damage by feeding the false accusation that the president had lied the nation into the Iraq war. The only criminal charges he prosecuted were generated by his investigation. He won a 2007 conviction of I. Lewis “Scooter” Libby, former chief of staff to Vice President Dick Cheney, for obstruction of justice, false statements and perjury. The conviction was based on small inconsistencies Mr. Fitzgerald discovered in (or created from) more than 20 hours of Mr. Libby’s FBI interrogation and grand-jury testimony. Star prosecution witness Judith Miller wrote in her 2015 memoir that Mr. Fitzgerald had withheld crucial information and manipulated her memory, inducing her to testify falsely against Mr. Libby.
In contrast, then-FBI Director Comey played softball with the 2015-16 Hillary Clinton investigation. Despite the gravity of the matter—military service members can be court-martialed and discharged for sending classified information on nonsecure systems—Mr. Comey mostly avoided issuing subpoenas and cooperated with the Obama Justice Department in obscuring the investigation’s criminal character. He permitted Mrs. Clinton and her team to destroy evidence and granted generous immunity deals to her advisers. He drafted a statement exonerating Mrs. Clinton months before the FBI interviewed her. And his FBI neither recorded the interview nor compelled her to answer questions under oath.
In addition, in a July 2016 press conference, Mr. Comey usurped the authority of Justice Department prosecutors by publicly exonerating Mrs. Clinton. In the process, he confused the pertinent legal issue by asserting she did not intend to violate the law. But intent wasn’t a necessary condition for a crime. Federal law criminalizes “gross negligence” in mishandling classified information. By Mr. Comey’s own account, Mrs. Clinton had been “extremely careless.”
With Mr. Trump, by contrast, Mr. Comey is playing hardball even after leaving government. In May, shortly after President Trump fired him, Mr. Comey—possibly in conflict with FBI policy—leaked notes of an Oval Office meeting with the president. His purpose, Mr. Comey publicly acknowledged, was to “prompt the appointment of a special counsel.”
Mr. Mueller is playing hardball too. Unlike the Clinton investigation into narrowly defined allegations, his mandate authorizes pursuit of unspecified crimes. That invites casting a wide net, which Mr. Mueller has done, exploring conduct that long predated the 2016 presidential campaign. He has assembled a huge team that includes, in addition to FBI agents, 16 seasoned prosecutors, at least seven of whom have contributed money to Democratic candidates. He might have extended his investigation to Mr. Trump’s business interests. And he is working with agents from the Internal Revenue Service’s criminal investigation unit, raising the possibility that he has obtained Mr. Trump’s tax returns.
Mr. Mueller has adopted scorched-earth tactics in pursuit of Paul Manafort, who ran Trump’s presidential campaign from June to August 2016. The special counsel’s team has reached back more than a decade into Mr. Manafort’s financial affairs and conducted a predawn, guns-drawn raid on his home on a day he was scheduled to testify before Congress as a cooperating witness.
One crucial difference distinguishes the probe of Mrs. Clinton from the two Comey-instigated special-counsel investigations of Republican administrations. Mr. Fitzgerald’s multiyear investigation of the Bush administration and Mr. Mueller’s ever-widening scrutiny of the Trump campaign exhibit a tenacious and nearly unconstrained search for persons and crimes to prosecute. In contrast, Mr. Comey’s investigation of Mrs. Clinton reflects a determination not to prosecute systematic and obvious unlawful conduct.
Both excesses threaten the rule of law—but the dogged search for persons and crimes to prosecute poses the graver threat to constitutional government.
Mr. Berkowitz is a senior fellow at the Hoover Institution, Stanford University.
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2) The Iran-Hamas Plan to Destroy Israel
- Iran's goal in this move? For Hamas to maintain and enhance its preparation for war against Israel.
- Iran's message to Hamas: If you want us to continue providing you with financial and military aid, you must continue to hold on to your weapons and reject demands to disarm.
- Iran wants Hamas to retain its security control over the Gaza Strip so that the Iranians can hold onto another power base in the Middle East, as it does with Hezbollah in Lebanon.
In a historic reawakening, Iran is once again meddling in the internal affairs of the Palestinians. This this does not bode well for the future of "reconciliation" between Hamas and Palestinian Authority's Fatah faction run by President Mahmoud Abbas.The re-emergence of Iran, as it pursues its efforts to increase its political and military presence in the region, does not bode well for the future of stability in the Middle East.
The Iranians are urging Hamas to hold on to its weapons in spite of the recent "reconciliation" agreement signed between Hamas and Fatah under the auspices of Egypt. Iran's goal in this move? For Hamas to maintain and enhance its preparation for war against Israel.
A high-level Hamas delegation headed by Saleh Arouri, deputy chairman of Hamas's "political bureau," traveled to Tehran last week to brief Iranian leaders on the "reconciliation" deal with Fatah. During the visit, Iranian leaders praised Hamas for resisting demands (by Fatah) to disarm and relinquish security control over the Gaza Strip.
