Archive for the ‘Pelosi’ Category

Like the Democrats she leads, Speaker Pelosi keeps getting more radical by the minute. She recently told the NYTimes that she’s “worried President Trump might not step down if defeated in 2020”, saying “We have to inoculate against that, we have to be prepared for that”, urging Democrats to “win the debate that matters most to many voters inside the party: electability. ‘Own the center-left, own the mainstream.'”

First, Democrats of 2019 aren’t center-left. Which of you reading this thinks that Steven Cohen, David Cicilline or Jerry Nadler represents the mainstream of American politics? Next, there’s this:

Pelosi also said that in order to beat Trump, liberals have to play at his level, and the best way to do that is to win big, so he can’t challenge the results. “If we win by four seats, by a thousand votes each, he’s not going to respect the election,” she said. “He would poison the public mind. He would challenge each of the races. He would say you can’t seat these people.”

Thanks to the Democrats’ investigation-only agenda, Democrats won’t keep their majority in the House. According to this, Democrats can only afford to lose 17 seats if they want to keep their majority. The likelihood of that happening isn’t high. Here in Minnesota, the likelihood of flipping the Second and Third districts back to the Republicans looks quite possible. Don’t be surprised if Republicans regain House seats in California, Virginia and Pennsylvania, too. The Democrats’ majority is anything except rock-solid.

Last Wednesday, Pelosi pushed out a statement taking aim at the Trump administration in the aftermath of Special Counsel Robert Mueller’s report, blasting the president as “immoral, unethical, corrupt and unpatriotic.”

That’s rich coming from the political party that lied to the American people that President Trump committed treason and had obstructed justice, then had to scamper after the special counsel’s grand jury determined the opposite. Now Michael Horowitz, the DOJ Inspector General, is investigating whether Democrats abused “the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act” when they investigated “President Trump and associates of his 2016 campaign.”

Finally, there’s this:

It isn’t easy to get Bill Barr to smile, much less laugh. Ted Cruz accomplished those things during his questioning of Attorney Gen. Barr:

In laying things out so beautifully, Sen. Cruz demolished Speaker Pelosi’s arguments. The good news for Speaker Pelosi is that she doesn’t have to worry about getting exposed because the MSM, aka the media wing of the Democratic Party, won’t cover Sen. Cruz’s questioning of Bill Barr.

For the past 6 months, Democrats have consistently tried talking down the economy, suggesting that we were heading for a slowdown, if not a full recession. The economy just won’t cooperate with the Democrats. This morning, the Bureau of Labor Statistics, aka the BLS, announced that the US economy created 263,000 jobs in April. Further, “Nonfarm payrolls increased a seasonally adjusted 263,000 in April, the Labor Department said Friday. The unemployment rate fell to 3.6% last month, the lowest level since December 1969. Average hourly wages for private-sector workers grew 3.2% from a year earlier, matching the prior month’s increase.”

Welcome to Speaker Pelosi’s ‘Soup line America’. This morning, she released this statement. In the statement, she said “The April jobs report numbers show some promising news, yet these gains hide the true weight of the economic uncertainty felt by millions of hard-working Americans. Unfortunately, the evidence shows that most of the economic gains continue to benefit those already well-off. We must do more to ensure that the economy is benefiting every family in every community, and that all Americans have the opportunity to move ahead in our economy.”

First, what the hell is she babbling about? Is she intentionally misleading the American people? Compare Pelosi’s negativity with Larry Kudlow’s optimism:

Let’s be clear about something. The strongest job growth, according to Mr. Kudlow, is “has come from the blue collar sector.” Democrats have been attempting to paint a gloomy picture on the economy. That tactic is failing. You things are good when President Trump is getting help from this NYTimes article:

Which workers are benefiting?

The recent gains are going to those who need it most. Over the past year, low-wage workers have experienced the fastest pay increases, a shift from earlier in the recovery, when wage growth was concentrated at the top.

