Obama's Legacy Is Coming Unglued, Despite Schumer's Cynical Efforts, as President Trump and His Supreme Court Take Over

THE REAL NEWS IS THAT SENATOR CHUCK SCHUMER IS NOT A SERIOUS PERSON. That's what President Trump says. • • • SCHUMER CALLED FOR OBAMACARE MEETING. President Trump questioned Senate Minority Leader Charles Schumer's proposal that all 100 Senators meet to talk about Obamacare. While the President was preparing to take pictures with the World Champion Chicago Cubs on Wednesday at the White House, a reporter shouted a question about Schumer's offer. Trump paused, then he said he had to "find out if he's serious." The President added : "He's done a lot of bad talking. He hasn't been serious. Obamacare is such a disaster -- such a wreck. He wants to save something that's hurting a lot of people. He just doesn't seem like a serious person." Democrat Schumer recently sent a letter to his Republican counterpart, Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell, asking to meet to talk healthcare. Politico quoted the letter : "The US Senate has long been considered the world’s greatest deliberative body and, as members of that body, we should each support open and robust debate." Schumer has recently attacked the Republican bill as one that would hurt scores of Americans. • We know that the truth about Obamacare is that it's on life-support. Insurers are fleeing. Many Americans have only one or no provider to choose from. And when they can find a provider in their state, the out-of-pocket expenses are so high -- as much as $6,500 per person according to GOP Senator, and medical doctor, Barrasco -- that most Americans cannot afford to go to a doctor at all, for any problem, unless they are being subsidized by the government. • Obamacare is the worst of the poster children for Barack Obama's presidency, and there are many other disasters to add to the list. When will the Democrats accept that they produced a healthcare failure, with Nancy Pelosi's catastrophic leadership and infamous "You have to pass this bill to know what's in it" comment. Progressive Democrats and their mainstream media mouthpieces ought to stop defending Obama and start defending the American public by helping to find a way out of the train-wreck Obamacare plan that they created. • • • SCHUMER IS ALSO IN TROUBLE WITH GRASSLEY. Senate Judiciary Committee Chairman Chuck Grassley on Wednesday slammed Minority Leader Chuck Schumer for using a rare procedure to block a classified briefing on the Obama administration's steps to "unmask" members of the Trump campaign and transition teams. Committee members told the Washington Times they had planned to use the session with intelligence officials to find out how agencies identified Americans whose communications with foreigners outside the United States were monitored. Senator Grassley, the Judiciary Committtee Chairman, tweeted : "Today, the Judiciary Committee was set to hear from senior intelligence officials about highly sensitive intelligence gathering authorities that will soon require action from Congress....It's disturbing and reckless for the minority leader to block the briefing....We've seen too many recent reminders of how unsafe the world is today. This is no time to play politics with our national security." • Under Senate rules, Schumer can object to committees holding meetings beyond the first two hours after the Senate's day begins. No new date for the briefing had been scheduled. • Last week, Grassley chastised Schumer twice for using the same tactic to block two Judiciary Committee actions : a hearing on Russian involvement in last year's presidential election and a session concerning legislation to block human trafficking. Grassley said : "The federal government's primary responsibility is to protect the American people, so it's unbelievable that the minority leader would block Senators from both parties from holding a national security briefing to examine our nation's most critical tools to protect the homeland." • Schumer's cynical action speaks volumes about the real fears behind Congress's Democratic minority efforts to stonewall, sidetrack and prevent the Republican majority from actually finding out what Obama and his national security staff did to turn FISA surveillance of foreigners into a political witch hunt against the GOP presidential candidate, Donald Trump, and his team. When will the MSM speak up about this latest Democrat "abuse of power"? When will Americans of all political preferences demand that the Democrats give up on their fake news war on Trump and get on with helping to govern America, as they were supposedly elected to do? Is there a Democrat grassroots or are all Democrats simply obedient rubber stamps for CNN, Chuck Schumer and Barack Obama?? • • • A NEW OBAMA SIN CROPS UP. Legal Insurrection reported on June 10 : "Just when you thought Obama’s disastrous Iran deal couldn’t get any worse, we learn that in order to protect the bad deal, Obama systematically disbanded units investigating Iran’s terror-funding networks. Not only that, but he also disbanded units investigating the state funding of terrorists by Syria and Venezuela. • The internet news site was quoting the Washington Free Beacon : "The Obama administration 'systematically disbanded' law enforcement investigative units across the federal government focused on disrupting Iranian, Syrian, and Venezuelan terrorism financing networks out of concern the work could cause friction with Iranian officials and scuttle the nuclear deal with Iran, according to David Asher, a former US official who spent decades dismantling terrorist financial networks." Asher, who previously served as an advisor to General John Allen at the Defense and State Departments, told the House Foreign Affairs Committee in June that top officials across several key law enforcement and intelligence agencies in the Obama administration “systematically disbanded” law enforcement activities targeting the terrorism financing operations of Iran, Hezbollah, and Venezuela in the lead-up to and during the nuclear negotiations with Teheran. Asher testified : “Senior leadership, presiding, directing, and overseeing various sections [of