RUTHFULLY YOURS

https://www.wsj.com/articles/pelosis-coronavirus-power-grab-11588526451?cx_testId=3&cx_testVariant=cx_4&cx_artPos=6#cxrecs_s

“The coronavirus has given Mrs. Pelosi the greatest control over the House of Representatives of any speaker in U.S. history. Fear of the virus has given her an excuse to send 434 of us home and essentially say, “See you when I need you.” Before Republicans objected two weeks ago, she even sought an amendment to House rules to allow for proxy voting. Under this plan, representatives wouldn’t even need to return to Washington to vote and pass legislation. They could simply hand over their voting cards to Mrs. Pelosi or one of her lieutenants.”

For nearly two months, my staff and I have been fielding calls from the people of southwest Alabama—small-business owners, bankers, seniors and many others. The government’s response to coronavirus is affecting their livelihoods, and their congressman may be the only voice they have in Washington. But when the lights are turned off in the committee rooms and on the floor of the House, who’s watching out for them? Who’s holding Washington accountable?

More important than the flawed message Congress’s absence sends to the American people—that their representatives value personal protection over their constituents’ interests—is the reality. When nobody is around, it is easier to make backroom deals, and Speaker Nancy Pelosi is taking advantage. She has consolidated the power of the institution in her person. Without lawmakers there to speak up for their districts and influence the legislative process, Mrs. Pelosi has made herself the sole voice and negotiator for the House, as it passes massive funding and regulatory bills.

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2020/05/a_new_york_times_opinion_writer_says_its_time_to_dump_biden.html

On Sunday, I wrote that it’s been fun watching Democrats struggle with the Biden conundrum: Do they rally around him or, because he’s obviously mentally diminished and has significant corruption problems, do they use Tara Reade’s accusation against him as an excuse to boot him out? By Sunday night, Elizabeth Bruenig, a New York Times opinion writer, had her verdict: It’s time for Biden to go.

Bruenig is surprisingly sympathetic to Reade. She acknowledges that Reade’s story has been inconsistent and that she’s a somewhat eccentric character. However, unlike other Democrat journalists, she extends to Reade the same benefit of the doubt that Democrats routinely extend to politically correct victims:

Ms. Reade’s account is not nearly as incredible as some have argued. In the course of my reporting, I have worked closely with many survivors of sexual assault. It isn’t unusual, in my experience, for survivors to exhibit behavior that seems unstable or erratic to others. They may initially disclose to investigators or journalists only a fragment of what happened, and then reveal more over time — some even falsely recant, either because they sense the police don’t believe them, or because they fear the consequences of pressing their claims. And victims often maintain relationships with their attackers or harbor mixed feelings about them.

“It’s not at all uncommon for someone to still have positive feelings about aspects of the person who assaulted them, or to admire or respect them,” Scott Berkowitz, the founder and president of the Rape, Abuse & Incest National Network (RAINN) told me. “With people who work for politicians, there’s usually a strong measure of loyalty or respect in that relationship. So it’s not indicative that someone wasn’t telling the truth.”

https://thefederalist.com/2020/05/01/potential-vp-picks-thirsty-for-higher-office-overlook-biden-sexual-assault-allegations/

EXCERPTS:

Democrats are descending into disarray as their presumptive presidential nominee battles allegations of sexual assault far more credible than anything ever thrown at Supreme Court Justice Brett Kavanaugh, whose unsubstantiated allegations prompted calls for the Justice’s nomination to be withdrawn and subsequent pleas for impeachment.

As Biden searches for a running mate amid the accusations, here’s what the same people who praised Ford’s testimony are saying about Reade so not to spoil their chances in the veepstakes:

Stacey Abrams

Abrams is taking a break from her imaginary duties as governor of Georgia to break from tradition by publicly campaigning for the number two spot.

After Biden finally addressed the allegations head on, Abrams came out with a lackluster statement paling in comparison to what she said about Ford.

“I am pleased that the Vice President directly addressed these allegations and by how he addressed them. Women and all people should be heard, and they deserve a safe space and process through which they can come forward,” Abrams said.