"We congratulate you on your refusal to abandon your weapons, an issue that you consider as a red line," Ali Velayati, a senior Iranian politician and advisor to Leader of the Islamic Revolution Ayatollah Khamenei, told the visiting Hamas officials. "The Palestinian cause is the most important cause of the Islamic world, and after all this time you remain committed to the principle of resistance against the Zionists despite all the pressure you are facing."
Arouri and his colleagues rushed to Tehran to seek the support of the Iranian regime in the wake of demands by Abbas that Hamas allow the Palestinian Authority to assume security control over the Gaza Strip. The "reconciliation" agreement stipulates nothing about the need for Hamas to disarm, and Hamas officials have stressed during the past two weeks that they have no intention of laying down their weapons or dismantling their security apparatus in the Gaza Strip.
Hamas views the demand to disarm as part of an Israeli-American "conspiracy" designed to eliminate the Palestinian "resistance" and thwart the "reconciliation" accord with Abbas's Fatah. Hamas's refusal to disarm is already threatening to spoil the "reconciliation.
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Arouri was quoted during his visit to Tehran as saying that Hamas "will not backtrack on the option of defending the Palestinian people." He specified that the "reconciliation" agreement with Fatah would not affect the weapons of the Palestinian "resistance," including Hamas. Hamas, he added, will "confront the Israeli-American conspiracy through national unity and reconciliation and by continuing the resistance. The Palestinian resistance forces will always stick to their weapons and will not lay them down."
Hamas also sees the visit of its top officials to Tehran as a rejection of Israel's demand that it cut off its ties with Iran. Hamas officials say they continue to see their relations with Iran as "strategic and significant," especially in wake of Tehran's financial and military aid to their movement in the Gaza Strip.
By aligning itself with Iran, Hamas is also seeking to resist any demand that it abandon its ideology and charter, which call for the destruction of Israel and oppose any peace process between Israelis and Palestinians.
Iranian officials apparently do not like Mahmoud Abbas and the Palestinian Authority and are not keen on seeing them return to the Gaza Strip. Iran considers Abbas a "traitor" because his Palestinian Authority conducts security coordination with Israel in the West Bank and claims that it is committed to a "peace process" with Israel. This position goes against Iran's wish to destroy the "Zionist entity."
Abbas, for his part, has always considered Iran a threat to his regime as well as to stability in the region. In the past, he has criticized Iran for "meddling" in the internal affairs of the Palestinians by supporting Hamas and Palestinian Islamic Jihad in the Gaza Strip.
Earlier this year, the Palestinian Authority strongly condemned Iran after a senior Iranian official accused Abbas of waging war in the Gaza Strip on behalf of Israel. The official's statement came in response to a series of punitive measures imposed by Abbas on the Gaza Strip.
Abbas's spokesman, Nabil Abu Rudaineh, accused Iran of meddling in the internal affairs of the Palestinians and some Arab countries. He said that Iran's actions "encouraged divisions" among the Palestinians. "Iran must stop feeding civil wars in the Arab world," he said. "Iran must stop using rhetoric that only serves Israel and the enemies of the Arabs."
Abbas and the Palestinian Authority are now convinced that Iran is working towards foiling the "reconciliation" agreement with Hamas. They believe that Iran invited the Hamas leaders to Tehran to pressure them not to lay down its weapons.
Abbas and the Egyptians were probably naïve to think that Hamas would disarm and allow Abbas loyalists to deploy in the Gaza Strip after the signing of the "reconciliation" agreement. It is possible that some of the Hamas leaders had lied to Abbas and the Egyptians by hinting that Hamas would give up security control of the Gaza Strip.
The Egyptians, who played a major role in brokering the Hamas-Fatah deal, are also believed to be worried about Iran's renewed meddling in the internal affairs of the Palestinians. Both the Palestinian Authority and Egypt see the visit of the Hamas delegation to Iran as a serious setback to the "reconciliation" agreement and as a sign that Hamas is not sincere about implementing the accord.
Some Palestinian Authority and Hamas officials have recently claimed that Israel was not happy with their "reconciliation" agreement and was doing its utmost to foil it. The truth, however, is that it is Iran and Hamas that are working to thwart the agreement by insisting on maintaining the status quo in the Gaza Strip. Iran's message to Hamas: If you want us to continue providing you with financial and military aid, you must continue to hold on to your weapons and reject demands to disarm.
What is in it for Iran? Iran wants Hamas to retain its security control over the Gaza Strip so that the Iranians can hold onto another power base in the Middle East.
Iran wants Hamas to continue playing the role of a proxy, precisely as Hezbollah functions in Lebanon.
The last thing Iran wants is for the Palestinian Authority security forces to return to the Gaza Strip: that would spoil Tehran's plans to advance its goal of destroying Israel.
