RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.nationalreview.com/2018/06/democrats-done-pretending-to-be-moderate/They think they’re unpopular because they aren’t left-wing enough.

The Democratic love of socialism was for many years the love that dared not speak its name. No more. Now the party is figuratively jumping on Oprah’s couch shouting its love of socialism. You’d have to plug your ears not to hear it.

Socialist Bernie Sanders is unquestionably the spiritual leader of the Democratic party, which is radicalizing itself in his image, and on the strength of her blowout Democratic-primary win over liberal incumbent Joe Crowley in the party-ruled NY-14 congressional district, soon-to-be-congresswoman Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez is now one of the most prominent faces in the Democratic party. A poll last fall put support for socialism at 44 percent among Millennials, and even more disturbingly, 23 percent of this group agreed that Joseph Stalin is a “hero.” Socialized medicine, i.e., Medicare for all, is the hottest issue on the Left (unless you count hating Trump as an “issue”).

In short, Democrats are who we thought they were. They’re just losing their inhibitions about it. As the woke-youth site Vox puts it, “Maybe Democrats should stop being afraid of the left” because “Ocasio-Cortez’s victory is a big sign that Democrats can run on socialist ideas and win.” Talk of revolution flows naturally. After Justice Kennedy announced his retirement, MSNBC’s Chris Matthews said, “I tell you, the Democratic base is wired now for a revolt.”

It’s become a cliché to compare Washington politics to Wag the Dog (1997) or Idiocracy (2006), perhaps the two most-cited political movies of this era. A forgotten political film from the 1990s, though, deserves more attention for its prescience: Warren Beatty’s Bulworth, which appeared in theaters 20 years ago this spring. (Spoilers follow. The movie is streaming on the Starz pay-TV service.)

https://pjmedia.com/trending/socialists-like-ben-jealous-and-alexandria-ocasio-cortez-would-bring-back-the-dark-ages/
“Ben Jealous and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez aren’t really “progressives.” Their big government platform is actually quite regressive. ”

On Tuesday, two veterans of the 2016 campaign launched by self-identified socialist Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-Vt.) won important upsets in Democratic primaries. Sanders himself congratulated Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, a member of the Democratic Socialists of America, and former NAACP Chair Ben Jealous, who each defeated rivals endorsed by the Democratic Party. Their victories have been hailed as “progressive,” but the socialist ideology they pursue is truly regressive, and would resurrect the age-old tragedy of a pre-free market command economy with fewer options and more poverty.

Sanders declared that Jealous’ victory “showed that running a progressive, issue-oriented campaign can bring all working people together in the fight for justice.”

What issues does Sanders consider “progressive”? An ever-increasing government control of the economy, heavy on redistributing wealth. But don’t take my word for it — examine Ocasio-Cortez’s campaign platform. Here it is, complete with some snarky explanations courtesy of America Rising.

Ocasio-Cortez promises “Medicare For All,” the standard Sanders approach to health care, “free” public universities and trade schools, guaranteed jobs for everyone, a 100 percent renewable “infrastructure overhaul,” and guaranteed housing. How would she pay for all this largess? “Taxing Wall Street.”

Riiiight. Even if you confiscated every single dollar in the stock exchange, that would not come close to covering the cost of all these programs. In the process, you would be killing the engine of growth that enables jobs, goods, and services to exist in the free market in the first place.

In short, full implementation of this plan is not only economically infeasible, it would derail America’s wealth-creating machine, bringing back a poverty and injustice all too familiar in human history. CONTINUE AT SITE

https://www.realclearpolitics.com/
As the midterm election season heats up, a mixed economic message is coming from Democratic congressional candidates as the progressive wing finds itself at odds with party moderates. Partly, this is a reflection of the difficulty the out-of-power party has getting traction during robust economic times. The 2018 midterms are taking place at a time when the unemployment rate is at its lowest point in 18 years. But this dichotomy is also indicative of the Democratic Party’s leftward movement. The moderate wing is in shock after 10-term New York Congressman Joe Crowley lost a primary battle Tuesday to Alexandria Oscasio-Cortez, a 28-year-old underfunded outsider candidate to the left of “democratic socialist” Bernie Sanders.

Progressives have absorbed the Sanders playbook and are campaigning on platforms advocating free college tuition, free single-payer health care, and a jobs guarantee program for all. This is on top of calls for a $15 minimum wage and a new affordable housing mandate to address income and wealth inequality. They insist that this all can be done by taxing Wall Street, millionaires and rolling back the recent Republican tax cuts.

