Dagny and Stella turn six.
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A government which robs Peter to pay Paul can always depend on the support of Paul.George Bernard Shaw
Giving money and power to government is like giving whiskey and car keys to teenage boys.P.J. O'Rourke, Civil Libertarian
The only difference between a tax man and a taxidermist is that the taxidermist leaves the skin.Mark Twain
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All registered Democrats in California should be required to house every illegal immigrant. The State of California should subsidize their cost by raising the taxes on all registered Democrats. That is what I call equal justice. (See 1 below.)
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World responses to Mossad's revelations. (See 2 below.)
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What if Mueller's 50 shoes were on Obama's feet? (See 3 below.)
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Dick
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1)
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++Illegal immigration up 233 percent in April on southwest border
Central American migrants traveling with a caravan gather at the border wall, some sitting on top of it, look toward the U.S. from Mexico during a gathering of migrants living on both sides of the border, on the beach where ... more Illegal immigration along U.S.-Mexico border surged 230 percent in April compared to last year, according to new numbers released Thursday that experts said expose major loopholes in American immigration law.
Chief among the loopholes is the de facto “catch-and-release” policy that sees most illegal immigrants caught at the border quickly put back out on the streets, with the hope that they’ll return to be deported later.
Perhaps 75 percent of all migrants caught by Border Patrol agents are given catch and release, said Brandon Judd, president of the National Border Patrol Council, which represents line agents. Knowing they’ll be released rather than quickly deported has served as an enticement for more illegal immigrants to make the journey, he said.
“The reason is obvious: If you can cross the border illegally without any consequence, why not? As long as the catch-and-release policy-program exists, large numbers of people are going to cross the border illegally,” said Brandon Judd, president of the National Border Patrol Council.
April’s numbers continue a months-long trend of worsening illegal immigration.
The Border Patrol says it nabbed 38,234 illegal immigrants during the month, while Customs and Border Protection Officers encountered 12,690 more people who tried to come through the official ports of entry without permission.
That makes for the worst month since President Trump took office.
It’s also a huge turnaround from last year at this time, when the new president’s get-tough rhetoric sparked a massive drop. In April 2017, Border Patrol agents nabbed just 11,1129 people, and CBP officers encountered 4,646 others.
Mr. Trump has repeatedly bragged about those early figures, and Democrats have also seized on them, saying the border situation was essentially solved.
The latest numbers suggest that’s far from the case, however, with totals now back to where they were during the Obama era.
“In 2017 and due to the rhetoric we had fewer apprehensions than any year in the past 45 years. It was simply because people believed that if they crossed the border illegally they would be held until their deportation hearing,” Mr. Judd said.
But, he added, that didn’t end up happening. “Smugglers quickly realized everything was status quo, and they’re once again recruiting people to enter our country illegally,” he said.
Illegal immigrant children traveling alone, and families traveling together, are a particular target for the smugglers, who assure the migrants they can win a foothold in the U.S. Officials say it’s so bad that some illegal immigrants have taken to kidnapping or “borrowing” children en route to the U.S. so they can pose as a family and get more lenient treatment.
More than a third of those caught by Border Patrol agents in April were Unaccompanied Alien Children (UAC) or families, while for CBP officers the rate has soared to more than 50 percent.
Children and families are two groups that particularly benefit from catch-and-release, thanks to court rulings that have set strict limits on how long children can be held in detention. Releasing them virtually guarantees they don’t show up for their deportations, security experts say.
Still other rank-and-file illegal immigrants are also processed and released if there’s not enough detention space in the system to hold them.
Mr. Judd said that leads to the 75 percent catch-and-release figure. Given the more than 38,000 migrants agents apprehended last month, that would mean more than 28,500 of them are likely to be quickly released.
Administration officials have acknowledged the problems. They say they’ve ended “administrative catch and release,” which means they no longer have an official policy calling for some classes of illegal immigrants to be released automatically.
But they said a lack of detention bed space and demands set by federal courts still force catch-and-release for many illegal immigrants.