On Tuesday, Abrams offered a more passionate defense on CNN.

“I believe Joe Biden,” Abrams said. “I believe that he is a person who has demonstrated his love of family, of our community, has been made perfectly clear through his work as a congressional leader and as an American leader. I know Joe Biden and I think he’s telling the truth and this did not happen.”

That’s a sharp turnaround from when Abrams said “I believe women,” in 2018.

Kamala Harris

California Democratic Sen. Kamala Harris fared no better in the sweepstakes of Me Too hypocrisy to land a top spot on the Democratic ticket.

“I believe her,” Harris said of Ford’s allegations in 2018. “Anybody who comes forward at this point to be prepared to testify in the United States Senate against someone who’s being nominated to one of the most powerful positions in the United States government, that takes an extraordinary amount of courage.”

According to Harris, simply testifying before Congress should make any allegations inherently truthful, no matter the evidence. Let’s not forget that Harris used to be the attorney general of California.

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2020/05/joe_bidens_running_mate_will

Once Joe Biden emerges from his basement bunker as the presumptive Democrat party presidential nominee by default, he’s expected to name his vice presidential running mate.  He’s promised to choose a woman but has provided no clue as to whom he will tap to carry his water for the next six months.  One thing is for certain: she will be tasked to defend and run interference for a man exhibiting serious mental decline issues, a man who has been accused of sexual impropriety by a former female Senate staffer, and a man whose checkered career in politics is guaranteed to be fodder for President Trump.

Prior to the nationwide COVID-19 lockdown and before sequestering himself in his Delaware home, Joe Biden’s questionable behavior in public was already raising eyebrows.  Multiple incidents plagued his performance on the campaign trail, ranging from sudden bouts of anger and insulting audience members at campaign rallies to licking his wife’s fingers while she spoke at a campaign event.  His oftentimes awkward television interviews, coupled with an obvious inability to string together a coherent sentence, has left even the most casual observer wondering what’s wrong with Joe.

https://www.theepochtimes.com/washington-police-say-tara-reade-sexual-assault-complaint-against-biden-is-now-inactive_3333048.html#

The Washington, D.C., Metropolitan Police Department (MPD) are no longer investigating Tara Reade’s sexual assault complaint against Joe Biden, a spokesman for the agency told the Washington Examiner.

“This is an inactive case, and there are no additional details to provide,” a police spokesman said April 29, providing no further comment.

Reade, a former Biden staffer, filed a report on April 9, 2020 with police in which she said she was a victim of sexual assault but did not name Biden. The court filing stated, “Subject-1 disclosed that she was the victim of a sexual assault which was committed by Subject-2 in 1993.”

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2020/05/democrat_feminists_excuse_democrat_sexual_predatorsbecause_theyre_democrats.html

Democrats, especially people who identify as women and also identify as Democrats and especially people who identify as women and identify as Democrats and also identify as feminist, seem to believe that it is perfectly fine for men who identify as Democrats to assault and sexually harass women or otherwise take advantage of them.  This is a decades-old line of Democratic thinking, as there are now senior citizen Democratic women who still swoon over noted Democratic, er…Lotharios such as Sen Ted Kennedy (D-Mass.).

Skipping through the decades to the present, there are the many Democratic women who not only excuse President Bill Clinton (D) despite all the solid proof of his sexual predatory behavior against women, but also defend him.  Most notable is his supposed injured wife, noted feminist Hillary Rodham Clinton, who dismissed the charges and allegations against her husband as “a vast right-wing conspiracy” in numerous public outings.  (What she thought in private might have been different.)  Incidentally, Hillary added Clinton to her name, not in 1975 when she married Bill, but years later to help her husband win re-election as governor of Arkansas.

