As the Week Ends -- TWA 800, Elijah Cummings, Julian Assange, and President and Mrs. Trump at Arlington

LET'S REVIEW STORIES WE COULDN'T FIT IN THIS WEEK. And, let's begin with the ill-fated TWA 800 flight. • • • "DID TRUMP SEND TWA 800 SIGNAL AT MONTOURSVILLE?" That's what Jack Cashill asked on WND when he wrote about the President's rally in Montoursville. Jack Cashill -- who wrote TWA 800 and is an expert on the flight -- wants President Trump to reopen the probe into the deadly downing of the aircraft. For his rally on Monday, the President chose Montoursville, a pleasant little town of fewer than 5,000 people in Lycoming County, Pennsylvania. Cashill says those who have heard of Montoursville : "...include the CIA analysts, FBI honchos and Clinton White House operatives who orchestrated the cover-up of the TWA 800 crash. On July 17, 1996, the ill-fated 747 was shot down off the coast of Long Island, almost surely by accident, killing all 230 people on board. Among the dead were 16 French-Club students from Montoursville High School and five of their chaperones. I have been to Montoursville and spoken with people who lost their children. They are still waiting for answers." • Cashill says : "Many people are waiting for answers, including the hundreds of TWA veterans with whom I have spoken, most recently at a heavily attended LAX event led by retired TWA Captain Al Francis. The TWA vets lost 53 of their colleagues on board that plane. If there is one among them who buys the government line that a rogue spark blew up the center fuel tank, I have not met him or her. A question I have heard often, and I suspect Captain Francis has too, is whether President Trump can or will reopen the investigation, there being no riper example of Deep State treachery than the TWA 800 investigation. I am not optimistic, but Monday’s rally gave me a glimmer of hope. In the special congressional election held the following day, Republican Fred Keller did not need the President’s help : he won by a greater than 2-to-1 margin. Presuming that the election inspired the trip, the obvious site of the rally should have been the nearby and much larger Williamsport, the county seat and celebrated home of the Little League World Series. Indeed, there are many towns in Pennsylvania’s 12th district larger than Montoursville. But the President chose Montoursville." • Cashill outlines "what Trump’s people need to know" about TWA 800 : "According to an air traffic controller at NY TRACON, 'A primary radar return (ASR-9) indicated vertical movement intersecting TWA 800,' and then TWA800 disappeared. As anti-terror czar Richard Clarke tells it, he immediately called a high level meeting in the White House situation room. Illegally, but publicly, the FBI seized control of the investigation from the NTSB within hours of the crash. According to CIA documents, 'The DI [Directorate of Intelligence] became involved in the ‘missile theory’ the day after the crash occurred.' The CIA’s George Tenet told the 9/11 Commission in March 2004 that a 'wall' prevented the CIA and FBI from cooperating on national security issues. As the CIA documents prove, the CIA and FBI collaborated uneasily on the TWA 800 investigation for the next 16 months, wall or no wall. According to the CIA, within two weeks of the disaster, FBI agents had interviewed 144 'excellent' eyewitnesses to a likely missile strike and found the evidence for such a strike 'overwhelming.' The CIA analyst boasted of discouraging the FBI from releasing its missile report. He seems to have succeeded. Two weeks later, the FBI permitted the New York Times to interview one and only one eyewitness. He saw the event out of the corner of his eye and thought it was a bomb. The NTSB eventually identified 258 eyewitnesses who had seen a glowing object streaking towards TWA 800. At least 56 had followed the object from the horizon. The Times interviewed none of the 258. The eyewitnesses were not easily explained away. With the NTSB illegally shut out of witness review, the FBI turned the task over to the CIA. Working with just one-third of the witness statements, the CIA concluded that the eyewitnesses saw the aircraft ascend more than 3,000 feet after a spontaneous explosion blew off the plane’s nose. In April 1997, the head of the FBI missile team, Steve Bongardt, bucked the brass and demanded to know why the CIA failed to account for the eight witnesses who saw an object 'hit the aircraft.' The CIA blew him off. Instead, the CIA created a specious animation to promote its exploding fuel tank theory. The FBI showed the animation once, when it closed the criminal case in November 1997. To sell this lie, as the CIA documents prove, the CIA created at least three critical witness statements from whole