RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://issuesinsights.com/2022/08/30/who-are-the-real-semi-fascists/

President Joe Biden caused quite a stir late last week after accusing supporters of former President Donald Trump of following a political creed of “semi-fascism.” But it’s yet another case of the far-left Democratic Party projecting its own grievous sins on the political opposition.

This was Saul Alinsky’s 13th rule: “Pick the target, freeze it, personalize it, and polarize it.” The Biden administration and the Democrats are following this rule to a T.

They constantly call Republicans, conservatives and those “deplorable” moderate Americans in middle America the most vile names – “racists,” “fascists,” “Nazis,” and worse – and have launched an all-out, non-stop Deep State campaign against the man they fear the most, Donald Trump.

Thus came this not entirely unexpected but wholly unpresidential and hate-filled diatribe by Biden just last week:

“What we’re seeing now is the beginning or the death knell of an extreme MAGA philosophy. It’s not just Trump, it’s the entire philosophy … it’s like semi-fascism,” Biden charged at last Thursday’s Democratic National Committee “Build a Better America” rally in Rockville, Maryland.

“Trump and the extreme MAGA Republicans have made their choice,”  Biden went on. “To go backwards, full of anger, violence, hate and division.

“We’re at a serious moment in our nation’s history. The MAGA Republicans don’t just threaten our personal rights and economic security, they’re a threat to our very democracy,” he added. “They refuse to accept the will of the people, they embrace political violence.”

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2022/07/i_was_wrong_about_trump.html

I recently wrote a column about why I believed Trump should not run in 2024. I was wrong. I allowed my distaste for Trump’s personality to override his virtues, which are considerable. Some people want Trump without his vices. I was among them, until yesterday, when I watched and listened to Tom Klingenstein’s speech titled “Trump’s virtues.”  It was masterful and shamed me that I did not make the distinction between Trump’s character and his virtues, the former being deeply flawed, the latter being almost perfect. I need to man up in my defense of the former President’s virtues. The speech was among the most pointed I have heard and deserves some exposure. Klingenstein says:

Other Republicans say some version of “I like Trump policies but I don’t like the rest of him.” This gets it almost backwards. Although Trump advanced many important policies, it is the ‘rest of him’ that contains the virtue that inspires the movement… Trump was born for the current crisis, a life and death struggle against a totalitarian enemy I call woke communism… that controls all the cultural and economic powers in America…

[Trump] revealed, not caused, the divide in this country. In war, you must make a stand… Trump is a manly man… traditional manhood, even when flawed, is absolutely essential… Trump plays to win… There are no clean hands in a fistfight…Trump is unreservedly, unquestionably pro-America… Trump is a refreshing break from the guilt and self-loathing that marks our age…

It is anti-Americanism that makes so many of us very angry: The Left have trashed America’s Founding and her history to the point where some believe it virtuous to hate America. Rather than advocating forgiveness for sins, the Left is advocating hair shirts, self-flagellation, and perpetual guilt. It is un-American and certainly un-Christian.

Trump thinks we can vanquish all comers if we just put our minds to it, and he’s right… Courage never demands perfection… Trump over and over said exactly what political correctness prohibits one from saying… Trump said Haiti is a shithole and that representative Maxine Waters has a low IQ. These were not racist lies. They were uncouth, politically incorrect observations with which most of us would agree but would not dare say.

In 2016, we loved Trump for his outspokenness. But many seem to have changed their minds without cause; Trump is the same today as he was before he was elected. The very things we disdain today are the things that made him the man for our time.

From morning to night, we were told that Trump is a racist. But endless repetition does not make it true. It isn’t. Trump’s contempt for political correctness showed patriotic Americans that its ever-tightening grip could be loosened… It is difficult to overestimate the significance of Trump’s fight against political correctness, a fight in which most Republicans are reluctant to engage… Trump treated the woke media with the same contempt he treated political correctness, provoking their outrage and revealing their utter corruption… it must be defeated.

https://amgreatness.com/2022/08/28/american-ayatollahs/

What do Salman Rushdie, Dave Chappelle, and Congressman Lee Zeldin (R-N.Y.) have in common?

Not much at first glance. One is an erudite writer who was once married to the stunning Padma Lakshmi. The other is a fast-talking, streetwise comedian who might just say anything for a laugh. And finally Zeldin is a Jewish GOP Congressman running for governor of New York. But the recent attack that nearly killed Rushdie is a reminder that the three, and many others in modern life, actually have a lot more in common than may seem obvious. 