They will get a chance to test their liberal economic message in one of the most watched midterm races, a congressional election in Orange County, California, where Mimi Walters is the two-term Republican incumbent. This is an upscale swing voter district that Hillary Clinton won by five percentage points. Democrats have identified it as a key district to flip in their quest to retake the House. Facing Walters in the November general election is Katie Porter, a Democrat who finished a distant second to Walters in California’s “top-two” primary system.

Porter, a university professor and a protégé of Elizabeth Warren’s from her Harvard days, has been dubbed the “Elizabeth Warren of the West.” She has endorsed Bernie Sanders’s “Medicare for All” proposal, touts Nancy Pelosi’s plan to roll back the recently passed tax cuts, and insists that wealthy corporations “pay their fair share.”

However, her close association with Warren, which includes a fundraiser headlined by the Massachusetts liberal and numerous photos with her, are viewed as a vulnerability by some Republicans. “Katie Porter is out of touch with this district as a far-left progressive,” said Courtney Alexander, communications director of the Congressional Leadership Fund, a super PAC aligned with the Republican House leadership. “Going into the fall, she will be a sharp contrast to the Republican message of less taxes.”

https://www.wsj.com/articles/racial-gerrymanders-rebuked-1529968160

Liberals have weaponized the Voting Rights Act and sometimes found support from a conflicted Supreme Court. But a 5-4 majority on Monday pushed back hard against the left’s gambit in Texas to use the law to racially gerrymander legislative districts.

At issue in Abbott v. Perez were the state legislature’s 2013 Congressional and state House maps. After liberal groups sued to block the legislature’s 2011 redistricting plans, the Supreme Court ordered a lower court to redraw the maps for the 2012 election. The legislature then adopted the lower court’s maps with a few nips and tucks.

But lo, liberal plaintiffs contended the new maps were still “tainted” by bias, and a three-judge panel last summer gave the state what amounted to an ultimatum: Redo the maps or we will. Texas sought relief from the High Court, which showed sympathy to most of the state’s claims.

Writing for the majority, Samuel Alito explains that the Court has held that Section 2 of the Voting Rights Act commands states to provide minorities equal opportunity to elect the candidate of their choice. But the Equal Protection Clause of the Fourteenth Amendment also “forbids ‘racial gerrymandering,’” and prohibits “intentional ‘vote dilution.’” In other words, legislatures must consider race, but not too much.

https://pjmedia.com/trending/walkaway-campaign-urges-fed-up-democrats-to-leave-the-party/

A new grassroots movement is urging Democrats who are fed up with the ugly direction the party has taken in recent years — especially since President Trump was elected — to “walk away.” The #WalkAway campaign is “dedicated to sharing the stories of people who can no longer accept the current ideology of liberalism and what the Democratic Party has become,” the group’s Facebook page states.

Some left long ago. Many of us have recently been “red-pilled”. Some here have wanted to leave for some time, but have feared the consequences they might suffer from friends or family if they walk away.

This group is here to encourage and support those on the left to walk away from the divisive tenets by allowing people to share their stories, or watch the video testimonies and read the posts of others who have walked away.

Brandon Straka aka “The Unsilent Majority” kicked off the campaign with a video on May 26.

“It is my sincere hope that you will join me in this campaign and that we may start a movement in this country — which not only encourages others to walk away from the divisive left, but also takes back the narrative from the liberal media about what it means to be a conservative in America,” Straka says in the video.

It is up to all of us to make our voices heard and reclaim the truth. The Democratic Party has taken for granted that it owns racial, sexual, and religious minorities in America. It has encouraged groupthink, hypocrisy, division, stereotyping, resentment, and the acceptance of victimhood mentality. And all the while, they have discouraged minorities from having independent thought, open dialogue, measured and informed opinion, and a motivation to succeed.

“For years now, I have watched as the left has devolved into intolerance, inflexible, illogical, hateful, misguided, ill-informed, un-American, hypocritical, menacing, callous, ignorant, narrow-minded, and at times blatantly fascistic behavior and rhetoric,” Straka says in the video below.

The video has 1,156,248 views on Facebook and over 61,000 views on YouTube. The #WalkAway Facebook page has over 20,000 likes and over 6,000 members.