For example, in the case of a mother and child caught at the border, a court order generally limits Homeland Security to 20 days’ detention. That’s usually too short a time to complete their deportation case, so they are released with the hope they return for their deportation hearings later. That hope is often frustrated.
CBP didn’t respond to a request for comment on the new numbers, which come even as the border agency is dealing with the illegal immigrant caravan.
Mr. Trump, asked about the caravan and border security in a press conference earlier this week, said Congress needs to step up and fix the matter.
“We need a change in the law. Catch and release is ridiculous. If they touch our property, if they touch our country, essentially, you catch them and you release them into our country. That’s not acceptable to anybody,” he said.
Homeland Security Secretary Kirstjen Nielsen echoed that call in testimony to Congress last week, where she pleaded for Congress to write laws giving her department the ability to hold people.
“If you have an alarm in your home and you catch a burglar and you call the police and the police come, and in fact it is an illegal entry into your home. But the police then tell you that they have absolutely no ability to detain or remove those criminals and the criminals stay in your house, you would not tell me that is home security. That is what we face at the border,” she said.
“We stop people, we interdict them, but we do not have the authority given the loopholes in many cases to detain and remove them. We are forced to release them back into the communities after they have committed crimes,” she said.
But Democrats have resisted those calls for change, objecting to her description of the law as “loopholes.”
“These laws aren’t loopholes. I know because I helped write them,” Sen. Dianne Feinstein, California Democrat, said earlier this week. “They merely guarantee that children will be treated humanely — not detained indefinitely — and have the right to seek asylum or other immigration relief available under existing law. The Trump administration shouldn’t be using families and children fleeing violence as political bargaining chips to roll back critical protections for children.”
The number of illegal immigrants caught attempting to jump the border is considered a rough yardstick for the overall flow of illegal immigration across the border.
Mr. Judd said it’s impossible to know exactly how many people evade detection, but agents figure they are between 50 percent and 60 percent effective.
“If that is the case, and being an agent myself, I can say it is, then the numbers become staggering,” he said.
2)
Former inspectors trash media spin that there was no new information in the Mossad cache
Supporters of the Iran agreement have played down the Israeli revelations saying there wasn’t anything in the documents recovered by the Mossad that wasn’t previously known about Iran’s nuclear weapon’s program (which is interesting in itself since that implies Obama administration officials misled the public about the agreement).
However, two prominent former inspectors say that the revelations do indeed contain new information.
Olli Heinonen, the former deputy director general of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA), said “There were some pictures that were quite familiar to me. But at the same time, there was also new information.” Specifically, Heinonen mentioned evidence regarding Iranian hardware previous unknown to authorities.
This new information has serious consequences, he implied. “They must have manufactured pieces of equipment in Iran,” Heinonen said. “Where are those pieces? Who is keeping them?”
Another top expert, David Albright, a former UN weapons inspector who worked extensively on issues regarding Iran’s nuclear program, said the revelations provided many new details.
“Here we have a jigsaw puzzle with 30 to 40 percent of the pieces,” said Albright referring to what was already known about Iran’s nuclear weapon’s program. “[Now, it has turned into] one that has 99 percent of the pieces. The picture is clear,” he added.
Europeans exhibit yet another case of foot-in-mouth disease
Numerous officials from the European Union have insisted that the reason the deal was (and still is) necessary was because everyone knew that the Iranians were lying about having a nuclear weapon’s program. The crux of the deal was that it wasn’t based on trust but on rigorous enforcement of the terms.
How would the world know that Iran had complied with the deal? Through inspections, of course. As the High Representative of the European Union for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy Federica Mogherinisaid, the IAEA has published 10 reports certifying that Iran has fully complied with its commitments.
Yet, what Mogherini knows but isn’t saying is that those very inspections were a ruse.
Two parts of the agreement that were kept secret (but later exposed by the AP) allowed Iran to use its own inspectors in military sites suspected of developing nuclear weapons.