Iran's continued support for Hamas stems not out of love for either Hamas or the Palestinians, but from its own interest in consolidating its presence in the Middle East.
Many Palestinians see the "successful" visit of the Hamas officials to Tehran as a major setback for efforts to end the 10-year-long Hamas-Fatah dispute. Similarly, the Egyptians are now wary of the sudden rapprochement between Iran and Hamas and are beginning to ask themselves whether they have been duped by Hamas. An Israeli delegation that visited Cairo on the eve of the signing of the Hamas-Fatah deal is said to have warned the Egyptians that the "reconciliation" would not work unless Hamas disarms and severs its ties with Iran. However, the Egyptians reportedly failed to listen to the Israeli warning.
As for Israel, the US and other Western parties, the lesson to be drawn from the renewal of ties between Hamas and Iran is that Hamas has not changed one iota.
Contrary to delusional hopes, discussed on the heels of the "reconciliation" agreement in Cairo and based on lies and thin air, Hamas is not headed toward moderation and pragmatism. By openly supporting Hamas, Iran is once again demonstrating that it aims to fan the fire in the Middle East and continue to sabotage any prospects for peace.
Khaled Abu Toameh, an award-winning journalist, is based in Jerusalem.+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
3)
Is a National Identity Necessary? Left-Right Differences: Part IX
By Dennis Prager
In 2011, after 899 issues and 73 years of publication, Superman, the most famous American comic book character, announced that he was renouncing his American citizenship.
"I intend to speak before the United Nations tomorrow and inform them that I am renouncing my U.S. citizenship," Superman announces. He then adds, in reference to his famous motto: "Truth, justice and the American way — it's not enough anymore."
After a national uproar, the comic publisher announced that this theme would not be revisited in any future edition of the comic. But an important point was made. To the liberal publishers of Superman, the hero's American identity just didn't feel right. Maybe that was what people wanted from 1938 to the late 20th century. But this national identity stuff has got to go. We should all be world citizens.
This example illustrates a primary difference between left and right: their respective views of nationalism and national identity.
The rejection of national identities began with the founder of leftism, Karl Marx. He ends his major work, "Das Kapital," with the famous left-wing motto, "Proletariat of the world, unite; you have nothing to lose but your chains." Marx regarded national identities as backward and useless. In his view, the only identities that mattered were class identities — the working class and the ruling class. If a worker thought of himself first as a German or Englishman, rather than as a worker, Communism would never be achieved.
The rejection of nationalism in Europe became mainstream after World War I. Many Europeans, especially among the intellectuals, concluded that the unprecedented loss of life caused by the Great War was a result, first and foremost, of nationalism. They concluded that Europeans slaughtered each other for nothing more than a flag and a national identity. Therefore, the argument went, by abolishing nationalism, war could be abolished. That is the belief that led to the creation of the European Union: The more Europeans identified with Europe rather than with a particular country the less likely were the chances of war between European countries.
In the United States, however, a national American identity has always been a major part of what it means to be an American. The three pillars of Americanism, constituting what I have called the "American Trinity" — are found on every American coin and banknote: "Liberty," "In God We Trust" and "e pluribus unum." The latter is Latin for "out of many, one." Because America has always been a nation of immigrants, it has no ethnic identity. Therefore, unlike almost all other nations, America could not depend on an ethnic identity to keep its people together. In fact, if all Americans retained their ethnic identities, America would simply splinter. So a non-ethnic American national identity had to be forged and preserved.
To this day, foreigners in the United States are struck by how patriotic Americans are in comparison to whatever country they come from. They marvel, for example, at the fact that before almost every sporting event — from professional down to high school — the American National Anthem is played and/or sung.
Conservatives wish to conserve all these manifestations of American patriotism and nationalism because they believe a sense of national unity is essential to the political and social health of the country. On the other hand, the American left, like the left in Europe, is opposed to nationalism, and it generally finds patriotic expressions corny at best and dangerous at worst.
This is easily seen. Just visit conservative and liberal areas on July Fourth, America's Independence Day. You will see American flags displayed throughout conservative areas and virtually none displayed in liberal areas such as Manhattan, or Santa Monica or Berkeley, Calif.
Left-wing opposition to American nationalism is exemplified by the left's embrace of "multiculturalism" — the cultivation of all ethnic and racial identities except American. It has even reached the point wherein some American colleges no longer display the American flag.
In lieu of an American national identity, the left prefers an international identity. Thus, ideally, United Nations authority would supersede American authority, and the World Court would supersede American courts. To conservatives, such ideas are anathema because, in addition to subverting American sovereignty, the United Nations has not done nearly the amount of good in the world that the United States has.
That's why the liberals at DC comics had Superman renounce his American citizenship (at the United Nations, no less). In their view, Superman is now even more super. In conservatives' view, the renunciation is kryptonite.
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