Check out the Times’ graphic, too. In Stuart Varney’s interview of Larry Kudlow, Mr. Kudlow repeatedly kept referring to the economy being in the “sweet spot.”

PS- Check out John Hinderaker’s post on the economy. It’s both pithy and powerful.

Democrats keep digging their PR hole deeper each day. Today, a multitude of Democrat activists/propagandists in the MSM insisted that Bill Barr lied. E.J Dionne’s article is a perfect example of that. Dionne fancies himself as a leading Democrat intellectual, which, if true, is frightening.

Here’s one of Mr. Dionne’s best arguments:

It’s not good enough that a redacted version of the report was eventually made public. For 27 days, the debate over Mueller’s findings was twisted by Barr’s poisonous distortions that implied a full exoneration of President Trump. Many public statements and much punditry were devoted to insisting that Trump’s opponents owed the president an apology, that the Russia matter was never what it was cracked up to be, that the president was free and clear.

Mr. Dionne, is it that difficult to admit that Robert Mueller has closed shop without filing a single indictment of conspiracy or obstruction of justice against anyone connected with President Trump?

For months, Democrats insisted that “the walls are closing in on” President Trump or that Mueller’s team was preparing to indict various family members of President Trump’s family. None of those things happened. One bombshell after another turned into a dud. Finally, the Mueller team closed up shop after getting Paul Manafort or Michael Cohen to plead guilty for crimes they’d committed long before the Trump campaign started (Manafort) or after President Trump’s inauguration (Cohen).

Now, Nancy Pelosi, the leading Democrat in the House, accused AG Barr of lying to Congress without presenting any proof. There seems to be lots of that going around within the Democratic Party. Check this out:

Something’s bothering Pelosi. Look how much she’s aged since regaining the Speaker’s gavel. What’s probably bothering her most is the fact that she can’t control the pro-impeachment radicals in her caucus.

It was Van Hollen who, two weeks after Mueller had registered his complaint, had asked Barr an un-senatorially direct question: “Did Bob Mueller support your conclusion?” Barr replied: “I don’t know whether Bob Mueller supported my conclusion.”

Lawyers might argue over whether this was an outright lie, but to call Barr’s answer misleading and obfuscatory is rather kind. Trump must have been very proud of his attorney general.

Actually, for people who use nuance and words for a living, it isn’t even slightly misleading. Mueller’s team was upset. That’s entirely different than asking if Mueller himself was upset.

Nowhere in Mr. Dionne’s article does he provide proof of his ill-advised allegations. These days, Democrats don’t believe in the presumption of innocence or due process but they definitely think allegations and trash-talking constitute proof. Saying that Democrats, starting with Ms. Pelosi, think that the Constitution is a nuisance that gets in the way of them total victory is understatement.

In November, 2020, we need to re-elect Donald Trump, grow the Republican majority in the Senate and retake the majority in the House. I’m confident that that’s totally possible, especially if Democrats keep acting this deranged.

Let’s be clear about something. A number of Democrat committee chairs are constitutional illiterates. Either that or they’re exceptionally corrupt or both. It’s something I’ve spent a big chunk of time thinking about. Here’s what finished things off for me.

When House Oversight and Reform Committee Chairman Elijah Cummings issued subpoenas for President Trump’s private financial records when he was a private citizen, President Trump’s attorneys filed a lawsuit to prevent the production of those records.

The legal complaint from Trump’s legal team reads “Chairman Cummings has ignored the constitutional limits on Congress’ power to investigate. Article I of the Constitution does not contain an ‘Investigations Clause’ or an ‘Oversight Clause.’ It gives Congress the power to enact certain legislation. Accordingly, investigations are legitimate only insofar as they further some legitimate legislative purpose.”

That’s true as far as it goes but I’d add that they didn’t mention a separation of powers conflict, too. Congress isn’t tasked with investigating private citizens before they were part of the government. That’s the jurisdiction of the executive branch. Specifically, the Department of Justice has the statutory authority to investigate private citizens. The investigations of private citizens is the responsibility of the FBI or the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives. The only people vested with the responsibility of convening grand juries are the DOJ attorneys, U.S. attorneys or a special counsel.