Here’s how Bill Clinton explained it to Bruck:

When she came to me and said she wanted to change, I could see in her eyes that she had made the decision to do it. And I said, “I do not want you resenting me. I would a lot rather lose the election than lose you.” She said, “I’m not going anywhere.” I said, “I know, but I don’t want you to resent this for the rest of your life. You made this decision when you were a child. I like it. I approve of the decision. I don’t care about it.” And she said, “Look, Bill, we cannot—this is stupid! We shouldn’t lose the election over this issue. We shouldn’t run this risk. What if it’s one per cent of the vote? What if it’s two per cent? You might win or lose the election by two per cent.”

https://pjmedia.com/election/bryan-preston/2020/04/30/biden-select-im-not-making-this-up-chris-waitress-sandwich-dodd-to-lead-vp-search-n386844

File this in “you can’t make this stuff up.” The “stuff” being both the facts of the case and how the media are already responding to it.

Presumed Democrat presidential nominee Joe Biden has selected his pal, former Sen. Chris Dodd, to head up his veep search. Axios reports, while leaving out some very important context.

Joe Biden is one step closer to naming a running mate, announcing four co-chairs and a committee to vet candidates for a job he has committed to filling with a woman.

Driving the news: The vice presidential selection committee will be headed by Biden’s longtime friend former Sen. Chris Dodd; Cynthia Hogan, a longtime aide and adviser who served as Biden’s vice presidential counsel in the Obama White House; and two national campaign co-chairs, Delaware Rep. Lisa Blunt Rochester and Los Angeles Mayor Eric Garcetti.

That first name in the paragraph is important. Dodd is a particularly problematic figure in Biden’s current circumstances. As we and others have been reporting, Biden is facing an allegation that he sexually assaulted his then-Senate staff member, Tara Reade, in 1993. Reade’s story has been corroborated. That doesn’t mean he’s guilty, but Biden pushed the Kavanaugh narrative as much as anybody, and that narrative explicitly sought to deny Kavanaugh due process.

Having learned nothing at all, Biden taps Dodd to seek his veep. Why is this a problem?

Because Dodd was best pals with the late Sen. Ted Kennedy, a well-known notorious womanizer who left Mary Jo Kopechne to die at Chappaquiddick — and who with Dodd performed the notorious “waitress sandwich” at La Brasserie restaurant.

https://www.nationalreview.com/news/stacey-abrams-on-tara-reade-allegation-biden-will-make-women-proud-as-president/

“I stand by [former] vice president Biden,” Gillibrand told reporters during a conference call. “He’s devoted his life to supporting women and he has vehemently denied this allegation.”

Former Georgia gubernatorial candidate Stacey Abrams on Tuesday said she backed Joe Biden despite new allegations of sexual assault against the former vice president.

“I believe women deserve to be heard, and I believe that has happened here,” Abrams told the Huffington Post. “The allegations have been heard and looked into, and for too many women, often, that is not the case. The New York Times conducted a thorough investigation, and nothing in the Times review or any other later reports suggests anything other than what I already know about Joe Biden: That he will make women proud as the next President of the United States.”

Abrams has been lobbying to be Biden’s pick for vice president, declaring her intentions publicly and, before Biden’s presumptive victory, meeting with Democratic candidates privately regarding the position.

https://www.americanthinker.com/blog/2020/04/the_house_of_representatives_has_identified_itself_as_a_nonessential_service.html

The original plan in Washington, D.C., was for both the Senate and the House to reconvene on May 4. News broke on Tuesday, though, that the House will not be returning to work. It turns out that so many members of the House panicked at the thought of working once more for the American people that House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer was forced to announce that the House would remain closed next week (emphasis added):

We made a judgment that we will not come back next week but that we hope to come back very soon,” Hoyer told reporters on a press call.

Hoyer said he and Pelosi made the decision to halt plans to return after consulting Monday evening with the Capitol’s attending physician, who warned that lawmakers could be at risk given the still-rising number of coronavirus cases in the Washington, D.C. area. Nearly 4,000 people have tested positive in D.C., as of Monday, plus thousands more in the Maryland and Virginia suburbs.

“We had no choice. If the Capitol physician recommends that we not come back, then we have to take that guidance,” Pelosi told reporters on a separate call Tuesday afternoon.

Pelosi’s statement that “we had no choice” is a load of bull manure. All over America, people have been making choices to keep the country functional: Healthcare workers, truckers, factory workers, store clerks, sanitation workers, and many more. The list is endless.