These two parts of the agreement were negotiated separately between the IAEA and Iran. In fact, they were so secret that viewing them was off limits to Congress, the secretary of state and even the U.S. president. (You can’t make this stuff up.)
At the time, Heinonen said he could not recall any similar concession with any other country.
(Notably, in January of 2015, Heinonen said that Iran was two to three weeks away from building a nuclear weapon, making it a “nuclear threshold state.”)
Iran was just found culpable in 9/11 by a U.S. Court
A lawsuit charging that Iran, the Islamic Revolutionary Guards Corps and the Central Bank of the Islamic Republic of Iran aided the 9/11 hijackers was just successfully prosecuted. Iran and its relevant institutions were ordered to pay $12.5 million per spouse, $8.5 million per parent, $8.5 million per child and $4.25 million per sibling killed in the 2001 terror attacks.
Although the suit was filed in 2004, its prosecution was only recently made possible by Congress through the passage of the 2016 Justice Against Sponsors of Terrorism Act, which permitted families of terror victims to sue state actors. Former President Barack Obama vetoed the bill but Congress overrode the veto.
Israel’s revelations have breathed new life into anti-regime protests in Iran
Although anti-regime protests in Iran which began at the end of last year have not stopped (even if the mainstream media has stopped covering them), Israel’s revelations about Iran’s secret nuclear weapons program has breathed new life into those who are pushing for regime change.
In response, and in anticipation of anti-regime protests if Trump re-imposes sanctions on Iran on May 12 (the deadline for certifying the nuclear deal), regime authorities shut down the encrypted messaging app Telegram to “protect” national security.
Due to a brutal crackdown by authorities resulting in the arrests of protesters, a good portion of the dissent has moved online. After Israeli PM Netanyahu’s speech, Twitter saw a resurgence of the hashtag “We’re Done!” in Iran.
A defiant Iran vows to increase its missile program threefold
One of the ways the Europeans hoped to save the nuclear deal with Iran is to convince Trump that they are on his side in terms of cracking down Iran’s ballistic missile program. Ballistic missiles are used to deliver nuclear warheads.
In response, IRGC Aerospace and Missile Force Commander Brig.-Gen. Amir Ali Hajizadeh said, “Our production [of missiles] has increased threefold.”
“With regard to the recent positions of some of the Western officials in the matter of our military and missile capability – our defensive capabilities cannot be stopped or curbed. No country can control the might of Iran’s defense … There will be no negotiations on or halting of our defensive capability,” Deputy IRGC commander Gen. Hossein Salami added.
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3)
What if Mueller Questioned Barack Obama? By Victor Davis Hanson
Imagine if a right-wing version of Robert Mueller, backed by a properly pro-Trump legal team, had sent former President Barack Obama the same sort of questions thatMueller allegedly delivered this week to President Trump. The special counsel might dress them up in legalese, innuendo, and with perjury-trap IEDs, thereby casting suspicion with the mere nature of the questions.
If so, the interrogatories might run like the following—
President Obama:
What did you mean when you were heard, by accident, on a hot mic, providing the following assurances to outgoing Russian Prime Minister Medvedev: “On all these issues, but particularly missile defense, this, this can be solved, but it’s important for him to give me space . . . This is my last election. After my election, I have more flexibility”?
Did you and the Russian government have any private agreements to readjust Russian-American relations during your own 2012 reelection campaign? Were there other such discussions similar to your comments to Prime Minister Medvedev?
If so, do you believe such Russian collusion had any influence on the outcome of the 2012 election?
Did your subsequent reported suspension of, or reduction in, some planned missile defense programs, especially in Eastern Europe, have anything to do with the assurances that you gave to the Russian Prime Minister?
Did the subsequent Russian quietude during your 2012 reelection campaign have anything to do with your assurances of promised changes in U.S. foreign policy?
Did you adjudicate U.S. responses to Russian behavior on the basis of your own campaign re-election concerns?