Straka, a gay man from Nebraska, says that he is one of the liberals who melted down in November of 2016 after Trump was elected. “It’s funny now, but at the time it was completely tragic,” he told conservative podcaster David J. Harris in a recent interview. “I was heartbeat away from being that ‘Leave Britney alone!’ guy … just crying hysterically,” he said. Straka told Harris that a string of emotional videos he made after the election are still up on his Facebook page. He said the reason he was so devastated was because he believed all of the media lies about Trump being a “racist, sexist, bigot, homophobe, sexual predator.” CONTINUE AT SITE

http://thehill.com/homenews/campaign/393676-races-to-watch-in-tuesdays-primaries

Voters in six states — Colorado, Maryland, New York, Oklahoma, South Carolina and Utah — head to the polls Tuesday to pick nominees in critical races ahead of November’s midterm elections.

Leading contenders include two African-American candidates fighting to become Maryland’s next governor, the first openly gay man with a strong shot at a governorship and a former presidential nominee who’s likely to claim a seat in the U.S. Senate.

Here are the key races to watch as results roll in:

Romney will finally beat Kennedy

Twenty-four years ago, Mitt Romney began his political career by mounting a surprisingly strong challenge to then-Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-Mass.). Romney came up short, but his first race put him on a path that led to the Republican presidential nomination in 2012.

Now, running to replace retiring Sen. Orrin Hatch (R-Utah), Romney is likely to exact a small measure of revenge against a Kennedy — though not one who’s related to the Massachusetts clan. A poll conducted last week showed Romney leading state Rep. Mike Kennedy (R) 65 percent to 23 percent.

Romney is all but certain to skate to the Senate in November. He will face Salt Lake County Councilwoman Jenny Wilson (D). Utah has not elected a Democrat to the Senate since Frank Moss won reelection in 1970. Hatch beat Moss six years later.

Big races in the Big Apple

New York voters will pick party nominees in federal races Tuesday, though they have to wait until September to nominate candidates for statewide office.

Four incumbents face credible threats in their home districts, led by Rep. Dan Donovan (R), whose predecessor, ex-Rep. Michael Grimm (R), is mounting a comeback bid. Democratic Reps. Carolyn Maloney, Joseph Crowley and Eliot Engel are under pressure too, though all three remain the heavy favorites in their New York City-based seats.

Democrats see opportunities this year to capture at least four upstate districts held by Republicans, especially if a blue wave begins to develop. The party faces competitive primaries in districts held by GOP Reps. John Faso, John Katko and Elise Stefanik. Democrats rallied around state Assemblyman Anthony Brindisi (D), who’s mounting a bid against Rep. Claudia Tenney (R).

https://www.nationalreview.com/2018/06/president-trump-bulldozes-republican-leaders-should-not-force-loaylty/The President cows his critics, but he should be careful how much loyalty he demands.

Inside the Republican party, President Trump is riding high and his critics seem to be running scared. He enjoys sky-high approval ratings from voters who identify with the GOP, and his Republican critics are paying a price for crossing him.

On Tuesday, the day that voters went to the polls in South Carolina, Trump slammed GOP representative Mark Sanford and urged Republicans to vote for his rival in the congressional race in the state’s first district:

The tweet almost certainly played a role in Sanford’s defeat. Next month, Representative Martha Roby of Alabama faces a run-off at least in part because she criticized Trump two years ago during the 2016 campaign. Trump’s ire at Arizona senator Jeff Flake probably played a role in Flake’s plummeting poll numbers and his decision last year to retire after one term.

Sanford ruefully told NBC’s Meet the Press that while he supported the president’s legislative agenda about 90 percent of the time, it wasn’t enough for some primary voters who demanded personal loyalty to Trump. His defeat will make it harder for his congressional colleagues to call Trump out, he said, whether it’s on trade or on his twist-and-turn foreign policy. “From an electoral sense, people are running for cover because they don’t want to be on the losing side of a presidential tweet,” Sanford told host Chuck Todd. “And from a popular standpoint, it’s almost a Faustian bargain: I’ll pander to you if you pander to me.”

That mutual dependency has smoothed over a lot of rough spots in President Trump’s relationship with GOP lawmakers. But on Tuesday, Trump will meet with House Republicans in an effort to push for his immigration policy. Some worry that Trump will threaten to undermine those who oppose him.

https://www.americanthinker.com/articles/2018/06/democrats_need_antisemites_to_win.html

The Democrat Party’s power depends on Jew-haters. Democrat politicians and their media elite pander and promote anti-Semitism for two reasons. It is a key part of the identity politics of the left, and since Obama’s transformative impact on his own party, the left is calling the tune on Democrat leadership, policy, and getting out the vote. The other reason is naked power. The Democrat Party can’t win with only the votes of decent people. They need the haters, so they’re fine with the hate.