cloth and flagrantly corrupted more than 200 others. The deputy attorney general who successfully oversaw the investigation, Jamie Gorelick, left the Justice Department in 1997 to take a job with Fannie Mae. She would make more than $25 million over the next six years. In 2004, Gorelick left Fannie Mae to become a member of the 9/11 Commission. In April 2004, Attorney General John Ashcroft testified to the 9/11 Commission, 'The single greatest structural cause for September 11 was the 'wall.' Full disclosure,' Ashcroft continued, 'compels me to inform you that its author is a member of the commission.' Yes, that commissioner was Jamie Gorelick. As the nation learned in the aftermath of 9/11, the 'wall' that was breached all too easily to protect the secrets of TWA 800 held much too firmly when it came to the secrets of our enemies. Those responsible for the cover-up had to sleep just a wee bit uneasily Monday night. They know what 'Montoursville' means. Here’s hoping the President does, too." • In a separate American Thinker article on Wednesday, Jack Cashill asked "Why did Trump hold a rally in this small Pennsylvania town?" Cashill answered his own question by sating : "If there was a reason President Donald Trump chose the small Pennsylvania town of Montoursville to hold a campaign rally, no one in the media is saying what it is. In the absence of any answers, let me suggest one, admittedly more speculative than proven but a possibility nonetheless. In 1996, during the midst of Bill Clinton's desperate drive to become President [for a second term], 16 French club members from the Montoursville high school and five of their chaperones died in the crash of TWA Flight 800 off the coast of Long Island. Although the phrase has been much abused, there is none better than 'cover-up' to describe what followed. Like many initiatives the Clinton White House choreographed, this one was highly improvisational. Before it was through, with the CIA calling the shots and the FBI following its lead, the TWA 800 investigation would make several sharp course corrections. To be sure, the great majority of those working the investigation had little or no idea it was being misdirected. Some who did harbor suspicions bravely resisted the misdirection, but they had almost nowhere to turn with their protests. Had there been a vigilant media to hear these individuals, or even a mature internet to share their objections, the truth would have surfaced, but it has not. At least not yet. What better place to start the unraveling than Montoursville?" • The official US government report issued by the NTSB found that the probable cause of the crash of TWA Flight 800 was an explosion of flammable fuel/air vapors in a fuel tank, most likely from a short-circuit. Conspiracy theories say the crash was due to a US Navy missile test gone awry, a terrorist missile strike, or an on-board bomb. Jack Cashill clearly does not think it was an on-board bomb. • • • TWA800.COM. This is the site of the Associated Retired Aviation Professionals, formed in early 1997. Its members include former military, civilian, and aviation professionals who are committed to independently investigating the mysterious crash of TWA Flight 800 on July 17, 1996. • Commander William S. Donaldson, USN (ret.), challenged the official NTSB position on the cause of the crash of TWA Flight 800 in a series of letters to James Hall, Chairman of the NTSB between April 1997 and December 2000. During those four years, Commander Donaldson worked with other Retired Aviation Professionals, including some previous crash investigators as well as persons inside the NTSB investigation itself. Commander Donaldson, who died in 2001, had extensive experience as a Naval crash investigator and he and others concluded that the NTSB's explanation of the Center Wing Tank explosion was not credible. With the help of these other concerned aviation professionals,Commander Donaldson produced an extensive report on the cause of the crash. The initial Interim Report was delivered to the House Aviation Subcommittee on July 16th, 1998. Since that time a great deal of new information has surfaced. For example, information uncovered in early 1999 now shows that TWA Flight 800 could have been shot down by one or more shoulder-fired missiles. The FBI was briefed by military missile experts in the Fall of 1996 that Flight 800 was well within the range of a shoulder fired missile. The FBI conducted a covert dredging operation for stinger missile parts between November 1996 and April 1997. Commander Donaldson brought this new evidence to the House Aviation Subcommittee in testimony on May 6, 1999. it seems not to be up to date since about 2005, but there are some early reports and tests still on the site, although