This won’t be a terribly difficult case to decide. The legislative branch has the constitutional authority to give advice and consent, pass legislation, provide legislative oversight and to ratify treaties.

House Democrats don’t have the authority to investigate the private activities of private citizens. That’s the job of the executive branch. Period. Mark Levin discussed another possible explanation with former Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli on Sunday night’s Life, Liberty & Levin:

I don’t know if that’s what these Democrats are trying to do but I won’t rule it out. It’s pretty frightening when the People’s House is weaponized to torment private citizens. Though that precedent hasn’t been sent, Speaker Pelosi did say that subpoenas might be a way to negotiate with President Trump:

Apparently, Pelosi and other Democrats don’t think playing fair is required. That’s why they need to voted out of office in 2020. The bigger the landslide in the House and Senate, the better. It’s clear that Democrats don’t see limits on their investigative powers:

I suspect that they’ll be stopped cold by the Supreme Court. I can’t wait to hear about that ruling. What’s chilling is hearing E.J. Dionne say that going after a private citizen’s private financial records “is the right thing to do.”

I’m normally a fan of HotAir’s Allahpundit. This isn’t one of those times. After reading this post, I can’t help but object to some of AP’s statements.

For instance, I must object when AP says “Here’s my question for Kushner, though: What would he have had Rod Rosenstein and Bob Mueller do? Granted, the Russiagate probe was bitterly divisive and contributed to Trump’s delegitimization among his critics. But given all the contacts between Trump officials and Russians during the campaign, given Trump’s weird apologetics for Putin and Wikileaks, given the fact that his campaign did benefit to some negligible degree from Russian interference, how could the DOJ not look into it?”

The answer is simple. The DOJ shouldn’t have named a special counsel since it hadn’t identified a crime that was committed. So what if Chuck Schumer, Nancy Pelosi and other Democrats whine all day long? Who cares if Adam Schiff and other Democrats lie about having seen evidence of Trump-Russia collusion? I don’t care if these Democrats stomped their feet and held their breath until they were blue in the face.

The special counsel law is pretty precise. If Shepard Smith wants to throw a hissy fit, that’s his problem. When his contract expires, here’s hoping he isn’t rehired and that they replace him with Trace Gallagher or Ed Henry. They’d be miles ahead if they did that. Listen to Smith’s temper tantrum:

Why is anyone surprised that Putin tried contacting both campaigns or that Putin tried interfering in our election? That’s as surprising as finding out that Bill Gates is rich.

Here’s a question for lefty Smith: why isn’t he interested in the Clinton campaign’s using Russian sources for the infamous discredited dossier? It isn’t news that both parties compile an opposition research file. What is news is that the Clinton campaign, then the FBI, relied on the dossier to trash a man with unverified information. Why isn’t Shepard Smith upset about that? Why aren’t other Democrats upset, too?

It’s time for that no-talent hack (Smith) to get fired.

Last Friday, the leader of the free world taught the Democrats a lesson in trolling while exposing Democrats as border security hypocrites. Last Friday, President Trump turned the tables on Nancy Pelosi, the Democrats’ presidential candidates and the messaging leaders of the House Democrat Conference, aka AOC, Rashida Tlaib and Ilhan Omar.

That moment hit when President Trump told reporters that he was considering giving sanctuary cities what they want. Specifically, he told reporters that he was considering shipping illegal immigrants to sanctuary cities when they were released or when CBP ran out of bed space for these illegal aliens.

That set off howls from Democrat hypocrites like Nancy Pelosi:

That’s rich. A woman who’s spent her entire life in San Francisco and Washington, DC, is telling people in Rust Belt states about American character. Right. Further, she’s insisting that elitist Democrats, not entrepreneurs, blue collar workers or the taxpayers whose property taxes keep going up thanks to the massive influx of illegal immigrants into their schools, know what’s best. Right.