Salman Rushdie was a relatively obscure artsy author when he penned The Satanic Verses. That 1988 novel drew attention and caused a stir. That stir soon became a major controversy and riled up Ayatollah Khomeini, the iron-fisted Muslim radical cleric who ruled Iran from 1979 to 1989. 

Khomeini was always a fan of a particular kind of virtue signaling. “Death to America” was his favorite chant, and the virtue he signaled was all about spilling American blood on behalf of his vision of Allah. Rushdie’s book provided Khomeini the opportunity to demonstrate his ability to be a radical global influencer on behalf of the Islamic fascism he installed when he took over Iran. He didn’t even need TikTok or Instagram to get his point across. 

https://amgreatness.com/2022/08/28/the-strangest-thing-about-semi-fascist-trump/

For the Left, Donald Trump is synonymous with “fascism” (or “semi-fascism,” as Joe Biden put it the other day). And for Liz Cheney and most of the NeverTrumpers, he remains an existential threat to democracy. 

But to quantify those charges, what exactly has Trump done extralegally—as opposed to his bombast and braggadocio about what he might have wished to have done? 

And what are the standards by which to judge this supposed menace? Did Trump illegally and with a mere signature nullify over $300 billion of contracted student loans—to firm up his college-student and college-graduate base nine weeks before the midterm elections?

Did Donald Trump weaponize the feared IRS, the logical place to find fascistic tendencies of any president bent on using government to punish his enemies? Did he push through a plan to add 87,000 new IRS investigative agents at a time of national discord?

For the last five years, Trump was rumored to be under investigation by the IRS. Currently, his accountant is facing felony sentencing for advising improper write-offs. 

Certainly, from the contents of Hunter Biden’s laptop and the remarks of Hunter’s associates like Tony Bobulinksi, the Biden family raked in millions of foreign dollars. Evidence so far suggests Joe Biden was a recipient (as the “Big Guy”) of 10 percent of these quid pro quo payments. At times, Bobulinksi may have sent a strapped and broke Hunter thousands of dollars in cash gifts. Were any of these stealthy transactions taxed? Does the recently heavily Biden-endowed IRS care?

If Trump wished to abuse his power over the IRS, he would have followed the Obama model of weaponizing it during a reelection year to go after his ideological enemies. 

In Obama’s case, the tax agency slow-walked or denied nonprofit status for groups whose ideology was deemed not helpful to Obama’s campaign in 2012. There was a reason Lois Lerner invoked the Fifth Amendment, and it was not to protect Donald Trump.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2022/08/did-zuckerberg-prove-fbi-created-russian-disinfo-brad-slager/

It has become a really bad week for the FBI, and by extension the DOJ. With the release of the warrant affidavit the comically redacted document only further cast the Bureau in a mocking light.  From what can be gleaned out of the fragments revealed is that now the raid on Trump’s residence was inspired not by the revelation of state secrets missing or classified nuclear intel, but by the National Archives requesting more docs after receiving boxloads, and a local news affiliate that saw moving trucks at Mar-A-Lago. 

This means that the raid was justified with the thinnest of reasons. And the purpose was to simply acquire as much as they could from the compound in an effort to find…anything. Reports of the Feds going in with a specific agenda were blown out of the water when the warrant was found to have been signed off with the intent of obtaining anything at all from Trump’s entire time in office.

Adding to the embarrassments was the news of a whistleblower from inside the FBI revealing that the Bureau had shielded the knowledge of the laptop obtained from Hunter Biden. This is a story not receiving much media coverage, a telling departure from a press corps that normally gets rather excitable at the arrival of whistleblowers. The claim being made is the FBI elected to bury the laptop story for the reason of not wanting to influence the 2020 election. Then things became even more disturbing – and more ignored in the press.

On Joe Rogan’s podcast Mark Zuckerberg revealed that FaceBook had been approached by the FBI regarding the laptop story and to be wary of how the platform treats the information. The focus has been on the move by the FBI to direct social media to avoid the story.

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2022/08/three_signs_were_in_a_banana_republic.html

Satirist Sol Luckman defines “banana republic” in his irreverent glossary, The Angel’s Dictionary, as a “lawless society where the monkeys rule.”  

