RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://pjmedia.com/trending/the-left-is-working-overtime-to-normalize-fascism/

It is hard to believe that the president of the United States is often accused of being a fascist by the same people who advocate harassing, assaulting, and censoring his supporters. But, that is exactly what is going on now. The political left is labeling anything conservative as hateful, bigoted, racist, sexist, homophobic, etc., to justify un-American suppression of non-left-wing views.

Freedom of speech is an essential American value, and restrictions on free speech aren’t likely to sit well with a majority of the American people. But, Democrats have a found a loophole: let privately-owned companies do the censoring. Social media sites like Facebook and Twitter have long been accused of anti-conservative bias. Earlier this year, Facebook temporarily prevented my ability to promote my new book. A couple of months ago, they demanded personal information from me in order for me to have the “privilege” of paying to promote my books. I have chosen not to give them any information that could potentially be misused.

I’ve had better luck on Twitter, but Hispanic science fiction author Jon Del Arroz has experienced repeated censorship there.

“Leftists have been successful in targeting me on Twitter every time I’ve reached new heights in my writing career,” he told PJ Media. “When I hit #1 Amazon Bestseller, Twitter gave me a notice within 30 minutes as if I was permanently banned, giving me no reason, but the account became unlocked a few minutes later.”

Del Arroz recently launched a comic book crowd-funding project on Indiegogo called Flying Sparks and found that his self-promotion on Twitter was met with a coordinated attack by left-wing authors who reported his tweets en masse. “I didn’t violate Twitter’s Terms of Service, but now I’m suspended for a week and can’t promote my project to my nearly 5,000 followers just as it’s gaining momentum,” he said.

Google is no exception either. Last year, PJ Media contributor Megan Fox found her YouTube channel demonetized after Rush Limbaugh read one of her columns on his radio show. This was by no means an isolated incident, as YouTube had been targeting conservative content creators long before that.

But throttling conservatives on social media isn’t enough for the radical left. The vice chairman of the Democratic National Committee, Congressman Keith Ellison (D-Minn.), recently wrote to Amazon CEO Jeff Bezos, accusing him of profiting off the sales of materials he considers “racist” or linked to “hate groups.” What exactly does Ellison mean by “hate groups”? For Ellison, he trusts the wisdom of the embattled Southern Poverty Law Center (SPLC). Despite its history, in recent years the SPLC has become a tool of leftists to brand conservative groups “hate groups.”

Tucker Carlson recently and accurately described it as “a left-wing political group that uses ‘hate crime’ designations to target its ideological enemies and to crush people.” Several years ago they targeted the Value Voters Summit and its primary sponsor, Family Research Council for being “bigots” and “haters.” Why? Because they believe in traditional marriage and that homosexuality is a sin. The SPLC haphazard tossing around the “hate group” label has gotten them into some serious trouble. The SPLC recently agreed to a $3 million court settlement after falsely listing Muslim reformer Maajid Nawaz, in its 2016 “Field Guide to Anti-Muslim Extremists.” Nawaz is a practicing Muslim. Following the settlement, at least 60 organizations branded as “hate groups” by the SPLC are considering legal action against the left-wing organization. CONTINUE AT SITE

Battle Tested

A husband, father, combat veteran, and businessman, John James is a conservative Republican. The former Army Captain and West Point graduate is President of James Group International, a supply-chain logistics company in Detroit.

John James is a husband, father, combat veteran and businessman. He is a pro-life, pro-Second Amendment, pro-business conservative who has demonstrated energetic leadership, clarity of vision and a passion for service from the battlefield to the boardroom. John James is a proven servant-leader who will represent all Michiganders and help unify Washington.

At 17, John made the decision to serve his country. After graduating from West Point in 2004, he became a Ranger-qualified aviation officer. John went on to serve with distinction in Operation Iraqi Freedom where he earned a Combat Action Badge (CAB) and two Air Medals, among other awards, while logging 753.8 flight hours in theater leading two Apache platoons.

After eight years of service to the nation, John James was honorably discharged and returned to Michigan to work in the family business: James Group International. Currently its President, James has led the company from $35 million to $137 million in revenue while creating 100 additional jobs in Michigan and around the country since 2012.

https://pjmedia.com/election/trump-endorses-spectacular-iraq-war-vet-john-james-in-michigan-senate-primary/

President Trump gave a big boost to John James, a rising star in the Republican Party who is running in Michigan’s Republican primary for U.S. Senate. In two tweets Friday, the president called the 37-year-old African-American business executive and Iraq War helicopter pilot a “SPECTACULAR!” candidate with “great potential,” who is “strong on crime and borders, loves our Military, our Vets and our Second Amendment.”

James is running against detergent manufacturer Sandy Pensler in the August 7 contest and the winner will face third-term Democratic Sen. Debbie Stabenow in November.