some are not available when you click on them. • There is also a lengthy Wikipedia entry on TWA 800 at < https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TWA_Flight_800 >. Wikipedia favors the official government version of what happened to the aircraft. • • • JACK CASHILL'S BOOK. On the 20th anniversary of the crash of TWA 800, The Daily Mail published a long article and interview with Jack Cashill and his research into the crash. The entire Daily Mail article is available at < https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3673935/What-brought-TWA-Flight-800-Claims-plane-hit-missile-mid-air-explosion-government-cover-detailed-book-20-years-Long-Island-crash.html >. The July 4, 2016, article by Chris Spargo, goes into detail with Cashill about his TWA 800 research. Spargo wrote : "What brought down TWA Flight 800 : Claims that plane was hit by missile before mid-air explosion and of a government cover-up are detailed in a book 20 years after the Long Island crash. It has been 20 years since TWA Flight 800 crashed off the coast of Long Island 12 minutes after taking off from JFK Airport in New York City. The National Transportation Safety Board spent four years looking into the cause and declared it to be a short circuit in the plane's fuel tank. Of the 755 eyewitness who spoke to the FBI, 258 described seeing a streak of light heading towards the plane before the explosion. In his new book 'TWA 800 : The Crash, the Cover-Up, and the Conspiracy,' author Jack Cashill takes a look at some of the alternate crash theories. Cashill speaks with eyewitnesses again and those who have never spoken before who believe they saw a rocket or missile. He also examines claims of a possible government cover-up involving the FBI and CIA." • Spargo lists the theories Cahill reviews in his book -- some sort of missile or rocket hit the plane; there was a government cover-up to keep what really happened a secret; a strike to the outside of the plane may have come from a terrorist or even a US Navy ship according to conspiracy theorists, claims that were both declared untrue by the FBI a little over a year after the crash. • Spargo recounts the crash details : "TWA Flight 800 was a Boeing 747-131 that had completed over 16,000 flights and been in operation for 25 years when it departed on the evening of July 17 from New York City. The plane exploded and crashed into the ocean just after 8:30 pm as it made its ascent to 15,000 feet eight miles off the coast of East Moriches in the town of Brookhaven, located just west of the Hamptons. Some who had seen the explosion and crash immediately took action to see if they could find any survivors, including an Air National Guard helicopter that was only miles away and even a few nearby residents who were out on the ocean on boats. The helicopter was eventually forced to turn away due to debris from the plane that was still falling from the sky, while those who approached the burning wreckage in boats said that the smoke was so bad it became impossible to breathe or get close to the scene. Recovery of the bodies began the next day, a task that took 10 months before all 230 victims were identified. Wreckage also began being removed from the water soon after, with investigators piecing the plane back together in hopes of getting some idea as to what happened to the doomed aircraft." • Spargo says : "The best information at first came from the witnesses who saw the crash, and many told the same exact story of seeing something shoot up towards the plane just before the explosion. Of the 755 individuals that the FBI spoke with who witnessed some aspect of the crash, at least 258 described seeing a streak of light prior to the plane's explosion while close to 100 said that they watched that streak travel from the Earth up towards the aircraft....Cashill spoke to some of these witnesses for his new book, including the woman considered by many to be one of the most crucial people the FBI interviewed after the crash, WITNESS 73. The woman's identity has never been revealed, but she is one of the few people who was closely watching the plane when the explosion occurred. She had been visiting friends when she decided to go down to the beach around 8:30 pm, just before the explosion brought down the aircraft. The FBI report stated in its summary of her interview : 'While keeping her eyes on the aircraft she observed a 'red streak' moving up from the ground toward the aircraft at an approximately a 45 degree angle. The 'red streak' was leaving a light gray colored smoke trail. The 'red streak' went passed [sic] the right side and above the aircraft before arcing back toward the aircraft’s right wing.' Witness 73 described the streak as looking like 'an upside down NIKE swoosh logo.' She continued to watch as the streak connect with the plane according to the report, which said : 'She then observed a fire at the aircraft followed by one or two secondary explosions which had a deeper sound. 