Let these windbags deal with the crisis they’re at least partially responsible for. Their cities are going to hell in a handbasket. Homeless people (literally) litter their streets with drug needles and worse. Still, these elitist Democrats insist that they know what’s best for America. These elitist Democrats insist that they’re responsible for defining America’s values and priorities.

Mr. President, ship these illegal immigrants to San Fran Nan’s neighborhood and to Gavin Newsom’s new digs. Send some to AOC’s neighborhood, too. Then tell her constituents that she invited these illegal immigrants to NYC but chased Amazon from NYC.

Let’s face it. Democrats are trying their best to play a terrible hand that’s filled with even cards. (Cribbage players know what I’m talking about.) Cher gets it:

I Understand Helping struggling Immigrants,but MY CITY (Los Angeles) ISNT TAKING CARE OF ITS OWN.WHAT ABOUT THE 50,000+??Citizens WHO LIVE ON THE STREETS.PPL WHO LIVE BELOW POVERTY LINE,& HUNGRY? If My State Can’t Take Care of Its Own(Many Are VETS)How Can it Take Care Of More

— Cher (@cher) April 14, 2019

Unfortunately, AOC and Pelosi don’t.

Tom Emmer, my congressman, states in his op-ed for Roll Call Magazine that “Nancy Pelosi’s optimism over 2020 is misplaced.” While I’ve disagreed with Rep. Emmer from time-to-time, I agree with him 100% this time. This video isn’t silly:

It’s beyond absurd. The average American doesn’t care about diversity. They care whether politicians, in this case Democrats, intend to fix America’s problems. At minimum, they want politicians not to screw things up too much.

In the first 100 days, the socialist Democrats managed to call for over $100 trillion in new spending, but are so dysfunctional, they refuse to propose a budget outlining the payment plan for their radical agenda. Ridiculously, these socialists have spent weeks continuing to attack President Donald Trump’s budget proposal. Talk about hypocrisy.

While they couldn’t develop a budget plan, House Democrats did find a way to tax Americans into oblivion, introducing a host of socialist policies that threaten America’s foundation and the values we hold dear: freedom and liberty.

That isn’t all. If Democrats think that they can get re-elected by constantly vilifying President Trump and offering counterproductive initiatives, they’re heading for a wave election — again. Then there’s this:

If that wasn’t scary enough, nearly half of the Democratic Caucus co-sponsored a bill mandating a $32 trillion government takeover of the health care system. Their plan would eliminate private insurance, make it illegal for businesses to offer health insurance to workers, destroy the current Medicare system that America’s seniors have paid into for decades, and make a trip to the doctor feel like a trip to the Department of Motor Vehicles.

In 1995, after Republicans took over the House majority for the first time in 40 years, they spent the first 100 days passing the Contract With America:

1. require all laws that apply to the rest of the country also apply to Congress;
2. select a major, independent auditing firm to conduct a comprehensive audit of Congress for waste, fraud or abuse;
3. cut the number of House committees, and cut committee staff by one-third;
4. limit the terms of all committee chairs;
   ban the casting of proxy votes in committee;
5. require committee meetings to be open to the public;
6. require a three-fifths majority vote to pass a tax increase;
7. guarantee an honest accounting of the Federal Budget by implementing zero base-line budgeting.

This might be the most important paragraph of Rep. Emmer’s op-ed:

The first 100 days have made it crystal clear that the socialist Democrats are not up to the task of leading our country. So in the next 100 days, Republicans will continue recruiting a diverse group of candidates to take back the majority. We are already making tremendous progress, thanks to the hard work of Rep. Susan Brooks, recruitment chairwoman for the National Republican Congressional Committee. Thus far, we have met with over 110 women, 50 veterans and 60 minorities considering a run for office.

Thus far, House Democrats have been a profile of the Do-Nothing Congress. That won’t last long. The American people will throw House Democrats out fast enough.