Vice President Mike Pence also endorsed James on Friday.

“I want to help the president create more economic opportunity, secure our borders and strengthen our national security. From the battlefield to the boardroom, I have the experience to get the job done for Michigan,” James said in a statement.

The candidate and his “good buddy,” former U.S. Navy SEAL Rob O’Neill (who allegedly fired the head shots that killed Osama bin Laden), expressed how pleased they were with the endorsements while out politicking on Friday. CONTINUE AT SITE

https://www.wsj.com/articles/mccaskills-intimidation-game-1532646222

If you’ve tuned in to this year’s midterms, chances are you know about that hot Senate race in Missouri: McCaskill vs. Humphreys. Oh, wait.

Democrat Claire McCaskill is indeed facing a tough re-election, trying for a third term. She’s had a particularly rough week, after the Kansas City Star reported that businesses tied to her husband had been awarded $131 million in federal contracts since she took office in 2007. Her putative opponent is the constitutional conservative Josh Hawley, the current attorney general and the strong favorite to win the GOP primary on Aug. 7.

Team McCaskill is already employing the Democratic Party’s go-to tactic this midterm: character assassination. There’s not much else. The economy is humming, the party’s centrist and liberal wings are fighting, and the drumbeat of impending Trump doom isn’t finding much accompaniment. So in Missouri as elsewhere, candidates are reverting to personal attacks. But the McCaskill forces are piling on a guy who isn’t even running.

Indeed, they are attacking a private citizen and donor, David Humphreys. Back in March, Chuck Schumer’s Senate Majority PAC began plowing millions into attacks on the businessman, who donated to Mr. Hawley’s campaign for attorney general. The pattern is the same: An ad makes a malicious accusation against Mr. Humphreys, then sidles over to tar Mr. Hawley with guilt by association. Just how invested are they in this strategy? Since airing their first spot, 70% of Democratic ads—amounting to $4.7 million—have been focused on Mr. Humphreys.

Ms. McCaskill’s pickle is that the GOP has upped its recruitment game. Her only prior re-election bid in 2012 had her face off against Todd Akin, who self-immolated after his blundering comments on abortion and rape. Mr. Hawley—a savvier, younger man and squeaky clean—hasn’t provided a similar opening. A native Missourian and onetime U.S. Supreme Court law clerk, he arrived on the political scene only in 2016, becoming the Show Me State’s first Republican attorney general in 24 years.

http://www.bostonherald.com/news/columnists/howie_carr/2018/07/howie_carr_liz_warren_to_join_tribe_of_losers

Psst: Mitt Romney was the Governor of Massachusetts from 2003 to 2007…..rsk

One thing the Democrats can do to assure Donald Trump’s re-election in 2020: Nominate somebody from Massachusetts. Virginia used to be called the Mother of Presidents. Massachusetts is the Mother of Presidential Losers.

I mention this today in the wake of a sycophantic, fawning cover story in New York magazine declaring that the fake Indian, Sen. Elizabeth Warren, is now “the de facto leader of the Democratic party.”

To which Trump has got to be saying, Dirty Harry-like, “Go ahead, make my day.”

What is it with the national Democrats’ fascination with Massachusetts?

Look at the record: Ted Kennedy, Mike Dukakis, Paul Tsongas, John Kerry. Fool me once shame on you, fool me four times, five times … what’s up with that?

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2018/07/kirsten_gillibrand_tacks_hard_left_for_2020_to_compensate_for_excessive_whiteness.html

New York Senator Kirsten Gillibrand has a problem. She wants to be the Democratic nominee for President in 2020. But she’s white.

Not only is Gillibrand white, but she’s extremely white. She’s so white that even Hillary Clinton looks almost Hispanic by comparison.

That’s not an asset in a competitive Democratic primary. It used to be that being a woman was sufficiently virtuous. No longer. Gillibrand has to compete against candidates from other identity groups. Cory Booker is a minority, Kamala Harris is a minority, and even though Elizabeth Warren isn’t a minority, she does play one on TV.

So Gillibrand is tacking hard left to compensate. She was formerly a moderately conservative Democratic congresswoman from upstate New York, until she was appointed to a vacant Senate Seat by the then-governor, David Paterson, a blind black adulterous former cocaine user whose resume full of multiple identity group memberships dazzled New Yorkers throughout the state.

Gillibrand, who used to brag about keeping a gun under her bed and advocated deporting illegal aliens and making English the official language of America, now sings to a very different tune. When she got elected to the Senate she saw she got a lot of media attention when she repeatedly told her “fat shaming story”, her claim that then Senator Daniel Inouye allegedly told her “Don’t lose too much weight now. I like my girls chubby!”

After that, Gillibrand latched on to every offense, real and perceived, against women in the non-Islamic world to attract the attention of the media. And it worked, for a while, to raise her profile.