'She then observed the front of the aircraft separate from the back. She then observed burning pieces of debris falling from the aircraft.' Cashill uncovers shocking new information in speaking with Witness 73 for his new book though, including claims that someone inside a government agency may have attempted to discredit her statement by falsifying records....Cashill also revisits interviews he did withe eyewitnesses from his 2001 documentary on the same subject, 'Silenced: TWA 800 and the Subversion of Justice.' Among those he spoke to were Mike Wire, who was building a bridge in nearby Westhampton at the time of the explosion. Wire said in the documentary that he watched a white light as it 'zig zagged' from the beach up in the air before it 'arched over' and disappeared from his view. Seconds later he saw 'an orange light that appeared to be a fireball' and heard four loud explosions as the plane fell from the sky. He was only interviewed once however, and even that is not as shocking as the story of David McClaine. McClaine submitted a report about what he saw almost immediately after the crash as he was a pilot flying from Boston to Trenton going in for a landing when he watched the aircraft explode right in front of him. Cashill reveals in his book however that despite the vantage point, the fact that he was more familiar with planes than any other eyewitness and that he was the first to actually report the explosion, he was not interviewed by the National Transportation Safety Board until 1999, three years after the crash. Meanwhile, the CIA’s Deputy Director for Intelligence released a statement about the crash in 1997, saying: 'Our analysis demonstrates that the eyewitness sightings of greatest concern to us -- the ones originally interpreted to be of a possible missile attack -- took place after the first of several explosions aboard the aircraft...combined with the total absence of physical evidence of a missile attack, [this] leads CIA analysts to conclude that no such attack occurred.' " • The findings by the CIA and FBI do not add up however to Cashill, as he explores in his book : " 'The single greatest structural cause for the September 11th problem [the 9/11 investigation problem] was the 'wall' that segregated or separated criminal investigators and intelligence agents,' Attorney General John Ashcroft told the 9-11 Commission in April 2004,' Cashill told DailyMail.com. 'Thanks to a treasure trove of recently unearthed CIA documents we now know that the FBI and CIA ignored the 'wall' and collaborated from day one of the TWA 800 investigation. The CIA had no other role but to discredit the 258 FBI witnesses to a missile strike. 'Overseeing the TWA 800 investigation was deputy attorney general Jamie Gorelick. In 1995, Gorelick wrote the wall memo. In 2004, Gorelick sat on the 9-11 Commission." • Will President Trump revive the TWA 800 investigation? Or is Cashill reading too much into the President's choice of Montoursville for his rally? We have no clue so far. • • • IS ELIJAH CUMMINGS ENGAGED IN PAY-FOR-PLAY??? As we discussed in our May 22 blog, Obama-appointed judge Amit P. Mehta, in his district court level opinion authorized congressional review of presidential financial papers by saying the review is part of Congress's power to impeach a President. Judge Mehta wrote that the standard for obtaining a valid congressional subpoena is not a difficult bar to clear under Supreme Court precedent, and Democrats had easily shown they were not simply out on a "fishing expedition." Comments made by Democrats suggesting their political motivations, Mehta said, did not automatically make the subpoena itself invalid : "The Oversight Committee has shown that it is not engaged in a pure fishing expedition for the President’s financial records. It is undisputed that the President did not initially identify as liabilities on his public disclosure forms the payments that Michael Cohen made to alleged mistresses during the presidential campaign. Furthermore, Michael Cohen has pleaded guilty to campaign finance violations arising from those payments." The chairman of the House Oversight Committee that issued the subpoena for the financial records is ELIJAH CUMMINGS -- arch Hillary defender. No politics there -- no sir, Judge Mehta says, although President Trump's lawyers in a filing to Mehta had earlier asked the judge to prohibit Mazars from 'enforcing or complying' with the subpoena, quoting Democrats as openly admitting they wanted to use subpoena power for political purposes. "We’re