Looking around the United States today, it’s hard to say we don’t fit his meaning.  Nearly 80% of Americans believe we live under a two-tiered system of justice.  Likewise, in Gallup’s recent survey of Americans’ confidence in U.S. institutions, it notes, “This year’s poll marks new lows in confidence for all three branches of the federal government — the Supreme Court (25%), the presidency (23%) and Congress.”  Of sixteen institutions tested, confidence in the U.S. Congress sits at the very bottom with a scant 7%!  Even though there is now “record-low confidence across all institutions,” confidence in the Office of the Presidency suffered the largest year-over-year drop in 2022 — cratering 15%!  In other words, not only do Americans believe the country is lawless, they’re also convinced that it is being run by a barrel of monkeys!  Clearly, Americans “get” that we’re living in a “banana republic” today.  

Just consider these three telltale signs:  

(1) Manipulation of language and mandatory leftist religion:

The political Left’s most potent weapon is its penchant for undermining the meaning of words.  For decades Democrats have branded anything antithetical to their worldview as “hateful” and banned “offending” viewpoints from civic culture altogether.  When “authorities” deconstruct biological sex so preposterously that they can’t even tell the difference between boys and girls, though, they’ve lost the plot.  One school board in Wisconsin is so fearful of the language police crashing through its doors that it has replaced all references to “girls” with sterilized language concerning a “person with a vulva.”  When “teachers” are afraid to say “girl” out loud, it’s banana republic time! 

https://issuesinsights.com/2022/08/29/the-dis-unification-of-america-continues-ii-tipp-poll/

To look on the bright side, Americans don’t disagree about everything. One issue in particular seems to bring them together in near-perfect accord: Are we a unified nation after more than a year-and-a-half of President Joe Biden? Americans overwhelmingly answer no, the latest I&I/TIPP Poll shows.

To gauge the ongoing unity zeitgeist, each month the I&I/TIPP Poll asks Americans whether “the United States is: Very united. Somewhat united. Somewhat divided. Very divided. Not sure.”

The data make for depressing reading. Among those responding to the poll, taken Aug. 2-4 from online surveys of 1,335 adults across the county, 74% described the U.S. as “Divided,” versus just 24% who called it “United.” The poll has a margin of error of +/-2.8 percentage points.

And among all survey participants, the No. 1 response was “very divided,” with 43% answering this. No. 2 was “somewhat divided,” at 30%. By comparison, just 8% of the entire survey called America “very united,” while 16% described it as “somewhat united.” Just 2% were “not sure.”

https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-comey-clinton-document-standard-fbi-investigation-donald-trump-mar-a-lago-classified-prosecution-justice-department-11661711673?mod=opinion_lead_pos3

“If Mr. Garland can’t make a compelling case that Mr. Trump’s transgressions are greater than Mrs. Clinton’s, with enough clear and convincing evidence to warrant a criminal charge, the better judgment is not to prosecute and put the country through the trauma of a political trial that half of America will suspect is a case of unequal justice.”

When Jim Comey held his July 2016 press briefing on Hillary Clinton’s emails, his conclusion was this: “Although there is evidence of potential violations of the statutes regarding the handling of classified information, our judgment is that no reasonable prosecutor would bring such a case.”

In other words, Mrs. Clinton could have been indicted but wasn’t. That ended the Clinton email saga as a legal matter—with a lecture but without a prosecution. As we wrote at the time, this was an outrageous usurpation by the FBI director, whose role was to investigate and turn the evidence over to a U.S. Attorney or the Attorney General to decide on prosecution.

https://nypost.com/2022/08/25/kathy-hochuls-call-for-5-4m-republicans-to-leave-new-york-is-dangerous/

Gov. Kathy Hochul, who hasn’t proven shy about issuing orders, had one for the state’s Republicans this week — all 5.4 million of them: “Just jump on a bus and head down to Florida where you belong, OK?” she said. “You are not New Yorkers.”

If you can move beyond the frankly disgusting political partisanship and intolerance, her message is fiscally irresponsible, even dangerous. The governor probably already knows this, but the state’s extensive public sector is heavily reliant on personal income taxes paid by residents, and with nearly $14 billion in projected budget gaps over the next five years, it can’t afford to lose any taxpayers, let alone 5.4 million of them.

The Empire State has already lost 1.5 million residents in the past decade, and there’s no sign of that trend letting up. In fact, more than 350,000 New Yorkers relocated during the 12 pandemic-plagued months leading up to July 1, 2021.

Kathy Hochul said Republicans should move down to Florida.
Getty Images

In her attempt to be snappy, Hochul exposed a major problem that has gripped our state since the dawn of the Cuomo-Hochul era: New Yorkers are leaving, and they’re taking their tax dollars with them.