But as the status of women as a virtue group has declined, and the status of minority and other identity groups have risen in the Democratic Party, Gillibrand has had to up her game.

https://www.wsj.com/articles/mccaskill-and-the-swamp-1532467234

Who says newspapers are dying? The Trump newsprint tariffs aren’t helping, but daily journalism appears to be alive and well at the Kansas City Star, which performs a public service today in illuminating a lucrative area of the Beltway swamp. Specifically, the Star details the rising income from federally-subsidized investments enjoyed by the spouse of a U.S. senator.

“Businesses tied to U.S. Sen. Claire McCaskill’s husband have been awarded more than $131 million in federal subsidies since the Missouri Democrat took office in 2007,” reports the Star.

The newspaper details the surge in income for Ms. McCaskill’s husband, Joseph Shepard, as a result of his investments in government-backed housing projects. According to the Star:

In 2006, the year before McCaskill entered the Senate, her husband’s personal income from those investments was between $1,608 and $16,731, according to the senator’s financial disclosure forms.

In 2017, five years into McCaskill’s second term, Shepard personally earned between $365,374 and $1,118,158 from investments in housing projects that received federal subsidies, the disclosure forms show. Disclosure forms only provide ranges of income.

There’s no evidence that McCaskill played any part in directing federal funds to businesses affiliated with her husband.

The senator’s campaign tells the Star that she has nothing to do with her husband’s investments and the paper notes that he was investing in affordable-housing projects long before he met the senator, whom he married in 2002.But lately Mr. Shepard seems to have become much better at selecting such investments. According to the newspaper:

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/articles/2018/07/24/dont_underestimate_the_socialist_surge_on_the_left_137601.html

A Democratic “blue wave” may or may not be able to overcome the Republicans’ majority and structural advantages in the 2018 midterm elections. But the bigger story that’s brewing is the dramatic and nationwide leftward shift of the Democratic Party. The socialist surge has potential to reshape not just the party but American politics for generations to come.

Democratic socialist Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez’s victory over 10-term incumbent Joe Crowley in a New York primary was the most significant political upset since Tea Party Republican Dave Brat defeated then-House Majority Leader Eric Cantor in 2014. Her victory wasn’t an isolated incident. Democratic-socialist candidates also scored wins in Pennsylvania’s House of Representatives and, in 2017, in Virginia’s House of Delegates.

Meanwhile, in California, the Democratic state party executive committee decided to endorse progressive stalwart Kevin de Leon over Dianne Feinstein. (Feinstein won the open primary, but in California the top two finishers, even if members of the same party, run against each other in the general election.) Feinstein has major advantages in the November face-off (name ID and fundraising) and will likely prevail. But when Dianne Feinstein is deemed too conservative for the Democratic Party a major shift is underway.

The Democratic socialists hoped to start a new chapter in their crusade with a rally last week in the heart of America: The event took place in Wichita, Kansas. For Kansas’s conservatives, the rally was the political equivalent of “Red Dawn.” The Bernie Sanders liberation army, under the leadership of General Ocasio-Cortez, parachuted into the heart of Koch country (Wichita is the headquarters of Koch Industries) to pick a fight and make a point. Ocasio-Cortez said they chose the location to prove that “an honest, grassroots, lobbyist-free movement for working-class Americans can work anywhere.”

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/270776/ocasio-cortez-capitalism-wont-always-exist-matthew-vadum

Democrat giant-slayer and soon-to-be Congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez came close to saying she supports abolishing the free enterprise system and the precious economic freedoms on which it is based that have made America wealthy beyond its founders’ wildest dreams.

The so-called democratic socialist Ocasio-Cortez whom DNC Chairman Tom Perez hails as “the future of our party,” breezily dismissed the current strength of the U.S. economy, claiming unemployment is low only because Americans are working two jobs.

Capitalism is a fleeting phenomenon, she told PBS in an astounding display of historical ignorance that would no doubt endear her to anti-American conspiracy theorist Naomi Klein.

I do think that right now, when we have this no-holds-barred Wild West hypercapitalism, what that means is profit at any cost. Capitalism has not always existed in the world, and it will not always exist in the world. When this country started, we did not operate on a capitalist economy.

Asked if democratic socialism, the system to which Ocasio-Cortez claims allegiance, “calls for an end to capitalism,” the candidate said:

“Ultimately, we are marching towards progress on this issue. I do think that we are going to see an evolution in our economic system of an unprecedented degree, and it’s hard to say what direction that that takes … ”

The interviewer interjected: “It sounds like you are skeptical that capitalism is going to continue to be the right answer.”

“Yeah, I think it’s, um, I think it’s, I think it’s at least a question,” Ocasio-Cortez said. “I think it’s absolutely a question.”