going to have to build an air traffic control tower to keep track of all the subpoenas flying from here to the White House," one Democrat said; another referenced a "subpoena cannon" firing at the White House. President Trump’s lawyers also noted that House Oversight Committee Chairman Elijah Cummings, D-Md., "flat-out admitted that he wanted to ‘investigate whether the President may have engaged in illegal conduct before and during his tenure in office’ and ‘review whether he has accurately reported his finances to the Office of Government Ethics and other federal entities." • And, what do we now learn about Elijah Cummings? Here is what American Thinker's Monica Showalter wrote on Wednesday : "Pay to play, the Democrat way. Now it's Elijah Cummings. Is there no end to Democrat corruption? Here's what's going on with one of the most supposedly respectable of them, Representative Elijah Cummings of the House Oversight and Government Reform Committee, according to the Washington Examiner : "A charity run by the wife of Representative Elijah Cummings received millions from special interest groups and corporations that had business before her husband's committee and could have been used illegally, according to an IRS complaint filed by an ethics watchdog group. Cummings, 68, a Maryland Democrat, is chairman of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. His wife, Maya Rockeymoore, 48, is the chairman of the Maryland Democratic Party and briefly ran in the state's gubernatorial race last year. The couple married in 2008. Cummings was once heavily in debt -- in part due to hefty child support payments to his first wife and two other women he had children with -- but his financial situation has improved considerably over the past decade. So it's not just the crazy extremists among the Democratic Party elites, such as Representatives Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez and Ilhan Omar, who have ethics issues around the sale of office for favors. It's even more egregious with the more established Democrats in powerful positions. Like Hillary Clinton before him, Cummings's game seems to be pay to play. Donate big to my charity foundation and get the legislation you want. A charity linked to Johnson & Johnson has been pouring cash in....A second problem has been self-dealing. A big federal grant to stop childhood obesity went to Cummings's charity -- and then to a consulting firm with the same name run by his wife. She pulls in an undisclosed-by-Cummings $152,000 salary. That contract sure helped. Tom Anderson, director of the National Legal and Policy Center's Government Integrity Project, which has been investigating the nonprofit arrangement and provided research to the Washington Examiner, said the potential for corruption is 'off the charts.' He said Rockeymoore declined to let his organization view her nonprofit organization's most recent public financial records as required by the IRS." • Showalter spells it out : " What this shows is that for all their calls for President Trump's tax returns, and for all their claims to our tax money and regulatory enthusiasm, they're still in the same game they're famous for -- using public office to get rich. The Examiner report (which is very well written, by the way) points out that political power has been good for Cummings's pocketbook. Now he and his wife are yelling that the complaints are 'politically motivated.' Laws, see, have nothing to do with this lucrative gig." • Are you listening, Office of Government Ethics? It isn't President Trump you ought to be investigating. It is Elijah Cummings. • • • JULIEN ASSANGE INDICTED ON 18 COUNTS. The indictment relates to his alleged coordination with Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning to leak classified national-security documents. Fox News states : "A federal grand jury returned an 18-count superseding indictment on Thursday charging WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange with a slew of offenses over his alleged role in one of the largest leaks of classified information in US history. The indictment alleged Assange coordinated with former Army intelligence analyst Chelsea Manning to leak classified documents related to US war and diplomacy efforts around the world. US officials claimed Assange worked in tandem with Manning to break into a classified government computer. Manning, who served several years in prison for leaking to WikiLeaks, was jailed in March after refusing to testify to a grand jury regarding WikiLeaks....The indictment specifically alleged that Assange agreed to receive classified documents from Manning and 'aided and abetted her in obtaining classified information with reason to believe that the information was to be used to the injury of the United States or the advantage of a foreign nation,' as well as caused her to provide classified documents. The indictment charged that Assange published the unredacted names of sources who gave information to US forces in Iraq and Afghanistan as well as to State Department diplomats around the world. The sources included journalists, religious leaders, local Afghans and Iraqis as well as political dissidents from repressive regimes, according to the Justice Department. 