We are talking about Democrats from top to bottom, regular Democrats — leadership, elected officials, donors, voters. We are talking about the Democrats’ indispensable voting blocs: blacks, Hispanic immigrants, feminists, gay activists, campus millennials, our growing Muslim population. Every Democratic demographic except white suburban women is stuffed with anti-Semites.

As the left wing takes over the Democratic levers of power, they are bringing anti-Jewish bigotry into the mainstream. Leftists embrace anti-Semitism on principle. The principle is intersectionality. While all whites and heterosexuals are attacked as oppressors, Jews are called out for special targeting, even progressive Jews.

The Collegefix.com reports:

Politically progressive Jews are also being ostracized by like-minded peers “because of their support, or even just presumed support, for Israel,” the report says: “Jewish students report being rejected from progressive social justice activities such as pro-choice rallies, anti-rape demonstrations, Black Lives Matter events and racial justice conferences.”

This is not about compassion for Arabs. Swastika graffiti on campuses calls for death to Israel. It calls for all Jews to be killed. Progressive attacks on Israel morphs into old-fashioned anti-Semitism: Jews murder children, secretly run things, are subhuman creatures, are pariahs.

https://www.nationalreview.com/2018/06/midterm-elections-trump-may-not-drive-voters-to-democrats/
Voters also dislike the Left’s nonstop focus on impeachment and ‘resistance.’

Five months before the midterm elections, predictions that Democrats will ride a “blue wave” to forcefully sweep away GOP control of the House of Representatives have become hopes that a high tide can still bring them a bare majority of 218 seats.

Last week, political analyst Larry Sabato found 211 House seats at least leaning to the Republicans, 198 at least leaning to the Democrats, and 26 toss-ups. If the toss-ups break evenly, Democrats would gain 17 seats, but the GOP would still have a 224-to-211 House majority. What has changed to give Republicans a better-than-fighting chance to hold on?

One explanation is the economy, which may improve President Trump’s approval ratings and affect how voters plan to vote in November. In June 2016, only 32 percent of Americans rated the economy as “good” or “excellent.” Today 62 percent do. The growth rate for President Obama’s last year in office was only 1.6 percent; growth projections for the second quarter of 2018 are north of 4 percent. The stock market is up 25 percent since Trump’s inauguration. Midterm elections that have occurred in a cycle featuring clear economic growth, such as those in 1998 and 1978, have seen the party that occupies the White House doing much better than in years when the economy was struggling.

Nonetheless, President Trump’s drama-prone leadership seems to be contributing to his less-than-stellar polling numbers, which are still upside down. But his favorability ratings have improved. His job approval was only 37 percent in December. The average of polls monitored by RealClearPolitics now has him at just under 43 percent approval, his highest in more than a year. Along with that improvement, Republicans now are only about five to seven points behind in polls that ask voters which party they want to control Congress. That is significantly below the 12.5 percentage point lead that Democrats had in June 2006, the last year they took back control of the House.

https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/270395/brotherhood-linked-congressman-running-be-ag-matthew-vadum
Just for the record, Ellison who represents District 5 in Minnesota, got an 8+ from the Arab American Association, for his anti-Israel bias and votes…..rsk

Brotherhood-linked Congressman Keith Ellison is giving up his ultra-safe seat in the U.S. House of Representatives to run for the post of attorney general of Minnesota, a risky move in a state that isn’t as radically left-wing as his home district.

The primary election is Aug. 14.

Ellison, the Democratic National Committee (DNC) deputy chairman who essentially endorsed the violent anarchists and communists of the subversive Antifa movement, claims he wants to be the North Star State’s top lawyer to litigate away in a quest for justice.

“It was attorneys general who led the fight against [President Trump’s so-called] Muslim ban,” Ellison said after filing his paperwork on the final day allowed. “I want to be a part of that fight.”

“As Attorney General, I will push for equal rights under the law, for commonsense gun safety laws, and for criminal justice reform that ends unjust policies and creates a pathway for Minnesotans to reenter as contributing members of society.”

“No one — not even a President — is above the law,” he wrote in a statement. Minnesotans “need a fighter on their side,” he added, calling himself the “People’s Lawyer.”

But the term “People’s Lawyer” has a special meaning for left-wing radicals.

The Left likes to refer to some of its legal heroes like Sixties icon William Kunstler as “People’s Lawyers.” It’s not what you might think.

A “People’s Lawyer” – the phrase is always capitalized – is a crusading, small-c communist attorney who devotes his life to using the legal system to fundamentally transform America. As such it is a profoundly antisocial, un-American concept, so, naturally, it is embraced by the communist-dominated National Lawyers Guild (NLG).