these agencies] and portions of the US intelligence community systematically disbanded any internal or external stakeholder action that threatened to derail the administration’s policy agenda focused on Iran." Under oath, Asher attributed the dismantling of terror investigations to the Iran deal that Obama was determined to reach...at any cost. The Washington Free Beacon article reported : "that [Asher] attributed the motivation for decisions to dismantle the investigative units to 'concerns about interfering with the Iran deal,' a reference to the nuclear deal forged between the US, five other world powers, and Iran during the final years of the Obama administration. As a result, 'several top cops' retired and the US government lost their years of expertise. The United States squandered the chance 'at a very low financial cost' to take apart Hezbollah’s finances, its global organization, and the Iran proxy’s ability to 'readily terrorize us, victimize us, and run a criminal network through our shores, inside our banking systems -- and in partnership with the world’s foremost drug cartels -- target our state and society,' [Asher] said. 'We lost much of the altitude we had gained in our global effort, and many aspects including key personnel, who were reassigned, budgets that were slashed -- many key elements of the investigations that were underway were undermined.' " • We can add this to the basketful of disasters foisted on America and the world by Obama, the US President whose only concern was the cosmetics of his persona and legacy. • • • ANOTHER OBAMA DISASTER IS THE RUSSIAN ASCENDANCY IN SYRIA. TheHill's Max Greenwood reported that the Pentagon said on Tuesday : "the US has observed chemical weapons activity at a Syrian air base used to launch the April chemical attack that left dozens of civilians dead." Pentagon spokesman Captain Jeff Davis said that the US has seen “active preparations for chemical weapons use,” according to the Associated Press. • It is not clear if another chemical strike by the Syrian government is imminent, but the last prompted President Trump to launch a missile strike. The White House said in a statement Monday night that the US had identified potential preparations for a chemical strike by the regime of Syrian President Bashar al-Assad, and warned the Syrian government against conducting another attack. White House press secretary Sean Spicer said : "As we have previously stated, the United States is in Syria to eliminate the Islamic State of Iraq and Syria. If, however, Mr. Assad conducts another mass murder attack using chemical weapons, he and his military will pay a heavy price." • Syria's government as well as Russia, which backs al-Assad, rejected the White House's allegations on Tuesday. A chemical strike allegedly carried out by the al-Assad regime in April left dozens of civilians dead, many of them children. That attack prompted President Trump to launch a strike on the Syrian government's Shayrat airfield, from which the chemical attack was believed to originate. • CNBC published an article on Wednesday stating that Russia has doubled down on its rhetoric against the US for the allegations that its ally Syrian President Bashar al-Assad was planning a new chemical weapons attack. In the latest round, a Russian Foreign Ministry official on Wednesday slammed the US for not accepting assurances from the Syrian government that there are no preparations for a chemical attack. When the White House warnings were issued Monday and threats made about a response, a Kremlin spokesman the next day termed it "unacceptable." • The new criticism was published on the Facebook page of the Russian Foreign Ministry's spokesperson Maria Zakharova but also picked up Wednesday by Tass and other state media. Zakharova said : "We know from the past that the (George W.) Bush regime has already used the falsification of facts on weapons of mass destruction in Iraq against its own people to carry out a military aggression against that country. We are seriously concerned over this." • US Secretary of State Rex Tillerson spoke to his Russian counterpart on Monday, the State Department confirmed Tuesday. A State Department spokesperson told reporters : "The Secretary has made his concerns clear in the past and continues to do so with regard to Russia." • The al-Assad regime continues to deny that it was responsible for the chemical weapons attack on April 4 in Khan Sheikhoun, a rebel-held town in northern Syria, that claimed at least 70 lives, including children. The US blamed that chemical attack on the al-Assad regime, and President Trump responded by launching Tomahawk missiles against the Shayrat air base operated by the Syrian government. • CNBC says there are indications that the Syrians may have gotten the message on chemical weapons. US Defense Secretary James Mattis told the Stars and Stripes newspaper and other media traveling with him to a NATO event : "It appears they took the warnings seriously." According to the paper, Mattis wouldn't divulge what the US saw that made them concerned about another chemical attack. He also wouldn't confirm that it involved anything to do with the Shayrat base, which the US linked to the April chemical attack. • But, instead of drawing and erasing lines in the sand, President Trump acted decisively in April to warn al-Assad and his military that chemical weapons attacks will not be tolerated. President Obama could have done the same thing, but instead, he vacillated and did nothing, and the chemical attacks continued. • • • NORTH KOREA AND CHINA, ANOTHER HOTSPOT. Reuters reported last week that President Trump "is growing increasingly frustrated with China over its inaction on North Korea and bilateral trade issues and is now considering possible trade actions against Beijing." Reuters was quoting three senior administration officials, who told Reuters that Trump is impatient with China and looking at a range of options, including tariffs on steel imports, which Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross already has said he is considering as part of a national security study of the US steel industry. The officials told Reusters there is no consensus