Yesterday, after AG Bill Barr testified, calmly, that spying did occur, Democrats started howling as if he’d said something controversial. I’m betting that the vast, vast, vast majority of LFR readers found that statement to be totally uncontroversial. Andy McCarthy certainly didn’t find it controversial:

In his testimony Wednesday before a Senate Appropriations Committee subcommittee, Attorney General William Barr made statements that were so clearly correct, they should be no more controversial than asserting that the sky is blue. The fact that they are causing consternation is what should alarm people.

What planet are these Democrats from? Better yet, what solar system were they brought in from? There’s no question that the FBI surveilled people within the Trump campaign. That isn’t questionable. At least, it wasn’t until someone set Nancy Pelosi’s hair on fire:

Ms. Pelosi said that she trusts Mueller but doesn’t trust Barr. That’s interesting since Barr and Mueller are working on the redactions together. At this point, my first reaction is to question Ms. Pelosi’s intellectual honesty. This week, Ms. Pelosi has insisted that she’s the arbiter of what’s un-American, unpatriotic, etc. How is a person who’s spent the past 40 years shuttling between San Francisco and Washington, DC (except for the occasional fundraiser at Harvey Weinstein’s place in New York or Los Angeles) qualified to determine who displays these qualities and who doesn’t?

Democrats that think that they’ll hold the House in 2020 don’t appreciate just how toxic Ms. Pelosi, AOC and Ilhan Omar are in Rust Belt Swing districts.

Yesterday, Nancy Pelosi insisted that Adam Schiff was a patriot. That’s laughable. It’s more likely that I can beat Hulk Hogan in an arm-wrestling match than it would be to find a consensus that Schiff is a patriot. PS- There’s no chance I’d beat Hulk Hogan.

Democrats are simply prolonging their lie about Russia. Mueller said that he didn’t find any evidence that anyone in the Trump campaign colluded or collaborated with the Russians despite multiple attempts by the Russians.

Here’s something that Pelosi hasn’t answered. A couple months ago, she said that there wasn’t a crisis at the border. With 1,000,000 illegal aliens expected to invade the United States, how can she say that this isn’t a crisis? Only a dingbat from San Francisco could think that. It’s worth noting that San Fran Nan thinks that Kirstjen Nielsen’s figures were a lie.

Now Bill Barr’s report is a lie, too? Just how far does this conspiracy go in San Fran Nan’s mind?

This is proof that a little paranoia goes a long way. Either that or she’s flipped out and can’t be trusted. At this point, who knows? With someone from San Francisco, it could mean anything.

After this morning’s House Intel Committee meeting, it’s impossible to think that Democrats will be able to defend Committee Chairman Adam Schiff much longer.

The article opens by saying “Every Republican on the House Intelligence Committee is calling on Chairman Adam Schiff to resign Thursday, accusing the California Democrat of weaving a ‘demonstrably false’ narrative of collusion between the Trump campaign and Russia and ‘undermining’ the credibility of the panel.”

Literally, for years, Chairman Schiff insisted that he’d seen proof that President Trump had colluded with Russians during the 2016 election. After Mike Conaway read the GOP letter, Schiff responded “A visibly emotional Schiff, who did not know this broadside from Republicans was coming, had a strident response. At times raising his voice, he listed a litany of known and controversial interactions between the Trump campaign and Russia – including Donald Trump Jr.’s involvement in the Trump Tower meeting and former campaign chairman Paul Manafort’s sharing of polling data with a Russian associate. “You might think it’s OK,” Schiff said. ‘I don’t.'”

Actually, Mr. Schiff does think it’s ok — if Democrats are employing those tactics. If he thought these things were wrong, why didn’t Schiff present legislation making President Trump’s actions illegal? As chairman of a powerful committee, that legislation, at minimum, would get a hearing. Most likely, that legislation would pass the House.

At this point, there’s no reason to think this isn’t just a stunt. Watch this video and tell me he wasn’t playing to the cameras:

Speaker Pelosi issued this preposterous statement in defense of Schiff:

I’d love to know what type of drugs Ms. Pelosi is taking because they must be powerful if she thinks that a liar like Schiff is a patriot.