More specifically, what exactly did you mean when you asked the Russian Prime Minister for “space”? And further what did you intend by suggesting that after your 2012 election you would have more “flexibility” with the Russian government?
Would you please define “flexibility” in this context?
What do you think Prime Minister Medvedev meant when he replied to your request for space, and your promise for flexibility after the election, with: “Yeah, I understand. I understand your message about space. Space for you . . . I understand . . . I will transmit this information to Vladimir.”
Did you hear subsequently from the Russians that Prime Medvedev had delivered the message that you had intended for Vladimir Putin?
Subsequently, did Vladimir Putin communicate with you about any such understanding that the U.S. government would modulate its foreign policy during your reelection campaign in exchange for “space”?
Did any such arrangement in 2012 have anything to do with the later absence of a strong U.S. response to subsequent cyber-attacks by Russian operatives, or to the later 2014 Russian invasions of both Eastern Ukraine and the Crimea?
During the email controversies over the illegal use of a private email account and server by your secretary of state, Hillary Clinton, you stated publicly that you first became aware of her improper use of a private server through press accounts. Yet records show that you yourself communicated with Secretary Clinton over her unauthorized email account. How do you reconcile your public statements with your private actions?
Did you ever at any time improperly transmit classified information over Secretary of State Clinton’s email server under a pseudonymous email account?
Do you feel that you violated federal law by communicating with your secretary of state over an unsecured email server?
Did you discuss in any fashion with your own Department of Justice the ongoing FBI investigation of Secretary of Clinton’s email server and account? Do you know anything about a September 2016, election-cycle communication in which FBI investigator Lisa Page texted to fellow FBI investigator Peter Strzok that “potus wants to know everything we’re doing?” What did you wish to know from the FBI about the email investigation?
When in August 2016 you declared on Fox News that then candidate Hillary Clinton had not endangered national security by the use of an unsecure email server (“I can tell that you this is not a situation in which America’s national security was endangered . . . she has not jeopardized America’s national security”), on what basis did you offer such a blanket exoneration? Had the FBI confirmed to you such a conclusion?
Do you have any knowledge of the contents of any of the 30,000 emails that were deleted by Secretary Clinton?
Were you aware at any time—before, during, or after—of a clandestine meeting between Attorney General Loretta Lynch and former president Bill Clinton on an airport tarmac in Phoenix, Arizona before their meeting became public?
If so, what immediate actions did you take to ensure the integrity of the ongoing investigation of Secretary Clinton’s email account?
Were you briefed at any time on the contents of the Fusion GPS so-called Steele dossier? If so, when and by whom, and what actions did you take in response to such knowledge?
Were you aware that members of your Justice Department and the FBI had relied on the purchased Steele dossier to obtain FISA warrants to surveille member(s) of the Trump campaign staff during the 2016 election?
Were you aware at any time that FISA court judges were not informed of the fact that the author of the dossier has been hired by the Clinton campaign, or had been fired from a cooperative relationship with the FBI, or that the dossier itself was unverified by the FBI or that news accounts about it that were presented to the court as verification of its contents, were in fact, based on selective leaks of its contents to media sources?
If you were aware of any of the above, what action did you take?
Have you ever discussed the Fusion GPS/Steele dossier with Loretta Lynch, James Comey, Bruce Ohr, Glenn Simpson, Rod Rosenstein, or Hillary Clinton? If so when and under what circumstances?
Were you aware that transcripts of such subsequent FISA surveillance were made available to members of you own staff and administration, including, for example, Samantha Power, Ben Rhodes, and Susan Rice?
At any time during the 2016 campaign were you briefed on the contents of the Steele dossier by either your CIA director John Brennan, or Director of National Intelligence James Clapper?
Did you speak at any time with former Senator Harry Reid about the contents of the Steele dossier?
Were you aware at any time that members of your administration had viewed classified transcripts of such surveillance, requested that redacted names of the surveilled were to be unmasked, and then leaked those names to the press?
Did you ever approve or know of direct surveillance of the Trump campaign or transition?