yet on the way forward with China and they did not say what other options were being studied. • Reuters also reported that the United States "has also pressed China to exert more economic and diplomatic pressure on North Korea to help rein in its nuclear and missile programs. Beijing has repeatedly said its influence on North Korea is limited and that it is doing all it can." The death of American university student Otto Warmbier last week, after his release from 17 months of imprisonment in Pyongyang, has further complicated Trump’s approach to North Korea, his top national security challenge. • Trump signaled his disappointment with China's efforts in a tweet last week : “While I greatly appreciate the efforts of President Xi & China to help with North Korea, it has not worked out. At least I know China tried!” North Korea's tests of long-range missiles continue unabated and there have been reports Pyongyang is preparing for another underground nuclear test. Trump has said that the US naval presence and carriers will remain near the Korean peninsula. Trump met Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi on Monday at the White House and made a point of noting that the United States, India and Japan would be joining together in naval exercises soon in the Indian Ocean, a point that seemed aimed at India rival China. Trump also thanked India for joining the United States in imposing new sanctions against North Korea. • The North Korea nuclear issue has festered since the Bush administration, but it was President Obama who stopped the meetings that were ongoing under President Bush. It is another ticking bomb left by Obama on President Trump's desk. • • • DEAR READERS, while we think about the many problems President Obama botched and then left for President Trump to deal with, we can also think about several areas where President Trump has quickly picked up the dropped ball and is making real progress -- immigration, military preparedness and control of its functions, VA revamping, regulations eased for the energy sector, the Keystone Pipeline, and much more. • And, President Trump is having an immense impact on the rest of the world. To add details to several of yesterday's topics, here are updates. • Concerning the "Trade Disagreement" between President Trump and Chancellor Merkel, CNBC reported that US Commerce Secretary Wilbur Ross has at the last minute pulled out of a trip to Germany on Tuesday, according to the German economy ministry, which did not give a reason for the cancellation that comes at a sensitive time with Washington over trade policy. Ross had been due to meet German Economy Minister Brigitte Zypries and to address an event hosted by the economic council of Chancellor Merkel's conservative party. Trade has become a source of friction between Merkel and Trump, who advocates "America First" policies, while Merkel has made free and fair trade one of her priorities in the German Group of 20 presidency. Merkel will host a G-20 summit in Hamburg on July 7-8, and said earlier this week that she does not see common interests between the United States and Europe on climate and trade policy at the moment. But, Merkel said the United States can be relied on when it comes to security, and Germany is looking to see where there were other areas of agreement. Last week, Merkel used an appearance alongside veteran German-born US diplomat Henry Kissinger to stress that the transatlantic relationship was rooted in "joint convictions, values, and understandings." Merkel said a strong European economy is good for the United States, reminding her audience that a month ago, Trump called Germany's trade and spending policies "very bad." This spat will work itself out, because finally, Europe needs to be on friendly terms with President Trump and the United States, and the US needs a committed Germany in the NATO alliance that protects both Europe and America. But, Trump is making his point -- that America will not continue to be the cash cow for all of Europe. • And, as the Supreme Court handed down its first set of decisions with newly sworn-in Justice Neil Gorsuch on the Court, analysts are already talking about an emerging pattern in the Chief Justice Roberts Court -- it's about defending the First Amendment right to religious freedom. While Gorsuch did not participate in the bulk of these First Amendment decisions, he was invloved in the Missouri decision handed down on Monday that gave a religious school the right to participate in public programs that have nothing to do with religion. The Supreme Court under Roberts is well on its way to becoming an historic champion of religious freedom. The trend began in 2012, when the Court blocked federal authorities from trying to apply equal-employment law to the hiring of church ministers in a unanimous decision. Then, the Court ruled that the upstate town of Greece, New York, was within its rights to permit volunteer chaplains to open town meetings with a prayer, to the great consternation of the New York Times. Then came the Hobby Lobby case, in which the Court in a 5-4 decision exempted the religious owners of a closely held retail chain of craft stores from the contraceptive mandate that was put into effect by the Department of Health and Human Services after Obamacare’s passage. Later, even the Court's most Progressive members had to agree that the Little Sisters of the Poor, a group of nuns who care for the elderly poor, had the right not to be entangled in the birth-control mandate -- in a 9-0 decision. • And, that brings us back to the trunk full of Obama errors as President. What was Obama thinking when he gratuitously attempted to bully a charity named Little Sisters of the Poor. Not about the Constitution, evidently. And, now the Court has agreed to hear the case of the wedding-cake baker, Jack Phillips, under fire from the Colorado Civil Rights Commission for refusing to bake a cake for a same-sex marriage. The case will be heard in the October term. • As Obama's executive orders and administrative regulations come unglued one-by-one, we will see the return of religious freedom and, once again, we will be able to publicly thank God for the Supreme Court.