'Assange’s actions risked serious harm to United States national security to the benefit of our adversaries and put the unredacted named human sources at a grave and imminent risk of serious physical harm and/or arbitrary detention,' according to the superseding indictment. In late 2009, Assange and WikiLeaks allegedly 'actively solicited United States classified information, including by publishing a list of ‘Most Wanted Leaks’ that sought, among other things, classified documents,' the DOJ added. The superseding indictment revealed that in 2010 Manning allegedly used the access she had as an intelligence analyst to search for classified documents and gave Assange and WikiLeaks databases that had 'approximately 90,000 Afghanistan war-related significant activity reports, 400,000 Iraq war-related significant activities reports, 800 Guantanamo Bay detainee assessment briefs, and 250,000 US Department of State cables,' even though many of these documents were classified at the Secret level. The DOJ claimed it meant 'their unauthorized disclosure could cause serious damage to United States national security.' Manning also allegedly gave WikiLeaks 'hundreds of thousands of documents classified up to the SECRET level that she downloaded from departments and agencies of the United States, including the Afghanistan war-related significant activity reports and Iraq war-related significant activity reports,' according to the indictment. Those reports described the circumstances and limitations under which US forces would initiate or engage in combat with other forces, according to the DOJ. The superseding indictment alleged that Assange “actively encouraged” Manning to provide more information during their discussions." • Fox News adds that : "Assange also has been charged with conspiracy to commit computer intrusion for allegedly agreeing to crack a password hash stored on Defense Department computers connected to the Secret Internet Protocol Network, a government network used for classified documents and communications. Ben Brandon, a lawyer representing the US government, said in court earlier this month that American investigators had acquired details of communications between Manning and Assange in 2010. The two had allegedly 'engaged in real time discussions regarding Chelsea Manning’s dissemination of confidential records to Mr. Assange.' " • The extradition treaty between the US and Sweden provides for political defense, according to Fox senior judicial analyst Judge Andrew Napolitano. Earlier this month, Assange, 47, told a British court he wouldn’t agree to be extradited to the US where he’s facing the charges of conspiracy to hack a Pentagon computer. He addressed the court on May 2 via video link from a prison in London, saying he wouldn’t 'surrender myself for extradition for doing journalism that has won many awards and protected many people.' That hearing came just a day after the WikiLeaks founder was sentenced to 50 weeks in prison in the UK for jumping bail in 2012 and hiding in the Ecuadorian Embassy in London in an effort to avoid extradition to Sweden where he was wanted for questioning over rape and sexual assault allegations." • Reuters reported Monday that : "Swedish prosecutors heading the probe into a rape allegation against Julian Assange issued a formal detention order Monday against the WikiLeaks founder, who is jailed in Britain -- a first step in seeking his extradition. Eva-Marie Persson, Sweden’s deputy director of public prosecutions, said she had filed the request with the Uppsala district court to have Assange detained in absentia. 