If so, what actions did you take either to reprimand such actions or to prevent their recurrence?
At what time where you briefed by either FBI Director Robert Mueller, or Deputy Attorney General Rod Rosenstein on the progress of the so-called Uranium One investigation?
Did Attorney General Loretta Lynch discuss with you the nature of that investigation?
Were you at any time worried about the compromised status of U.S. uranium sources, and if so what did you do about such concerns?
Did you at any time talk with members of the Russian government or those with ties with the Russian government about the Uranium One sale?
Were you aware at any time of massive gifting from Russian-related operatives to the Clinton Foundation?
Were you aware that Bill Canton in June 2010 had received a $500,000 honorarium for a speech in Moscow from business interests with ties to the Russian government?
Did you at any time discuss with Secretary Clinton either President Clinton’s speech or her own violations of supposed promises and agreements with your office—specifically that both the Clinton Foundation and Bill Clinton would not have commercial relations or receive gifts/honoraria from any interests seeking commercial agreements or exemptions from the State Department?
Were you aware that Secretary Clinton’s personal aide, Huma Abedin, was as a private consultant conducting business with foreign entities, while still employed by the Clinton State Department?
How and when did you first become aware of the hacking of the email accounts at the Democratic National Committee?
Did your administration have any discussions with John Podesta, Donna Brazile or any members of the DNC concerning such data breaches?
Were you aware that DNC Chairman Debbie Wasserman-Schultz, did not offer DNC computers to FBI investigators for examination after they were compromised?
Were you told by any member of your administration why this was so?
Were you aware at any time, prior to James Clapper’s false testimony in a congressional hearing, that the National Security Agency and other intelligence agencies had illegally surveilled American citizens?
Were you aware at any time, prior to John Brennan’s false testimony in a congressional hearing, that U.S. drone attacks in Afghanistan and Pakistan had inadvertently killed noncombatant civilians?
Did you take any action to reprimand John Brennan for lying to Congress on two occasions, concerning his false assertions that drones had not killed civilians, and that the CIA had not monitored U.S. Senate staffers’ computer communications?
Did you take any action to reprimand James Clapper for providing false testimony to the Congress concerning NSA surveillance?
Were you aware of the communications between your Justice Department and any local, state, or federal authorities concerning the jailing of Internet video maker,Nakoula Basseley Nakoula on suddenly discovered probation violations?
When and by whom were you first briefed that the Benghazi attacks were pre-planned terrorist attacks and not, as members of your administration had alleged, spontaneous riots resulting from an Internet video?
When and by whom were you briefed about Lois Lerner’s conduct at the IRS?
Did you discuss with anyone Lois Lerner’s decision to invoke her Fifth Amendment right against self-incrimination?
On what basis did you assert that neither Lois Lerner nor her associates were guilty of “even a smidgen of corruption”?
Was your public exoneration based on any evidence presented to you by internal IRS or FBI investigators? If so, when and by whom?
Why in the last days of your presidential tenure, did you suddenly vastly expand the number of agencies and intelligence analysts privy to classified NSA intelligence gathering?
On what grounds did you take such action, and did your decision have anything to do with your knowledge of the classified surveillance of Donald Trump, or his campaign, or information in the Steele dossier?
In the past, were you aware of the circumstances under which the sealed divorce records of both your 2004 Illinois primary and general election Senate opponents, Blair Hull and Jack Ryan respectively, were illegally leaked to the press? At any time, did you view such sealed records and, if so, when and by whom were you apprised that such records were leaked to the press?
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The point is not to embarrass President Obama, but to demonstrate that any president, past or present, could be forced to answer questions to a special prosecutor, both concerning his original mandate but also far beyond it, including matters of his own personal and business past.
His answers could then be used to collate both with public or even surveilled presidential statements to find evidence of inconsistency, false testimony, obstruction of justice, or collusion with a foreign government.
Give a special counsel the man—including Barack Obama—and his team of partisan investigators could find the necessary crime to charge him.
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