'If the court decides to detain him, I will issue a European Arrest Warrant concerning surrender to Sweden,' Persson said in a statement. She added that once the court had granted the request, which comes after last week’s reopening of a 2010 rape probe, she would ask British authorities to transfer the Australian whistleblower to Sweden. The development sets up a possible battle between Sweden and the US over who gets to try Assange first. He faces a US extradition warrant for allegedly conspiring to hack into a Pentagon computer. Persson said British officials will decide any conflict between a European arrest warrant and a US extradition request for Assange, who was evicted last month from the Ecuadorian Embassy in London, where he had been holed up with political asylum since 2012. He was immediately collared by British police on April 11 and is serving a 50-week sentence in Britain for jumping bail in 2012. On May 13, Swedish prosecutors reopened a preliminary probe against Assange, who visited Sweden in 2010, after two Swedish women alleged that he had committed sex crimes against them. While a case of alleged sexual misconduct against the 47-year-old in Sweden was dropped in 2017 when the statute of limitations expired, a rape allegation remains. Swedish authorities have had to shelve it because he was living at the embassy at the time and there was no prospect of hauling him to Sweden....The statute of limitations in the rape case expires in August 2020. Assange has denied wrongdoing, claiming the allegations were politically motivated and that the sex was consensual. According to the request for a detention order, Assange is wanted for 'intentionally having carried out an intercourse' with an unnamed woman 'by unduly exploiting that she was in a helpless state because of sleep.' The request added there was 'an aggravating circumstance' because he didn’t use a condom. Assange met the two Swedish women in connection with a lecture in August 2010 in Stockholm. One was involved in organizing an event for Sweden’s Social Democratic Party and offered to host him at her home. The other was in the audience. A cop who heard the women’s accounts decided there was reason to suspect they were victims of sex crimes and handed the case to a prosecutor. Assange faces a maximum of four years in a Swedish prison if he is convicted of the rape. Persson said the day and time for the detention hearing at the Uppsala District Court that will make the decision has not yet been decided. 'However, in my view, the Swedish case can proceed concurrently with the proceedings in the UK,' Persson said in a statement." • Fox News states that Assange's extradition to the US is being handled by the Justice Department’s Office of International Affairs. If convicted, Assange faces a maximum of 10 years in prison on each count except for conspiracy to commit computer intrusion which has a maximum penalty of five years." • Assange supporters are trying to make this a First Amendment case vis-à-vis the US charges, describing Assange as a modern intel reporter who should not be prosecuted for revealing what others offer to him. Against Espionage Act charges, this argument will probably not succeed. • • • DEAR READERS, although mainstream news is not reporting this, the Daily Caller ran a story on Thursday about President and Mrs. Trump making a surprise visit to Arlington National Cemetery as America prepares to celebrate Memorial Day weekend. The President and First Lady paid their respects and placed American flags at the graves of soldiers. At the cemetery, President Trump an Melania were greeted by four military personnel dressed in fatigues, according to a White House pool report. The presidential couple stopped at gravestones to plant an American flag and pause in silence to pay their respects. • The Daily Caller reminds us that : "Ahead of Memorial Day, 'more than 260,000 flags are planted in an event that spans the weekend known as ‘Flags In,’ according to the director of operations at Arlington Cemetery,' the pool report added." • White House press secretary Sarah Huckabee Sanders said : "The President is also expected to hold a Memorial Day event in Japan during his upcoming trip. But, President Trump wanted to visit Arlington as well." • On Thursday, the First Lady made a special trip to Walter Reed National Military Medical Center in Bethesda, Maryland, to visit with “wounded warriors” and present a Purple Heart. First Lady Melania Trump share this tweet about her visit to Walter Reed : "(@flotus) on May 22, 2019 at 5:51pm PDT 'I want to thank the service members I met today. As each of them recovers, we are reminded of the cost of our country’s security. I am grateful to each of these warriors and their families for what they sacrifice for our country. The President and I will always stand with our men and women in uniform,” she added. “I also want to thank all the medical leadership and staff at Walter Reed National Military Medical Center for the care and support they give our military members.” • All the photos of President Trump and Melania at Arlington are available at < https://dailycaller.com/2019/05/23/melania-president-trump-arlington-cemetery-place-flags/?utm_medium=email >. • Enjoy the Memorial Day weekend with those you love. Be safe, and be grateful for those who serve in uniform. Pray for the wounded and for those who have died for freedom's cause over the past 250 years.